Signal Boost

Rally in Asheville, N. C. on April 4.  (Via Mills River Progressive)

Form to RSVP and map.

Instead of Coffee

In which Shark-fu lives up to her blog title.

Let’s talk about the removal of comprehensive sex education from our schools and how our young people enter adulthood with the abstinence only advice to put a quarter between their legs and squeeze.

Let’s talk about how the debate over life ends at birth…about the young women I’ve met who chose to have a baby only to find that the same people praising them for that decision won’t hire them, don’t want them moving into their neighborhood, will one day grab their handbag and lock their car door when that black baby becomes a black man who walks by them on the sidewalk.

Under the Radar

Southern Beale posts on religious leaders beginning a fast/hunger strike to protest the Republican-authored (Federal) budget:

Anyway, I’m posting this information for a couple of reasons. 1) Not all Christians are right-wing, intolerant assholes and 2) Budgets are moral documents which tell the world your priorities. Where your treasure is, so is your heart. And if your treasure is devoted to war, and torture, and bombs, instead of feeding poor children and funding schools and the rest, then you’re in deep trouble as a nation. You're failing your people. And when no one in power stands up and says "enough, this will not stand," then you no longer have the moral authority to tell anyone else in the world how to behave.

[Link and emphasis added.  And by the way?  Not feeding poor children?  Deeply un-Christian.]

Hmmmmmmmmmm...

Jurassicpork's guest blogger at Welcome Back to Pottersville is Susan Lindauer on Libya.

More Information

Zeno Ferox discusses the Cronon blogpost, the Republican reaction, and some more information about ALEC (no, not the actor who played Obi-wan Kenobi nor the Baldwin brother -- the American Legislative Exchange Council, a shadowy group):

The book begins by offering a bogus quote from Abraham Lincoln, the long-since refuted litany that begins, “You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.” Perhaps it's significant that ALEC's book opens with a hoax, especially given the hollow-shell justifications of Republican politicians who claim that collective bargaining must die if workers are to prosper. I presume they will soon introduce measures to establish more prisons and workhouses to manage the poor.

Is the old ALEC paperback out-of-date and of little use to us today? I think not. Although it carries a publication date of 1980, the 92-page booklet is oracular in its contents. The nutcase wet-dreams of yesteryear are the standard policy planks of today's teabagger politicians. Here, for your edification, is a sampler of the Source Book's list of model legislation. The headings are from the booklet and the descriptions are excerpted from the actual text. A few may seem like motherhood and apple pie (both of which, come to think of it, are now more controversial than they used to be), but there are some real nuggets of crazy in here. The first item is especially pertinent (complete with Wisconsin reference!).

The rest of the post consists of summaries of some of the proposed legislation. A sample:

Improving Education

Textbook Content Standards Act. The suggested Textbook Content Standards Act establishes the requirement that textbooks and teaching materials adopted for use in public schools accurately portray American history, tradition and values. Abraham Lincoln said, “The philosophy of the classroom today is the philosophy of the government tomorrow.” [There's no citation, of course. Is this another bogus Lincoln quote? If so, how nice to find it in an item about accuracy in textbooks!]

Honor America Act. The suggested Honor America Act requires that all public elementary and secondary school students recite the Pledge of Allegiance during each school day.

It looks reasonable until you think about what is meant by "American history, tradition and values." Also, although the folks at ALEC probably don't know this, those who took the Pledge seriously are diametrically opposed to everything conservatives desire ("liberty and justice for all" will probably get edited out of the ALEC-approved Pledge), not to mention that some religions do not pledge or take oaths.

Sunlight!  Sunlight!

[ETA:  via Amygdala, and apparently I've had that window open for two days.)

Snarking the Pol

Via jurassicpork (who is requesting donations), "The Rant" by Tom Degan, who dissects Newt "Not related to 'Whiplash Willie'" Gingrich's ambition.

Why bother with fact when there are volumes of lies waiting to be exploited? Newt fancies himself a historian. His specialty seems to be historical fiction. My advice to him would be to find another line of work. Gore Vidal he ain't.

Verrrry Interesting...

Via Shakesville:  T. A. Frank at Washington Monthly back in 2007 on why Bob Herbert is not more "influential:"

...Beltway insularity is to blame. Never have I felt more inclined to resort to this explanation than when I met Bob Herbert, whom I wound up liking just as much as I feared I would. He makes a pretty good case for the idea that it is cocooned Washington types like me who are the problem.

