tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37814412007-11-07T09:26:58.162-05:00Bob's Links and RantsBobBlogger9397125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-42395529712174126522007-11-07T09:15:00.000-05:002007-11-07T09:26:58.187-05:00Oil new high, dollar new lowFor today, that is. AWol is pResident for another 14 months. When aWol was misinaugurated in 2001, oil was about $27 a barrel and you could buy a euro for 90 cents. Today, oil is at $98 a barrel and a euro costs $1.47.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-43579601546282645892007-11-06T06:55:00.000-05:002007-11-06T11:40:29.430-05:00Ted Rall on ShillaryI haven't had time for a good Hillary-sucks rant for a while. Fortunately, Ted Rall <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ucru/20071106/cm_ucru/thetimetomakethedoughnutscandidate">wrote one for me</a>:<blockquote>But a funny thing happens when Democrats and Republicans talk about 2008: they find common ground. <br /><br />"I can't stand Hillary," the Republican opens. <br /><br />"She's disgusting," the Democrat agrees. At last, a Uniter. <br /><br />Half the electorate hates her--and not just members of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.<br />...<br />Every voter has his or her limit, a moment or an act or just a general sense about a politician that makes the idea of voting for them feel so unpleasant they'd rather cross party lines, or stay home on election day. For me, and for a lot of people, it was Hillary's vote to declare Iran's Revolutionary Guards a "foreign terrorist organization," unleashing new sanctions and U.S. military "instruments"--a step toward war--against Iran. <br />...<br />As I said, I'm the forgiving type. I get it: Hillary can't apologize for her Iraq vote. It would make her look weak. As she said in September 2006 on ABC News, "I can only look at what I knew at the time because I don't think you get do-overs in life. I think you have to take responsibility. And hopefully, learn from it and go forward. I regret very much the way the president used the authority he was given because I think he misled the Congress, and he misled the country." <br /><br />Except...except...she did get a do-over. The same president who misled her, Congress and the country, asked for her vote on yet another resolution based on phony intelligence that starts us down the path to war--this time against Iran. She had a chance to prove that she'd learned her lesson. She voted yes. Again. <br /><br />President Hillary won't close Gitmo. She won't stop torturing. She won't stop listening to our phone calls. She won't stop the war in Iraq, much less in Afghanistan. Heck, she might even start a new one. <br /><br />Fool you once, shame on Bush. Fool you twice, I stop thinking how cool it would be for the United States to finally elect a woman president.</blockquote>Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-83101665871511973542007-10-23T11:22:00.000-04:002007-10-23T11:37:51.952-04:00Quote de l'annéeI can't even pretend to have a quote du jour any more. But here's one from <a href="http://www.bobharris.com/content/view/1534/1/">Bob Harris</a>, commenting on <a href="javascript:void(window.open('http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Poll_Half_of_Americans_would_never_1021.html','','resizable=yes,location=no,menubar=no,scrollbars=yes,status=no,toolbar=no,fullscreen=no,dependent=no,width=900,height=400'))">poll results</a> that show that the leader for the Democratic presidential nomination is a woman half of American voters say they'd never, ever vote for:<blockquote>Shouldn't we all be stepping back to marvel at just how dysfunctional our electoral system so obviously is? Bad enough our campaign finance structure and winner-takes-all system limit the spectrum of "mainstream" political opinion from conventional suck to full-blown delusional. But we're still more than a year away from the actual election, and our most likely leaders for the next four years have already been winnowed down mostly to people we already can't bloody stand.</blockquote>I should point out that that poll was obviously flawed. Dennis Kucinich came in second as a candidate Americans said they'd never, ever vote for--at 49%. And you and I both know that the percentage of American voters who have never even heard of Kucinich is way more than 49%. And I'd suggest that Hillary's 50% is low--every Republican and half of the Democrats despise her. The Dumbos demonstrated in 2004 how to lose an unloseable election, and they can do it again if they nominate Shillary.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-86514435985705338082007-10-23T09:56:00.000-04:002007-10-23T10:11:35.846-04:00Fire and WaterBob Morris at Polizeros writes about the <a href="http://polizeros.com/2007/10/22/southern-california-fires/">California fires</a> and the related and ultimately more threatening <a href="http://polizeros.com/2007/10/23/the-future-is-drying-up/">water shortage in the west</a>. We've got tens of millions of people living in a region capable of only supporting tens of thousands. And not just living--growing cotton and cattle, playing golf, maintaining ridiculous lawns. Immense amounts of resources (water, energy, money) have been wasted over the past century to make this possible. But more and more it appears that it was possible only for a short time. The piper is at the door, demanding to get paid.