Be sure to vote today if you haven’t already! Even if you dislike the Presidential choices, downticket races are important.
And an overdue note: Thanks SO much to those of you who came out to meet me in Dallas last week. We had a group of 30-35 attend, including someone from Iowa and a libertarian who declared that NC was one of only three non-libertarian sites that he reads. We have a lively discussion and I think everyone had a good time.
The organizer of the evening, Steve in Dallas, circulated a list for people who wanted to be on a Dallas Meetup listserv. Some participants had already left by then, so if you missed the opportunity to sign up and would like to be included or missed this meetup but want to be kept in the loop, please ping me at yves_at_nakedcapitalism.com and I’ll send your coordinates to Steve. Please put “Dallas Meetup” in the subject line.
At the end of the evening, Steve raised an important issue: he’s tried getting friends and family members to read NC and other independent media, with much less success than he’d like. I volunteered that most people don’t want to question authority, and that going outside the mainstream media was tantamount to admitting that the traditional press was wrong, or doing a superficial job.
This chart might help get traditional media loyalists to consider that reporting isn’t what it used to be
If readers have other approaches that have worked, please share them in comments. Thanks!
Watch a Baby Iguana Run for Its Life From a Terrifying Pit of Snakes Motherboard
Beware, iPhone Users: Fake Retail Apps Are Surging Before Holidays New York Times (furzy)
China?
China tries chequebook diplomacy in Southeast Asia Financial Times
China’s New Cybersecurity Law Rattles Foreign Tech Firms Wall Street Journal. Bill B:
“It further requires network operators to provide ‘technical support’ to authorities for national security and criminal investigations.”
Silicon Valley always “obeys the law.” Especially when they’re helping to identify political dissidents.
China Ousts Finance Minister as Xi Turns to Allies in Surprise Reshuffle Wall Street Journal
Brexit
White-collar workers feel Poles apart in London Financial Times
Theresa May needs to have a plan up her sleeve on invoking Article 50 Telegraph
Vestager and Ireland face off over Apple billions Politico
Despite what Everyone Thinks, Biggest Threat to Mexico’s Economy isn’t Trump but Pemex Wolf Street (EM)
Ukraine/Russia
Quitting as regional governor, Saakashvili hits out at Ukraine’s Poroshenko Reuters (YY)
Syraqistan
WHO says over 7,000 killed in Yemen 20-month war Middle East Online (resilc)
Big Brother is Watching You Watch
Swedish prosecutors say Julian Assange questioning set for Nov. 14 Christian Science Monitor
Conspiracy theories abound as Twitter goes down after WikiLeaks ‘DDoS attack’ Independent (furzy)
Clinton E-mail Tar Baby
Judge balks at five-year timeline for release of Clinton emails Politico (furzy)
Clinton E-Mail Releases Threaten to Drag on Past 2020 Election Bloomberg
US election 2016: How to review 650,000 emails in eight days BBC
2016
16 battlegrounds that will decide the election Politico
Nine Ways the U.S. Voting System Is Rigged But Not Against Donald Trump Intercept
The day North Carolina became the center of the political universe Politico
Why Chinese Elites Endorse Hillary Clinton Foreign Policy (resilc)
Corporate US dismayed over choice of Clinton or Trump Financial Times
Election winner to face lawmaker scrutiny The Hill (resilc). Somewhat dated; does not reflect Comey having put the latest Clinton inquiry to bed.
More Pot, Fewer Guns, Higher Pay: The Other Big Issues on the Ballot Bloomberg
Khodorkovsky: Trump presidency might not please Putin Politico. Khodorkovsky is the last guy who’d do Putin any favors, which is why he didn’t say this until now (in that the alleged Trump connection has become the biggest justification for US hostility in the last month, if not longer).
There’s a small, irresponsible part of me that would like to see Trump win The Week
Have I “Downplayed” The Horrors Of Trump? A Self-Assessment Medium (Phil U)
Mexican designers create renderings of Trump’s border wall Business Insider (furzy)
Whether Democrats or Republicans take the election on Nov. 8, Elizabeth Warren wins Quartz
The Democrats’ Fight Over Finance New Yorker (Kevin C)
Control of the Senate Goes Down to the Wire Wall Street Journal
Paul Ryan Makes Huge (Yet Really Obvious) Admission About Obamacare Huffington Post (furzy)
Diving Into the Medical CPI: Are Your Medical Expenses Up Only 5% from Year Ago? Michael Shedlock (resilc)
California’s ballot initiative to control drug prices has the pharma industry terrified Quartz (Micael)
The 2016 Election Exposes the Very, Very Dark Side of Tech Wired
Market predictions: S&P 500 to sell off if Donald Trump tops Clinton, and more from Wall Street CNBC
Here’s Your Cheat Sheet for How Markets Will React to the Election Bloomberg
Beware economic models MacroBusiness
Steve Ballmer’s Plan to Make America Great Involves Excel Spreadsheets Bloomberg
Class Warfare
What Is Socialism for the Twenty-First Century? Monthly Review
The Case Against Democracy New Yorker. Michael: “Guillotine watch meets class warfare. We can clearly see where the ‘epistocracy’ of economists has taken us.”
John Oliver: Why Congress Won’t Shut Down Pyramid Schemes That Destroy People’s Lives Alternet
Danish evidence on wealth inequality in childhood VoxEU
Federal Judge Erred in Blocking Nursing Home Arbitration Rule Public Citizen
Antidote du jour. Timotheus recommended this image for Election Day:
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
339 comments
Comments are closed.
Small mistake in the heading: Election Day 11/9 = 8 of course.
Are you sure?
She got the month correct, unlike someone…OK, unlike yours truly who once typed December for the month.
I missed it earlier but I now see what you did there.
Voter suppression!
Lifelong (I). Switched to (D) in March to vote in CA Primary for Bernie.
Switched back to (I) on June 8 after obviously fixed primary and massive voter disenfranchisement.
Show up to polls today – suddenly I’m a vote-by-mail voter! Never voted by mail in my life and voted in person LESS THAN 6 MONTHS AGO AT SAME LOCATION. 4 little old ladies have no idea how it happened, but you can cast a provisional ballot!
I’m sure it has nothing to do with CA SoS Julian Castro openly campaigning for Clinton (in violation of his office). I’m sure I’m the only (D)-to-(I) from June 8 who had to cast a provisional (quick primer: provisional = your vote didn’t count). I’m sure it’s purely a coincidence. It’s not like leaving the (D) party the day after the fixed primary told them who I was going to vote for (just who I was voting against. Wasn’t even voting Trump but this spineless Oligarchy can never be too sure even in a ‘safe’ state like CA.)
This Oligarchy is so in your face about it. Hope I live long enough to watch them all burn.
Alex Padilla. CA SoS. http://www.sos.ca.gov/administration/about-alex-padilla/
Julian Castro. HUD Secretary. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Castro
Don’t worry. It could be the courts deciding on 11/9. That’s called being prescient!
No matter who wins I’m praying for intractable gridlock. And if Hillary does manage to steal it, I pray that she’ll be so scandal ridden and moribund that she’ll be unable to get the nuclear war with Russia that she’s angling for.
With regards to prescience, I’d predict the destruction of the Democratic/Republican parties under Hillary, an accelerated collapse of the US empire (with a possible nuclear war as an added bonus) and the first stirrings of an organized domestic insurrection that doesn’t get crushed immediately. Anyone else?
Then on 11/10 too, when the Supreme Court changes its mind.
Everybody wins.
and then comey announces they’ve discovered more emails and the fbi is reopening the investigation.
Obama was in perpetual gridlock with >50-60% approval ratings (sometimes higher). Probably the one person the Repubs hate more than a black prez Obama is Hillary Clinton. She’s starting with record level unapproval ratings, and she risks pissing off the Sanders wing even further than she has if she makes her neolib and neocon appointments.
Climate change is a lost cause alas but let’s just hope we can prevent a war with Russia. I don’t see any progress in the poor Mideast… Israel and the Saudis will carry on as before essentially running US foreign policy.
At least–I suppose–when the financial crash comes, HRC will get the blame.
That is where I am, at least in the event of a hillary victory, there’ll be no one to point fingers at.
Overjoyed that election day is finally here, thanks yves, lambert and the rest of the nc crew for a long contentious slog through the most absurd election in my lifetime.
But alas also no fingers left to do the pointing, either. The cute picture of Poppy and Shrub Bush trotting out to vote for Hilary got me thinking about what the rest of the transition to single-party government will look like in the U.S. I live now in Australia where The Party Out Of Government is a key formalized institution, with “shadow” ministers chosen to play man-on-man defense at each level (shadow Treasurer, shadow Health minister, etc). Each day these “loyal Opposition” members keep the party in power honest with close and specific questionning on policy. Now that the Fifth Estate no longer performs their oversight and transparency role either I guess we’ll just need to trust in the benevolence and honesty of the self- selected mandarins who rule our former Republic. Republic: from the Latin res (a thing) and publica (of the people).
I suspect Clinton will go for a twofer. Solve climate change by cooling everything down with a nuclear winter.
tactical nuclear winter. brilliant
And it takes care of the overpopulation problem. Hard to spot a downside.
Gallup and others stopped doing tracking polls. I suspect Obama’s approval was quite a bit lower but based on old poll metrics. In the end, his margins of victory over Mittens were fairly small, and Mittens was basically Hillary. Even then, the GOP attacks on minority voting were extreme in 2012, and I don’t go for that “this is the most divisive election” garbage every year. Minorities especially African-Americans really pushed back against the GOP in 2012. The LAT predicted that push back which is why they were right about the 2012 election.
he was in gridlock when he had legislative majorities. he liked gridlock. it gave him an excuse to avoid following through on his promises.
That’s not just Obama. That’s the entire Harry Reid senate. It is a rant I have. When the Dems are the majority in the Senate, the GOP rules the roost with “filibusters” (that aren’t filibusters, just gentlemen’s agreements to require 60 votes on everything – no pain involved). When the GOP is in the majority, the GOP rules the roost.
The GOP “filibusters” EVERYTHING. The Dems “filibuster” NOTHING. Ever. It’s “unseemly”. No, the Dems HATE being in the majority in Senate unless they know the GOP will hamstring them. They don’t have to follow through with any promises or expectations from the base. They have the handy excuse (and it’s also handy fundraising tool!) of “the meanies in the Republican Party wont let us do what we SOOO badly want to do for you!”. Of course, it remains a VERY simple thing to fix things so they CAN do LOTS of things: reform the filibuster by making it a REAL filibuster. People having to stand on the floor of the senate 24/7 talking and reading phonebooks and anything else. A painful exercise that can actually fail. A painful exercise that is actually rarely used. No, instead, the Dems keep the bogus filibuster in place whenever they take the majority because it serves their personal interests to NOT get what the voters want them to do. It serves their big donors, their personal pocketbooks, and their future job prospects as lobbyists for all the corporations they are serving during their terms.
Such a simple fix would make the senate actually work again and get legislation that the people actually demand going again. Simply bring back the REAL filibuster.
It was originally designed to be unpleasant and RARE but the two Party’s apparachiks have decided, together, to make it so easy that the question becomes “why NOT filibuster?” A “filibustering” Republican gives up nothing. S/he goes home at 5pm, goes out to their usual cocktail parties or gangbangs, sleep in their comfy beds, etc. The Dems simply never avail themselves of even the faux filibuster so they can be ignored. They guarantee that the ratchet ALWAYS steps rightward. Ever rightward.
So, it doesn’t matter who controls the senate because, in the end, it is the GOP that controls the agenda by design and mutual agreement.
Excellent analysis… it all boils down to spineless Dems and Repubs who use every trick in the book. As you point out, it leads to a steady drift rightwards… Jeezus Richard Nixon is more liberal than HRC in many ways!
And for all the Dems’ cries of “SCOTUS, SCOTUS!” to get out the vote for yet another worthless and/or neoliberal candidate (Kerry being the prime example of each), they consistently put up middle of the road justice nominees whilst the Repubs pack it with ultra-right wing, young justices: Alito, the execrable Thomas, Roberts, etc.
Thus the Warfare State rolls on…
In agreeing with you I offer the following challenge: name one issue on which Hillary is to the left of Nixon.
LGBTQ!
She’s been consistent on that issue for a whole four years or so, no? Lol
Not quite, it is just over three. She finally ‘corrected the record’ as in flip flopped in 2013.
Well she did remember to praise Nancy Reagan at her funeral for all the work the Reagan admin did to help solve the AIDS crisis. Bonus points for that!
Pavel;
You must be snarking mightily on that one. If H Clinton did so opine at Nancy Reagan’s “Off To H—” party, then she was indulging in some industrial grade cognitive dissonance.
Three.
Nixon destroyed Cambodia, whereas HRC destroyed Libya, which you will note is to the left on the map.
Speaking of Cambodia, here’s something HRC has in common with Nixon: the admiration and guidance of one Henry Kissinger, destroyer of nations and war criminal extraordinaire.
Nixon pulled off a coup in Chile. Hillary did one in Honduras.
The Chilean coup killed more people, but just give Honduras some time to catch up.
This happens because the GOP fears its base while the DNC does not.
By the way, I do not understand why any registered Democrat who supported Sanders would vote for HRC after the Wikileaks revelations. But then again, I do not understand why victims in abusive relationships keep going back for more.
WJ, I believe the term is called Stokholm Syndrome…
“…is a psychological phenomenon first described in 1973 in which hostages express empathy and sympathy and have positive feelings toward their captors, sometimes to the point of defending and identifying with the captors.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome
WJ, I believe the term is called Stockholm Syndrome…
“…is a psychological phenomenon first described in 1973 in which hostages express empathy and sympathy and have positive feelings toward their captors, sometimes to the point of defending and identifying with the captors.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome
There are plenty of other ways to move a country & populace to the right. Some merely historical proposals. Others appear to be in use now. Look at Israel. Look back here.
Why doesn’t this country, outside of FDR, drift left ‘accidentally’?
I think it has on social and race issues, and largely for the better.
On economic issues, I think it is crucial to keep in mind that the assumptions and vocablulary our country uses today to frame such issues is the result of an orchestrated, well-funded, and extremely successful propaganda campaign begun in the late 70s or thereabouts and continuing up until even this election. Propaganda in the form of think-tank “research”, white papers, media outlets, talk radio, etc. really works.
A ‘real’ filibuster will never happen while geriatrics are in the senate. Their support hose won’t last longe enough to hold them up 24/7.
abolishing it entirely is not necessarily a bad idea either but maybe needing an amendment to do, it’s clearly anti-democratic (small d).
