Quote of the Day

Walt:

...

There's no need for Twitter.

Blogging is bad enough.

Indeed. Going to work ...

The outrage ...

Da Tube stolen from Oliver Willis.

Ron Silver dies

So long, asshole.

The Freeman Affair - 'killing a chicken to scare the monkeys'

This will be of interest to those who care about the effects of the Israel lobby and the new Likudnik Israeli government. It's at TomDispatch, so take a lunch. Many links.

[...] On withdrawing from his nomination as director of the National Intelligence Council, Charles Freeman, former ambassador to Saudi Arabia and a rare provocative thinker in Washington, let loose with a broadside against his enemies. Of accusations from the generally right-wing groups and individuals who claim to represent the Jewish community in official Washington, he wrote:

"There is a special irony in having been accused of improper regard for the opinions of foreign governments and societies by a group so clearly intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government -- in this case, the government of Israel. I believe that the inability of the American public to discuss, or the government to consider, any option for US policies in the Middle East opposed by the ruling faction in Israeli politics has allowed that faction to adopt and sustain policies that ultimately threaten the existence of the state of Israel... This is not just a tragedy for Israelis and their neighbors in the Middle East; it is doing widening damage to the national security of the United States."

Freeman put it more metaphorically to me: "It was a nice way of, as the Chinese say, killing a chicken to scare the monkeys." By destroying his appointment, Freeman claimed, the Israel lobby hoped to intimidate other critics of Israel and U.S. Middle East policy who might seek jobs in the Obama administration.

In his interview with me, Freeman noted the propensity members of the Israel lobby have for denying the lobby's existence, even while taking credit for having forced him out and simultaneously claiming that they had nothing to do with it. "We're now at the ludicrous stage where those who boasted of having done it and who described how they did it are now denying that they did it," he said.

"For all of you out there who may have questioned whether there was a powerful 'Israel lobby,' or who admitted that it existed but didn't think it had much influence, or who thought that the real problem was some supposedly all-powerful 'Saudi lobby,' think again."

This new attention to the lobby's work comes at a critical moment, which is why the toppling of Freeman might be its Waterloo.

Perhaps most important of all, Israel is about to be run by an extremist, ultra right-wing government led by Likud Party leader Bibi Netanyahu, and including the even more extreme party of Avigdor Lieberman, as well as a host of radical-right religious parties. It's an ugly coalition that is guaranteed to clash with the priorities of the Obama White House.

Any right-wingers, in any countries anywhere on this planet are not good for anybody. Period.

The last paragraph:

So here's the reality behind the Freeman debacle: Already worried over Team Obama, suffering the after-effects of the Gaza debacle, and about to be burdened with the Netanyahu-Lieberman problem, the Israel lobby is undoubtedly running scared. They succeeded in knocking off Freeman, but the true test of their strength is yet to come.

Just one more plate full o' right-wing crap for Obama to deal with. We'll be watching.

Pablo's gone fishin'...

Paul 'Pablo' Wilsbach of Pablo On Politics has closed up shop after six years of some of the best photo-toons we're likely to see.

Pablo, you did some great work and we'll miss you. Best of luck.

The Twit gets a little payback. From a safe distance.

[A big welcome to Jim Yeager's readers at Skippy's. - F]

Think Progress

Yesterday on CNN, former Crossfire co-host Tucker Carlson ripped The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart, calling him a “partisan hack” and an operative for the Democratic party who only took on Jim Cramer and CNBC only because they criticized Obama’s budget. “I would like to see somebody have the stones to come out and say, Jon Stewart is kind of a pompous jerk, actually,” Carlson added.

Kindly remember, Repug operative Twit boy, that Stewart came on your show and called you a dick to your face. He's got more stones than you ever had in your wildest dreams.

Quote of the Day

Think Progress, with video:

Meghan McCain Tells Laura Ingraham: ‘Kiss My Fat Ass!’

Ladies, please! Please keep it up! I suggest a big tub of Jello...

Ooooh! This is getting so good!

"CNBC...has the time horizon of a fruit fly"

Today's 'recommended read' by James Poniewozik in Time:

To watch CNBC today is to enter an alternative universe, where élites are populists, Wall Street is Main Street and bank executives are the oppressed. It's not surprising that a voice of opposition to the new Administration would emerge. But who would have thought it would be on a channel not owned by Rupert Murdoch?

