Thursday, March 12, 2015

Open Thread

I'd meant to post something original today, but unfortunately a major plumbing issue affecting several of the units in my complex will be interfering with the blog. Our regular handyman threw up his hands in despair last night and the major troops and outside contractors are being called in. I've been told to stay out of the kitchen. From past experience with such things, I am expecting the noise to fall somewhere between a dental drill on steroids and a jackhammer.

If anybody is out there, talk about whatever you like in comments. Meantime, here are a few of my recent New York Times comments to inspire you or disgust you or just leave you in a state of numbed apathy.

First, Charles Blow wrote about the privileged Oklahoma frat boys of Sigma Epsilon KKK and their racist chants on the bus. He is not shocked, shocked. My response:
There's a reason they call them frat brats. Rather than go to college to develop their cerebral cortices, they exercise the tribalistic, primitive limbic area of their brains. Their majors are brawls, beer, babes and bigotry. If there aren't any freshman pledges around to haze, then they'll pick on other people whom they deem weak or marginalized. If there is no physical prey immediately available, they'll conjure them up, braying their KKK anthems and telling their foul jokes.

And when they get caught, what do you think they do? They go into full Paula Deen mode. Nobody feels as bad as they do, they pathetically sob. They are not bigots -- the beers and the peers made them do it! Even their Paula Deen clone of a housemother joins in the folksy fun, for crying out loud. And OMG, look over there! There are black students caught on video, threatening the poor white frat boys. Will horrors never cease.

Boys on the bus chanting odium is nothing new, because the school bus has been bullying central all their lives. Luckily, this country is currently in a rare self-examination mode, and schools are falling all over themselves to take hazing, rape and blatant racism at least somewhat seriously, lest they lose their government and corporate funding and precious reputations.


 But the rot is still simmering and will inevitably come to a boil. Just because racism isn't sanctioned doesn't mean it's not endemic. Sigma Delta Hate is as close as the house next door.
And where would the New York Times op ed page be without Hillary to kick around and obsess over?  Entering the fray is so very hard to resist. So here are my comments to Frank Bruni and Gail Collins respectively:
 Hillary Clinton's cover of Frank Sinatra's "I Did It My Way" fell flat. She came across like Nixon, testily defending her emails and mawkishly bringing up her sainted mother's funeral arrangements contained therein as prey for a ravening press corps. She made them grovel for credentials, then pre-emptively accused them of having no interest in the real scandal of the GOP's attempted sabotage of the White House-Iran negotiations.

"Now, I would be pleased to talk more about this important matter," she said, "but I know there have been questions about my email, so I want to address that directly, and then I will take a few questions from you."

She never did address the Iran question, nor was she asked about the fact that some of her charity and political donors (Goldman Sachs, hedge fund billionaire Richard Perry) are also among the donors funding the bomb bomb bomb Iran campaign currently in full throttle in Congress and think tanks and on cable TV. Her email scandal is likely only the tip of the iceberg.

If Mrs. Clinton thinks she can coast to the Oval Office while hiding from the public, treating the press like dirt, and avoiding debates with challengers from the left, she should have another think coming. Then again, we no longer have a functioning democracy. Perhaps we should let the people in charge of the DNC know, right away, that they can expect a voter boycott if they insist on shoving this damaged politician down our throats.

 ***
Gail Collins is right: the media should be pressing Mrs. Clinton on her policies. We know we're never going to find out whether she was micromanaging Chelsea's wedding on the public's dime and time instead of her own, so we might as well move on to more important stuff that will affect all of us directly.

Will she support expansion of Social Security in these tough times? Her family foundation has had an uncomfortably close partnership with Wall Street billionaire Pete Peterson, who's made it his life's mission to cut our earned benefits. Chelsea herself teamed up with Catfood Commissioners Simpson & Bowles to try and convince college kids that their grandparents were stealing their medical care and futures. What's up with that?

