Gotta admit, it is tons o' fun watching Tons O' Fun circle the drain, hoist mostly on his own fat petard.
For someone who spent the '90s so obsessed with Clinton's pee-pee, Newt shore don't wanna talk about it now. Just take his word for it, his marital indiscretions were totally different from Clinton's. Even his own kool-aid chuggers can't be thumbing their tiny dicks to that tune; in a base best characterized by ridiculousness at every angle, that one's too preposterous even for them.
Although the lunar colony shit is pretty fuckin' hilarious as well. Tell ya what, Fatboy, we'll start building it tomorrow if you'll serve as its governor for life.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Strange Brew
There is apparently no small amount of hoo-ha over Arizona "governor" Jan Brewer's finger-wagging guff in Obama's face, like he was the butler who dropped her favorite purse dog.
Let me suggest that, aside from the fact that teabagger politicians have long felt empowered to act like assholes to this president, to jam their finger in his face or heckle him at the State of the Union speech, there is no controversy, especially considering the source.
Jan Brewer is a clown, a schmuck, a puller of stunts, a shameless fabulist who squats out lies about her own father's history, who concocts lurid fables about deranged Meskins loppin' off heads in the Sonoran desert, leaving them for innocent Yuma children to stumble across on their way to Sunday school, no doubt. Anything and everything she says about any subject whatsoever should be viewed through the prism that she will say pretty much whatever is most expedient for her at the given moment.
Arizona has very deep-seated streak of stone yahooism in its politics, one that well predates our current conservatard lunacies. They've been barking at the moon since Evan Mecham was a pup. Brewer is exactly the sort of ass-grabbing fool Arizona wants -- and more importantly, deserves.
Maybe Brewer will use this as a stepping-stone to a run for Jon Kyl's Senate seat. One can only hope; with the demise of other clown-car devotees such as Sharron Angle and Christine O'Donnell, the GOP needs to upgrade its batshit quotient.
Let me suggest that, aside from the fact that teabagger politicians have long felt empowered to act like assholes to this president, to jam their finger in his face or heckle him at the State of the Union speech, there is no controversy, especially considering the source.
Jan Brewer is a clown, a schmuck, a puller of stunts, a shameless fabulist who squats out lies about her own father's history, who concocts lurid fables about deranged Meskins loppin' off heads in the Sonoran desert, leaving them for innocent Yuma children to stumble across on their way to Sunday school, no doubt. Anything and everything she says about any subject whatsoever should be viewed through the prism that she will say pretty much whatever is most expedient for her at the given moment.
Arizona has very deep-seated streak of stone yahooism in its politics, one that well predates our current conservatard lunacies. They've been barking at the moon since Evan Mecham was a pup. Brewer is exactly the sort of ass-grabbing fool Arizona wants -- and more importantly, deserves.
Maybe Brewer will use this as a stepping-stone to a run for Jon Kyl's Senate seat. One can only hope; with the demise of other clown-car devotees such as Sharron Angle and Christine O'Donnell, the GOP needs to upgrade its batshit quotient.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Dixie Key Party
So Fatboy and his big ideas, tiny cock, and swingin' heart won the day down in the original Treason in Defense of Slavery state. Awesome. That weird sound you just heard was every comedian, and every member of Obama's campaign team, simultaneously creaming their jeans. America's Wang should be even more hilarious; maybe they'll go for Santorumentum, or perhaps a stray dog wearing a sandwich board (or one of Rick's cool sweater vests).
No one in the corporate media has the balls to say it on the record, since this perpetual reality teevee show is their bread and butter in a dying market, but the Goopers' primary has long since degenerated into an ass-kicking contest consisting entirely of one-legged people. Only more hilarious. It's only a matter of time before they start using Yakety Sax for theme music at the remaining debates.
No one in the corporate media has the balls to say it on the record, since this perpetual reality teevee show is their bread and butter in a dying market, but the Goopers' primary has long since degenerated into an ass-kicking contest consisting entirely of one-legged people. Only more hilarious. It's only a matter of time before they start using Yakety Sax for theme music at the remaining debates.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Priorities
Cases of this sort are fascinating, primarily for the unusual gymnastics of reasoning undertaken in resolving them.
Whenever someone proposes to sterilize someone else, for whatever reason, obviously there should be some voice of skepticism raised, just to make sure the idea is being thought through, and either accepted or rejected for rational, hopefully at least somewhat utilitarian reasons. This does not seem to be the case here, the ruling does not appear to have a practical basis.
Consider the discordant rationales being deployed here. You have a 32-year-old woman whose mental illness is severe enough that her parents have to care for her. She is legally incompetent to take care of herself, to support herself, to make rational decisions for herself. This is not in dispute by any of the litigating parties, nor by the appellate court which overturned the first ruling.
So ostensibly this woman -- who, again, cannot care for herself, and therefore cannot support herself -- would suffer a tremendous civil wrong were she compelled to either abort the fetus she is currently carrying, or even to be temporarily or permanently sterilized afterward. Fair enough. This is not an unreasonable argument on its face.
But one still has to wonder at what expense comes avoiding this great wrong. Maybe the 'rents are independently wealthy, so they can just kick down for an daughter who can't take care of herself or any number of children she "chooses" -- to the extent that a person declared legally incompetent can be said to have made a rational choice in the first place.
But what if they aren't wealthy? What about the kid she already has, that the parents are taking care of? Or the fetus, that may be damaged from the drugs she has to take, or damaged by her if she has to go off those drugs during the pregnancy? Do any of the other people in this scenario have any rights, including the right not to be saddled with the poor decision-making capacity of a legally incompetent, mentally ill person? It's like their concerns don't matter at all, they are just there to accept responsibility.
I don't necessarily assume offhand that there is a political agenda underpinning any of this, though I do recall a privately-funded movement in Southern California in the '90s that set out to essentially pay crackheads with at least four kids to get their tubes tied. The movement got shouted down by self-styled women's rights groups, who bizarrely (imho) felt that a crackhead's "right" to reproduce infinitely trumped, say, the right of her children to not enter teh world addicted to hard drugs, or the right of society to not be compelled to infinitely underwrite this foolishness.
I suggest that this is one of those issues, like abortion, where the biological function of reproduction has been granted some mystical, exalted, practically untouchable status. It is a polite fiction people seem to have tacitly agreed on, this one inviolability of the right to irresponsibly reproduce with impunity.
Of course there are any number of reprehensible historical examples. Fortunately we live in a society whose very modernity enables judges to establish proper mechanisms to prevent such instances. We're not talking about sterilizing every retard and criminal here. (Although really, people, aren't there enough Juggalos in the world already, must we clutter up a dying planet with more, to accelerate the impending doom?)
You can propose legislation that allows for wiretapping, pulling suspects off the street and throwing them into Gitmo for torture, or just lobbing a missile at them halfway around the world, without trial or even charge, and no one will bat an eyelash. But Flying Spaghetti Monster forfend that anyone intervene in a legally incompetent person's "right" to compel everyone else in their life to bear the consequences of their decisions. It seems like the parents and the children should have some rights as well.
Whenever someone proposes to sterilize someone else, for whatever reason, obviously there should be some voice of skepticism raised, just to make sure the idea is being thought through, and either accepted or rejected for rational, hopefully at least somewhat utilitarian reasons. This does not seem to be the case here, the ruling does not appear to have a practical basis.
Consider the discordant rationales being deployed here. You have a 32-year-old woman whose mental illness is severe enough that her parents have to care for her. She is legally incompetent to take care of herself, to support herself, to make rational decisions for herself. This is not in dispute by any of the litigating parties, nor by the appellate court which overturned the first ruling.
So ostensibly this woman -- who, again, cannot care for herself, and therefore cannot support herself -- would suffer a tremendous civil wrong were she compelled to either abort the fetus she is currently carrying, or even to be temporarily or permanently sterilized afterward. Fair enough. This is not an unreasonable argument on its face.
But one still has to wonder at what expense comes avoiding this great wrong. Maybe the 'rents are independently wealthy, so they can just kick down for an daughter who can't take care of herself or any number of children she "chooses" -- to the extent that a person declared legally incompetent can be said to have made a rational choice in the first place.
But what if they aren't wealthy? What about the kid she already has, that the parents are taking care of? Or the fetus, that may be damaged from the drugs she has to take, or damaged by her if she has to go off those drugs during the pregnancy? Do any of the other people in this scenario have any rights, including the right not to be saddled with the poor decision-making capacity of a legally incompetent, mentally ill person? It's like their concerns don't matter at all, they are just there to accept responsibility.
I don't necessarily assume offhand that there is a political agenda underpinning any of this, though I do recall a privately-funded movement in Southern California in the '90s that set out to essentially pay crackheads with at least four kids to get their tubes tied. The movement got shouted down by self-styled women's rights groups, who bizarrely (imho) felt that a crackhead's "right" to reproduce infinitely trumped, say, the right of her children to not enter teh world addicted to hard drugs, or the right of society to not be compelled to infinitely underwrite this foolishness.
I suggest that this is one of those issues, like abortion, where the biological function of reproduction has been granted some mystical, exalted, practically untouchable status. It is a polite fiction people seem to have tacitly agreed on, this one inviolability of the right to irresponsibly reproduce with impunity.
Of course there are any number of reprehensible historical examples. Fortunately we live in a society whose very modernity enables judges to establish proper mechanisms to prevent such instances. We're not talking about sterilizing every retard and criminal here. (Although really, people, aren't there enough Juggalos in the world already, must we clutter up a dying planet with more, to accelerate the impending doom?)
