I’m writing early for Day 23, and I’m still running short on sleep, because I have not yet had the good sense to sacrifice my neighbor to the :evil:. 😉
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 2:58 (average 4:14). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From NY Times: I RECENTLY spent a week in Berlin, where the entire city seemed under construction. In every direction, cranes and other heavy equipment dominated the landscape. Although many projects are in the private sector, innumerable others — including bridge and highway repairs, new subway stations and other infrastructure work — are financed by taxpayers.
But wait. Hasn’t Germany been one of the most outspoken advocates of fiscal austerity after the financial crisis? Yes, and that’s not a contradiction. Fiscally responsible businesses routinely borrow to invest, and so, until recently, did most governments.
Lately, however, fears about growing public debt have caused wholesale cuts in American public investment. The Germans, of course, yield to no one in their distaste for indebtedness. But they also understand the distinction between consumption and investment. By borrowing, they’ve made investments whose future benefits will far outweigh repayment costs. There’s nothing foolhardy about that.
The trick is that Republicans are only austere when it comes to spending that benefits all Americans, but are gung ho for spending that benefits the 1% only.
From Crooks and Liars: …Many observers instantly believed that Thomas had perjured himself, as soon as he made the claim. Roe was one of the most controversial and important cases decided at the time when Thomas was in law school—precisely the sort of case that every law student in the land with the slightest bit of professional ambition absolutely had to have an opinion on. One might fairly say, if you didn’t have an opninion on Roe, you didn’t have a pulse. Even if no one could immediate prove that Thomas was lying, it was such a preposterous claim that when Anita Hill’s claim of sexual harrasment became known, there were justifiably severe doubts about Thomas’s self-defense. The balancing-worshiping media media gleefully spread the meme of “two very credible witnesses,” but anyone paying attention before Hill’s accusations emerged knew this was a lie. There was nothing very credible about Thomas’s claim to have no opinion about Roe. And, indeed, it took very little time for Thomas, once approved, to show just how extreme his previously non-existent views were.
It says a lot about the man and the party he represents that he considered it ethical to lie in order to steal an appointment to the Supreme Court. Click through for more of Teabag Thomas’ confirmation lies.
From Daily Kos: Conservative policy in this arena centers on the following, interconnected axioms:
1) with very few exceptions, wealth is totally earned and deserved.
2) social programs unfairly confiscate and redistribute wealth from those who have earned it to those who have not, from the "worthy" to the "unworthy."
3) the unworthy recipients of such largesse are then trapped in what Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) referred to as a "culture of dependency," i.e., they’d be better off if they were allowed/forced to survive on their own.
4) as Fox News analyst Andrew Napolitano wrote—"Taxation is theft."
On taxes and wealth, conservatives ignore (or pretend to) the fact that the current distribution of wealth—one that sees greater inequality and a higher concentration of wealth at the very top than at any time since just before the Great Depression—is not a "natural" occurrence, it’s not simply the result of merit
Click through for an excellent article that thoroughly debunks the Republican lie that the rich are rich solely through merit, and the poor are poor solely through their own choice.
Cartoon:
18 Responses to “Open Thread–7/8/2013”
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3:30 Well I certainly am not top hat! But please don't crush me as I love the colours.
3:13 TomCat must be part magician and pulled this one out of his hat!
Jerry?
3:12 My hat dropped over my eyes at the last minute.
Woooo Hoooo!
Great time, by the way! Will the Critter crush your hat?
I hear we'll be getting a break from our heat and heavy rains here in NY. Our rivers are all flooding. Thank God, my backyard river has a high cliff to climb to get to me. The people downstream are not so lucky though. They've been flooded out for almost 2 weeks now. They caught a short reprieve and were somewhat cleaned up and the rains let loose again. 33 out of 38 days with Heavy rains!
NY Times ~ German politicians and the general populace understand the importance of a stable infrastructure. Our politicains only care about the bottom line in their net worth statements.
Crooks and Liars ~ Sorry. I can't click through. I just ate a wonderful muffin d=for breakfast and don't want to lose it.
Daily Kos ~ Oh yeah! I definitely chose to get hurt so I couldn't perform my job as a Hospice Nurse anymore. I also choose to have my income so limited as to wonder how I will pay for heat each winter.
Cartoon ~ Great day!
Npope. I Catboxed him 😉
Fon;t worry. I'm sending you more heat. 🙁
Try transferring wealth and establishing power.
Don't blame you.
Amen!
A fun little brainteaser:
What comes next in this sequence?
Nom.
Suet.
Sweden.
Hurts.
___?
❓
Since you asked: "Fir"
They're anagram abbreviations for the days of the week (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday …)
So "Fri." would be next – and to make it into an anagram –> "Fir"
Thanks Nameless. It was just too hot and too early to think bass ackwards.
NY Times: Germany is going ahead and will eventually become a leader in their future plans, investments all the while USA lags further behind in investments into its own country. USA is looking more and more like a "third world Country".
Crooks and Liars: Thomas should never have been appointed and confirmed to the Supreme Court.
Daily Kos: Disagree with the Conservative policy and its interconnected axioms.
Solar Plane; An awesome feat of applied engineering.
Thank RepubliCorp!
…or even to Dog Catcher!
As do I.
Amen!
The working poor pay all the taxes… sigh
That's the Republican way!
Puzzle — 3:30 Well I certainly am not top hat! But please don't crush me as I love the colours.
NY Times — Excellent article that is spot on. The author's comparison of spending for consumption vs spending for investment hits the nail of the head! Too bad that the Congress critters, particularly Republicanus/Teabaggers, don't understand Keynesian economics . . . or don't want to understand them. They are so wrapped up in their ideological war and wanting to see Mr Obama fail, that they are willing to throw the American economy and people under the bus. Oh look, there's an elephant in the garden eating all the flowers!
Crooks and Liars — I'd like to 'redact' the fool! I didn't like him when the Anita Hill situation was exposed, and I don't like his judicial activism and in your face flaunting of the constitution. Can he not be removed for lying? Or would a full impeachment process be needed which won't happen because of Republicanus/Teabagger control of the Congress?
The Daily Kos — Excellent article. Even before reading the article, I knew where it was going. To predicate the conservative`s argument solely on merit, ignores all the variables, including plain dumb luck, that make up financial success. On the other side of the argument, these same variables can leave a financial mess which has nothing to do with where people are financially at the beginning. I rather liked the part where the wealthy were seen to lie more often to gain an advantage. That is something that I have seen during my banking career.
Myths exploded! Keep the myths coming to be exposed.
Cartoon — Very cool! I`m not sure that I am ready to be a passenger yet, but very cool!
I didn't. I Catboxed you. 🙂
Exactly!
Full impeachment process.
But it's OK, when they do it.
Got that right, and certainly not on a cloudy day! 😉
The Republicans are hell bent on making Obama look bad while our roads and bridges are deteriorating.
I watched the Thomas hearings, don't know why EVERYONE watching didn't know he was a sham, should never have been appointed.
With very few exceptions, wealth is inherited, either through direct cash gifts from parents or being in the right "class" to have the advantages. The poor are kept poor in many areas and the person who breaks out of poverty to a better life is the exception. Eastern Kentucky is a prime example. The coal companies came here and bought mineral rights for practically nothing and then began to destroy the land, with no repercussions. Our school systems have been kept below par, so even if you graduate from high school, chances are you didn't get an education. Other companies that have tried to locate here have been met with resistance because that lowers the labor pools for the mines.
Amen!
During the hearings, I kept comparing him to Marshall and cringeing!
Well said, Edie!