Weekend Open Thread

14 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”

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   1. I’m much more interested in these:

      Listen to the applause, after one blowhard on the panel states, “No one is listening to you”.

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      1. cf. Kathy Ireland

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2. Studios can already remove content for no valid reason. Universal Censors Megaupload Song, Gets Branded a “Rogue Label”

   Earlier today, Megaupload released a pop video featuring mainstream artists who endorse the cyberlocker service. News of the controversial Mega Song even trended on Twitter, but has now been removed from YouTube on copyright grounds by Universal Music. Kim Dotcom says that Megaupload owns everything in the video, and that the label has engaged in dirty tricks in an attempt to sabotage their successful viral campaign.

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3. Jay Carney, Despite Evidence, Says Economists Didn’t Know How Bad The Recession Would Get

   White House Press Secretary Jay Carney made a surprising assertion on MSNBC Wednesday, saying that in early 2009, as Barack Obama was taking office, there weren’t any major economists who understood just how bad the recession was.

   The problem is that the evidence doesn’t support his claim.
   
   …
   
   In reality, though, well-respected analysts and economists from all corners were sounding alarms about the state of the economy — in early 2009, and even before.

   Numerous experts warned that the stimulus bill wouldn’t go far enough to address the nation’s economic woes as it was making its way through Congress in the early days of Obama’s presidency. They cautioned that the economy was pointed toward higher unemployment and weak or nonexistent growth — conditions that have indeed come to characterize Obama’s first term in office.

   Hindsight is 20/20 and it’s very legit to say that there were differences of opinion among knowledgeable economists. But there’s a world of difference between the economists we listened to got it wrong and everyone agreed with us.

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   1. There’s a lot of that going around these days with absolutely no hope it’s going to end anytime soon.  It’s a staple in political discourse that sadly we have come to expect.

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   2. Remember how often Libertad would post graphs comparing what the Obama Administration put out for projected economic growth vs. the actual (lower) growth to say how the stimulus was a failure?

      And remember how the Obama Administration wanted more stimulus than it got due to Republicans and a few conservative Democrats in the Senate demanding a smaller and less stimulative package?

      In hindsight, the Obama Administration’s more aggressive stimulus was both needed and still not as much as the economy would have demanded based on the under-estimation of the depth of the recession.

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4. but I have a better idea.  Get politicians to stop lying, sabotaging, shortchanging and holding science hostage.  Get politics out of science.

   http://2012.talkingpointsmemo….

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5. The boys and girls at Fox on 15th Street are really getting excited over their hopes that the European welfare state might be dismantled. The third paragraph of the lead front page article told readers:

   “If adopted by other nations in the union, the deal would mean drastic cuts in European budgets. It would also spell the end of three decades of overspending that helped finance a cozy social protection system envied by much of the world.”

   But as Baker notes, the countries in Europe with the most generous safety net are also the ones in the best financial shape. And the fiscal problem started with the toxic asset bubble, hardly a problem that was created by a generous safety net.

   http://www.cepr.net/index.php/…

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   1. The financial firms caused the collapse, yet they’re telling the politicians what they have to do going forward. Our politicians are ignoring both economics and the voters while doing the bidding of the financial elite.

      And what’s even dumber, going down this road is not the best long term route for the financial elite either. But it is the best for them short-term.

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      1. the fundamental problem.

         They only think “next quarterly report”…it is in the DNA. That’s what makes them become (and stay) republicans.

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      2. is their long term guarantee.  As long as Congress keeps bailing out the crooks (plus not prosecuting them), they’ll do well both short term and long term.  

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   2. And what, prey tell, is does Fox think is so bad about being the envy of much of the world? A glaring exception is Greece where, along with the global financial meltdown, they tried to combine the triple banana split of social benefits, including the right to retire with generous pensions at 50, with the Doug Bruce attitude toward paying taxes. Not a winning combination. But the most prosperous countries still educate everyone and provide healthcare for everyone and even their version of conservatives wouldn’t have it any other way.  In Europe “conservative” generally doesn’t yet mean ” willfully ignorant grumpy old crank”.

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6. Drove under the Jeffco Monument to Goverment Wast today (The pedestrian bridge at Wadsworth and Bowles) and some jackasses had put up signs saying “USA on thin ice. Vote Conservative” or some crap like that.

   They choose to forget that ALL 3 OF THE JEFFERSON COUNTY COMMISSIONERS WERE REPUBLICANS when the bridge was approved.

   I think I figured out how to get conservative votes for ANY office. Just go out and say “I’m ignorant and spiteful and I blame everything that’s wrong with America on liberals.”

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