tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52313686979161083692012-01-28T05:37:49.384-08:00Tell It Like It IsWe're going to explore what the meaning of "is" is: for you, for them, for me... but mostly for me.Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.comBlogger16271100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-53030606876292040742012-01-27T12:29:00.001-08:002012-01-27T12:29:19.070-08:00Bloomberg: U.S. economy powered by slaveryJust keep this in mind when folks talk about going back to the "good old days" of the 18th and 19th centuries. America's economy was powered by slavery, and the wealth generated by slavery reverberates in today's companies like Lehman Bros., Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase. How Slavery Led to Modern Capitalism: EchoesBy Sven Beckert and Seth Rockman January 24, 2012 | BloombergURL: http:/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-73447972081901099722012-01-20T03:33:00.001-08:002012-01-20T03:34:24.741-08:00China subsidizing solar exports to U.S.So China is smart and we're dumb, or rather, we naively stick to the rules of the "free market" while China plays by the rules of real business. China's goal is to drive U.S. solar panel makers out of business and dominate U.S. market share by dumping panels that are about 10 percent cheaper on the U.S. Once their work is done, the Chinese government will stop providing $30 billion in subsidies Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-73846198607066130612012-01-19T23:36:00.001-08:002012-01-19T23:37:51.408-08:00The 'Duh' Files: Condoms & family planning prevent HIV, abortionsThere were two articles in two days from New Scientist on the impact of condoms and family planning in preventing the spread of HIV and abortions. It's too bad the U.S. spent 8 years under Dubya de-emphasizing both these commonsense measures globally, especially in Africa. How many deaths could have been prevented? Unsafe abortions rise as contraceptive funding is cutBy Andy CoghlanJanuary 19, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-60434740797585835292012-01-19T09:02:00.001-08:002012-01-19T23:38:47.937-08:00'Libertarian' Koch bros. are hypocrites taking gov't subsidiesEven worse, the evil Koch bros. take their $41 million in government agricultural subsidies and plow it back into unregulated campaign spending, lobbying, and their army of think tanks. We're paying for these pro-laissez-faire hypocrites to buy our political system.Biofuel companies awarded bulk of state aidCritics have questioned the amount of public money pumped into the industry January 15, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-60078009601270067532012-01-19T03:14:00.001-08:002012-01-19T23:40:04.072-08:00DC Johnston: Shrink the IRS, grow the deficitKind of reminds me of Republicans' stance on illegal immigration: Let's enforce the laws currently on the books, eh? Every hour spent enforcing our tax laws produces almost $10,000 in lawful, legally-owed revenues which go to shore up our deficit hole. Now that's real bang for our taxpayer buck. Those who want to de-fund the IRS are simply anti-tax zealots who don't believe in the rule of law Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-25644178290856979682012-01-18T09:33:00.001-08:002012-01-18T09:35:41.934-08:00Progressive California pulling the rest with it, againThank goodness for the United State of California, the 8th largest economy in the world. When California says "jump," industry asks "how high?" California is so big that their progressive reforms will trickle down to the Red States and flyover country, too -- in fact all over the world. This is the very opposite of the "race to the bottom," the dark side of globalization. California Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-48977484164458223272012-01-18T09:32:00.001-08:002012-01-18T09:36:54.181-08:00Britain Vice PM: Israeli settlements are 'vandalism'When you're not beholden to the Israel lobby as a politician, sometimes you can get away with telling the truth. Hear, hear!Nick Clegg: Israel Settlements Are 'Deliberate Vandalism' By David StringerJanuary 16, 2012 | Huffington PostURL: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/16/nick-clegg-criticizes-israel_n_1208661.htmlJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-57117361757285108252012-01-18T09:31:00.003-08:002012-01-18T09:39:40.746-08:00Stiglitz: Austerity is a 'suicide pact'Stiglitz says European austerity plans are a 'suicide pact' By Malcolm MooreJanuary 17, 2012 | The Telegraph Imposing austerity measures as countries slow towards recession is a fundamentally flawed response, said Mr Stiglitz, who won the Nobel prize in 2001 for his work on how markets work inefficiently. "The answer, even though they see over and over again that austerity leads to collapse of Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-71768130302119829032012-01-18T09:31:00.001-08:002012-01-18T09:40:26.363-08:00U.S. no longer 'land of opportunity'I missed this one earlier but fortunately stumbled across it today. Less equality, less mobility than in other countries, including "socialist" Europe. Is the American Dream dead? Harder for Americans to Rise From Lower Rungs By Jason DeParle January 4, 2012 | New York TimesBenjamin Franklin did it. Henry Ford did it. And American life is built on the faith that others can do it, too: rise fromJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-38272598491159564702012-01-17T09:27:00.001-08:002012-01-17T09:30:06.293-08:00Neocons at it again with IranReal neocons never die, they just shut up for a while. Now they're crying for war with Iran, again. Will these dufuses ever learn? Are they insane? Iran is a country that can actually HURT us and our allies at home, unlike Iraq and Afghanistan. They have been preparing for this eventuality for years: just as we've been war-gaming, they've been preparing to make terrorist strikes. And morally,Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-25243833139250842542012-01-16T11:25:00.001-08:002012-01-20T00:12:16.888-08:00MB360: Food stamp nationI know ya'll want to blame this on 'Bama, but c'mon, you know it's not true. He's been adding private sector jobs almost every month since the end of the recession in mid-2009. But he's still digging us out of 7-million jobs hole. (Yeah, yeah, I know: the POTUS, no matter who he is, doesn't sit in the Oval Office pulling the levers of the U.S. economy, but then that's just more reason not to Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-8380370765203847032012-01-16T10:59:00.001-08:002012-01-17T09:32:08.055-08:00Robert Parry: Founders couldn't have stopped ObamacareAll you "strict constitutionalists" out there better make sure you're not reading revisionist history. Robert Parry quotes the Founding Dudes and a Reagan-appointed conservative judge. It's case closed. Ron Paul's False Founding NarrativeBy Robert Parry January 13, 2012 | Consortium News Exclusive: Rep. Ron Paul and other right-wingers have lured many average Americans into their camp by Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-72205530056094390782012-01-16T09:07:00.001-08:002012-01-16T09:07:31.080-08:00NYT: Who is the 1 percent?Just who makes up the 1 percent? What are their hopes and fears, their dreams and failings, their favorite sports teams? .... Do we care? No -- just tax the hell out of 'em! Seriously though, I suppose regional cost of living differences do matter. So we could easily take the upper East/West Coast bound of, say, over $1 million income per household, and raise taxes on them to post-WWII Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-9607203235109804622012-01-15T05:58:00.000-08:002012-01-15T06:00:00.798-08:00Reuters: 'Zombie banks' try to fool markets to delay inevitablePublicly traded banks which come clean about the real value of their bad loans get punished by the market, so they have adopted a "delay-and-pray" strategy. How many "zombie banks" are still out there? As long as they keep playing tricks and papering over their losses, we won't know for sure... until it's too late and it causes are crisis or a call for another expensive government bailout. Why Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-68135195635338421312012-01-15T05:45:00.001-08:002012-01-15T05:47:37.929-08:00Reuters: Who profits from Greek debt deal?Greece's government is asking its creditors to accept a 50 percent reduction (haircut) in the principle amount owed to them.The major creditors, mostly hedge funds, are still holding out, they won't accept Greece's offer. It's interesting to note that the original creditors or holders of Greece's debt got out a long time ago and sold their bonds for anywhere from 20-45 cents on the euro, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-86247266579290630442012-01-15T05:24:00.001-08:002012-01-15T05:25:19.541-08:00CEA Chair Kreuger: Inequality hurts us allIt's not up for debate anymore whether income inequality has been growing in the United States since the 1970s, (with the exception of the Clinton years). America's level of inequality more closely resembles Brazil or Russia's than Germany, Japan or Great Britain's. Apropos, here are some excerpts a recent speech by Alan Krueger, the chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, to Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-40649072090764949082012-01-15T04:37:00.001-08:002012-01-15T05:26:40.699-08:00America's hidden social welfare state"Once tax expenditures for social welfare programs are included in social spending figures, the U.S. welfare state is a similar size to those in Europe." You don't hear about that every day! Here are some details:"Based on direct spending on social welfare programs as a proportion of the total economy, the U.S. (at 16.2 percent) lags behind every country in Europe except Slovakia, according to Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-69149927149655417582012-01-15T04:27:00.001-08:002012-01-15T05:28:04.643-08:00Krugman: Government can't run like a businessBoy, oh boy, if you have ever said government needs to run like a business, then you must read the latest by Krugman. Krugman also could have mentioned the fact that any large company is extremely bureaucratic. It's just a law of organizational design. It's a function of size and the complexity of the external environment. If we want government to do lots of complex things -- as the majorityJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-624352192958489022012-01-12T08:39:00.001-08:002012-01-15T05:28:54.985-08:00'Laffer curve' inventor sued for Ponzi schemeIf you think about it, the Laffer curve is kind of the opposite of a Ponzi scheme: it argues that we must put less and less money into the scheme to keep it going, and in fact we make more money the less we put in. It is one of those ideas that is so stupid yet so simple and tempting to believe in that it nevertheless catches on, in spite of all evidence to the contrary.Now it looks as if Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-24442283393550728842012-01-12T08:15:00.001-08:002012-01-12T08:17:42.622-08:00Um, about that 35% corporate tax rate...... Something is seriously wrong when more than two-thirds of a country's corporations are non-taxable. More Firms Enjoy Tax-Free Status By John D. McKinnonJanuary 10, 2012 | Wall Street JournalStoneMor Partners LP, the publicly traded firm that specializes in running cemeteries, expects to see handsome profits in coming years as baby boomers age and die. But unlike its largest rivals, its Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-23867404508671055952012-01-12T08:14:00.001-08:002012-01-12T08:18:39.726-08:00U.S. moving to universal 'Net access too slowlyObama's FCC is definitely taking steps in the right direction -- toward universal broadband Internet access -- but they are insufficient, especially given: 1) America's great wealth, population, and population dispersion; and 2) our ostensible competitive advantage in high-tech and knowledge-based industries. A few far-sighted countries like Finland and Estonia, meanwhile, have enshrined the Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-73795531171471783872012-01-12T05:08:00.001-08:002012-01-12T05:10:03.114-08:00Try EPA's new greenhouse gas data tool!This tool from the good folks at the EPA is kind of neat. It allows you to see what enterprises are emitting the most greenhouse gases in your area, whether it's carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O) or others. So it lets me see, for example, that the biggest polluter near me in my home state is a coal-fired Duke Energy power plant spitting out 4,117,452 metric tons (MT) of Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-18744389123819491682012-01-11T11:09:00.001-08:002012-01-11T11:11:00.706-08:00Israel to ban Nazi/Holocaust analogies?Israeli Jews are only about 4 years behind me, when I first supported banning Nazi/Hitler comparisons (as well as Stalin/Lenin/Communist comparisons) in our democratic polity. Such comparisons are like a very big and clumsy but powerful gun that nobody knows when to use or how to aim properly, so we'd be better off just leaving it. Israel Nazi Comparisons Bill ProposedBy Eline GordtsJanuary 12, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-82623235335936372262012-01-11T10:42:00.001-08:002012-01-11T10:50:21.589-08:00David Brooks: Why aren't there more liberals?Of course Brooks's op-ed is mostly wrong, but it's wrong in a thoughtful way, not a "liberals-hate-America-and-are-trying-to-destroy-it" way, so Brooks deserves a thoughtful response. To start, we must concede that "liberal" is a dirty word in the U.S. nowadays, unfair and silly as that may be. We liberals have failed to own it and say it proudly. (Except for me). The Right has done a pretty Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-70467755412001141992012-01-10T08:43:00.001-08:002012-01-11T10:51:16.281-08:00Despite balanced-budget amendments, states still in deficitsGet ready for the U.S. economy to get worse in 2012 as more states continue to have budget gaps, and if the federal government won't bail them