Sunday Open Thread

by Jerome a Paris Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 11:41:00 AM EST

Sunday Open Thread

Sunday Open Thread | 38 comments (38 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

Coming to a country near you

by cagatacos on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 11:55:48 AM EST

Excellent. And you are correct, America in the not too distant future. Not everyone can be a Mitt with a castle on the ocean.

ALL grovel before the GREATNESS of EMPEROR TRUMP! 😝

by THE Twank (yatta blah blah @ blah.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:39:53 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Barter clubs (none / 0)

I think we saw something recently about this already happening in Greece. Also, the transition town currency idea is being taken up there, maybe the argentines should consider it.

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:41:13 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Praise Yurp (4.00 / 3)

So I sold off my Jeep (sad panda) and got a Fiat 500. And, in addition to pretty much tripling our gas mileage, we're having a blast.

Also, while I will not relinquish Italian engineering jokes (and will not stop giggling at the parent company of Ferrari naming its subcompact engine the "FIRE" engine), Japanese and American automakers please take note: Laying out things under the hood is a clean, logical, easy-to-access way? Good thing. Jamming the engine so far back it's practically sitting on the radio (lookin' at you, Toyota)? Not good thing.

Now would you guys please send diesel ones over before my wife decides she wants one?

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

by Drew J Jones (pedobear@pennstatefootball.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 12:01:57 PM EST

Re: Praise Yurp (none / 0)

Italian engineers are very good, and this from a mechanical engineer.

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:03:43 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Praise Yurp (none / 1)

I know, but I still get to make the jokes.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

by Drew J Jones (pedobear@pennstatefootball.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:26:47 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Praise Yurp (none / 1)

Specs' red one is over two years old, and the only problem was when thugs broke the window to find there was only a 3-foot sunflower to steal, which they didn't. (They left the Johnny Cash tape.)

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin

by Crazy Horse on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:52:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Praise Yurp (none / 0)

Different engine and tranny though. But the engine's from the same plant as my wife's Jeep, and they tend to put together very solid, if somewhat unrefined-sounding, engines. And the tranny's from Japan, so it should be pretty good. (GM generally tends to do the best automatic trannies, from what I've seen, but Aisin is pretty good, too.) Having gone over it pretty thoroughly, I'm pretty impressed at how they didn't cheap out on underlying components.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

by Drew J Jones (pedobear@pennstatefootball.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:34:49 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 3)

by Nomad on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 12:55:17 PM EST

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

But the world is full of threats which require full global domination

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 01:54:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

I find it interesting that the only people who ever worry about nuclear attack are the Americans and the Israelis although the second is subject to debate.

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:05:05 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Not the first time you say that. I don't know if this is true, have you any info about it?

by Katrin on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:11:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Just my personal observations and opinions.

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:17:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

there's a good case to be made that not being afraid of nuclear war is denial or ignorant bliss.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:28:28 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

it depends on whether one is afraid of some potential nuclear war, or whether one is afraid of being the target of a potential nuclear attack. I don't think that not being worried of being a target is being in denial.

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:43:18 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 5)

Can't you pack more negations into one single sentence? ;-)
During the cold war being in denial about being a target was the only way to remain sane, in my experience.

by Katrin on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:53:22 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 2)

no, I tried but I can't.

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:58:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

;-)

by stevesim on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:17:14 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

i think global warming is the new lump under the rug. we can stay sane, but every denial has a price, and can you say that sanity is entirely normal these days?

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 06:56:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 3)

There was no mistaking the situation. And all the "crises" and "tensions" and even war games could trigger off nuclear war. We used to know that it would be a matter of minutes and could happen every minute and we chose denial.

You can't compare that to global warming. Most people find it difficult to understand. Then there is a campaign to say it's just one theory among many. We are talking about long term here. And "global warming" sounds much nicer than nuclear annihilation (I suggest we switch to "cooked planet" or something to get the message across). Hell, Hamburg needs some warming just now.

by Katrin on Mon Apr 16th, 2012 at 12:12:03 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Katrin:

There was no mistaking the situation. And all the "crises" and "tensions" and even war games could trigger off nuclear war. We used to know that it would be a matter of minutes and could happen every minute and we chose denial.
You can't compare that to global warming.

maybe i can't but somehow i do, :)!

if anything global warming is off-the-map terrifying, and i feel living through the cold war horror is a large reason for all the short-term thinking that has become so endemic at all levels of western societies, from alienated yobs to greed-drunk ceo's to pols who cant't see round the bend of the next election.

it's much harder to defer gratification in a world whose odds of longterm survival are between short and shortening.
perhaps 'sane' pretty much equals 'functional', with debatable values of the latter at that...

functional with the help of xanax, prozak, viagra and ambien maybe.

it doesn't even have to be conscious...

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Wed Apr 18th, 2012 at 06:26:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]

It's like smoking (4.00 / 2)

maybe i can't but somehow i do, :)!

