Why this man decided to become a goat New York Post
Injured Tortoise Receives World’s First 3D Printed Shell Bored Panda (furzy)
Black bears flock to claim food in evacuated Fort McMurray homes Guardian (David L)
Robot ranchers monitor animals on giant Australian farms New Scientist (Chuck L)
Lowering the Bar: Medicine in the 21st Century Medpage Today. (Chuck L). Important.
Alcohol intervention programs ineffective on fraternity members EurekAlert (Chuck L)
China?
Cold Feet: China’s Experiment With Freer Yuan Again Gets Cut Short WSJ China Real Time
China: Potential bad debts are now reaching into the USD trillions – Rabobank FX Street
New Political Earthquake in Brazil: Is It Now Time for Media Outlets to Call This a “Coup”? Intercept (Sid S)
Philippine dictator Marcos to get hero’s burial: Duterte MSN. Furzy: “The march to right wing dictatorships continues….”
Venezuela Opposition Calls for Coup, Protests Turn Violent teleSUR (Sid S)
Dollar will be the winner when the EU volcano erupts CNBC
While euro zone banks regain footing, Italian lenders still in shambles Globe and Mail
What Remains of All Our Outrage? Socialist Project (Sid S)
Brexit?
The Economic Arguments Against Brexit New Yorker
EU referendum poll: Pensioners, Tory voters and men are deserting the Brexit campaign Telegraph
Russians rally to the Brexit flag Financial Times
Grexit?
Greek Debt Sustainability and IMF’s Pipe Dreams Constantin Gurdgiev
IMF pushes debt interest cap for Greece Financial Times
Ukraine/Russia
Saudi Market Share Takes A Hit As Russia Doubles Oil Exports To China OilPrice
Syraqistan
Another assassination of a jihadist leader. Here’s what comes next… Fabius Maximus (resilc)
Imperial Collapse Watch
U.S. Troops to Disembark in Argentina Dawn News
US Army Laser Chief: ‘We Absolutely Blew Lots of Things Up’ Motherboard (resilc)
Clinton E-mail Hairball
Intel Officials Urge Fast Report on Clinton’s Emails George Washington
2016
Clinton declines Calif. debate The Hill (furzy)
Sanders wins greater say in Democratic platform; names pro-Palestinian activist Washington Post
Sanders names Cornel West, Keith Ellison to DNC platform committee The Hill (furzy)
Coat-tails and down-ballot worries for the 2016 election Brookings Institution. Judy B: “And Hillary, the consummate grifter, is refusing to distribute the money that was raised by the DNC Victory campaign to be distributed among state and local “down ticket” candidates …. !!”
Reid throws wrench into Clinton vice presidential picks The Hill. A Washington Post article flagged this issue two weeks ago, as the reason Warren would never be Clinton’s veep.
Donald Trump is going to win: This is why Hillary Clinton can’t defeat what Trump represents Salon
A Deep Dive into How the Clinton Foundation Operates Illegally and in Haiti Charles Ortel
A Harvard MBA Guy Is Out to Bring Down the Clintons Pam Martens and Russ Martens
Hillary Clinton’s Energy Initiative Pressed Countries to Embrace Fracking Intercept
Bernie Sanders raises $250,000 for Debbie Wasserman-Schultz’ primary opponent CNN
Bernie Sanders Slams White House Compromise on Puerto Rico Debt Wall Street Journal
Why Sanders supporters are suing over California’s voter registration Christian Science Monitor (furzy)
Bernie is building an army of Democratic primary challengers Slate (resilc). Sanders will probably lose the battle of the 2016 presidency, but he can win the war of making a hostile takeover of the Democratic party.
The Real Reason Neocons Are So Upset About Donald Trump Nation (resilc)
“Never Trump!” Is Becoming “Go Trump!” in the Blink of an Eye American Prospect
Trump Boasts of Rapport With Wall St., but the Feeling Is Not Quite Mutual New York Times
The Blaster: Is Nazism a One-of-a-Kind Historical Curiosity? Chuck Spinney (Chuck L)
Officials: Federal prosecutors investigating Virginia Gov. McAuliffe Washington Post
Why Ted Cruz’s campaign was so active at Minnesota’s GOP state convention MinnPost (Chuck L)
Flint had many betrayers Socialist Worker (Sid S)
Fed
Fed Funds At Two Percent Or More? Get Used To The Idea. Forbes
Bank of America Penalty Thrown Out in Crisis-Era ‘Hustle’ Case Wall Street Journal
Libor Antitrust Claims Are Revived in Setback for Banks Reuters
Wall Street fixed income declines Business Insider
Class Warfare
Machine Bias: There’s software used across the country to predict future criminals. And it’s biased against blacks. ProPublica (guurst). A must read.
Disposable Americans: The Numbers are Growing Common Dreams (Sid S)
Money Doesn’t Buy as Long a Life as It Used To Bloomberg (resilc). As we said in 2007, highly unequal societies create a lifespan cost even on the wealthy.
Pattern: when the left won’t protect people from neoliberalism, they turn to reactionaries in hopes they’ll do it. Harpers (Sid S)
Antidote du jour (Maulik). From India, story here.
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
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The Salon link for Donald Trump is going to win leads to the Deep Dive into Clinton Foundation
I did find the link by searching though
http://www.salon.com/2016/05/23/donald_trump_is_going_to_win_this_is_why_hillary_clinton_cant_defeat_what_trump_represents/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
http://charlesortel.com/a-deep-dive-into-how-the-clinton-foundation-operates-illegally-and-in-haiti
Both are now fixed.
re goat man–animals are in the present, which is where we all should be. this is not “stuck in time”, this is a liberated state in which you can act appropriately in the moment, using experience.
…Now…if we just reversed the participants, that statement would probably be more accurate !