You can propose legislation that allows for wiretapping, pulling suspects off the street and throwing them into Gitmo for torture, or just lobbing a missile at them halfway around the world, without trial or even charge, and no one will bat an eyelash. But Flying Spaghetti Monster forfend that anyone intervene in a legally incompetent person's "right" to compel everyone else in their life to bear the consequences of their decisions. It seems like the parents and the children should have some rights as well.
Still Alive
I've probably mentioned this before, but I had sort of an assumption that finishing up grad school would somehow grant me more leisure time. And at least initially, I felt like I had my nights and weekends "back".
But it didn't take long at all to realize that not only was there not going to suddenly be this abundance of screw-off time, but that I didn't even want there to be. I'll watch the teevee, but I can't just sit and watch; I have to either have a book or a guitar or the laptop going as well. And the late nights continue apace, as the projects grow and expand far beyond their initial parameters.
The past six months or so have also seen me ingesting huge amounts of music, a little bit of everything -- thrash/power/prog metal, some pop, and even some classical (torrented all 104 Haydn symphonies, and while I'm familiar with the last 20 or so, it's been interesting getting acquainted with the earlier ones a few at time). After turning 40 a few years back, I was initially perplexed that my musical tastes seemed to be getting heavier in general, but as my daughter starts figuring out what she likes, I quit wondering about it and just going for whatever's there.
And there's a lot, and a lot of really cool stuff, in quite a few genres (more in an upcoming post). Anyone who whines about how today's music sucks just needs to turn the radio off, leave it off, and go on walkabout in the internets. There's tons of places to find great music that will never get on the radio. I hear people complain about radio pap, and I don't know what to tell them. There is no excuse for being stuck with mainstream crap, unless you're a 15-year-old mallrat and just don't know any better.
Some of these projects I'm working on will be put on the internets at some point, hopefully to turn at least a modest buck, but at least to get some decent chops at building a real thing, not just the creation of a product but building the requisite 21st-century marketing presence around it. Naturally, I will keep you all apprised as things develop. Right now we're balls-deep in a pure content-building phase, probably into March or April.
In the meantime, the blog, such as it is these days, tends to suffer quantitatively, and I suppose I'm becoming more okay with that. Seven years has kind of snuck up on me in some ways. Obviously the first five years were fairly prolific, and once school cut into that, I found myself missing the catharsis of these little 'sodes less and less.
Actually, the writing is still a great deal of fun, it is the subjects that are less so. How many ways can you call Mitt Romney an empty suit, Obama a feckless dupe who has betrayed his putative constituency and abdicated what at least plausibly appeared to be his deeper convictons? How many times can the industries underpinning our economic systems be portrayed as the money-grubbing rackets they most certainly are, and still sound relatively fresh? How many different ways are there to point out what a useless toad, what self-aggrandizing, leg-humping sack of shit Newt Gingrich really is, not to mention the hypocritical dipshits he represents?
And on and on. The names change here and there, but the bullshit remains mostly the same. They keep lying, too many of us keep buying. So it goes.
But politics and power are the things that capture my interest, and I suppose we'll have some things to mull and discuss this fine campaign season. So for now I certainly plan to keep the Hammer banging at least through the end of this year, while I continue working on the projects, get the products finalized and formatted and ready to roll, and get a website (possibly two or even three) up and running.
Like I said, I still enjoy writing, and while the hit counter doesn't trsvel fast here and there aren't many comments, I do strongly feel -- and there are practically infinite corroborating examples anywhere you look -- that the folks that do check in here are thoughtful and reasoned in the commentary they share. I'd much rather have five or six literate, intelligent comments than the six million lumps of monkey shit you see in, say, just about any YouTube comment section for starters, not to mention any given corporate media site, who really should be able to attract a better class of riff-raff.
It is a weird phenomenon that I'm still digesting much of the time, this compulsion to be constantly working on something. I've always liked to work, to learn, to keep busy, but we're talking about staying up to 3:00 or 4:00 AM three or four nights a week working on a project, or reading about ideas to make the project just a little bit better. And then going to work at 7:30. If I didn't enjoy it so much, I'd be burnt by now.
So thanks for checking in, thanks for still reading, please continue to do so (and leave some comments!), and we'll try to get the posts at least a little more regular, see how this year shakes out.
Only one thing is certain -- Newt will still suck. Just a beastly little man, on so many levels. In a truly civilized country, this is someone who would have been tarred and feathered already, not treated like a serious person.
But it didn't take long at all to realize that not only was there not going to suddenly be this abundance of screw-off time, but that I didn't even want there to be. I'll watch the teevee, but I can't just sit and watch; I have to either have a book or a guitar or the laptop going as well. And the late nights continue apace, as the projects grow and expand far beyond their initial parameters.
The past six months or so have also seen me ingesting huge amounts of music, a little bit of everything -- thrash/power/prog metal, some pop, and even some classical (torrented all 104 Haydn symphonies, and while I'm familiar with the last 20 or so, it's been interesting getting acquainted with the earlier ones a few at time). After turning 40 a few years back, I was initially perplexed that my musical tastes seemed to be getting heavier in general, but as my daughter starts figuring out what she likes, I quit wondering about it and just going for whatever's there.
And there's a lot, and a lot of really cool stuff, in quite a few genres (more in an upcoming post). Anyone who whines about how today's music sucks just needs to turn the radio off, leave it off, and go on walkabout in the internets. There's tons of places to find great music that will never get on the radio. I hear people complain about radio pap, and I don't know what to tell them. There is no excuse for being stuck with mainstream crap, unless you're a 15-year-old mallrat and just don't know any better.
Some of these projects I'm working on will be put on the internets at some point, hopefully to turn at least a modest buck, but at least to get some decent chops at building a real thing, not just the creation of a product but building the requisite 21st-century marketing presence around it. Naturally, I will keep you all apprised as things develop. Right now we're balls-deep in a pure content-building phase, probably into March or April.
In the meantime, the blog, such as it is these days, tends to suffer quantitatively, and I suppose I'm becoming more okay with that. Seven years has kind of snuck up on me in some ways. Obviously the first five years were fairly prolific, and once school cut into that, I found myself missing the catharsis of these little 'sodes less and less.
Actually, the writing is still a great deal of fun, it is the subjects that are less so. How many ways can you call Mitt Romney an empty suit, Obama a feckless dupe who has betrayed his putative constituency and abdicated what at least plausibly appeared to be his deeper convictons? How many times can the industries underpinning our economic systems be portrayed as the money-grubbing rackets they most certainly are, and still sound relatively fresh? How many different ways are there to point out what a useless toad, what self-aggrandizing, leg-humping sack of shit Newt Gingrich really is, not to mention the hypocritical dipshits he represents?
And on and on. The names change here and there, but the bullshit remains mostly the same. They keep lying, too many of us keep buying. So it goes.
But politics and power are the things that capture my interest, and I suppose we'll have some things to mull and discuss this fine campaign season. So for now I certainly plan to keep the Hammer banging at least through the end of this year, while I continue working on the projects, get the products finalized and formatted and ready to roll, and get a website (possibly two or even three) up and running.
Like I said, I still enjoy writing, and while the hit counter doesn't trsvel fast here and there aren't many comments, I do strongly feel -- and there are practically infinite corroborating examples anywhere you look -- that the folks that do check in here are thoughtful and reasoned in the commentary they share. I'd much rather have five or six literate, intelligent comments than the six million lumps of monkey shit you see in, say, just about any YouTube comment section for starters, not to mention any given corporate media site, who really should be able to attract a better class of riff-raff.
It is a weird phenomenon that I'm still digesting much of the time, this compulsion to be constantly working on something. I've always liked to work, to learn, to keep busy, but we're talking about staying up to 3:00 or 4:00 AM three or four nights a week working on a project, or reading about ideas to make the project just a little bit better. And then going to work at 7:30. If I didn't enjoy it so much, I'd be burnt by now.
So thanks for checking in, thanks for still reading, please continue to do so (and leave some comments!), and we'll try to get the posts at least a little more regular, see how this year shakes out.
Only one thing is certain -- Newt will still suck. Just a beastly little man, on so many levels. In a truly civilized country, this is someone who would have been tarred and feathered already, not treated like a serious person.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Great Moments In Journamalism
Since apparently that War On Christmas thing finally, blessedly petered out, the persecution ninnies need to create another quasi-Christian tempest in a teapot. Enter Bill Maher:
In other words, it's not unreasonable to ask out loud exactly how Tebow has managed to avoid being converted to a fullback or H-back, considering how poorly and inconsistently he throws a football. Which is ordinarily a deal-breaker for someone who plays the position of quarterback in the National Football League.
Part of it may be that, in a climate where some folks never get tired of braying the tedious "role model" trope, Tebow gives that particular crowd something to hang their hats on. He's not a grotesquely-overpaid doorstop who, in a hyper-competitive profession, somehow managed to be completely unmotivated by a $60 million contract. Nor is Tebow a jism-spraying fool who never got the memo on how babies are created. God-bothering aside, when you watch enough soulless jerkoffs dick around through their careers with an obscene sense of over-entitlement, Mister Clean is going to pull in a lot of people who are repelled by that sort of behavior.
But I digress, this is actually not about all that nonsense. What this is about is the ludicrous notion of what online Faux News considers worthy of reportage.
Tebow himself is less bothersome than the rabble roused by his schtick, people who would almost certainly come unglued if Tebow were Mooooslim, and felt compelled to preface every interview by thanking Allah and the One True Prophet (PBUH). And that's really what the people picking on Tebow are on about -- football fans want football; if we wanted a sermon, we'd go to church. Faith is supposed to be, and used to be, a personal thing for most people, rather than a tribal or political declaration.
