Category: Politics

The stupidity to which American citizenship condemns us all.

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Failing Infrastructure is not News

Online NewsHour: America’s Infrastructure Needs Crucial Repairs — April 4, 2006

Ever since one of the major bridges connecting Minneapolis to suburbs across the Mississippi river spontaneously collapsed, considerable time has been spent on the discussion of the state of the American infrastructure. In all of these discussion, little mention was ever made of the bipartisan report commissioned by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The results were released over a year and a half ago, and the commission endorsed the findings of the Association of Civil Engineers’ estimates.

What the association of civil engineers has done — and they do this every two or three years — is they do some kind of a balance sheet of the nation’s public assets. And they give it a grade, about A, B, C, D, on the level of being adequate.

And they’ve come up — their latest figure is that it would take a $1.6 trillion dollars to bring the infrastructure of this country up to an acceptable level of decency. We’re falling another $300 billion every two or three years behind because we don’t provide adequate support to this problem.

Now, I can also tell you that it’s very difficult to do this if you religiously think that you can’t raise taxes, and that you can’t raise revenues, and that fees are a problem, and, certainly, taxes are a problem.

Future failures of the sort that unraveled so dramatically in Minnesota in August of 2007 should therefore come as no surprise to anyone. We were all adequately forewarned, it would seem.

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“Bush is a Moron” Declares Alan Greenspan

Greenspan Is Critical Of Bush in Memoir | washingtonpost.com

The meaning is quite unmistakable. The implicit comparison between Clinton and Bush (W) made by Greenspan in the following paragraph (page two of the article linked above) necessarily leads to the conclusion stated in the title of this post.

However, he calls Clinton a “risk taker” who had shown a “preference for dealing in facts,” and presents Clinton and himself almost as soul mates. “Here was a fellow information hound. . . . We both read books and were curious and thoughtful about the world. . . . I never ceased to be surprised by his fascination with economic detail: the effect of Canadian lumber on housing prices and inflation. . . . He had an eye for the big picture too.”

In the rest of article, of course, Greenspan lambastes every Republican official from Bush down to Hastert and DeLay. His acerbic language (in the context of Greenspanese like “irrational exuberance”) leads one to think of how incredibly poorly these politicians must have acted in order to draw the ire of the most stolid man on the planet. Greenspan’s reaction is not just extreme by Greenspan’s own standards. It is unprecedented in American history.

Is it not?

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A Hopeless Cause?

Presidential Approval Ratings Since 2001

W approval ratings since 2001
If politics is a popularity game, then this graph paints a rather hopeless picture for the future of warmongers.

And a hopeful one for humanity.

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This Is Your Government on Iraq

Program shows CIA behind Wikipedia entries – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

With their baffling means of operating, the CIA and other US government agencies have given Wikipedia the greatest endorsement of legitimacy. If the greatest institutions that the US government has erected in the service of dissembling and misinforming have elected to target Wikipedia, then it must be the case that Wikipedia is a superb and reliable source of information.

Why theese agancies care to modify the entry regarding Adam Smith may remain classified for eternity, however.

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One Manual the White House Has

White House Manual Details How to Deal With Protesters – washingtonpost.com

Why is it that there is so much more documentation of the GOP’s expertise in staging appearances and playing dirty politics than there is documentation of expertise in military and economic theory and management? When they are compared with the military failures in Iraq economic discord here in the US, the public relations successes of the White House strongly hint at the distinct absence of manuals for economic and military success.

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Woe be the US Economy

Cisco CEO sees strong world economy, U.S. bumps – washingtonpost.com

There is ample political criticism in the commentary of CEOs like Cisco’s John Chambers. All CEOs of major American companies see opportunities for growth in every corner of the planet except in the United States. If this does not frighten people of the political establishment in the US, then it ought to give them pause, at the very least, when it is time to digest claims that slashing taxes and deregulating markets are beneficial. After all, according to CEOs, the net effect of reducing taxation and relaxing regulations in the US has been the creating of economic growth outside the US.

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Preview to Petraeus?

NIE Cites ‘Uneven’ Security Gains, Faults Iraqi Leaders – washingtonpost.com

Another government report is released, and yet again, the picture it paints contradicts virtually every claim made by the prosecutors of the military operation in Iraq. The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) released August 24, 2007, contains many discouraging findings, of which the following is typical.

The IC [Intelligence Community] assesses that the Iraqi Government will become more precarious over the next six to 12 months because of criticism by other members of the major Shia coalition (the Unified Iraqi Alliance, UIA), Grand Ayatollah Sistani, and other Sunni and Kurdish
parties. Divisions between Maliki and the Sadrists have increased, and Shia factions have explored alternative coalitions aimed at constraining Maliki.