“You’d better watch out for Brother Man-Goat, with his top hat and walking stick.” At least that’s how I’ve always heard the line, though the online lyrics say “Mongoose.”
re lowering the bar
Cafe Pharma forums are an interesting place where drug reps gather to dish the dirt.
http://www.cafepharma.com/boards/general-discussion/
Thanks for the Cafe Pharma link. It led me this helpful piece:
http://www.liveinthenow.com/article/statin-drugs-cause-even-more-nerve-damage-than-we-thought
Very handy, as seemingly all of my healthy contemporaries are being advised to take statins simply because they’re over 60. Despite the Cleveland Clinic’s Steve Nissen being a prime cheerleader for statins, my own doctor knows better than to suggest I join that crowd.
so glad you found that
what is a ‘doctor’..??
the pusherman, apparently
Well, good for Harry Reid. Warren is far more important in the senate than she could be as VP. And Reid is right about removing senators. One of the worst things Obama did in his first year in office is appoint a bunch of senators to the cabinet. Just completely stupid and counter-productive.
Although I do want a good vp and think Brown would be awesome. But I expect Clinton will appoint someone awful up her own alley really.
Not really counter-productive, his goal was to debase the remainder of the left-wing, and to gain ground for the clients of the Chicago machine, large corporations. This instinct was absorbed from his mother’s milk (she helped facilitate micro-loan programs for the World-Bank, that’s about as neo-liberal as one can get) and his (Vice President, Bank of Hawaii) grandmother’s instruction when she took over raising him in relative privilege .
By removing those Democratic Senators, he removed obstacles to pushing a corporatist system; he was well advised through out this process. The man has said several times that he looked forward to working with Republican Controlled Congress, they gave him a legitimate excuse to not carry out any small remaining populist part of the party platform, and took the blame for carrying the ball forward while he stepped aside.
That’s new information regarding Obama–that his mother and grandmother were involved in the banking sector in a big way. Is there a link you recommend?
It’s even available in Wikipedia. Don’t have time right now but just search Obama’s family history.
What is that they say about counting chickens? Obama knew exactly what he was doing.
In addition to being among the very first to endorse Clinton, Brown voted with alacrity to confirm pharma shill Robert Califf as FDA Commissioner. Disgusting. As one of his constituents, I’m sorry to say this, but Sherrod Brown really is a faux progressive.
True. I am an ex-Buckeye and followed Sherrod Brown over the years—he is your basic corporate Dem, although probably better than most.
Brindle, you might enjoy this true story: In the summer of 2005, I was invited by Sherrod Brown’s brother (very nice guy, BTW) to an informal backyard party intended as an early get-acquainted event with then-candidate for Governor of Ohio, Democrat Ted Strickland (Strickland was elected in 06 and served one term–he’s running now for Portman’s Senate seat).
When introduced to Sherrod, I started chatting him up about the crying need for single payer universal health care. He was genially non-commital, and I turned to greet his wife, the newspaper columnist Connie Schultz. She shook my hand and her head, saying “You people never give up, do you?”
I just smiled, replied “No, we never do.” and moved on.
Wow……. “You ‘little ankle bitters’…. uh..people”………
“Hear doggy….. wanna bone”……..
Ankle biterz of the world unite…
Leg humpers are doggies too!
Bob Barker sez: spay and neuter your oligarchs!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_Netherlands
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_health_consumer_index
Injured Tortoise Receives World’s First 3D Printed Shell
Six years ago I found a box turtle in my yard that was missing about two square inch of upper shell. “Boxanne” probably tangled with a neighbor’s lawn mower. It was a bad situation and she would have died had we not found her. We treated her for two months, then put a fiberglass patch over the still open wound, then let her go. She’s returned every year since. I saw her yesterday for the first time this season and she appears to be doing just fine.
oh, thanks for sharing, that’s lovely. Boxanne, lol
That’s a nice story, like that penguin that returns every year (Argentina, I think)
“I promise, my love, I will come back.”
I think box turtles have a localization drive.
wow. so wonderful. this made my day
That is the truth of life right there. Beautiful stuff.
Prose antidotes! Especially needed as the news turns bleaker and bleaker.
Great idea
Boxanne – now that is witty!!! (must restrain myself from asking how you tell boy turtles from girl turtles…)
Everybody knows how to distinguish boy turtles from girl turtles. That’s easy.
One wears pink, the other blue.
And everybody keeps wondering how the hell I got my biology degree.
You have to take them to North Carolina and see which restroom they head toward.
Color of eyes. Look it up.
If the best Clinton can do is run even, or slightly behind Trump, how does this not signal that she is in Trouble-with-a-capital-T? How can the Clinton people still be pushing the idea that the only problem is that damn Bernie Sanders who won’t get the hell out of her way? How can they keep ignoring her terrible numbers with huge sectors of the electorate, her high negatives? How is it a winning argument that Trump’s numbers are worse?
Trump has managed to vanquish 16 other Republicans to become the presumptive nominee, and he did it by exposing their weak spots; he has only just begun to go after Crooked Hillary and Predator Bill, and I’m not convinced she can prevail over Trump with her strategy of staying above the fray.
Is there anything that could stop this slow-motion train wreck?
Super-delegates carrying out their ostensible role?
Super-delegates need to reconsider.
Richard Charnin has a model with can be adjusted with different numbers/assumptions over time, but quotes the Party ID numbers currently held by the Democratic and Republican Parties that are so horrible, the super-delegates should rethink their responsibility:
https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com/2016/05/23/2016-preliminary-election-model-sanders-vs-clinton-vs-trump/
2016 Preliminary Election Model: Sanders vs.Clinton vs. Trump
Richard Charnin
The model is flexible so that one easily change input vote shares and the Party-ID split. State vote shares and electoral votes are automatically calculated.
The model projects Bernie Sanders as the winner with 308 electoral votes assuming he wins 50% of Independents and 40% of Democrats. And of course, we assume a fair election and Sanders is on the ballot in all the states.
In 2014, the National Party ID split was: 41% Democrat,35% Republican and 24% Independent. Current surveys indicate that the current split is 29D-21R-50I – a sharp increase in self-identified Independents.