[Update: Wonder why "some fans" didn't get all publicly butt-hurt over Big Daddy Drew's blasphemous takedown a couple months ago.]
Okay, Maher is being deliberately obnoxious and confrontational, but that's what a political comedian is supposed to do. And the argument can -- and has -- been reasonably made that Tebow's squeaky-clean, overly-publicized evangelism has changed the outcome of Tebow's job profile, in that while Tebow has demonstrated his toughness and resilience, he still insufficiently displays competence in the basic mechanics of his job."Wow, Jesus just f**ked #TimTebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere....Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler "Hey, Buffalo’s killing them."
Tebow had thrown four interceptions in his team's Christmas Eve loss to the Bills, which prompted Maher's remark.
In other words, it's not unreasonable to ask out loud exactly how Tebow has managed to avoid being converted to a fullback or H-back, considering how poorly and inconsistently he throws a football. Which is ordinarily a deal-breaker for someone who plays the position of quarterback in the National Football League.
Part of it may be that, in a climate where some folks never get tired of braying the tedious "role model" trope, Tebow gives that particular crowd something to hang their hats on. He's not a grotesquely-overpaid doorstop who, in a hyper-competitive profession, somehow managed to be completely unmotivated by a $60 million contract. Nor is Tebow a jism-spraying fool who never got the memo on how babies are created. God-bothering aside, when you watch enough soulless jerkoffs dick around through their careers with an obscene sense of over-entitlement, Mister Clean is going to pull in a lot of people who are repelled by that sort of behavior.
But I digress, this is actually not about all that nonsense. What this is about is the ludicrous notion of what online Faux News considers worthy of reportage.
Wow, that's fascinating, Faux News! How many "fans" is this mysterious "some" comprised of, six, ten, fifty, a kajillionty? Is there a link to the Yahoo Sports story? Is there any organizing entity behind these "some fans", say James Dobson, that sort of thing, some door-knocking claque with the word "Family" in their name? Or is this someone's random "ya know whut we shud do" Facebook page? You literally cannot any of those obvious questions by reading this "article", yet it the whole thing is presented as if it were actual news.And while Tebow did not respond to Maher, some of his fans are calling for a boycott of HBO, urging customers who find Maher's tweet offensive to cancel their subscriptions to the pay cable channel, Yahoo! Sports reports.
Tebow himself is less bothersome than the rabble roused by his schtick, people who would almost certainly come unglued if Tebow were Mooooslim, and felt compelled to preface every interview by thanking Allah and the One True Prophet (PBUH). And that's really what the people picking on Tebow are on about -- football fans want football; if we wanted a sermon, we'd go to church. Faith is supposed to be, and used to be, a personal thing for most people, rather than a tribal or political declaration.
[Update: Wonder why "some fans" didn't get all publicly butt-hurt over Big Daddy Drew's blasphemous takedown a couple months ago.]
Monday, December 26, 2011
The Walking Dead
Seems that the folks at The Atlantic have been analyzing Ron Paul's disingenuous responses to racist sentiments being disseminated in his own newsletter, much to the chagrin of the usual claque of exasperated Paultards, who are still agog that the rest of us can be so blind to the great man's innate brilliance.
Now, hilarious as this is, every bit as hilarious as the schtick of someone who's been in politics for 35 years still pretending to be an outsider, it is the audience of mouth-breathing, window-licking, arm-dragging troglodytes clamoring for this racist guff which really bears some scrutiny:
Maybe we should be reassured that the '96 focus group was "only" 12, that maybe these are isolated idiots. Some days it's hard to be sure of that, though. Regardless, as Coates notes, Paul's evasiveness pretty much tells you where he and his fans are at, not as racists per se, but intellectually dishonest nonetheless. It should be easy meat to repudiate this detestable shit right out of the gate, and yet for some reason it isn't.
I suppose people are charmed by Paul's irascible, insouciant insistence that the American garrison state pull out of its 700-plus bases around the world. Hey, that's a super idea, as long as we're all willing to conserve a bit. And since we're clearly not, not even a little bit, except as some boutique bien pensant notion, you need your hegemon, you need your octopus. They don't seem to have an answer for that one.
Paul at least is the most interesting and sincere of all of the people running for the office, and that includes Obama. However, that is exactly why he has no chance in hell.
Now, hilarious as this is, every bit as hilarious as the schtick of someone who's been in politics for 35 years still pretending to be an outsider, it is the audience of mouth-breathing, window-licking, arm-dragging troglodytes clamoring for this racist guff which really bears some scrutiny:
Wow. Just....Jesus H. Christ, keep in mind that this took place in 1996. Truly old times there are not forgotten. Then there's the excerpt in the Coates link about George Wallace being the forward-thinking liberal in his area -- until, of course, he got "outniggered" by an opponent and vowed never to fall for that again. Charming.At the time I was Lefty Morris' campaign manager, who was the Democrat running against Ron Paul in the general election. Our campaign released the "Ron Paul Political Report" to reporters and later focus grouped some of his writings and affiliations at a restaurant in La Grange, Texas.
At the time, the "Ron Paul Political Report" was listed in an online Neo-Nazi Directory that also included publications by the Ku Klux Klan and the Aryan Brothers (or something like that).
Of course, we thought we could use this to our advantage. So, in the focus group, we let participants look at the newsletters and told them that Ron Paul's Political Report was listed in the Neo Nazi directory with the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups.
The focus group got really quiet. Then one man pops off, "There's nothing wrong with the Ku Klux Klan."
Another man in the group says, "The Ku Klux Klan has done a lot of good things. For example, if a man wasn't taking care of his family, the Ku Klux Klan would take him down to the town square and tar a feather him."
Next a woman says, "It's the media. They never report the good things that the Ku Klux Klan does."
We had a runaway focus group on our hands. About 10 of the 12 participants were chirping their enthusiasm for the KKK.
Maybe we should be reassured that the '96 focus group was "only" 12, that maybe these are isolated idiots. Some days it's hard to be sure of that, though. Regardless, as Coates notes, Paul's evasiveness pretty much tells you where he and his fans are at, not as racists per se, but intellectually dishonest nonetheless. It should be easy meat to repudiate this detestable shit right out of the gate, and yet for some reason it isn't.
I suppose people are charmed by Paul's irascible, insouciant insistence that the American garrison state pull out of its 700-plus bases around the world. Hey, that's a super idea, as long as we're all willing to conserve a bit. And since we're clearly not, not even a little bit, except as some boutique bien pensant notion, you need your hegemon, you need your octopus. They don't seem to have an answer for that one.
Paul at least is the most interesting and sincere of all of the people running for the office, and that includes Obama. However, that is exactly why he has no chance in hell.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Character
A valiant attempt on the part of the NY Times to rehabilitate Gingrich's, um, character. Megalulz:
Look, not to rehash yet again the long-dead Clinton impeachment saga, but it's relevant here. Count me among the folks who were repulsed and annoyed at the idea of the president not only getting his cock sucked by an intern while discussing Balkan troop deployments, but by his own admission ejaculating into a fucking bathroom sink. Because blowing a wad in this girl's mouth would have been wrong, you know? I don't expect pols to lead perfectly moral lives, but really, the whole thing was weird as all hell, in addition to being completely inappropriate. (Yeah, I'm a little square about bosses banging subordinates as a general principle, sorry.)
And just as a practical matter, you don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to know that that sort of thing will completely derail your term in office, and that by nature of your immensely powerful position, there's a good chance that your good-time girl will get so excited, she'll have to tell somebody. So it's also an unforgivably irresponsible squandering of political capital. No doubt Clinton assumed that the usual gentleman's agreement was in place; shoulda known better that he wasn't dealing with gentlemen.
Aaaaanyhoo, despite the above-listed, far-too-often-discussed reasons to be pissed at Clinton for his exploits, I reserve far more contempt for someone who persecutes a man for such picayune things as if they were high crimes, while he himself is enjoying the exact same services. And, setting aside hoary sentiments about hypocrisy being the tribute vice pays to virtue, it's particularly puzzling that a claque of doofuses who reflexively leap their high horses to lecture us godless heathens on their regard for high moral character, can align themselves with this slug.
And that's not even getting into the other various episodes of hypocrisy (taking $1.8 million from the much-maligned Freddie Mac) and revolting stances (such as using poor children as school janitors). Not that he has a chance to actually take the nomination; Newt is just the final "anyone but Romney" pig at the dance before the goobers buckle in and settle for either the real thing or Huntsman, who is apparently going all out to try to capture the NH primary and build momentum from there.
Jesus, the man is just awful, and the people supporting him are just as pathetic. Nice of them to demonstrate so convincingly for us that their sanctiomonious nonsense was just that after all. (As if their jumping from serial harasser Herman Cain to serial adulterer Newt Gingrich wasn't enough of a clue.) Turns out we really did know what they were all along, we were just haggling over the price.
Mr. Gingrich has repeatedly said that he is not perfect and that there are episodes he regrets. “There are periods of my life I’ve had to seek forgiveness and reconcile with God for,” he said last month in an interview in New Hampshire. “But if you look at who I am today, I think I can withstand scrutiny as well as anyone else in the field.”
His candor seems to be working even with social conservatives, who seem more interested in choosing a hard-edged opponent to face President Obama. Recent polls of Iowa voters showed Mr. Gingrich with the largest share of support from Christian evangelicals.
