Saturday, May 11, 2013
Bonus
Indeed
The prime minister's adviser on enterprise has told the cabinet that the economic downturn is an excellent time for new businesses to boost profits and grow because labour is cheap, the Observer can reveal.
Lord Young, a cabinet minister under the late Baroness Thatcher, who is the only aide with his own office in Downing Street, told ministers that the low wage levels in a recession made larger financial returns easier to achieve. His comments are contained in a report to be published this week, on which the cabinet was briefed last Tuesday.
Burger Justice
Fast food workers deserve dignity.
If you work, you deserve respect. And also too, healthcare and retirement.
And burger flippers at least can't totally fuck up and ruin the national economy, like derivatives flippers.
Organizers say that over a hundred workers joined the St. Louis strike between Wednesday and Thursday. That included a group of Jimmy John’s workers who alleged that management humiliated them by requiring them to hold up signs in public with messages including “I made 3 wrong sandwiches today” and “I was more than 13 seconds in the drive thru.” “Sometimes I walk for more than an hour just to save my train fare so I can spend it on Ramen noodles,” St. Louis Chipotle worker Patrick Leeper said in an e-mailed statement Thursday. “I can’t even think about groceries.”I've never liked jokes about how humiliating it is to "flip burgers."
If you work, you deserve respect. And also too, healthcare and retirement.
And burger flippers at least can't totally fuck up and ruin the national economy, like derivatives flippers.
Friday, May 10, 2013
World Domination
I, for one, am quite happy with the plan for Handy Nasty to rule the world.
Make sure to eat there if you're in town and can handle the spicy stuff.
Make sure to eat there if you're in town and can handle the spicy stuff.
Good
The plan B thing is just absurd.
Whatever you want to happen, teens are going to have sex, sometimes earlier than you think is appropriate. They should have access to contraception.
NEW YORK — A government appeal of a ruling giving women of all ages broad access to morning-after birth control is frivolous, a federal judge said Friday as he refused to suspend enforcement of his decision pending appeal.
Whatever you want to happen, teens are going to have sex, sometimes earlier than you think is appropriate. They should have access to contraception.
The Cars, They Kill People
I actually don't think Philadelphia drivers are all that bad with respect to pedestrians, with not infrequent exceptions. But it's a more obviously a pedestrian zone than most places (in much of city, anyway). There are small streets, and lights or stop signs and pedestrian crossings at every intersection. The drivers that do get enraged when you dare to try to cross a street at an intersection probably aren't local.
Pedestrians can behave badly, too, but when they do they're unlikely to kill people. Police should do more to address drivers behaving badly.
Pedestrians can behave badly, too, but when they do they're unlikely to kill people. Police should do more to address drivers behaving badly.
They Edited The Talking Points!!!
BENGHAZI!!!!
I feel guilty joking about this stuff because, you know, people did die and that sucks.
I feel guilty joking about this stuff because, you know, people did die and that sucks.
Thursday, May 09, 2013
The Immigrants, They Are Everywhere
One weird thing about what I'll politely call anti-immigrant crackpottery is that their side lost. In the early 90s, in much of the country, newly arriving immigrants, especially ones perceived as being of a different race, were truly a new thing. % and total foreign born declined for decades, before trending back upwards in the 70s, and the new wave of immigrants were initially pretty geographically concentrated. Some states had them, but most didn't. So while I don't approve, the "we must stop this thing from happening" position made sense. For most locations, it hadn't happened yet.
But now, you know, they're everywhere.
But now, you know, they're everywhere.
Kids Today
I don't know why more old fogies don't get that the moment you decide to write your "get off my lawn" article is the moment you've proven your fogie status to the world.
Give The People What They Want
Hopefully my bearish outlook is wrong, and things really are going to get better at a faster than glacial pace, but nobody should be surprised that after 4 years of a horrible economy voters are a wee bit more concerned about jobs than other things.
Wednesday, May 08, 2013
Wednesday Evening
I'd love to be able to explain Benghazi to you all, but other than it has something to do with an Arkansas land deal gone bad I really have no idea.
