Postcards from the Bleeding Edge
Friday, September 26, 2008
Some choice quotes from this week:
I'll start with Palin...
Glenn Greenwald has also had choice things to say about Palin, too many to list.
Palin is nowhere near as good as Peter Sellers at political speech. Palin comes across as genuinely confused, where Sellars comes across as confusing genuinely.
Given Palin's incoherence on the issues, a comparison to Princess Caraboo seems in order.
I try not to be depressed. There was such great comic material in everything that happened this week - Letterman bashing McCain, for example, Palin's swimsuit video, for another. This latter video keeps getting pulled for violating copyright law, and the public keeps reposting them - I have little doubt that the recently passed PRO-IP law will be used to suppress further expressions of mass outrage...
Then there was the bailout...
Not to be outdone by the Chinese, the McCain campaign placed an ad claiming that McCain won today's debate - the ad was showing long before debate and even before anybody knew if he'd even attend.
And I don't think the SEC's methods have improved much over the last 5 years.
Lastly, a bit on the life and times of Edward Bernays, who established some of the core ideas behind amoral PR. He found his ideas used by just about everyone, from capitalist to Marxist, and loved that. I had read Manufacturing Consent decades ago, I'd like to find a copy of Engineering Consent to round out my education.
I'll start with Palin...
- Fight back, you hacks! Demand access. Demand accountability! It's our duty. If we cannot ask questions of a total newbie six weeks before an election in which she could become president of the country, then the First Amendment is pointless. Grow some! -
Andrew Sullivan
Glenn Greenwald has also had choice things to say about Palin, too many to list.
Palin is nowhere near as good as Peter Sellers at political speech. Palin comes across as genuinely confused, where Sellars comes across as confusing genuinely.
Given Palin's incoherence on the issues, a comparison to Princess Caraboo seems in order.
And then there was the election...
I try not to be depressed. There was such great comic material in everything that happened this week - Letterman bashing McCain, for example, Palin's swimsuit video, for another. This latter video keeps getting pulled for violating copyright law, and the public keeps reposting them - I have little doubt that the recently passed PRO-IP law will be used to suppress further expressions of mass outrage...
Then there was the bailout...
- "I'll go with the guy with one house. The guy with one house is scared about losing his house." - Chris Rock
"Phone calls to my office about the wall street bailout are running 50-50--50% 'No' and 50% 'Hell No.'" - Congressman Ron Kind
"`I nationalize strategic companies and get criticized, but when Bush does it, it's OK. Bush is turning socialist. How are you, comrade Bush?'" - Hugo Chavez
Playboy: Too Big to fail? - Lew Rockwell
... It may be that the former CEO's of some of these institutions ought to be given golden parachutes and made to use them from 20,000 feet... - Jerry Pournelle
Not to be outdone by the Chinese, the McCain campaign placed an ad claiming that McCain won today's debate - the ad was showing long before debate and even before anybody knew if he'd even attend.
And I don't think the SEC's methods have improved much over the last 5 years.
Lastly, a bit on the life and times of Edward Bernays, who established some of the core ideas behind amoral PR. He found his ideas used by just about everyone, from capitalist to Marxist, and loved that. I had read Manufacturing Consent decades ago, I'd like to find a copy of Engineering Consent to round out my education.
Labels: absurdity, banking, msm, politics, space
¶ 9:52 PM 0 comments
Weapons of Mass distraction used to shield PRO-IP bill passage
Am I the only one that noticed that amid all the hoo-rah and weapons of mass distraction unleashed during the financial crisis that the Senate passed the PRO-IP bill?It essentially creates a copyright czar reporting directly to the president. The RIAA loves this bill.
My guess is that the extension of copyright's lifetime to the life of the author + 70 years probably will cost the public far, far, far more than a mere 700 billion. That crime was committed years ago.
While the DOJ pushed back, the new PRO-IP bill creates a federal copyright cop which will ultimately put more teeth in the current, wildly violated set of statutes.
Public Knowledge has more. ¶ 9:40 PM 0 comments
Monday, September 22, 2008
The always articulate Glenn Greenwald weighs in on wall street:- What is more intrinsically corrupt than allowing people to engage in high-reward/no-risk capitalism -- where they reap tens of millions of dollars and more every year while their reckless gambles are paying off only to then have the Government shift their losses to the citizenry at large once their schemes collapse? We've retroactively created a win-only system where the wealthiest corporations and their shareholders are free to gamble for as long as they win and then force others who have no upside to pay for their losses. Watching Wall St. erupt with an orgy of celebration on Friday after it became clear the Government (i.e., you) would pay for their disaster was literally nauseating, as the very people who wreaked this havoc are now being rewarded.
- Buying assets at anything other than fair market value is against every principle we should be enforcing. Transparency. Accuracy. Full disclosure. This is a non-starter. Who cares where the assets are carried on a firm's books? If Morgan Stanley (MS) has them at $.30, Merrill (MER) at $.32 and Goldman (GS) at $.50, this is not the point and should play no part in the analysis. There should be a reverse auction to determine price, with the Treasury buying the cheapest and moving up the line.
Some More Pithy Bits... and some lovely satire courtesy of Wil Wheaton.
And, lastly, a little Thomas Jefferson:
- "I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs. "