[...]

This whodunit will not have an ending worthy of Agatha Christie. But it will, at least, have a resolution: Bobdunit. It's true that elites don't care enough about the world of the working class or the poor. It's true that human nature is inherently biased against Herbert-style entreaties. These obstacles make his job very, very hard. But they are constants. A columnist must use the only variable, his column, to surmount them. Instead, Bob Herbert disregards them. His underlying problem turns out to be simple: he doesn't write with his audience in mind.

If we're using the beer test *ptui* I'd have the alcoholic beverage of my choice with Mr. Herbert; Mr. Brooks and/or Mr. Douthat would wind up, sooner or later, wearing the beer.

In Memoriam

• Diana Wynne Jones, author;
• Olga Ulyanova, niece of V. I. Lenin (né Vladimir Ulyanov);
• Geraldine Ferraro, 1984 Vice-Presidential candidate;
• Richard Leacock, documentarian.

Late Breaking News: Bob Herbert Leaving New York Times

His last column for the Times:

So here we are pouring shiploads of cash into yet another war, this time in Libya, while simultaneously demolishing school budgets, closing libraries, laying off teachers and police officers, and generally letting the bottom fall out of the quality of life here at home.

Welcome to America in the second decade of the 21st century.

That leaves no one whose op-eds I would read. That means I am only reading the Paper of Record for the obituaries and the occasional deep background article.

Actually Fair and Balanced

Via Echidne of the Snakes, the history of the rebirth of conservatism by William Cronon, a history professor at the University of Wisconsin, who's done some research on this matter.

I want to add a word of caution here at the end. In posting this study guide, I do not want to suggest that I think it is illegitimate in a democracy for citizens who share political convictions to gather for the purpose of sharing ideas or creating strategies to pursue their shared goals. The right to assemble, form alliances, share resources, and pursue common ends is crucial to any vision of democracy I know. (That’s one reason I’m appalled at Governor Walker’s ALEC-supported efforts to shut down public employee unions in Wisconsin, even though I have never belonged to one of those unions, probably never will, and have sometimes been quite critical of their tactics and strategies.) I’m not suggesting that ALEC, its members, or its allies are illegitimate, corrupt, or illegal. If money were changing hands to buy votes, that would be a different thing, but I don’t believe that’s mainly what’s going on here. Americans who belong to ALEC do so because they genuinely believe in the causes it promotes, not because they’re buying or selling votes.

Succinct Statement of Fact

Avedon Carol:

In other words, while the Republicans are certainly mean and crazy mad dogs with rabies, the Democrats are also crazy and at best callous beyond all decency, though they don't have rabies and therefore don't foam at the mouth, thus appearing "saner". But they are still destructive, callous, and embarked on a course to barbarism. Whether they are stupid enough to believe the crap they write or simply working from the script is, while an entertaining question for late-night drinking bouts, largely irrelevant, since both parties are trying to enforce right-wing policies on you and destroy the very essence of the American form of government (i.e., liberal government).

And no, "barbarism" is not too strong a term.

Centennial

Today is the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire.

Today politicians are trying to strip workers of unions and preventive regulations.  They are doing this where unions were once strong.

Today we need to say a loud "No!" to the conservative agenda.

I am not now and will never be a conservative, and this is one reason why.

21st Century Epistle

Anna van Z of Mills River Progressive writes the letter we all wish we could send to our Congresspeople and/or Senators; a tiny piece:

While we're at it, why are you people allowed to profit from your investments while in congress, when your decisions directly affect the profitability of those investments? Why is such a blatant conflict of interest allowed? Furthermore, if you hate government-assisted health care so much, why haven't you relinquished your own tax-payer funded, lifelong health benefits? Why not just buy your own health insurance from your corporate benefactors? Won't they give you a discount?

There's a lot more.  (I throttled an intemperate and profane rant recently; this is so much better written!)