Look at the advisers. If former Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin comes on board, raise the warning flag. It was Rubin (helped by John Podesta and Larry Summers) who orchestrated financial deregulation, paving the way for the economic crash and the ensuing worst wealth disparity in modern times. Don't let her blame that mess on just the GOP or "irresponsible borrowers." We need restoration of Glass-Steagall, and as Elizabeth Warren suggests, a dismantling of the TBTFs. What's Hillary's position on that?

Ask her about drones, gun control, dealings with corrupt foreign governments like Saudi Arabia, and corporate coups disguised as "free trade" deals.

Don't just let her get away with platitudes about breaking glass ceilings.

29 comments:

Kat said...

Sorry to hear about the disruption at your complex, Karen. But remember-- "disruption" is a good thing! Hopefully it will be accompanied by much "creative destruction".
Stay away from the Ferguson story, if you value your teeth. I did some gnashing when I read about the "anarchy". Would people please use that term correctly? It does not mean chaos. And why do people feel that unquestioning fealty to the police makes us safer? When police feel free to knock heads, they usually feel free to engage in other criminal activities.
Oh, and Nic Kristof is at it again.

annenigma said...

Re: Hillary

Get ready for a Republican president if Democrats nominate Hillary. The real hot potato has yet to be tossed because the Republicans are waiting until 'the moment is right' before they bring that one up. That would be Bill's friendship and trips with convicted pedophile pimp Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein somehow got a sweetheart deal from the Justice Dept that helped keep some other associated names out of the court and media spotlight, such as Prince Andrew, Bill, Alan Dershowitz and numerous as yet unnamed Hollywood celebrities and politicians. Epstein specialized in providing fresh, ripe, underaged sex slaves for the rich and famous. Jihadi's believe in 21 virgins after they die, but the rich and famous enjoy them now.

Would Hillary involve herself in a plea deal to help keep matters out of court and out of the spotlight when it involved her husband? What good is power if it can't be applied when needed? She's had a future Presidency at stake. With this being such an delicate personal issue, and with her SOS travels taking her so far and wide, a private server made sense. Unfortunately, that meant she co-mingled her State Dept and personal emails with his on his server. It's no wonder Rosemary Woods Clinton had to purge those files. She couldn't allow a 3rd party to sift through that ugly mess.

But why would Bill need his own server for emails when he claims he never uses emails. "Only two, and those were while I was President". And he never had sexual relations with 'that woman' either. Oh well, the emails are wiped clean now, unlike the infamous blue dress.

Will said...

I'm gonna go off topic here cuz it's an open thread and Karen said we could. Yay!

Here's some seriously entertaining footage of Benny the Bull, official mascot of the NBA's Chicago Bulls, doing his thing. Normally costs a lot of bread to see this circus, but today we get to watch it for free. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/flPKprlu7ik

annenigma said...

Re: Hillary, Israel, and the Presidency

Since the NSA gives Israel the complete electronic content of all American citizens' communications - minus only OFFICIAL U.S. Gov't communications- then only Israel has the complete Clinton collection. The NSA only keeps metadata because that's all they need after offshoring the rest to Israel to act as repository and escape U.S. laws, just as Hillary's emails stored in her own server did.

'NSA Shares Raw Intelligence Including Americans' Data With Israel'
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/11/nsa-americans-personal-data-israel-documents

Israel might actually benefit if Hillary becomes the next President if they've already got the goods. There's nothing more powerful than leverage to have your way in the world. And just think of it - they didn't even have to hack in! There are no digital footprints left behind. Hillary can claim that her server has been secure all along, and she might be none the wiser right now, but when/if she becomes President, I'm sure she'll be shown her own dossier at that point and maybe Bill's too.

If Israel can own Hillary, then so can our own Military-run Intelligence Community since they are virtually one and the same entity. That seems to be the point after all. They certainly appear to own Obama despite all his encouraging pre-election rhetoric. Now that we are in the Post-Snowden era, some things are starting to look a lot clearer. Some used to suggest he was shown some big scary intelligence info that turned him - or maybe they showed him his own secrets.

So the question is, who will best take orders from the Military-Industrial-Intelligence Complex? Who can they control? Who is compromised? Who do they have the most secrets on? I'd say Hillary, hands down, because she actually handed it all over to them. She's too clever by half, but I bet it was Bill's idea. They're both past their Use By date. She used to be sharp but she now reads off cue cards.