Look, not to rehash yet again the long-dead Clinton impeachment saga, but it's relevant here. Count me among the folks who were repulsed and annoyed at the idea of the president not only getting his cock sucked by an intern while discussing Balkan troop deployments, but by his own admission ejaculating into a fucking bathroom sink. Because blowing a wad in this girl's mouth would have been wrong, you know? I don't expect pols to lead perfectly moral lives, but really, the whole thing was weird as all hell, in addition to being completely inappropriate. (Yeah, I'm a little square about bosses banging subordinates as a general principle, sorry.)
And just as a practical matter, you don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to know that that sort of thing will completely derail your term in office, and that by nature of your immensely powerful position, there's a good chance that your good-time girl will get so excited, she'll have to tell somebody. So it's also an unforgivably irresponsible squandering of political capital. No doubt Clinton assumed that the usual gentleman's agreement was in place; shoulda known better that he wasn't dealing with gentlemen.
Aaaaanyhoo, despite the above-listed, far-too-often-discussed reasons to be pissed at Clinton for his exploits, I reserve far more contempt for someone who persecutes a man for such picayune things as if they were high crimes, while he himself is enjoying the exact same services. And, setting aside hoary sentiments about hypocrisy being the tribute vice pays to virtue, it's particularly puzzling that a claque of doofuses who reflexively leap their high horses to lecture us godless heathens on their regard for high moral character, can align themselves with this slug.
And that's not even getting into the other various episodes of hypocrisy (taking $1.8 million from the much-maligned Freddie Mac) and revolting stances (such as using poor children as school janitors). Not that he has a chance to actually take the nomination; Newt is just the final "anyone but Romney" pig at the dance before the goobers buckle in and settle for either the real thing or Huntsman, who is apparently going all out to try to capture the NH primary and build momentum from there.
Jesus, the man is just awful, and the people supporting him are just as pathetic. Nice of them to demonstrate so convincingly for us that their sanctiomonious nonsense was just that after all. (As if their jumping from serial harasser Herman Cain to serial adulterer Newt Gingrich wasn't enough of a clue.) Turns out we really did know what they were all along, we were just haggling over the price.
A Thousand Cuts
"If America goes, it will surely be an inside job." -- Mort Sahl
OK, so Alec Baldwin getting booted from a plane (and getting put on American Airlines' internal no-fly list) for being an asshole and not shutting down his iPad right when he was told to isn't really a sign, in and of itself, of an impending totalitarianism. But it's a symptom, an indicator of how much we're conditioned to put up with, what we've come to expect.
Isn't it interesting that, after ten full years since 9/11, of not getting attacked on US soil, either internally or from abroad, that now it becomes suddenly of vital national interest to declare the "homeland" (or, if you prefer, Heimat) a battlefield, necessitating the complete suspension of habeas corpus, of charging a suspect with a crime, of fair trial by jury. Yes, only now is it vital to officially decide and declare who is a vetted journamalist allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights, and who is but a mere blogger, not allowed to slander critical cogs such as foreclosure attorneys and pepper-spray-happy cops down at the be-in.
Maybe press passes should be required for people to discuss the daily news at the water cooler as well, lest the ruling class feel slandered by the scourge of unvetted public opinion. Officially approved discussion topics will consist of Tebows, Kardashians, and speculating as to whom will be the next set of neverweres on that dancing show.
Gin and Tacos commenter J. Dryden makes a brilliant point, summed up nicely in this sentence:
OK, so Alec Baldwin getting booted from a plane (and getting put on American Airlines' internal no-fly list) for being an asshole and not shutting down his iPad right when he was told to isn't really a sign, in and of itself, of an impending totalitarianism. But it's a symptom, an indicator of how much we're conditioned to put up with, what we've come to expect.
Isn't it interesting that, after ten full years since 9/11, of not getting attacked on US soil, either internally or from abroad, that now it becomes suddenly of vital national interest to declare the "homeland" (or, if you prefer, Heimat) a battlefield, necessitating the complete suspension of habeas corpus, of charging a suspect with a crime, of fair trial by jury. Yes, only now is it vital to officially decide and declare who is a vetted journamalist allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights, and who is but a mere blogger, not allowed to slander critical cogs such as foreclosure attorneys and pepper-spray-happy cops down at the be-in.
Maybe press passes should be required for people to discuss the daily news at the water cooler as well, lest the ruling class feel slandered by the scourge of unvetted public opinion. Officially approved discussion topics will consist of Tebows, Kardashians, and speculating as to whom will be the next set of neverweres on that dancing show.
Gin and Tacos commenter J. Dryden makes a brilliant point, summed up nicely in this sentence:
our country and culture is fertile ground for totalitarianism.
Flight of Dickarus
Judging from the media coverage of the non-event, I guess I'm supposed to be outraged at Alec Baldwin's uppity behavior. I mean, really -- how dare not just shut his cakehole like a good German, and happily submit to what has long been nothing more than an abusive process, from the time you set foot in the departure terminal to whenever you eventually disembark.
Seriously, Baldwin should have thanked American Airlines for their "just shut the fuck up and sit quiet while we wait on the runway for a fucking week to take off" attitude that they stockpile in reserve for every airline passenger. Instead, he had the nerve, the absolute gall, to USE HIS I-PAD WHICH COULD TOTALLY BRING DOWN THE ENTIRE FRAGILE AIR TRANSIT INFRASTRUCTURE!!!elevenZOMG!!!
No. It's much easier for us to tell ourselves that some mouthy actor is being an asshole, than to wonder for a hot second just how we continue to let ourselves be treated like animals in a routine consumer transaction. Some folks will continue to do so right up to the moment the wage slave on the kill floor parks the metaphorical bolt gun between their eyes and pulls that trigger.
Just another little cut, a common indignity which most have been conditioned to placidly accept, one of a thousand. Go back to sleep.
Seriously, Baldwin should have thanked American Airlines for their "just shut the fuck up and sit quiet while we wait on the runway for a fucking week to take off" attitude that they stockpile in reserve for every airline passenger. Instead, he had the nerve, the absolute gall, to USE HIS I-PAD WHICH COULD TOTALLY BRING DOWN THE ENTIRE FRAGILE AIR TRANSIT INFRASTRUCTURE!!!elevenZOMG!!!
No. It's much easier for us to tell ourselves that some mouthy actor is being an asshole, than to wonder for a hot second just how we continue to let ourselves be treated like animals in a routine consumer transaction. Some folks will continue to do so right up to the moment the wage slave on the kill floor parks the metaphorical bolt gun between their eyes and pulls that trigger.
Just another little cut, a common indignity which most have been conditioned to placidly accept, one of a thousand. Go back to sleep.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Mother of Invention
Historian-in-chief makes specious claim. Really, I'm surprised he didn't invoke the dog in a manger argument.
Also, too is the fact that -- again, brace yourself -- Newter's talking out of his capacious bunghole yet again: the name Palestine was derived from the Biblical "Philistine" by the Romans, fell into semi-official use by the Ottomans, and was revived by the British (along with other administrative designations) when they parceled out the area after WW1.
Gingrich's parsimonious averral that the usage only became common after 1977, after decalring the term an "invention", is too clever by half, but perfectly in keeping with the necessity of courting evangelical votes by waving the Israeli flag, as all Republican candidates are now required to do. Good luck with that, son -- either it's the economy, stupid, or it's not. Anyone with the luxury of obsessing over gay marriage or abortion or "holy" lands instantly reveals the true level of their concern for addressing the economic situation.
Also, too is the fact that -- again, brace yourself -- Newter's talking out of his capacious bunghole yet again: the name Palestine was derived from the Biblical "Philistine" by the Romans, fell into semi-official use by the Ottomans, and was revived by the British (along with other administrative designations) when they parceled out the area after WW1.
Gingrich's parsimonious averral that the usage only became common after 1977, after decalring the term an "invention", is too clever by half, but perfectly in keeping with the necessity of courting evangelical votes by waving the Israeli flag, as all Republican candidates are now required to do. Good luck with that, son -- either it's the economy, stupid, or it's not. Anyone with the luxury of obsessing over gay marriage or abortion or "holy" lands instantly reveals the true level of their concern for addressing the economic situation.
Projection
Remember when one of the primary -- and most hilarious -- rationales given for invading Iraq was the idea that Saddam might have a squadron of nucular-tipped drones that would only take 45 minutes to get London or Washington? Somewhat ironic, considering how much we've depended on drones in the Afghan campaign (and the amount of diplomatic grief some of their more "erroneous" misfires have caused.
The commentary over Iran's pursuit for nuclear capability has been uniformly paranoid. Not that the mullahs are nice guys, and they very well could cause some trouble with the capacity for nuclear weapons, most notably by dissemination through surrogate independent terrorist cells.
But the simpler and more prevalent explanation is that Iran simply needs to keep up with its neighbors at this point. If you live in a really dangerous neighborhood to begin with, and all your neighbors have AR-15 assault rifles, and all you've got is a 12" Buck knife, are you gonna want a gun or what, just in case?
Anyway, this whole snafu plays right into China's hands, at least as much as Iran's. Between the Osama copter and now this, their reverse-engineering crews have just gotten a huge upsurge in projects to work on. And the tech monkeys can downplay this all they want, talk about how the Sentinel's tech is already been surpassed, but the fact is the plane has only been declassified for four years, and therefore is almost certainly less than ten. For a country that's still playing catchup on 70-year-old nuke tech, they'd settle for being just ten years (or less) behind on surveillance drone tech, since that is a huge future branch of warfare.
It might be useful if, just once in a while, our insect overlords considered their projected anxieties about certain weapons and tech, and see if that helps them empathize a bit more with other countries that are nervous over our capabilities with those weapons. Rational-actor theory aside, a scary weapon is still just that.