……….
A fair election:
https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com/2016/05/19/the-democratic-primaries-no-more-exit-polls-kentucky-and-oregon-recap/
The Democratic Primaries: No more exit polls, Kentucky and Oregon recap
Richard Charnin
…….
BERNIE, RECOUNT KENTUCKY. TALK TO BEV HARRIS AND RICHARD CHARNIN.
…….
http://blackboxvoting.org/fraction-magic-1/
Fraction Magic – Part 1: Votes are being counted as fractions instead of as whole numbers
By Bev Harris May 12, 2016
1 – Summary –
This report summarizes the results of our review of the GEMS election management system, which counts approximately 25 percent of all votes in the United States. The results of this study demonstrate that a fractional vote feature is embedded in each GEMS application which can be used to invisibly, yet radically, alter election outcomes by pre-setting desired vote percentages to redistribute votes. This tampering is not visible to election observers, even if they are standing in the room and watching the computer. Use of the decimalized vote feature is unlikely to be detected by auditing or canvass procedures, and can be applied across large jurisdictions in less than 60 seconds.
GEMS vote-counting systems are and have been operated under five trade names: Global Election Systems, Diebold Election Systems, Premier Election Systems, Dominion Voting Systems, and Election Systems & Software, in addition to a number of private regional subcontractors. At the time of this writing, this system is used statewide in Alaska, Connecticut, Georgia, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Utah and Vermont, and for counties in Arizona, (upcoming) California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming. It is also used in Canada.
………
Richard Charnin’s spreadsheets:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sGxtIofohrj3POpwq-85Id2_fYKgvgoWbPZacZw0XlY/edit?pref=2&pli=1#gid=1476097125
………..
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Sanders-Scolded-For-Callin-by-Kevin-Gosztola-Bernie-Sanders-2016-Presidential-Candidate_DNC-Chairman_Democrats-DNC_Wasserman-Schultz-Debbie-160521-905.html Op Eds 5/21/2016 at 21:03:43
Sanders Scolded For Calling Attention To Rigged Primary
By Kevin Gosztola
Reprinted from shadowproof.com by Kevin Gosztola
Democratic Party leaders accuse Bernie Sanders and his presidential campaign of inciting “violence” among supporters by promoting allegations that the primary process is rigged in favor of his opponent, Hillary Clinton. Surrogates for Clinton and pundits, who favor Clinton, have ramped up their attacks on Sanders for maintaining a robust campaign, even though the last votes have yet to be cast in the primary.
snip
But the story is not that Sanders supporters are unruly because Sanders has whipped them into a frenzy over “allegations” of a rigged primary process. It is not that they lack education about the process. Sanders supporters understand very well how the process works and what kind of candidate is supposed to make it to the end. Real and actual evidence of a rigged primary is what fuels such discontent.
………
Super-delegates, what about the actual evidence of rigging that Bev Harris found in many voting machines? Do you think you can win the general without getting rid of those machines? What if Bernie Recounts Kentucky? Perhaps, then.
If the DemParty nominates Sanders, the Clintonites will vote for Trump or stay home to assure Sanders’ defeat to teach the Sanderists a lesson, and also to blame the Sanderists for causing defeat by depriving the DemParty of the one true Clinton who could have won the election.
It is very unlikely the DemParty would nominate Sanders in any event, because the Hamilton Project DemParty works for the FIRE sector perpetrator class. And if Sanders somehow got nominated, the DemParty itself would work to defeat Sanders just as the DemParty apparatchiks and regulars did what they could to deepen and broaden McGovern’s defeat in 1972. They would do this in order to accuse Sanders of “losing” the election, and they would work to purge Sanderists out of the Party.
Does this mean that the Sanderists should “give up”? I don’t see why. Running to the bitter end at the Convention will allow the Sanderists to see how many Sanderists there really are. That might inspire them to stay together and stay active and deepen, broaden, and cat’s cradle-ize the mutliple organizational cross-linkages among themselves as they prepare to conquer and dominate the Democratic Party and prepare to purge whatever neoliberal Goldman-Sachs type Hamilton Projectors out of the Party that need to be purged.
How many Clintonistas are just like Terry MacAuliffe? With Obama’s anything goes policy, I think there are plenty of Clinton loyalists who desperately need to be on the right side of pardoning power. Obama won’t pardon because of his legacy at this point.
Don’t forget simple human arrogance. “Our betters,” Aaron Sorkin acolytes, missed what a terrible candidate is. How can this be? The answer is the voters are wrong, not the elites. Every step of the Gore 2000 campaign was brilliant, the voters spoiled everything, not Gore or their bad decisions.
Speaking of Al Gore. !0 years since “Inconvenient Truth” came out. Here’s an update on how it got made: http://grist.org/feature/an-inconvenient-truth-oral-history/
Saudi Arabia gave Sec. Clinton $500,000 worth of jewels as a gift, the GSA has no records of being registered.
https://twitter.com/maassive/status/734919743132422144
Bears flock?
The collective noun for bears is “sleuth” or “sloth.” I prefer the former, for obvious reasons.
Bears would then sleuth, not flock….
Dear “Skeptics”… [Scientific American]
If I’m not mistaken, this article is by the same John Horgan who wrote a book called Rational Mysticism which is highly recommended to anybody who’s into that sort of thing.
re: Risk Assessment.
Ugh. More Artificial Intelligence. It should be called Intelligent Artifice.
Extend computer dating to selecting the best politicians with AI.
1. Everyone fills out their financial and medical situations and their political preferences.
(One day, the monitor over your head 24/7, installed when you are born, will do that for you).
2. Crunch the data collected from all citizens with AI.
3. Voila, the best president according the special sauce algorithm
Re “Intel Officials Urge Fast Report on Clinton’s Emails.” Given the caliber of those who signed, don’t you think our famous free press will be all over this?
