By the gods, it’s Midsummer!

Posted on June 21, 2011 by oddmanout215

Skoal, as they say in the north lands. Time for wild strawberries and spiced vodka and rolling in the hay with Bibi and Liv at midnight, with the sun still shining.

Of course Midsummer isn’t quite the same if you don’t have airline tickets to Sweden and have to celebrate here. The sun sets at nine and there’s no hay to roll in unless you go out to where the Amish live, or the Mennonites, or some other tribe of Christian party-poopers.

But we make do with what we have, and it is the solstice — the first day of summer and the longest day of the year. Shoot out the lights. Build a wicker man and fill it with your least favorite people. Enjoy yourself before the real Philly summer hits and it’s too damn muggy to roll around except with the air conditioner at full blast.

I’ll keep looking for a deal on airline tickets.

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Why Obama is still kissing up to Wall Street crooks

Posted on June 17, 2011 by oddmanout215

Here’s Robert Reich, talking to the wall again, trying to tell Democratic politicians what they must do to lead the way to economic recovery and prevent Republicans from creating an even worse downturn than the one that has plagued us since 2008:

Americans are scared, with reason. We’re in a vicious cycle in which lower wages and net job losses and high debt are causing consumers to cut their spending – which is causing businesses to cut back on hiring and reduce pay. There’s no way out of this morass without bold leadership from Washington to rekindle consumer demand.

If the Democrats remain silent, the vacuum will be filled by the Republican snake oil of federal spending cuts and cut taxes on big corporations and the wealthy. Democrats – starting with the President – must have the courage and conviction to tell the nation the recovery is stalling, and what must be done.

Reich even made a video that explains why the recession persists, so succinct even a Tea Partier could understand, if he or she was interested in understanding.

You know a smart fellow like Barack Obama understands. You know he could eloquently explain that it will take jobs creation programs, restoration of higher taxes on the rich, disincentives for outsourcing existing jobs, legal protection of workers who want to unionize and other bold measures to get the economy back on track.

By now you also probably know that Obama is still kissing up to the big corporations and, most shamelessly, to the owners of the Wall Street casinos, who are “one of his most vital sources of campaign cash” and the same people who played a major role in wrecking the economy.

It’s safe to assume Obama and most congressional Democrats — just like the Republicans — will continue to reject jobs creation, effective regulation of financial markets and higher taxes on the ultra-rich, if only because pursuing them would alienate the executives who form their true base of support.

Obama isn’t interested in Reich’s cogent diagnosis of our economic malady, or in possible cures. He’s interested in being re-elected, period, and he takes for granted we’re all in his camp because the alternative is some odious Republican dwarf who would make life even harder for most of us.

It’s time we stopped complaining about how pissed off we are at Republicans — they will always be what they are — and at “the corporatocracy,” and focused on cleaning up our own party, by refusing to nominate Democrats in name only who sell us out every day.

There is no way out of this trap without a serious challenge to Obama from within the party or from a third-party candidate. Reich knows this better than anyone. Why doesn’t he make a video that addresses this reality?

Footnote: See Glenn Greenwald on the Obama people’s ridiculous e-mail pitch for contributions from “everyday Americans.” The funniest lines: “Most campaigns fill their dinner guest lists primarily with Washington lobbyists and special interests. We didn’t get here doing that, and we’re not going to start now.”

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Why it’s so easy to hate LeBron James

Posted on June 14, 2011 by oddmanout215

It’s not because he embraced the nickname King James and has “Chosen1” tattooed on his back. It’s because he’s too arrogant or stupid (same thing?) to resist taking verbal shots at basketball fans who rooted against him during the NBA Finals. This is how James, in sore-loser mode, put it after his team lost:

…At the end of the day, all the people that was rooting on me to fail . . . they have to wake up tomorrow and have the same life that they had before they woke up today. They have the same personal problems they had today. They can get a few days or a few months or whatever the case may be on being happy about not only myself, but the Miami Heat not accomplishing their goal, but they have to get back to the real world at some point.

And this is how Stephen Colbert, an eloquent LeBron hater, responded to James’s comments:

Like they say, it’s not whether you win or lose, but how you disparage the pathetic lives of the little people who make it possible for you to have a career bouncing an inflatable ball.

James is a poster boy for corporate America’s core beliefs — brute force and big money are the only things worth valuing, loyalty is for suckers, wealth is to be flaunted, poor people are to be despised and mocked. It was a pleasure to watch him lose and imagine his counterparts in high finance, big business and government being undone by the same strain of arrogance.

I woke up anxious today, with personal problems, but with a real-world consolation that isn’t likely to fade — at least I’m not LeBron James.