out anymore, since austerity seems to be in fashion. (As we all know, government austerity measures everywhere at the same time leads to depression.) This just goes to show we can't cut our way to economic growth and prosperity. It's not the problem thatJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-66543230765686150362012-01-10T08:19:00.001-08:002012-01-11T10:57:29.300-08:00Obama's greatest failure as POTUS?One of Obama's greatest, tragic failures as President has been his willful neglect of mortgage borrowers in distress. By contrast, when the Too Big To Fail (TBTF) banks were in trouble, starting in 2007, help from Congress, Treasury and the Fed was overwhelming (in the $ trillions, not $ billions) and above all FAST, with so little oversight that to this day we don't know who got loans why and Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-34984197481853634172012-01-09T05:39:00.001-08:002012-01-09T05:39:37.008-08:00Gingrich grabs $5 M from Israel; Obama gets Israel Super PAC against himMeanwhile, The Emergency Committee For Israel has set up a Super PAC which can raise unlimited sums of cash to fight Obama. They have already taken out full-page media ads accusing Obama of "blaming Israel first," whatever the hell that means. Gingrich got $5 million for saying Palestinians are invented people (lord, why am I so cynical?) By Philip WeissJanuary 8, 2012 | MondoweissURL: http:/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-13552157512679589512012-01-08T13:57:00.001-08:002012-01-11T10:52:16.043-08:00UrbanBaby asks who's 'rich' -- NO JUDGING!This is why Republicans still do well at the ballot box. Even the coastal liberal elite won't admit they're rich; meanwhile the poor don't want to seem like "haters" and anyway aspire to be rich... er, solidly upper-middle class, too. This reminds me of the Bloomberg story from last March about a survey of actual U.S. millionaires by Fidelity Investments. Respondents said they'd need $7.5 Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-30776433708006172252012-01-08T05:41:00.001-08:002012-01-08T14:10:22.921-08:00Huntsman: Break up the TBTF banksWell, well, well, it looks like Huntsman's trying to get noticed. "The Obama and Romney plan" for the banks. That's funny. As if they sit and plan together.Probably it won't do him any good; it may just put pressure on Romney. Criticizing Wall Street doesn't play well to the GOP's radical base, which hates anything which smells like "class warfare" or OWS: now they will have a knee-jerk Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-51879266324061021172012-01-07T11:00:00.001-08:002012-01-07T11:00:59.440-08:00Canada & U.S. in 'race to the bottom'This is the "race to the bottom" in action, folks. Guess what? Canada's not going to win it; neither will we. That's why it's a fool's game; we shouldn't play it. Germany has found a better way. Cheap U.S. Labor Used As Leverage To Lower Canadian Workers' WagesBy Alexander Eichler January 6, 2012 | Huffington PostURL: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/06/us-cheap-labor_n_1189428.htmlJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-59919301985933667472012-01-07T10:41:00.001-08:002012-01-07T10:46:24.695-08:00Jeremy Rifkin on the 3rd Industrial RevolutionJeremy Rifkin, a professor at Wharton business school, gives longer and shorter versions of this presentation on the Third Industrial Revolution that's coming (or already starting). This is a longer one from 2010, still current, covering pretty much everything. You can find shorter ones on YouTube, the gist is the same. You can focus on the scary parts of his presentation, like this:"We humanJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-30900199478261197842012-01-07T08:48:00.001-08:002012-01-12T08:30:29.867-08:00No big fracking deal: Ohio earthquakesOh, just frack it, it's no big fracking deal. What's a couple of little fracking earthquakes?Mother Nature just has to get used to our fracking her in the crack. There's a lot more fracking coming her way, in Ohio at least, because fracking politicians like Kasich, Boehner and Chabot get a lot of fracking campaign donations for it. Yep, we are so fracked.Ohio magnitude 4.0 earthquake linked to Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-33658810981816841362012-01-03T04:31:00.001-08:002012-01-07T08:51:41.628-08:00Krugman: U.S. debt/deficit know-nothingsThere should be a law that this article must be read aloud at Tea Party meetings and Ron Paul rallies. This is so, so important to read and understand, if you're serious about understanding America's fiscal situation. Nobody Understands DebtBy Paul KrugmanJanuary 1, 2012 New York Times In 2011, as in 2010, America was in a technical recovery but continued to suffer from disastrously high Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-83088627154791653112011-12-27T05:31:00.001-08:002012-01-07T08:55:01.041-08:00Taibbi: Obama CHOOSES not to prosecute Wall St. fraudObama and Geithner: Government, Enron-StyleBy Matt TaibbiDecember 20, 2011 | Rolling Stone URL: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/obama-and-geithner-government-enron-style-20111220#ixzz1hk2FddlZJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-21271033513955586642011-12-27T05:08:00.001-08:002012-01-07T08:55:57.389-08:00How German automakers double U.S. production AND wagesGreat quote:"So, if I believed what the neo-liberals are arguing, we [Germany] would have to be bankrupt, but apparently this is not the case. Despite high wages... despite our possibility to influence companies, the economy is working well in Germany." I can tell you, collaborative work by management and labor is definitely not what is taught in U.S. business schools, nor is it the practice, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-16154795031892389652011-12-27T04:55:00.001-08:002012-01-07T08:57:22.663-08:00Oxford study: The rich get their way in U.S. politics -- DUH!I know this isn't a personal anecdote from an older Midwesterner or a Marine veteran that "tells it like it is," but for those of you who still put some stock in, well, facts and stuff, check out this Oxford study [emphasis mine]: "Using an original data set of almost two thousand survey questions on proposed [U.S. government] policy changes between 1981 and 2002, I find a moderately strong Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-52879486965468843662011-12-15T05:50:00.001-08:002012-01-07T08:59:32.625-08:00Stiglitz: What caused the 'Great Slump' & how to fix itMy favorite bearded liberal Nobel economist has a new slant on what caused the Great Depression -- and our present "Great Slump," which my other favorite bearded liberal Nobel economist, Paul Krugman, is already calling a Depression. This is definitely worth reading in full.The Book of Jobs Forget monetary policy. Re-examining the cause of the Great Depression—the revolution in agriculture thatJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-63128567603172970512011-12-15T05:49:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:00:21.015-08:002.5 