But they are all dinosaurs…they still hold the ridiculous belief that the powerful should be held to the same standards as everyone else!
IMHO, the letter-writers are dead wrong about blackmail opportunities. No matter how ugly the secret a blackmailer reveals, it will either be ignored or blame will be focused elsewhere. People were killed because of her data breach? Option 1 = yawn, change subject. Option 2 = seek vengeance against whoever used the information and killed those people. Send soldiers or, better yet, drones.
RE: “Money Doesn’t Buy as Long a Life as It Used To Bloomberg (resilc). As we said in 2007, highly unequal societies create a lifespan cost even on the wealthy.”
Yves, you’ve said this several times, and it’s an attractive argument for building a united front of the 99.9%, but the data is a bit more ambiguous. I’ve corresponded with Wilkinson on this, which I’m happy to share offline, but between-countries comparisons of the health outcomes of the rich are not available as far as I know.
Income inequality is a huge driver within country, world-wide. Other factors, like “culture” etc. play a bigger role in between-country comparisons. Would be a great study to do, BTW, but a challenge to build that database.
FWIW, Wilkinson thinks we have to remain agnostic about whether the top few percent are adversely affected by greater inequality.
However, it’s still a good argument for building a united front of the 90% IMHO!
It’s not as ambiguous as you suggest. Wilkerson’s findings were confirmed by other public health experts. Ichiro Kawachi and Bruce Kennedy of the School of Public Health at Harvard University have independently confirmed many of his claims.
When I watched the Frontline program that showed how aggressively they went after whistle-blowers, then there is Hillary with her private server. Obama pooh-poohing this is really amazing.
Obama clearly believes elites are special. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has an understanding of morality similar to the prosperity gospel. Yes, he attended Reverend Wright’s church, but it was also the church where people went to be seen. Much like my own experience with religion, no one pays attention anyway choosing to believe whatever they want.
Joshua Dubois and T.D. Jakes are the President’s go to spiritual advisors. Besides Dubois being a creepy dude and running the office of faith based initiatives, T.D. Jakes is a proponent of the prosperity gospel, only rich men get through the eye of the needle.
Whistle blowers suggest the elite aren’t special and need to be punished.
Exactly. It seems that Obama thinks that people like him (i.e. do well on standardized tests, are credentialed from Ivy League schools, wear business suits) actually know what they’re doing. He should have read Halberstam’s The Best and the Brightest and brought more skepticism into office, but it’s not in his nature.
https://www.goat-trauma.org
Need I say more?
lmfao I still have scars, but from Adult Goat Trauma. I learned to carry a cape, like a bullfighter…
I don’t think it is weird at all that DWS is opposed to legalizing MJ. Pharma has yet to get its claws into making big bucks off of “standardizing” it and “making it safe”.
After working in the weed business in WA for 5 months, I won’t touch marijuana anymore. I dont want to support a bunch of crooks. And that’s who’s running the show in WA, crooks.
Are you referring to the street level hoods who went ‘legit,’ the three piece suit thugs who weave a glamour over it all, or the ‘elected’ punks who facilitated it all, for a cut of the action?
Well, a future Kennedy could arise out of this shake up, as happened after the repeal of Prohibition. Imagine, if you can, the American Ambassador presenting his credentials to the Court of Saint James with the moniker, Al (el Gordo) Weissmann, Minister without Portfolio, engraved on the hemp fibre card stock. (The shade of Joe Kennedy haunts the halls of Congress still.)
Both.
Google Roger Goodman, who is not good….but very very crooked.
obviously there is big money to be made in marijuana or there wouldn’t be big money behind the initiatives such as in California. Whoever thinks it’s not capitalism, yea I want what they are smoking. And btw though it may be better than prohibition and prisons, nothing good ever comes out of corporate capitalism either.
There are reportedly three initiatives brewing regarding recpot in Michigan, one grassroots (MI Legalize, with my canvasser friend now gathering last minute signatures at USD0.50 apiece), two corporate (which I haven’t heard much of recently). After the Ohio debacle, my litmus test for legalization law legitimacy is support for non-market production. Come to think of it, that might be a good benchmark for legitimacy in all laws.
Yes. The WA crooks are evidence of how bad legalization is without allowing domestic growing.
If you grew just enough marijuana for your own personal subsistence non-market use, you would not be supporting even one crook, let alone a whole bunch of crooks. In that scenario, would you be willing to touch your own home-grown cannabis as long as it stayed un-monetized and totally outside the money-denominated economy?
She must of had a ‘bad trip’ once ………… smoking too many of those banana republic skins !!
The article at Harper’s carries this title:
Front Runner
Marine Le Pen’s campaign to make France great again
So the link above makes it sound more general than it is. What is important about the article is that it is a profile of Marine Le Pen, the rise of the populist right in France, and the economic problems underlying the problem. Jauntily written, too. So it is worth a read for a better understanding of the Trump phenomenon. The article also points out that the southeast of France, one of the most prosperous regions, has been Le Pen country for years. A curiosity? Or something else?
The Filipinos elected Duterte, and he will give a nice burial to Marcos. I spend a lot of time in the sunny Philippines, and I have always been amazed that most of the Filipinos still love Marcos. When I point out that he stole all the money out of the treasury, they say something like, “yeah, but he instilled discipline in the people.” Well, we’ll see how Duterte does. I like the fact that he pretty much eliminated tobacco smoking in Davao. I’d like to see that instituted world-wide.
sure……with the help of the iron fist……right?
I’ve seen cigarette smoking gradually repressed through the years. I think people more or less accept this repression because they know very well it’s a nasty dirty expensive habit that has no redeeming qualities. In some states in the US it’s illegal to smoke in any building, including your house. Of course people break the law and smoke in their house, but yeah I’m in favor of making tobacco illegal, and making marijuana legal. I don’t know what you mean by iron fist.
Tobacco is a sacred, medicinal herb.
Marijuana is also a sacred, medicinal herb, for native Americans.