Threesome

• Fafblog!'s Medium Lobster on Libya:

  And so it is that the United States is fighting to free the Libyan people from the Libyan people by killing the Libyan people. The situation is fairly straightforward, after all - Libya faces a humanitarian crisis, and the only way to address a humanitarian crisis is to bomb it with hundreds of cruise missiles. I'm told that the Red Cross still delivers bottled water and medical supplies by duct-taping them to the nose cone of an outgoing Tomahawk. More importantly, the Libyan people are oppressed by a bloodthirsty dictator - a dictator who kills his own people - and the least we can do is kill those people ourselves. How, I ask, can we stand idly by and allow people to be slaughtered by a ruthless tyrant when we could be slaughtering them instead?

• Young male feminist on matching his actions to his ideals:

  I took a feminist-political-theory class my junior year and was introduced to feminist writers and activists of all different stripes. For an uninitiated 20-year-old, it was rather uncomfortable sitting through readings of The Vagina Monologues, but in hindsight I'm grateful. It was challenging and enlightening, but also frustrating and disheartening, to come to the realization that I had been complicit in the oppression of women simply because I was unaware.
  
  Years later, I still have a lot of changing to do. See, it's one thing for me to admonish someone like Chris Brown for violence against women, but it's completely different to analyze my own shortcomings

• Republic of T's Terrance, with pictures, on the de-industrialization of Detroit:

  But that’s not what’s happened with Detroit. Nor is this the story of some lost civilization that left only its architecture behind to help us determine just what did it in. We’re not talking about the Nazca Lines, the Lost City of Atlantis, the lost colony.
  
  Ever since I was a child, I’ve had an affinity for abandoned places. During trips to visit my grandparents, I would pass the time looking at the kudzu-covered shacks, the abandoned storefronts, and old, empty houses along the Georgia highways. I’d wonder about the people who lived or worked in those places, what stories they held, and make up stories about how they came to be abandoned.
  
  But when I look at the pictures of Detroit’s ruins, I don’t have to wonder or make up the story of what happened. Neither should anyone else.

If the archaelogists need cheat sheets, though...

Food for Thought

• Echidne of the Snakes on Why Unions Matter.

  Unions also matter in the political market place. Out of the ten largest donors to political parties, three are unions, and those are the only three which do not donate only to Republicans. If unions can be de-fanged altogether (and we are almost there), one of the few wider channels of donations to the Democratic Party will also die. That the Democrats in the Congress don't appear overly worried about this makes me wonder what color the sky might be in their world.

• Republic of T mentions Elizabeth Taylor's activism at AmFAR.
• Southern Beale on the media not getting it:

  It's kind of sad that the media doesn’t get it. We’ve been in a recession for a really, really long time -- since long before the market crash of 2007. I remember blogging about all the people left behind from the supposed “Bush boom,” and Republicans calling me “angry” and “negative” and a “blame American first” kind of person who suffered from “Bush derangement syndrome.” I mean seriously, am I the only one who remembers these conversations from 2004? Am I the only one who remembers arguing with Bill Hobbs every time he blogged about how terrific the economy was? Am I the only one who remembers George W. Bush telling a divorced mother that it's "fantastic" and "uniquely American" that she works three jobs? As if she wanted to?

• Driftglass...reports on an actual smackdown of Thomas Friedman by someone who knows the history and territory of the Middle East.  And what he found when he checked back later to verify the transcript:

  What is equally interesting in almost exactly the opposite way is the fact that between the time I heard the broadcast live on the air, and the time I checked with the WBEZ website to listen to the above exchange one more time so as to transcribe Mr. Saud's world accurately, someone at WBEZ excised a few of Mr. Saud's more lacerating comments as well as the name of at least one other person who Mr. Saud included in a more generalized indictment of the punditocracy and which WBEZ also censored on the taped version.

  Mmm-hmmmmmmmmm...
  
• From Dr. Grumpy, the main problem with money-driven medicine.

In Memoriam

Elizabeth Taylor, movie star.

She's been around, illnesses, marriages, and all, for my entire life.

In Memoriam

Pinetop Perkins, Delta bluesman and piano player.




[crossposted]

Funky, Funky

So, anyway:

• Jill of Brilliant at Breakfast on ignorance, stupidity, and what the media pushes.

  I understand why people might want to be ignorant of current affairs. When you have kids that you're going to try to put through college when an in-state school is going to cost you six figures over four years; when your house is worth less than you owe on it after taking an equity loan to remodel the kitchen four years ago; when your spouse lost her job last year and now yours is on shaky ground; when the little you've been able to squirrel away for retirement is now showing minus signs again because the markets panic every time someone says "Boo!"; when being informed means having to confront the realities of the Middle East and what nuclear power means, and half of Japan being obliterated, and this winter's weird weather being not just a fluke but an ominous sign of things to come; when it costs you forty bucks to gas up a Honda Civic but you can't car-pool because you never know how late you're going to have to stay at the office; it's not surprising that people would prefer to stay ignorant and just watch Dancing With the Stars.
  