<br /><br />Meanwhile, W, having declared that $35 billion is too much to spend to save the lives of American children, believes <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/23/washington/23prexy.html?_r=1&oref=slogin">$196 billion</a> is needed to continue destroying the lives of Iraqi children. And keeping much of the California National Guard far away from where they're needed. Quite possibly the most evil person ever to live. And the Dumbocrats who have done nothing to end his reign of error are probably the most craven.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-92212245489079056582007-10-19T16:34:00.000-04:002007-10-19T16:35:11.146-04:00<img src=http://www.cagle.com/working/071018/britt.gif><br>From <a href="http://www.cagle.com/politicalcartoons/pccartoons/archives/britt.asp?Action=GetImage">Chris Britt</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-14714568716314638132007-10-19T08:51:00.000-04:002007-10-19T08:52:35.486-04:00What People Want<img src=http://www.pastpeak.com/clips/an-inconvenient-truth.jpg>Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-57710478410609725292007-10-18T15:55:00.000-04:002007-10-18T16:01:20.444-04:00New RecordsOil over <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=a0c7s0VQ._98&refer=energy">$89 a barrel</a>. Dollar at a new low against Euro: The dollar will now buy 0.704 of a euro, down from over 1.2 euros back in December 2000.<br /><br /><img src=http://www.marketwatch.com/charts/int-basic.chart?symb=C_EUR&sid=127354&time=20&startdate=&enddate=&freq=1&comp=&compidx=aaaaa~0&uf=0&ma=&maval=&type=2&size=1&lf=1&lf2=&lf3=&style=1013&mocktick=1&rand=780509591>Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-90729521632809558372007-10-16T08:36:00.000-04:002007-10-16T08:53:53.030-04:00There goes the neighborhoodBack in January (no, it wasn't my last post) I <a href="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/2007/01/there-goes-neighborhood.htm">wrote about</a> how Pfizer was pulling its 2100 local jobs out of Ann Arbor, and how they were abandoning a huge, expensive facility that they were <a href="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/2007/01/efficiency-of-capitalism.htm">continuing to expand</a> right up until the day of the bugout announcement.<br /><br />Well, nine months later, many of the employees are gone, taking the local housing market with them. While construction finally stopped, the "Construction Traffic Only" sign remains:<br /><br /><img src="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/constructiontraffic.jpg" /><br /><br />However, the only traffic lately has been moving vans<br /><br /><img src="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/movingvans.jpg"><br /><br />and a big crane,<br /><br /><img src="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/crane.jpg"><br /><br />which is removing some valuable piece of pharmahardware to be hauled to its new home in Connecticut (which will be built <a href="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ebgoodsel/post911/2007/01/i-think-they-just-like-playing-god.htm">where the old homes of some old people were</a>).<br /><br />The moving vans have been departing regularly for the past week or two. The "invisible hand" of the "free market" efficiently allocating resources? Hardly. No, it's evidence of an immensely wasteful and corrupt economic/political system run solely for the benefit of the very wealthy few.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-35275803220959572242007-09-27T12:39:00.000-04:002007-09-27T12:54:10.995-04:00Fed Up?That's the subject of an e-mail I got from Carl Levin, Michigan's senior senator and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He wants me to contribute to his 2008 re-election campaign to scare off any potential challengers:<blockquote>We can force potential challengers to think twice before entering my race, by taking action today. A contribution before Sunday's critical end-of-quarter deadline will show any opponent that we're ready.<br /><br />Click here to make an immediate, secure contribution of $50, $75, or more. Your support before September 30 will force Republicans to think twice before trying to silence one of their toughest critics. <br />...<br />There is no military solution to the political problems in Iraq. That's why I keep introducing my plan to begin to reduce our forces. It's the only way to force the Iraq political leaders to take control of their own destiny.<br /><br />Time after time, Republicans have blocked my plan to get our troops out of Iraq. The one time we succeeded in getting it passed by Congress, the President vetoed it and there weren't enough votes to override his veto.<br /><br />If you are as fed up with the Bush Administration's policies as I am, please make an urgent investment in our campaign today. Together, we can send a clear signal to the White House that their plans to defeat me--and silence one of their toughest critics --will not work.