If she is indeed compromised, then she will get some powerful help getting elected, then they will play her like a fiddle. But will she take orders? We know what they do with those who don't.

Patricia said...

I am so sorry to hear of your plumbing dilemma. I hope it's resolved quickly, as I always enjoy stopping by your blog and reading about your take on the political chicanery going on. As far as those "frat brats" I doubt their parents were admirers of Martin Luther King or anyone fighting for social justice, that's where it starts. Now I am going to get to Hillary and Jeb. For God's sake can we please get someone to run for office who isn't going to be a tool for the Military Industrial Complex, Lobbies, corporations or billionaires? If those 2 are the choices, count me out. The election is nothing more than a fantasy and we really know who we are electing if we vote for either of these two. This is a moneymsker for TV, marketing firms, advertising agencies. It's bread and circuses. Emails, shemails...Ugh. They are all up to their eyeballs in bribes, corruption and kickbacks.

annenigma said...

Did anyone else who viewed the video of the Ferguson shooting of two policemen get the sense that it was staged? I'm sorry, but that's what struck me immediately as I watched the video of the police reaction. All the cameras happened to be in the right place to film the police whose reaction was very controlled and unemotional, unlike the barely controlled rage usually evident in such events, with violent screaming of orders, etc. Did they mature and change their attitudes so soon?

Why was there even a protest when things were changing? Who organized it? Call me cynical, but given the level of corruption there, why wouldn't we be suspicious. Police reaction just looked phony to me.

Meredith nyc said...

Karen....You say Collins is right, the media should be pressing Hillary on her policies. But when is Gail interested in policies? Not that I recall. She's interested in personalities, and who is hiding what.

The candidates can get away with general talk and PR, until just b4 the 11th hour. Then they adapt to the climate of the moment and come out with a few policy statements at last. But nothing that contradicts their big donors.

Gail does mention --in 08 HC was against 1 type of Wall St tax break and says she will again ‘crusade against Wall St”. But how, about what? Nobody knows.

We can't really go to Collins for policy analysis—not her schtick.
She’s sort of an inside dopester, with the gossip on the latest power moves. A worthy occupation. Not as mean and scathing as the other lady, with the claws.
I know they're both politically savvy and adept phrase makers.

meredith nyc said...

Karen....i had to try 4 or 5 times to submit my post....it kept saying my url had illegal characters. I tried lower case nyc and kept trying. this has happened before.... any reason do you know?

annenigma said...

I see the NYT is going all Facebook on us. I hope they don't join with other newspapers in herding us all into the Facebook playpen.

Many papers are just eliminating comments at their online paper entirely and make commentators leave their site and go to Facebook page. You find the article and add a comment, but in my experience it's a whole different crowd of know-nothings.

It seems to be the trend with papers now. If NYT takes that route, they will lose me completely.

Cirze said...

Love it (sorry about your plumbing problem)!

Although I should mention when I said essentially this at my last "progressive Nation reader" meeting over two years ago, I was then ignored, disinvited and publicly abused (out of my hearing at least).

We've got to start a new movement for real progressives (again!).

NOW!

Perhaps we should let the people in charge of the DNC know, right away, that they can expect a voter boycott if they insist on shoving this damaged politician down our throats.

Annenigma,

I swear I've seen little in the news lately that didn't look staged to benefit authoritarians. Thanks for picking up this one.

Karen Garcia said...

Anne,

Re the Clintons and their dirty laundry, and the Bushes and their dirty laundry: watch out for the October Surprises. Clinton will be linked to the sex ring (yawn, nobody will care, especially since it was the Obama DOJ which made the plea deal with Epstein)-- and the Bush Family will be linked to 9/11 (the WH is saving those 28 redacted pages of the Commission report for an electoral emergency in prime political time, I am sure.)

Re the cop shootings: my guess is a white supremacist/sovereign citizen type of cop-hater, not one of the #BlackLivesMatter activists. It is miraculous that the officers went straight from listed in serious condition to being released from the hospital within a matter of hours. Usually the very serious conditions are kept at least overnight before being kicked out. Meanwhile, the Obama administration cares so much about cops that they just caved on their plan to outlaw bullets designed to pierce body armor.

