Dec 02 2008
In a sign that they may have been a tad too obsessed with the daily squabbles on The View, The National Bureau of Economic Research made the shocking and unexpected announcement yesterday that the economy has been in recession for over a year.
The NBER followed up their “recession” revelation with the BREAKING NEWS that the really hot chick in the Crying Game was really… a dude.
In other news that you already knew…
Dec 02 2008
This from Richard Spencer in Beijing, this morning:
A statement posted on online government media overnight said that 294,000 babies and young children had suffered “urinary system abnormalities” after drinking formula milk from Sanlu, the company most seriously affected, and other brand names.
It now says as many as six infants died and up to 294,000 suffered from urinary tract ailments including kidney stones. That figure is a lot higher than had previously been reported. More than 850 children are still being treated in hospital; at least 150 of them are said to be seriously ill. Why? Last year, China’s dairy industry was worth $18 billion. That’s a whole lot of dairy products.
Dec 02 2008
 Gen. James L. Jones, Robert M. Gates |
On Monday President-elect Barack Obama announced the makeup of the core of his incoming administrations foreign affairs team with what Jeremy Scahill, Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at the Nation Institute, yesterday called “Barack Obama’s Kettle of Hawks“:
The absence of a solid anti-war voice on Obama’s national security team means that US foreign policy isn’t going to change.
…
[T]he real rivalry that will play out goes virtually unmentioned. The main battles will not be between Obama’s staff, but rather against those who actually want a change in US foreign policy, not just a staff change in the war room.When announcing his foreign policy team on Monday, Obama said: “I didn’t go around checking their voter registration.” That is a bit hard to believe, given the 63-question application to work in his White House. But Obama clearly did check their credentials, and the disturbing truth is that he liked what he saw.
The assembly of Hillary Clinton, Robert Gates, Susan Rice and Joe Biden is a kettle of hawks with a proven track record of support for the Iraq war, militaristic interventionism, neoliberal economic policies and a worldview consistent with the foreign policy arch that stretches from George HW Bush’s time in office to the present.
Obama has dismissed suggestions that the public records of his appointees bear much relevance to future policy. “Understand where the vision for change comes from, first and foremost,” Obama said. “It comes from me. That’s my job, to provide a vision in terms of where we are going and to make sure, then, that my team is implementing.” It is a line the president-elect’s defenders echo often. The reality, though, is that their records do matter.
Hillary Clinton was confirmed as Obama’s Secretary of State, and three other appointments were confirmed as well: his closest foreign affairs adviser Susan Rice becoming UN ambassador with a seat at the cabinet table, former NATO commander General James L. Jones as national security adviser, and current Secretary of Defense Bush appointee Robert M. Gates to remain in that role.
What is the symbolism and what is the actuality of Obama’s appointments?
On the flip The Real News CEO Paul Jay talks to Lawrence J. Korb and Phyllis Bennis to analyze the overall message about ongoing US foreign policy that is sent out to the world by Obama’s choices.
Dec 02 2008
149 years ago today, at 11:15 in the morning John Brown was hanged by the neck until dead in Charles Town, Virginia, for the crime of trying to start a slave insurrection.
Henry David Thoreau said in his breathtaking A Plea for Captain John Brown:
This event advertises to me that there is such a fact as death; the possibility of a man’s dying. It seems as if no man had ever died in America before; for in order to die you must first have lived.
I read Thoreau’s piece this morning. Rather than quote it at length, or editorialize about John Brown, I encourage you to take a little time today and read it yourself.
Today, as in 1859, there are great crimes being committed on our soil and around the world by the rulers of these United States, committed in our name, with our taxes.
Let John Brown’s example encourage us to try and stand, like him, “with the oppressed and the wronged, that are as good as you.”
Crossposted at Fire on the Mountain.
Dec 02 2008
From AllAccess.com:
It’s a huge loss for the radio industry, as ALL ACCESS reported on SATURDAY (NET NEWS 11/29) that radio legend BILL DRAKE died from lung cancer at age 71 in LOS ANGELES. DRAKE passed away SATURDAY at WEST HILLS HOSPITAL in the SAN FERNANDO VALLEY.
DRAKE streamlined the Top 40 format, using modern methods, such as market research and ratings demographics, to maximize the number of listeners. He believed in forward momentum, limiting the amount of disc jockey chatter, the number of advertisements and playing only the top hits, as opposed to less-organized programming methods of the past. DRAKE created concepts such as 20/20 News and counter-programming by playing music sweeps, while his competitors aired news.
I frickin worked at KYNO briefly in the 80s.
And here I am. Still spinnin’ the hits.
RIP Bill Drake.
Without you, I’d be a different me.
Dec 02 2008
Could this be part of the ‘Change’ we’re not only looking for but this Country needs?
Just caught a short report on Charlotte’s local news at WCNC 36, not up on the site yet, about the firing of a Conservative Radio talk show host, one Jeff Katz.
