Posts from — January 2008

I wasn’t going to wade into this swamp, but then I heard an Obama commercial¹ that starts out “…after college and law school…” and then talks about his activism in Chicago.

Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. graduated from Columbia University in 1983 and started the Harvard law school in 1988. I get suspicious when people don’t acknowledge a five-year chunk of their lives.

“…Barack Obama’s first job after graduating from Columbia University was with the company [Business International Corporation]. He held a position as editor in its international financial information division.”

There’s nothing illegal or immoral about working for a corporation in New York’s financial district during the Reagan years, but it might color your perception of the period.

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So, I caught a few minutes of CNN at my Mother’s today and learned that Obama won 80% of the black vote in Nevada, possibly as many as 7,000 votes [based on the 7.9% of Nevada’s population that is black, and the voter turn out], and that that is a major problem for Clinton.

Bill Clinton is becoming rabid in his attacks on Obama, and Ted Kennedy and Raum Emmanuel have reportedly had to intervene, and George H.W. Bush wasn’t mean to John McCain, when McCain ran against the Shrubbery.

Obama, Clinton, and some white guy are in South Carolina for a debate, but the other white guys weren’t invited because this is a race between Obama and Clinton.

The Republican voters don’t seem to understand that this is a race between John McCain and Rudy Giuliani. They keep voting for other white guys who won’t go away and keep winning John and Rudy’s delegates.

The media better hope for no clear winners in either party before the conventions, because, given the ham-handed way the media conglomerates are dealing with the writers’ strike, the conventions may be the only original television available for a very long time and they don’t have to pay residuals.

In response to the “economic slowdown” plan of the Hedgemony Paul Krugman noted the Return of the tax families, the examples used to terrify people into supporting more and more tax cuts.

One of the examples was “A single mom with two children and $30,000 in earnings would see her taxes go up by 67 percent.”

I realize I’m not one of the VSP, but only the humble proprietor of an on-line opinion magazine. I do however possess the 2007 1040 Forms & Instructions courtesy of the wonderful people at the Internal Revenue Service [available in PDF format at Forms and Publications. A little sucking up can’t hurt, right?]

I decided to find out what “Mom” pays in taxes, and how a 67% increase will hurt. No need to get carried away, so we’ll use the standard deduction, nothing fancy, no tax dodges, just a standard vanilla 1040.

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Actually this is a bigger joke than I assumed below.

Disregard any and all numbers being reported, and any claims of victory or loss in Nevada. From dday at Hullabaloo, who talked to the head of the Democratic Party in Nevada, nothing was decided. This vote was to select 11K delegates to county conventions, where they will select delegates to the state convention, where the actual delegates to the national convention will be selected. Until the roll call at the national convention, no one will know who won Nevada. This was not what we thought it was, is irrelevant to the selection process, and tells us nothing about the eventual nominee – it’s a freaking poll!

See Non Sequitur for a further explanation.

Even if the Democrats don’t find a spine and impeach the criminal conspiracy now in charge, in one year a new gang gets the keys to the government.

Can the nation survive?

Florida License Plates

Beneficiary

A weekend feature of Why Now.

The Associated Press reports that the U.S. Sends Wounded Troops Back To Iraq –

(AP) Seventy-nine injured soldiers were pressed into war duty last month as the U.S. Army struggled to fill its ranks, but most were assigned to light-duty jobs within limits set by doctors, two Army leaders said.

The Denver Post, quoting internal Army e-mails and a Fort Carson soldier, reported that troops had been deployed to Kuwait en route to Iraq while they were still receiving medical treatment for various conditions.

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I hate caucuses for the simple reason that, while seeming to be a democratic way of selection candidates, they most definitely are not based on the “one person – one vote” schema.

Everyone paying attention knows that John Edwards came in second to Barack Obama in Iowa, but Hillary Clinton received more delegates than Edwards.

Hillary is about to experience what John Edwards must have felt, because, it is highly likely that Barack Obama will receive more delegates in Nevada than she will, despite receiving 5% more of the vote. That’s what the complaint about the locations on the Las Vegas strip was all about. The locations were approved to facilitate voting primarily by members of the Culinary Union, and then the Culinary Union endorsed Barack Obama. The locations are for “at large” delegates because the voters are not in their residential voting districts, so Hillary will win a majority of the regular delegates, but Obama wins the “at large” delegates. Nice legal way of rigging a win. Very Rovian.

Sometimes it gets so bad that even the wheeler-dealers in South Florida don’t want to touch it. CBS reports on The $10M “Gift” Nobody Wanted:

(CBS) This earmark mystery stretches all the way from the Alaskan tundra to the warm beaches of South Florida.

“Basically, we were given a gift that we didn’t want,” Estero Council of Community Leaders chairman Don Eslick told CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson. “And it was for the wrong thing.”

The “gift” was $10 million tax dollars earmarked from Congress for traffic needs. But not just any traffic need. The money had to be used to connect Coconut Road, a deadend street, with the major Interstate I-75.

The question was why?

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So, the Shrubbery announced his stimulus package and the Dow dropped another 60 points. Lots of confidence in his economic policies.

Oh, as I look back my guess is that the start of the “economic slowdown” will be October, 2007; it won’t be official for another two months; and the delay in requests means that nothing has a prayer of getting done on stimulus before the summer.

Given that the Christmas sales started in November, and no one seemed to be overstocked this year, I have a feeling that retailers had already figured out that things were going to suck in the late summer. As usual the people and the Hedgemony are the last ones to find out what’s going on with the economy.

The proprietor of the Pensacola Beach Blog has picture and the story of the dumbest thing any candidate has done to win votes on the Panhandle: FEMA Destroyer Visits Gulf Coast.

While many people are aware that FEMA hasn’t been very helpful with Katrina, few realize the Florida Panhandle is still stuck in limbo on Ivan from the year before, and Giuliani comes here with Joe Allbaugh, who among his other great moves recommend his college roommate, Michael Brown, to head FEMA when he left.

I’m surprised Rudy didn’t schedule a photo op of him kicking dogs at the local humane society – it wouldn’t have made him any less popular.

Complaining Already

Mom, he’s in my area!

[Editor: Another cold front coming in, so nothing to see but lumps under the blankets. Here’s a baby picture.]

Friday Ark

In Memoriam

NTodd had to say goodbye to Rin Tin.

It is nice to see that Federal Reserve Chairman “Gentle Ben” Bernanke realizes that an “economic slowdown” is in progress and wants to do something about it.

CNN Money reports: Bernanke: Juice the economy ‘quickly’

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress Thursday that legislators should enact a fiscal stimulus package in order to help beleaguered consumers as recession fears grow.

The comments by Bernanke, who testified before the House Budget Committee, came as a cascade of more bad news about the housing, financial and manufacturing sectors stoked calls for decisive action.

“To be useful, a fiscal stimulus package should be implemented quickly and structured so that its effects on aggregate spending are felt as much as possible within the next twelve months or so,” Bernanke said.
…

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Ashura is the most important holy day for Shi’ia Muslims as it is at the very root of their schism with the Sunni. It commemorates the martyrdom of the third Imam, Hussein, and the battle of Karbala in 680CE.

It has unfortunately also come to mean violent attacks against Shi’ia pilgrims in Iraq, this MSNBC report, Iraq blast kills 10 worshippers on Shiite holiday, is just the first I noticed, but there will be more. There always are.

While I accept the possibility that I’m just weird, I don’t really understand why people seem to cling so tightly to their defeats, and remember so little of their victories.