million youngsters can thank Obama2.5 M young adults gain coverageDecember 14, 2011 | AP URL: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501367_162-57342943/apnewsbreak-2.5m-young-adults-gain-coverage/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-58007701441409391332011-12-14T08:32:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:01:22.658-08:00No debating it: In education, class mattersIn statistics, this is a slam-dunk correlation: Data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress show that more than 40 percent of the variation in average reading scores and 46 percent of the variation in average math scores across states is associated with variation in child poverty rates. But I know you conservatives and "school choice" folks eschew statistics and prefer anecdotes Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-34843791570704526962011-12-11T02:41:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:03:17.369-08:00Drumroll, please: And the new Fed bailout total is....... $29.6 trillion and counting. Lovely. Viva el capitalismo!Please remember this $ figure the next time you or one of our crotchety conservative friends feels the urge to complain about the Solyndra loan guarantee ($500 million), Detroit-automotive bailouts ($65 billion), or extended unemployment benefits ($60 billion). If you have any sense of consistency, fairness, humanity or just basic Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-34602460223046604532011-12-05T08:51:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:04:47.082-08:00CBS investigates: Why no prosecutions of Wall St.?All of you who think the FMs caused the mortgage crisis, you need to read this. Countrywide and Citibank both engaged in deliberate mortgage fraud. No regulator in the world can prevent the kind of fraud they perpetrated -- regulators can only prosecute them when it's uncovered. It has been uncovered. Whistleblowers from both companies are ready to testify. Yet the Justice Department hasn't Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-10685833051257903762011-12-05T02:33:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:05:23.433-08:00VC millionaire: Raise taxes on 1% to help true job creatorsHear hear!Raise Taxes on Rich to Reward True Job Creators By Nick HanauerDecember 1, 2011 | Bloomberg BusinessweekIt is a tenet of American economic beliefs, and an article of faith for Republicans that is seldom contested by Democrats: If taxes are raised on the rich, job creation will stop. Trouble is, sometimes the things that we know to be true are dead wrong. For the larger part of human Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-66907798443022338132011-12-04T23:24:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:06:14.768-08:00Will GOP make hard cuts to troops' pay & benefits?I wonder if those same folks on the right who want to gut "bloated" union-employee benefits want to employ the same dull scalpel to the Pentagon's pension & benefits budget?Consider this: the average enlisted soldier retires at 43; the average officer at 47 -- and then they collect pension & health benefits for the rest of their lives, regardless of income or ability to work. That is a "CadillacJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-11901267384842735092011-12-04T23:12:00.001-08:002012-01-07T09:07:41.438-08:00Krugman: Europe is cautionary tale for U.S., but not how you thinkWe in the U.S. have a bit of time to see how austerity and high interest rates help Europe's economy before we ourselves go into full austerity mode, but so far the effects in Europe have been dire. Soon to be catastrophic. In the U.S. we also have too many who irrationally fear the inflation bogeyman -- primarily those who are living comfortably and don't want to see the value of any of their Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-80694650034244458852011-12-02T08:10:00.001-08:002011-12-02T08:12:47.595-08:00Journalists suddenly disorderly at OWS, must be arrested for their own safetyI know the right wing has been trying, with some success, to portray OWS protestors as violent and disruptive, but since when did so many U.S. journalists turn disorderly?! Journalists have been arrested on flimsy pretexts not only in New York, LA, Chicago and DC, but also in places like Boston, Nashville, Rochester, Richmond, Milwaukee, Oakland, Atlanta and Chapel Hill. Many say they were only Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-4083460963160983532011-12-02T08:09:00.001-08:002011-12-02T08:14:15.849-08:00B Corporations: The synthesis of Adam Smith?Adam Smith Was Not SchizophrenicBy Kyle WestawayDecember 1, 2011 | HBR Blog Network Despite the recent crackdowns in New York and Los Angeles, it's not surprising that the Occupy Wall Street movement has exploded into 900 chapters. The Occupy movement — as well as The Tea Party — are both "mad as hell" about the current state of affairs. Both sides share a general dissatisfaction with our Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-20321193471297332872011-12-02T06:40:00.001-08:002011-12-02T08:15:16.783-08:00Sirota: U.S. Muslims more loyal than EvangelicalsThey used to say the same thing about Catholics: when JFK was elected, non-Catholics were worried he'd take orders from the Pope in Rome. Nowadays it's Muslims' turn. Why Many Evangelical Christians Are More "Un-American" Than US Muslims By David SirotaNovember 29, 2011 | AlterNet If you have the stomach to listen to enough right-wing talk radio, or troll enough right-wing websites, you Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-39311650827016309622011-12-02T06:39:00.003-08:002011-12-02T08:16:15.112-08:00Study: Financial industry's value overestimatedFinancial Industry's 'Value Added' Significantly Overestimated, Report Contends November 30, 2011 | ReutersBanks' contribution to the economy may be hugely overstated, underscoring anger about the scale of taxpayer rescues and resultant government cutbacks, but a sharp retreat of banking worldwide looks painful for all and needs calibrating. As sovereign debts and austerity bite across the WestJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-8426984355410252442011-12-02T06:39:00.001-08:002011-12-02T08:17:26.015-08:00Why the Right embraces wacky outsider Cain yet distrusts ObamaYou're free to read this entire article about why conservatives the world over look to right-wing populists to reinvigorate their cause, and, ironically, to uphold privilege and hierarchy for the few, but I found this part really interesting, it lit up an "Oh, yeah, of course!" flashbulb of recognition in my mind that this was just so obviously true: "I think to the right-wing, Obama's rise to Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-79963092749946481952011-12-01T23:39:00.001-08:002011-12-02T08:20:23.770-08:00Spitzer: Punish the Fed, Wall St. for misleading usTea Partyers and slash-the-debt types on the right will greet this news with a yawn. "What about Solyndra!" they'll reply. $500 million vs. $7 trillion. They just don't get it. They're dupes. Meanwhile, OWS