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‘Rentiers’ to the jobless: Your pain is our gain

Posted on June 12, 2011 by oddmanout215

Those trying to escape the saga of Anthony Weiner and the Weiner-ettes may not have seen Paul Krugman’s Friday column, which focuses on the relentlessly high unemployment rate and on the fact that the most powerful people in government — starting with Barack Obama, of course — are doing nothing to end this ongoing disaster.

Instead, the Republicrats want to slash spending further and thus destroy even more jobs in order to stay on the good side of the people who fund their campaigns. Krugman uses a vaguely Marxist and, Lord help us, French term to describe this group, which is opposed to deficit spending, debt relief and others actions that might help put the unemployed back to work:

Consciously or not, policy makers are catering almost exclusively to the interests of rentiers — those who derive lots of income from assets, who lent large sums of money in the past, often unwisely, but are now being protected from loss at everyone else’s expense. Of course, that’s not the way what I call the Pain Caucus makes its case. Instead, the argument against helping the unemployed is framed in terms of economic risks: Do anything to create jobs and interest rates will soar, runaway inflation will break out, and so on…

And against these hypothetical risks one must set the reality of an economy that remains deeply depressed, at great cost both to today’s workers and to our nation’s future…

Ask for a coherent theory behind the abandonment of the unemployed and you won’t get an answer. Instead, members of the Pain Caucus seem to be making it up as they go along, inventing ever-changing rationales for their never-changing policy prescriptions.

In stating the obvious, Krugman jabs at the pigs who benefit from policies that help keep the jobless out of work and ruffles the feathers of the buzzards who disapprove of language that might wake the unemployed and working poor to the fact that they’ve been written off by the Dems as well as the GOP.

Say what you will about Krugman, he is one of only two people I can think of at the NYT — Gretchen Morgenson is the other — who speak truth to power and aren’t shy about reminding readers that the moneylenders and corporatists who own both major parties have no interest in closing the ever-widening gulf between the rich and poor, or in stamping out the malignant strain of capitalism that has stunted the country’s economic growth.

Posted in economic collapse, globalization, Great Depression, Great Recession, mainstream media, New York Times, New York Times op-ed, Obama, Politics, unemployment, Wall Street, world-wide economy | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Greenwald to media: You’re all Weiners

Posted on June 9, 2011 by oddmanout215

I saw a clip of Chris Matthews screeching about Anthony Weiner and, shortly afterwards, read this in Glenn Greenwald’s column:

I’d really like to know how many journalists, pundits and activist types clucking with righteous condemnation of Weiner would be comfortable having that standard applied to them. I strongly suspect the number is very small. Ever since the advent of Internet commerce, pornography — use of the Internet for sexual gratification, real or virtual — has been, and continues to be, a huge business. Millions upon millions of people at some point do what Weiner did.

This is even more to the point:

Reporters who would never dare challenge powerful political figures who torture, illegally eavesdrop, wage illegal wars or feed at the trough of sleazy legalized bribery suddenly walk upright — like proud peacocks with their feathers extended — pretending to be hard-core adversarial journalists as they collectively kick a sexually humiliated figure stripped of all importance.

I feel bad for Weiner but I’d have more respect for him if he’d ditched the tearful, interminable apology and instead told the press corps, “I’m resigning. This is not because of the sexting, which is legal and none of your business, but rather because I lied about it and got caught, and therefore will never again be able to function as an effective advocate for universal health insurance and other vital legislation that 99 percent of Democratic politicians are too cowardly to touch. So have a nice day and go fuck yourselves.”

Footnote: The Weiner fiasco is yet another cautionary tale about the limits of power and privacy, and a reminder that “social networking” technology is inherently creepy. The congressman turned to new-media gadgets for virtual reassurance of his potency, to avoid real-life complications, not realizing these gadgets have become more real to many people than their own flesh and blood.

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Stick a fork in Weiner, he’s done

Posted on June 7, 2011 by oddmanout215

Denounced from the pulpit by the Gray Lady:

For more than a week, Representative Anthony Weiner, a New York City Democrat, baldly lied in denying that he had sent a lewd photo of himself to a woman over Twitter, claiming that his account was hacked. When he finally and tearfully confessed the truth on Monday, it turned out to be worse than expected: He admitted to a longstanding pattern of sending inappropriate photos to women.

The New York Times editorial board is what it is — a handful of smug ivory tower types who make the sort of lofty assertions (“moral” judgments) they think will appeal to the most readers.

But this doesn’t change the fact that Weiner (OMG, that name!) is a self-obsessed jerk who didn’t have the good sense to own up to his “sexting” habit before it became public knowledge.

No surprise that the mainstream media have worked much harder on this tepid tale (there was no actual sex, of course) than on Chris Christie’s hypocrisy, or on evidence that the country’s wealthiest bankers committed perjury in defending their actions during the economic meltdown.

Weiner was one of only a few Dems with the balls (sorry!) to speak out in a smart and spirited way against Republican lies, but now he just looks like a lonesome, insecure fool. Stick a fork in him, he’s done, at least through 2012.