CNBC's reaction is colored by its stressed-out day trader's focus on the short term. When ordinary people think about the economy, they think about jobs, college, retirement. Sure, the stock market affects them in the long run — but so do job security and the threat of getting wiped out by health-care bills. When CNBC considers the economy, it means Wall Street's numbers that day, that hour, that minute. CNBC may pay lip service to the long term, but it has the time horizon of a fruit fly.

This means that CNBC looks at everything, particularly politics, in terms of how it will affect "the Market." The commentators on CNBC murmur about the Market as if it were the Island on Lost: a mystic force that must be placated, lest it become angry and punish us. "The Market doesn't like ..." "What the Market wants to see is ..."

And, oooh, is the Market cranky at Obama! The Market doesn't like raising taxes on the wealthy (even if Buffett does). The Market doesn't like government health-care reform or cap-and-trade environmental policy or big budgets or limiting bonuses at bailed-out banks. And don't get the Market started on bank nationalization. That ticks the Market off!

I hope everybody noticed that as soon as the talk of 'nationalization' got serious, all of a sudden those banks reported they were making plenty of money and don't need nationalized, thank you very much. Feelin' fine, don't need none o' that stinky medicine!

It is as if — between MSNBC and CNBC — NBC News were trying to own the liberal and conservative voices of cable news. But CNBC's is a much different strain of conservatism from Sarah Palin's or Bill O'Reilly's: it is urban, club room and Mammon-oriented rather than small town, VFW hall and God-oriented. It's an ideology not exclusively beholden to party (Cramer voted for Obama), but it's an ideology nonetheless.

It's also an ideology that you'd think, given the track record of trusted financial institutions, people would be a little wary of crowing in public nowadays. But ratings are up. As the rest of the country stews over the mismanagement of insurers and banks, there's still a small, demographically appealing niche for talking heads fulminating against the "demonization" of business and being in favor of laissez-faire government.

Hey, somebody's gotta stick up for the little guy. Even, or especially, when he's the big guy.

Especially if it makes the network money. That's what it's all about.

There are some good financial reporters out there who saw and reported on what was going on that led the economy into the mess it's in. Just like there were those who saw the truth about Iraq. The people and agencies that could have done something about it either didn't want to listen or were told not to. More likely the latter, in my opinion after eight years of watching the Bush regime wreck this country.

All I know about economics is that the richer I get, the lumpier my mattress is. I'm thinkin' of taking some of those rolls of nickels inta town and trading them in for paper money.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Pollution Has Dimmed Skies Over Last 30 Years
NASA releases chart (right) of trackable objects in space.

China's Premier “Worried” About U.S. Debt
Mulls dispatching 300 million debt collectors.

Fermilab Scientists Closer to Finding “God Particle,” They Say
Immediately prior to being struck by lightning bolt.

Shuttle Delivers New Urine Recycling System to Space Station
Astronauts had been complaining about the Tang

Bad News: More 10th-Graders Smoking Marijuana Than Cigarettes
Good news: more 10th-graders smoking marijuana than cigarettes.

Cheney Says He, Bush “Not to Blame” For Current Mess
“We had nothing to do with it,” he adds.

Musta been all Clinton and Obama's fault.

Why?

Does Dick "dick" Cheney get a platform after helping to run this country into the ground over the last 8 years? I was painting yesterday when I got to hear John King fellate the former Presi Vice-President for a half hour. And then CNN flogged it all day like it was news. What the fuck did they think he'd say; that he supported the new President? That Scooter Libby deserved what he got and more? That President Obama is doing the best he can with the mess they left him?

No, all he had to say was "stuff happens".

If they have anything it's chutzpah, Cheney and CNN both. Much as Wolfie annoys me, I wish he'd be back on Sunday mornings. John King was disgraceful when he should have gone all Jon Stewart on Beelzebub. Shoulda watched Little George's hair.

Figures ...

Today's losers losing their homes are Republican districts. At least according to the Center for Responsible Lending, who has just issued a new report that shows nine of the top ten districts with the most [foreclosures] are Republican and most likely to receive the bulk of any homeowner bailout, and thus, at least according to one On Air editor of a major cable network, fit the definition of "losers" ...

Maybe the Rethugs should just STFU*, being at every level of government, everything they've touched has gone to shit.

Leave us not forget, this is the same 'moral values' crowd who have the highest divorce rate and the highest level of teenage pregnancies and pregnancies out of wedlock.

Seems the party of 'fiscal responsibility' can't get that house in order either.

...