  But to do so is to participate in the continued handing over of our country to the oligarchs. And when we are all scrambling for the scraps left after the oligarchs can't stuff themselves with another bite, perhaps Americans will wish they'd paid more attention instead of watching Extra every night.

• Jill also pointed me at Sardonicky, which has further information on the NY Times' digital subscription scheme (I wonder if converting to single page is considered two articles--probably not, but one never knows.  I'm also trying to train myself to go to the site only once a day) and why it's not such a hot idea.
• The Republic of T on being the face of same-sex marriage and the future.

  Like I’ve said before, it makes a difference on the street where we live, and in countless other communities where our neighbors witness us going about our lives as a family, with the same ups and downs that any other family experiences. When we chat with our neighbors and with parents of our kids classmates and playmates, we talk about the things that any other family talks about. We talk about work, or the economy, or schools, and often about parenting as we exchange stories and advice, or just share experiences.

• Via Daisy's Dead Air, Lotus-Surviving a Dark Time (aka Whoviating) analyzes the Republican efforts to destroy our way of life:

  That what, the something that is under attack, is sometimes called The Commons. I'm using the term here in a somewhat broader sense than its more usual economic understanding of referring to shared resources; rather, I'm thinking of a philosophical Commons, a social Commons, of the idea of a public sphere wherein all can participate, all have a stake, all have a part - and all have some responsibility. That space of socially shared and mutual duty, of what is or at least by rights should be equally available to all.
  
  It's true that that sense of The Commons has always been under attack from the elites of our society; indeed, that is likely true of the elites of any society, who tend to care neither for the idea of all having a stake nor for the idea of they themselves having responsibilities to others other than those self-imposed ones of noblesse oblige, the true purpose of which is to demonstrate that elite's superiority. But the intensity and range of the attack we are seeing now is nearly if not totally unprecedented here.

• Brief comic relief:  The CBC's arts section's roundup of New York reviews for Priscilla, Queen of the Desert misstated the name of the reviewer for the New York Times.  It's Charles.  Not Christopher.  (Also, the comment section for that article is closed already.)
• Yesterday, by way of several abandoned blogs, I found some Bugs Bunny cartoons.  I spent an hour or so there.  Yay, Bugs!

"Spring is Here, Uh-Suh-puh-Ring is Here!"

That equinox thing is around here somewhere...

(Why yes, I am playing the appropriate Tom Lehrer song.)

We're having one of those sunshine-and-precipitation days that require both an umbrella and SPF 15 lotion.

During the gig that drove home to me just how lousy a waitress I would be, I started on Peter Straub's A Dark Matter, which I finished a few days later.  I hadn't, outside of the first collaboration with Stephen King, read any of his books after Ghost Story, probably because of the occasional loose end.

It was OK.

Part of it takes place in Madison, Wisconsin.  (It's a coincidence.)

Anyway.  It features ...something... which kills one of the characters.

Arthur Silber characterizes the U.S. as something similar, only with insulting names and some examples.

The United States government is led by blood-guzzling, flesh-eating pigfuckers. Fuck polite.

I must mention one other aspect of much of the criticism being offered about the assault on Libya. Many writers point out in excruciating, mind-numbing detail that the assault won't "work," that it will fail to achieve its announced aims, that it will certainly lead to more death and suffering rather than less, and so on and so forth. All of which is true in one sense -- but all of which is, from the only perspective that genuinely matters, completely irrelevant.

Doubling Down on Stupid

This will all go down better if you are singing "Send in the Clowns."

• The U.S. is now at war with Libya.  And Qaddafi promises a long war.  And I would not at all be surprised if al-Qaeda is rushing operatives to Tripoli right now.  Hello, recruitment opportunity!
• Southern Beale's reaction.
• Anna van Z (Mills River Progressive)'s coverage of weekend protests and reaction.
• John Shuck at Shuck and Jive calls shenanigans and backs this with a quote from Reinhold Niebuhr.
• And Comrade Misfit prices a missile and reminds us that those on the right do not consider that as budget-busting.

