Trickle down

 

The mask slips

So Republicans are now the party of “your kids must die for our guns” and “your parents must die for our money.”

Debt buyers and their illegal and ugly practices exposed by John Oliver

Would Mark Twain recognize the US today? I think he would....

Said almost one hundred and fifty years ago but still applicable: Some men worship rank, some worship heroes, some worship power, some worship God, and over these ideals they dispute and cannot unite -- but they all worship money.    Mark Twain

Larry Wilmore Had the Best 2 Minutes on the Confederate Flag You'll See  And some people can't understand what the word slavery actually means.

Is fracking killing babies in Vernal, Utah?

Amazon tribe creates 500-page traditional medicine encyclopedia

Anti-intellectualism is killing the US.

Alaska is going up in smoke.

Why rape victims often don't fight or scream.

Delayed drowning involving children.  This can happen after the child seems ok after choking in the pool and pulled to safety.

*Gasp* A woman scientist who agrees with Tim Hunt....

A little late but a nicely drawn comic explaining the TPP and  how trade works.

Fukushima'd Monday

The horror of Fukushima keeps on giving.

Immigrant children who were sent back are being killed.

How lizards regenerate their tails: researchers discover genetic 'recipe':

By understanding the secret of how lizards regenerate their tails, researchers may be able to develop ways to stimulate the regeneration of limbs in humans. Now, a team of researchers from Arizona State University is one step closer to solving that mystery. The scientists have discovered the genetic “recipe” for lizard tail regeneration, which may come down to using genetic ingredients in just the right mixture and amounts 

Lizards?... might want to be careful...

George Bush.

Bank of America gets to pay back 17bn over questionable mortgages.  Do they get to go back and help those people they drove out of their houses and into poverty, too?

Bigger spiders a good thing?  I don't think so....

A cop discusses Ferguson and the behavior of the police.

Oh please, let this be true! The Twilight of Antonin Scalia

One half-hour to change a governor's mind about climate change.  And they don't think it worked.

How much you can save when you stop buying shit.

How amazingly transparent the CIA is....

How do you pronounce pecan?

California drought, before and after comparisons.

Wednesday wobbles

Paris time capsule.

Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bill Moyers.

Excellent article on the addiction of money and what it does to our society.

Never forget that George Bush's administration was both dangerous and incompetent.

War over women's rights and the whinyness of those denied.  And many have noticed the similarities between the Taliban and the far right's attitudes about women and life in general.

What caused the 10 year winter back in 536AD?

Talking back to the makers of The Wolf of Wall Street.

Do not touch the Gympie Gympie tree.

We're gonna need Geiger counters to go shopping or to the beach.  And if you want to not eat anything ever again, here's Dr. Helen Caldicott.  At least we have UC scientists watching our kelp.

And with all that... sitting too much is gonna kill you.

Where there is money or power...

There will be people figuring out ways to take it...

Going after public education.  Because that's where there's money to be had.

Vouchers sound like such a nice plan.  Because that's where there's money to be had.

The 99.9% can easily be squeezed for more.  Because that's how the .1% make their money.

Reoccupying your foreclosed house.  Because that's where the banks played fast and loose with your home.

Beating the tar out of the camping Occupy protesters instead of the teabaggers or overnight shoppers.  Because they are the biggest threat to the people who hold power.

Banks are nervous.

Good.

Welcome to the Plutocracy

Bill Moyers.

Internetal tubing

Today is 10/10/10. What did Nostradamus and the Aztecs say about this?

Fathers.

Time capsule: For 70 years the Parisian apartment had been left uninhabited, under lock and key, the rent faithfully paid but no hint of what was inside.

My son was just given one of these. We're rich!!1! ... or he's rich and we're related so he better share!1!!1

And speaking of the rich:

Donald Duck and Glenn Beck:

Mickey's response to Donald Duck's smear of Glenn Beck:

We can't live without land.

Blog sprinkles

Thank you for your service to our nation.

CAMP VICTORY, Iraq — With heads bowed beneath a palace dome still etched with the initials of Saddam Hussein, dozens of U.S. service members paid tribute Monday to Americans killed in action not only in Iraq, but also in Afghanistan and in wars of the past.

Officers presented a Memorial Day wreath, a bugler played "Taps" and a lieutenant general spoke about how "little compares to the loss of a brother in arms." Soldiers in uniform and contractors in work boots said the nearly 4,400 Americans who've died in Iraq since 2003 weren't faceless statistics: They were commanders, friends, family.

For some of the troops who gathered at Camp Victory in Baghdad, it was difficult to discuss individual losses, even now that combat deaths have tapered off and the war here is eclipsed by the bloodshed in Afghanistan, where the number of troops killed in action just passed the 1,000 mark.

