Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

I really should read my own blog.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

This fight is for everything.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

There are times when telling just part of the truth is effectively a lie.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it is a trap.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

Fear and negativity are contagious, but so is courage!

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

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Archives for 2009

Internet consumption billing

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It’s coming to my area:

In April, Time Warner Cable will begin collecting information on its customers’ Internet use in the Texas cities of Austin and San Antonio and in Rochester, N.Y. Consumption billing will begin in those cities later this summer.

Fighting29th explains:

There’s nothing wrong with the concept of usage-based Internet pricing, but all of the usage tiering I’ve seen is unrealistic. Time-Warner’s is no exception: by one calculation, their top tier, which is still pretty limited, would lead to $200/month in overage charges for a family whose use I’d classify as “moderate”.

I will switch to our other broadband provider, Frontier, ASAP, but they have also proposed internet usage caps (of 5GB). Fighting29th expands:

There’s little or no competition in the home Internet market — Time-Warner has a monopoly in large parts of the 29th district. One way to get a real market here and elsewhere is to treat Internet service the way we treat telephone service. Local service – the connection to the nearest switching center – would be the responsibility of Time-Warner or Frontier and have a regulated, low price based on the actual cost of delivering the service. At the switching center, other, nationwide bandwidth providers would be able to compete with Frontier or Time-Warner for our Internet business.

Like long-distance, once real competition hit the market, we’d see an ever-diminishing cost for Internet bandwidth. It’s only because TWC and Frontier have a monopoly that they’d even consider $200/month Internet pricing. Their recent actions have shown that their Internet monopoly needs to be broken.

A website has formed to fight this, but who knows how successful it will be.

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More of Glenn Beck’s America

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Charles Blow writes:

At the same time, the unrelenting meme being pushed by the right that Obama will mount an assault on the Second Amendment has helped fuel the panic buying of firearms. According to the F.B.I., there have been 1.2 million more requests for background checks of potential gun buyers from November to February than there were in the same four months last year. That’s 5.5 million requests altogether over that period; more than the number of people living in Bachmann’s Minnesota.

Coincidence? Maybe. Just posturing? Hopefully. But it all gives me a really bad feeling. (Where’s that Pepto-Bismol?!)

That sounds like an increase from 4.3 million to 5.5 million (a little over 25%). There may be other causes besides Beckism for this but a 25% year-over-year is certainly significant.

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Glenn Beck’s America

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I’m afraid we are going to see a lot more of this:

A man opened fire on officers during a domestic disturbance call Saturday morning, killing three of them, a police official said. Friends said he feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns.

Three officers were killed, said a police official at the scene who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Police spokeswoman Diane Richard would only say that at least five officers were wounded, but wouldn’t give any other details.

***

One friend, Edward Perkovic, said the gunman feared “the Obama gun ban that’s on the way” and “didn’t like our rights being infringed upon.” Another longtime friend, Aaron Vire, said he feared that President Obama was going to take away his rights, though he said he “wasn’t violently against Obama.”

Perkovic, a 22-year-old who said he was the gunman’s best friend, said he got a call at work from him in which he said, “Eddie, I am going to die today. … Tell your family I love them and I love you.”

Perkovic said: “I heard gunshots and he hung up. … He sounded like he was in pain, like he got shot.”

Vire, 23, said the gunman once had an Internet talk show but that it wasn’t successful. Vire said his friend had an AK-47 rifle and several powerful handguns, including a .357 Magnum.

And, of course, when you point out that certain individuals with all their talk about “revolution” and “armed insurrection” are inciting this kind of behavior in unstable people, you will get howls of protest about the 1st Amendment and what not. Sure, crazy people do crazy things. But that doesn’t make it responsible to encourage them, which is what a lot of really foolish people are doing right now for purely political reasons.

If nothing else, the next few years is going to mean full employment for Dave Neiwert.

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Uniform Changes

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That is all:

Late last month Blackwater Worldwide lost its billion-dollar contract to protect American diplomats here, but by next month many if not most of its private security guards will be back on the job in Iraq.

