My intertrons went out last night, so I need to catch up on my news.
Have at it.
Archives for 2008
Talk Left Trolls Us
Big Tent Democrat links to a Chris Bowers post and demands to know what I think about it.
What do I think about it? I think Big Tent Democrat has lost his fucking mind, that is what I think.
Now get back to your busy schedule of praising Fox news while telling everyone that Obama is a lying liar stealth muslim misogynist but you intend to support him anyway. And really, don’t you have comments to be deleting?
I really can not wait until November. Seriously.
*** Update ***
Speaking of trolling, how did I get on an email list for a fruit juice mass marketing firm? I have received numerous emails from them asking me to buy fruit juice in America. What the hell kind of bizarre spam is this?
*** Update #2 ***
From the comments:
The most amusing point is that Chris Bowers did not at any point say that Obama was “fighting for uncommitted delegates in Michigan”. He just assumed that Obama would win most of the “Uncommitted” delegates would go Obama’s way, he said nothing about Obama fighting for them.
Then he challenged you to rebut a point that no one made.
Perhaps Armando should spend some more time thinking and reading and less time pitching his “Big Tent” for Hillary.
Glad I am not the only one who is wondering wtf BTD is doing and thinking.
They Need a Bigger Conference Room
Now that every taxpayer the country is part owner of Bear Stearns:
CNBC’s Steve Liesman reports on a letter from Treasury Secretary Paulson to New York Fed President Tim Geithner. In the letter, Treasury agrees that the Fed can bill Treasury for any losses from the Bear Stearns deal.
This is where someone gets to explain to me that I am wrong to be pissed about this.
*** Update ***
If you need something to cheer you up, the second chapter in The War Journals of Hillary Clinton, named Sunday Bloody Sunday is up:
After a few moments the Irishman straightened and began surveying the aftermath of the battle, a slightly ill expression stealing over his face. For all his considerable talents, the singer had never had the stomach for wetwork.
“Does it ever bother you?” he said softly. Catching my tight expression, he hurriedly corrected himself.
“Not this – ” he said, waving a hand to indicate the bloody scene. “I just mean – you’ve saved the Northern Ireland peace process, again, and no one will ever know.”
I gave him a steady stare. “Someday people will know. When the time is right. Until then, I’m content to operate in the shadows.”
The singer looked at me curiously, studying my face. “You seem – different, somehow. That thing in Tuzla, now this . . . it’s done something to you. Almost like you’ve – ”
“Crossed a threshold,” I murmured, the phrase springing to mind unbidden. The words felt powerful somehow, totemic, pregnant with future possibilities.
In other good news, Fafblog is back.
April Fools
I forgot to do one, again, but if you find any that are particularly clever, link em here so we can enjoy them.
For the gaming nerds, you might want to check out what Blizzard has in store for you this April 1st- the Bard Hero class and Molten Core, the Console game. The Molten Core trailer is pretty awesome, promising ten bosses with 6 unique frames!
Consider this an open thread.
Itunes Issue
For whatever reason, my Itunes has been unable to look up the names of songs when I put the CD in the machine. Is the server just temporarily down, or have I screwed something up? If it is just a server issue, is there a way to upload the names at a later date?
FYI- Abbey Road, The J.B.’s, and Beastie Boys- Some Old Bullshit are the discs I tried this morning and can not get loaded.
Also, I want to start watching Battlestar Galactica. I remember watching either a movie or something, but could someone please link the amazon links to the first season or whatever is available right now? there is so much of this crap out there that I want to make sure I buy the right one.
Finally, I couldn’t sleep again last night and Pulp Fiction was on Encore so I watched that for a bit, and I forgot how funny some it was (and yes, I know this means there will be thirty people who tell me Tarantin0’s writing is garbage and that I have shitty taste. Piss off. I like what I like.). The scene where they are cleaning brains out of the car cracked me up:
You’re gettin’ ready to blow? I’m a mushroom-cloud-layin’ motherfucker! Every time my fingers touch brain I’m “SUPERFLY T.N.T,” I’m the “GUNS OF NAVARONE.” I’m what Jimmie Walker usta talk about.
I have felt that way. Good stuff.
*** Update ***
I had forgotten how much I like the way the songs on Abbey Road blend together. BTW- any Ben Folds Five fans out there?
BTW- every time I listen to Abbey Road and hear She Came In Through The Bathroom Window, I inevitably think of Joe Cocker’s version, which then reminds me of John Belushi as Joe Cocker on SNL.
Stream of consciousness, anyone? Some insight into how my mind works. Frightening, no?
Dr. Bush’s Miracle Elixir
GOP logic:
A boom-and-bust speculation hysteria is wrecking the economy (last time dot-commers, this time mortgages, next time tulips).
Deregulation is the proximate cause of destructive market cycles.
Ergo, deregulate!
Conventional wisdom has it that the Federal Reserve is a big winner in the Treasury Department’s plan to overhaul how the financial system is regulated.
[…] But the Fed would give up its power to regulate the day-to-day affairs of banks, responsibilities that many in the institution view as essential to its role as guardian of the economy — even as the central bank gains new powers to insert itself into the affairs of any business creating risk for the financial system as a whole.
[…] “The Fed should not be enamored of this proposal at all,” said Ernest T. Patrikis, a former senior official at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York who heads the banking regulation practice at the law firm Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. “It takes away a lot of authority, power and involvement.”
It would be hard to understand threats to the financial system, Patrikis said, without having a staff that is constantly scrutinizing the inner workings of banks*.
Thousands of employees at Federal Reserve regional banks spend their days examining the nuts and bolts of the financial system. They collect and analyze information on bank holding companies’ management structure, business lines, risk controls and vulnerabilities — responsibilities that would be shifted to the new regulator.
Needless to say the Fed is quasi-independent from political control while the new branch can be easily staffed with political hacks.
I need a drink.
(*) Non-trivial caveat – it’s also hard to understand risks to the economy when your Fed chair is an armband-wearing Randroid who thinks interest-only option ARMs are the neatest thing since New Coke. That doesn’t mean that we should strip power away from the Fed, although it does make a compelling case. It argues that we should be more careful about who we put there.
Race Tightens In PA
Senator Hillary Clinton’s lead in the Pennsylvania Primary is shrinking.
The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in Pennsylvania shows Clinton leading Barack Obama by just five percentage points, 47% to 42%. For Clinton, that five-point edge is down from a ten-point lead a week ago, a thirteen-point lead in mid-March and a fifteen-point advantage in early March.
The end could be upon us. Hallelujah.