"It's too personal," said Air Force Staff Sgt. Bien Covita, 34, of San Jose, Calif., looking away as he declined to discuss the fallen service member on his mind. He added that he wished that Americans would view Memorial Day as "more than just a day off work. We sacrifice every day for them to sleep comfortably."

Seeing the war dead arrive at Dover:

It was pretty stark in the dim light with an almost full moon; at first there was no one there. Then the bus carrying the families showed up but it was choreographed so they got out on the side away from us so we could not see them. One white van, what they call the "transfer vehicle," was parked on the tarmac and one soldier, a young woman, stood next to it. She is the "Transfer Vehicle Guide," whose ceremonial role it is to close the van's back doors after the bodies are loaded on board.

The procedure began with high-ranking officers and the pall-bearer details appearing, marching in formation. Since there were two dead that night, Cpl. Kenneth Nichols, Jr., of Chrisman, Illinois, US Army, and Lance Cpl. Jonathan Taylor, of Jacksonville, Florida, US Marine Corps, both killed in Afghanistan, there were two separate teams, one from the Army, the other of Marines, dressed in their different uniforms.

The Army went first, boarded the stairs onto the airplane, and emerged out the front. The loading ramp then lowered onto ground level with the coffin and the seven pall-bearers carried the body past the saluting officers, into the waiting van. The Marines then repeated the same. Not a sound could be heard from the hidden family members just a few feet from us on the other side of their bus. Another time, I could hear a woman, probably the wife or the mother, crying a terrible wail that was the only sound on the airfield.

Asking too much of our military and their families:

Brooke Knox, a former Navy wife, counsels military relatives who are struggling with the repeated deployments of husbands and fathers, wives and mothers.
There's often one unifying refrain -- one deployment too many to handle well. She has found that often, that number is three.
"There's a saying among Army wives," said Knox, who leads a free counseling program for military families through the Mental Health Association of Tarrant County.
"The first deployment, they say, 'I think I can do this.'
"The second deployment, they say, 'I know I can do this.'
"The third deployment, they say, 'I can't do this.'"

And the week that was:



28 Of The Worst Money-Saving Ideas Ever The comments are entertaining...

Tylenol being recalled:

The company recalled 40 widely used children's pain and allergy medications, saying some may have a higher concentration of their active ingredients, while others may be contaminated. J&J has had four recalls in the past year of over-the-counter medicines.

In an FDA report issued on Tuesday, inspectors said they found thick dust, grime and contaminated ingredients at the J&J plant that produces Children's Tylenol and dozens of other products recalled last week.

DeLauro, in her letter, said the company's "disregard" for manufacturing standards was "both unnerving and unethical."

"The corporate oversight observed at this facility appears to be symptomatic of reckless behavior that is clearly unacceptable," she wrote.

What the hell was Israel thinking?:

After least nine people have been killed after Israeli commandos stormed a convoy of ships carrying aid to the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army says.

Armed forces boarded the largest vessel overnight, clashing with some of the 500 people on board.

It happened about 40 miles (64 km) out to sea, in international waters.

Israel says its soldiers were shot at and attacked with weapons; the activists say Israeli troops came on board shooting.

The activists were attempting to defy a blockade imposed by Israel after the Islamist movement Hamas took power in Gaza in 2007.

THIS is what I've been saying. All that oil just doesn't disappear.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Streaming video of oil pouring from the seafloor and images of dead, crude-soaked birds serve as visual bookends to the natural calamity unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico.

But independent scientists and government officials say another disaster is playing out in slow motion — and out of public view — in the mysterious depths between the gusher and the coast, a world inhabited by sperm whales, gigantic jellyfish and diminutive plankton.

All about fucking booms... and how BP isn't doing anything right:

It's fucking obvious. Boom is not meant to contain or catch oil. Boom is meant to divert oil. Boom must always be at an angle to the prevailing wind-wave action or surface current. Boom, at this angle, must always be layered in a fucking overlapped sort-of way with another string of boom. Boom must always divert oil to a catch basin or other container, from where it can be REMOVED FROM THE FUCKING AREA. Looks kinda involved, doesn't it? It is. But if fucking proper fucking booming is done properly, you can remove most, by far most of the oil from a shoreline and you can do it day after day, week after week, month after month. You can prevent most, by far most of the shoreline from ever being touched by more than a few transient molecules of oil. Done fucking properly, a week after the oil stops coming ashore, no one, man nor beast, can ever tell there has been oil anywhere near that shoreline.

And the inevitable:

While work continues to try to staunch the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, an avalanche of class action lawsuits is descending upon BP in courthouses from Texas to Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida.

Pakistan, between a rock and a hard place....

This week's visit by the US president's national-security adviser and the head of the Central Intelligence Agency to Pakistan was portrayed as a feel-good trip that highlighted the high level of cooperation between Washington and Islamabad.