Maybe it'll be rumors of an armed black revolution that will be the final impetus for bipartisan gun control laws.

Karen Garcia said...

Meredith,

Sorry you are having trouble posting comments. I don't have a ready answer, but I have heard that this is a browser issue. As I have previously told others who've had occasional trouble posting, you can always email me your comments (kmgarcia2000@yahoo.com) so I can paste them up as soon as I get them.

Re Collins: at the very end of her column she mentioned something about Hillary waxing rhapsodic about a professed desire to reform carried interest deductions, and how skilled she is at discussing wonky stuff that is not an email scandal. So I says, sure, Gail is absolutely right, let's hound Hillary on other stuff to make her really uncomfortable.

The day that Gail writes a truly critical op-ed about a Democratic politician will be a cold day in hell. Notice that she never touches Andrew Cuomo, and so far has given Menendez a pass, even tho they are in the same class as that hilarious Chris Christie.

I rarely comment on Collins, because I am usually accused of not joining in the harmless fun of shooting GOPsters in a barrel. The "red meat" comments most colorfully insulting to the Republican Clown Car always get top reader recs on her narrow little slice of turf. At least, unlike Collins, Maureen Dowd is an equal opportunity offender.

Karen Garcia said...

Kat,

Love the Ferguson coverage, which amounts to "why aren't 'those people' satisfied"?

I rarely even read Kristof, led alone comment on his concern-trolling stuff. He's a slightly more enlightened version of David Brooks, in that he occasionally does helicopter down to the poor neighborhoods for an hour or day, while Brooks just reads books about the poor written by members his own social class.

Karen Garcia said...

Patricia and Cirze,

Thanks for your sympathy. They fixed the plumbing problem but left a bit of a smelly mess. For some reason there was a black hand-print left on my fridge, which gives you an idea of what they must have sucked up. This is not sewage, thank god, just whatever crap has been festering in kitchen waste drains for the past decade or so. At least it warmed up to the tropical 40s here so I could open a window.

Karen Garcia said...

Oh, I almost forgot. If they really want to see Hillary's emails, try the NSA storage facility out there in Utah.

Will, thanks for sharing the clip. We need regular doses of humor to keep sane.... with the full awareness of course that we are the targets of distracting bread and circuses.

annenigma said...

Did you know that there is a Pentagon 'National Media Exploitation Center'? It's not what you might think, at least officially, but I suspect it actually is what the name implies. You know how these secret programs tend to grow and morph and spread like The Blob. Considering it has had 14 years to do so, I'm sure it has.

"The National Media Exploitation Center (NMEC) was established in late 2001 to coordinate FBI, CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and National Security Agency (NSA) efforts to analyze and disseminate information gleaned from millions of pages of paper documents, electronic media, videotapes, audiotapes, and electronic equipment seized by the U.S. military and Intelligence Community in Afghanistan and other foreign lands.

The NMEC ensures the rapid collection, processing, exploitation, dissemination, and sharing of all acquired and seized media across the intelligence, counterintelligence, military, and law enforcement communities. These tasks include the collection, receipt, cataloging, initial processing, and transmission of information; forensic analysis and translation; and reporting, storage, dissemination, and sharing. NMEC is a DNI Center, and DIA is its Executive Agent."

http://itlaw.wikia.com/wiki/National_Media_Exploitation_Center

Meredith NYC said...

I commented to Krugman column--- Strength is Weakness. Krugman simply won’t address US ‘exceptionalism’.

I said...
So, “the US isn’t exactly booming, but it looks great compared with Europe, where the present is bad and the future looks worse.” How confusing for us non economists, who just see continued lowering of US financial security for average salaried people, while the 1 percent have ever more influence on our 3 branches.

Just curious, if the Euro is so weak against the dollar, why is Manhattan full of European tourists? In Central Park we hear dozens of languages—one told me their language was Albanian. I’ve given directions to people from Italy and Holland.