The IAEA Reports

The International Atomic Energy Agency on the Fukushima nuclear emergency.  With graphics.

Miscellany

• At flip flopping joy, communications (letter to Michiganders in body and spirit) from Michael Moore, who has been following events in his home state, especially the budget.
• The return of Aristide to Haiti.
• Via Geri Sullivan at Live Journal:  Mike Glicksohn has died.

Gory Details

The New York Times rolls out its digital subscription plan.

I think this means I can still direct readers to the Obituary section; I link more than 20 of those individually a month, and outside links are unlimited.  So far.

There are other sources.

Two Things

• Single female politician slammed for not having a family;
• Limits on Internet use.  Net neutrality was important.

OK. Back to Regularly Scheduled Blogging

I have a horrible confession to make here.

I've never used the Huffington Post as a source.  (Unless I was using someone else's link.)  This was not from exaggerated purity or ideological difference.  I just never went there.  Some marvelous writers posted there, but I only saw them if someone had put up a link.  It stinks that the site was making money and not paying the writers (and I imagine that Harlan Ellison would have been quite scathing on that score) but HuffPo was rather out of my daily ambit.

However, it seems that one [excuse me--I need to take a very hot bath now] Andrew Breitbart [and scrub] is now blogging there, and I am willing to bet that he is getting paid. (Warning:  If you follow that link, there is a rape image.) (My assumption that he is getting paid is pure speculation based on cynicism.)

So the worth of HuffPo as information just went to zilch.  Known liars do not supply good data.

Because the Political Stuff's at Dreamwidth

Atlantis believed found in Spain.  Via seattlepi.com (say, isn't it Pi Day?  Have an arc's worth of  fruit-filled pastry to celebrate!)

Slippery Facts

Of spies and diplomatic immunity, via Scott Horton at Harper's.

Reciprocity

Scott Horton at Harper's:

This weekend tens of thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators in Egypt stormed the headquarters of the Mubarak regime’s secret police in Alexandria and Cairo—flooding the Internet with pictures of the cells and torture devices used there. Leaders of the effort said their raid was undertaken to preserve evidence of the mistreatment of prisoners so that appropriate measures could be taken for accountability in the future. Around the world, the outcry against this regime of torture and terror is rising and fueling massive public uprisings–as we see today in Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and Yemen. This movement was spurred in part by WikiLeaks disclosures that helped lay bare the corruption and venality of these regimes. The brig commander at Quantico should consider carefully whether it is really wise to deal with a young whistleblower by using watered-down versions of the tools of tyrannical oppression with which regimes like Mubarak, Ben Ali, and Qaddafi are so closely associated.

ETA: Uh-oh.

Yahrzeit

Yahrzeit.

Blankie, Warm Milk, Comforter, Soft Music, Dark Room

Got all that?

Good.

The explosion at the Japanese nuclear plant apparently released less radiation than expected, which is a good thing if true, because the graphic representation of the fallout distribution (via Brilliant at Breakfast) was a bit alarming this morning [ETA:  That post has been taken down; apparently the graphic was not sourceable.].  Interestingly, yesterday the story in the NY Times was that strict building codes had saved lives, but today (for tomorrow's paper) the line is that there are still limits to what preparedness can do, although most of the article recounts the ways in which Americans are very much not prepared.  If your child is in school in Oregon, for example?  Chances are the school is not reinforced for earthquakes.

Avedon has links to a lot of articles that everyone should be taking very seriously.  If we want this country back, that is.  (I think that a general strike would be a most effective weapon if Americans would actually stand together, but we don't know how, and we've all got weaselly excuses.  Many weaselly excuses.  That tsk-ing noise you're hearing is the Founding Fathers and Emma Goldman.)  There are still protesters in Wisconsin, and they need a focus.

ETA:  The IWW are still around, and they have information (link via silveradept at Dreamwidth):

In essence, a general strike is the complete and total shutdown of the economy. A general strike can last for a day, a week, or longer depending on the severity of the crisis, the resolve of the strikers, and the extent of public solidarity. During the strike, large numbers of workers in many industries (excluding employees of crucial services, such as emergency/medical) will stop working and no money or labor is exchanged. All decisions regarding the length of the strike, the groups of workers who continue working, and demands of the strikers are decided by a strike committee.