First reply kicked into touch…try, try again:
As I said, fair play to Sen. Harry Reid, who in November, 2013, invoked the “nuclear option”, essentially barring filibusters during voting on fed. judiciary nominees by the Obama Administration. A truly significant and important parliamentary ploy, as it opened the doors to hundreds of “progressive” judges going to the fed. bench, as counterweights to all the rightist judges placed in the system by Cheney-Bush. Reid was really unappreciated in his role as Majority Leader, as he played the game much in the manner of LBJ, during Johnson’s years as Majority Leader.
he played the game much in the manner of LBJ, during Johnson’s years as Majority Leader.
I cannot imagine Harry Reid locking the Senate in chambers during a filibuster rather than giving in, as LBJ did to secure passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
Well, let me just say that if the Demos squeak by and claim the Senate this cycle, Chuck Schumer as SML will really, really make us all miss Harry Reid.
They filibuster every major budget bill but then they “fast track” trade deals.
My prediction is we will get better or more addictive circuses.
Oh, and for recreation, or to sooth the pain of living under another Clinton regime, many states will legalize Marijuana (though not at the federal level).
“Take one. Be happy. Peace. We are all brothers and sisters. Let’s all get along…with even the 0.01%. No overthrowing of anything now. Be sure to wear flowers in your hair.”
I don’t think cannabis is an opiate of the masses. That would be heroin/opiates. Just ask China. Not too many people are holding protest smokeouts when it comes to opium, whereas I’ve watched people trying to smoke up on federal land in protest of prohibition get beaten into the pavement for it.
Fortunately, the USA has secured the Silk Road in Afghanistan and is making damn sure that opium continues to flow.
People smoke to ease their pain.
The Chinese have more options – acupuncture, moxibustion, Tiger Balm, etc.
They also have opium, shark fins, and rhino horns. There are all kinds of reasons for imbibing.
Tiger Balm flat-out works. I swear by the stuff.
Maybe not an opiate of the masses, but a much needed stress reliever that helps to sedate the masses.
This more a cultural assumption than a drug thing. I’ve known some pretty energetic (and even a few violent) stoners in my day. Check out the etymology of “assassin:” https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=assassin%20etymology
And, in Black nationalist cowboy culture (i.e. gangsta rap), we have “I’ll finish you before I finish the dutch” – Styles P, “Good Times”
If you don’t harsh their mellow, they generally won’t care about you.
I’ve been doing some research on the earth 19th century for a book project of mine. Recently came across the idea of the “Era of Good Feelings” under Monroe. Monroe basically presided over the dissolution of the opposition party, the Federalists, in 1816. With patience and some interesting posturing, he basically wiped them off the political landscape, to the point where he ran for his second term virtually unopposed (1820). Hence, Good Feelings.
I think that HRC thought that she could unite the Rs and Ds together under a similar umbrella, slowly phasing out the Rs when it came to her cabinet, ignoring them as an opposition party, and so on.
What she might have forgotten is that Monroe’s term led into major cracks in the Democratic Republican party apparatus, where nobody won the electoral college, leading to the splitting apart of Monroe’s party, and eventually led to Andrew Jackson in 1828, who a lot of people say was one of our worst presidents, but who really just resembles Trump.
i think she is more interested in slowly phasing out the d’s. i don’t know if she ever wanted to unite with the deplorables.
That’s a good point, but even as she rejected the left, she openly courted republican donors that were abandoning Trump. Probably secured quite a few of them, too, but I wasn’t tracking that. But seeing Bush advisors and even Koch getting on board, that’s the feeling I was getting out of her campaign.
Either way, it seemed she wanted to get the Democrats shifted right to the center and make sure there was a good war going, and that we were all putting our retirement savings into manged accounts or eating catfood by the end of her first term.
I don’t think we’re there yet because the top 20% really hasn’t begun to suffer. Remember that George Washington, and others like him, would not have been as open to revolt if they had just been treated like they thought they deserved to be treated. In large part, the upper middle class are being treated how they expect to be treated. The poor are too disorganized and miserable to revolt, that’s why they’re killing themselves with opioids.
I’m equally bearish on the death of the neoliberal establishment if Hillary is elected. They will have shown that they can us anyone through to promote their agenda. They have ample evidence that populism can be brought to heel. That’s liable to soothe all the fears of losing their grip on the country.
When that changes… when credentialism and nepotism are no longer guaranteed paths to success, then you’ll get the revolt.
The reason GW and co. mostly came from slave states is that they could advocate for democracy within a system where the bulk of labor was conducted by violently repressed people with zero rights. As a general rule, people in power are much more concerned with their relative status within any given hierarchy than preventing the hierarchy from collapsing. If history is a guide, the elites will cling to their relative status and self-serving fantasies right up to the moment the blood-dimmed tide is loosed.
The poor still have something to lose. That being hope. Once that’s out, the same confluence of interest that keeps diverse elites from fighting each other may once again be realized downmarket.
It’s already November 9 in New Zealand and eastern Australia!
That’s were they put AZ’s polling booths!
we should ask them who won.
As noted in NC a few days ago, NBC/MSM apparently had the answer ready for airing last week…
Meh, mockups happen. Even though that mockup seems unusually “strategic” — Stein juuuust short of 5% (which I’m about to go correct right now) and a clear enough Hillary mandate — the prayers of an endangered bourgeoisie take many forms.
We’re forbidden from revealing future election results to those countries far behind us. Likewise with winning lottery numbers.
I don’t want to face the wrath of angry Time Lords (again).
The Wired story is a doozy. On internet trolls: ‘the so-called Bernie Bros (leftists Bernie Sanders devotees) became infamous for their well-documented misogynist rants and threats against Sanders critics and Clinton supporters.’ And it is stated as fact that the ‘Russians’ hacked the Podesta emails. So much for that.
Apparently the people at Wired had not seen the internet prior to 2016…
Would this be the issue of Wired “guest edited” by Pres Obama? Who has nothing else to do with his time besides volunteering to help out profit-making enterprises?
Had a discussion about your intro topic when I first got to the Dallas meetup. How did we end up at NC?
Going back about a decade, it was Mish, ZH (in the less crazy days), TAE, then NC. Like it or not, ZH is a gateway drug into this alternate media. I have about a half-dozen educated and well-informed friends that I told about ZH and have gone from there to many other sites.
Man, I wish ZH would back down from Teh Crazy a little bit. I liked them a whole lot . . . 5 years ago. I haven’t been back to that site in a few years; last I checked, it had been overrun by crazy people. But you are right, it was my gateway drug into the world of alternative media and NC is the first site I check into everyday now.
I sometimes enjoy what they write but, on the whole, the place is infested with Gold Bugs and debt/deficit scolds. All nonsense.
The gold bugs and debt/deficit people are one thing — the virulent racism and antisemitism is what made me stop reading.
This exactly. Add in a very healthy dose of misogyny, too.
ZH ~= transporters in cell walls, which are not for hanging out in, and therefore require a certain repulsive force. But as long as the payloads are on the right side of the matrix, there’s value.
How did I end up here? Via The Housing Bubble Blog.
I was an avid reader of the Housing Bubble Blog. It was fascinating. I was studying the housing bubble and the financial system – also would take a look at Calculated Risk. And M Taibbi during that time too.
For years, I couldn’t get over having to click through to each individual story, rather than reading it on the main page. I didn’t want to commit the time to reading a story without seeing more of it or all of it first, so I was only an occasional NC reader. I got desperate for non-corrupted information during the fast track vote and realized NC was by far the best place for non-Obamabot-provided information that isn’t right wing. I got used to the format and now prefer it.
During the Bush years, I had been addicted to TPM, the great orange satin and similar sites. Obama started going off the rails on election night when he used his speech to lower expectations and none of them were willing to call him on it and it’s been downhill ever since. NC has been consistently on point throughout. None of this “let’s give our guy the benefit of the doubt.”
Truth-out.org, recommended by the IATSE guy at the stage door of a local large venue; thence to Firedog Lake, then here.
Former firebagger here, more of a lurker then. I found them when they were live-blogging the Scooter Libby trial and got hooked!
I remember your handle from there.
David Dayan did an amazing job – as they all did.
When they transitioned to the new site, I somehow found nakedcapitalism, I really can’t recall how, but nc is now my news filter the way firedoglake had been.
Both wonderful resources.
Thank you Yves and Lambert and commenters for this oasis of sanity.
Ditto. I was led to FDL as the go-to source for all things Plame from Mark Kleiman’s blog, which sadly later went Obot. There often were links at FDL to NC articles, and with the collapse of FDL, NC filled the niche for reality-based reporting and commentary. The level of the discussion here, thanks to the writers, moderators and commentators (well, most of them) is something that can’t be found anywhere else.
I also found NC through the late FiredogLake, and was immediately hooked. The postings were extremely informative (something I couldn’t find elsewhere) and the comments were great, often providing links to other sites. NC really is a place to come to share thoughts and find hope these days. The antidotes are uplifting and soothing. Thanks to all of you for this oasis.
The late Firedoglake was also my gateway to NC. During the early days of Occupy in 2011 someone mentioned a thread at NC about the Roosevelt Institute losing its way. I have been here ever since.
Read zh for about how many years now but had to turn away during the past few due to how stupid and crazy the people were who commented. It was far out during the financial crisis – that and another blog that is long gone. It was a real eye opener – zh. Now they pick up stories pretty quickly so like the range of material they cover. But NC is my definite favorite due to how it makes my brain cells come alive and sing. Also started reading it during the financial crisis – learned tons – a big thank you.
The other eye opener for me was the mainstream press. I just can’t tolerate it at this point due to this election. I watched them first hand trying to manipulate thinking at every turn. As an example big rally for Clinton last night in PA – tons of people there. But then again why not – Springsteen and Bon Jovi were there to entertain. For free, I am sure. Why didn’t the media make that point – that people were there because of these two headliners?
Free concert by Springsteen and Bon Jovi? Who wouldn’t show up for that concert?
The speeches? Well, let me venture to guess that once the music was over, the crowd started leaving.
Free “stuff” is not just food, housing and phones anymore. Concerts, too.
I think Springsteen will regret this endorsement, considering his fan base. Now that my children have children, I see this enormous sea change in their tolerance for popular culture.
One daughter dresses for work with “The View” every morning, but recently said ” I don’t like Whoopie Goldberg anymore. She’s changed. She’s so hateful.”
My son turned the channel during the Super Bowl when Beyonce was strutting her scantily clad posterior across the podium at half time. He didn’t want his toddler to see her.
Both these young adults have been steeped in American Pop Culture since childhood, accepting multi cultural norms, tattooed friends, and somehow chose to reject much of what the left is peddling. My son voted against legalized pot. My daughter has begun to listen to old Dean Martin music.
And most recently – each was horrified by the hypocrisy of the left demonizing Trump for language that pales next to Grammy award winning “artists”.
And as to Hillary bemoaning a Trump presidency – because the “children are watching” — she sang along to “fu*k, n*gga, fu*k, n*gga, fu*k, n*gga, fu*k, n*gga” while Beyonce shook an ample booty at a rally this week.
This is more than a revolution by gun nuts and racists. This is a battle for the soul of a nation.
Detractors be advised. We are a family of agnostics and atheists. None of my children have been baptized or Christened – and I don’t recall anyone in our extended family EVER attending church, owning or reading a bible.
Hunt? We don’t even fish. One family member led the fight to ban zoos in Costa Rica. So our dedication to the cause for good is solid. And our Mormon neighbors are some of the finest people on the planet. They live by example, and their goodness is tangible. None has ever questioned my faith or belief system. They just ARE what they ARE.
There is such a thing as goodness and evil. It is my firm belief that the fight for goodness is upon us.
Thank you for sharing those thoughts, GMoore. One of the things I’ve hated the most about this appalling election is how the coastal elites insist on thrusting everyone not of their kind into categories that often carry pejorative connotations.
GMoore: You can’t go wrong with Dean Martin, who really was a good musical stylist. And Tony Bennett is still around.
Don’t get me going on Sinatra, who went flat around 1950 and sang through his nose thereafter.
No way that Sinatra could have pulled off “Anything Goes” the way that Tony Bennett sings it.
GMoore, what you are fighting, and I think we should all fight, is known as
“Civic Decay”
There’s a lot of profit in Civic Decay.
There’s a lot of camouflage for some people offered by Civic Decay.
Who will pay attention to the terms of your mortgage loan and do the math in your paycheck when your kid is in rehab?
IMHO it really got going with the drug culture of the 1960s, I witnessed that first hand in California, than it progressed through the crapification of music, glam rock, punk and then metastasized all over America thanks to MTV. Each succeeding generation has no idea what they are missing in quality, manners, values etc. Those new electronic devices and (Gordon) Moore’s Law offer a nice opiate.
Who will see what’s coming down the pike when they have their face buried in their phone as they cross the street?
I’m very much a newbie! I think I found NC via links from the sites created by people deserting Daily Kos during the primaries. But after I looked up the background of the posters here and found the writing and comments far superior to other sites, I was hooked.
I am pretty sure that for me it was Corrente, Lambert’s site which I’ve read since 2008 (wishing I found it years before) then here. I could have found Corrente through a number of paths that year, but I believe it was through The Confluence… maybe his comments??
I was reading economist’s blogs (Krugman, Delong, the regional Feds) and looking for other perspectives, like the aggregation site run by the Permabear fund (Prudent Bear I think), and a fellow in Sweden whose name I don’t recall, an economist, who was extremely skeptical of the entire economics field and its reliance on counter factual assumptions to allow the math to work (not a MMT adherent to my knowledge, just a rigorous skeptic). I followed links and one led here.
I remain alert to the dangers of bias and make it a point not to let NC curate my news exclusively, in particular looking for thoughtful right of center opinions.
I too was reading PK and in one of his columns he gave a shout-out to NC so I checked it out and never looked back. I wonder if PK still reads it??
I was reading those sites too. I believe the direct connection to NC came about through TomDispatch though. I’ve slacked off on reading his site in the last half year – the quality seemed to decline after the primaries were finished. I expect that it may improve again after the election. I doubt there’s going to be any honeymoon period with the next U.S. president.
yelling at NYT and WSJ, much angry googling, truthout, then NC
Somewhere at the intersection of Simon Johnson, Mish, Calculated Risk, Harry Shearer, Max Keiser, ZH, Amy Goodman. It’s been so long that I don’t even remember when I started.