You can get cancer from second hand tobacco smoking.
I suspect you can get cancer form second hand marijuana smoking as well.
Why is one illegal and the other legal-pending? Both are medicinal, though one is not as ‘satisfying.’
IMHO, tobacco smells a LOT worse, and I don’t see how it can be construed as “medicinal”.
Nicotine is a great stimulant. I quit smoking 25 years ago, and I’m glad I did. Still, gotta confess I was mentally sharper when I smoked.
It blows my mind that there are people who seriously think possessing plants or unprocessed dried plants should be subject to criminal penalty. They’re just plants! Unclench please, for your own and everyone else’s good.
Iron fist = criminalization; where you are subject to arrest and mistreatment without any accountability, resist and very likely die, that sort of thing. If no direct and present threat of harm to others is caused by one’s actions, they should almost always be wholly legal to do. This is the wise part of libertarianism, that gets lost in all the Randian/”free market”/devil take the hindmost garbage.
Of course tobacco will never be completely prohibited. But there are some parts of the Philippines (like around Manila) where they still let people light up in restaurants, hotels, anywhere they like. Well, I don’t like! But in other parts of the country it’s more like the US, with designated smoking areas at the swimming pool, no smoking inside, etc. So it’s a lot nicer for a non-smoker. I heard that Duterte eliminated smoking in Davao—-but I doubt that means completely eliminated, but rather having no smoking in public places, etc. But I don’t know. Call up Davao city hall and ask them.
Exploitable labor classes are made, not born. They don’t even care about the behavior in particular, just traffic. “quantity is a quality all its own”.
So you still support violent prohibitionism against the drugs you “don’t support”. In other words, you still support the War On Drugs as long as it is a War on the Drugs which YOUUUU don’t approve of.
If tobacco is outlawed, only outlaws will have tobacco. And then we can have all kinds of tobacco violence. Lets outlaw sugar too, so we can have a War On Sugar and the rise of the Sugar Cartels with Money to Launder.
Sugar doesn’t stink. Tobacco smoke gets on peoples’ bodies, clothes, etc.—-even the innocent bystander. Cigarette smoke is amazingly penetrating.
You refer to Duterte and elimination of smoking…..
..maybe it’s just me…,but I get the feeling this guy’s gonna be a tyrant!
I don’t know exactly what he’s going to do. He was mayor of Davao, which is known as the cleanest city in the Philippines. Davao is geographically closer to Singapore, so I suspect maybe that influenced him, but that’s just me. The Filipinos I talked to liked him because he wants to crack down on crime and drugs, although these problems over there are very minimal, compared to a place like the US. I don’t expect any radical change in the country. Hopefully he won’t be as corrupt as most of his predecessors.
He’s very critical of the Catholic Bishops in the Philippines, as well. With all the past political/economic corruption between the church’s hierarchy and state pols, and perhaps especially the RC Bishops’ efforts in the Philippines to prevent public access to contraception, i suspect his harsh criticism towards them works in his favor with the public at large, too.
Yes, the average filipino is acutely aware that the major problem of their country is co-rup-shone! and anything that can be done to alleviate this all-pervasive practice will be a great improvement. I hope he takes some steps to combat crony capitalism. I think since Marcos there has been a small series of improvements in cutting back on corruption. Years ago the road project never even got built, because all the money was pocketed by pols. Now it will eventually get finished, at least.
Here is the correct link for the Salon article on Trump:
Donald Trump is Going to Win
RE piece on US Army lasers, allow me to link to an old Gary Brecher piece on the subject, http://exiledonline.com/wn-day-24-ray-gun-vs-evinrude/
‘
PS. Brecher’s doing a weekly listener-supported podcast with Mark Ames. https://www.patreon.com/radiowarnerd?ty=h (half of the episodes should be unlocked for non-subscribers). We’re up to 936 supporters at the moment.
Agreed, and I’d add laser weapons don’t have much value against a prepared enemy. The story’s reported threats are real. However using lasers against all but the most primitive militant force is just asking for expensive equipment to be wiped out. It is a farce, and the DOD knows it. These weapons are not being developed to use against another technically competent military, they are “aimed” at civilians and civil infrastructure targets, probably like that US favorite hospitals, where close proximity negate most of those problems Brecher raises are not an issue because the target can’t mount much of a push back. Key word here is civilians.
Lasers as heat weapons don’t work well against material either transparent, highly reflective to the emission wave length, or extremely thermo-conductive, ie it takes time to burn these items, which means a lot of time being a lit beacon.. All lasers, both heat weapons and targeting, transmit information about where they are being fired from, making them an extremely easy target for return fire. Unlike artillery directed by passive signals (sight, sound,intercepted signals (including enemy lasers)) , heat weapon lasers can’t use gravity to launch a hook shot from behind cover. For example, the more advanced Russian tanks already carry sensors that can both operate targeting counter-measures as well as automatically launch a counter-offensive against the laser targeting platform/operator.
When we’re no longer cannon fodder or coughing up taxes, then we’re either liabilities or potential enemies to the DOD.
Right:
Anti-civilian weapons.
So now you know what the US military is planning.
–Gaianne
I swear I read an account here of low powered lasers in numbers being used successfully as dazzlers by protesters against police. Somewhere in Europe I think it happened. It denied entire streets to police vehicles. Anyone else remember that? At the least it will force cumbersome countermeasures which is really all you can ask of confrontational tactic.
Silly commenters, you’re under the illusion that military procurement is intended to generate useful weapons that can fight our actual adversaries (I can’t recall who those are but let’s imagine there are some).
In fact military procurement is an exercise in removing dollars from taxpayers’ pockets and placing them directly in the pockets of billionaire arms company shareholders.
The program has many notable successes, including a trillion-dollar fighter jet that doesn’t work and is so hot you can target it *from the front*; an electromagnetic space-based “rail gun”, and a $4 billion battleship that a handful of $500K missiles can turn into an artificial reef.