I thought many EU nations like Germany kept more of their mfg jobs home, while we off shored millions of our jobs?

Why don’t EU nations weaken their unions like the US, so they can cut wages?

Also if Europe's future looks so bad, when do they plan to stop funding their universal health care? (whose prices they do negotiate with corporations). Can't they use emergency rooms as Bush advised us?

When will they force their college students into life time tuition debt, and stop their low cost education?

When will they turn over their election funding to wealthy donors looking for return on investment? How can these nations afford tax money to elect leaders, to protect candidates from having to fund raise and audition for donors? Will independent party platforms be a thing of the past?

When will this needed cost saving take place, so they can reach parity with the US? Please clear this up for me.

Some interesting partial clips from informative replies: (I forgot about mass transit and infrastructure!)

“ I, too, don't understand why if things are so bad in Europe, they continue to survive, even with big, bad socialized medicine, pensions, affordable education, great mass transit, forcing employees to provide at least five weeks of vacation each year, and having people live longer so they can continue to "drain" their system.

Apparently, Professor Krugman doesn't read The New York Times, either. Remember that series of articles on the mysterious owners of condos that are priced in a few stratospheres above the rest of us peons?”

Another said....
“European businesses pay more of their revenue back to their employees (as wages and indirectly through taxes) which means investors make lower returns in general. But...stable, productive businesses don't need massive new investment -- only dot com bubblers do and that leads to instability and crashes not to mention ridiculous bonuses and inequality.

Even in a relative slump, ordinary people do better in Europe and still take their 4 weeks of holidays. Thus one explanation for the continuing strength of the US dollar is in fact a willingness to treat ordinary people badly in the name of profit. Currency valuations reflect only how easily investors think they can extract wealth and are unrelated to how we all do on main street.”

Meredith NYC said...

re my previous post, I went to see Krugman speak at Hunter college last fall. He gave the same line re---Europe is in such bad shape compared to the US. He lumps all EU together, which just serves to confuse.

During audience questions I sent up this on a card:
If EU is doing so bad vs the US, how can they afford to fund their universal, quality h/c, low tuition, and publicly financed elections?

His answer---he dodged it. He brought up Greece, right away--the worst EU case. Then he said the EU has higher taxes. (ok , therefore what?)

Then a confusing line about how much corruption countries get for a certain amount of campaign donations--I couldn't grasp his point--EU or US corruption??

His response was totally inadequate. I've been a Krugman fan, but, he's a disappointment. The professor interviewing him is with the CUNY project on ineqality he is joining. She's an expert on EU $$ child care allowances and safety nets for families--which does a lot to lower inequality. But she didn't press him for more at that event.

Pearl said...

Rules for saving, providing emails? Not for Congress http://www.tricities.com/news/rules-for-saving-providing-emails-not-for-congress/article_3733cf38-7186-54fe-a4d7-aeadb818ec9a.html#.VQNWcN5G0GI.twitter via @TriCities

Who's Minding the Store? Is this Anarchy?

Jay–Ottawa said...

@ Students registered in Business 101

In the last class, students, we explained how $$$s can––and do––trickle up.

(1) Congress can TARP $$$ directly into the outstretched hands of Wall Street Panhandlers in exchange for worthless and fraudulent paper, and
(2) The FED can shovel $$$billions into the backdoors of banks TBTF for years as Quantitative Easing. The dough is supposed to trickle out the front door to common folk in looser lending practices but mostly flows up to the top floors of banks TBTF.

These measures come under the heading of (magical) Recapitalization and explains why the FED is running out of green ink.

There’s yet another road for $$$ to travel up and out of sight forever: Stock Buybacks. With me, today, as guest lecturer on SBs is Ralph Nader with his 3-minute explanation of SBs.

What? .... Yes, this will be on the test!

Ralph?
https://blog.nader.org/2015/03/13/billionaire-hanauer-hammers-stock-buybacks/

annenigma said...

@Jay

Thanks for the link. I also followed up by going to Hanauer and Liu's website, the True Patriot Network.

http://www.truepat.org/ournetwork

where they discuss their book and network of pretty respectable organizations, including the ACLU.