Might have been FireDogLake in the healthcare debate that steered me here. Sorry Jane isn’t still doing it. I appreciated the “doable activism”. Whether it was paying for Chelsea Manning’s defense, John Kiriakou’s mortgage or sleeping bags for Occupy…I felt like I was putting my little shoulder to the wheel w/my community. I realize NC doesn’t work on that model, it is a salon of ideas (and I’m grateful that sanity prevails!). But maybe in some future we can find a way to mobilize our strengths collectively to move our world in the right direction. In little ways.
For an example of NC doable activism, I think supporting NC helps to support Yves in her work (and others) regarding CALPERS, which is more than supporting a salon of ideas.
Best i can recall, it was Bill Moyers &Co which caused me to start reading NC.
i came here by following a link from eschaton.
Peakoil.com, theoildrum, TAE, then here.
Me too…
Me three but mostly skipped TAE — the hard sell on a fast-crash scenario was tough to take. Glad to have found NC.
When my economics & policy education was clearly insufficient, there were analyses from Metafilter, and the line that Freakonomics and Gladwell were going, behavioral economics and actually testing hypotheses. Most particularly important was looking at bias and self-deception, Marilyn vos Savant and Gilivoch, which led to Munger.
But sites with decent objective basis, like Calculated Risk, weren’t having good predictive value, and there were too many to adequately track. So I tested my 100+ sites (which you can do since the internet is archived) and only two (!) came up aces: Naked Capitalism and Mercola. Both presented ideas that seemed absurd, and both had a surprising knack of being proven right against a majority that turned out wrong, again and again.
I have had conversations with mentors, and almost (not all) have given blank looks. So I don’t just come here to get information, but to have the flaws beat from the mettle. Not always comfortable. But it’s a rare place with the depth of knowledge and the commitment to sincerely challenge assumptions, and should be cherished.
Along these lines:
“To be the reserve currency issue, you need to be willing to run trade deficits on an ongoing basis so there is plenty of your currency in foreign hands. That is equivalent to having your domestic demand support foreign jobs, or exporting jobs.” – Yves
“Local government exists for one reason and one reason only: to decide how land gets used. Everything, and I mean everything, that local government does deconstructs to a decision about which landowners will win, and which will lose.” – Greg Travis
Is it possible that Clintons advancing a 65% estate tax is a shot at local elites and local economies? Because if you fly a corporate jet and eat on the company tab and don’t need to pay for the penthouse, in other words you are a corporate flexian, then all that wealth is not your estate to tax. To what degree has the control function superseded ownership?
Ditto on Calculated Risks. I also think CR went downhill once Doris died.
Steve, could you explain this in more depth?
Thanks.
Maybe someone else can explain this to me. Thanks.
Sites like Salon & Slate were not as clearly partisan as can be seen now, and they were looking at things like demographics. They held explanatory value, but were not usually falsifiable, and were insufficient for generating predictive understandings. Calculated Risk actually dove into the available numbers on the housing market, but the framework was pretty much orthodox, in the way my econ classes were. And that broke down when it came to understanding the crash.
That required understanding derivatives and their effect. My background was not finance. 2010 was when ECONned came out and Taibbi coined ‘vampire squid.’ By 2011 I understood how Federal debt default could be gamed, but still had information overload. So I started to look at predictive value, beyond explanatory value, which can be tripped up by confirmation bias. At least one site was nearly 100% wrong, CR wasn’t that bad but (iirc) kept assuming things would normalize.
Between that, and the ability of the NC comment section to eviscerate hypotheses, my use of CR faded. It’s a bit like looking at FRED data, you can get clean numbers but Fed public predictions seem to skew in orthodox (or expedient) directions.
How did you test sites:
Dr Mercola’s alternative medicine site? Are you referring only to the crash in the housing market?
Do you mean you watched to see if their predictions/assumptions were accurate? I really want to understand how you found the 100 sites to test and then how you ran the tests.
They were sites I had built up over the years, from various sources. What this retrospect is showing me is how more sophisticated the web is now, early on it was Reddit and Metafilter which were providing answers, such as they were. Counterpunch was good for finding new authors, who then posted elsewhere and I’d follow them to new sites. I particularly remember TomDispatch, Bill Bishop’s ‘Big Sort’ on Slate, and Pepe Escobar writing about Pipelineistan. It seems like it was people providing links, and not in social media.
But the crash challenged the perspective, so while Slate and Salon were better than mainstream media in aligning with my views (see confirmation bias), they didn’t give sufficient explanation. By 2010 I was finding alternatives of which NC was one.
The first cull took out many political sites which hadn’t foreseen the crash. I had to overcome the connection between my degree in environmental science and the political beliefs of my associates. The policy part of my education was built on standard economic theory, and risk assessment was the primary modus operandi, but they were equilibrium models which couldn’t account for black swan events. vos Savant was important in cracking that open.
Once I’d done that cull I looked for testable points. This took over half a year, as I pored over archives for material I hadn’t read. An early introduction to finance language, for example, came from a Metafilter poster and his blog, but he was 0 for 4 in his predictions. Pepe Escobar was a leftist ranter who kept being insightful and right, but some of his work was, shall we say derivative, and citing sources is important to me for veracity. Enough confirmed misses and I’d stop the search on that site.
Both NC and Mercola did something more than just be pretty much always right for what could be verified. They both changed my perspective in a huge way from accepted best practice, and that surprise made an impact. For NC it was the notion that fiat governments don’t need taxes to fund government spending. For Mercola, is was eating more fat, not less. And that walking barefoot and ‘grounding’ was good for you, which I thought was totally hippy b.s. until I read the papers on blood viscosity.
Both sites also have had a habit of talking about subjects ahead of the curve. Keywords and sources they wrote about showed up more broadly in the media months later. And, truth be told, they both still have some points I’m a little sketchy on, but their track record means I won’t dismiss them outright, and the past indicates they usually have a particular detail parsed out that resolves a general case.
Okay, forgive me if I’ve oversplained. My life is better for the cull, and I would like to read about your results if you do something similar.
No you haven’t oversplained. I guess I thought Metafilter was a tool to find other websites rather than a website itself. Also, I wondered if your search was broad or narrow. I think you use the same process as many of the rest of us here do, in that we let our curiosity wander all over the place.
That I have found many things in my education the last five years since I retired, just this way. Also, one of my wonderful resources is the large selection of books and films at my public library. I probably borrow $1500-$2,000 books, audio books and DVDs a year, which I could never afford otherwise. I try to, at least, skim anything I learn about here and other websites I visit for more depth.
NC has been a sanity saver. While in graduate school I was always wanting to do some research in econ that would test some of the hypotheses that my profs & classmates took as gospel, but decided that it would take too long to get the space to do that since I would have to work within the assumptions currently accepted too long. Seemed too frustrating and chancy for a career. Love this site since we can think openly and allow others to react to our ideas that assume we care about everyone, not just ourselves.
I get a couple of physician newsletters that give me some perspective of what is happening in healthcare. I subscribe to many other newsletters to see how much I learn then delete them if they are not helpful. U of CA universities have a newsletter that gives podcasts in several fields. That led me to Dr. Robert Lustig’s Sugar: The Bitter Truth UCTV 2009. I like lots of detail to understand and shake out how credible the information is. You sound like you do the same. The Mercola site is a favorite of my medical message therapist. Found a very few but helpful info from TopDocumentaries. Most are garbage, but winnowing helps. Found Raphael Mechoulam’s “The Scientist” from this, but it is easily available now from a google search. I needed it to learn about a medicine I now use for pain. As you know this could go on and on. Thanks for explaining. Hope you see this.
beth, thanks, I’ll watch the Mechoulam documentary. Metafilter (& Ask Metafilter) had a higher than normal commentariat quality, possibly the five dollar one-time fee. The only reason I stopped was there was too much interesting/distracting/irrelevant material.
Probably something like Firedog Lake or Counterpunch. Basically I came to completely distrust this country over it’s wars and police state and so on first … then only leftists analysis of it all made any sense.
Anybody here remember Pamela Jones’ site, Groklaw?
I remember it very well, as a regular contributor and reader for almost its entire existence. After GL, I was kinda “lost” for something to do, so I discovered popehat (legal blog similar to NC). A link in someone’s sig sent me to NC.
Been trying to think. For the most part didn’t have time to do much beyond mainstream media until I was laid up in 2008, oh, I occasionally read the great orange Satan or Eschaton, but mostly was just playing headline catchup. Since I had the time in 2008 I spent most of the crash going all over the place to understand what was going on and why no one knew it was coming when I had figured out the housing bubble had to crash years earlier. Hit my usual but found Firedoglake and Ian Welsh and through them Empty Wheel. FDL became my go to, especially during the ACA debacle. Dropped Kos then but still checked in on Eschaton. NC was a drop by until the demise of FDL. And this election has made it indispensable. The antidotes alone might do it, but it is also an antidote in itself for the propaganda and out right lies of our free press – with links to support that.
I believe it was FDL that led me here as well.
I read Dkos during the Bush years and it wasn’t bad at the time, even Pelosi was openly slammed for taking impeachment off the table. But Bush was low hanging fruit. The illuminating event for me with that blog was its refusal to allow any posts critical of Israel’s 2006 invasion of Lebanon.
First saw links to NC on Digby’s Hullaballoo. Stopped going there after she shut down comments (which were often more interesting than the posts). NC is still mostly over my head, but the quality of posts/comments here beats any place else I’ve seen.
For me it was Dean Baker -> EPI –> Calculated Risk –> NC. Never heard of Zero Hedge til I got here.
I think it was through Tomdispatch via Truthout.
I can’t remember. I thought it was through Corrente… but was Corrente around in 2007?
Somewhat similar to you, Scott, I arrived here at Naked Capitalism via The Economist’s View, and I arrived there via DeLong’s site. And the only reason I was there, which happened a little over a decade ago, is because someone in the physics blogosphere mentioned a couple of interesting concepts in physics that are widely used by economists and they linked me to his site. Up until then, I pretty much confined myself to the physics blogosphere with weighty discussions on dark matter/energy, quantum gravity, and the very early universe.
Now I enjoy reading and having weighty discussions on economics and finance, and that has expanded to include weighty discussions on foreign policy and war-related issues. Which is probably why I still enjoy reading Zero Hedge — bloggers there discuss both issues and often in combination. Unlike many here at Naked Capitalism, I have learned to filter out all the Zero Hedge crazies. It’s not easy, but it’s well worth it, IMO.
Fast as I can… because I need the long version to make a few points… of how I found NC and why I love it…
In ~1950, my father, a Lutheran German with a college degree in mining engineering, moved from Germany to Salt Lake City to get an advanced mining engineering degree at the Univ. of Utah (he also wanted to snow ski!!!). There he met my mother, a 2nd-gen Russian Jew (cousin of Barry Manilow) from the Bronx NYC (qwarta for ya thawts), who was working on a PHD in biochemistry. So a German meets a Jew in the remote ‘pioneering wilderness’ of the Mormons in the mid-1950s. After managing underground uranium mines in the 4-corners area and then doing research at the Colorado School of Mines (where he developed/patented/wrote-the-book on slurry pipelining… transporting solids suspended in liquid through pipes) he was hired by Conoco Oil Company (not yet 35 yo, as ‘General Manager’) to start and operate their ‘Minerals Department’.
So why do I say all this?…
1) I grew up with a father who was a non-fiction current-events bookworm… he was always reading… big fat technical books, newspapers everywhere, etc.
2) My father was gone most of the time… traveling literally all over the world.
3) My two brothers and I grew up traveling… Europe many times since we were infants, on our own with backpacks as young teenagers… my father dragged us through Inca and Aztec ruins when they were first being excavated, before there were tourists (before National Geographic became a PR rag for the MIC!!!).
4) I grew up surrounded by earth scientists, engineers, geologists, etc… when (IMPORTANT POINT…) these people were the top-most corporate managers… before the ‘business degreed’ shysters and MBA con artists pushed real leaders out of the corporate management ranks.
5) Yes… my father was pushed out come the 1980s… fortunately he and my mother moved to Vienna, Austria to work at the UN-IAEA while my brothers and I were in college… so the UN paid for us kids to go visit the folks many times!!!
My story also involves being screwed by the MBA shysters…
I was the only family member who stayed in Colorado… to get my BA and MS in mechanical engineering at CSU. (Interesting… regarding reading… in my first year of graduate school I was tricked into teaching a ‘senior-level’ circuits-and-automation laboratory… where I promptly discovered that most of 45 students couldn’t write a complete sentence or compose a coherent thought to save their lives… I was shocked… to this day, my reaction to anyone who says “our education system is good” is “you are fooling yourself”).
In my last three of seven years in college I invented/developed three of six generations of a 3D scanning machine (which used a laser to illuminate surface points and various mechanics to move the laser around complex surfaces). With interested people (buyers!!!) coming from all over the world, my father and brothers helped me start a company and develop and sell three commercial generations of the machine. During the 90s we attended and had booths at MANY high tech conferences/shows all over the world… where we mingled with hundreds (thousands?) of startup companies who, like us, all had development, marketing, sales and support people. Those days were so thrilling… and yes, it was real capitalism where all of us had (IMPORTANT POINT…) competition… and there were lots of jobs!!! Then what happen??? You guest it… MONEY… EVERYWHERE… the shyster MBA/Bankers came in and bought up everything… the late 90s into the crash became, for me, a nightmare (very long story…).
By 2002 when the articles and books were announcing that $10 trillion of workers ‘compensation’ had evaporated (roughly $30K per American… $120K per family of four!!!) I was furious… the bankers had printed trillions to buy up all the new computing and manufacturing technology (e.g. 3D CAD/CAM/CAE)… consolidated it into a relatively tiny number of ‘global’ companies… the jobs and the whole environment of enthusiasm, innovation and competition were gone by 2002… the bankers and their cronies walked away with all the valuable assets/income… and the losses were dumped on the stupid worker/investors. And then, to add insult to injury, there was no ‘blowback’ reaction from the jobless workers… it seemed like I was alone screaming “they ripped us off… look where they got the money… out of thin air… they took all the hugely valuable assets and left us with worthless paper… why isn’t everyone furious???
So what has this got to do with finding NakedCapitalism.com (I hope you’re getting an idea)???