But despite what may have been written about CIA chief Leon Panetta's and General James Jones's meetings with civilian and military leadership during their visit, analysts in Pakistan say all is not well between the two sides.

They note that as senior US officials visit Islamabad to make new demands -- mostly about increasing military or law enforcement efforts against myriad extremist groups in Pakistan's western border regions -- Pakistani officials continue to respond by urging patience, asking for more money and weapons, and calling for a true understanding of their military, political, and economic limitations.

Former Pakistani diplomat Tayyab Siddiqui says the US-Pakistani relationship is currently on a "bumpy road" and the visit by the two senior US officials a week ahead of a planned second round of strategic dialogue was significant.

Uhhhh.... right.

The Vatican is planning a new initiative to reach out to atheists and agnostics in an attempt to improve the church's relationship with non-believers. Pope Benedict XVI has ordered officials to create a new foundation where atheists will be encouraged to meet and debate with some of the Catholic Church's top theologians.

The Vatican hopes to stage a series of debates in Paris next year. But militant non-believers hoping for a chance to set senior church figures straight about the existence of God are set to be disappointed: the church has warned that atheists with high public profiles such as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens will not be invited.

No Dawkins and Hitchens? Then you aren't serious. And then there's this:

Tombstone, shackles found in priest's home
Poole, accused of shoplifting, nailed posters all over rectory

So how about you fix your own house before you go knocking on other people's doors, Pope?

Headlines

Twittering into history: 5 Famous Last Status Updates

The Ten Most Influential Internet Moments of the Decade

Slate's: The Going Rogue Index, TPM's Sarah, Plain And Lying

Strange Crocs of the Sahara has some fantastic dinosaur era animation. Also: Dung helps reveal why mammoths died out

Pirates!: Increased Violence on the High Seas

And this: College Students Arrested For Refusing To Pay Tip

Let the sunshine in

Hint, it ain't a grassroots movement, you guys. Who's funding the Conservative Movement?

Blog sprinkles

To help you figure out why billowing smoke is coming out of the computer tower vents...


click to embiggen..

And speaking of fires, California could use this information from Bryan of Why Now? The real hazards of wood ash after a burn.


Look forward, not back! There's nothing to see or learn from, really! No investigations are needed!

Steve Benen muses that Obama must really hate Bush:

I've been trying, however, to think about this from Obama's perspective. Bush left him with a generational economic crisis, an abysmal job market, a budget mess, a war in Iraq, a deteriorating war in Afghanistan, an nuclear-armed and unstable Pakistan, a nuclear-armed and nutty North Korea, a warming planet, a collapsing U.S. auto industry, an ineffective health care system, a massive debt, an absurd national energy framework, and a nation that has lost much of its global prestige.

Ready to dive in and start getting the nation back on track, the president is told, "Wait, before you tackle this to-do list, we have to deal with the consequences of the previous administration's alleged war crimes, too."

It's no wonder No Drama Obama prefers to turn the proverbial page.

I still wonder what happened to Riverbend of Baghdad Burning.

Matt Taibbi:

Let's start with the obvious: America has not only the worst but the dumbest health care system in the developed world. It's become a black leprosy eating away at the American experiment — a bureaucracy so insipid and mean and illogical that even our darkest criminal minds wouldn't be equal to dreaming it up on purpose.

The system doesn't work for anyone. It cheats patients and leaves them to die, denies insurance to 47 million Americans, forces hospitals to spend billions haggling over claims, and systematically bleeds and harasses doctors with the specter of catastrophic litigation. Even as a mechanism for delivering bonuses to insurance-company fat cats, it's a miserable failure: Greedy insurance bosses who spent a generation denying preventive care to patients now see their profits sapped by millions of customers who enter the system only when they're sick with incurably expensive illnesses.

The cost of all of this to society, in illness and death and lost productivity and a soaring federal deficit and plain old anxiety and anger, is incalculable — and that's the good news. The bad news is our failed health care system won't get fixed, because it exists entirely within the confines of yet another failed system: the political entity known as the United States of America.

Cell phones are rotting our brains!

One man's trash.... makes a neat house!

Too many pennies!

Mentioned in comments somewhere:

The Chemists Drinking Song
Words by : John A. Carroll (inspired by Isaac Asimov) Tune of : The Irish Washerwoman

Paradimethylaminobenzaldehyde,
Sodium citrate, ammonium cyanide,
Mix 'em together and add some benzene,
And top off the punch with trichloroethylene.

Got gassed up last night with some furfuryl alcohol, Followed it up with a gallon of propanol, Tanked up on hydrazine 'til after noon, Then spit on the floor and blew up the saloon.