That $4b battleship you refer to is not really a battleship but rather the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, yes? The 600 foot destroyer which might not need a handful of missiles to become a reef because in a following sea off the stern quarter, the screws and rudders might come out of the water, allowing the slope-sided ship to capsize, right? (600 foot makes this destroyer roughly the size of normal cruisers.)
Re: A Harvard MBA Guy Is Out to Bring Down the Clintons
I remember seeing somewhere that the State Department IG position was unfilled during her entire tenure there. I wonder if that was an effort to keep State from looking too closely at the activities of the Foundation.
And remember the “damn” emails? Forget the “classified” flap. It’s all about the “foundation.”
In my humble opinion.
Between:
-Obama’s anything goes when it comes to white collar crime
-the perceived inevitability of Hillary
-the grifter nature of Clinton Inc.
I have a feeling a large number of public personalities beyond Terry Mac (c’mon it was only a matter of time in his case) may have engaged in unethical behavior. We might have to dump “gate” and put “dome” at the end of any future Clinton behavior.
TPP was written while she was at State.
He hasn’t been as bad of a governor as Bob McDonnell. For my money, Terry is slightly less slimy than Mark Warner. That being said, I’m surprised that it’s taken this long for some fundraising flap to come up.
Wait! Less slimy than Mark Warner. I don’t like Warner, but Terry Mac? Clinton’s bag man?
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/11/terry-mcauliffe-governor-virginia
As far as Taliban Bob, he restructured and updated the transportation situation (those public private partnerships are Kaine’s brainchild), kept a lid on the crazies (I do know the Speaker; the crazies get more now because there is less money to spend in pork. Howell killed bills for years), and moved to end the governor oversight for restoration of voting rights, making the process automatic and regular so we avoided a Kaine situation where he didn’t restore any voting rights.
I was looking at Ortel’s list of “exhibits” and “Laureate Education” came up several times.
Found this:
It was recently revealed through Hillary’s emails that during her first year as Secretary of State she insisted that Laureate Education be included in the guest list for an education policy dinner hosted at the U.S. Department of State.
“It’s a for-profit model that should be represented,” she wrote in the August 2009 email, and as a result, a senior vice president at Laureate was added to the guest list. Several months later, former President Bill Clinton became an honorary chancellor of Laureate International Universities, which turned out to be incredibly lucrative. He was paid a cool $16.5 million between 2010 and 2014 for his role with the for-profit college.
But, since “for-profit colleges” are falling somewhat out of favor in the u. s. due to their blatantly predatory behavior, the secretary of state gig came in handy–Laureate went global–specifically everyone’s favorite international punching bag–Latin America.
Laureate gets 84 percent of its revenue from outside the U.S., and mostly from Latin American countries.
Note to Trump: It’s the basement server, stupid.
http://www.rawstory.com/2016/03/hillarys-emails-reveal-lucrative-ties-to-for-profit-colleges/
Thanks for that.
I wonder how much of this was always that way, and how much is so novel and of such a scale that it truly is unprecedented.
“honorary chancellor” – I would have thought a title of “honorary” gets you a fairly spiffy coffee mug and a t-shirt with the college’s name on it…(and they say there is no inflation)
It seems to me that we are regressing – government is solely for the selling of favors.
How much more money can be made with more and bigger government agencies, and with each agency ready to spend more (to help the little people, so it will be claimed)?
It’s a big prize, always very seductive, like The Ring, when one gets to captain the big ship.
Foundation Business as usual for Shillary is a perfect instance of collaboration horizontale (en Francais). H/t the LRB…
It is never too early to think of Christmas presents, and I always buy some naff novelty items for those people I don’t want to give a proper gift to, but instead have some (hopefully) droll, ironic, love-to-hate gift. One sure-fire winner, for example, is a Buckingham Palace tea caddy for my ardent republican friends. Well, I laugh, anyway.
For my lefty comrades I was going to, as another example, give Tory concern-trolling Labour mugs. Which then set me thinking “I wonder what Hillary has in that line?”. So off I went to Shop Hillary (and, my darlings, how many people from all walks of life haven’t uttered those very same words at some time or other, brandishing cheques with varying amounts of zeros on them?) to have a scout around. Of course, in all good conscience, I couldn’t actually buy anything official from there, but at least I’d know what fakes to look up on ebay.
Quel dommage! Nothing at all in the way of anti-Trump mugs. Hillary, I rarely give free advice, why should I, but for you I’ll make an exception: Learn from Britain’s Conservative Party — start churning out Anti-Trump mugs. Immediately begin seeking out suppliers and get your team onto creating some designs. You’re missing a trick there and no mistake. I won’t even ask for a royalty fee. See, I’m really all heart. Love and sticky kisses, yours untruly, Clive.
Austrian Far-Right Candidate Norbert Hofer Narrowly Loses Presidential Vote (NYT)
Am I the only one who finds it weird (but not strange) that there is an almost total news blackout on the actual winner of the Austrian Presidency, an ex-Green? It’s almost as if the MSM is afraid to note that there is a left in addition to a center-right and far-right.
Narrowly is the key word. And the bourgeois parties don’t ever seem to figure in Austrian politics lately.
i’m not sure that austrian green is anything like the green you’re thinking of. my understanding is that the president-elect is a status-quo neoliberal.
Not sure there was that much of a media blackout; it actually seemed pretty hefty given that the presidency is a mostly ceremonial role in Austria. NYT has had a link on their top three international stories since last night.
I also saw stories in FT and the Guardian.
It’s just that all the headlines and stories are about the guy who lost, not the guy who won, about whom I know absolutely nothing.
Valid point.
What I thought was weird — is weird — is that the far-right guy had won the first round and was ahead in all the polls and yet miraculously when the “postal votes” were counted it was juuuuuust enough to make the “other guy” the winner. That is a miracle worthy of Karl Rove or Wasserman-Schultz.
yep…………
don’t worry though ………. cracks are beginning to appear in the dam of fraud!