</blockquote>That's right! It's your chance to prove once again that money trumps democracy in America! Our worthless senator wants to run unopposed so he can keep introducing his plan until the cows (but not the troops) come home. That his plan isn't working, of course, is irrelevant in his mind to his status as one of the "toughest critics," and even if it were, its failure is all the fault of a scandal-ridden Repug minority, a pResident with record low popularity, and a practically non-existent Iraqi puppet government. How can one man in an extremely powerful position possibly overcome such formidable opposition?<br /><br />Stopping the funding of the war can't be vetoed--which is probably why Levin won't support it. He'd much rather complain about the Repugs and the Iraqis foiling his "plan" than actually come up with a plan that would work.<br /><br />Fed up? You bet I am.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-77324499805861579022007-09-27T12:33:00.000-04:002007-09-27T12:39:06.637-04:00Still hereTo any loyal readers I may have left: I'm still here! I've been teaching a computer programming course at the U. of Michigan, which has taken up most of my spare time. I still check in and read some of my favorite blogs, like <a href="http://tinyrevolution.com/mt/">A Tiny Revolution</a>, <a href="http://www.chris-floyd.com/">Empire Burlesque</a>, <a href="http://youwillanyway.blogspot.com/">You Will Anyway</a> and <a href="http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com/">Whatever It Is I'm Against It</a>, wondering if the fact that those blogs have much cooler names than mine is what keeps them going. Anyway, most blog posts I might come up with these days would be just regurgitating what I read on those blogs--so just click on over and read there what you might have read here.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-36598836647037820732007-09-13T13:21:00.001-04:002007-09-13T13:22:16.215-04:00$80.20Oil prices <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070913/bs_nm/markets_oil_dc;_ylt=AnjXFs00eWsBvm3j6kzNdxas0NUE">went above $80</a>a barrel for the first time today.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-39679324210253887342007-09-11T16:37:00.001-04:002007-09-11T16:37:57.843-04:00$78.23A new <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aZlMkl.atpT0&refer=energy">crude record</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-24653542143554103982007-09-10T08:31:00.000-04:002007-09-10T08:32:59.045-04:00Busy, busy, busyIf I had time to blog these days, I would probably write something like <a href="http://www.chris-floyd.com/content/view/1276/135/">this</a>, but it probably wouldn't be as good.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-64282002952540487752007-09-05T12:33:00.000-04:002007-09-05T12:50:49.667-04:00Bush defines "functioning government"W down under:<blockquote>They [Iraq] got a budgeting process that's funding their military. In other words, there is a functioning government.</blockquote>-- via <a href="http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com/2007/09/george-bush-looking-forward-to-some.html">WIIIAI</a>.<br /><br />Just before that, W said:<blockquote>Do they need an oil law? You bet they need an oil law. Why? Because it will be part of saying to Sunnis, Shia, and Kurd alike, the oil belongs to the people. It's a way to unify the country. On the other hand, they are distributing revenues from the central government. In Anbar province they have distributed $107 million this year, about $96 million last year. There's only one place they could have gotten the revenue from, the oil resources.</blockquote>Only one place. RIGHT. The US officially has provided <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/02/AR2006010200370_2.html">billions of dollars earmarked</a> for the Iraqi military. It could be some of that. They could have gotten it by selling misplaced US weapons or leftover stockpiles of munitions on the black market. They could be smuggling Afghan heroin to Turkey, or selling Iraqi orphans to the highest Saudi bidder.<br /><br />Aargh! WHY am I trying to apply logical arguments to W's totally insane nonsense?Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-17072061637249709592007-09-05T12:15:00.001-04:002007-09-05T12:15:41.823-04:00<img src=http://www.cagle.com/working/070904/sherffius21.jpg><br>From <a href="http://www.cagle.com/politicalcartoons/PCcartoons/sherffius.asp">John Sherffius</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-68677038549929036182007-09-04T21:40:00.000-04:002007-09-04T21:42:12.235-04:00Of course they didBritain's MI5, aka Big Brother, <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070903/ap_on_re_eu/britain_orwell_files;_ylt=Aq8YAsaExCTwwUGvSPJMn0Ss0NUE">spied on George Orwell</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-21824499442499979992007-09-02T06:57:00.000-04:002007-09-02T07:33:12.577-04:00Take note, CanadaYesterday, I went to the Canadian National Exhibition here in Toronto. The featured act of the CNE yesterday (and today and tomorrow) was an air show. The weather was picture-perfect, and it was impressive watching the planes do their tricks over Lake Ontario. One or two Canadian stunt pilots were featured, as well as a new Canadian-built short-haul airliner and the Snowbirds aerial demonstration team (Canada's answer to the Thunderbirds and Blue Angels). Nevertheless, the show was dominated by the US military. <br /><br />The show began with an F-18A