Yeah, it's kinda hard to miss that you do.

Good point about the cold war being a factor in the proliferation of short term thinking. There is more to it, though: if a nuke is shot at your town, you know what you will die of and when and your society with you. If we don't stop global warming now, this can a) end in a catastrophe or b) it will be stopped later or c) it will not have the result we thought or d) we all will have died in a nuclear war before the planet is much warmer.

by Katrin on Thu Apr 19th, 2012 at 01:17:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Great way to bleed off wealth from the US middle class. Just a ruse.

ALL grovel before the GREATNESS of EMPEROR TRUMP! 😝

by THE Twank (yatta blah blah @ blah.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:42:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Yea, but america is running out of road on it. I read somewhere that the US pulls in $2.4 trillion in taxes, but spends $3.7 trillion. You can't keep doing that for long, however often you raise the deficit limit.

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:49:08 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 2)

I think the whole monetary/debt thing is a ruse. A way to "legally" impoverish everybody slowly so they don't wake up to how badly they're being screwed. For example, I think people my age are breathing a sigh of relief that we won't live long enough to see what's coming (in another 20 years) and the kids won't know the difference.

My conclusion: Homo sapien is a failed species. It's the top dog on an entire isolated planet and it doesn't take care of its biosphere. Probably just one data point in a huge screening design. I think the major independent variable will prove to be human mortality. The logic goes, "Why should I give a fuck about the planet 100 years from now if I know I'll be dead by then?"

Only immortals can be trusted with planets. Everything else is vegetation and cattle.

ALL grovel before the GREATNESS of EMPEROR TRUMP! 😝

by THE Twank (yatta blah blah @ blah.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:08:20 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 2)

I think a key driver of the crisis is that protecting the purchasing power of the savings of people your age is a more important policy objective than employing younger people. But, of course, that's self-defeating since, if the younger generation is not working it's not producing goods and services for the older generation to enjoy with their accumulated savings.

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:21:26 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

Well, surely that's solved by buying goods from China? And employing some few mileuristas to be spa workers and beauty technicians?

by Metatone (metatone [a|t] gmail (dot) com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:56:28 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (none / 0)

In Spain we have this wonderful thing called the "dependency law" which enshrines the right to receive state assistance for caring for dependents. In many cases this care will not be terribly qualified. Lots of elderly people would qualify, too. I think it would be an excellent source of employment.

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 05:50:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Daily dose of graph (4.00 / 4)

Who are you and what have you done with the real Twank, by the way?

guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:21:51 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Sunday Open Thread (none / 1)

BBC News - India anger at Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan detention

India has reacted angrily to the detention of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan by US authorities for 90 minutes at White Plains airport near New York.
This "policy of detention and apology by the US cannot continue", External Affairs Minister SM Krishna said.
The actor arrived on a private plane and was on the way to Yale University for a function when he was stopped.
US customs and border protection authorities later expressed "profound" apologies for the incident.
The spokesman for the US embassy in Delhi, Peter Vrooman, also apologised "if Mr Shah Rukh Khan experienced an inconvenience or delay".
It is not clear why Khan was detained at the airport, which serves New York City.
In 2009 the actor was detained for two hours at Newark airport and was released after India's embassy in the US intervened.
The actor said then that he was stopped because he had a Muslim name. US customs officials denied that Khan had been detained, saying he was questioned. 'Uncalled for'
"Apologies from America have become mechanical," Mr Krishna said on Friday.

i just saw this guy in a great movie last night (my name is khan).

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 02:51:17 PM EST

Re: Sunday Open Thread (none / 1)

The Hindu : News / National : `Shah Rukh's detention need not have happened'

India has taken up with the U.S. the issue of Shah Rukh Khan's detention at a New York airport, conveying its "deep concern" over the incident. "We have taken it up with the State Department," Indian ambassador to the U.S. Nirupama Rao told journalists here.
Ms. Rao, who was in the city for a Columbia University conference on India, said the detention of the Indian superstar is an "incident that need not have happened."

Shah Rukh Khan's plight at American airport: US grovels, India sulks - The Economic Times

Providing details of how the Indian diplomatic corps acted with alacrity to the plight of King Khan, an embassy statement said he had arrived at the White Plains airport in a private jet on the afternoon of April 12. Approximately half-an-hour after his arrival, the consulate general of India in New York received information that he had not been cleared by the US customs and border protection (USCBP) at the Airport .

"The consulate general immediately intervened with the concerned authorities for his early clearance, which was done within 75 minutes of his arrival. Khan thereafter left the airport," the statement said, adding that "the same evening, USCBP authorities, through an email to the consulate general conveyed their profound apology for the incident."

