2013 archive
Feeding at the Public Trough 0
The NFL head-butts the taxpayers, aka the “fans.”
David Cay Johnston analyzes the concussion settlement.
(snip)
Still, Rishe missed the big story by not asking an obvious question: If the settlement does not cover all the costs of medical care, much less lost future wages, who will bear that burden?
Answer: Taxpayers.
The average left after those costs above is just $150,000. [Update: To arrive at these illustrative calculations I divided the settlement figure by the approximately 4,500 plaintiffs. Dividing by the full list of retirees and surviving spouses—several times larger—would reduce the average per-player allotment.] Since some players, or their families in the case of dead players, may collect as much as $5 million, even that average figure is inflated. That figure, a typical payout of less than $150,000 per player, should have set reporters to asking if it was in fact enough to cover the players’ medical costs. NFL players only have health insurance while workingfor the length of their careers plus five years, a highly relevant detail for any industry that knows many workers will be unemployable due to on-the-job injuries.Makes sense in a way, I guess. After all, the Emperor helped pay for the circuses in the Roman Coliseum.
More Xes and $s at the link.
Credibility Gaffe 0
Rajan Menon thinks that blowing up stuff in Syria is not relevant to America’s international “credibility.”
“Credibility” has great power in national security debates.
(snip)
In reality, the credibility gambit often combines sleight of hand with lazy thinking (historical parallels tend to be asserted, not demonstrated) and is a variation on the discredited domino theory. This becomes apparent if one examines how it is being deployed in the debate on Syria.
Making a futile and pointless gesture, one that is agreed will ultimately accomplish nothing, though, will most certainly undermine “credibility”; such is politics a la Animal House.
“Here She Comes, Miss America” 0
But will anyone notice the new incarnation of this hollow, silly, exploitative spectacle which has always tried to pretend it’s about something other than staring at putting girls on display for money, burlesque without the moves*?
Karen Heller reminisces:
Never cover Miss A a second time.
Little has changed since. The press is still asked to call the organization “a scholarship program,” not a pageant. The whatever-it-is must be promoted as “the world’s largest provider of scholarship assistance for young women,” yet most winners ultimately become anchorbots and infomercial chatterboxes. True, there are doctors, lawyers, and Vanessa Williams, the most talented Miss A ever, but the year’s first Miss A, Mallory Hytes Hagan of Brooklyn, 23, claims her ambition is to “obtain a degree in cosmetics and fragrance marketing.” How much scholarship assistance does she need for that?
Back when I was a young ‘un, news stories for the new Miss America in even the most proper paper carried the winner’s measurements. They no longer do so.
Now we wait for the sex tape.
___________________
*Afterthought: And without the honesty.
Digital Divides 0
Right here in River City.
Well, just down the road a piece:
Unable to get high-speed Internet or cable TV or reliable phone service, about a dozen residents have banded together to press local communications companies and the city government to come to their aid.
Cox Cable and Verizon say it’s outside their service areas.
More properly, it’s inside their service areas, completely surrounded by folks with access to home broadband, an island of dialup in a sea of speed.
It’s been almost a decade since I used dial-up. I have no idea how long it would take to have one of today’s heavy, graphics intensive, script-laden web pages full of embedded video to load over a 28.8 modem. Days, I imagine. Long enough that, when residents of Land of Fortune Road need to use the internet to do such things as, say, fill out college applications or check their course assignments, it’s easier for them to drive to Starbucks than wait for the download.
At the rate my cable and phone bills go up annually with no improvement of service (which is, I must say to be fair, pretty reliable), one would think a bit of them could be used to lay some cable for Land of Fortune’s unfortunates.
What Goeth before a Fall? (HInt: It’s Not Pride) 0
Follow the link.
This trap opened with the Iranian Revolution and continued with the defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. That historical event contributed to the fall of the Soviet Union but created a psychological trap for the West, that of invincibility. That led to the first Gulf War and insidiously and cumulatively developed into a direct threat to the West slowly dragging us into a vortex of barbarity, self-deception and degradation of political life.
And the answer to the question is
(Junk) Bonding with the News 0
I remember when employees first were given the right to shift their funds about in their IRAs.
Something would happen and, the next day, some folks would be on the phone moving money from “high-risk” to “low-risk” funds or vicey versey.
It was silly, stupid, and often self-defeating. Closing the barn door after the horse etc.
At MarketWatch, George Sisti explains to whom to turn:
More from his expert at the link.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” (Updated) 0
Another random act of politeness.
“We can characterize this young women’s death, as unintended and extremely tragic,” said Cmdr. Jeff Satur, Longmont police spokesman.
Addendum, the Next Day:
She was shot by one of those good guys with a gun.
Update from the Foreclosure-Based Economy 0
The thug life.
Sustaining Supremacy 0
Learn how it takes place; go here and listen to the podcast.
This Is Not Right 0
What’s really sad about this column is not its purported point (that, by how they might look or dress, women don’t “ask for” being raped).
It is the casual, tacit acceptance by the writer, a young college student, that women
Memory Lane 0
I remember these days very well.
Some would bring them back.
In fact, some would be quite happy to bring back these days:
Video via Contradict Me.
Business Models 0
Daniel Ruth puts it in a nutshell.