Footnote: When will the Gray Lady use her pulpit to denounce editor Bill Keller for being disingenuous in explaining the part his newspaper played in spreading the lies that led to the disastrous Iraq war? Just asking.

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Promoting the 1st annual Chris Christie 100-Yard Walk

Posted on June 6, 2011 by oddmanout215

Michael Smerconish in The Philadelphia’s Inquirer, inadvertently shedding light on why the mainstream media are so reluctant to bash elitist politicians:

It was no surprise to me that Chris Christie took heat for using a state helicopter to attend his son’s baseball game, but I’m not thinking of the wrath of New Jersey taxpayers. If his house is anything like mine, he has bigger problems on the home front for the poor decision he made.

Last Tuesday, Christie flew from Trenton to Montvale to watch his son Andrew play baseball in a state playoff game. Upon arrival next to the field, Christie was shuttled about 100 yards in a dark town car with tinted windows to the stands. Then, after the fifth inning, play was halted so he could depart in order to travel to Drumthwacket, the governor’s mansion, to dine with some Iowans who were courting him to run for president.

Smerconish doesn’t slam the governor for believing fiscal austerity is good for the peons but not for the millionaires. He doesn’t mention that Christie’s Ralph Kramden-esque personal style is much more off-putting than that of unionized teachers, whom he has described as “bullies and thugs.”

Instead, the issue that concerns the columnist is the possible harm Christie’s helicopter usage might do to the psyche of his son, the baseball player. He urges the governor to drive — i.e., to be driven — to the kid’s next game.

Smerconish informs us that he drives an F-150 pickup and an $80,000 Jaguar “provided” by one of the sponsors of his radio show. He confesses to embarrassing his sons twice, by picking them up from school in his “spectacular” Jag and, on another day, in the F-150, which prompted one of the boys to ask, “Dad, how many pickup trucks do you see other than ours?”

Oh, the emotional trauma of kids raised in upper middle-class privilege, and of harried upper middle-class fathers like Smerconish and Christie! My heart goes out.

But Smerconish could help undermine the public perception that he and his soul brother are lazy, wasteful elitists. He could create and promote the first annual Chris Christie Save the Schools 100-Yard Walk, the proceeds of which could be used to help pay for teachers and school supplies. The event might boost both men’s public image and the oft-heard right-wing claim that charity should take the place of government programs that help the poor.

The fee to participate in the walk would be twenty dollars. Each walker would be sponsored by an N.J. millionaire who would kick in an additional $10,000 and have his name engraved in the 100-yard walkway (at Drumthwacket?).

Christie could take part, if only to inspire the grossly obese who are trying to get in shape. Smerconish might join him to prove that he, Mr. Jag, is still capable of walking 100 yards. But only after a thorough physical exam, of course.

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A Tina Fey bus tour would put Palin’s in perspective

Posted on June 2, 2011 by oddmanout215

Where’s Tina Fey when we need her? The question sprang to mind when I read about Sarah Palin’s latest publicity stunt:

…Unless Palin decides to formally explore a possible presidential run, she is free to spend the money raised by SarahPAC for “any lawful purpose” under federal law, experts said. That means it doesn’t matter whether the trip is a holiday, a political event or something in between…

Traveling in a brightly decorated bus — which is labeled “Paid for by SARAHPAC” — Palin kicked off the “One Nation Tour” Sunday with an appearance at the Rolling Thunder motorcycle rally on the Mall. Stops since then have included Mount Vernon in Virginia, the Gettysburg Civil War battlefield in Pennsylvania and the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor…

Reporters are being kept at bay throughout much of the trip, with even lodging details kept secret.

My policy is, if I can help it, to post only once about celebrity clowns — one post on Glenn Beck, one on Donald Trump. Today’s clown is Palin, whom mainstream reporters continue to pursue because… well, because she’s Palin. The half-baked Alaskan never makes sense when she speaks, but she’s good looking and flirty and therefore deemed newsworthy by the powers that be.

I was going to suggest that you, my legion of readers, contact Tina Fey and urge her to launch a nationwide tour posing as Palin, in a bus covered with patriotic images and slogans. Fey could cover costs with a “TINAPAC” and, like Palin, travel to random destinations without notifying the press in advance. (Although it’s pretty hard to keep the press “at bay” when you’re traveling in a bus that looks like a redneck art installation.)

If neither Palin nor Fey were announcing appearances, then reporters would have an even harder time telling them apart than they did in 2008, when Fey was lampooning Palin on Saturday Night Live.

Alas, Fey, due to her pregnancy, is out of action for the summer, according to a publicist I contacted today. The closest you could get to her, which wouldn’t be close at all, would be through William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (phone 310-285-9000, fax 310-248-2020).

