March 2, 2009 archive

Monday Morning Business Update

And Late Breaking News.

From Yahoo News Business

1 Source: AIG to get up to $30B more in Fed aid

By IEVA M. AUGSTUMS, AP Business Writer

1 hr 11 mins ago

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Struggling insurer American International Group Inc. will receive up to $30 billion in additional federal assistance in the fourth government rescue of the company, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Sunday.

The new infusion is intended to prop up AIG – once the world’s largest insurer – as it is expected to announce $60 billion in quarterly losses early Monday, the source said on the condition of anonymity because the discussions are still ongoing.

The company, which is considered too large to fail, previously received about $150 billion in loans from the government, which now has an 80 percent stake in the company.

Muse in the Morning

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Muse in the Morning

Life Storm

Rift

How strange

that such a small

easily stated

.

difference

.

between us

could open

such a vast

.

.

.

chasm

.

.

.

of distrust

mystery

confusion

misunderstanding

even hatred

How sad

that the variation

occurring so early

in our lives

could affect

so much

for so long

Can such a breach

ever be healed?

–Robyn Elaine Serven

–January 30, 2009

Five Remarkable Interviews in “The Warning”

The producers of a unique documentary sent me a DVD copy of their independent documentary, “The Warning.” They hoped they would get a good review, and they needn’t have worried.

“The Warning,” written, produced, and directed by Joseph P. Sottile, consists entirely of interviews with five well-known liberal authors (see below). Rather than questions and answers, the interviewees are allowed to speak for themselves. Occasionally, they even read appropriate selections from their works.

But rather than a boring word fest, the seriousness of the work gives it a riveting feel. The subject is nothing less than the descent of the United States into a ruthless totalitarian state, which relies on state torture, an imperial executive, widespread surveillance, the conscious use of fear-laden propaganda, a docile press, and the influence of a radical Christian core of believers to spread the program in institutions throughout civil society.

testing 123

I don’t know whether you watched that first video.  I don’t even know whether you are old enough to remember when it ran on tv the first time.

I remember it.

I remember when products that Americans bought were actually “Made in the U.S.A.”

But more of them were “Made in Japan.”

Now it’s “Made in China/Korea/Indonesia/Vietnam.”

Look:  All those countries deserve good economies, and I’m all in favor of their building up their economies and exporting whatever they can..  There is nothing wrong with that.

But the GOP has done everything in their power since 1980 to ensure that the supposedly “free” market + globalization would screw the middle class and further enrich the richest among us.

This is not a bug, this is a feature.

Globalization and Trickle Down have one thing in common:

PISS ON YOU

Pony Party is an Open Thread.  Please not to rec the party.  Thank you.

Late Night Karaoke

More Fun Than….

Imbolc

In this Pagan exploration, I, your Resident Witch, will attempt to explain the Pagan holiday of Imbolc, which falls on February 2nd, and just what it has to do with cross-dressing children, the patron saint of abortion providers, voodoo angels with a hankering for hot peppers – and, of course, Groundhog Day.

Imbolc

The Constellation of Orion

StarDate: -314155.78

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain…

Roy Batty.
Blade Runner, 1982

Orion Nebula: The Hubble View
Orion Nebula: The Hubble View
NASA, ESA, M. Robberto (STScI/ESA) et al.

The nebula in Orion's Sword.

Imbolc

Hi, Cave-dwellers! Everybody please give up for Julia Rain, a knowledgeable pagan who has graciously lent her expertise and beautiful writing to tonight’s proceedings. Take notes, ask questions, and behave yourselves; I’ll be back next week, and there may well be a pop quiz. – Unitary Moonbat

In this Pagan exploration, I, your Resident Witch, will attempt to explain the Pagan holiday of Imbolc, which falls on February 2nd, and just what it has to do with cross-dressing children, the patron saint of abortion providers, voodoo angels with a hankering for hot peppers – and, of course, Groundhog Day.

Imbolc

Here’s one of the problems….

Yesterday, over at Orange, there was an FP diary about meeting some attendees of CPAC on a train in Washington.  They were described as overweight, crew cut and wearing suits in an area where people wear suits even to go out to the bars.  The last line, roughly, was that gosh oh gee, we can even tell them because they look different than us.

I read it and it just really turned me off.

I mean, it was pathetic. Period.

PATHETIC!

Forced Navajo Relocation Continues on Big Mountain

“Springtime” continues, as “BIA Hopi Agency Police and Rangers are patrolling this region (Big Mountain) where a few traditional elders continue to live and also resist federal mandates to relocate.”


Obama: Stop the Peabody Mine Expansion on Black Mesa

As we speak, there exist a state of fear and anxiety in a traditional community at Big Mountain in the heart of Black Mesa. And as we speak, the federally deputized officers of the BIA Hopi Agency Police and Rangers are patrolling this region where a few traditional elders continue to live and also resist federal mandates to relocate.

Depose A Dharmanian! Change

Docudharma is a small community of very smart, stunningly attractive people. We may not have all the answers, but we certainly are witty and crafty enough to reply in an amusing fashion! So if you have a question, whether snarky, simple, political or philosophical, be it meta, meaty, maddening or impossible to answer,….what the hell? Post it here and see what happens! You have nothing to lose but your underwear! Heck, there is a chance it might even get answered, possibly even correctly!

Any questions?

They Hanged Julius Streicher Didn’t They?

Photobucket

I would like to take an opportunity to recommend a piece from a friend of mine, William Cormier who has written today on the role of the mouthpieces in the fascist propaganda machine in the crimes that they so eagerly encourage. Such an essay is especially important to bring awareness to with the $40 million a year ‘populist’ spokesman for the anti-American virulent Republican party form of dead-ender fascism that is the last bastion of scoundrels trying to save their think tank paymasters, the malefactors of great wealth who have subsidized their careers and purchased the media from which they belch their hate and bile. Now with the paymasters of the extremist right in The Homeland doing their damn level best to incite violence, revolution and a crusade against the hated libruls, brown-skinned devils, commies, gays and every other scapegoat that could be invoked at the snakepit of sin and stupidity that was this week’s CPAC bund conference it is imperative that we ask the forbidden question.

How complicit are the establishment hatemongers in the crimes that they have done so much to endorse and in many cases encourage? In my personal opinion, and I have brought this up recently in my own writings – the propagandists and the whores in the media should no longer be able to cower behind the defense of free-speech as a shield as they and the oligarchy that employs their sordid services use the First Amendment as a shield from behind which they can use their money as ‘free speech’ while seeking to destroy the rights of everybody else.

So without further adieu, I present the following with the request that it be taken into account just how complicit that the purveyors of hatred are in the crimes of those that they encourage to commit.

Denial is no excuse, not any longer, not when the stakes are this high. The smell from those smokestacks downwind from Auschwitz wasn’t from freshly baked apple pie.

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