fair and balanced ranting

louisgray.com: One Thousand Four Hundred Sixty One Days

Over the next one thousand, four hundred and sixty one days, there will be scandals, both real and artificial. There will be surprises. There will be excitement and frustrations. There will be great speeches and boring ones. And if you think about it, theoretically, Obama and his team would have to royally screw things up to not have the American people say, in November 2012, that they will be better off than they are today, giving them a running start at reelection already. But anyone who thinks this is going to be a piece of cake is kidding themselves. Even as Obama spoke today, and gave a speech many are fawning over, the stock market fell. Even as many cheered in Washington DC, others were notified they were losing their jobs. And the wars around the world didn't take a time out.

(Via louisgray.com: One Thousand Four Hundred Sixty One Days.)

Talking Points Memo | Breaking News and Analysis

As some of you have seen, Vice President Cheney is getting pushed around today in a wheelchair. Thankfully, it's no serious medical issue. He hurt his back lugging books while moving out of the old digs. But it's iconic. There's no escaping the symbolism of the tired and enfeebled old guard hobbling off the stage. On so many fronts the stage setting, the unpredictable coincidences, perhaps just the fates seem to be conspiring to give us a dose of hyper-reality, not just the truth of the moment but a scaffolding of trappings and symbolic exclamation points to make sure we're paying attention.

(Via Talking Points Memo | Breaking News and Analysis.)

The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan

It will be about the moment. What Obama understands - and it's worth reiterating - is that his presidency is a unique combination of one man and one very specific moment in time. We are witnessing the collapse of an old ideological order, the end of the 1960s, and the implosion of conservatism as an intellectually coherent governing philosophy. Into this wasteland, created by some hideous combination of evil enemies abroad and clueless leaders at home, this man arrives. Without the events of 2003 - 2006, Obama would not be president. And after the Bush catastrophe, we are immensely lucky he is. Alone, he is impressive - and would have made a good president at any time in the next few decades. But now, in this moment, with this set of gargantuan problems, at a time when Americans need desperately to believe again in their country and their constitution and their president ... well.

I don't really believe in any grand idea of providence, and don't believe that America is somehow more blessed by the divine than any other (that notion is absurd to my Catholic mind). But this week is testing my agnosticism.

(Via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.)

Forget the bailout, start over: the New American Bank Initiative - O'Reilly Radar

Interesting idea…

The bailout of the US financial system isn't working. The government's rescue plan has fundamental flaws, including incentives that favor the failed firms, not the country as a whole. New ideas are needed. In "New American Bank Initiative: Removing structural flaws in the economic rescue," Sal Khan and I propose a radically different plan--don't prop up existing banks, take part of the $700 billion earmarked for the bailout, and capitalize a new financial system.

(Via Forget the bailout, start over: the New American Bank Initiative - O'Reilly Radar.)

UAW busting, Southern style - Los Angeles Times

When one compares how the auto industry and the financial sector are being treated by Congress, the double standard is staggering. In the financial sector, employee compensation makes up a huge percentage of costs. According to the New York state comptroller, it accounted for more than 60% of 2007 revenues for the seven largest financial firms in New York.

At Goldman Sachs, for example, employee compensation made up 71% of total operating expenses in 2007. In the auto industry, by contrast, autoworker compensation makes up less than 10% of the cost of manufacturing a car. Hundreds of billions were given to the financial-services industry with barely a question about compensation; the auto bailout, however, was sunk on this issue alone.

(Via UAW busting, Southern style - Los Angeles Times.)

Wal-Mart and Black Friday

On Long Island, there was a riot at a Wal-Mart that killed a man so that people could save $3 on a WII game. I cannot say it better than the Rude Pundit.

The family of that worker is suing Wal-Mart and the Nassau County cops. Lets be clear here: it wasn't one of the frothing mad shoppers who was trampled to death. It wasn't one of the (let's be frank) rioters. It was someone who was ill-trained to keep order who got killed. The bitches and cocksuckers who ran over Jdimytai Damour, thinking that a sale on Wii games was more important than a human life? Fuck them. Send 'em to prison on Christmas Eve. With their kids watching.

(Via Photos That Make the Rude Pundit Want to Freebase Candy Canes :....)

Quote of the day: The power of “Huh?”

“In science, the most exciting expression isn’t ‘Eureka!’ It’s ‘Huh?’”

– Michael Hawley, a computer scientist and director of SiOnyx, quoted in the NY Times, 10/12/08 

(Via Quote of the day: The power of “Huh?”.)

Quote of the century so far...

Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance

(Via D-squared Digest -- FOR bigger pies and shorter hours and AGAINST more or less everything else.)

What a Community Organizer Does - Swampland - TIME

Joe Klein on the Palin Speech

This morning, I received a press release from a group called Catholic Democrats about the work--the mission, the witness--that Obama performed after he got out of college. Here's the first paragraph:

Catholic Democrats is expressing surprise and shock that Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's acceptance speech tonight mocked her opponent's work in the 1980s for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development. She belittled Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's experience as a community organizer in Catholic parishes on the South Side of Chicago, work he undertook instead of pursuing a lucrative career on Wall Street. In her acceptance speech, Ms. Palin said, "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities." Community organizing is at the heart of Catholic Social Teaching to end poverty and promote social justice.

So here is what Giuliani and Palin didn't know: Obama was working for a group of churches that were concerned about their parishioners, many of whom had been laid off when the steel mills closed on the south side of Chicago. They hired Obama to help those stunned people recover and get the services they needed--job training, help with housing and so forth--from the local government. It was, dare I say it, the Lord's work--the sort of mission Jesus preached (as opposed to the war in Iraq, which Palin described as a "task from God.")

This is what Palin and Giuliani were mocking. They were making fun of a young man's decision "to serve a cause greater than himself," in the words of John McCain. They were, therefore, mocking one of their candidate's favorite messages. Obama served the poor for three years, then went to law school. To describe this service--the first thing he did out of college, the sort of service every college-educated American should perform, in some form or other--as anything other than noble is cheap and tawdry and cynical in the extreme.

(Via What a Community Organizer Does - Swampland - TIME.)

Friendability

Here is a hierarchy that works for me:

Friend -- Most of the people that Facebook calls "friends" I call Acquaintances.
Actual Friend -- Someone whom I've had a meal with, or has visited my home.
Real Friend -- Someone who would drive me to the airport at 6 am.
True Friend -- Someone who would get me out of jail.

(Via Friendability.)