Through the 90s and up to 2008 (I’m very embarrassed to say) I was a daily reader of the Wall Street Journal. Then two things happened… 1) I read The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein and 2) Rupert Murdoch bought the WSJ. In reaction I went to the internet and instantly found the ‘independent media’. I was shocked (in a very good way… finally!!!)… within a month of reading the independent media I knew that 20 years of reading the WSJ had taught me absolutely NOTHING. For the first time I was learning the basics of how the system really works… great people like Yves Smith, Michael Hudson and Bill Black were explaining in detail how deregulation of the banking system had reduced our economic system into a crime syndicate. Also, I instantly started to understand what the wars were all about… how the Cheney neocon PNAC criminals were coordinating with the Greenspan/Rubin/Summers globalist neoliberals to force the world into the dollar system (store and trade your wealth in dollars/euros or else… bombs???).
I could go on… about how amazing NakedCapitalism and the independent media is… how it has ‘enlightened’ my world… and how desperately I want others to tune into the ‘enlightenment’. Many times I have begged family, friends and associates to turn off the mainstream media… tune into the real (old fashioned?) news… written by true competent journalist with integrity. Unfortunately I’ve had very little success promoting the independent media… my mother still watches FOX news …. my brothers tell my nieces and nephews that Uncle Steve is a crazy conspiracy kook. Here’s the ultimate irony and frustration… they always ask me “so Steve… how is all this stuff going to change anything?”… and I answer… “if tens of millions of Americans would tune out of the MSM and start sharing IM articles with all their family and friends… EVERYTHING would change… the criminal corrupt elites would be instantly scared straight… there’s no way they would or could continue what they’re doing if tens of millions of citizens started understanding and watching what they’re doing”.
Mish for me. I will be forever grateful to him for pointing out the coming housing crisis and laying out his reasoning in terms that made it blindingly obvious even to a layman like me (this is one reason why I have absolutely zero patience with the “nobody could have seen it coming” crowd). However, while he was great in his area of specialty I eventually decided that I didn’t find his writing on other topics all that insightful. He was always good about linking to topical posts on NC and other blogs so I found myself reading NC more and more. Eventually I made the leap and by the time Lehmann came around I was relying on NC as primary source.
I thought I’d contribute an additional Antidote du Jour because of the US presidential election. Here’s Civilization VI’s arrangement of a American folk song titled Hard Times Come Again No More originally composed by Stephen Foster. It’s a song about poverty and a reproving reminder to the privileged classes to sympathize with the plight of the deplorables. Oddly appropriate that it was chosen as the American civilization’s theme.
There are multiple renditions in the game but this version seemed to be the most applicable. The other versions were either too optimistic and triumphalist or belonged to another era of American history. My favorite part is from 00:47 – 1:40. The following movement captures the melancholy of the times and the skillful use of one instrument illustrates an individual tragedy which is actually part of a greater collective tragedy.
“Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.” -Victor Hugo
Wonderful arrangement. I listened while appreciating @ChrisArnade’s latest series of photographs. An excellent fit.
I’m glad some people actually listened to it and liked it. I thought “video game” and “folk song” would scare people away from listening.
Haha!
Starts with Aaron Copeland’s Fanfare for the Common Man,, then segues into the Hard Times arrangement. To hear it with the words, the best version I know is this one, by Thomas Hampson. The photos are just …
James Taylor/ Mark O’Connor.
Those photos are from the Farm Security Administration’s photography program, which ran from 1935 until 1944.
And Appalachian Spring as well–the orchestration, harmonies etc.
Yup, the arrangement is heavily influenced by Copeland (sp?). Copeland was renown for his compositions that were distinctly American. They evoke images of the wide expanses and wilderness of the country.
Probably why I like it so much.
It’s a good singable song, I admit, but too beaten-down in spirit. For election day, I prefer Sis Cunningham’s “Congressman, Mister Congressman,” to the tune of “Little Brown Jug”, which starts:
Congressman, Mister Congressman, sitting up there in Washington,
If you don’t listen to our song you ain’t going to be up there very long.
Oh-ho-ho, nosiree, in Washington you will not be. (2x)
The rest of the verses are somewhat dated in specifics (e.g. “The vets want jobs with decent pay, and that don’t mean three bucks a day.”) but strong in principle. I’ve always wanted to see a modern update.
I prefer My Chemical Romance – “Our Lady of Sorrows” as my theme song for today – I’m a bit Emo….
Stand up fu*king tall
Don’t let them see your back
And take my fu*king hand
And never be afraid again
We’ve only got one chance to put this at an end.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vp9Rs8oVmiE
Whatever works! The ghost of Whitman would probably be pleased to hear many songs again.
Hah! I wouldn’t have expected many My Chemical Romance fans on NC. I had ‘Teenagers’ going non-stop during the Snowden drama.
It’s funny ’cause it’s probably true to his life. All of it.
My Chemical Romance -Danger Days
MCR’s Danger Days is a very political album in its own way. Life as it is lived, or may soon be lived, by those younger than me. I just turned 64, but this album really speaks to our times, in my estimation at least. More layered production, big panorama, a stylistic tour de force, some who value their earlier stuff may sniff at it. Mistake. Artists evolve; early Beethoven is not like Beethoven in his later years. Don’t limit yourself, or part of you just ossifies right then and there. Pretty soon you’ll be shaking your cane at those kids today. Don’t miss out on the fun of being an American, one of its resilient people by turning yourself into your own headstone before you are dead.
In hospital, surviving a bout with kidney stones, but may be discharged in time to vote on the way home. For the Republic!
Whoa! A village elder who appreciates the music of the youngins. You, sir, are a unique individual.
Hey- thanks for responding and sharing. Excellent choice for the Snowden drama, I agree!!
No problem! On our most sacred of secular holidays, or whatever, which has caused so much angst it’s nice to kick back and share the near universal love of music.
…and I can start reading comments again because the presidential election won’t be dominating everything… hopefully?!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXIFE47CR9s
and not to be missed: not so beaten down. with anger and love:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYOIPiUkLqo
Today my electoral theme song is not made of nostalgia, but, of proclamation!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6AGQ_L1KF8
Human Being
You’ve got a right
You’ve got a right
You’ve got a right,
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
You’ve got a right to scream
When they don’t want you to speak
You’ve got a right to be
What you want and where you wanna be
You’ve got a right to breathe
To breathe
You’ve got a right
You’re a human being
You’ve got your own voice so sing
You’ve got two hands, let’s go and make anything
We all got rules we all have to break
We all have to make those mistakes
When I say, I know the way, I’m only trying
No don’t nobody know where the road to life is really lying
See the people on TV get shot in their very own street
People just like you, people just like me
Can’t you see you cut your hand on the advantages
You could stand to manage your damages
You, my dear, are a force to feed, not to fear
You’ve got a right to anywhere, anything
You’ve got a right, you’ve got a right
You’re a human being
You’ve got a right to anywhere, anything
You’ve got a right, you’ve got a right
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
You’re a human being
Got a right, got a right, got a right, got a right
Got a right, got a right, got a right
Got a right, got a right, got a right, got a right
Got a right, you’re a human being
Got a right, got a right, got a right, got a right
Got a right, got a right, human being
Got a right, got a right, got a right, got a right
Got a right, you’re a human being
Cat Power
Philistine as it may be to some, I love Rage Against the Machine and their political edge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMjjsjNBS_4&list=PL2EbESdPFdo5Xwx2SHw0_SsayQzOqZaNZ –Take the Power Back
Yes, yes, yes!!
I know the commenters here were off the charts in the brain department – but to see this excellent and diverse taste for music – it’s like I found Utopia! T
please correct the election day mistake
freudian slip? wishful thinking? to avoid the whole subject in the hope that everyone will wake up reading naked capitalism.com on election day and go back to sleep?
wouldn’t it be grand
here’s a critique of Adam Curtis’ “HyperNormalization” from the left:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/10/21/adam-curtis-another-manager-of-perceptions/
“Adam Curtis: Another Manager of Perceptions” by Jonathan Cook
Well I’d sure like to vote and then go to sleep, but then we would need to make election day a holiday for that to happen.
Here in Hawaii it is.
New York Magazine has a good “guide” to following the election results as they roll in.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/11/the-ultimate-guide-to-watching-the-election-results.html
Love the antidote. I can sympathize that creature.
ZH has gone full insane. 10 grandpa ZOMG articles for every one about finance / markets. It’s like there is one Tyler that delivers the goods before breakfast and hands the login over to his prepper uncle the remainder of the day.
Lots of spill over into the comments here. Their commentariate is scary sometimes.
Great antidote. Sums up this election season perfectly.
Today’s Notable California Congressional Races [Down With Tyranny]
Good wrap-up of the highlights – and low lifes – on the ballot in CA,
with strong evidence for why the Democratic leadership needs purging.
How did Wired miss outfits like “Correct the Record”? Or the other various PACs from across the spectrum spamming social media to push a narrative?
Or did they ignore those groups?
This article is still pertinent: http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-how-to-hack-an-election/
Went to go vote around 0645 this morning. My district is heavily Latino, and the rest would sway towards Trump, I suspect. The line was very long, out the door of the elementary school I vote at. My 9 year old daughter had come with me because she really wanted to watch me fill in my ballot and see the process (again), but this morning was the first time Central Virginia had gotten to near freezing temperatures and neither of us were quite prepared to spend an hour standing outside in the cold to wait to vote.
My observation was that it wasn’t that there were too many people there to vote. The line didn’t move very much in the few minutes we stayed, and people were trickling out of the building at a very slow pace. I suspect there weren’t enough poll workers to keep things moving along.
I’ll go back on my lunch hour when things are a) warmer and b) probably less busy.
It will be a tense night at my house; my husband is passionately pro-Clinton, my mother is pro-Trump (only because she believes his Presidency will force the Republican party to heal itself), and I am meh and angry at my options and will probably vote Jill Stein if she made it onto VA’s ballot.
According to RCP polling for Virginia, Stein is around 1.2% today. Johnson is at 4.1%. We’ve had a moderate libertarian candidate here in Virginia, Robert Sarvis, who has been excluded from the process in several races over the past four years, yet has won a surprising percentage of the vote. Stein’s values are closer to my own but the Green Party seems to be going exactly nowhere. So I’m supporting the Libertarian party, not really because of Johnson but in an attempt to help legitimize it in Virginia.
… sigh
As if there’s a better option?
I understand. But the Green party will continue to “go exactly nowhere” so long as voters find a reason to vote against their values.
I know. But the VA Green Party has a history of infighting and can’t seem to build on any of the momentum they sometimes achieve. They have a minimal local presence. Aside from the urban tip of Northern Virginia, Green values are far from those of the rest of the state right back to the founding of the colony. The Libertarians have a better shot here.
Libertarians are funded by eccentric billionaires and they reflect it. If states adopted ranked choice voting, like I hope Maine does, third parties would have a real chance and the Greens might get serious about it.
I think the test is not whether she can get 5%, but whether the Green Party will out-poll the Libertarian Party.
Even without exceeding the 5% threshold, it’s progress if that happens.
I had the same dilemma on who to vote for. The only reason I went with Green party (even if it is going no where) is that I don’t trust what the polls and would rather vote my conscience and be counted rather than a strategic choice.
That being said, I’m glad I wasn’t the only one with this challenge, and do hope that at least one third party is able to muster 5% to start turning this two party ship around.
Voted right when the polls opened. There is going to be a bottleneck where the lady logs each voter by writing their name out in capital letters, slowly. Small price to pay for keeping people from voting twice (or 3 times).
I couldn’t care less how many times they vote as long as the lot are only counted once.
This secret ballot nonsense is a powerful enabler of stolen elections. The ills ballot secrecy are ostensibly meant to solve are already illegal, so the enabling is probably the real reason for it.
Trump, Hillary, Stein, Johnson…
That America is great will be self-evident by the very act of defeating Hillary, who has said, America is great.
I believe that is, in fact, the first act of demonstrating America is great. That is to say, it’s a process. You can call it Making America Great Again. So, America-Is-Great = Making-America-Great-Again.
In any case, the key point here is audience-participation.
And we will do it today to demonstrate America Is Great, as we make America Great Again.
Trump has proven to be standard-issue Republican, but gaudier.
Perhaps he has a private position on TPP???
What are you babbling about, Beef? See, children, this is what the extended cognitive dissonance of pushing a candidate who doesn’t represent your beliefs can do to you. A word of warning.
Vote for what you believe in! Don’t vote against your own values, just because the polls say this.. or the polls say that.. the MSM says this, or that.. or their opponent is more awful than they are.
My hope is Hillary doesn’t move into the White House.
My hope is also my belief, which is she shouldn’t be the commander in Chief. My vote reflects that.
From one side, it looks like I am voting against her, but from another side, I am voting for what I believe in.
Ok probably the truest reflection of beliefs in Cali is the Peace and Freedom party. The leftmost party on the ballot. But Stein at least in theory could get federal funding, P&F is not even close to being a federal party.
Following up to my original post: went back and voted at 0930 when my bosses were entrenched in a meeting. I am fortunate to work close enough to home to go cast my ballot and be back at my desk in about 40 minutes. The earlier line was now nonexistent. Not a lot of people there at all. Took about 6 minutes from walking in the door to walking out. People on my FB feed in Central VA are talking about “historic turnouts” at their precincts, but they must be forgetting about 2008. I was in line at 0545 in 2008 and the line wrapped around the school. Even the line early this morning didn’t come close to that.
Voted Stein, so if Trump does win, I will have to fib to my husband about who I voted for; divorce would potentially be on the table (j/k). Honestly, I was happier that I got to vote against David Brat (Tea Party darling that ousted Eric Cantor), and happiest that I got to vote against the two Constitutional Amendments that were on our ballot.
No Trump Army armed “poll watchers” to be seen. No shenanigans. No one even bothered me as I walked up the sidewalk (a first).
Relieved to be done; I was weary of constantly rallying my courage to against the heavy peer pressure amongst my social circle to vote Clinton.
We mailed in our absentee ballots on Friday, here in California.
Both of us voted for Trump, to try to stop the Clinton coup.
We’re former Berners; got *four* refund checks from Tennessee this past month, b/c we over-donated.
Wondering: since it took about a month to fully “process” the California
Democratic Primary results, how does CA process today’s results in a timely
manner? Guess it’s moot since CA will prolly go for the war profiteer.
People over at the FBI are said to be pretty fast workers.
Maybe they will help with counting votes.
at the polls (in Cali yes) they told me *provisional* ballots would be counted tomorrow. I don’t know if that is true or just misinformed poll workers, but if it is – things that make you go hmm.