The commentary over Iran's pursuit for nuclear capability has been uniformly paranoid. Not that the mullahs are nice guys, and they very well could cause some trouble with the capacity for nuclear weapons, most notably by dissemination through surrogate independent terrorist cells.
But the simpler and more prevalent explanation is that Iran simply needs to keep up with its neighbors at this point. If you live in a really dangerous neighborhood to begin with, and all your neighbors have AR-15 assault rifles, and all you've got is a 12" Buck knife, are you gonna want a gun or what, just in case?
Anyway, this whole snafu plays right into China's hands, at least as much as Iran's. Between the Osama copter and now this, their reverse-engineering crews have just gotten a huge upsurge in projects to work on. And the tech monkeys can downplay this all they want, talk about how the Sentinel's tech is already been surpassed, but the fact is the plane has only been declassified for four years, and therefore is almost certainly less than ten. For a country that's still playing catchup on 70-year-old nuke tech, they'd settle for being just ten years (or less) behind on surveillance drone tech, since that is a huge future branch of warfare.
It might be useful if, just once in a while, our insect overlords considered their projected anxieties about certain weapons and tech, and see if that helps them empathize a bit more with other countries that are nervous over our capabilities with those weapons. Rational-actor theory aside, a scary weapon is still just that.
Thursday, December 08, 2011
What a Friend We Have In Tebow
Klosterman on Tebow. Worth a read.
I'm not sure of all the consternation surrounding the kid. As an atheist, I am non-plussed by his zealous professions of faith, it's how he was raised, it's how he's always going to be. Whatever works.
As a man, I have to wonder about someone who becomes a marquee Heisman-winning QB at a notorious SEC party school, and still manages to emerge as a virgin. This is a feat unbeknownst to modern science, friends 'n' neighbors. I mean, dude, you don't have to bang every cheerleader, but you can at least have a girlfriend, someone you actually care about and have fun with. People who store up sex for special occasions are inevitably disappointed.
But as a football fan, Tebow is simultaneously frustrating and exhilarating to observe. He runs like a deer and takes some serious hits. There's no denying his toughness. But he throws like old people fuck; every time he cocks back for more then fifteen yards, I get a visual of someone attempting to heave a frozen turkey over a ten-foot wall.
So as a lifelong Raiders fan, I find it immensely frustrating that Tebow continues to find ways to win, regardless of the inherent superiorities of the opposition. The Jets and Vikings, with their run-stopping front fours, should have shut his ass down; the Raiders, with a 17-point halftime lead last month, should have stood on his goddamned neck and pushed that lead to 30. But no, all the guy does is ride a storming D into single-possession fourth-quarter deficits to be overcome by moxie and/or gumption. To abuse the cliché, he just finds ways to win.
I still don't see the Donks making playoffs, it's statistically improbable at best. Then again, I still can't believe George W. Bush made it into the White House -- even by hook and/or crook -- not once, but twice. Truth really is stranger than fiction.
I'm not sure of all the consternation surrounding the kid. As an atheist, I am non-plussed by his zealous professions of faith, it's how he was raised, it's how he's always going to be. Whatever works.
As a man, I have to wonder about someone who becomes a marquee Heisman-winning QB at a notorious SEC party school, and still manages to emerge as a virgin. This is a feat unbeknownst to modern science, friends 'n' neighbors. I mean, dude, you don't have to bang every cheerleader, but you can at least have a girlfriend, someone you actually care about and have fun with. People who store up sex for special occasions are inevitably disappointed.
But as a football fan, Tebow is simultaneously frustrating and exhilarating to observe. He runs like a deer and takes some serious hits. There's no denying his toughness. But he throws like old people fuck; every time he cocks back for more then fifteen yards, I get a visual of someone attempting to heave a frozen turkey over a ten-foot wall.
So as a lifelong Raiders fan, I find it immensely frustrating that Tebow continues to find ways to win, regardless of the inherent superiorities of the opposition. The Jets and Vikings, with their run-stopping front fours, should have shut his ass down; the Raiders, with a 17-point halftime lead last month, should have stood on his goddamned neck and pushed that lead to 30. But no, all the guy does is ride a storming D into single-possession fourth-quarter deficits to be overcome by moxie and/or gumption. To abuse the cliché, he just finds ways to win.
I still don't see the Donks making playoffs, it's statistically improbable at best. Then again, I still can't believe George W. Bush made it into the White House -- even by hook and/or crook -- not once, but twice. Truth really is stranger than fiction.
Sunday, December 04, 2011
Ho Ho Holy Crap
This little number is far less interesting for the actual topic -- second-grade teacher drops a dime on "Santa"; parents get butt-hurt -- than for how quickly some of the commenters mount their librulnatsi hobby-horses:
Some folks are clinging on a bit too tight. You want to preserve the power of imagination for your precious rinpoche? Help them imagine what it's going to be like finding a fucking job in about ten years, one that doesn't make them want to self-medicate or ram their pedicab into a bridge abutment.
But it's the ones that immediately make the hyperintuitive leap to librul malfeeance that truly fascinate me. They're the ones for whom the very existence of, say, Glee is prima facie evidence that something untoward is being rammed directly down their throats, thus forcing them to confront the horrific notion that they might secretly like it. The axiom that anyone who obsesses that much -- or, you know, at all -- over gay people is very likely themselves gay holds true as always.
And so forth. Look, it's bad enough that some offshoot of the War on Christmas guff will be ignited over the teacher's tragic revelation. (And not to break the hearts of some of the more addled codgers further down the comment board, claiming to be well into their fifties and sixties, yet "still believing", but I had the Santa thing dialed in when I was maybe six or seven. It seemed important to my mother, who grew up in a Jehovah Witness household and therefore got cheated out of childhood Christmases, so I went along with it until I was about ten. I have a feeling that many, maybe even most kids, are just going along with it at some point.)Jeff Nickels · Top Commenter
"Teachers wont lie to them"? You cant be serious. Students get lied to by leftist "teachers" every single day in colleges and grade/middle schools around the country. It is not the job of a so-called educator to inform my child of anything other than the lessons at hand, and that includes whether or not there's a santa claus.
Jennifer Wagner
What are these lies that are being told "every single day in colleges and grade/middle schools..."?
Jeff Nickels · Top Commenter
Well on a local forum I frequent, an anonymous teacher bragged that she was "indoctrinating (my) kids with all of the liberal "information" she could so that kids wouldnt be "hateful conservatives". I guess we can live in fairy-tale land and pretend that mine was the only case of something like this happening, if you want to. We can also pretend that teacers are infallible arbiters of pure truth if you'd like; the national test scores and illiteracy rate would say otherwise,
Jeff Nickels · Top Commenter
(cont)..but we can also ignore that as well, if you'd like.
Jeff Nickels · Top Commenter
I'm willing to bet that if I teach my child a biblical view about homosexuality, you feel it would be alright for said teacher to "correct" my child, dont you? I can assure you that were that to happen, I would not only have the teacher's job. I would have the school board, school, principle, and anyone else involved in civil court post-haste. I am fed up to the gills with agents of government thinking they know best how to raise my own children.
Some folks are clinging on a bit too tight. You want to preserve the power of imagination for your precious rinpoche? Help them imagine what it's going to be like finding a fucking job in about ten years, one that doesn't make them want to self-medicate or ram their pedicab into a bridge abutment.
But it's the ones that immediately make the hyperintuitive leap to librul malfeeance that truly fascinate me. They're the ones for whom the very existence of, say, Glee is prima facie evidence that something untoward is being rammed directly down their throats, thus forcing them to confront the horrific notion that they might secretly like it. The axiom that anyone who obsesses that much -- or, you know, at all -- over gay people is very likely themselves gay holds true as always.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
And Now For Something Completely Different
So I assumed that in going to see the new Muppet movie over the holiday weekend, I would simply be fulfilling another parental duty, handing good money over to the Mouse Cult in exchange for two hours of cloying sentimentalism. And it is sentimental, and wears its sweetness and innocence on its sleeve.
But writer/star Jason Segel is clearly passionate about this project, and his joy in the story is infectious. Amy Adams is her usual perky, cute, engaging self. The Muppet characters feel like old friends, long time no see, and the movie makes an earnest but true point about the role for their style of entertaining in a steadily coarsened culture.
But what really makes it a very good movie are the songs, especially the ones written by Flight of the Conchords alum Bret McKenzie. The songs are fun and silly, play off the story's abundant meta jokes, and move things along (and the movie isn't two hours, more like a crisp 90 minutes or so). And there are a couple of extremely funny sight/music gags toward the end.
I know, I was surprised too. This may ruin my reputation as a foul-mouthed intartubez curmudgeon. Go see it anyway, you'll be glad you did.
But writer/star Jason Segel is clearly passionate about this project, and his joy in the story is infectious. Amy Adams is her usual perky, cute, engaging self. The Muppet characters feel like old friends, long time no see, and the movie makes an earnest but true point about the role for their style of entertaining in a steadily coarsened culture.
But what really makes it a very good movie are the songs, especially the ones written by Flight of the Conchords alum Bret McKenzie. The songs are fun and silly, play off the story's abundant meta jokes, and move things along (and the movie isn't two hours, more like a crisp 90 minutes or so). And there are a couple of extremely funny sight/music gags toward the end.
I know, I was surprised too. This may ruin my reputation as a foul-mouthed intartubez curmudgeon. Go see it anyway, you'll be glad you did.