has its heart in the right place but its head who knows where, and doesn't give a hoot about parties or elections, so we can't count on them. The remaining adults in the room are either Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-44486277557527525152011-12-01T09:29:00.001-08:002011-12-01T22:56:44.918-08:00Forbes: 'Every day is Black Friday' in housing sector"Any sort of self-sustaining [housing sector] recovery, at this point, appears unfathomable." The U.S. economy won't recover until housing recovers; and housing won't recover until the U.S. economy recovers. It's a perfect Catch-22! So when's the last time you heard a single national-level politician offer an idea how to address this, the #1 problem our economy is facing right now? If they wereJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-54647921710504140922011-12-01T09:28:00.001-08:002011-12-01T22:57:22.728-08:00OWS is the 'rotten fruit of Obamaism'I'm not sure you old tea-party types sitting at home in the 'burbs watching FOX and listening to ClearChannel really understand the sentiments driving the OWS protests. If you think this is about getting out the vote for Dems in 2012, re-living the hippy '60s, union funding, or George Soros's diabolical organizing, you're just not getting it. So here you go: Of course, the sense of possibility Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-24896228040613334472011-11-27T10:09:00.001-08:002011-12-01T22:59:09.722-08:00Economist: Bosses who don't play golf earn 17% less"The same study found that although golfing bosses are paid more, they do not produce better results for shareholders." Clearly, golf distorts the free market and right-thinking companies should discourage their employees from playing it.Why golfers get aheadBy R.G.November 21, 2011 | The Economist URL: http://www.economist.com/blogs/gametheory/2011/11/golf-and-business?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-13787875281224386182011-11-27T10:00:00.001-08:002011-12-01T22:59:52.090-08:00Ames reveals amazing UC Davis-Greece connectionMark Ames is on a roll. Lately he's been digging up some unbelievable connections -- and not the "six degrees of separation" kind of connections on GB's lunatic chalk board either. This is too amazing not to read.How UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi Brought Oppression Back to Greece's Universities By Mark AmesNovember 22, 2011 | The ExiledURL: http://exiledonline.com/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-90922456828493163312011-11-27T09:48:00.001-08:002011-12-01T23:01:14.891-08:00Ames: CATO, Reagan said 'Deficits don't matter'Everybody gets duped once in a while. Hell, I voted for Obama, thinking I was getting a real anti-war progressive. Alas, I got duped. Obama is in fact a moderate Republican... or what used to be called a moderate Republican until about 10 years ago. What matters is how you react when you're finally faced with the truth: Do you double down on your delusion, go permanently schizo with cognitive Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-91238319619459149252011-11-27T09:32:00.001-08:002011-12-01T23:02:38.997-08:00Krugman: 'We are the 99 percent' an understatementWe Are the 99.9%By Paul KrugmanNovember 24, 2011 | New York Times "We are the 99 percent" is a great slogan. It correctly defines the issue as being the middle class versus the elite (as opposed to the middle class versus the poor). And it also gets past the common but wrong establishment notion that rising inequality is mainly about the well educated doing better than the less educated; the bigJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-63316867633832406722011-11-27T09:23:00.001-08:002011-12-01T23:04:31.870-08:00Studies: Charitable giving irrational, favors pain, not totally altruisticThe facts of human beings' emotional, irrational reactions to appeals for charity is just one more reason not to depend on private charity to take care of our brothers and sisters in need. We should take advantage of government's economies of scale and rely on professional bureaucrats' dispassionate planning to ensure an adequate social safety net for our fellow citizens. Why Do We Give? Not Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-61034469646898323732011-11-23T07:53:00.001-08:002012-01-07T11:05:04.551-08:00To survive, NBA needs socialism like NFL, MLBBasketball is the one professional sport I care to follow, so I'm pissed I won't get to see any NBA this year. But enough about my precious feelings. This article illustrates how the NBA is in the same situation as the NFL and MLB: less competitive smaller-market teams cannot be profitable without a scheme of socialistic wealth distribution from the fewer more successful larger-market teams. InJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-33669358945156925402011-11-23T07:52:00.003-08:002011-11-24T05:38:40.623-08:00Epic words of those yearning to breathe free"Poop": thank goodness they can still text it. Let freedom ring!It's Still OK To Text 'Offensive' Words In Pakistan By Mark MemmottNovember 21, 2011 | NPRURL: http://n.pr/s8Bjvo Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-11907880875674137142011-11-23T07:52:00.001-08:002011-11-24T05:39:41.857-08:00OWS already has a win -- in OhioOWS has successfully changed the debate from the federal debt and deficit reduction, to reducing inequality and consumer debt and improving the welfare of the bottom 99 percent. We owe them a big thank-you. "Nonetheless, it's undeniable that a mood change had hit Ohio -- and in a major way. Pro-worker organizers and volunteers benefited from something their peers in Wisconsin lacked: the wind Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-43367362335530046242011-11-22T23:20:00.001-08:002011-11-24T05:41:04.217-08:00Banks spend record $ amounts on lobbyingWall Street has already spent $100 million this year lobbying Congress, mostly related to the Dodd-Franke financial reform bill.Meanwhile, most Americans are worried about other things. Some of those distractions are understandable: persistent unemployment, crushing debt, poor health, etc. But some of those distractions are manufactured, such as Solyndra: a "scandal" over a loan for $528 Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-24401506757286813802011-11-22T22:59:00.001-08:002011-11-24T05:42:07.170-08:00Krugman: Romantic dreamers posing as 'technocrat' economistsBoring Cruel RomanticsBy Paul KrugmanNovember 20, 2011 | New York Times There's a word I keep hearing lately: "technocrat." Sometimes it's used as a term of scorn — the creators of the euro, we're told, were technocrats who failed to take human and cultural factors into account. Sometimes it's a term of praise: the newly installed prime ministers of Greece and Italy are described as technocrats Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-21800603675927365512011-11-20T11:12:00.001-08:002011-11-21T00:02:31.857-08:00Taibbi: Now I Love the OWS ProtestsAlthough I do wish the OWS protests would "get specific" and really go after corrupt Wall Street banks as