From Pine View Farm

July, 2014 archive

Homogenized 0

What Noz said.

The Stupid. It burns.

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Sugar Babies 0

In Florida, Daniel Ruth offers a new domino theory, a honeyed tail of sweetening the pols pot.

How do you tell the difference between a political pig at the trough and a wild boar? The Tallahassee swine species requires a lobbyist leash.

Tampa Bay Times reporters Michael Van Sickler and Craig Pittman reported Sunday that for years some of our august public servants took time out from crusading for responsible government to sneak away to Texas for swanky hunting vacations at the King Ranch with expenses paid by U.S. Sugar.

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The Unraveling of the Regency, What’s My Line Dept. 0

Vivian Paige, preeminent local politics blogger and columnist for my local rag, asks, “Will the real Regent please stand up?”

The second day of the McDonnell trial brought the bombshell revelation of a splintered family. I couldn’t help but remember the former governor’s 1989 thesis, which was made public during his gubernatorial campaign. In it, Bob McDonnell lamented the breakdown of the traditional family and proposed specific policy proposals to curb it.

Either McDonnell didn’t take his own advice, or the defense is just an effort to win an acquittal. In either case, the Bob McDonnell of 1989 wouldn’t recognize the Bob McDonnell of 2014.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Be polite in the halls of commerce.

When the employee brought out the manager, Jaudon started yelling and calling the employee vulgar names.

Jaudon then slapped the employee across the face.

The employee grabbed Jaudon and threw her to the ground.

Once separated, Jaudon threatened to kill the employee and admitted that she had a gun.

She then went outside, got a gun out of her vehicle and waved it around, threatening to kill the employee once again.

Via Southern Beale.

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No Reason Needed 0

Obama Derangement Syndrome starts to boil over.

Jim Wright has a brilliant post about the wingnuts’ Obama Derangement Syndrome at Stonekettle Kitchen. A snippet (emphasis in the original):

Six years they’ve been telling us Obama is going to destroy America. And every year it gets louder and more shrill and more strident and more panicked and more desperately insane.

And yet – and yet – far from an America destroyed, our nation has steadily improved day by day, month after month, year after year during the entirety of Obama’s Administration. We are better off here in the United States than we have ever been and better off than nearly anywhere else on the planet.

In much of the rest of the world the problems are starvation, hunger, malnutrition, pervasive poverty, epidemic disease, war, rape, terror, slavery, horrifying oppression, homelessness, murder, genocide, natural and manmade disasters in endless succession.

But here in the United States, we are so well off that our worst problem at present, the “crisis” that presently dominates our headlines, is that millions of the less fortunate desperately want to become Americans.

Think about that for a second, won’t you?

Read the rest. He doesn’t write often, but he writes brilliantly.

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“Disruptors”–Just Another Word for Scofflaws 0

My local rag has an excellent editorial on Uber and Lyft. A nugget (emphasis added):

In other words, under existing state code, taxicabs must follow the rules of both the state and the locality in which they operate. They must have insurance to protect people in the event of an accident. They must comply with identification rules. They are required to follow additional regulations to protect passengers.

And that’s the kind of red tape Uber and Lyft have fought all over America. Both because it threatens a business model that depends on the low overhead made possible by ignoring state regulations and because the ideology of the new economy demands it.

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Beyond the Palin 0

Funny or Die lauds the features of the new “Sarah Palin Channel.

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Nothing To Do, Nowhere To Go 0

Looking up a bit. (The most surprising part of this is in bold.)

Fewer Americans filed applications for unemployment insurance benefits over the past month than at any time in more than eight years, signaling employers are hanging on to workers as demand improves.

The four-week average of jobless claims, considered a less volatile measure than the weekly figure, dropped to 297,250, the lowest since April 2006, from 300,750 the prior week. Claims in the period ended July 26 climbed to 302,000, in line with the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg, from a revised 279,000 the prior week that was the lowest since 2000.

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Suffer the Children 0

Republicans:  The border crisis is Obama's fault.  We demand that he help us amend the 2006 anti-trafficking law that makes it harder to deport Central American children that was passed in 2006 by unanimous consent and signed by George W. Bush.  (pause)  Obama made us do it.

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

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QOTD 0

Phillip K. Dick:

Certainly it constitutes bad news if the people who agree with you are buggier than batshit.

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LICKR Is Quickr 0

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None Dare Call It Treason 0

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Facebook Frolics, Conservapedia Dept. 0

Facebook apparently is too liberal, so some wingnuts are starting their own site, where they can wallow unmolested in hate.

The Rude One’s comments on this are a delight.

Via the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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Profit Motive 0

We need single-payer (emphasis added–read the rest).

An analysis this year by NerdWallet Health found that about 60 percent of all bankruptcies are health-related. And a comprehensive study by Harvard researchers who examined a large sample of 2007 bankruptcy filings found that “using a conservative definition, 62.1 percent of all bankruptcies . . . were medical.” That research, published in the American Journal of Medicine, found that most of these “medical debtors were well-educated, owned homes and had middle-class occupations.”

And although access to health insurance can help stave off medical debt, it doesn’t solve the problem. About 10 million insured Americans have medical bills they are unable to pay. The Harvard researchers found that three-quarters of the medical debtors they studied had health insurance.

As long as the primary goal of health insurance is paying country-club fees for health insurance CEOs, we are screwed.

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Thom Cracks the Code 0

From the website:

Thom Hartmann shares from his book, “Cracking the Code”, the differences between how Liberals and Conservatives view the world.

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“Map My Teabag” 2

TPM has an interactive map where you can find out just how popular teabaggery is in your county.

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Aye, She’s a Fey Lassie 0

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Politeness must be inculcated from a young age.

Police said they believe the mother and her boyfriend were sleeping in the house when the 3-year-old located a handgun and accidentally shot himself in the chest, Lt. Dennis Wilson said.

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QOTD 0

Arthur Wellesley, First Duke of Wellington:

Be discreet in all things, and so render it unnecessary to be mysterious about any.

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The Unraveling of the Regency 0

The Regent went on trial today, and the trail opened with a bombshell.

Here’s a snippet from a long report in my local rag:

Those revelations came Tuesday morning during the opening statement of Maureen McDonnell’s defense team.

Attorney Bill Burck said Maureen McDonnell was unhappy and lonely as a governor’s wife. By the time Williams came onto the scene, the former first couple were “barely on speaking terms,” but were “putting on a brave face” for the public.

Burck said Williams used Maureen McDonnell to get to her husband, lavishing her with the “attention and time” she was not getting from “the other man in her life.”

Family Values. It’s a Republican thing.

Video ia C&L, which has more.

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