Chunky Flunky
Apparently this month's GOPmedia flavor is a heady swirl of lard, failure, and what passes for intellectualism in an intellectual and moral vacuum.
The only thing more perplexing than ceding electoral imprimaturs to unpopulated states such as Iowa and New Hampshire is the notion that Gingrich is some sort of intemellectual thoroughbred, simply because he's written a bunch of books. So has Danielle Steel.
The actual ideas Gingrich promulgates are nothing more than retreaded American Exceptionalism boilerplate, tarted up for an audience of mouth-breathers that tells themselves and each other that reading Atlas Shrugged autmoatically confers smart-set credentials. Not entirely clear how or when mere affirmation became intellection, maybe it's always been thus and I missed it because I wasn't reading the highbrow assertions of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter. Talk about missing the boat. Of course, in this case it's the proverbial lifeboat where everyone's talking cannibalism.
At any rate, I suppose the Goopers have just about run out of losers and also-rans to audition for their little Anyone But Romney booty pageant. Unless they're going to change their minds about the Mittster, or give Paul or Santorum a go, or come to their senses and realize that Huntsman is about the only halfway reasonable person on the roster, they'll have to go back through the list of oafs and castoffs, and try to convince us that Perry or Cain or Bachmann are seriously electable. But let's face it, they can't even convince themselves.
The only thing more perplexing than ceding electoral imprimaturs to unpopulated states such as Iowa and New Hampshire is the notion that Gingrich is some sort of intemellectual thoroughbred, simply because he's written a bunch of books. So has Danielle Steel.
The actual ideas Gingrich promulgates are nothing more than retreaded American Exceptionalism boilerplate, tarted up for an audience of mouth-breathers that tells themselves and each other that reading Atlas Shrugged autmoatically confers smart-set credentials. Not entirely clear how or when mere affirmation became intellection, maybe it's always been thus and I missed it because I wasn't reading the highbrow assertions of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter. Talk about missing the boat. Of course, in this case it's the proverbial lifeboat where everyone's talking cannibalism.
At any rate, I suppose the Goopers have just about run out of losers and also-rans to audition for their little Anyone But Romney booty pageant. Unless they're going to change their minds about the Mittster, or give Paul or Santorum a go, or come to their senses and realize that Huntsman is about the only halfway reasonable person on the roster, they'll have to go back through the list of oafs and castoffs, and try to convince us that Perry or Cain or Bachmann are seriously electable. But let's face it, they can't even convince themselves.
Friday, November 25, 2011
Eliminationist Rhetoric
Goddammit. Just. Goddammit. [Via Dohiyi Mir]
Look, we all get that Ann Coulter's role in this here game is that of agent provocateur. The factoid that Coulter and Bill Maher (both Cornell alumni) are supposedly close friends may be a tip of sorts that Coulter is cheekily aware that her obnoxious jabber is simply lucrative schtick.
But it's possible to point out that there is a line of sorts, fine or not, between schtick and open hostility, the sociopathic hostility of indifference to the murder of defenseless coeds by vicious thugs. Despite Coulter's implicit assertion, there is no debate whatsoever here -- the murdered college students were unarmed, period, end of sentence. The notion that someone would try to "humorously" walk that one back to Schtickville just says more about them than the subjects of their anemic jape.
I dunno. It's one thing to advocate physical violence against the authors of economic violence against the abject masses. Perhaps impolitic, but you get whence it originates.
But to advocate death for the people who have the temerity to agitate against the manifest economic injustices being perpetrated upon them, this is a different animal. This is the rhetorical arrogance of making a goof about kids being killed at school, about people who were dumb enough to believe that their national institutions would do the right thing when confronted -- despite a preponderance of evidence to the contrary -- and were murdered in cold blood as a consequence.
Sooner or later something's gotta give, the question is on which side it falls initially. Do frustrated, beaten-down peons strike back against feckless, armored thugs, or do the latter just decide to stomp down the former? Sadly, you can always count on someone to inexplicably defend the latter, to trade their humanity for a couple of shekels and a sack of magic beans.
Look, we all get that Ann Coulter's role in this here game is that of agent provocateur. The factoid that Coulter and Bill Maher (both Cornell alumni) are supposedly close friends may be a tip of sorts that Coulter is cheekily aware that her obnoxious jabber is simply lucrative schtick.
But it's possible to point out that there is a line of sorts, fine or not, between schtick and open hostility, the sociopathic hostility of indifference to the murder of defenseless coeds by vicious thugs. Despite Coulter's implicit assertion, there is no debate whatsoever here -- the murdered college students were unarmed, period, end of sentence. The notion that someone would try to "humorously" walk that one back to Schtickville just says more about them than the subjects of their anemic jape.
I dunno. It's one thing to advocate physical violence against the authors of economic violence against the abject masses. Perhaps impolitic, but you get whence it originates.
But to advocate death for the people who have the temerity to agitate against the manifest economic injustices being perpetrated upon them, this is a different animal. This is the rhetorical arrogance of making a goof about kids being killed at school, about people who were dumb enough to believe that their national institutions would do the right thing when confronted -- despite a preponderance of evidence to the contrary -- and were murdered in cold blood as a consequence.
Sooner or later something's gotta give, the question is on which side it falls initially. Do frustrated, beaten-down peons strike back against feckless, armored thugs, or do the latter just decide to stomp down the former? Sadly, you can always count on someone to inexplicably defend the latter, to trade their humanity for a couple of shekels and a sack of magic beans.
About the Other Night
So uh, yeah, maybe I was channeling Burroughs a bit back there, not by intention but it kinda shook out that way. And of course there are plenty of things I actually am thankful for -- a healthy family, a job, a house, a reliable vehicle, a reasonably valuable skill set.
But even those things come with a set of caveats: since I work in the public sector,findingfunding is always precarious, I don't have much seniority, and I spend at least three nights a week looking for greener pastures in a moribund job market; the house is underwater, not as much as a lot of folks out there, but enough to make me a glorified renter; and even with pretty decent medical insurance, we still have to check EOBs and medical billing clerks and haggle with insurance companies whose provider lists may or may not be accurate at any given time. That's the thing in this country anymore -- even people who are doing "okay" are really just a paycheck or two from the sidewalk, still have to worry about job security in a flat economy, still have to waste hours on end haggling over routine doctor's office visits -- again, with medical insurance.
But all those things are a given, really. What's really burning my ass is the indifference or insouciance paid to the more blatant examples of official thuggery in our midst. We've been long accustomed to it, obviously. People were hunky and/or dory with police-state actions in the War on Some Drugs, no-knock warrants, civil asset forfeiture without trial nor even charge. And 9/11 just sealed that deal, and utilized technological advances to snoop and secure ever more.
So we're comfortable with masked DEA guys kicking in doors and shooting without provocation, just as we're inured to ordinary county mounties and town clowns tasering speeders for getting lippy. We're jake with whisking people to Gitmo, be they bountied Afghan shepherds or homegrown assholes, and stuffing them away for years on end, again without charge nor trial.
So what's the big deal about pepper-spraying college kids and elderly women for sitting on a sidewalk? After all, it might prevent potential consumers from getting that sweet-ass Black Friday deal, right?
Oh, and about that:
But those stories, much like the thing itself are overblown; when the herd is heavily encouraged to converge, we shouldn't be too surprised when there's trampling here and there.
The part that's puzzling is that we continue to put up with all this shit, even though we know that we know better. I don't know if the prime instinct has simply become escapism at every turn, whether it's self-actualizing through shopping or endless schlock, or what. But again, it's really just going to come down to unplugging from the system, to stop feeding the beast.
But even those things come with a set of caveats: since I work in the public sector,
But all those things are a given, really. What's really burning my ass is the indifference or insouciance paid to the more blatant examples of official thuggery in our midst. We've been long accustomed to it, obviously. People were hunky and/or dory with police-state actions in the War on Some Drugs, no-knock warrants, civil asset forfeiture without trial nor even charge. And 9/11 just sealed that deal, and utilized technological advances to snoop and secure ever more.
So we're comfortable with masked DEA guys kicking in doors and shooting without provocation, just as we're inured to ordinary county mounties and town clowns tasering speeders for getting lippy. We're jake with whisking people to Gitmo, be they bountied Afghan shepherds or homegrown assholes, and stuffing them away for years on end, again without charge nor trial.
So what's the big deal about pepper-spraying college kids and elderly women for sitting on a sidewalk? After all, it might prevent potential consumers from getting that sweet-ass Black Friday deal, right?
Oh, and about that:
Words fail. Not to advocate vigilantism, but one hopes at the very least that when they check the surveilance tapes and figure out who this dunce is, her victims drop by with fresh pepper-spray canisters of their own.This year, reports of injuries, fights and at least one shooting have come in from across the country, with one California customer even fending off competing shoppers with pepper spray.
But those stories, much like the thing itself are overblown; when the herd is heavily encouraged to converge, we shouldn't be too surprised when there's trampling here and there.
The part that's puzzling is that we continue to put up with all this shit, even though we know that we know better. I don't know if the prime instinct has simply become escapism at every turn, whether it's self-actualizing through shopping or endless schlock, or what. But again, it's really just going to come down to unplugging from the system, to stop feeding the beast.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Giving Thanks
We thank you, o lord, for the banksters who have murdered the economy of the planet, who have turned the profit and productivity of others into a lint-ridden pocket for themselves to dip into.
Thanks for overpopulation, for idiots who seriously think they should have a dozen or so children, while entire species are driven to extinction at an unprecedented rate and resources deplete.