I wasn’t in your area in 2008, so I dont have a good handle on the rural/surburban breaks. (Dave Brat did send Cantor packing; I really hate Cantor) After all, Central Virginia is large. The Al Weed campaign* in 2006 had people at every polling station all day until they were called into the towns in the northern third of the district (it’s the largest district by area East of the Mississippi). I don’t remember who ran against Cantor in 2006, but I remember he was “let’s have 435 people” candidate. There were people at every polling station in Green County for example for Weed in 2006, and that is as rural as anything outside of Grundy and Monterey (they make maple syrup, not “fancy” grade which is hard to make outside of Vermont) Virginia.
*Yes, the Congressional campaigns did the work. Webb had a few army buddies drive him around.
Shortly after 7 a.m. Tucson time, I bicycled past my neighborhood’s polling place. Wow. Quite a few cars in the parking lot. So, I cruised into said lot for a look-see.
Didn’t see a line outside the building, but I did see a couple of volunteer poll watchers. A couple of very friendly ladies who were doing their part to help people vote. They told me that this particular polling place, which is in a historically black neighborhood, will have people watching it until this evening.
I thanked them for what they were doing, and I continued on my way to work.
And that’s the Arizona Slim report from Tucson.
No divorce here. In CA, so top spot didn’t matter except how we weren’t voting for Clinton. One Stein, one Trump with disagreement on who would have to mark for Trump ha! On other matters, we sometimes make an effort to not cancel each other out….. ok, this one isn’t worded that well and has too many additions so I’ll give up this one if you give me that one.
I got to vote for mj legalization and against the death penalty. Handed in ballot at new office (with only a few parking spaces) yesterday.
I have a number of iguanas that live near my condo, much bigger than these (probably 10+ pounds at their largest), and mostly they just bask in the sun or occasionally climb trees 10-15 feet up when it gets cold a night). But even for the large ones, when they do run, their legs look and work very much like stilts. Except for some small alligators, I suspect the grown iguanas here have few predators.
Why it’s a rainy Coup d’état day here, I wonder what the effect on voter turnout will be? Does it matter?
Ah, well I do have an absurd $60mm school referendum to vote down (a second time), thats something
http://www.d181.org/our-district/hms-referendum/index.aspx
Turnout (8) is down in Dixville Notch from 2012 (10) and way down from 2008 (21).
More people voted in the primaries this year (9). It’s basically public voting.
Back from voting. Looked to be a big turnout here in Republican country.
Big turnout regardless means legitimization of the political process when it has never been more illegitimate.
Had to vote against our local sheriff–a real turkey.
It occurred to me that Obama has yet one more innovation to impart to a grateful world, besides a pardon for Hillary: a presidential pardon for the Clinton Foundation.
…because Foundations are people, too!
BHO’s only “pardon” should be int the form of an excuse me parting quote “Pardon me Folks”
I am trying to evaluate my sense of revulsion seeing/hearing him to when GWB was departing. Might be more? I am already ther with HRC and her dog Bill –and the fix is notevenin yet! I canti magine my point revulsion scale if she is elected
i was more revolted by bush, probably because of iraq.
Yes Iraq was my redline on that ahole as well.
The militarized foreign policy has metastasized for eight more years and apparently many ppl are desensitized to it, as they are likely not to push back on it today. Popular vote is an endorsement.
BHO, at least for the first term feigned to be a reformer for the ppl that voted for him.
GWB had more fidelity to being a straight up ahole, BHO I think was more deceitful.
That would be a fitting end to Obama’s presidency:
–HILLARY, the warmonger, liar, thief… pardoned
–GITMO… remains open
If you like your torture regime, you can keep it!
Federal versus state charges? I thought pres pardons were for federal charges. So while he will pardon her for federal mishandling documents, violations of federal foia, federa bribery and federal corruption charges, I thought states have oversight of foundations. Something like using foundation money for personal expenses would be litigated in the states in which a foundation is listed. The consequences of mixing the SoS, Foundation (and possibly campaign or party activities) was an act like accepting money from Qatar while SoS can be pardoned by the president for corruption but passing it through the foundation might lead to investigation at the state level? Any help here would be appreciated. I understand that Foundations are nothing but scams to hide wealth to avoid taxation and make what would seem the ideal mechanism for laundering bribes, but there aren’t there minimal standards for even foundations.
To be honest, I think the Supreme Court would rule that foreign money could pass through a foundation, an individual could pay themselves money as chair and then run for office on that money.
The case against “intellectuals”(knewyawkuh)…nothing amuses me more about the 8 yrs of forced greek learning imposed upon me growing up then watching “sophisticates” fumble “kratia” into “cracy”…
Krasi is wine…russians use the letter “c”…and ancient greek/religious greek uses “c”…
Demo-kratia
Not
Democracia/democracy…
T not C…
If one is to read from some moldy books at the top of the shelf(plato,et al)…best not to end up too obviously sophisticated.
& as for today…
can I show my clothespin to get a free donut somewhere…
already misplaced that sticker…
probably subconsciously trying to hide the evidence…
heaven forbid some orderly looks me in the eye when I am in my late 90’s and drooling and asks who I voted for before flipping over my wheelchair and kicking me a few times…
“In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.”
-Anatole France
I used my “I voted” sticker to cover the camera port on my laptop, today.
Does that sum it up?
China checkbook diplomacy.
Is that like the Economic Hit Men, but more diplomatic?
I voted this morning in Manchester, New Hampshire, largely working class ward close to downtown. The lines were backed out the door of the middle school and the ballot box / scanner broke about 45 minutes after the doors opened at 6:00AM; that’s the first time I’ve seen that in my 10+ years as a voter here. It was very disconcerting as they told everyone to stack their ballots in a box and they’d be hand-counted later by hand “like absentee votes.” I’m wondering if both parties hate a particular candidate why wouldn’t the fix be in? My heart said to vote Jill Stein and as many independent down ballot candidates as I could, but my overwhelming fear is a hot war with Russia fomented by Hillary and her girl Victoria Nuland. So I voted Trump. Talk about existential angst! I hope my UU co-congregants never find out!
Ps. My wife voted about an hour after me and said that the ballot box was now working and people were anxiously feeding in a box of ballots under the watchful eye of a policeman. Interesting!
Talk about (two-party fix) bipartisan! It was interesting that a Republican Secretary of State was at the helm for those shenanigans in the Democratic primary in AZ this spring. Trump had been the favorite among Republicans for some time. The only thing they accomplished was flipping the state from Bernie to Hillary.
Chinese Elites endorse Hillary.
Also hopefully better understanding of the US election laws. In 1996, Bill’s Chinese billionaire donor got many people into trouble.
RE: US election 2016: How to review 650,000 emails in eight days BBC
“Tweet” from someone named Dave Itzkoff:
How can a COMPUTER review 650,000 EMAILS in 8 DAYS?
How can a TOASTER make my BREAD warm?
How can a CAR go faster than a TEAM OF OXEN?
So THIS is HOW the EDUCATED EXPLAIN inexplicable things.
i just doubt it’s a meaningful review. i don’t doubt they can remove duplicates, but i don’t trust the people atop the fbi or the justice department.
But they have proven to be so trustworthy! D:
I am sure the top DOJ and FBI staff hunkered down, ordered in, and made an honest weekends worth of work out of it.
How many emails were reviewed over the year long investigation? I seem to remember it being less than 650,000.
How can HILLARY and a PEDOFILE make 650,000 emails, all found on the same laptop?
Optional technocrat answer: multi-gigabyte hard disk storage.
For that matter, how does one write 650,000 emails? Do these people sit around all day doing nothing but emailing each other? I’ve been wondering..
Yes, that’s exactly how businesses (and flexians) operate.
While there is no doubt that it is possible to have software solutions to “review/compare” 650,000 pieces of mail (as long as they’re not on paper), the number 650,000 sounds like bogus information given a life of its own. Sort of like the 300,000 who live in Aleppo (East) which at a certain point suddenly started to be reported as 250,000, neither being all that believable. These numbers that get reported and repeated are just plain suspect as to number of digits.
Some robots have higher IQs.
Similarly, some computers can read faster.
Or perhaps, the computer cheated – it was given those 65,000 emails long ago.
And thus, several World’s Firsts with this exceptional couple. One is, henceforth, violations resulting from mishandling classified information will be treated more leniently.
Two, foundations will increasingly play important roles in future elections and (be grateful you’re witnessing its very birth), historians will trace its origin to 2016.
Three, all students will be given exam questions beforehand. A precedent at the highest level has been established.
I can’t find the Wikileaks Twitter stream again, but I read a 5 part Tweet from them (in reply to someone named Gen… Something ) that outlined how extremely difficult it would be to accurately review those messages.
I wish I could figure out how to search for specific Twitter messages and copy them. It was valuable information. And I haven’t seen it repeated.
I’ve seen that toaster thing too. Bleh. P
OK, I give up why would it take eight days? If the code has been written, assuming the FBI has from time-to-time had a programmer or two on staff, this would be a standard task. Email snooping software should have a boat load of preexisting implementations. Maybe they can’t do AI but stuffing information into a database and doing queries has been around since the beginning of the mainframe era.
Or are they still doing horse-and-buggy. Maybe they’re printing them out, like Huma did for the soon to be crowned, so that they can put them up on a wall and connect strings to words with tacks.
Why would it take more than five minutes even with an 8086 running Windows 95? This is a trivial task, the hardest part should be thinking up the questions to ask.
“hardest part should be thinking up the questions to ask.”
That is precisely the problem with computer search. Works great when you are looking for a specific thing you can define with a search string. Much less good if you are on a fishing expedition.
True but that’s where software comes in to play. Once parsed, all sorts of standard questions should be baked in. Each new useful question becomes a part the next iteration of the software. Of the 650,000 emails the number of interesting returns should not be overly large, maybe a few thousand. Most emails should be spam unless the email owner is really and truly connected to something really complex.
Trickiest part would be emails that appear to be coded with uncommon words or usage but that too should be part of a standard email parser. Virtually nothing to do with software is rocket science. If they don’t already have this stuff for English, as well as most foreign languages, then maybe they should hire a couple of script kiddies.
Rewriting a language vocabulary parser would be a useful starting point and there are a few of those in open source. Probably get a lot of false positives though.
For what it’s worth, here is something that may be of interest:
Edward Snowden Shows Just How Fast The FBI Could Read Hillary Clinton’s Emails
Don’t know enough to know if this is true, but it’s food for thought, anyway.
Even if all duplicates, some were classified, no?
So how did classified emails wind up on Weiner’s computer when he has no security clearance?
Doesn’t this, alone, suggest HRC was careless with classified data?
No it would indicate that Abedin was careless with classified data, as she would have been the party with access to that computer.
You’re making an assumption that the duplicates included those that were classified and part of the original review, and I don’t think we have enough information to say that, do we?
Here are my other questions: did Clinton know Abedin was sending Clinton’s e-mails to other e-mail accounts? If Abedin says she didn’t know the e-mails were on her husband’s laptop, then how did they get there?
I’ve come to the conclusion that there are so many “important” people at so many levels who are involved in this and other matters concerning Clinton, her tenure at the State Department, her and her family’s involvement with the Clinton Foundation, their international connections, the coziness with the banking and brokerage industries, that those with the ability to keep it all from unraveling will go to whatever lengths they have to so they can continue to profit and most especially, keep themselves out of prison.
There is no one person, no president, who is going to right this ship – the best we can hope for is to avoid foundering in shallow waters, crashing into an iceberg, or capsizing in a hurricane – not least because there are only enough lifeboats and life preservers for the very wealthy to possibly swim to safety – the rest of us will just go down with the ship.
I am not even sure, at this point, what it would take, or what the first step would be to begin to make things right. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be done, but you know that no one will ever agree on how to do it.
The whole thing is making me feel very claustrophobic – and combined with work that has me wanting to breathe into a paper bag, I am not feeling great about this part of my future.
I’m wondering if the sheer number of emails found on the laptop helps gloss over the fact that they were not all duplicates. For instance, I saw one story blowing off the Weiner files as just another nothingburger, because 95% of the emails were duplicates. Well, 5% of 650,000 is still 32,500 emails — enough to constitute a something burger, possibly. Even if 99% were dupes, that still means 6,500 newly uncovered ones.
That’s exactly correct, if the old set was provided in electronic form. If it was scanned from paper, forget it — spacing variations, even invisible ones, will throw message hashing off.
If the search software is a good as, oh, say Google, it could be pretty quick, no? For instance, I just searched for “durian” (the tropical fruit), got 2.9 million hits in less than 6 seconds. “durian + cake + recipe” gave me a tight 20 hits in about 3 seconds, easy to human-check to sort out “best prices for durian + cake + recipe” garbage. It’s not about the computing power, we (well, they) have that in spades. It’s about the questions.
HotFlash, not software, but prep work. The ability to respond to a search query near-instantly rests on a lot of pre-calculation that web search users don’t get to see. Loading and indexing a codex into a search engine is a slow and intensive process. Anyone who feels like fiddling around with it can try Elasticsearch.
You’d think you’d want a human being to review potential photographic evidence of a crime.
That is, if you were interested in performing a criminal investigation.
Repeat after me: “See no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil”
Takes all of 4 secs.
I wonder if the gorilla in the antidote du jour is flipping off the mass media and the elections. Or is it HRC?
Beautiful animal (I mean the gorilla)
Gorilla? I would have said chimpanzee. Any experts reading?
Whatever the species, I can’t help wondering if this critter has seen enough human interactions to know what it’s doing. If so, not only beautiful but humorously inclined, and more power to it!
hmm my totally uninformed opinion tilts chimpanzee. win valuable prizes in the “guess that primate” contest today!
According to my authoritative study…err…quick look at Google Images, that’s either a chimp or (more likely by coloration) a bonobo. I hope bonobo, the best ‘adjusted’ of the great apes.
Heading to polls soon. I won’t decide until I’m in the booth what to do at the top of the ticket. Probably I’ll vote Green Party, Jill Stein. Otherwise blank.
What a sad day.
If you’re considering leaving it blank, why not vote Green?
I did just that. Voted Green, including Green on 2 down ticket races.
You and 5% of all votes cast, hopefully!! Crosses fingers…
Early voted Green for president but in Hawaii they’re not on the ballot for anything else where I live.
That New Yorker article was one of the most insufferable pseudo-intellectual pieces I’ve read in a long time. He doesn’t even acknowledge the fact that our education system has been degraded to the point where civic education is barely an elective at the high school level, or that journalism has been corrupted by concentrated ownership by powerful interests. Both are required for our republic to function as intended. He argues for the abolition of democracy when it’s people like him who have sabotaged the very functions of the system.
