From Pine View Farm

Mammon category archive

Cry Babies 0

Paul Krugman warn us “to beware the pettiness of the powerful,” observing that

. . . what men who can afford anything tend to want, more than money per se, is adulation. And when they don’t get it, they all too often go politically crazy.

Follow the link for his evidence.

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He’s All about the Benjamins 0

How is this not begging for a bribe?

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Lead Poisoned 0

Anna Clark, reporter at ProPublica covering issues in the MidWest, discusses her recent reporting on the Flint water crisis, 10 years later.

Learn more here.

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It’s All about the Benjamins 0

PoliticalProf follows the money.

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What’s in a Name? 0

At Above the Law, Joe Patrice considers a Reuters report that Tesla is under investigation for inflating the “self-driving” capabilities of its vehicles. A snippet:

But just how far is too far when it comes to puffery? Tesla has advertised its system as an “autopilot” despite being little more than a driver assistance program.

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This New Gilded Age 0

Title:  Growing Hypocrisy.  Frame One:  Two men stand in front of a chart with a line going Up.  Man one says,

Click to view the original image.

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It’s All about the Benjamins 0

At The Nation, Katrina vanden Heuvel looks at what went wrong at Boeing. A snippet (emphasis added):

In 1997, Boeing acquired McDonnell Douglas, one of their largest competitors, in a $13.3 billion merger, which at the time was the 10th biggest in US history. In so doing, it also adopted the company’s CEO, Harry Stonecipher, into executive leadership—a man who, as Wise points out, subscribed to the Jack Welch philosophy of maximizing short-term shareholder value at all costs.

That view quickly took hold at the new Boeing. One CEO after another drove up Boeing’s stock value by skimping on its greatest assets: its world-leading engineering and the experts who made it possible. In the last decade alone, the company spent over half a billion dollars on executive pay and $40 billion on stock buybacks instead of reinvesting those profits in operations. Cracks in this approach started showing in 2018 and 2019, when two faulty 737 Max planes crashed, leaving 346 people dead.

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Non-Compete Non-Compensate Agreements 0

Sam talks with David Dayen about the FTC’s recent ruling on “non-compete” agreements and how those agreements became weaponized to suppress wages.

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The Louse Always Wins 0

Sportswriter extraordinaire Bob Molinaro runs the numbers:

BetVirginia has announced that the March sports betting handle was up 16.6% over February. “State coffers,” a press release notes, “benefitted (sic) from both college and professional basketball wagers.” As for the cost to the plungers who throw good money after bad picks or the long-range societal damage of young men getting hooked on easy online gambling, that’s not the state’s problem, right? Not for now, anyway.

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The Cryto Con 0

The grifter gifter.

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This New Gilded Age 0

Of you can read the transcript.

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The Fix Is In . . . 0

. . . and it’s all about the algorithm.

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Facebook Frolics 0

Fraudulent frolics.

Whoever would have thunk that there be scammers on “social” media?

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Misdirection Play, Crime Wavers Dept. 0

Thom makes the case that, despite conventional wisdom, inequality (such as, for example, the effects of Ronald Reagan’s “trickle on economics”), not poverty alone, is the primary root of crime.

He provides some telling examples.

In related vein, speaking of arrogant billionaires . . . .

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It’s All about the Algorithm 0

Shorter Cameron Smith: Paul Simon was prescient.

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The Disinformation Superhighway 0

At Psychology Today Blogs, Stacey Woods offers some tips to avoid being taken in by scams on “social” media.

It’s required reading, because, as has been so often demonstrated, “social” media isn’t.

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Suffer the Children 0

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Twits Own Twitter X Offenders 0

Above the Law reports that Elon Musk seems ill-deposed.

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Reverse Midas 0

Real estate genius, indeed.

Residents at Trump Plaza, a 40-story high-rise in the suburban New York city of New Rochelle, are pushing for the building to be renamed and to escape a near-two decade association with the legally-troubled ex-president and real estate mogul.

It would follow the slew of buildings in New York City and elsewhere that have abandoned the Trump name since he entered politics, as Trump has become a divisive, much-loathed figure by liberals even as he is loved by his fans.

(snip)

In February the New York Times reported that after Trump became president the value of apartments in buildings bearing his name had underperformed market value. Buildings which had stripped the Trump name had seen their value shoot back up.

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Fly the Fiendly Skies 0

The miles just seem to disappear>

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