Don’t know him and never listened to him, frankly conservative radio and tv news shows give me a freakin headache, and I don’t get headaches, no news just blathering opinion, which we find way too much all over the span of the mainstream outlets now, as they say “like assholes, everyones got one!”.
Dec 02 2008
Told In 2006 That
Banks Were In Trouble
Bush Did What He Does Best
Ignored It
Officials Vow to Act Amid Forecasts of Long Recession
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
Published: December 1, 2008
WASHINGTON – The United States economy officially sank into a recession last December, which means that the downturn is already longer than the average for all recessions since World War II, according to the committee of economists responsible for dating the nation’s business cycles.In declaring that the economy has been in a downturn for almost 12 months, the National Bureau of Economic Research confirmed what many Americans had already been feeling in their bones.But private forecasters warned that this downturn was likely to set a new postwar record for length and likely to be more painful than any recession since 1980 and 1981.
Rice urges Pakistan to cooperate fully with investigation
US secretary of state adds to global pressure on Islamabad as India claims to have evidence of link to deadly attacks
Julian Borger and Vikram Dodd in Mumbai
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday December 2 2008 00.01 GMT
Condoleezza Rice yesterday called on full Pakistani cooperation with the investigation into the Mumbai attacks, saying they represented a “critical moment” in the new civilian government’s efforts to wrest control of Pakistan’s security services.The outgoing US secretary of state said she did not want to “jump to conclusions”, but made it clear during a visit to London yesterday that she expected Islamabad would have to answer for the attacks which left nearly 200 people dead last week.
Rice, who is due to arrive in India tomorrow, urged its government to focus on the investigation of the attacks, and to avoid actions that might have “unintended consequences”, such as troop manoeuvres.
USA
A Pragmatic Pair Chosen to Confront Terrorism Threat
By Carrie Johnson and Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, December 2, 2008; Page A11
In nominating former federal prosecutors to lead the departments of Justice and Homeland Security, President-elect Barack Obama yesterday selected two Democrats with sterling law-and-order credentials but less experience in detecting threats and gathering intelligence in the age of international terrorism.Eric H. Holder Jr., the candidate to lead the Justice Department, served as the law enforcement agency’s second in command during the waning years of the Clinton administration, overseeing pursuits of violent crime, drug cartels and public corruption offenses. Janet Napolitano, who will run the sprawling Homeland Security bureaucracy, has served since 2003 as governor of Arizona, a border state at the forefront of the nation’s immigration debate.
Dec 02 2008
 Muse in the Morning |
State of the Onion XVIII
Art Link Not Quite Balanced
|
Dec 02 2008
Madam Zelda! Madam Zelda!
Has it only been 7 trading days?
| 11/20 | Thursday | -444.99 | 7,552.29 | |
| 11/21 | Friday | +494.13 | 8,046.42 | |
| 11/24 | Monday | +396.97 | 8,443.39 | |
| 11/25 | Tuesday | +36.08 | 8,479.47 | |
| 11/26 | Wednesday | +247.14 | 8,726.61 | |
| 11/28 | Friday | +102.43 | 8,829.04 | |
| 12/1 | Monday | -679.95 | 8,149.09 |
Dec 02 2008
This fear is exactly backwards. During a terrorist attack — during any crisis situation, actually — the one thing people can do is exchange information. It helps people, calms people, and actually reduces the thing the terrorists are trying to achieve: terror. Yes, there are specific movie-plot scenarios where certain public pronouncements might help the terrorists, but those are rare. I would much rather err on the side of more information, more openness, and more communication.
I was going to post a reply to his previous blog on the subject that said the same thing, but then – especially having realized that he wasn’t buying the Associated Press bullshit erm, disinformation piece which claimed there were “only 10 terrorists” either – I realized that 1) I was preaching to the choir and 2) he’d probably find a way to say the exact same thing I wanted to, and say it better. He did.
My 20 year career in IT has revolved around the use of technology to ensure that people can communicate, especially in a time of crisis. I’ve lived through two such crises in which there was a major disruption of communications: the Flugtag/Ramstein Air Show disaster of 1988, and the attacks on the WTC. I’ve provided mission critical IT support during the first Gulf War. What I’ve learned from these experiences is that it’s far better to have a well-informed citizenry who are on your side, untrained civilians though they might be, than to worry about giving away information to a small number of enemies. Our government is supposed to be of the people, by the people, for the people. In such a crisis I, for one, would never hesitate to give any civilian – perhaps a fellow citizen soldier – the best possible fighting chance, even if their only desire was to get away unharmed.
So yes, as clinical as I might sound, there actually is a shred or two of compassion in there. Indeed, I find the willingness of the media to outright lie to the folks who need them the most to be one of the foulest manifestations of the lack of compassion displayed by the mindless and yes, heartless servants of the military/industrial complex.
Schneier seldom, if ever, disappoints. I really hope the coming administration will take his advice seriously.
Fifty days until sanity…