It looks like the best we can do is personally remind print reporters and talking heads on TV, through e-mails, tweets, and so on, that their knee-jerk coverage of the Paris Hilton of politics is an absurd and unprofessional waste of time and resources.

This might shame them into living up to their responsibility to keep the public informed of serious issues, including the mystery of why the Obama Justice Department is ignoring evidence that Goldman Sachs executives such as Lloyd Blankfein and Daniel Sparks lied under oath to a Congressional subcommittee investigating Wall Street’s role in creating the mortgage bubble that ate America.

But that’s wishful thinking. Hacks have no shame.

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In praising Scott-Heron, Inquirer buries his message

Posted on June 1, 2011 by oddmanout215

Gil Scott-Heron, the African-American poet and musician who died this week at age 62, was most famous for his recording of “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” a funny and uncompromising call-to-arms that envisions the downfall of the corporate masterminds who distract poor black people from the fact that they have no power. A sample verse:

The revolution will not be right back after a message
About a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat.

The fact that The Philadelphia Inquirer would extol Scott-Heron today – in a piece directly underneath an editorial about the late punk rocker Mikey Wild, no less — is a testament to the fact that everything Scott-Heron stood for was inexorably crushed by the corporations that control the political process, the economy, and the hundreds of mainstream news outlets that arguably deaden us to what’s really going on in the world.

If Scott-Heron symbolized an actual threat to the corporate state, The Inquirer wouldn’t be saluting him. You can tell this is true by the editorial writer’s tone and word choices:

America isn’t the same tortured nation it was when Gil Scott-Heron suggested that “the revolution will not be televised.” That’s not to say this country has solved every problem it had when Scott-Heron famously made that pronouncement in his 1970 poem. It is to say that in part because of the consciousness-raising of Scott-Heron and other politically oriented artists, this nation was confronted with its racism, sexism, classism, militarism, and myriad addictions, and led into meaningful dialogues, if not solutions.

Blah blah. America today is an even more tortured nation now than in 1970, when there was hope the plight of the poor could be solved by education and jobs training. That the middle class would keep growing thanks in part to a booming economy, reasonably priced housing and a fairly equitable tax structure. That the military machine might be overhauled and tamed in the wake of the ongoing disaster in Vietnam.

None of those things came to pass. We now have less institutionalized racism, but the black unemployment rate is as high as ever, and the rate for whites is almost as bad.

Scott-Heron was wrong. The “revolution” has not only been televised, it has been co-opted, shanghaied, downloaded, e-mailed, Facebooked and neutered by forces too powerful for naive idealists to seriously challenge.

Here’s what I’d ask if I had your ear, Mr. Editorial Writer: What’s the good of “consciousness-raising” if it doesn’t result in a better quality of life, materially and spiritually? What’s the point of “dialogue” if it goes on and on, deliberately skirting solutions?

Posted in arts, economic collapse, globalization, Great Recession, mainstream media, Philadelphia, Politics, pop music, taxes, unemployment, Wall Street, world-wide economy | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A society that renews the ‘Patriot Act’ isn’t free

Posted on May 31, 2011 by oddmanout215

The bizarre Francophobia of columnist Roger Cohen, brought to you by The New York Times:

After Osama bin Laden was killed, a prominent French radio station called me for an interview. It turned into a mildly hallucinogenic experience. Everybody from the president of the United States to Al Qaeda itself was saying Bin Laden was dead, but my interviewer kept pressing me for “the proof.”

…And now we have the Dominique Strauss-Kahn sexual assault case, viewed, it seems, by close to 60 percent of French society as a conspiracy against the putative Socialist presidential candidate…

Cohen writes that “conspiracy theories are the refuge of the disempowered,” as if there are more conspiracy theorists in France than in “freer societies” such as our. He implies that the French are uniquely inclined to believe that Jews secretly funded the terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks, as if anti-Semites in others countries haven’t made the same accusations.

It makes me sick that good old boys like Cohen get paid to write “op-ed” drivel as a reward for having worked as real reporters in their younger years, but hey, that’s how the mainstream media works.

Not surprisingly, Cohen writes nothing critical about the high-ranking American officials who worked hard to drum up support for war in Iraq, or about the fact that the Times and other major media outlets played a key role in helping these officials make their case. (Hello Judith Miller and Bill Keller! Why haven’t you guys been drummed out of the journalism business?)

If “freer societies” are those that neglect the poor, ignore the unemployed, exclude millions of people from healthcare and subvert civil liberties with laws like the Patriot Act, then I’ll take France, or almost any other European country.

Memorial Day thought: I don’t know what happened between Strauss-Kahn and that hotel maid, but I’d feel a lot less suspicious about his arrest if George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and their co-conspirators had been hauled off in handcuffs after proof that they had lied about WMD in Iraq became available.

Too bad Cohen would rather dis the French than the monsters responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths and the destruction of the U.S. economy.

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