While most Indians would be delighted to leave an airport within 75 minutes after arrival , a recent issue of the Economist described the paucity of diplomats in India's foreign office to carry out the serious mission of advancing India's strategic goals, providing a counterpoint to what its officials were tasked with this week.

by Bernard on Mon Apr 16th, 2012 at 06:57:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Sunday Open Thread (none / 1)

his latest flick is about a moslem indian with asberger's whose life mission is to find the president of the usa and tell him 'i am not a terrorist!'

i hope this drives millions more to go see it. :0)

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Apr 16th, 2012 at 07:51:25 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Sunday Open Thread (4.00 / 2)

Roger Ailes tells journalism students: `I think you ought to change your major' | Poynter.

The Fox News Chairman and CEO spoke to about 350 people, including young journalists, Thursday as part of a special lecture series at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He started by telling them to change majors, which, Melody Butts reports, "elicited at least a few eye rolls." Here's what else he said:
"If you're going into journalism if you care, then you're going into the wrong profession ... I usually ask (journalists) if they want to change the world in the way it wants to be changed."
"Democracy depends on freedom of the press. But freedom depends on fairness in the press. There has to be more than one point of view."
"Remember, the last time all of us got lined up together, we were lined up by two guys - Hitler and Stalin. If there's an alternative point of view, don't wet your pants. ... Suck it up and say, `Hey, there's room for everything.' "
"We're the only news organization who has not had layoffs because of economic conditions. Why? Because we win."
His strength: "I pick good people ... although some people point out that most of them are blond ... when women get into television, they dye their hair blond."
On Jon Stewart: "I don't think he could make a living without Fox News. I think he likes Fox."
On Newt: "Newt is trying to get a job at CNN because he knows he can't come back to Fox News."
On the Fox News mole: "The mole shows a culture that believes in theft, a lack of loyalty, turning on his colleagues, lying to management, and there are some real, ethical, serious questions about it."

lol

i massaged a woman once who was fired for not dying her hair blond at fox news.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:24:27 PM EST

Re: Sunday Open Thread (4.00 / 2)

Daily Kos: Article in The Atlantic Magazine Restores My Hope in The Progressive Movement

I just read one of the most inspiring articles I've read in a very long time! It is inspiring not because of its great prose, or poetic beauty, but because it restores my "faith" in the possibility that maybe, just maybe, the progressive movement may have finally grown a spine to really take on the corporatist-led attack on what is left of our democracy.
The article, "Exposing ALEC: How Conservative-Backed State Laws Are All Connected," was written by Atlantic correspondent Nancy Scola.
It talks about how the website ALEC Exposed came to life, and the impact it has had as a powerful "weapon" against the corrupt back-room deals between pay-to-play politicians, and their corporatist pay-masters.
Having the bills all in one place painted a certain picture. "If it's voter ID, it's ALEC," observed Doug Clopp, deputy director of programs at Common Cause. "If it's anti-immigration bills written hand-in-glove with private prison corporations, it's ALEC. If it's working with the N.R.A. on 'Shoot to Kill' laws, it's ALEC. When you start peeling back state efforts to opt out of the regional greenhouse gas initiative, it's ALEC." Adopted first in the states, by the time these laws bubble up to the national level, they're the conventional wisdom on policy.
It talks about the role The Nation magazine had in helping bring about ALEC Exposed, "with a series of companion articles."
But most importantly, it talks about how organizations like ColorOfChange.org have used "I'm going to make you an offer you can't refuse" tactics to "convince" some of the biggest corporate players in the U.S. to stop supporting ALEC.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:31:42 PM EST

Re: Sunday Open Thread (none / 0)

I got my old laptop back, although it's been seriously reconditioned so that the trackpad and keyboard feel different.

But it runs Vista, which is sooooo slow compared to 7even it's ridiculous.

Still, I'm now a 2 laptop family.

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 03:43:51 PM EST

For CH (4.00 / 4)

For Crazy horse

Katzenjammer : By appointment to Nobel Prize Winning Economist

keep to the Fen Causeway

by Helen (lareinagal at yahoo dot co dot uk) on Sun Apr 15th, 2012 at 04:12:25 PM EST

The Katz Reply (none / 1)

EVEN NOBEL PRIZE LEAUREATES LIKE KATZENJAMMER.
Paul Krugman, bad-ass keynesian economics prof at Princeton, New York Times op-ed columnist, Nobel Prize leaureate and one of the most popular bloggers in the world, puts up a video of Demon Kitty Rag as his Friday Night Music relief moment away from the more or less wonkish (and these days pretty dreary) analyses of coming Greek defaults and the Medicare-busting Ryan budget.
"A commenter recommended this group", he writes, "and they're just what I needed to cheer me up after a cold, very rainy day in southern California." Glad to be of service, professor Krugman!

From Katzenjammer Site

As i understand it, the girls spend most of their time running the bus' supercomputer, developing the algorithms which prove that the much-invoked invisible hand is actually a muse which only appears to musicians, and which patently ignores economists.

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin

by Crazy Horse on Mon Apr 16th, 2012 at 03:54:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Texting and bears (4.00 / 2)