In other words, "Since the Rick Santelli's of the world have been complaining about how the people who would be helped by this bill are so 'irresponsible' and are really just a bunch of 'losers.' .... Rick Santelli's 'losers' may turn out to be the people who are supposedly his ideological fellow travelers."

*Great thanks to Susie Madrak for the link.

Quote of the Day

Greenwald:

...

At least give credit to Cramer for facing his critics and addressing (and even acknowledging the validity of) the criticisms. By stark contrast, most of our major media stars simply ignore all criticisms of their corrupt behavior and literally suppress it (even if the criticisms appear as major, lengthy front-page exposés in The New York Times).

...

Talking Merchant Marine

I've just always liked this guy.

He must have been the first cowboy-folk-rap artist. He plays that Martin D-28 with a beat-jazz attitude. A true American original. -- Tom Russell on Jack Elliott

Some sample lyrics:

Ship loaded down with TNT
All out across the rollin' sea;
Stood on the deck, watched the fishes swim,
I'se a-prayin' them fish wasn't made out of tin.
...

Gonna blow them fascists all to hell!
Win some freedom, liberty, stuff like that.
...

I'm just one of the merchant crew,
I belong to the union called the N. M. U.
I'm a union man from head to toe,
I'm U. S. A. and C. I. O.

Gee, pretty commie stuff - doing his duty as a merchant sailor, liberty & freedom, union man - I'm guessin' he's not a Repuglicant.

Ramblin' Jack Elliott ~ Talking Merchant Marine (W. Guthrie)

Thanks to peglegsam.

My Give A Damn's Busted

I could watch this gal for hours. Until my arm gets tired, anyway.

Jo Dee Messina

Thanks to limpnjen.

The Culture Warriors Get Laid Off

Do not miss Daddy Frank's column today. It will make you feei good! Apparently our nation's slide into the Dark Ages has been halted. Links at site.

What has happened between 2001 and 2009 to so radically change the cultural climate? Here, at last, is one piece of good news in our global economic meltdown: Americans have less and less patience for the intrusive and divisive moral scolds who thrived in the bubbles of the Clinton and Bush years. Culture wars are a luxury the country — the G.O.P. included — can no longer afford.

I think it's a stretch to call what the religious whackjob wingtards have been trying to do to us a 'luxury', but it's certainly one we can do without.

Once again, both the president and the country are following New Deal-era precedent. In the 1920s boom, the reigning moral crusade was Prohibition, and it packed so much political muscle that F.D.R. didn’t oppose it. The Anti-Saloon League was the Moral Majority of its day, the vanguard of a powerful fundamentalist movement that pushed anti-evolution legislation as vehemently as it did its war on booze. (The Scopes “monkey trial” was in 1925.) But the political standing of this crowd crashed along with the stock market. Roosevelt shrewdly came down on the side of “the wets” in his presidential campaign, leaving Hoover to drown with “the dries.”

Much as Obama repealed the Bush restrictions on abortion and stem-cell research shortly after pushing through his stimulus package, so F.D.R. jump-started the repeal of Prohibition by asking Congress to legalize beer and wine just days after his March 1933 inauguration and declaration of a bank holiday. As Michael A. Lerner writes in his fascinating 2007 book “Dry Manhattan,” Roosevelt’s stance reassured many Americans that they would have a president “who not only cared about their economic well-being” but who also understood their desire to be liberated from “the intrusion of the state into their private lives.” Having lost plenty in the Depression, the public did not want to surrender any more freedoms to the noisy minority that had shut down the nation’s saloons.

Frum was contrasting Obama to his own party’s star attraction, Rush Limbaugh, whose “history of drug dependency” and “tangled marital history” make him “a walking stereotype of self-indulgence.” Indeed, the two top candidates for leader of the post-Bush G.O.P, Rush and Newt, have six marriages between them. The party that once declared war on unmarried welfare moms, homosexual “recruiters” and Bill Clinton’s private life has been rebranded by Mark Foley, Larry Craig, David Vitter and the irrepressible Palins. Even before the economy tanked, Americans had more faith in medical researchers using discarded embryos to battle Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s than in Washington politicians making ad hoc medical decisions for Terri Schiavo.

Perkins is now praying that economic failure will be a stimulus for his family-values business. “As the economy goes downward,” he has theorized, “I think people are going to be driven to religion.” Wrong again. The latest American Religious Identification Survey, published last week, found that most faiths have lost ground since 1990 and that the fastest-growing religious choice is “None,” up from 8 percent to 15 percent (which makes it larger than all denominations except Roman Catholics and Baptists). Another highly regarded poll, the General Social Survey, had an even more startling finding in its preliminary 2008 data released this month: Twice as many Americans have a “great deal” of confidence in the scientific community as do in organized religion. How the almighty has fallen: organized religion is in a dead heat with banks and financial institutions on the confidence scale.

