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Good Morning!
Photo credit: bperry1349 @ Photobucket
“The man of power is ruined by power, the man of money by money, the submissive man by subservience, the pleasure seeker by pleasure.”
~ Hermann Hesse, Steppenwolf
News
Grover Norquist's "Axi$ of Anti-Taxe$" is found drowned in a North Dakota bath tub and, ever one to miss the mark, he has instructed his GOP minions to round up suspect voters across the nation:
North Dakota Voters Reject Effort to Abolish Property Tax
NY Times
Voters in North Dakota on Tuesday rejected a constitutional amendment to abolish the property tax, turning aside arguments by advocates of the measure who say the tax has proved inconsistent and is in conflict with the basic concept of property ownership.
The result, which showed North Dakotans overwhelmingly opposing a property tax ban in unofficial returns, ended those advocates’ immediate hopes of making North Dakota the first in the nation to take such a step.
Is it so hard for the right wing (and the media) to wrap their minds around the idea of "Climate Change" if "Global Warming" doesn't exist?
Global warming means more wildfire for California, study shows
LA Times
Rising temperatures and changing precipitation patterns associated with climate change are likely to increase wildfire levels in California and the West in coming decades, according to a new study.
Watcha gotta do to get the serious people's attention in this nation?
“The administration should be worried about the level of despair here.” Like many attendees, he brought up the failed recall election in Wisconsin. The Republicans, he pointed out, sent all sorts of surrogates to the state to campaign for Gov. Scott Walker. “Obama stayed away,” he says. “Why? Because he would be embarrassed if he lost. I’ll tell you what. If he shows that he’s going to fight for the things that I care about, I will fight twice as hard for him.” And if he doesn’t? “Then I’ll vote for him,” says Moulitsas.
~ Markos Moulitsas being interviewed by thedailybeast.com at NN12
I guess the Obama administration is not taking notes on
bold ideas?
Barack Obama skips Rio+20 Earth summit
The Guardian
Hillary Clinton to go instead, disappointing campaigners who hoped president would add impetus to sluggish talks.
Huzzah! And not just because it is one less campaign to distract from the issues:
Democrats keep Arizona congressional seat
USA Today
Democrat Ron Barber has won a special House election in southern Arizona to finish the term of Gabrielle Giffords.
Giffords resigned a year after she was shot in the head while meeting with constituents at a Tucson shopping center.
Barber defeated Republican Jesse Kelly, a former Marine who narrowly lost a House race to Giffords in 2010.
“It is the most graphic account of challenging sexual behaviour you are ever going to read."
Yet and in the end? It is teh gay that killed the ol' penguin's story???
The Perverted Penguins That Scandalized the Scott Expedition
Time Magazine
Necrophilia, rape, masturbation — it’s just another day for an Adélie penguin, in the eyes of a gentleman scientist.
That’s what George Murray Levick, a doctor who journeyed alongside Captain Robert Scott to the Antarctic, recorded when his expedition spent almost a year in 1911-1912 at Cape Adare, on the Ross Sea. Levick recorded these observations — which he deemed evidence of “astonishing depravity” on the part of the penguins — and attempted to share them when he returned home to Britain, but the Natural History Museum of London ultimately deemed the report too salacious for publication.
...snip...
Still, these shocking sexual activities may not have ultimately led to the museum’s decision not to publish Levick’s observations. Rather, the fact that the penguins occasionally engaged in homosexual acts could have been the tipping point for suppression.
Yves there:
More on the Supposedly Out of Control JP Morgan Chief Investment Office and the “Fortress Balance Sheet”
Naked Capitalism
Whocouddanode? As more and more tidbits leak out about the activities of the JP Morgan Chief Investment Office, it increasingly appears to be a unit that was inadequately supervised. While that revelation is a dent to the reputation of self-styled ubermensch and alleged control freak Jamie Dimon, if he takes a few lumps in the press and otherwise can carry on as before, what difference will it make to him and the industry? Lloyd Blankfein took at least as much heat over a longer period, and he’s still firmly in place.
The CEO “I’m in charge and I know nothing” defense is alive and well because it has proven to be so successful.
The electrifying reality of life in the fast lane:
HOV-Lane Access Drives Electric Car Sales In California
International Business Times
Sales of the Chevrolet Volt Hybrid-Electric Vehicle (HEV) have experienced a surge in California following tweaks that now allow the car from General Motors Company (NYSE: GM) to qualify for High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lane access, even if only one person is the car.
Moreover, HOV lane access has become a primary driver for sales of HEV and EV cars in California as consumers turn to the eco-friendly cars not to save the planet but to shave some minutes of their commutes. California accounts for as much as 50 percent of EV sales each month, according to Alec Gutierrez, senior market analyst for automotive insights at Kelley Blue Book.
In California, EVs and HEVs that meet certain emissions standards can get a sticker allowing them into in HOV lanes even when there are no passengers besides the driver
Blog Posts of Interest
Meteor Blades shines a light on reality in the middle of the night:
"Is drone policy worsening our security?"
David Mizner writes about the Monster on the loose:
In Which I Explain Everything
It's the postwar period. Post World War II, that is. 40s, 50s & 60s. In the ruling's class perpetual attack on everyone else, everyone else has, against long odds, gained some ground. Thanks to the New Deal reforms, there's relative economic equality in the land. No, not a social democracy but social democratic tendencies for sure. About a third of workforce is unionized. Unemployment is low, 4 to 5 percent. The rich are paying close to a reasonable amount in taxes. The top exec at IBM, for examples, pays 69% of his income in federal income taxes. No reason to do a happy jig, not least because women and minorities have little freedom, but the people, through their government, are holding back the Beast.
The Beast, though, keeps pushing on, as it always does. Business leaders launch a blistering offensive in what they call "the everlasting battle for the minds of men and indoctrinate people with the capitalist story. The reason is the truth is subversive, it's anti-American, and it has to be eliminated." They spend billions of dollars on pro-corporate, anti-union propaganda, which they disseminate through the media, schools, churches, Hollywood -- just about any forum you can imagine. The Beast's propaganda is reaching tens of millions of people.
News on the three NATO demonstrators, a grand jury indicted them - by Ralph Lopez for Daily Kos
NATO 3 Indicted. The Charges: We'll Get Back to You on That
“Every age, every culture, every custom and tradition has its own character, its own weakness and its own strength, its beauties and ugliness; accepts certain sufferings as matters of course, puts up patiently with certain evils. Human life is reduced to real suffering, to hell, only when two ages, two cultures and religions overlap... Now there are times when a whole generation is caught in this way between two ages, two modes of life, with the consequence that it loses all power to understand itself and has no standard, no security, no simple acquiescence. Naturally, every one does not feel this equally strongly.”
~ Hermann Hesse, Steppenwolf