Past victories won by general strikes are:

· Chicago, New York, Cincinnati, and elsewhere, 1886 – First victory in the fight for an eight-hour day

· Toledo, OH, 1934 – First successful unionization of the auto industry.

· San Franc[is]co, CA, 1934 – Unionization of all West Coast ports of the United States.

· Poland, 1980 – Began the process of democratic reforms that led to the end of Soviet control over the country.

· Egypt, 2011 – Brought the 30-year reign of an autocratic despot to an end.

If enough of us act together, we’ll see some serious changes, and quick. That’s the “general” part of a general strike. We’re all divided up by race, religion, gender, and political affiliation. In a general strike, people come together in large numbers across those divisions and unite around our struggles as workers. If enough of us stand together and stop work, Walker’s bill will be defeated – even if it passes! If enough of us are united, WE can decide the outcome.

[Bolding in first paragraph is mine.]

Meanwhile Rep. Peter King, who doesn't believe the Irish Republican Army did terrorism, but all Muslims do, probably wouldn't believe these people are terrorists, either (via Comrade Misfit).  Mr. King is wrong about Muslims, too.  Not a surprise.

Jean-Bertrand Aristide, former (and elected) president of Haiti, is returning.  (Baby Doc Duvalier returned in January and was arrested.)

And via Pandagon, what Republicans really want.  Why yes, I have pointed this out before.  Why, of course, I will point it out again.  And I will buttress this truth with others, who tend to have things like statistics, experience, and a better grasp of history and sociology.  And every so often, I will make fun of it.  It's a survival technique.

Today...

is International Women's Day.  In fact, the 100th International Women's Day.  I read The Disappearance (Philip Wylie) many years ago, and oh, are there disputable assumptions and Just Plain Wrong guesses.  But it was interesting for its time.

Also Mardi Gras.

And I don't have a proper mask or plastic bead necklace to throw.  I forgot to have pancakes.  But it's a beautiful day, and not even the evil stupidity of politicians can destroy that.

Today is for harvesting joy.

Morning Readings

Brilliant at Breakfast:  Jill's title says it all.  Watch the video anyway.  Oh, and if some bozo (and yes, that is the technical term for it) starts yammering about how building codes are evil, expensive, and a Dreadful Imposition on Freedom, point said bozo to this video, this article at Making Light, this article at Wikipedia on the Iroquois Theater fire.

One of the odd sidelights of the Our Lady of Angels fire (Chicago, 1958; I remember reading about it in the Buffalo Courier-Express) is that one of the survivors grew up, changed his last name, and is best known as a keyboardist with Journey.

The Way We Live Now

1. Business reporters trying to kill electronic vehicles, from the perspective of someone who has ordered one (Southern Beale).

   You know what pisses me off about this whole thing? McFail started with the idea that American consumers are not embracing EV vehicles, and then went looking for some numbers to back up that presupposition. So that’s how you kids do journalism these days! And her colleague Indiviglio, while trying to correct her, still stuck by that basic premise for some absurd reason I cannot fathom.

2. Via Mills River Progressive, the list of Koch products to boycott:

   Brands from the Evil Empire:
   
   Angel Soft toilet paper
   Brawny paper towels
   Dixie plates, bowls, napkins and cups
   Mardi Gras napkins and towels
   Quilted Northern toilet paper
   Soft 'n Gentle toilet paper
   Sparkle napkins
   Vanity fair napkins
   Zee napkins
   Georgia-Pacific paper products and envelopes
   
   All Georgia-Pacific lumber and building products, including:
   Dense Armor Drywall and Decking
   ToughArmor Gypsum board
   Georgia pacific Plytanium Plywood
   Flexrock
   Densglass sheathing
   G/P Industrial plasters (some products used by a lot of crafters)
   FibreStrong Rim board
   G/P Lam board
   Blue Ribbon OSB Rated Sheathing
   Blue Ribbon Sub-floor
   DryGuard Enhanced OSB
   Nautilus Wall Sheathing
   Thermostat OSB Radiant Barrier Sheathing
   Broadspan Engineered Wood Products
   XJ 85 I-Joists
   FireDefender Banded Cores
   FireDefender FS
   FireDefender Mineral Core
   Hardboard and Thin MDF including Auto Hardboard
   Commercial Roof Fiberboard
   Perforated Hardboard and Thin MDF
   Wood Fiberboard
   Hushboard Sound Deadening Board
   Regular Fiberboard Sheathing
   Structural Fiberboard Sheathing
   