History is cyclical, and it would be foolhardy to assume that the culture wars will never return. But after the humiliations of the Scopes trial and the repeal of Prohibition, it did take a good four decades for the religious right to begin its comeback in the 1970s. In our tough times, when any happy news can be counted as a miracle, a 40-year exodus for these ayatollahs can pass for an answer to America’s prayers.

Halle-fuckin'-lujah! Much, much more.

Look in the mirror ...

Being I live in NY, I've gotten to hear more than my share of Bernie Madoff's victims (most of them lived here) whining on my TV about how screwed they are.

Listen to me, those of you who invested your "life savings" with this asshole on the promise of 46% returns. You have no one but yourselves to blame. Forty-six percent???!!! If it weren't for your own greed, you wouldn't be scraping for every dime now. Nobody asked the hard questions of Madoff or they would (should) have taken their money and run for the hills (the mattress at the least).

Which brings me to an interesting article in the Times I found via Dday:

...

And yet, just about anybody who actually took the time to kick the tires of Mr. Madoff’s operation tended to run in the other direction. James R. Hedges IV, who runs an advisory firm called LJH Global Investments, says that in 1997 he spent two hours asking Mr. Madoff basic questions about his operation. "The explanation of his strategy, the consistency of his returns, the way he withheld information — it was a very clear set of warning signs," said Mr. Hedges. When you look at the list of Madoff victims, it contains a lot of high-profile names — but almost no serious institutional investors or endowments. They insist on knowing the kind of information Mr. Madoff refused to supply.

...

A little due diligence would have saved many people from ruin*, but the same impulses that inspired people to buy houses that common sense said were way out of their league were at work here.

...

I suppose you could argue that most of Mr. Madoff's direct investors lacked the ability or the financial sophistication of someone like Mr. Hedges. But it shouldn't have mattered. Isn’t the first lesson of personal finance that you should never put all your money with one person or one fund? Even if you think your money manager is "God"? Diversification has many virtues; one of them is that you won't lose everything if one of your money managers turns out to be a crook.

...

My 'financial guy' is someone Mrs. F used to babysit for and not everything is with him. I trust him, but only so far. You also have to know something about money, your money, especially if you're trusting someone else with your future dreams. I am, by no means, qualified to invest on my own but, by golly, I know where all my investments are.

When I saw what was happening in the mortgage world (4 years ago), a phone call to my guy made certain everything we had in mortgage-backed securities was liquidated and put somewhere else. I could have made more, probably, but I thought the crash would happen earlier. It is our life savings (it's gonna buy us our retirement home in Paris and allow us to live our "golden years" in a place we both love) and I ain't taking unnecessary chances with it.

If some idiot comes up to me and says I could make 46% on my money I'd laugh and ask him what drugs he's taking, because even the most profitable investments don't return half that (unless you're a loan shark). These folks just saw dollar signs and refused to consider the reality (or refused to educate themselves enough) that shit doesn't work that way unless you're doing something illegal. Many of Madoff's investors (I've seen too many interviews with them) had an inkling he was trading on insider information, but didn't want to ask questions so as not to rock the boat and derail the gravy train. If you don't investigate what's being done with your money, you can't bitch when you get taken for a ride (hey, people still fall for those Nigerian email scams), and you'd better not come looking to me for a 'bailout'.

...

And that’s the point. People did abdicate responsibility — and now, rather than face that fact, many of them are blaming the government for not, in effect, saving them from themselves. Indeed, what you discover when you talk to victims is that they harbor an anger toward the S.E.C. that is as deep or deeper than the anger they feel toward Mr. Madoff. There is a powerful sense that because the agency was asleep at the switch, they have been doubly victimized. And they want the government to do something about it.

...

The only thing the government owes these people is a refund of the taxes they paid on the ersatz 'profits' they earned through Madoff. It's one thing to help out the folks who got in over their heads with a mortgage (it affects my property value if my neighbors go into foreclosure), but I'll be damned if any of my tax money goes to people who engaged in willful ignorance when they should have known better.

...