The same individuals will just be wearing new uniforms, working for Triple Canopy, the firm that won the State Department’s contract after Iraqi officials refused to renew Blackwater’s operating license, according to American diplomats, private security industry officials and Iraqi officials. Blackwater — viewed in Iraq as a symbol of American violence and impunity — lost the contract after being accused of excessive force in several instances, particularly an apparently unprovoked shooting in downtown Baghdad in 2007 in which 17 civilians were killed.

Despite the torrent of public criticism against Blackwater, American officials say they are relieved that the old guards will stay on. Otherwise, Triple Canopy, they say, would not be able to field enough qualified guards, with the proper security clearances, before the new contract goes into effect in May.

SSDD.

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Case Studies in Bad Governance

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Speaking of Palin, here is what she is up to:

Meantime, Palin is engaged in a less nationally-visible effort to deny a state senate appointment to a highly popular and competent state house member — Juneau Democrat Beth Kerttula — who happened to voice the uncontroversial view last August that Palin was “not ready” to be Vice President. When state Sen. Kim Elton resigned last month to take a job with the US Department of the Interior, Palin was obligated by state law to name a registered Democrat to replace him; the local party organization forwarded Kerttula’s name to Palin as its sole recommendation — a decision that was reasonable, given Kerttula’s surpassing qualifications for the job and given the near-certainty that she’ll win the seat outright next year during the fall elections. Palin, however, opted instead to nominate a conservative legislative aide, Tim Grussendorf, who had actually switched his party affiliation to qualify for the job. Palin wasn’t required by law to accept the local party’s recommendation; by the same token, the senate Democrats weren’t required to accept her choice. And so yesterday, the senate Democrats rejected Grussendorf by a majority vote in closed session.

Now to you and me, this is why she is unfit for office. But to the Palin crowd, this is why she is their hero. What motivates her is not the public good, but petty revenge and pissing off the side with a different colored foam finger.

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Sign of The Times

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Tomorrow night on the History Channel: “Ripped Off: Madoff and the Scamming of America.”

*** Update ***

BTW, scanning memorandum, I see that once again there is another round of stories about Palin’s family and last week there was a round of stories about Joe Biden’s daughter. I’m not going to link to them, but I have to say I am just sick of this stuff. Sarah Palin and Joe Biden have taken enough positions over their years that you can find any number of legitimate things to attack them for that their kids and their family members don’t need to be dragged through the headlines and trashed at every opportunity. The whole baby nonsense irritated me during the election, and the latest round of stuff makes me mad, as well.

Beyond the fact that this paparazzi like stalking of family members is creepy, and the fact that the people linking to this stuff take so much obvious glee in trashing people who are just private citizens, but every single on of you has a family member or relative with their own issues, and you would be livid if your job performance were somehow critiqued by what they do. Trashing these family members who are having hard times getting their act together, running their names through the media, and using them to attack their politician parent is ugly, it is inhumane, and it makes you a small and nasty person. Bristol Palin and Levi Johnson are kids. Joe Biden’s daughter isn’t writing drug policy. Al Gore’s son is not responsible for your problems. Leave them alone, you small-minded and petty jerks.

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The many moods of Jackson Diehl

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Jackson Diehl on Obama three weeks ago:

Washington has spent the past couple of weeks debating whether Barack Obama’s ambitious agenda and political strategy are more comparable to those of Franklin Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan. Oddly, hardly anyone is talking about the ways in which Obama is beginning to resemble the man who just vacated the White House.

[…..]

So Obama hasn’t strayed far from Karl Rove’s playbook for routing the opposition.

Jackson Diehl on Obama today:

For many around the world, Obama’s diplomacy will certainly look like a refreshing change from that of George W. Bush. Yet in Washington, some may compare it to his handling of early domestic legislation, where he has allowed congressional Democrats to take control and set priorities. Is the new president shrewd and pragmatic about using his power at home and abroad — or too passive, even weak? That’s a question worth weighing as he heads back to Washington.

So he’s gone from Rovian power monger to passive weakling in three weeks? He was too much like Bush last month and now he’s not enough like Bush?

Only in Georgetown…

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