   (INVISTA Products):
   COMFOREL® fiberfill
   COOLMAX® fabric
   CORDURA® fabric
   DACRON® fiber
   POLYSHIELD® resin
   SOLARMAX® fabric
   SOMERELLE® bedding products
   STAINMASTER® carpet
   SUPPLEX® fabric
   TACTEL® fiber
   TACTESSE® carpet fiber
   TERATE® polyols
   TERATHANE® polyether glycol
   THERMOLITE® fabric
   PHENREZ® resin
   POLARGUARD® fiber and
   LYCRA® fiber

   (Boldfacing and single-spacing mine.)
3. Republic of T sent me over to Booman Tribune, whose Steven D explains the Republican agenda with historical examples and statistics.

   The Republicans in Congress, and in states across the country are making no bones about their agenda: they desire to kill unions and worker's rights. They desire to kill the EPA, and kill any regulation regarding worker safety, drug safety, food safety, environmental safety -- you name it. They want to destroy Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and healthcare reform with a thousand cuts until nothing is left but private accounts managed by by their buddies at Wall Street to which you are forced to contribute. They want to privatize prisons and schools.
   
   They want an end to financial assistance to college students and their families (except football and basketball players, of course). They want to kill any investment in alternative fuels and public transportation. They desire the awarding of no-bid contracts to their "friends," i.e., the people who contributed the most to their political campaigns. Oh, and they want to make it ever more difficult, if not impossible, for innovative small businesses to compete with the corporate behemoths that dominate our political landscape. Indeed, without a middle class how can small businesses not dedicated to serving the desires of the rich survive?

   In The Stand, there's a scene in which Randall Flagg (I'm not spoiling the book for anyone if I state that Mr. Flagg is the Devil, right?) and his high henchman visit Prof. Glen Bateman in prison.

      "Shoot one of us, anyhow, Lloyd," he said. ... It's guys like this that you wanted to get back at. Little guys who talk big."
      Lloyd said: Mister, you don't fool me. It's like Randy Flagg says."
      "But he lies. You know he lies."
      "He told me more of the truth than anyone else bothered to in my whole lousy life," Lloyd said, and shot Glen three times.

   Not, of course, the whole truth.  But people won't hear things they don't want to hear.
   

Mr. Kafka, Mr. Franz Kafka to the White Courtesy Phone, Please.

On the treatment of Pfc. Bradley Manning.  And why it isn't just an aberration.

ETA:  Decided a quote would help:

Thus, according to this spokesman, Manning is subjected to repeated humiliation and degradation -- for his own good. Moreover, the reason for the repeated humiliation and degradation cannot be provided because of the military's boundless concern for Manning's "privacy" -- that is, the military also refuses to explain the reason for its cruelty for Manning's own good.

Does the nightmare begin to assume more definite shape before you? If you feel assaulted in the depths of your being by this mere recitation of the facts -- and you should -- you are experiencing but the faintest shadow of what Manning experiences in captivity. Manning is, I remind you, only the "accused."

via Once Upon a Time....

Resource

The Wheeler Report for Wisconsin news.

The "Success" (Ha!) of the Irish Economy

The "Celtic Tiger"...and the lessons thereof, or why conservatives would prefer drawing the wrong conclusion.

In conservative framing, Ireland represents both an ideal we should strive for, and omen we should heed. That framing omits one important element. What conservatives idealize about the Irish economy is also what’s most ominous.

[...]

Ireland, Paul Krugman noted, got into its current mess by traveling almost exactly the same economic path as the U.S. And it is where we could end up, if we stay on that path — which is what conservative policy would have us do; complete with further deregulating of already out-of-control banks, and inflicting harsh, job-killing spending cuts on the rest of the population. It hasn’t been the recipe for recovery in Ireland and it won’t be here.

Republic of T reports.

Eyes Only

Warning on the use of social networking tools during revolutions.

Update

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:  Wisconsin budget, item by item.

Also [paragraph 14, under the picture of the woman in the red suit, contains irrelevant gratuitous sexism ], Walker packed his budget address with ringers.  And I don't mean bells.

ETA: via adsartha on Dreamwidth.