But why? What happened to the victims of Bernard Madoff is terrible. But every day in this country, people lose money due to financial fraud or negligence. Innocent investors who bought stock in Enron lost millions when that company turned out to be a fraud; nobody made them whole. Half a dozen Ponzi schemes have been discovered since Mr. Madoff was arrested in December. People lose it all because they start a company that turns out to be misguided, or because they do something that is risky, hoping to hit the jackpot. Taxpayers don’t bail them out, and they shouldn’t start now. Did the S.E.C. foul up? You bet. But that doesn’t mean the investors themselves are off the hook. Investors blaming the S.E.C. for their decision to give every last penny to Bernie Madoff is like a child blaming his mother for letting him start a fight while she wasn’t looking.

...

Yes, Madoff is a crook, but if these folks want someone to blame, they should look in the mirror. And let that be a lesson to the rest of you out there. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Do your research and pay attention to what your money is doing and make sure it's doing what you want it to do. That's what the quarterly statements are about. It's your money and if someone swindles you out of it, nobody's gonna give a shit but you.

*Those who invested with Madoff indirectly through "feeder funds" may have some recourse suing the funds themselves, but those who invested directly, with Ol' Bernie himself, are probably fucked.

Saturday Crazy Redneck Blue Oval Music Blogging

This goes out to - well, you know...(wink)

Jerry Reed ~ Lord, Mr. Ford

Thanks to wifeOFcaptainchaos.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

As a country music fan for fifty years, since back when it was called 'country and western' and people wouldn't ride in my car because I played it on the radio, I am sensing a subtle shift in the genre in the 21st century. So far, if this vid is any indication, it's for the better.

This goes out to all of us who 'held on' through the Bush years.

Solomon and Emmylou on the old George Jones / Tammy Wynette hit

Solomon Burke and Emmylou Harris ~ We're Gonna Hold On

Thanks to 1000Magicians.

Are You Tired Of Me Darling

Nanci, Emmylou and Iris on a song they recorded together for Nanci's Other Voices / Other Rooms Cd

If you want to get a Nanci Griffith album, make it Other Voices, Other Rooms or Other Voices, Too. Trust me on this one. You can get the rest of them later.

Nanci Griffith, Emmylou Harris, & a way knocked up Iris DeMent ~ Are You Tired Of Me Darling

Thanks to 1000Magicians (UK) who only joined YouTube about a week ago and is already one of my favorites to gleep stuff from.

Update:

There's a war on between some of the music companies and the folks who post the videos on YouTube without paying them. This video was yanked about 10 minutes after I posted it. Buy the album.

Update II:

Now it's back. Yeesh. Buy the album.

"Stewart creamed him."

Following up on Fixer's post, here's the ChiTrib on the Stewart/Cramer Vanilla Cage Death Match. With video.

The crowd at Comedy Central's studio cheered because it was good populism, well aimed and well delivered. And Cramer, the usually peripatetic host of CNBC's "Mad Money," sat and took it, mostly, like a schoolboy willing to let the teacher go on in hopes of still being allowed to graduate.

Stewart creamed him, if anything almost to a fault. [...]

He called it "this weird Wall Street side bet" happening on top of, and dwarfing, the public game of whether stock A or B is headed up or down. He kept the focus, almost unrelentingly, on the Wall Street gamesmen and women who turned bad mortgages into epic disaster and, to his credit, tried to indict Cramer and his colleagues en masse, and for failing a broader civic duty.

"I hope that was as uncomfortable to watch as it was to do," Stewart said when it was over.

It wasn't uncomfortable at all, Mr. Stewart. It was a pleasure to watch you hand Cramer his ass. You plenny smart fella for a comedian, and you got the balls the political gasbags oughta have. Good job.

Update:

Think Progress has more, with links.

Last night, CNBC’s Jim Cramer had a brutal face-off with The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart. “I understand that you want to make finance entertaining, but it’s not a f*cking game,” Stewart told Cramer. Cramer also agreed to do one show with more serious, level-headed commentary.

There has been almost universal acknowledgment that Stewart humiliated Cramer. Jim Fallows called it a “slaughter,” and the Huffington Post has a gigantic headline reading, “Jon Stewart eviscerates Jim Cramer and CNBC.” [...]

As Michael Calderone notes, yesterday on Twitter, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough wrote that he would have the “exclusive Jim Cramer interview tomorrow morning to discuss tonight’s war with Jon Stewart.” But after the rough night, Scarborough wrote this morning that Cramer was a no-show:

Cramer probably couldn't hear the alarm clock from hidin' under the bed. Or else he was, understandably, too drunk to go on TV. Heh.