It will be shocking if the highly anticipated Petraeus report contradicts any of these findings. After all, the findings of the Director of National defense have been quite consistent over the past few years. So, how on earth could Petraeus produce a report that categorically contradicts every one of the DNI’s major findings and the findings of other government and military bodies for the past four years? How could one general produce an assessment of reality that differs dramatically from the assessments of all of his predecessors? Why do these senseless pleas for patience keep finding sympathetic ears? Isn’t anyone listening?

And, if Petreaus does contradict everybody, would that mean that Commander in Chief was stupid enough to appoint boneheads to lead the Iraqi operation for the past four years? Or would it mean that Petraeus is the bonehead? The American psyche is plagued with such a pernicious insolence when it comes to reasoning that is not surprising at all that the majority fail to reason that Petraeus’ report will be damning to the White House no matter what it says.

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The Rewards for Military Service Increase

Going to war leaves US soldiers’ kids at risk – health – 31 July 2007 – New Scientist

It seems as if the entire American identity is wrapped in the admirable shroud of World War II. Every military involvement is compared with it, every aspect of American pride derives from it, and every criticism of American foreign policy is refuted with it. It is as if World War II alone was sufficient to place the United States in a state of permanent nobility and, thus, burden her with unspeakable noblesse oblige that began with the Cold War and is now ending with the New World Order.

But this is a grand delusion that is eroding every vital fiber of American society. To expose the delusion, one only needs to compare the horrible fate that meets current American soldiers with the fate of WW II veterans to realize how far the US worldview has deteriorated since World War II. WW II veterans returned to heroes’ welcome, received economic help upon their return, and prospered in the economic boom that resulted from Europe’s destruction.

Since WW II, however, soldiers return to pathetic economic conditions, receive little or no help from the government that conscripted them, and struggle in a competitive economy that is quickly losing ground to resurgent Europe and East Asia. From the dreadful conditions that visited Vietnam veterans (as documented by Oliver Stone and countless others) to the recent scandals at the Walter Reed hospital, the only conclusion supported by the evidence is that the American soldier is not the honorable person he (or she) used to be.

If that were not enough, the above article cites new evidence that the unusual suffering of the soldiers’ families is not relieved in any way by the military, either. The data are fresh, and the military may yet act, but given the military’s inaction in the face of grave problems in the past, the children of soldiers serving in Iraq may continue to suffer inordinately high rates of abuse and neglect until a crisis shames the miliatry into action.

WW II soldiers were heroes, and veterans of all the subsequent wars slaves, in comparison.

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Palestinian Winners

Hamas says Abbas accidentally paid its fighters | International | Reuters

The phrase itself is an oxymoron, “Palestinian Winner”. Unlike any other political race in the world, Palestinian politics is a race composed entirely of losers. Whether it’s the Palestinians choosing Hamas, or the US and Israel choosing Abu Mazen’s Fattah party, nobody can find a winner. Or even a party that is not a horrible, wretched loser.

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Regulation Spawns Competition, Part II

Dell Answers Customer Calls For Linux In Europe

Those who keep denigrating government regulation really must take note of this major announcement by Dell in Europe: Dell is now selling Linux PCs to consumers at large. Unlike Dell US, which sells Linux on some its top of the line servers only, Dell Europe now has the freedom to sell operating systems other than Windows to anyone.

Why is this important? Because it means that, at least in Europe, Dell has the freedom to sell the systems that it wants to customers. If Dell wants to bundle its own music service, or its own software with the systems, it can now do that, just as Apple has been doing all along. It has this freedom in Europe because the European Union has put Microsoft on a very short leash. Consequently, Dell can move away from Microsoft without any fear of retribution from Microsoft.

This is not the case in the United States, of course. The US government has relaxed its controls on Microsoft’s monopoly power. Consequently, Dell, HP, Gateway and other computer manufacturers have little freedom to promote or to include services that compete with the services that Microsoft promotes through its Windows operating system. This means that Dell, HP and Gateway cannot compete with Apple! They cannot promote or sell services (such as a music store) on computers that they sell! In effect, Microsoft has enslaved these large corporations, and has relegated them to purveyors of commodity computers that net little profit.

So, if you’re wondering why Dell and HP are not offering digital music stores even when Microsoft’s store is clearly failing, look no further than Microsoft and the ridiculous lack of regulations in the American marketplace. In this absurd environment, an inept competitor like Microsoft is suppressing all competition and allowing Apple to run away with the booty. As an Apple stockholder, I don’t mind, but perhaps Dell stockholders should.