Paradimethylaminobenzaldehyde,
Powdered aluminum, nitrogen iodide, Chlorates, permanganates, nitrates galore, Just swallow one drink and you'll never need more.

Whiskey, tequila, and rum are too tame. No, the stuff that I drink must explode into flame, When I breathe and dissolve all the paint in the room, And rattle the walls in a ground-shaking boom.

Paradimethylaminobenzaldehyde,
Go soak your head in a good strong insecticide, Slosh it around and impregnate your brain, With dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane.

Just let the mothers at the Mom And Me group have at him.

And ... ew? ....

Orlando, FL (AHN) - The unknown animal found inside a can of Diet Pepsi drank by a man from Ormond Beach, Florida last July was a frog or toad, the Food and Drug Administration has confirmed after testing the product.

Explains our economic collapse

And so many other things....

LA GRANDE, Ore. -- A mouse found inside an automatic teller machine -- along with a nest it had built with chewed-up $20 bills -- gave an Oregon gas station employee the surprise of her life.

The mouse, discovered Thursday, had thoroughly torn up two bills and damaged another 14 to line his nest. Employee Millie Taylor says she screamed and slammed the machine's door shut.

The bank replaced all the money that wasn't extensively damaged, and the ATM has continued to work just fine. The mouse also got a reprieve: He was evicted from his nest but set free outside the station.

Where did the 9 BILLION go that is unaccounted for in Iraq? Mice. Where did the bailout money actually go when handed to the banks? Mice. Where did the money grabbed by Enron and Madoff go? Mice.

Those damned mice got everything!....

Or do I mean rats?

Reserve Fund shut out, cutting rates, and liquidity traps

Start burying your gold in the backyard....

The national “bank holiday” that ushered in the New Deal in 1933 locked up the public’s cash for four days. The crisis that hit last month at the Reserve Fund, the nation’s oldest money market fund, has frozen hundreds of thousands of customer accounts for more than six weeks — with no sure end in sight.

At least 400,000 people, and perhaps as many as a million, can’t get access to their savings, a problem that has quietly persisted in spite of widely publicized federal efforts to restore confidence in money-fund investments.

Some of these customers — who, like most Americans, assumed their money funds were as safe and accessible as bank accounts — are getting desperate.

And on the subject of money.... The feds just cut rates again:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The Federal Reserve cut a key short-term interest rate by a half-percentage point Wednesday and expressed continued worries about the damage being done to the economy by the ongoing crisis in the financial and credit markets.

The rate cut put the central bank's federal funds rate at 1%. That matched the lowest level for this overnight bank lending rate ever -- the last time it was at 1% was from June 2003 to June 2004.

Investors had been expecting a half-point cut and some were betting that the Fed would even cut rates by three-quarters of a point to 0.75%.

The Dow Jones industrial average, which had been higher ahead of the Fed's decision, turned lower shortly after the announcement.

Is anyone in charge thinking about a liquidity trap?:

Here’s why these events are distressing: When the Fed douses the monetary system with cash but banks hoard it, monetary policy no longer works and the economy starts to crash. This is called a “liquidity trap” and it occurs when interest rates are at or close to 0 percent and monetary policy is no longer effective. Newly minted money is injected into the banking system but trapped by financial institutions that are paralyzed by fear. When banks don’t recycle their money through normal lending activity, it doesn’t matter how much the Fed increases the money supply. Monetary policy just won’t work. Failing monetary policy usually means that we are going to have a recession, or worse.

This is what happened at the beginning of the Great Depression and during the Japanese banking crisis of the late 1990s. In both cases, economic activity slowed dramatically and deflation occurred. No matter how hard the central bankers tried to pump money into the economy, it wouldn’t work.

Use plastic mayonnaise lids on the jars, the metal ones rust.

Or better yet, let's all go to Zimbabwe!

Fannie and Freddie found not guilty

WASHINGTON — As the economy worsens and Election Day approaches, a conservative campaign that blames the global financial crisis on a government push to make housing more affordable to lower-class Americans has taken off on talk radio and e-mail.

Commentators say that's what triggered the stock market meltdown and the freeze on credit. They've specifically targeted the mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which the federal government seized on Sept. 6, contending that lending to poor and minority Americans caused Fannie's and Freddie's financial problems.

Federal housing data reveal that the charges aren't true, and that the private sector, not the government or government-backed companies, was behind the soaring subprime lending at the core of the crisis.

Try pointing the finger somewhere else, like at yourselves, guys. Blaming the victim is not going to work.

Check your spam

You might have missed this one:

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

Motto for the post Bush era:

Use it up, wear it out,make it do, or do without.

$700,000,000,000?

Thanks, but no thanks.

Or as Thers at Eschaton puts it:

No. Blank. Checks. For. Crooks.