February, 2009 archive
And This Surprises Us How? 0
It’s a long report, worth the seven or eight minutes it takes to read it. From TPM Muckraker:
In large part because of that noncooperation, Justice Department officials sought criminal prosecutors in at least two cases so far to take over their investigations so that they can compel the testimony of many of those officials to testify through the use of a federal grand jury.
The Rich Are Different from You and Me 0
They have enough money to make a getaway.
Bushonomics: The Hangover 0
All together now,
Missing the Obvious 1
Dick Polman:
(snip)
Do they not recognize how badly they have been rolled, how the Democrats may well have swiped one of their signature issues?
The missed obvious: They weren’t tax cuts for the rich.
Debtors Prisons 1
While I was looking at the headlines this morning, I remembered this building:
It’s an old debtors prison. It’s where persons who couldn’t pay their debt used to go until they could pay their debts. A student of the dialectic will immediately recognize the internal contradiction in that practice. Persons in prison generally aren’t in a position to earn money so as to pay off anything.
This is a new debtors prison:
The View from the Aquarium 0
Distilled by Skippy.
Even a Blind Pig Finds an Acorn Once in a While 0
Break Time 0
Off to drink liberally.
Truth. No Reconciliation. (Updated) 1
David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey in today’s Washington Post:
(snip)
Attempting to prosecute political opponents at home or facilitating their prosecution abroad, however much one disagrees with their policy choices while in office, is like pouring acid into our democratic machinery.
(There’s more at the link.)
Not that I think that prosecutions are a good idea, but, I’m sorry, suborning torture is not a “policy difference.”
Addendum, after Drinking Liberally:
The Booman:
Kiss of Dearth 0
No-kissing signs were put up at the station’s taxi and drop-off zone designated for rail travellers, as outbreaks of passion appeared to threaten the punctuality of traffic at the station operated by – yes – Virgin Rail.
NPR points out that the railroad owns a parking garage near the station which is ideal for extended smooching (ka-ching!).
LaLa Land 1
No. Not California.
Well, in addition to California.
Rich white guys who have jobs and work for the Wall Street Journal:
In an effort to ensure swift passage of his fiscal stimulus plan, which is aimed at arresting the recession, the president and his aides have used jargon that risks making it worse, to say the least.
Sorry, buddy. Whislin’ don’t put food on the table.
Return of Beyond the Palin 1
A rose by any other name . . . . (might be a turnip, but that’s a different issue).
“Sore Losers” 0
I Don’t Like California 1
I have spent a lot of time there, most of it in that fantasy called Southern California, a place that has no vegetation not imported from Florida and no water not stolen from Colorado.
SoCal was best described in Two Years before the Mast as a wasteland that no one would want to live in and where no one wanted to do real work.
It has since become a wasteland that many want to live in, thanks to Edison’s Magic Lantern. Real work, well, that’s another topic.
Now the California Republican Party is determined to destroy Cali before it drops into the sea.
Apparently, I don’t dislike California as much as its own resident Republicans do.
(Aside: Are all Republicans nutcases, or just most of them? No. Really. How can supposedly sentient beings be so Godforsakenly stupid?)
I Get Email 2
Really lame emails from major national insolvent banks.
The subject line said “confidential.” (They had my email because I signed up to get my whatchamaycallit W-4 whatever form the interest is reported on? last year). What the heck is confidential about this?
Call us to discuss your mortgage and services that
may be of interest!Consider one of these simple options to contact us, check your account status and make your monthly mortgage payment if you wish.
Option 1: Go to www.[bankname].com to automatically make your payment.
Option 2: Call us, at [toll-free number] and select Option 2 to make your payment by phone.
Please call us today!
I’m not going to call them to discuss anything (‘cept maybe their bonuses, but you know the poor minimum wage bozo who is doing honest work by answering the telly phone doesn’t get a bonus–after all, he or she is doing honest work; that’s not bonus-worthy).
They send me a bill. I send them a payment.
They have no other services that may be of interest.
Boneheads.
Oh, yeah. It’s ungrammatical also. It is a sin to omit the last comma in a series.
Ungrammatical boneheads.
“Now Playing” 1
One of the things I like about my new MP3 player is that, if I shut it down in the middle of a podcast and later turn it back on, it gives me a chance to pick up right where I left off with two clicks.
I just discovered that Comcast’s On Demand does something similar, except that it takes three clicks. I paused a show, then went downstairs to fight with Windows (Windows put up a titanic struggle, but I wrestled it down to the electrons for three falls) and came back to find the On Demand main menu screen on display.
But I was able to restart my program at the 27 minute mark.
Drink Liberally 0
You’re out of work or your company is teetering on Chapter 11.
You work for a bank and nobody likes you anymore.
You still have a job but the folks on either side of you? Oh. Well.
What else is there to do? Good friends, good food, good times.
Triumph Brewing Company, 1 1/2 blocks from Front on Chestnut, Philadelphia, Pa., 6 p., every Tuesday.
Nothing in the weather forecast about “wintry mixes” or car crashes all over the highways.
If my cold doesn’t come back on me tomorrow, I might actually make it for the first time in what seems like a month of Sundays.