And there isn’t a word about the practical benefits to the democratic system, that it allows populations to force governments to be responsive to them through peaceful means. People don’t lose their agency just because they can’t vote, it just forces them to use revolution or other violent means to impose their will on the country when their concerns aren’t being heard. Robbing them of the ballot box just forces them to take more extreme options, similar to what the EU elite are experiencing right now due to their incompetence.
>He doesn’t even acknowledge the fact that our education system has been degraded to the point where civic education is barely an elective at the high school level, or that journalism has been corrupted by concentrated ownership by powerful interests.<
Nor does he appear to question the underlying assumptions. Education equates with credentials? Knowledge equates with wisdom? The only knowledge that matters is what is taught in schools? Really? My aunt with a sixth-grade education had more sense, and more kindness, than he ever will. I want those qualities represented in my government, even if that means some people may vote in ways that to me look irresponsible.
Not so concerned with our high school & 4-year college graduates but those certified morons with advanced degrees who aren’t good at anything except going to school.
No mercy with these acquaintances anymore (as nicely as possible). They bring the evidence or go home with their tail between their legs.
At one point he actually entertains an even more ludicrous assumption than intelligence = credentials. Intelligence = ability to get an intellectually challenging job. Yea sure doofus that’s how the job market works … everyone is just given jobs based on their ability …
Clueless, completely clueless.
The whole thing is based on a false alternative, that there are only two justifications/purposes for democracy. You point to another.
The one I would consider essential is that the purpose of society is to benefit the people in it – as many as possible of them. That involves things like ganging up on bullies (criminal law, in principle). Ultimately, those who make the decisions get the benefits, except by accident, so it’s crucial that the people who are supposed to benefit at least control who makes the decisions.
This logic applies better for direct democracy, if we can figure out a practical way to do it.
For the life of me I don’t see what’s still impractical about it, once all the time wasted on partisan pride has been spent on more useful activities inside or perhaps outside the political sphere.
Just to continue my bad behavior of adding more reporting of miseries in other places to the, dare I call it, inside-the-Empire navel-gazing and entrail-parsing here, one might pay some small attention to what’s going on between ‘the world’s largest democracy (sic),’ India, and its also nuclear-armed neighbor and even more effective state sponsor of terror, Pakistan. And how the “frictions” that happen in the borderlands seem reminiscent of the frictions that occur where the matchhead meets the striking surface, or in “our” own internal borderlands…
India’s crackdown in Kashmir: is this the world’s first mass blinding?
A bloody summer of protest in Kashmir has been met with a ruthless response from Indian security forces, who fired hundreds of thousands of metal pellets into crowds of civilians, leaving hundreds blinded
(snip)
….As Kashmiris took to the streets, police and paramilitaries were deployed in large numbers across the region. Thousands of young protesters charged at the armed forces with stones and slogans demanding freedom. Indian forces responded with lethal effect, firing bullets, CS gas, and metal pellets into the crowds. In less than four days, nearly 50 people were killed and thousands injured. More people took to the streets to protest against these killings, and the Indian forces and Kashmiri police killed and injured more of them. A cycle of protests connected to the funerals of those protesters were, in turn, fired upon, resulting in yet more killings and blindings. By the end of July, India was faced with a full-scale popular revolt in Kashmir.
(photo caption) An Indian policeman aims a pellet gun [SHOTGUN] towards Kashmiri protesters in Srinagar in July. Composite: Syed Shahriyar/Syed Shahriyar/NurPhoto via Getty Images
The most recent figures put the number of dead at 94, including a young Kashmiri academic who was battered to death by Indian soldiers, and an 11-year-old boy, whose body, riddled with hundreds of pellets, was found on the outskirts of Srinagar, the joint capital of Kashmir, in mid-September. Shockingly, more than 500 people, most of them young, were shot in the face with the pump-action “pellet guns” [please note that these are large-gauge SHOTGUNS, not “pellet guns”] that the Indian forces routinely use to suppress protests. These weapons discharge hundreds of small metal pellets, or birdshot, capable of piercing the eye.
As the uprising continued, the armed forces, by their own admission, fired nearly 4,000 cartridges at stone-throwing demonstrators, crowds protesting against police brutality, and even onlookers. This means that they sent, by one recent estimate, 1.3m metal balls hurtling towards public gatherings predominantly made up of young unarmed people.
Children as young as four and five now have multiple pellets in their retinas, blinding them partially, or fully, for life. At the start of September, doctors at Kashmir’s main hospital reported that on average, one person had their eyes ruptured by pellets every other hour since 9 July. “It means 12 eye surgeries per day,” one doctor told a local newspaper. “It is shocking.”
On 12 July, the fourth day of the protests, the state government, which is run by a controversial coalition between Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and a local ally, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), finally issued its first official statement on the use of the so-called “non-lethal” pellet guns. A spokesperson for the government, representing the PDP, described its position to the media: “We disapprove of it … But we will have to persist with this necessary evil till we find a non-lethal alternative.”
[sidebar — There is no recorded instance of a modern democracy systematically and willfully shooting at people to blind them]
At first, the statement appeared as a typical soundbite, the sort of thing that officials must compose and recite with studied ambiguity for the press – the “government version”, as its known. But I was struck by its cavalier defence of state violence and brutalisation. It was obvious that this was not the spokesman’s personal view; it was a clear articulation of the intent of the Indian state in Kashmir: we have no choice but to shoot people in the eyes.. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/08/india-crackdown-in-kashmir-is-this-worlds-first-mass-blinding
“None so blind as those who will not see…”
Of course there’s lots more on how the people of Kashmir, which one “government” or the other demands control over, have organized to claim some agency of their own, and how that response to assassinations of “rebel leaders,” and many other repressive violent “measures,” has been met.
One might wonder if, given how all the cops on the planet seem to now be reading from the same tactical playbook, one might expect that owning a pair of shot-pellet-resistant goggles might be a worthwhile purchase. Amazon delivers them to your door, or you can join the throngs down at your local gun store (where I just was, buying some gun-cleaning supplies and of course more AMMO. The gun store was having a sale, 11/1 to 11/7, and the place was jammed — and the heavy staffing mocked what you see at Walmart or Winn-Dixie, maybe 40 employees and managers for a 5,000 sq ft store (plus 50 meter gun range, pistol and rifle and ‘no reloads and no birdshot’) moving a wonderful cross-section of America through the mildly complex process of choosing the “right gun” and doing the paperwork. I am not kidding about either the heavy trade, or the cross-section thing — “all walks of life,” ages from 16 to maybe 80, all skin tones, all economic classes — all intent on arming themselves, maybe most of them looking like they might have no idea about what to actually do to stay alive, and kill “threats,” if the shooting starts.
What outcomes do we want from our political economy? And how do we make it “ours?” And achieve those outcomes?
‘a pair of shot-pellet-resistant goggles”
Holiday gift idea!
seriously, horrible news. ‘necessary evil’? how the f is this acceptable???
And this is why I think imaginary friends should be killed, brutally. It’s not against the law.
That is sickening. Which is not to say I’m sorry you brought it to my attention.
Alexei Sayle – Her Majesty’s Government Eye-Poking Stations:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnT2J7SZgrA
Correct link for the Public Citizen arbitration rule article:
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/pressroomredirect.cfm?ID=9050
As to the press release itself, it demonstrates what’s wrong with our legal system: the judge finds that the state is doing the right thing, but is wrong nonetheless, and that the nursing homes are wrong to force arbitration, but justified nonetheless. Utter lunacy.
“ruleoflaw.” Not the way I learned it in law school, at least first and 2nd year — after that you get into the “electives” and clinical practice (as a prosecutor in misdemeanor courts and in prison disciplinary hearings at Walpole, and then Vermont Legal Aid, where while helping people through retail-debt-induced bankruptcies where Household Finance would sidle up to the discharged debtor and sucker them into “recognizing” and thus REVIVING the just-discharged, not-dischargeable-again-for-another-seven-years debt) I successfully got a judgment for “replevin of a cow”) that let you glimpse how the fokking system really works…
Interesting that I twice experienced the same kind of disappointment: all those years of Civics and Social Studies and American and World History, and then you find out “it’s nothing but a racket,” with zero correspondence between the idealized imago, and how it really all works. A trip to South Vietnam helped nail down the realization.
Actually 3 times, shame on me — reading the Bible cover to cover, mastering the Presbyterian Catechism, and then finding out the Director of Christian Education liked to fondle little girls and boys, and the Communion was celebrated wit Welch’s Grape Juice because of all the alcoholics in the congregation. And a Senior VP of Standard Oil, big Texan, “upstanding member” and “family friend,” groped and tried to French kiss my mother at a swank dance, and the HS swimming coach made the young men swim nude and the girls wear those evanescent speedos — and finally coming across the version of the myth of Pandora and her basket, the one where the more cynical tellers held that the last plague on humanity to escape was the worst: the one called Hope.
I’m curious to know what other readers think are the important ballot proposals/initiatives in their state? Colorado’s Proposition 106 “End of Life Options” bill is similar to Oregon’s “Death with dignity” law. Hope it passes! ( pun intended!) And there is Initiative 71 sponsored by the oil and gas industry which would make it extremely difficult to get citizen initiatives on the ballot, i.e. limitations on fracking, not that we’ve had any success so far anyway.
Also, the Colorado Care amendment 69 which creates a single payer plan for all, initiating a new “premium” tax. Claims that you can choose any provider and that it will be cheaper. The Affordable Care Act has made people quite wary of those claims. I’m afraid that ship has sailed. Doubt it will pass.
Virginia has an amendment to the state constitution to make Virginia a constitutional “Right to Work” state. There hasn’t been a peep from Team Blue about this which is to be expected out of the Democrats in Virginia (Kaine, Warner, MacAuliffe). They make one miss Chuck Robb.
Take it from a working class stiff in a “Right To Work” state, Mississippi; the operational effect is “Right To Work For Less.”
Any Dems that even stay silent on this in your state should be primaried in the next cycle.
Or FL, “Right to be canned for any reason, or none” — but hey, the plutocrats say, it’s mutual! so you can leave any time for any reason, except for those non-competes and non-disclosure “contracts of adhesion” you had to sign to come slave for us…
Even my tight-ass Contracts professor in law school acknowledged that “without a right there is no remedy…’
Michigan does not have any state wide initiatives this time around. There were two Metro-Detroit proposals, one to stipend public education funding and the other to raise funds for public transit creation between the area and Ann Arbor.
As with anything government, the proposal is only as good as the person spending the money, but I voting yes in good faith. We desperately need better public transit (I am always hoping for monorail). Currently we have the much hyped, piece of trash Woodward line extends a whopping 9 miles or so and allows the rich Birmingham/Royal Oak types a direct tram line into the downtown area. No more dirty inconvenience of going through other parts of the city. that still look like a third world country. Don’t worry a new Nike store will make it all better!
We also voted yes on pub transit prop. Don’t feel hopeful but it’s gone further this time than the many previous attempts.
At 10:30, it was busy at our precinct in state’s most liberal county. Line was 15 people deep, a lot for our small town. People were quiet and anxious, unlike during primaries with noisy Bernie bubbling.
Both experiences (primary and today) were rather tense at my polling station. The first time it was the staff, but today it was the voters as well. I was waiting inside before they officially opened and the air was filled with tension and general annoyance.
For example, I held the door for a guy walking in behind me who replied, “SIGHHH…. a door holder.” or “One of those door holders…” He was signing in line the whole time. Perhaps he would have preferred to be thrown through the door? I am not sure.
One man quipped (in response to a woman concerned if others could use cell phones for their “cheat sheets” or to look up info), “well if you don’t know already maybe you shouldn’t be here” (paraphrasing).
I thought it was ridiculous that I had to have a photo ID, a voter ID (which was not needed), and a had to fill out a small voter application. Being 27 I share dread with scantron (“stress”tron) experiences… I hate filling them out and then sliding them into oblivion. “Did I fill in the bubbles good enough? Will the machine read it right? What if I marked the wrong space!” Those really should not be allowed in schools.
VA has two constitutional amendment questions that hardly anyone was talking about in advance. One was to enshrine the Right To Work laws into our Constitution, the other, which at first glance seems benign and generous, is to put property tax breaks for widows/widowers of first responders killed in the line of duty into the Constitution.
First, why should either of those rate a clause in the Constitution?
And the property tax breaks aren’t so generous as they sound on their face; it would only benefit homeowners with property to tax in the first place, so it will inherently benefit mostly wealthier people. And who wants to have to relive the loss of their spouse every year at tax time as they fill in the appropriate box to receive their benefit. The spouse would lose their tax break benefit if they remarried (and would they have to repay those back taxes? Since no one is talking about these, no one knows the answer.). And say a police officer gets off duty, stops in for a cup of coffee on the ride home while still in uniform, and is shot and killed by one of those jerks out there killing cops? No bennies for the spouse.
If either of these Amendments goes into the Constitution, it becomes at a minimum 2 year process to remove or change them. They only belong in the Code of Virginia, NOT the Constitution.
Illinois has one to amend the Constitution to make gas taxes, license fees,etc. only be applied to highway projects! When TF did this crap become a matter for state constitutions?
Next step, silly amendments to US Constitution. Narrow trivial crap amended to the thing they all claim such reverence for.
Constitutions are a framework for government, not a playground for certain factions to install their funding and appropriation preference on everyone, forever.
Can ya tell I’m pissed? Good!
Legalization of marijuana is on the ballot in Arizona. Yours Truly voted heck yeah on that one.
A proposition to raise the minimum wage is also on our ballot. It’s favoring a $12 minimum — I think it should be $15. But I voted yes anyway.
Also yes on both here. Don’t smoke weed, I just don’t believe in prohibition.
Pennsylvania had one on retirement ages for judges;
The way it’s worded is meant to confuse. It’s raising the age limit because two judges are going to have to retire soon. The legislature invalidated previous results of the same referendum on the spring primary ballot and pushed to have it on this ballot.
The whole thing sounds corrupt so I told them to retire already. 75 seems just as arbitrary as 70.
Awwwwwww sh……!!!!!! I naturally assumed that there was no age limit on judges since not only do I know this to be true for the Supremes, most of the rest of them seem so freaking old that I just assumed…So I thought this was imposing an age limit where there was none before.. Incredibly sorry for cancelling out your vote. GD it.
