The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    MrSmith1's picture

    Three Simple Solutions

    By MrSmith1 on Sun, 06/26/2011 - 11:46am |
    I offer three simple solutions to problems which affect our nation ...
     
    1) Give Fictional characters the same rights as corporations and 'reality-based' humans.  Character personhood would open up a whole new area for political recruitment and campaign financing.  It would also make it possible to appoint Atticus Finch to the Supreme Court.
     
    2)  Starting next month, the bags of money we're giving to the Afghan warlords must come with the provision that they invest at least 48% of that money in the American infrastructure, thus creating jobs he
    jollyroger's picture

    Henry McCarty to William Koch: You plutocrat sonofabitch, let go of my soul or I'll tear out your scumbag heart and feed it to the pigs. Howard Hughes reports outrage in outlaw heaven.

    By jollyroger on Sun, 06/26/2011 - 3:47am |

    It will come as no surprise that Billy the Kid is my earliest hero.  Thanks to Howard Hughes' movie The Outlaw, I was imprinted with recalcitrance at the age of 3, and it has stood me in good stead ever since.

    Therefor I am extra special primo outraged that William Koch, (the younger of the foul Koch duo) has come into possession of Billy's picture, for which he parted with two million blood drenched dollars (pocket change...)

    Richard Day's picture

    PAY TO PLAY

    By Richard Day on Sat, 06/25/2011 - 10:07pm |

     

    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

     

    Barth's picture

    Pretense, Magic and Make Believe

    By Barth on Sat, 06/25/2011 - 12:46pm |
    He was the kind of a phony that have to give themselves room when they answer somebody's question. He stepped back, and stepped right on the lady's foot behind him. He probably broke every toe in her body

    ---J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

    cmaukonen's picture

    OVERDOSE - A Documentary on the Financial Crisis that is coming.

    By cmaukonen on Fri, 06/24/2011 - 11:33pm |

    This is a really good documentary on the financial collapse, why it happened, what was done after, what was not and why the next one will be even worse. The moves made by the government - here and elsewhere - and those not made have set the world up for another financial disaster. The premise they give here is after the bust of the Housing Bubble, the solution has been to inflate a large number of other bubbles all about to burst. It's fairly log but worth watching. It has Spanish sub-titles and was done by a Swede.

    cmaukonen's picture

    Socialism Is Good For The Stock Market

    By cmaukonen on Fri, 06/24/2011 - 4:20pm |

    Came across this little tidbit in Huffington. Seems that the Stocks in socialized countries do much better that those here.

    FurudeRikaChama's picture

    Lady Gaga speaks At Europride in Italy

    By FurudeRikaChama on Fri, 06/24/2011 - 1:56pm |

    Hooray for Lady Gaga! She is truly a good speaker! You can see the video below.

    It appears Lady Gaga is also gay, but supports LBGT rights. She is a true woman who is willing to stand up for what she believes, and for that I salute her.

    She is truly a great woman.

    Barth's picture

    Thank goodness for Eric Cantor!!!

    By Barth on Thu, 06/23/2011 - 8:45pm |

    If anyone doubted this (and I suspect few outside the White House and Treasury did), there will be no "adults" coming to the rescue it appears. Congressman Cantor has announced that it will be impossible for him or his party to vote to extend the debt limit (to agree to pay our national obligations) without an agreement by Democrats not to seek a repeal of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest among us.

    cmaukonen's picture

    Chris Hedges and the coming economic storm.

    By cmaukonen on Thu, 06/23/2011 - 5:41pm |

    He's not at all upbeat on the future, to say the least. But does say their are steps that can be taken to prepare for it.

    tmccarthy0's picture

    Blogging While Female: Empowerment and Electronic Communication in a Civil Society

    By tmccarthy0 on Thu, 06/23/2011 - 2:49pm |

    What is blogging while female? What is it about so many blogs, whether they are of the liberal, conservative or middle of the road blogs that sexism becomes the mode of what is deemed civil discourse? What is female empowerment and what constitutes an on-line civil society and how does it contribute to the overall meaning of civil society? In the end, how do we become more effective communicators and more inclusive of other voices.

    Tommy Holmes's picture

    Nothing To Gain

    By Tommy Holmes on Thu, 06/23/2011 - 12:13pm |

        Was listening to a piece about the war powers act and the situation in Libya. They said the reasoning as to why we're there is because the people were being killed by their leaders. Well the same thing is happening in Syria. Why are we not helping those people? I suspect there are basically 2 reasons.

    1. Syria is an enemy of Israel. We no doubt don't care if there are a few less Syrians. Lord only knows Israel doesn't.

    2. Syria has no oil.

    My Goodness

    By LisB on Thu, 06/23/2011 - 6:43am |

    Gracious, me.

    Seems the Obama bashing folks have taken over this place while I've not visited.  And yet they STILL cannot come up with any alternatives, nor any new thoughts.

