From Pine View Farm

February, 2012 archive

“Workers of Lawlessness” 0

What Field said.

There’s nothing to add.

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Q. Where Does “Unlimited” Mean “Limited”? 0

A. On Southwestern Bell Cingular AT&T.

And the judge doesn’t think that’s right:

When AT&T started slowing down the data service for his iPhone, Matt Spaccarelli, an unemployed truck driver and student, took the country’s largest telecommunications company to small claims court. And won.

His award: $850.

Pro-tem Judge Russell Nadel found in favor of Spaccarelli in Ventura Superior Court in Simi Valley on Friday, saying it wasn’t fair for the company to purposely slow down his iPhone, when it had sold him an “unlimited data” plan.

AT&T says it will appeal so it can continue to limit unlimited.

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Homework Cat 0

Cat with "Angel Cat" Book

No matter what we do, we can’t get her to read the book.

H/T Susan for the pic.

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Twaddling Clothes 0

PoliticalProf observes:

One constantly hears that Republicans are the party of small government while Democrats are the party of big government. And, of course, the person making this claim usually makes it clear that small government is good and big government is bad.

Except, of course, this characterization of the two parties’ positions on government is factual twaddle.

Follow the link to find out why.

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Endless War 0

AKA full employment for Generals, consultants, and munitions makers.

Asia Times considers the ambling course of endless war over what seems like endless decades.

With the United States now well into the second decade of what the Pentagon has styled as an “era of persistent conflict”, the war formerly known as the global war on terrorism (unofficial acronym WFKATGWOT) appears increasingly fragmented and diffuse. Without achieving victory, yet unwilling to acknowledge failure, the United States military has withdrawn from Iraq. It is trying to leave Afghanistan, where events seem equally unlikely to yield a happy outcome.

Elsewhere – in Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia, for example – US forces are busily opening up new fronts. Published reports that the United States is establishing “a constellation of secret drone bases” in or near the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula suggest that the scope of operations will only widen further.

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Obsessive/Repulsive 0

Clarence Page muses upon Republicans’ skeevy (my word, not his) fascination with the sex lives of others. A nugget:

How has an election year that was supposed to be all about economic recovery suddenly become all about sex? Critics blame the media. They have a point. The media keep reporting what the candidates are saying.

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ISO . . . 0

. . . a coincidence.

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QOTD 0

Bayard Rustin:

To be afraid is to behave as if the truth were not true.

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Dustbiters 0

And the digit counters fall. Tonight’s list of banks no more:

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Driving while Brown, in Your Merry Mittmobile 0

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They Just Can’t Hide It Any More 0

The appeal to bigotry, that is:

Appearing on MSNBC, (Santorum spokesperson Alice–ed.) Stewart said that when Santorum accused President Obama this weekend of having a non-Biblical theology, he was referring to Obama’s “radical Islamic policies.”

But shortly after her appearance, Stewart phoned MSNBC to say that she had misspoken, that she had actually meant to reference Obama’s “radical environmentalist policies.”

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Hollow Party, Hollow Men 0

The Booman Tribune contributes two excellent articles contemplating the hollowness of Mitt the Flip and of Republicanism in general.

Here’s a bit from the first:

This is what happens when you take a poll-driven position that is wrong on the merits. Romney opposed the bailout (of auto manufacturers–ed.) because he saw it as a way to score political points. Because the bailout was deeply unpopular, he assumed that he’d be well-placed later on for having opposed it. And so one piece of bullshit begat another and begat another and begat another. In the end, Romney wound up in the same place he wound up with ObamaCare, out on an island surrounded by a sea of contradictory nonsense and lies, looking like the most inauthentic man to ever run for high office.

And from the second:

Conservatives have done a great job of organizing to take over the Republican Party, but they seem like the dog that caught the car. The dog doesn’t know how to drive. The dog doesn’t even think a car should drive. That’s why they chased it in the first place. In the first issue of the National Review, William F. Buckley said “It stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.” I think he launched a movement that succeeded in slowing the government to a stop. But where do the Republicans go from here?

In other words, conservatives have basically arrived at their destination and now they are in a position to actually act on their rhetoric. And people want no part of their actual agenda, which has been fueled on lies and bullshit and fear and paranoia.

Check them both out.

It would appear that the contemporary Republican party has gotten a field of candidates that it deserves.

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Mitt the Flip, Lover 0

Just sad.

Via Balloon Juice.

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This Is Not Right 0

The weather forecast for today is 80 Fahrenheits with severe thunderstorms.

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Endless War, the Quest for Enemies 0

Sign the petition.

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QOTD 0

W. E. B. Du Bois:

If there is anybody in this land who thoroughly believes that the meek shall inherit the earth they have not often let their presence be known.

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Spill Here, Spill Now 0

Though it’s largely out of the news, Buccaneer Petroleum’s wild well continues to soil the lives of people, even as Buccaneer Petroleum ups its dividend:

Bloomberg itemizes the damage.

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Who Said It? 0

Take the quiz.

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Little Ricky, Public Servant 0

Ronnie Polaneczky reminds us:

But the more I thought about asking Santorum to shut up, the more I realized that we need him to keep blathering.

Because the more he talks, the more he reminds us that the personal liberties enjoyed by Americans – particularly female Americans – are always at threat from primitive minds that want to rescind rights we thought had already been won.

Read the rest.

In other news, I understand that Primitive Minds is protesting the comparison as slanderous.

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Nothing To Do, Nowhere To Go 0

Signs of a positive trend continue.

Applications for jobless benefits were unchanged in the week ended Feb. 18 at 351,000, the fewest since March 2008, Labor Department figures showed today. The median projection in a Bloomberg News survey called for 355,000 claims, marking the fourth straight week that the figures have been better than forecast. The number of people on unemployment benefit rolls dropped to the lowest level since August 2008.

(snip)

The four-week moving average, a less-volatile measure, declined to 359,000, also the lowest since March 2008, from 366,000.

The number of people continuing to collect jobless benefits dropped by 52,000 in the week ended Feb. 11 to 3.39 million. The continuing claims figure does not include the number of workers receiving extended benefits under federal programs.

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