We in FL are facing a push for “Amendment 1,” an artfully misnamed scam by the power companies (so well named) here — would essentially squash private homeowner solar installatioins by letting the “power companies” charge huge fees to “tie in” and by its wording even to allow the PCs to “tax” completely off-grid solar installations:
Supporters’ ruse unravels. Vote no on Amendment 1: Endorsements 2016
For months, critics of a solar-power proposal on the November ballot, Amendment 1, have insisted it was deviously drafted to stifle competition for the state’s dominant electric utilities. Amendment supporters have stoutly denied that.
But voters, take note: The truth may have trickled out in a leaked audio tape. (What is it with embarrassing tapes in this campaign season, anyway?)
Last week the Miami Herald reported on the tape, in which a public policy expert at a conservative Tallahassee think tank touted Amendment 1 at a conference this month in Nashville, Tenn. Sal Nuzzo, vice president of policy for the James Madison Institute, said the proposal would capitalize on popular support for solar power to induce voters to head off a looming effort led by solar-power companies to expand in Florida. Nuzzo described the approach as “a little bit of political jiu-jitsu.”
According to its ballot summary, Amendment 1 would establish a constitutional right for Florida consumers “to own or lease solar equipment installed on their property to generate electricity for their own use.” This provision, which gives the amendment its pro-solar sheen, is already a right under state law.
But Amendment 1 also would enshrine in the constitution the authority for state and local governments to regulate solar energy and “ensure that consumers who do not choose to install solar are not required to subsidize the costs of backup power and electric grid access to those who do.” Supporters say this provision would protect Floridians who aren’t interested in generating solar power, or can’t afford to buy or lease rooftop panels to do it. Like the rest of the amendment, this part certainly sounds reasonable.
But amendment opponents — including solar companies, green-energy advocates and free marketers — have argued this language would grease the skids for fees or other policies that would make generating electricity from rooftop panels cost prohibitive for most Floridians. And the opponents cite studies that have concluded solar power lowers the price of electricity for everyone, in part by reducing the need to build more power plants.
Amendment 1 supporters have publicly insisted its passage wouldn’t preclude future changes in Florida’s law or constitution to promote rooftop solar energy. That’s not exactly what Nuzzo told the conference. Amendment 1, he said, “would completely negate anything they [the solar companies and their supporters] would try to do either legislatively or constitutionally down the road.”
Don’t listen to the expert?
The effort to pass Amendment 1 has been led by a committee, Consumers for Smart Solar, through a $21 million campaign heavily bankrolled by major utilities and other energy interests. Nuzzo told the conference that JMI had worked with the committee in drafting the amendment. Spokeswomen for the committee and the think tank said he was mistaken, though the committee has cited research by JMI in its promotional materials, and the think tank has received financial support from companies that also contributed to Consumers for Smart Solar.
Greed NEVER Sleeps…
Oregon has mail-in voting, so no lines and a high proportion of early votes. I and my family dropped our ballots in the white box in front of the Courthouse yesterday, then I spent a couple of hours making phone calls for my county’s Ranked Choice (Instant Runoff) Voting initiative. Had one perfect call: guy was filling out his ballot, didn’t understand the proposition, voted for it gladly once explained, AND knew where the nearest drop box was (from which the ballots go to the Courthouse for counting.)
Our other important intiative, statewide, raises the minimum tax for corps over a certain size – Oregon has minimal corporate taxes, a contradiction ofour supposed liberalism. I have hopes, but the opposition has been framing it as a sales tax, which is a no-go, ever, here. We’ve all been to states that have sales taxes. The framing is deceptive: it would be collected from the corporations themselves, so they might or might not be able to retrieve it from consumers. If they could raise their prices, they would have. But it’s a gross receipts tax, so technically….
Abolishing the death penalty is important. Watch it not happen :(
Bloodthirsty folks we have here on the left coast.
Not to mention allowing competing ballot initiatives. Repeal the death penalty or revise the death penalty…. expand the plastic bag ban or tax plastic bags (ooh, did that just repeal the plastic bag ban in place, oops)
The S&P500 WILL FALL IF TRUMP WINS
Well, boo hoo hoo
Feck the rich man’s casino markets!
What about my markets?
The job market sucks. It’s a jungle saturated in agent orange. A once vibrant market has been turned into a blackened, defoliaited waste land of part time tedium, zero hours joy-joy and pseudo work for pseudo wages.
All lost in the super-market of superindustrilised food components covered in lying pictures. Break up the minimonopolies and put the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker back in the high streeet. Give me local people doing local jobs and selling local produce and production. Give me the souk, the oriental spice seller and the gadgie shop selling the exotic used flotsam of human device.
Markets, markets everywhere but none for us – we are the meat in the markets.
Put the damn gorilla up for election! That’s a candidate with an actual policy.
They don’t say, More Jobs Overseas if Hillary Wins.
S&P – good. We care.
Jobs – huh? We don’t care.
+++
“Fuck You Gorilla” 2016
I’m more cynical about the Chinese preference for Clinton. I suspect they need a foreign military threat to hold on to power.
Who is ‘they’?
As somebody once said, “works in every country”.
Mass turnout at my poll. Not one of my two usual times (before 7am or late afternoon). Lines down the street, when normally they barely make it to the door. Will go back later. Those with any visible labeling were all with her. Not surprising considering this is one of biggest support areas by zip code.
Poll lines get heavy if you don’t go early. My mom is legally blind, so my parents were close to the first in line so my mom could take as long as she wanted with her ballot or the machine without bothering people.
The traditional hours are 8 to 9 (Democrats), 12 to 1 (independents), and after 4 closer to 6 with spillover (Republicans). Republicans are suburban voters and usually have more polling locations due to fund in and distance, so they can afford to wait to the end of the day. Democrats will go in the morning and then try to come back if the lines were long. Even if there are enough booths, there are bottlenecks at urban polling stations because there aren’t enough workers and the effects of having lines in places not designed for lines.
The early turnout numbers should be in, but with early voting, they aren’t as user friendly as before.
>Poll lines get heavy if you don’t go early. My mom is legally blind, so my parents were close to the first in line so my mom could take as long as she wanted with her ballot or the machine without bothering people.
It’s nice of your parents to try to be considerate, but nobody should be made to feel taking the time they need is bothering people. I would hope people who care enough to vote understand that.
Where is this?
New York
“Khodorkovsky: Trump presidency might not please Putin”
Seems clear; otherwise why would Putin speak so highly of Trump at that press conference? If Putin wanted Trump to become president of the US, wouldn’t he understand the wiser thing to do is openly grooming mrs. Bill? Former FSB, isn’t he?
Or Put in said the same non descript things about Trump he has said about every candidate in other countries when asked, but the Team Blue propaganda is completely out of control.
Perhaps a ray of ‘hope’ – Hill’s no-fly zone posturing is all kayfabe, and she’ll kick the neo-cons to the curb after the election. Or perhaps Putin realizes that it’s all a negotiation about how large of a ‘humanitarian’ donation he needs to make to the Clinton Foundation. Is this too cynical, or too hopeful? I can’t tell anymore.
Off to vote for Jill (not in a swing state).
rwv,
Putin is ex-KGB. The FSB is the successor to the KGB.
There seems not to be much difference between the two agencies though.
The “Great Danger Election Debate” between Bill Curry and Bruce Dixon HRC vs. Jill Stein:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=17612
My comment to Curry: If, as you said, blaming Gore’s loss on Nader is a “stupid slur,” (which I agree that it is) then why the hell did you bring it up???
Links 11/9/16, Today is 11/8/16….. ?
Unity idea: can we all come together tomorrow as a nation…and VOMIT?
I can get behind that! (if there’s any vomit left in me after today)
Eat some hair , then back away slowly …(on someone else’s carpet)…
VOMIT … into the Ditch … TOGETHER !!
and then go die?
Yes! Exactly how I was feeling. A good, cathartic vomit will help cleanse the system.
Yesterday there was an article in the Links about tiger poaching in India, now here’s an article about elephant poaching in Africa:
http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-elephant-ivory-poaching-20161107-story.html
Poaching is a nasty business, but even if there were no poachers, the tigers and elephants would be in grave danger from habitat destruction. As the world’s population continues to grow by more than 80 million people per year, land is gobbled up to provide places to live, to grow food, and to provide other needs and wants for humans.
re: encouraging interest in Naked Capitalism
I use a couple of strategies:
1) I ask what blogs they read that I might find interesting. Let’s say they say Calculated Risk. Is Naked Capitalism on the blogroll? If so, I have a springboard for a conversation. Do they value depth of coverage plus an independent editor and publisher?
2) If I share an article on Facebook aggregated on a Naked Capitalism links post, I’ll credit Naked Capitalism.
3) I keep the conversation low-key. “Consider adding Naked Capitalism to your reading collection,” not, “this is the Gospel!”
4) I point out that the one who leads the mainstream media around by the nose will lead the consumer around by the nose. First the Access Hollywood video, then Comey. I told friends the Access Hollywood video was hitting too early and they disputed that – not anymore.
5) If your friends believe you will challenge bias wherever you see it, they’ll grant you more credibility. I’ve told friends I’ve gone straight to the candidates’ voting record and policy briefings, bypassing all media sites. Including this one. And that’s true.
6) I point out that the commentariat is moderated on this site. That is a selling point.
7) Another way I might market Naked Capitalism: “If you’re entrenched in your opinions, Naked Capitalism is not for you.”
Well out here in Carroll County, Arkansas I was denied the possibility of a paper ballot. I was told that paper ballots have been available to all early voting but today machines only. I went to the Eureka Springs courthouse and then called the County Clerk Jamie Corrreia in Berryville who told me to quit watching the news about these machines… I told her I have no television broadcast or satellite that I read reports on these matters and blogs like bradblog.
Hence I did not vote. This system is a complete sham. Criminals are still in charge! Best not to encourage them in any way.
Sorry Dr. Stein, I could not allow Al Go Rhythm even the possibility of turning my vote into legitimizing either of the duevilists.
I’m with our close relative in the photograph! I doubt she claims us, though.
we’re an embarrassment to primates everywhere.
Felix the Cat outrages apes by telling them they’re related to humans:
https://archive.org/details/Felix_DoublesforDarwin_NoAudio
Re: Steve Ballmer’s current retirement project to develop a tool that allows one to explore all US gov’t spending–Good Luck with that. A couple years ago Catherine Austin Fitts, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Housing, gave a talk to the Breakthrough Energy Movement conference. (I think this was the 2012 or 2013 GlobalBEM conference.)
There are 2 personal experiences she described that are relevant to Ballmer’s current project.
1) She developed a tool to help her neighbors and others to track their local government spending (I think county/city). It quickly became extremely popular because its transparency gave citizens powerful information they could use to request change. The result was that she was sued by the government on some pretext–I forget the charges–that ultimately cost her her job. She eventually won the case, but it took her $6 Million to defend herself and about 10 years IIRC. The software tool had to be withdrawn. Fitts was certain the attack on her was to stop the potential spread of this software tool for citizens.
2) Fitts said that when she got into her job as Asst. Sect. of Housing, she had a statutory obligation for the finances. She discovered it was impossible to get the information she needed to be able to keep track of the income & expenditures of the department. Why? Because no one would give her the information. She eventually was able to gather the information on the expenditure side, but regarding the revenue side she was told she didn’t have the right to that information and she better not keep asking.
So–good luck again to Ballmer with his plans to make a transparent tool to “reveal all” about US government spending. He’s right that this information would be helpful–and indeed how can we be responsible, informed citizens & voters without such information?–but I have my doubts. Does he really think he’ll get accurate information about all the off-Budget items, including Black Ops?
He must be planning to just leave rows and columns of *asterisks* where the numbers for the War Department, Sneaky Petes and “17 Homeland Security Agencies”would appear… Congress ordered a complete audit of the War Department decades ago, and the Inspector General and auditors of that Beast have delayed or merely reported the the task is impossible, ever since. Older reporting, ca. 2000: http://www.bu.edu/globalbeat/usdefense/Hellman030900.html More recently, (looks like it stopped being a story of any substance in 2013), https://aminewswire.com/stories/510760993-defense-department-likely-to-miss-audit-deadline
Jeeeebus. Who. Fokking. Can. Continue. To. Even. Care? C’mon, Hillary! get in there and get it over with! I’m tired of the suspense!
Pam Martens
So HRC was too tainted for BHO to pick for VP but now–after she’s become much more tainted–he pushes her for President. What a world.
http://wallstreetonparade.com/2016/11/heres-the-wikileaks-bombshell-on-clinton-that-is-still-to-come/
he’s got nothing to lose now by doing it.
He got what he wanted; if he thought she was going to get in the way of reaching his goal to be president, well, then – draw a line through her name. It may even have been a case of, “People might vote for a black man, but vote for a black man and a woman on the same ticket? That could be a problem.”
I also have to think he didn’t want to end up being the top of the ticket playing second banana to the VP and her family.
Probably a million reasons why, many of them convenient and obvious and credible – but there are always more subconscious ones that may make someone accept or reject them.
“If readers have other approaches that have worked, please share them in comments. ”
I spread the N.C. word in the following manner.
Remember those tear off tabs for garage sales, missing pets, etc. that used to be posted on laundry bulletin boards and around college campuses?
I whip up some of those on my printer, making columns of
“www.nakedcapitalism.com”
“www.nakedcapitalism.com”
“www.nakedcapitalism.com”
Then, I cut them into strips, either lose, or joined “at the hip” and carry a few in my wallet, to give away to anyone that I can get involved in an economic or political discussions.
“How are things doing for you? You getting making a decent living here?” will get anyone to open up and tell you their economic life story. That leads to an opening….”You go online? You do? What sites about economics do you read? None? You ever read Naked Capitalism? It’s a site that covers a forbidden subject; economics and it explains things that they don’t want you to learn about.” I hand them a tab.
About ten a day given out for the last five years.
I like to check back with the tabbed people. About half have read the site.
Nice!
Wow, that’s great, thanks!
Fantastic work Dave, great stuff!
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/buchanan/what-hath-trump-wrought/
The Trump candidacy exposed what seems an unbridgeable gulf between this political class and the nation in whose name it purports to speak.
Consider the litany of horrors it has charged Trump with.
He said John McCain was no hero, that some Mexican illegals are “rapists.” He mocked a handicapped reporter. He called some women “pigs.” He wants a temporary ban to Muslim immigration. He fought with a Gold Star mother and father. He once engaged in “fat-shaming” a Miss Universe, calling her “Miss Piggy,” and telling her to stay out of Burger King. He allegedly made crude advances on a dozen women and starred in the “Access Hollywood” tape with Billy Bush.