Happy Hour
And, don't forget, our friend Echidne of the Snakes is having her annual fundraiser. If you can afford it, it would be wise to send her some turkee so we can still get posts like When Corpses are Buried or Unearthed. Always an interesting read.
Mysteries
Probably McDonald's should spend a few hundred million on management consultants who can tell them how to improve customer service.
Or, you know, the could pay their front line workers a buck more an hour.
Or, you know, the could pay their front line workers a buck more an hour.
Government Does Stuff
Hunter has a pretty good rant about the stupid people who run the government. We are in the era of truly stupid Republicans, the ones who grew up believing the stuff that was supposed to be just for the rubes to believe. In other words, we're ruled by the rubes now. They think the budget is just a competition between makers and takers, and their job is to give it all to the makers. They're unaware that government does some useful things which, even if you think government shouldn't actually be doing them, greatly impact lives. Take them away and it hurts.
Fear Of A Hippie Planet
Rodrik's discussion of the State Of The Econ conforms pretty closely to what my take is, or at least was when I was still in that world. They're afraid of conceding that the hippies sometimes have a point, even when their work shows that they do.
Tuesday, May 07, 2013
It's Actually Kind of Impressive
Niall Ferguson types the wankiest thing to ever appear on this or any other Internet.
The charge of homophobia is equally easy to refute. If I really were a “gay-basher”, as some headline writers so crassly suggested, why would I have asked Andrew Sullivan, of all people, to be the godfather of one of my sons, or to give one of the readings at my wedding?You couldn't possibly wank any harder without afterwards needing a ton of ice and a damn good surgeon.
Absolution
Even as of today media outlets were referring to Sanford as "disgraced," though I guess he's been purified by voters.
South Carolina
Not sure it matters much, but Sanford is creepy and happy to be on Team Colbert. Results!
I think she's obligated to do a Better Know a District segment.
I think she's obligated to do a Better Know a District segment.
All Is Well
Greg's a bit more optimistic about 2014 and Obamacare. At some level I actually agree with him. I don't think Republicans squawking about the evils of it are going to help them much, because they're too tone deaf about what people actually want and need (affordable available health care). It's just the reality of our health care system, and its new association, that worries me.
It's Gotta Be Good
Nobody could have predicted.
It'll all be Obamacare.
WASHINGTON — As the administration struggles to put in place the final, complex piece of President Obama’s signature health care law, an endeavor on a scale not seen since Medicare’s creation nearly a half-century ago, Democrats are worried that major snags will be exploited by Republicans in next year’s midterm elections.
...
“There are very few issues that are as personal and as tangible as health care, and the implementation of the law over the next year is going to reveal a lot of kinks, a lot of red tape, a lot of taxes, a lot of price increases and a lot of people forced into health care that they didn’t anticipate,” said Brad Dayspring, spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee. “It’s going to be an issue that’s front and center for voters even in a more tangible way than it was in 2010.”
It'll all be Obamacare.
Monday, May 06, 2013
Money
Whatever one thinks of the reasoning justifying Citizens United, I've always been a bit skeptical about its presumed impact on who actually gets elected. Not saying money doesn't matter, just that its impact is less than clear. McCain-Feingold was regularly referred to as the "Democratic Party Suicide Pact" and that didn't quite happen.
In terms of impact on the policies that actually get enacted in this country, I suspect the lobbyist/industry/government revolving doors are much more insidious than the campaign money spigot.
In terms of impact on the policies that actually get enacted in this country, I suspect the lobbyist/industry/government revolving doors are much more insidious than the campaign money spigot.
It Isn't Hard
I know I've said this a million times (literally, Biden-style), but the solutions to the economic misery in this country and elsewhere are very simple. And I don't just mean the wee shortage of aggregate demand. Make our lives easier. Let younger people at least buy into Medicare. Scrap the 401K system and put the money saved (as in tax expenditures which benefit wealthier people) into Social Security benefits. End means- and asset-testing of everything. Make most 'benefits' universal. Think wealthy people shouldn't get benefits because they don't need them? Fine, just tax them more. Provide universal free pre-K.