Re: Disposable Americans.
“What’s astonishing is the disregard that many of the super-rich have for struggling Americans.”
No, that’s not astonishing in the least. That’s been a feature of the wealthy since the dawn of time.
Another vote here for the Harpers Le Pen article.
1. It’s worth reading just for the inherent credentialed class shock at some of Le Pen’s less-publicised popular policies:
2. A great counterpoint to the Harpers article can be found in today’s NYT Upshot, in which Peter Eavis stuffs the FOMC minutes in his ears and repeatedly shouts “The Economy is OK! The Economy is OK! The Economy is OK!” all whilst the rabble fill his pretty garden, wielding pitchforks. There is an overwhelming aversion to economic awareness amongst the elites whereby they seek to divert any dispatches from the real economy most people are living and try to funnel it into identity politics instead (Trump/Le Pen are attracting the dumb lower classes because theyre all anti-immigrant racists”!) Or as Eavis would have it:
Double down on oblivious.
3. This last point can also be seen in how the US pundit class has processed the debacle in Brasil. The commentary seems to have run in 3 stages:
Again what gets swallowed up in this intellectual masturbaganza is that the problem with the new Temer cabinet is not so much that it is all white but rather that it is implementing neoliberal policies that Brasilians have rejected in elections for the last 16 years. But the chattering classes don’t understand that because to them market-friendly is awesome, why dont the dumb French, Brasilian, US masses get this?
i hope mr ortel doesn’t get into any small planes (or any large planes flying over dodgy territory) or drive a car that can be hijacked remotely. i look forward to what he produces on the most corrupt couple in the world.
The comedy show in the New York Times continues with this “soul searching” opinion piece about why Hillary Clinton is so disliked as a presidential candidate.
I don’t think anyone’s bothered to analyze the methods of “Correct the Record,” but flooding NYT’s online comment sections with “I don’t have to like my president to vote for her!” and “people hate her because the right wing has slandered her for decades!” and then vote-brigading these comments (none of them have less than 100 “recommendations”) — pushes the boundaries of good taste.
Clinton campaign’s new slogan:
Hillary 2016 – You don’t have to like her to vote for her!
When did ‘good taste’ have ANYTHING in common with Truth?
The fact that is is a question and not simply, “Why Clinton is Disliked”, speaks volumes. This election season alone has enough legitimate information to go above and beyond answering that question.
Hint: the crazy GOP conspiracies have nothing to do with it. That excuse won’t fly anymore.
From “I can’t be responsible for every undercapitalized entrepreneur in America” (1993) to “We’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business” (2016), Hillary has a sharp-elbowed way of poking her opponents in the ribs, which inspires their relentless opposition.
The woman is uncivil, disagreeable, and lacking in diplomacy. Becoming a la-di-da multimillionaire has only exacerbated these unflattering qualities, which no amount of money, surgery or personal coaching can fix.
She is not alone.
If you look, you will see that she (and her ‘way’) is an inspiration to many who want to and will be like her.
Sort of her clone army.
Maybe her ‘movement.’ Perhaps her religion.
they aim not for the ribs…..but for the eyes!
…and not with elbows…but with long, sharp, fingernails….. preferably faux!
Fascist leaning property mobster vs. Empress warmongering dowager…can we just hit the reset button ??
Is there any question the super delegates need to bolt $hillary…
Is it evil-evil, evil-good. good-evil or good-good for the following 2 scenarios:
1. President Trump investigates Hillary
2. President Hillary investigates Trump
Should it or how does it impact how one votes?
It should or it shouldn’t?
Raising the minimum wage would matter the most in Texas [Houston Chronicle]
The state has more workers making $7.25 or less than anywhere else in the country.
Which is why it will never happen.
… which is why people are fleeing the labor-exploiting horror of Texas.
Oh, wait …
It’s puzzling to me though, that more people have not fled to Mexico, where wages are even lower.
Yeah, and any granularity with that? How many of these ‘guest workers’ come from Mexico, and how many from the depressed and depressing South? People will move to where they have heard work is, from where work isn’t, and usually then try to work out the details. “When you’ve got nothing, you’ve got nothing to lose.”
Texas needs some homegrown Magon brothers.
Good point. Texas has a higher percentage of foreign born residents (16.5%) than the U.S. average (13.1%):
http://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/AFN120212/00,48
A lot of the population increase also comes from births, and the birth rate for Texas is above the national average, with a fertility rate of 62.9 births per 1,000 women aged 15-44 years. The Texas rate is 70.7 per 1,000 women in that age group Texas births outnumbered deaths by 220,000 in 2014. For a summary of the states, see:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/state-and-territorial-data.htm
Nation, 12.5 per 1000:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/births.htm
So a lot of the people who are added to the Texas population aren’t working (they’re babies), and a lot of the ones who are working come from low wage countries and states, as Ambrit pointed out.
i noticed these are the big 4 counties, where i expect a lot of immigrants end up–houston, dallas, san antonio and austin. that’s where the construction and restaurant/hospitality jobs are.
So how do Texans or new influx now feel about 20 odd years of deregulation of land development and the recent climatic events… drought and biblical floods…
Disasters and Deregulation
(Originally published in The Chronicle of Higher Education, July 21, 2006)
http://tedsteinberg.com/essays/disasters-and-deregulation/
Dishevled Marsupail…. but yeah… cheap dog boxes / Mc Mansions, imploding energy sector, public ed going down the gurgler, Ron Paul & BFF Gary North, and a extreme case of marginal taxation… get sum…
Ken Starr fired as president of Baylor University.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2016/05/24/kenneth-starr-reportedly-to-be-removed-as-baylor-president-amid-football-scandal/
Fantastic news. I don’t know how much its coverage may have helped bring this about but I’ll give a nod to ESPN and especially its investigative show “Outside The Lines”. They have followed this story for quite some time and kept the coverage and updates coming with unusual frequency and depth.