While such “gaffes” are normally fatal for candidates, Trump’s followers stood by him through them all.
Why? asks an alarmed establishment. Why, in spite of all this, did Trump’s support endure? Why did the American people not react as they once would have? Why do these accusations not have the bite they once did?
Answer. We are another country now, an us-or-them country.
Middle America believes the establishment is not looking out for the nation but for retention of its power. And in attacking Trump it is not upholding some objective moral standard but seeking to destroy a leader who represents a grave threat to that power.
Trump’s followers see an American Spring as crucial, and they are not going to let past boorish behavior cause them to abandon the last best chance to preserve the country they grew up in.
These are the Middle American Radicals, the MARs of whom my late friend Sam Francis wrote.
They recoil from the future the elites have mapped out for them and, realizing the stakes, will overlook the faults and failings of a candidate who holds out the real promise of avoiding that future.
======================================================
The elites all but acknowledge that national boundaries play no part in identifying productive citizens and whose rights and well being are paramount within the boundary lines of a country. No, Davos man ideals identifies the 1% as having The merit, intellect, and fortitude to prosper in any country. Indeed, any local laws that impede the allocation of resources by society’s betters hinders progress….as any policy that would hinder our ever growing GDP is not efficient and questions about distribution are just Bernie bro naive…
Class warfare is sweeping the west. First Brexit, maybe here, back to eu later this month in Italy, next year in France and others. MSM fighting trend with all its might in accordance with orders, which accelerates its own demise, as noted in today’s chart above.
If France goes Iberia will follow in lockstep.
It’s a revolt against neolib neocon policies, a haves vs have nots struggle not seen since GD.
Problem is neolib policies not sustainable, impoverishing the masses does enrich the elite but eventually demand crashes and recession arrives, actually costing the rich more than the poor. Last gap is credit card and other borrowing to sustain lifestyle, this too not sustainable not least on account of high interest rates. Ditto subprime autos.
Next president inherits Obomber’s recession, better open fiscal spigot fast, fed powerless when people already past borrowing limit… Maybe accelerated if fed raises, as their banks have been urging…
Why?
Because World War Three, the impoverishment of the Middle Class and the starvation of poor working Americans is far worse.
Just extend the economic trends in place for most Americans since the Bill Clinton years and keep following the same trajectory for another four or eight years.
It’s all about the personal arithmetic that voters have faced.
Laruse, nicely put.
Give Trump credit for one thing: he was right about McCain. Getting shot down and captured while bombing innocent civilians doesn’t make you a hero–let alone all Keating 5 scamming and warmongering he has done since becoming a Senator.
McCain is one of the top incumbents I’d love to see lose this time. Too bad it doesn’t look like it is going to happen–which just proves that the Trump voters may be angry at the establishment, but not angry enough to throw out the bums who really need to be thrown out.
“Middle America believes the establishment is not looking out for the nation but for retention of its power. ”
they are not looking out for the world, they have no plan to deal with climate change, they are the follow the leaders while we all drown, follow the leaders to hell. Why would anyone believe the establishment was capable of empathy or even enlightened self-interest when they show no evidence of it? They are stupid but have been deluded by money and power into thinking they are wise.
I have spent all morning just hitting F5 here on the Links comments. I realized I am apparently in need of Election Day moral support that I can only find here amongst the NC Commetariat. There is no other news source on the web where I seek out the Comments section.
Yves, Lambert, and NC Crew, thank you for providing this space. And thank you to the Commetariat for the moral support I so badly need today!
The war on cash, subcontinent edition:
India abolishes larger banknotes in fight against graft, ‘black money’ [Reuters]
1,000 rupees = $15.
According to The Wire, the Reserve Bank of India is replacing these notes with 500 and 2000 rupee bills.
My family in India is also posting on Whatsapp that the 2000 rupee bills have nano GPS chips embedded into them, but this link suggests it may just be a rumor: http://trak.in/tags/business/2016/11/08/rupees-2000-currency-note-circulation-hoax/
Despite 1000 rupees only being $15 in exchange, the cash is definitely valued more in India because of cheaper standards of living.
Are they going to change the batteries in those big bills every 36 months?
With the available ambient electromagnetic radiation, one might be able to listen for GSM transmissions and log tower IDs and times, but transmitting would be out of the question. The first new Rupees exported are going to find themselves under nitric acid and microscopes rather quickly. Only to find they’re surplus “export-quality” RFID tags from pallets of agarbatti Walmart didn’t want.
People who make up caste systems would lie about this sort of thing, wouldn’t they.
*snicker* adding, now THERE’S demurrage!
Can they modify it to ‘War on Cash in Politics?’
I will be all for that.
I put off watching the iguana escape video bcz I’m feeling a bit too anxious about this election. Just what will Hillary do to us?
And, yes, watching the video was like thinking about how we lower quintile economic strata types are going to manage to keep Hillary and the Austerian Corporatist snakes from getting the R’s to go along with some “bargain” which will strip us of our SocSec mite and chip away at Medicare and Social Security…. The knotted up part seems to indicate that gridlock is our only hope. That the House R Crazies will find it impossible to go along with something Hillary suggests….
And I haven’t decided the most tactically beneficial way to vote. Write in Bernie to show support for his ongoing efforts to put together a real democratic political party? Or vote for Stein to give the Greens a chance at some federal funding, easier way to get a ballot line.
What to do, what to do.
In most states a write-in isn’t counted unless the candidate has filed paperwork.
Stein & Baraka are on the ballot in most states and are formally-approved write ins in several others. So votes for them should be counted almost everywhere. There’s probably detailed info on the Green Party website if you want to confirm.
Yes, I should have been clearer. The original comment referred to a write-in for Sanders.
States where Stein/Baraka are on the ballot or recognized write-in: http://www.jill2016.com/ballot_access: http://www.jill2016.com/ballot_access
In 7 states write-ins aren’t allowed at all, and in a few write-ins are counted without the paperwork being filed. This link used to have a state map, but I’m having trouble accessing the page today (long-running script error):
https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_access_for_presidential_candidates
> There’s probably detailed info on the Green Party website if you want to confirm
Not to be cranky, but it didn’t take much to actually offer help, instead of pointing in the general direction of where help might be found. Here’s a map at the GP site.
Once I’d written my comment and went to vote, it became totally clear that if I’m trying to boost alternatives to the R & D juggernaught, voting to help the Greens get a higher percentage of the vote was the way to go.
Plus, I believe Bernie will work hard to keep his followers on point and work for real change.
So, I felt better, even good about my decision.
FWIW
Text from wife this morning re polling place at school where she works:
In all my years here (20+) I saw the longest lines to vote this morning I’ve ever seen.
Fellow teacher reported:
…went to her polling place at 7 and the line was too long to wait in
This is California, 85%+ Hispanic in our neck of the woods… hmmmm.
Interesting. How should we interpret this? Previously in this election it was the newcomer Sanders who seemed to generate the large primary turnout.
Can we say that it is the remaining outsider Trump generating turnout or is it Clinton and her fear of other generation the turnout?
Well I’m pretty sure most of the people voting here are with her. I wrote in Bernie.
I was seeing it as related to, perhaps confirming, the reports of huge numbers of hispanics voting in Florida.
Are Haitian Americans considered Hispanic? And are there a lot of them in Florida?
Shouldn’t be; they speak a version of French. And don’t know – probably more widely spread.
FWIW Update
At lunch with wife, she said her class of first graders voted today, in a secret ballot, 15 Hillary, 12 Trump. In California, in very Hispanic area… Interesting…
It shows that no group is as monolithic as we’d like to stereotype them to be.
Meanwhile, on my new smartphone, the top of the news (prepared for me) says something about election, Trump and Hillary, but the photo is of Clinton only. The next item or maybe the 3rd is the “I voted’ people around Susan B Anthony’s grave.
Subtle, and perhaps the reason why it’s very effective in manipulating readers.
I follow the Rochester news stations(grew up there) and was horrified to see SBA’s gravestone covered in “I voted” stickers-more and more as the morning wore on. I hope the staff is able to clean the headstone so it isn’t damaged. And the whole identity politics thing gets my goat, too, but whatever.
At my daughter’s school, heavily Latino, Trump was widely favored by the students in her classes, both last school year and into this one. Second and Third grades. Makes me sad.
Irish descended Americans had been 50 50 split last I checked.
Obama’s less than enlightened policies towards immigration and the like aren’t lost on people, even if it’s not on MSNBC.
Of course, I voted against what I perceived the teacher wanted any time I could in school.
Traditionally, I break down CNN’s terrible web/print election coverage, but it’s pretty racist and I refuse to bother.
Instead, here’s what I really think.
http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/08/us/orlando-pulse-city-to-buy-club/index.html
It’s likely being bought by the city for 2.25 million, for some reason. Mass shootings have been out of the news cycle for something like two months.
The phenomenon is repetition-fatigue. However, once the election is over I can almost guarantee more high-profile mass shootings.
Given the victims’ huge payoffs in Orlando and Conneticut, and the massive ‘political will’ in Washington, I am starting to see why.
Video games also suffer from similar repetition fatigue.
The latest propaganda installment is Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare.
Such violent games have been made by the national security aparatus for at least 15 years, since the Medal of Honor series producer was made a department head in either DARPA or the domestic intelligence section. Probably both.
The review for… again… a game literally called Infinite Warfare, they can hardly buy good press for this game. The reviews are bad, and it is generally agreed amongst game-snobs like myself that the fanbase is literally brain-dead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_87zvl0LcEg
Check the trailer, it starts with people complaining about the election, and saying “Screw it, let’s go into space.” then the obligatory action scenes set to “Welcome to the Jungle.”
It’s an age where the most purchased music is from the past.
The movies are all remakes.
Now, even the video games, arguably our newest media, cannot sell their crappy re-makes. This time it’s not the about the economy.
It’s about the content.
Fortunately, with gaming unlike movies it is much easier for a small team to put together a quality game than it is to produce a quality film. So while Triple AAA games may crash and burn, the smaller studios still put out quality and innovative (original meaning, not the Bezzle kind) products. That are typically a lot cheaper as well.
‘Check the trailer, it starts with people complaining about the election, and saying “Screw it, let’s go into space.” then the obligatory action scenes set to “Welcome to the Jungle.”’
And people say the social engineering stuff is crazy talk.
https://www.americasarmy.com/ Free video games kids! What’s your MOS? 11 Bravo?
http://www.goarmy.com/downloads/games.html
Liberal conservative buzz kills.
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/10/playing-war-how-the-military-uses-video-games/280486/
Paul Verhoeven is Cassandra.
https://youtu.be/SMTz9nIUkGc
I think there are fewer mass shootings during football season.
Had to laugh at this AP article headlined “Election Day: Americans choose between Clinton and Trump”
Which immediately brought to mind the Simpsons episode featuring Kang & Kodos as Ross Perot punches his fist through his hat.
It’s a two party system!!!
I have to say that, echoing Jerri-Lynn’s sentiment from yesterday, one of the most frightening, unpleasant sentiments I have encountered this election cycle is the completely baseless fawning over Obama and being “sad” he is leaving or wanting him to have a third term.
Every time I see that pop up it is founded on zilch. Maybe he can hang around to leave people out to dry as he facilitates smooth sailing for the banks again? Maybe he can stay around and “reign in” the “wild west” of news media. I KNOW! He can stay to wait around some more to see what happens with the DAPL and Standing Rock protestors! Now I miss him too!
… …
http://bruegel.org/2016/11/monetary-policy-at-the-time-of-elections/ goes to the Fed vs. elections post, as you see, but it was supposed to be the Intercept article on “9 ways elections are rigged”!
I see my original comment re-instated! Thank you!
I see my original comment re-instated! Thank you!
It has been hard not to fall into a default position of Trump support simply from watching the media spin machine in action. The amount of hysteria, hyperventilation and not-so-subtle Clinton boosting has been enough to make me gag. I have to keep reminding myself that he is a con artist without a shred of integrity whose entire business career has been about looking after number one, and who has left a trail of betrayals and broken promises behind him. And Clinton and her captive media still succeed in making him look good by comparison. Quite an achievement.
Pretty amazing the dems could find somebody that makes him look good.
And imagine, with all her faults, its not just the news media, it is the dem elites, plus the rep neocons, that are nearly 100% for her. Why, you’d almost think what I see as her faults they see as her virtues…
and he’s always been a racist to some degree as in early charges of discrimination (of course there are worse sins, but it is not a positive shall we say), probably diagnostically narcissist, often incoherent, some authoritarian traits, and has as many outright horrible policies as good ones. But yea I know what you mean. Never Hillary and her making this country even more of a banana republic.
“The Democrats’ Fight Over Finance | New Yorker” — Lemme guess, a vicious backroom tussle between the we-need-an-economy-with-much-more-of-it and we-need-an-economy-entirely-based-on-it factions?
[Re. electile dysfunction 2016, I’m on complete self-imposed MSM blackout today, with small exceptions of scanning front page of the local newsrag visible thru the newspaper dispenser box and perusing my Reuters newsfeed … i.e. yesterday’s news. Got some good DVDs laid in for tonight. Don’ own a smartphone, just a 15-y.o. candybar phone of the kind that makes phone calls and whose text/internet capabilities are too primitive to be in any way tempting. Tomorrow will bring what tomorrow brings.]
6:15pm in, only 0-2 people ahead of me but all 10 (±2) booths in use. Most of my time was spent trying to remember who I wanted to vote against! Chatter from the election workers was about high turnout (30-40% higher, as best I could gather) and one person was turned away while I was there for cause unknown (person accepted culpability for it… but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t a little issue up the line).
Anyway, one more vote for Stein, one for random judges whom I do not recall seeing named on signs near the words “tough love”, one more for public transit and one against “technology enhancements for schools” (against vested interest, but I know that bezzle), all fed into an ES&S Model 100 tabulator.
My Election Day poem:
I did not vote for Him or Her
I couldn’t do it, that’s for sure
Instead I drank a beer or three
and pinned my ballot to a tree
And so it goes as empire dies
a heap of dung and lots of flies
there’s not much left for us to do
but cook a batch of shit-fly stew
Awaiting Hillary’s concession speech.
Delays.
They are setting up her teleprompter and scrambling to add last minute flourishes to help save what’s left of her career so it won’t be completely buried in kitty-litter.
Why doesn’t she just speak off the cuff without the teleprompter? I mean, only a loser like Trump does things like that.