Thanks for punk bitch thug cops, wannabe tough guys who strut around in their Spaceballs stormtrooper suits (Taibbi's line) and spray blinding chemicals in the faces of their fellow citizens, which is the only reasonable response to peaceful protest, n'est-ce pas?
Thanks for a holiday that was once about reconnecting with family and community, but has long since devolved into a mindless orgy of pornographic consumerism, of people who actually look forward to the opportunity to go to Wal-Mart in the middle of the night and do battle to spend money they don't really have on shit they don't really want.
Thanks for the gaping hole in this nation's soul, and its collective inability to see or do anything about it.
Thanks for an interminable series of breathless "reports" on subhuman scumbags who think a college football program is more important than -- well, pretty much anything, apparently. Because there are actually people who are violently angry at the unfair persecution of poor ol' Joe Paterno. Lord, may their children all get ass-raped in the shower by Jerry Sandusky. (Not really, but perhaps make them take a second to reflect "what if", and double-check as to whether they are actually human beings or not. Because it's pretty unclear right now.)
Thanks for the fucking fascist scumbags who run this country now, who cravenly use a terrorist attack by a bunch of Saudis a decade ago as cover for their paramilitarizing of urban police forces. We thank you, sweet lord, for these gutless, inhuman thugs who wipe their asses with our constitution every chance they get. Good to know that official press passes must be obtained to "report" officially-sanctioned "news". Wouldn't want reg'lar citizens to think they can just show up unannounced atTahrir SquareZuccotti Park and, you know, document what occurs, write about or even film the armored pussies who pepper-spray old ladies and coeds. Lord, please jam lightning bolts up their asses, and melt their dead hearts, in Tebow's name, whatever and ever amen.
Some simple truths (pezzo di merde):
Because it most certainly is a bloody beast, voracious, insatiable, red in tooth and claw, utterly indifferent to the misery spawned by its actions, indeed taking perverse glee in the pain it causes. It does not care about you, and by "it" I mean Wall Street, Congress, Obama, the urban paramilitary gangs masquerading as cops, the hump-your-leg-till-you-waste-more-money media, the whole wretched lot of them.
The decision we have to make is whether we continue to put up with it just for the opportunity for more flat-screens and iPads, or decide that having a lifestyle is a piss-poor substitute for having a life, and that maybe we won't miss our Dancing with the Has-Beens and Never-Weres and the hourly Kardashian updates as much as they think we will. The greatest fear these motherless fucks have is that we one day decide to stand on our hind legs and be men.
I can't think of a better day than today for us all to resolve to do exactly that. I think we would all be more thankful, and right now an attitude of gratitude might be just the thing.
Otherwise, I've had quite enough of this hollowed-out police state, and its revolting cheerleaders, and I'd rather make it a goal to get the fuck out of here once and for all, find a bungalow in Costa Rica and spend the rest of my life surfing and playing guitar, which is all I ever really wanted to do anyway. Bageant had the right idea.
The bullshit going on right now in multiple quarters on multiple levels, and the vocal support it engenders from some of the more insane quadrants of the mediasphere, make me positively ill. One can still believe in Hume's Paradox, the old "they got the guns but we got the numbers" maxim, but there's really no substitute for just pulling out whenever and wherever possible, divesting from the beast and re-investing locally.
Thanks for overpopulation, for idiots who seriously think they should have a dozen or so children, while entire species are driven to extinction at an unprecedented rate and resources deplete.
Thanks for punk bitch thug cops, wannabe tough guys who strut around in their Spaceballs stormtrooper suits (Taibbi's line) and spray blinding chemicals in the faces of their fellow citizens, which is the only reasonable response to peaceful protest, n'est-ce pas?
Thanks for a holiday that was once about reconnecting with family and community, but has long since devolved into a mindless orgy of pornographic consumerism, of people who actually look forward to the opportunity to go to Wal-Mart in the middle of the night and do battle to spend money they don't really have on shit they don't really want.
Thanks for the gaping hole in this nation's soul, and its collective inability to see or do anything about it.
Thanks for an interminable series of breathless "reports" on subhuman scumbags who think a college football program is more important than -- well, pretty much anything, apparently. Because there are actually people who are violently angry at the unfair persecution of poor ol' Joe Paterno. Lord, may their children all get ass-raped in the shower by Jerry Sandusky. (Not really, but perhaps make them take a second to reflect "what if", and double-check as to whether they are actually human beings or not. Because it's pretty unclear right now.)
Thanks for the fucking fascist scumbags who run this country now, who cravenly use a terrorist attack by a bunch of Saudis a decade ago as cover for their paramilitarizing of urban police forces. We thank you, sweet lord, for these gutless, inhuman thugs who wipe their asses with our constitution every chance they get. Good to know that official press passes must be obtained to "report" officially-sanctioned "news". Wouldn't want reg'lar citizens to think they can just show up unannounced at
Some simple truths (pezzo di merde):
- Lloyd Blankfein, and every other bankster, for what they've done to literally billions of people at this point out of sheer greed and nothing more, are pieces of shit.
- Mike Bloomberg, for his craven support of the banksters, and for unleashing his punk-ass thug cops on unarmed peaceful citizens who are simply tired of taking shit from well-heeled thieves, is a piece of shit.
- Lt. John Pike, caught on video as a gutless, heartless bully, is a ten-pound growler, truly a king-sized piece of shit. Do your duty and flush twice on this motherfucker. It will truly be a fine day when this asshole finds himself in the unemployment line.
- There are many more, too many to mention. This nation seems overrun with numberless pieces of shit, from the halls of Congress to the boardrooms of Wall Street to the frontlines of Occupied America to the chat rooms defending the pussy paramilitaries who push around the citizens they're fucking well sworn to protect.
- What this nation needs is an enema, and a big one.
Because it most certainly is a bloody beast, voracious, insatiable, red in tooth and claw, utterly indifferent to the misery spawned by its actions, indeed taking perverse glee in the pain it causes. It does not care about you, and by "it" I mean Wall Street, Congress, Obama, the urban paramilitary gangs masquerading as cops, the hump-your-leg-till-you-waste-more-money media, the whole wretched lot of them.
The decision we have to make is whether we continue to put up with it just for the opportunity for more flat-screens and iPads, or decide that having a lifestyle is a piss-poor substitute for having a life, and that maybe we won't miss our Dancing with the Has-Beens and Never-Weres and the hourly Kardashian updates as much as they think we will. The greatest fear these motherless fucks have is that we one day decide to stand on our hind legs and be men.
I can't think of a better day than today for us all to resolve to do exactly that. I think we would all be more thankful, and right now an attitude of gratitude might be just the thing.
Otherwise, I've had quite enough of this hollowed-out police state, and its revolting cheerleaders, and I'd rather make it a goal to get the fuck out of here once and for all, find a bungalow in Costa Rica and spend the rest of my life surfing and playing guitar, which is all I ever really wanted to do anyway. Bageant had the right idea.
The bullshit going on right now in multiple quarters on multiple levels, and the vocal support it engenders from some of the more insane quadrants of the mediasphere, make me positively ill. One can still believe in Hume's Paradox, the old "they got the guns but we got the numbers" maxim, but there's really no substitute for just pulling out whenever and wherever possible, divesting from the beast and re-investing locally.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Psycho Finance, Qu'est-ce Que C'est
Ce que j'ai fait ce soir-lÃ
Ce qu'elle a dit ce soir-lÃ
Réalisant mon espoir
Je me lance vers la gloire... OK -- Talking Heads
George Monbiot is shrill:
More and more, it becomes clear that their defining characteristic is willingness to push boundaries, to engage in what would previously have been considered transgressive behavior.
Finally the crux of the biscuit.
Yet again, the myth persists that if we just stay the proverbial course, the ship will right itself anon.
Taibbi, per usual, has been all up in this shiznit. Handing Social Security and Medicare over to these thieves was a dreadful idea before they monkeyfucked the world economy; it is incomprehensible that any remotely serious person would still be considering such a thing at this stage of the game.
As Taibbi points out, not only is their chicanery exhaustively documented and simple to trace (though hopelessly convoluted in scope, and hence beyond the attention span of the average 'murkin, which is precisely what they count on), but so is their incompetence. You have to give props to people who have the balls to demand to be thanked and rewarded not only for their malfeasance, but for their ineptitude as well.
Here's how I've explained the situation to people, to make it a bit less muddled, feel free to use or modify as you see fit:
Say you have an idiot brother-in-law. He fancies himself a pigskin prognosticator, and decides to take a loan out on the value of his house to bet on the Super Bowl. But wait -- not only is the bank allowing him a loan at full value, they're allowing him to "leverage" on a 30:1 margin. That is, his house is worth $200K, but Bank of Stupid is letting him borrow $6 million. Still with me? Okay, good.
You can guess what happens next -- he bets on the Steelers, who lose to the Packers, and he's on the hook for way more money than he's ever going to see in his life. The bank basically tells you and your neighbors that you get to pay for it, since your asshole b-i-l sure as hell ain't gonna cough up a thin dime for his stupidity.
Of course, there are additional layers of complexity to this admittedly feeble analogy, but the point still stands. It's public subsidy/private profit at its worst.
Now, to add insult to njury, the richies are bemoaning their lot, and pushing back against the tubthumping DFHs in the park, with their usual condescending sneer:
As long as Bloomberg appears "progressive" enough on vital issues such as abortion and gay marriage, these putatively librul tools could give less than two shits about whether he regards the peons as human beings. Not that abortion and gay marriage aren't relevant issues, but I'll go out on a limb and stipulate that everyone's right to live a decent life commensurate with the work they put out is a tad more critical.