EFTA:  I am advised in comment that there is sexist language in the Abe Sauer article.  It's in the paragraph under the photo of the woman in the red suit (Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch).  That paragraph is almost completely (except for taking place in the Assembly room at the Capitol) irrelevant to the story and out of place.  (Mr. Sauer would probably disagree.)

At the moment, though, Mr. Sauer's is the eyewitness account that's available.  I expect The Isthmus to have something later, since one of their reporters was there, and ACLU Madison reports on testimony (both are Twitter links).  Comments to this article on the Daily Page of The Isthmus (scroll down to Chris Lapp's comment) allude to the supporters and the tunnel.  Here's a link to the video of Walker's speech.  It's in several parts.  Not such a hot job of showing the galleries.

So I will be placing a warning above, for the time being, and switching out the link when I get a better one.

All Over The Place

And it's not even noon here.

• Shakesville has an interesting set of links on Wisconsin, including the fact that there seem to be Republican shenanigans going on and a violated court order.

  Rumor has it that these supporters entered through the steam tunnels. This has been hard to confirm, given that the one reporter who followed up on the story was met with terse men who appeared to be protecting the tunnels.
  
  This is a news story. I know its popular in progressive circles to talk about things like Citizens United and access to government, but what's happened in Wisconsin this week takes things to a whole new level. The governor of Wisconsin appears to be using his power to commandeer law enforcement personnel to keep people he disagrees with from participating in government, while allowing his friends access-- and he's done so in violation of a court order.

• The Daily Howler cites reporter failure in the coverage of Wisconsin's budget. Or, as the movie title went: Situation Hopeless... But Not Serious.
• Fox News lies. And it needs to be broadcast, go viral, and trip off the lips of 3 year olds. That's a potential 11-letter Googlebomb right there.

  Yes, this rotten carcass of a news organization stinks from the head down. Not a shocker, of course. But one wonders how much longer this propaganda machine can keep up the charade or, more importantly, how much longer everyone else in the media will keep up the pretense, as well. I mean really: don't you folks take pride in your work? In your industry? It's almost like the rest of the media universe is purposely pretending that Fox is a legitimate media outlet, but why?

  Many of you are too young to remember the terms Communist propaganda and Nazi propaganda. In fact, I don't think I've heard the word "propaganda" in many years. But there you are. They admit that they lie. Think of Fox News as the National Enquirer with a bigger budget. Believe no Fox News story unless it's been verified by 3 sources (not counting other Murdoch outlets).
• Also via Shakesville, Mark Harris in Gentlemen's Quarterly GQ on the future of movies.

  And no Inception. Now, to be fair, in modern Hollywood, it usually takes two years, not one, for an idea to make its way through the alimentary canal of the system and onto multiplex screens, so we should really be looking at summer 2012 to see the fruit of Nolan's success. So here's what's on tap two summers from now: an adaptation of a comic book. A reboot of an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a sequel to an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a reboot of an adaptation of a TV show. A sequel to a sequel to a reboot of an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a sequel toa cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a movie based on a young-adult novel.2 And soon after: Stretch Armstrong. You remember Stretch Armstrong, right? That rubberized doll you could stretch and then stretch again, at least until the sludge inside the doll would dry up and he would become Osteoporosis Armstrong? A toy that offered less narrative interest than bingo?

  Yeah, it's marketers again.
• And in Missouri...

  All in all, this theatrical mess highlighted the callous disregard these state Senators have for their unemployed constituents…their complete ignorance over how unemployment funds work…their general wish to score political points with the conservative fringe on the people’s time…and the tragic limits of their vocabulary.
  
  My heart bleeds for their constituents, particularly for their unemployed constituents who should know after yesterday that none of these state Senators gives a flying shit about them.

  Shark-fu reporting for Angry Black Bitch.
• And South Carolina's governor blew off the National Governors Association in favor of hanging out with Republican governors only. Daisy Deadhead has the links.
• The unemployment blues.
• A conversation at Harper's with Zadie Smith.
• I'm beginning to sound like a newscast. Ick.
• So, to lighten things up: Daniel Radcliffe is rehearsing in a Broadway musical. (No, not the Anthroarachnid Play. How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.)

[crossposted]

Ah, Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Yip Mumm Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm...

Another excuse not to give you a job...and an attempt to outlaw it.

Via Southern Beale.