    My goodness.

    But....the sports posts have been excellent. 

    xoxo.

     

     

    cmaukonen's picture

    They Know What You Did Last Summer (and Fall and Winter And...)

    By cmaukonen on Wed, 06/22/2011 - 9:47pm |

    It would seem that our privacy and that of others around the world has been even more compromised that many had thought. The hacktivist team Anonymous acquired 70,000 emails from HBGary Federal concerning a government/private spying operation know as Romas/COIN and its replacement called Odyssey. Mostly targeting Arab countries but also citizens in this country.

    oleeb's picture

    Peace With Honor: Vietnamization in Afghanistan or Obama Channels Nixon

    By oleeb on Wed, 06/22/2011 - 9:17pm |

    There is much to be said of the deceptive and dishonest speech the President delivered to the country tonight regarding the withdrawal of a small portion of the massive American army permanently stationed in Afghanistan.  But one point is pivotal and it is this: in order to assuage soft minds, in order to mollify those who fervently wish to believe in their leader and that he intends to end the war in Afghanistan he knowingly and deliberately decieved the public and he did so with the full and enthusiastic assistance of the corporate media.  The President tonight led people to believe that

    Withdrawal from Afghanistan, Obama's 3 Options

    By NCD on Wed, 06/22/2011 - 12:39pm |

    How bold will Obama be, or will he go with leaving the the big decisions to the military? General Petraeus says we have made tremendous achievements in the region, yet, our progress is 'fragile and reversible'. (Is progress ever not reversible, especially in Afghanistan?) Information on options from Yahoo link.

    Tommy Holmes's picture

    The Real Terror in the War on Terror

    By Tommy Holmes on Tue, 06/21/2011 - 8:27am |

       Was just watching C-Span. The topic was; should we get out of Afghanistan? I was happy to hear 90% of the callers were stating facts that I have been aware of since the jets hit the World Trade Center. The policies being invoked in the name of the protection of our freedoms and way of life are not what they claim to be; by a long shot.

    cmaukonen's picture

    Goodbye Euro ?

    By cmaukonen on Mon, 06/20/2011 - 8:39pm |


    Could be. According to     this in the Telegraph the UK is panning that this may be the case.

    Richard Day's picture

    FIBBER MCGEE WITH SOME BOORTZ THROWN IN!

    By Richard Day on Mon, 06/20/2011 - 5:48pm |

    It was only after '86 that the number of blacks surpassed the number of whites in prison for the first time, and many of the offenders who were picked up that year are still locked up.

    cmaukonen's picture

    Greeks See The Bankers as Typhoid Mary

    By cmaukonen on Sun, 06/19/2011 - 11:53pm |

    Economic and political discontent - like the common cold - can be quite contagious. Especially when the carrier knows no geographic boundaries.

    jollyroger's picture

    Building Abandoned. Will the last person leaving Organizing for America Hdqtrs please lock the doors.

    By jollyroger on Sun, 06/19/2011 - 7:18pm |

     At his inauguration, Barack Obama was the owner of a chestful of political capital and the world's most valuable rolodex.

    We know the tragic way he wasted the capital, leaving him impotent to be a player in the midterm elections.

    The rolodex, the email addresses of 13 million grassroots supporters should have turned, in any intelligent machine, into the block captains of a concerted pressure group to support the administration's legislative agenda.

    cmaukonen's picture

    In an Unusual Moment of Clarity - Michele Bachmann Gets it Right Once

    By cmaukonen on Sun, 06/19/2011 - 11:31am |

    They say the even crazy people can be right at lease once and this time it has been our darling crazy, Michele Bachmann.

    Technology, Education, Opportunity and the H1B.

    By kgb999 on Sun, 06/19/2011 - 2:49am |

    When president Obama recently gave a speech announcing a new high-tech training program, education was highlighted as a part of the solution to the current employment disaster. The basic idea is pretty simple; emphasize so-called STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) educational subjects because related fields are where future jobs are likely to be.

    The context of education is somewhat terrible for discussing employment. In truth, neither S, T, E nor M represent an actual job that people get paid to do. Such details make up the content of academic coursework but when education is discussed as a job-creation engine, the jobs themselves remain an abstract out there somewhere in damn-yo-smartville. An academic position as research fellow is quite different than getting paid to grind script in a cubicle - yet both could be characterized as STEM jobs. For employment discussions, STEM education has often been roughly equated to yielding "jobs in tech". While far from a complete list these jobs include: design, engineering, coding, manufacturing, system/db administration and customer support.

    The time investment required for education seems to work against using it as an acute response to unemployment. However, that still leaves the very important question of how technology and education provide for long-term opportunity and job stability. This answer lies in the actual level of opportunity tech jobs represent and just how stable they will continue to be. Are these jobs (or any well-paid jobs for that matter) viable long-term in a globalized economy?

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