But Bloomberg, his proxies, and complicitly his starstruck audiences, they're all happy to lay it all at the feet of the one group that has no media or political presence whatsoever -- the working stiffs who got juked into these bullshit mortgages.
Yes, they should have known better, yes they should have done the math and figured it out. But a lot of people made -- and are still making -- a shitload of money for all that, really for taking deliberate advantage of their lack of financial sophistication.
Even worse, in addition to the foreclosed millions you hear about, there are millions more -- I count myself among them -- who did everything right, spent wisely, lived frugally, locked in the mortgage rate opportunistically, didn't use the HELOC as an ATM, and still got fucking hosed by decimated property values, reduced credit limits, fewer decent job opportunities, etc. Trust me folks, there's no reward whatsoever for doing things "right", and indeed only the finest of lines between those folks and the folks who are being jeered at by smug billionaires for their supposed stupidity and recklessness.
Really, if there's one thing that Bloomberg and his scumbag friends have proven time and again, it's that stupidity and recklessness pays quite handsomely, provided one has taken care to rent the right people ahead of time.
As the slow burn of Europe continues apace, and eventually spreads here, and shit really starts raining down, keep all that in mind when it's time to choose a side. Wall Street has the moral compass of a Mexican drug cartel. These motherfuckers would skin you alive and feed you your own nutsack if they thought it'd gain them two cents on their portfolio.
Has nothing to do with the virtues of "capitalism", the magic of the "free market", or the vicissitudes of the peons. It's just the nature of the beasts. Perhaps a viewing of Grizzly Man might jog one's perception of how this thing really works.
Ce qu'elle a dit ce soir-lÃ
Réalisant mon espoir
Je me lance vers la gloire... OK -- Talking Heads
George Monbiot is shrill:
Monbiot avers to the classic "all poodles are dogs, but not all dogs are poodles" chestnut, which is at least intellectually honest:In a study published by the journal Psychology, Crime and Law, Belinda Board and Katarina Fritzon tested 39 senior managers and chief executives from leading British businesses. They compared the results to the same tests on patients at Broadmoor special hospital, where people who have been convicted of serious crimes are incarcerated. On certain indicators of psychopathy, the bosses's scores either matched or exceeded those of the patients. In fact, on these criteria, they beat even the subset of patients who had been diagnosed with psychopathic personality disorders.
The psychopathic traits on which the bosses scored so highly, Board and Fritzon point out, closely resemble the characteristics that companies look for. Those who have these traits often possess great skill in flattering and manipulating powerful people. Egocentricity, a strong sense of entitlement, a readiness to exploit others and a lack of empathy and conscience are also unlikely to damage their prospects in many corporations.
In their book Snakes in Suits, Paul Babiak and Robert Hare point out that as the old corporate bureaucracies have been replaced by flexible, ever-changing structures, and as team players are deemed less valuable than competitive risk-takers, psychopathic traits are more likely to be selected and rewarded. Reading their work, it seems to me that if you have psychopathic tendencies and are born to a poor family, you're likely to go to prison. If you have psychopathic tendencies and are born to a rich family, you're likely to go to business school.
Here we're getting closer to the nut. Success in the high-stakes finance world is not predicated on raw skill; there is very little chance that Jamie Dimon or Lloyd Blankfein possesses skill sets that the average college graduate could not be trained for in, say, a year or two. Yes, they are highly specialized skill sets, but not uniquely so.This is not to suggest that all executives are psychopaths. It is to suggest that the economy has been rewarding the wrong skills. As the bosses have shaken off the trade unions and captured both regulators and tax authorities, the distinction between the productive and rentier upper classes has broken down. Chief executives now behave like dukes, extracting from their financial estates sums out of all proportion to the work they do or the value they generate, sums that sometimes exhaust the businesses they parasitise. They are no more deserving of the share of wealth they've captured than oil sheikhs.
More and more, it becomes clear that their defining characteristic is willingness to push boundaries, to engage in what would previously have been considered transgressive behavior.
Finally the crux of the biscuit.
Exactly. The persistent myth has been that taxes and regulations must be kept low in order to maintain robust growth and profits. Well, what of that, then? Both have been at historic lows for the entirety of this preceding decade, the paper profits of which have been wiped clean -- except, of course, for the engineers of that destruction. Securitization policies were upended to facilitate this mendacious scamboogery, and we can all see the results.The rest of us are invited, by governments and by fawning interviews in the press, to subscribe to their myth of election: the belief that they are possessed of superhuman talents. The very rich are often described as wealth creators. But they have preyed on the earth's natural wealth and their workers' labour and creativity, impoverishing both people and planet. Now they have almost bankrupted us. The wealth creators of neoliberal mythology are some of the most effective wealth destroyers the world has ever seen.
Yet again, the myth persists that if we just stay the proverbial course, the ship will right itself anon.
Taibbi, per usual, has been all up in this shiznit. Handing Social Security and Medicare over to these thieves was a dreadful idea before they monkeyfucked the world economy; it is incomprehensible that any remotely serious person would still be considering such a thing at this stage of the game.
As Taibbi points out, not only is their chicanery exhaustively documented and simple to trace (though hopelessly convoluted in scope, and hence beyond the attention span of the average 'murkin, which is precisely what they count on), but so is their incompetence. You have to give props to people who have the balls to demand to be thanked and rewarded not only for their malfeasance, but for their ineptitude as well.
Here's how I've explained the situation to people, to make it a bit less muddled, feel free to use or modify as you see fit:
Say you have an idiot brother-in-law. He fancies himself a pigskin prognosticator, and decides to take a loan out on the value of his house to bet on the Super Bowl. But wait -- not only is the bank allowing him a loan at full value, they're allowing him to "leverage" on a 30:1 margin. That is, his house is worth $200K, but Bank of Stupid is letting him borrow $6 million. Still with me? Okay, good.
You can guess what happens next -- he bets on the Steelers, who lose to the Packers, and he's on the hook for way more money than he's ever going to see in his life. The bank basically tells you and your neighbors that you get to pay for it, since your asshole b-i-l sure as hell ain't gonna cough up a thin dime for his stupidity.
Of course, there are additional layers of complexity to this admittedly feeble analogy, but the point still stands. It's public subsidy/private profit at its worst.
Now, to add insult to njury, the richies are bemoaning their lot, and pushing back against the tubthumping DFHs in the park, with their usual condescending sneer:
Here is a perfect example of why I detest bien pensant limo libs nearly as much as I despise the usual mouth-breathing, window-licking, up-to-the-fourth-knuckle nose-picking conservatards. Animals like Mike Bloomberg, who presents a media-friendly image and aligns perfectly with their socially-liberal-but-fundamentally-authoritarian impulses, know perfectly well that there's more than enough blame to go around.Mike Bloomberg wants you to believe the banks didn’t want anything to do with those unworthy borrowers. Yet in reality, the banks not only went to every conceivable length to take on the home loans of those subprime borrowers, they actually invented new technology to make clones of those Barney Frank debtors.
And there were thousands upon thousands of those synthetic deals, meaning each and every one of those deadbeat subprime borrowers have been Xeroxed by the banks fifty or a hundred times over, and are flying around the globe to this day as toxic assets.
Nomi Prins pointed out in her book It Takes a Pillage that we could have paid off every subprime loan in America at the start of the crisis for about $1.4 trillion dollars. But the bailouts ended up being four, five, perhaps as much as ten or twelve times that size.
Why? Because we weren’t paying off the underlying loans of those subprime, personal-responsibility-deficient homeowners. We were paying off the banks' bets on those loans. We were adopting all those clones they made.
Anyway, there's is a massive gap between making a bad decision with one’s personal finances and committing criminal fraud in billion-dollar amounts. Morally, the two acts are not even in the same universe.
As long as Bloomberg appears "progressive" enough on vital issues such as abortion and gay marriage, these putatively librul tools could give less than two shits about whether he regards the peons as human beings. Not that abortion and gay marriage aren't relevant issues, but I'll go out on a limb and stipulate that everyone's right to live a decent life commensurate with the work they put out is a tad more critical.
But Bloomberg, his proxies, and complicitly his starstruck audiences, they're all happy to lay it all at the feet of the one group that has no media or political presence whatsoever -- the working stiffs who got juked into these bullshit mortgages.
Yes, they should have known better, yes they should have done the math and figured it out. But a lot of people made -- and are still making -- a shitload of money for all that, really for taking deliberate advantage of their lack of financial sophistication.
Even worse, in addition to the foreclosed millions you hear about, there are millions more -- I count myself among them -- who did everything right, spent wisely, lived frugally, locked in the mortgage rate opportunistically, didn't use the HELOC as an ATM, and still got fucking hosed by decimated property values, reduced credit limits, fewer decent job opportunities, etc. Trust me folks, there's no reward whatsoever for doing things "right", and indeed only the finest of lines between those folks and the folks who are being jeered at by smug billionaires for their supposed stupidity and recklessness.
Really, if there's one thing that Bloomberg and his scumbag friends have proven time and again, it's that stupidity and recklessness pays quite handsomely, provided one has taken care to rent the right people ahead of time.
As the slow burn of Europe continues apace, and eventually spreads here, and shit really starts raining down, keep all that in mind when it's time to choose a side. Wall Street has the moral compass of a Mexican drug cartel. These motherfuckers would skin you alive and feed you your own nutsack if they thought it'd gain them two cents on their portfolio.
Has nothing to do with the virtues of "capitalism", the magic of the "free market", or the vicissitudes of the peons. It's just the nature of the beasts. Perhaps a viewing of Grizzly Man might jog one's perception of how this thing really works.
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