Class Warfare? http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_29920605/visa-involved-tesla-factory-expansion-sparks-debate
“The imported workers at the Tesla paint factory told this newspaper they made around $10 an hour — Lesnik said he received as little as $5 — and worked up to seven days a week. Tesla and its contractor, Eisenmann, said the contract with Vuzem specified a $55 hourly labor rate.”
Also discussed on KQED radio program, Forum. http://ww2.kqed.org/forum/2016/05/23/foreign-workers-at-tesla-spotlight-a-visa-system-vulnerable-to-fraud/
The online audio will be available tomorrow but the comments section available today is worth reading.
But but but: Elon Musk! Visionary entrepreneurial hero! Like Jeff Bezos, Travis Kalanick, Tim Cook…our visionary (robber baron) heroes needn’t be troubled by things like corporate responsibility, US wage laws, and US taxes…they’ve got rents to seek!
Today’s antidote is a topic near and dear to me. Thank you for sharing it and spreading the word about ending the barbarous practice of animal testing.
In the news:
New home sales came in at near 619,000 units, a 17 sigma event.
Also in the news:
Facebook guy Zuckerberg to raze 4 houses blocking his home view.
Question; Did the second (displaced homeowners) contribute to the first?
Diogenes: “Get out of my sunshine!!! I have important contemplation to do here.”
re: the intercepts political earthquake in Brazil.
Absolutely incredible that the transcript has surfaced and that the conversation between Juca and Machado was caught and then carried by Folha de São Paulo. Should it not be front page on the NYT or Guardian online when the world’s 7th largest economy and fifth largest population is discovered to be in the midst of a coup by an elite establishment? Instead subbed back under the World – Americas.
Fascinating because the level of corruption has now apparently surfaced in undeniable fashion; blatantly, explicitly and involving all of Brazil’s most powerful institutions including the Supreme Court, the media, the army and of course the lower and upper houses. This is generally when a total collapse occurs. How Brazilian democracy, more accurately, Brazil’s pretense of democracy can survive is inconceivable. Trying to imagine something similar here in the US, The 2000 Supreme Court coup in Bush vGore? Not close I think.
Also interesting that the Olympics, another deeply corrupt institution will point the world media at Brazil this summer. Can it be ignored, tidied up and swept under the rug in two months? Reminiscent of the 1968 Mexico City Olympic games and the student massacre in Tlatelolco plaza, when sprinters Carlos and Smith, US medalists in the 200m raised black gloved fists on the podium.
2000 Bush v. Gore? I think the reaction would have been the entire population just hitting the snooze button, when total, systemic, and pervasive corruption includes each of the organs of the media then the corrupt can continue to corrupt with complete impunity.
Panama Papers? Gone from the news cycle already. Snowden revelations? Ditto. The ever-giving fount of Hilary crimes? The fix is in.
In some ways I agree, we’re all mostly asleep at the wheel in this country and elsewhere.
Yet this moment in Brazil is almost unparralleled, as if the missing 18 minutes of the Nixon tape surfaced in the Sirica investigation and admitted to everything including sabotaging the 1968 Paris peace talks.
Typically as you suggest the united states of amnesia rolls over on its side, Brazil however has had insurection in the favelas and recent demonstrations manufactured and manipulated by the media. I’m not at all sure what comes next. It could just as well be an actual military coup.
Should also remember that Sanders and Trump are the result of a slow realization sinking in among the American electorate that the fix is in.
The problem for Brasil is that even if it is explicitly proven that every party, every politician and judge from traffic court and dogcatcher to President and Supreme Court are completely corrupt, that will surprise nobody, whether they are in Brasil or in Europe or in the US. We all expect as much. It therefore barely qualifies as news.
Just to clarify, so we should not expect people to take to the streets in Brazil? No outrage? After all, corruption is pervasive there, right?
China debt: it just occurs to me that China has a major home court advantage when it comes to which economic philosophy to apply in which situations in order to solve/bury problems. They can pick between Capitalism and Communism at will and apply it where and when it makes the most sense.
When they need to de-leverage the SOEs they can quickly administer debt-for-equity swaps, the State owning the equity is pure Communism, no need for philosophical hand-wringing, by 2PM that afternoon the deed is done.
On our side however, the ideologies constrain at precisely the wrong moment and in the wrong direction, on the day we gave Citibank $174B in guarantees we could have bought 100% of the outstanding common for $4B, imagine where we’d be today.
Methinks there are more than a few chuckles in the Central Committee right about now, beating the gwoi loh must look like absolute child’s play. The trick will be keeping the junkie alive long enough to extract the last drop of blood, then just pull back and watch the fireworks, maybe send another container load of iPhones or counterfeit MRI machines from time to time. My advice? COD only, yuan only, no credit.
Re. the Salon “Donald Trump is going to win” piece: IMO the ‘neofascist’ opening label is inappropriate – cf. this NC reader discussion yesterday on a similarly-asserting article – but remainder of the opening few paragraphs is spot-on. Rest of article is a cognitively dissonant mix of writer trying to sound really, really smart about neoliberalism, globalization and the (non)role of the nation/state in that agenda, and in some place laughably bad, e.g. the blather obout “the successful two-thirds of American society.”
Yesterday, Mish – with whom I disagree on most things regarding what ails the bottom 90% and what might help them, but who has been consistently right re. Trump’s rise (though he notes he considers Trump’s anti-globalization talk inane), ran a piece, Grim Election Map for Trump? Fox Analyst vs. RCP vs. Mish centered on a recent ‘analysis’ by Fox News pet in-house faux-progressive Juan Williams, who examines the electoral map by viewing Trump as Romney-with-louder-PR, but the above Salon piece notes that this may well be 180 degrees wrong – in this election, it is Hillary who represents the water carrier for the transnational capitalist rentier class.
Would that be the 2/3 of Americans who couldn’t come up with $1000 in an emergency?