Super Hornet, which flew numerous low and loud passes, as well as doing some tricks. Then, after three impressive but typical aerobatic acts, the PA microphone was handed over to some staff sergeant PR types from the Air Force. They mentioned repeatedly that this is the 60th anniversary of the US Air Force, and they "celebrated" this by showing a World War II-era P-51 Mustang, an F-16 Falcon (aka Viper), and the new F-22 Raptor. As if the phenomenal demostrations of power and maneuverability were not enough, each plane was introduced by the staff sergeant announcers as being or having been "the most lethal aircraft" ever. (All the staff sergeants had a jingoistic southern twang to their speech, even the guy from Michigan.) And I doubt if anyone in the crowd disagreed with that description of the Raptor. Ugly and big (about twice the size of the F-16), the Raptor did the same types of high- and low-speed passes that the F-16 did, as well as the vertical climbs. Amazingly, it also did most of the same tricks that the little aerobatic planes had done earlier, including some tumbles and appearing to just float in the air. The staff sergeant said "the Raptor is prepared to defend freedom around the globe" or some such BS.<br /><br />The Canadian announcers weren't much better, always thanking their "friends from the south" for being willing to come perform here in Canada. When planes like the F-16 and the C-17A that the Pentagon has condescended to allow Canada to purchase were shown, the announcers gushed over this fact. The announcer did mention that the multi-billion dollar purchase of C-17A's by the Canadian Air Force had been controversial in Parliament, but stated that the fact that the first one had just delivered war material to Canadian troops in Kandahar, Afghanistan was "proof" that the decision to purchase the plane from Boeing was the right one. He bragged that with planes like the C-17A, Canada's Air Force was prepared to "defend human rights and freedom both here and abroad."<br /><br />I imagine that there were many Canadians in the audience who realized that the people of Afghanistan and Iraq get a US "air show" every day, and that the main reason the USAF is willing to put on such a show in Canada is to remind the Canadians of their secondary status. "Hah--you waste all your money on health care, while we spend ours on the 'most lethal aircraft ever'!"<br /><br />On a superficial level, an enjoyable experience in a beautiful setting. On a deeper level, the whole thing was quite disturbing.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-6917984764083000892007-08-31T12:03:00.000-04:002007-08-31T12:04:46.881-04:00Ten years since Princess Di'edSeems like only just 9 7/8ths.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-32640458054548154702007-08-31T11:59:00.000-04:002007-08-31T12:01:55.469-04:00Greetings from London!London, Ontario, that is. I'm on the Via Rail train from Windsor to Toronto, where I'll be for the next two days. Just another overweight guy from Michigan come to see what's going on in our saner neighbor to the north. (Although I headed south to get in--Windsor is pretty much straight south of Detroit.)Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-58978547194663056102007-08-30T11:08:00.000-04:002007-08-30T11:09:29.609-04:00<img src=http://www.cagle.com/working/070829/sheneman00.gif><br>From <a href="http://www.cagle.com/politicalcartoons/PCcartoons/sheneman.asp">Drew Sheneman</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-41210421294287367632007-08-29T09:52:00.000-04:002007-08-29T09:53:44.633-04:00<img src=http://www.xoverboard.com/cartoons/2007/070820_jenna.png><br>From <a href="http://www.xoverboard.com/cartoons/2007/070820_jenna.html">August J. Pollak</a>.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-38347363494960107742007-08-29T09:40:00.000-04:002007-08-29T09:45:21.475-04:00The Great Iraq SwindleMatt Taibi writes in <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/16076312/the_great_iraq_swindle">Rolling Stone</a>:<blockquote>Operation Iraqi Freedom, it turns out, was never a war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. It was an invasion of the federal budget, and no occupying force in history has ever been this efficient. George W. Bush's war in the Mesopotamian desert was an experiment of sorts, a crude first take at his vision of a fully privatized American government. In Iraq the lines between essential government services and for-profit enterprises have been blurred to the point of absurdity -- to the point where wounded soldiers have to pay retail prices for fresh underwear, where modern-day chattel are imported from the Third World at slave wages to peel the potatoes we once assigned to grunts in KP, where private companies are guaranteed huge profits no matter how badly they f**k things up.