their name suggests, it's their prerogative to focus on some issues or none at all, because it's their protests. I'm not out there camping with them, that's for sure. Also, as I said before, it's not really fair or realistic to expect this mass of mostly young people to have all the Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-3310297335210545092011-10-31T09:36:00.001-07:002011-10-31T09:36:10.068-07:00Born to be a birther, or, Birther till I die!This third-string squad of colorful right-wing nutjobs and cranks, including serial racial profiler Sheriff Joe Arpaio and serial Supreme Court rejectee Orly Taitz, are teasing us that they're about to go "Geraldo" with a really big revelation about Obama's citizenship that will blow the lid off this whole thing. I don't even know why I'm dignifying this nonsense with a re-post, but... something Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-69742553256691387902011-10-28T15:28:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:47:37.298-07:00TARP wasn't 'paid back,' not by a long shotSo it turns out that TARP loans weren't "paid back," we should be owed about $300 billion in risk premiums for the year 2009 alone, and this is not to mention the $16 trillion in Fed bailouts for the international TBTF banks. TARP was absolutely free money. TARP wasn't really even a loan, it was a gift, it was a sick joke on U.S. taxpayers, because the bailed-out banks can pay off their TARP Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-68660670398022176652011-10-27T21:00:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:48:54.287-07:00'We are the 1 percent': 147 firms own 40% of global wealthGee, I'm relieved to hear that 1 percent of transnational corporations (TNCs) control the world not thanks to a global conspiracy, but thanks to nature. And it's comforting to hear that the top 25 TNCs includes many global financial institutions, such as Barclays, Bank of America, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase, Meryll Lynch, Morgan Stanley, UBS, Societe Generale, and Goldman Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-52642780312420207192011-10-26T07:19:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:50:33.666-07:00MB360: Here is the 1 percentThe top one percent of Americans are those who earn $1 million or more in gross adjusted income per year. Meanwhile the median annual income per American worker is $26,250.And 75 percent of total income tax is being paid by households earning $500,000 or less per year. These stats put things in perspective, don't they? Looks like OWS is right on the mark. The glory of debt spending and casino Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-90801102681013369102011-10-26T03:16:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:51:32.641-07:0057% of Ohioans favor repealing GOP's anti-labor lawIt's not long now till the Nov. 8 referendum when Ohioans will have the chance to strike this law down. No republic stuff this time, just direct democracy! Opposition To Ohio's SB 5 Grows, Quinnipiac University Poll Finds; Women, Union Members Push Kasich Deeper In Hole October 25, 2011 | Quinnipiac UniversityURL: http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x1322.xml?ReleaseID=1665Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-75782611982628589822011-10-25T09:43:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:52:41.523-07:00Grayson gets standing-O as spokesman for OWSHere's a partial transcript:Grayson: Let me tell what they're talking about. They're complaining about the fact that Wall Street wrecked the economy three years ago, and nobody's been held responsible for that. Not a single person has been indicted or convicted, for destroying 20 percent of our national net worth, accumulated over two centuries. They're upset about the fact that Wall Street has Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-15880947291764926022011-10-25T00:08:00.001-07:002011-10-25T00:12:42.919-07:00Frank Rich: 'Inchoate class war' won't be solved by '12 electionsMany are criticizing OWS for not having a clearer diagnosis of America's problems, and a ready batch of proposed solutions. But that's unfair. The OWS movement was started and continues to be fueled mainly by the young, who can't be expected to know everything. But that doesn't mean they know nothing. Here's their advantage: these young people still retain their acute adolescent sensitivity Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-37737032323341216412011-10-24T08:40:00.005-07:002011-10-28T15:54:24.643-07:00Krugman: GOP's jobs plan is to pollute moreUnfortunately, as Krugman noted elsewhere: "Today's American right doesn't believe in [negative] externalities, or correcting market failures; it believes that there are no market failures, that capitalism unregulated is always right. Faced with evidence that market prices are in fact wrong, they simply attack the science."Oh, and the eventual GOP nominee Mitt Romney is flip-flopping once again.Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-77272980303877937702011-10-24T08:40:00.003-07:002011-10-28T15:55:43.442-07:00Another bailed-out Wall St. crook gets off with a wrist slapYeah, those poor dumb Wall Street guys had no idea their mortgage-backed securities (MBS) were crap. They weren't greedy, just dumb.NOT !Here's how the NYT described Citigroup's crime: "... this week the Securities and Exchange Commission unveiled its latest charges involving mortgage-backed securities. In what may be a new low for conduct by a major Wall Street firm in the walk-up to the Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-87582908698160642952011-10-24T08:40:00.001-07:002011-10-28T15:56:50.129-07:00OWS camps care for local homelessI guess the Occupy protests ARE different than the Tea Parties. After all, the TPs would never set up camps to feed, clothe, and heal the homeless like OWS does. "Personal responsibility" not the "provide for the general welfare" is the TPs' mantra. Just keep this in mind though next time you hear a report about a "drunk" or "violent" OWS protester: it could very well be a local homeless person Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-88004603796933690702011-10-23T23:57:00.001-07:002011-10-28T16:08:10.108-07:00Fed's zero-interest policy has consequencesThe Fed thinks it's wonderful American households are de-leveraging. With their zero interest-rate policy the Fed is clearly trying to induce Americans to pay down debt and/or spend, since ordinary savings earn no return. However the Fed's Duke neglected to mention that U.S. student loan debt has reached nearly $1 trillion, with default rates at for-profit colleges rivaling sub-prime loans. Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-71148666550572654652011-10-20T08:51:00.001-07:002011-10-20T08:54:45.341-07:00OWS, that hurts: U.S. labor lost $500 billion since 1990As Kaldor's Facts Fall, Occupy Wall Street Rises By Peter Orszag October 19, 2011 | BloombergIn Economics 101, students learn that the share of national income received by labor stays roughly constant with the share received by capital. This is the first of "Kaldor's stylized facts," articulated half a century ago by the Cambridge economist Nicholas Kaldor. Recent experience betrays this lesson.Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-36392469909127994112011-10-20T07:27:00.001-07:002011-10-20T08:55:47.618-07:00World Bank: U.S. a great place for doing businessAt the same time that corporations and right-wing politicians' argue that "job-killing regulations" are to blame for America's current economic malaise, the USA has moved up in the annual Doing Business rankings by the World Bank -- from 5th place to 4th. As last year, only tiny islands managed to be more business-friendly than the good ole US of A. Looks like somebody doesn't know what the Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-73549696355815726712011-10-19T08:21:00.001-07:002011-10-19T08:55:05.966-07:00Study: Lobbying boosts firms' bottom lineOn the one hand the conclusion of this study is kind of, well, "Duh," but on the other hand it should give us pause to consider if this really the best way for our democracy to work. Although the analysis by Strategas of companies' federal lobbying and their profits from this investment leaves out banks because their lobbying spending is too small relative to their total assets, another study Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-21741271717668860462011-10-17T07:27:00.001-07:002011-10-19T08:26:32.191-07:00For the last time: Fannie did NOT cause financial disasterGee, I'm sure this well-researched article will put an end to the false belief that the FMs caused the financial crisis, which has become an article of faith among many, especially on the Right. I'm doubly sure that those who refute this article will come back with statistics or studies or something checkable to support their false claim that the FMs/GSEs caused the financial crisis. Yep, I'm Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-29591739383681190712011-10-13T08:18:00.001-07:002011-10-13T08:23:08.881-07:00DC Johnston: Orwellian tax talkReading this just makes me angry and sad, because as Johnston points out, the Stupid and the Avaricious usually win. Stupid people want to believe, and avaricious people want to convince them, that we can cut everybody's taxes and create more revenue and thousands of jobs, just like children want to believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. Get this through your heads, folks: Tax Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-38863301450899075582011-10-12T23:20:00.001-07:002011-10-13T08:23:53.066-07:00The 99 Percent v. the 53 PercentMore U.S. households have become exempt from federal income tax because they earn too little income, and because Bush lowered their taxes.So this "53 Percent" movement is basically blaming poor people for being too poor, and Democrats for Republicans' tax cuts. Makes no sense. But when do they ever?99 Percenters, Meet the 53 Percenters In response to Occupy Wall Street, some conservatives are Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-71971932446407747422011-10-12T07:20:00.001-07:002011-10-13T08:25:01.655-07:00Koch lured libertarian Prof. Hayek to U.S. with Social Security!Levine and Ames conclude their scoop on the Koch's and Hayek's hypocrisy thusly: "Why didn't Charles Koch offer to put up some of his enormous wealth to pay for Hayek's temporary medical insurance? One obvious answer: because the state had already offered a better and freer program. But perhaps Koch's stinginess also reveals the social ethic behind libertarian values: every man for himself; Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-16284825424213548642011-10-12T03:55:00.001-07:002011-10-13T08:25:53.409-07:00Fed bailouts: $16 trillion... and countingAs Alan Grayson and others are pointing out, page 131 of this report from the GAO to Congress shows that from December 1, 2007 to July 31, 2011, the Fed has lent $16.1 trillion to U.S. and foreign banks! As Grayson notes, that's $50,000 for every man, woman and child in the U.S.But for the federal government to compel those same banks to give Americans something in return, like real mortgage Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-34929381327004791802011-10-11T23:03:00.001-07:002011-10-20T08:57:55.594-07:00Face of Evil revealed: We've been had!Aha! Folks, we've been had. Our thanks to Michele Bachmann for this life-saving revelation. This is like that part in the movie when the hero who has been chasing the bad guy the whole time suddenly realizes the devil is the other guy who is now walking up to the dais to applause and handshakes. It wasn't Obama... it was Cain all along! Don't you see? It was a big diversion. Cain is the Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-51479112952653526822011-10-11T15:08:00.001-07:002011-10-19T08:57:11.746-07:00Suze Orman: 'Occupy Wall Street': Approved!Normally I wouldn't pay any attention to the likes of Suze Orman; but since she's precisely the kind of person who resonates with middle America and Tea Party types, I'm paying attention now. She just happens to be spot on. Occupy Wall Street: Approved!By Suze OrmanOctober 11, 2011 | Huffington Post URL: http://huffingtonpost.com/suze-orman/occupy-wall-street-approv_b_1005128.htmlJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-59492480521067410102011-10-08T03:19:00.001-07:002011-10-11T23:09:42.878-07:00Surprise, surprise: Socialist NFL leans GOPIs it any surprise that the owners of the socialist NFL give 2/3 of their campaign contributions to Republicans?They know that Republicans love their redistribution of wealth from the few rich to many poor teams, and are ready to give lots of corporate welfare for unprofitable sports teams to survive. NFL owners favor Republicans in campaign cashBy Eric Johnson October 7, 2011 | ReutersURL: httpJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-79401851182072431392011-10-07T09:08:00.000-07:002011-10-11T23:10:58.271-07:00Taibbi: AG's settlement the next big bank bailout?If Obama has to choose between the "helping actual human beings" and helping TBTF banks, we know which he's gonna choose. Attorneys General Settlement: The Next Big Bank Bailout? By Matt Taibbi October 5, 2011 | Rolling StoneAmidst all the bad news coming out of Wall Street and the economy, here's something good: California has backed out of the talks for the long-awaited foreclosure settlement, Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-48480846011299542092011-10-07T09:07:00.001-07:002011-10-19T09:01:38.720-07:00Ben Stein, a snarky, greedy old shill for Wall Street, posts somethingI'm reserving judgment about the effectiveness of the Occupy Wall Street protestors' methods, but not their decision to protest, or the selection of their target -- they're right on. Nevertheless this smug little missive from droning Hollywood nerd Ben Stein rubbed me the wrong way, and really illustrated several common fallacies: 1) "Greed is human nature." (Thus it's unavoidable, thus it's OKJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-46469787788887849272011-10-05T08:11:00.001-07:002011-10-11T23:13:59.143-07:00Stiglitz: Spend, spend, spendSpend, Spend, Spend There is only one way out of the global recession, and government must lead the way.By Joseph E. StiglitzOctober 3, 2011 | Slate As the economic slump that began in 2007 continues, the question persists: Why? Unless we have a better understanding of the causes of the crisis, we can't implement an effective recovery strategy. So far, we have neither. We were told that this Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-40992325205085346882011-10-03T08:08:00.001-07:002011-10-03T08:08:07.993-07:00Facebook = Big BrotherBoy, am I happy I deleted my Facebook account last week.Try finding me now, Zucker! Facebook changes touch privacy nerveBy Byron AcohidoOctober 1, 2011 | USA TODAY URL: http://usat.ly/q9OsSC Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-28468311737941325942011-10-03T08:07:00.001-07:002011-10-03T08:07:56.706-07:00Krugman: GOP economic doctrine 'divorced from reality'I'm late posting this but it's still current. I don't kid myself that this will change anybody's mind. But I do challenge those who disagree to put some statistics or even survey results about "business mood" behind their claims that "taxes and regulation" are what's holding our economy back. Phony Fear FactorBy Paul KrugmanSeptember 29, 2011 | New York Times The good news: After spending aJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-24445409457057721722011-10-03T08:05:00.001-07:002011-10-28T16:07:39.761-07:00Consumer debt, not federal debt, is the crisisThe real debt problem in the U.S. is private household debt. U.S. federal debt by historical standards is still manageable and not in a crisis; it's not holding the economy back; although long term it must be faced. Right now consumer/household debt -- which is still at 154 percent of wages and salaries -- is the crisis. Until Americans clean up their personal balance sheets and start spendingJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-58050767370909750972011-09-30T12:25:00.001-07:002011-09-30T12:25:41.173-07:00GOP Candidate Could Be Voters' Best Bet Against Obama In 2012GOP opting for the "canned" candidate? My new nickname for Romney: Spam Man. Edible, long shelf life, but unsavory. GOP Candidate Could Be Voters' Best Bet Against Obama In 2012 URL: http://huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/30/mitt-romney_n_988641.html Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-50155539671674872032011-09-30T09:55:00.001-07:002011-10-20T09:00:18.886-07:00For job creation, size still matters"Looking at a sample of [U.S.] companies created from 2004 to 2008 ... only 3 percent added more than 10 employees during that time. An even smaller proportion had applied or were in the process of applying for patents. (So much for being seedbeds of innovation.) Many small businesses simply go bust after a few years." Indeed, according to data compiled by the U.S. Census/SBA, the "churn"Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-35406006906174621682011-09-30T09:51:00.001-07:002011-09-30T09:53:46.709-07:00Ominous interview with Dr. DoomShould we pay attention to one of the only guys who predicted the global financial crisis, even if the solutions he offers run counter to the growing global consensus that austerity (what I call the "hunker down" approach) is the answer? Heck, yeah! He's Dr. Doom! Perhaps soon to be known as Dr. Double Dip. Interview with Nouriel RoubiniSeptember 23, 2011 | Emerging Markets Fears have grown Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-4925359919877446832011-09-14T14:53:00.001-07:002011-09-14T14:55:32.333-07:00Libertarians patently wrong on theory of money, barterHey, you libertards (a term I use with the utmost possible affection) who hate paper money, listen up!Here's a history + economics lesson all in one. Read, learn, and enjoy. E-mail me if you have any questions.Just another case of actual human/historical fact absolutely contradicting Randian/libertarian wishful thinking about how human beings actually interact. On the Invention of Money – NotesJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-79444594816580623702011-09-14T13:56:00.001-07:002011-09-14T14:04:10.372-07:00Ron Paul's campaign mgr. couldn't afford medical careCan't afford health care? Join libertarian Ron Paul's presidential campaign! Up to $400,000 for loyal idiots! It's that easy. (No guarantee you'll survive, though. Ayn Rand is an angry God.) Ron Paul's Ex-Campaign Manager's Death Backdrop For Health Insurance Position By Sam SteinSeptember 14, 2011 | Huffington PostURL: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/14/Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-81989434721832127262011-09-14T13:44:00.001-07:002011-09-14T14:06:17.229-07:00Palestinine's statehood bid in UN will show true stripesI have no idea how much air time this is getting in the U.S. MSM (methinks not much at all), but it's incredibly significant historically. It's not the least significant and accidental that Palestinians have taken this step under Pres. Obama, i.e. a Democratic administration: Palestinians have realized that political stripes in the U.S. don't matter, and they can't depend on a "liberal" U.S. Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-57693096022728711792011-09-14T13:30:00.001-07:002011-09-14T14:07:08.398-07:00Cheney 'embarrassed' by S&P now, but not thenYeah, the same guy who said "deficits don't matter" was embarrassed by S&P's downgrade of U.S. debt, although he was not at all embarrassed by S&P's estimation of sub-crime crap as AAA, which was a direct cause of the Great Recession and the resulting U.S. fiscal crisis. Just goes to show you whose side the puppet masters are on. (Hint: Not yours).Dick Cheney On U.S. Credit Downgrade: 'I Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-64242276761144259922011-09-14T13:19:00.001-07:002011-10-20T09:02:59.057-07:00Here is a real manI don't use the word hero too lightly, but Charles Howard of Kentucky is one.He has black lung but he continues to work in coal mines, and he continues to blow the whistle -- and be vindicated -- for unsafe working conditions for himself and his fellow miners. He is not some "movement" nerd with no skin in the game; he continues to work in, and will probably die from, Kentucky's coal mines. All Jay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5231368697916108369.post-46809613502385263552011-09-14T11:14:00.001-07:002011-09-14T14:12:28.350-07:00Perry apologizing for doing the right thingRick Perry is getting slammed by his own party for doing the sensible, moral thing.Now he's trying to backpedal. What does that tell you about him and today's GOP?Rick Perry's HPV Vaccine Law Sparks Political Fight That Ignores Health IssuesBy Laura BassettSeptember 13, 2011 | Huffington Post URL: http://huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/13/rick-perry-hpv-vaccine_n_961159.htmlJay Tellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10067522224772095450noreply@blogger.com0