It doesn't have to be so complicated all the time.
It doesn't have to be so complicated all the time.
What's It All About Then
Normally I have some understanding of the basic gist of the latest right wing nonsense scandal, even the ones that don't make any sense, but many months later I still just have no idea what the whole Benghazi thing is about.
LEAVE ROGAINE AND BRAVEHEART ALOOOOOOONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It's cute when colleagues cover for each other.
First they came for your house....
When Your Boss Steals Your Wages: The Invisible Epidemic That’s Sweeping AmericaImagine you’ve just landed a job with a big-time retailer. Your task is to load and unload boxes from trucks and containers. It’s back-breaking work. You toil 12 to 16 hours a day, often without a lunch break. Sweat drenches your clothes in the 90-degree heat, but you keep going: your kids need their dinner. One day, your supervisor tells you that instead of being paid an hourly wage, you will now get paid for the number of containers you load or unload. This will be great for you, your supervisor says: More money! But you open your next paycheck to find it shrunken to the point that you are no longer even making minimum wage. You complain to your supervisor, who promptly sends you home without pay for the day. If you pipe up again, you’ll be looking for another job.
Everardo Carrillo says that's just what happened to him and other low-wage employees who worked at a Southern California warehouse run by a Walmart contractor. Carrillo and his fellow workers have launched a multi-class-action lawsuit for massive wage theft (Everardo Carrillo et al. v. Schneider Logistics) in a case that’s finally bringing national attention to an invisible epidemic. ...
Americans like to think that a fair day’s work brings a fair day’s pay. Cheating workers of their wages may seem like a problem of 19th-century sweatshops. But it’s back and taking a terrible toll. We’re talking billions of dollars in wages; millions of workers affected each year. A gigantic heist is being perpetrated against working people: they’re getting screwed on overtime, denied their tips, shortchanged on benefits, defrauded on payroll, and handed paychecks that bounce like rubber balls. A conservative estimate of unpaid overtime alone shows that it costs workers at least $19 billion per year.
CoT; Radicals
Translation. And exegesis
The theme of the day at the Sunday talk shows was how a seemingly normal American can become radicalized into following an extremist agenda. I am speaking of course, about David Gregory, who has given up all pretense and appears to be openly auditioning for a job with Fox News.
Sunday, May 05, 2013
Rebels
I don't claim to know a damn thing about Syria, but I do know that in armed conflicts/uprisings/civil wars it's unlikely that one "side" are clearly the good guys.
(Reuters) - U.N. human rights investigators have gathered testimony from casualties of Syria's civil war and medical staff indicating that rebel forces have used the nerve agent sarin, one of the lead investigators said on Sunday.
Sunday Afternoon
Busy weekend hosting lots of guests for a book release party for this book which you should all buy and read.
Sunday Morning
As usual, Avedon has some great links. I missed this goodie:
Just the other day, Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers said, 'If the cost of solar panels keeps coming down, installation costs come down and if they combine solar with battery technology and a power management system, then we have someone just using [the grid] for backup.' What happens if a whole bunch of customers start generating their own power and using the grid merely as backup? The EEI report warns of 'irreparable damages to revenues and growth prospects' of utilities.
XVI
David Waldman's weekly #GunFAIL compilation. From David's summary:
Update: David tweets these reports as he finds them. @KagroX.
This week's compilation includes three God-given-but-somehow-forgotten guns, four accidents while cleaning loaded guns (which nobody ever does, though I've now found 102 who've done it so far this year), two home invasion shootings, one NRA-certified instructor shooting himself, six law enforcement officer FAILs, two more turkey hunters shot, and 10 kids accidentally shot, nine of whom either shot themselves or were identifiably shot by other kids under the age of 16. The victims are (or were) ages 2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 14 and 14. All were accidentally shot within a seven-day span, from April 27th through May 3rd.David and Cliff Schecter (who also works on the guns issue) joined us at Virtually Speaking last Sunday. David noted that the NYT's Joe Nocera has been doing a similar compilation.
Update: David tweets these reports as he finds them. @KagroX.
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