<br /><br />And just maybe, reviewing this appalling history of invoicing orgies and million-dollar boondoggles, it's not so far-fetched to think that this is the way someone up there would like things run all over -- not just in Iraq but in Iowa, too, with the state police working for Corrections Corporation of America, and DHL with the contract to deliver every Christmas card. And why not? What the Bush administration has created in Iraq is a sort of paradise of perverted capitalism, where revenues are forcibly extracted from the customer by the state, and obscene profits are handed out not by the market but by an unaccountable government bureaucracy. This is the triumphant culmination of two centuries of flawed white-people thinking, a preposterous mix of authoritarian socialism and laissez-faire profiteering, with all the worst aspects of both ideologies rolled up into one pointless, supremely idiotic military adventure -- American men and women dying by the thousands, so that Karl Marx and Adam Smith can blow each other in a Middle Eastern glory hole.</blockquote>As is commonly said here in the blogosphere--read the <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/16076312/the_great_iraq_swindle">whole thing</a>!Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-92174736205741956552007-08-27T21:10:00.000-04:002007-08-27T21:12:47.320-04:00I'm sure it won'tUnfortunate headline du jour: <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070828/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/gonzales_resigns;_ylt=AjiZ.cacBuqFKP_VMtoQ0P6s0NUE">Gonzales departure won't end probes</a><br /><br />No rest for the souls lost in the American gulag. Torture Inc. is bigger than one man.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-11495982362975431652007-08-27T09:45:00.000-04:002007-08-27T09:56:53.787-04:00Going, Going, GONZO!<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070827/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/gonzales_resigns;_ylt=AoJeFfP_53HuXSEWp0qErems0NUE">AP reports</a> that Torture Gonzales has resigned. While this should be good news, the Bushies have shown a nearly infinite capability to replace horrible with even worse, as with Gonzo's replacing Ashcroft, or Rice replacing Powell, or Roberts/Scalito replacing Rehnquist/O'Connor. And the politiburo, after making a few ineffectual noises, generally rubber-stamps whatever criminal moron Bush nominates.<br /><br />Advice to Democrats: Stonewall whoever Bush nominates. Make the next AG be one nominated by a Democrat. The country won't survive yet another Bush-nominated AG. Don't worry--if the next AG is picked by Hillary, he/she will be plenty bad enough to satisfy your corporate backers.Bobtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781441.post-86833719122239368862007-08-24T09:25:00.000-04:002007-08-24T09:31:55.083-04:00Ethnic cleansing and apartheidBoth are a result of the invasion of Iraq, and especially the "surge." Quite possibly, they were the INTENT of the surge, as <a href="http://www.chris-floyd.com/Articles/Articles/Bipartisan_Paradise%3A_Liberals%2C_Bush_Unite_in_Ethnic_Cleansing_of_Iraq/">Chris Floyd explains</a>:<blockquote>Most of the measures taken during the "surge" seem aimed precisely at ethnic cleansing: the increased support of the Iraqi government security forces -- which are largely Shiite militias -- has been matched with what some see as the lunatic policy of<a target="_blank" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/22/AR2007082201246_pf.html"> arming Sunni militias</a>.<br /><br />The latter is indeed a lunatic policy -- <span style="font-style: italic;">if</span> your aim is to establish security and political rapprochement in Iraq. And although the leaders of the United States are indeed a gang of depraved moral idiots, they are not lunatics. Even they could see the folly of such a course -- again, if the aim was actually security and political cohesion. Thus one can only conclude that this is <span style="font-style: italic;">not </span>their aim, that their aim is indeed to exacerbate ethnic conflict, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.chris-floyd.com/Articles/Articles/The_Time_of_the_Assassins%3A_Bushists_Stirring_Iraq%2C_Iran_Into_a_Bloody_Stew/">to foment more violence,</a> in what amounts to a stealth operation of ethnic cleansing.<br /><br />This serves two main purposes: first, as noted above, it will help shake the country out, eventually, into more manageable enclaves -- each one stronger and more cohesive than the current government (which is largely a fictional notion at this point), yet weaker, and more malleable, than any stable and legitimate central government would be. And since the only kind of central government that could achieve stability and legitimacy in the eyes of all Iraqis would be one which was genuinely sovereign, truly independent from American domination, we will never see such a government in Baghdad as long as U.S. troops are in Iraq. <br /><br />Which brings us to the second purpose of the "surge's" arming of sectarian gangs: to maintain a level of violence and chaos that would "justify" the continuing presence of American troops in Iraq. A permanent military presence is one of the overriding goals of the invasion, <a target="_blank" href="http://empireburlesquenow.blogspot.com/2005/03/dark-passage-pnacs-blueprint-for.html">set down long before the war</a>, before 9/11, even before the loser Bush was given the presidency by five Supreme Court justices (two of whom had family members working for the Bush operation). Therefore, to the Bushists, any measure is justified that will keep American troops in Iraq -- including fomenting bloody sectarian conflict and carrying out ethnic cleansing.</blockquote>Bob