I think their book has a lot of food for thought and is probably worth a read. It was published in 2007 and is free online at:

http://www.truepat.org/book/read

Jay–Ottawa said...

These Open Threads are dangerous. Gives us too much time to think, instead of jumping from one thing to another just to keep up. So I was thinking....

It just might be that noble spirits populate every economic class. According to Nader, and in contradiction to Marx and Marc 10:25, a few camels of the billionaire class are able to negotiate the eye of the needle quite well, thank you.

In some of Nader’s recent books, and in newsletter essays like the one about Hanauer’s good deeds, Nader celebrates the decency of a few rich men. He hopes that they, not firebrand proles with torches and pitchforks, will provide the wherewithal to eventually turn things around, economically and politically. Nader may even be going further, saying the rich are the key ingredient to reform. For example, see his “Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us!”

Oh wait––that’s a what-if novel by Nader, both comical and inspiring, about retired corporatists doing battle with working corporatists. Let’s hope Nader, by his willingness to mix with the rich, isn’t alienating the people who voted for him in 2000 or the grassroots PIRG’s he organized in about half the states.

Anyway, Hanauer (the rich man) and Liu (the writer) are not fiction. Nader thinks the world of them and their piecemeal, old-fashioned liberal ideas about cutting the masses a better deal. And, as annenigma just told you, Hanauer and Liu, endorsed by Nader, are GIVING their book away on line.

Which is it going to be: the apocalyptic Hedges swooning in despair and on the verge of passing out pitchforks, or the steady worker bee Nader who never ceases fighting for more crumbs? Nader is no revolutionary. Maybe Nader, throughout his life’s work, has been methodically counseling us in one field after another (cars, health, finance, etc.) not to waste time hoping for much more than a restoration of classic liberalism. The flip side of old-time liberalism, by the way, is the containment of cowboy capitalism.

Encouraging liberal talent to un-betray its betrayals, might be more achievable and therefore the best bet for crawling back to the point where the rich get richer, the middle class keeps expanding, and the poor get uninterrupted meaningful help.

annenigma said...

'The True Patriot' is actually a pamphlet and a quick and easy read. It covers all the best qualities of being American and as a result, a good world citizen. I think their small volume is worth adding to anyone's personal library.

It struck me that Democrats might still be a viable party if they took their advice back in 2007 when this was printed. As I read it, I am also thinking about how Obama has actually governed. It's interesting to read it with hindsight.

On the topic of the rich, here's a comment I made today on the NYT article 'For Tech Titans, Sharing Has It's Limits'

"Workers aren't just required to sign NDA's, they are also ordered not to make eye contact with the owners if they see them.

This is the situation for some home contractors working in Whitefish, Montana, home of billionaires and millionaires who are under the delusion that they are special someones. That's right - workers must avert their eyes. It's a wonder they aren't told to bow too. Definitely do not attempt to shake hands.

It's not like the rich actually make eye contact with us anyway, so why bother with the special instructions? To remind us of our place and of their dominance, power, and control.

We might have won our independence from the King, but we've coming full circle with rich petty tyrants who think they rule us all. Actually, considering that they bought and own our government, they do."

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/15/technology/for-tech-titans-sharing-has-its-limits.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

annenigma said...

@Jay

I agree about Chris Hedges. He speaks great truths that everyone should hear, but he can dive too deeply into the darkness, especially when he sinks into the sewers of prostitution and prison life. I don't know if you've read any of those pieces. If not, don't! It's hard enough to face reality without plunging all the way into Hell.

Obama ended up giving 'Hope' a bad name, but it's all we've got and we must hold onto it.

Ralph Nader has been a steady and extraordinary beacon of truth for half a century, but he's been viciously maligned - by Democrats no less. Forgive them, for they know not what they do. They really do need a resurrection/rebirth because they are spiritually and morally dead. (Easter must be affecting me early)

annenigma said...

Correction Re: Chris Hedges.

I meant to say his writings on pornography, not prostitution.

Denis Neville said...

The Wall Street bonus pool for last year is roughly double the total earnings of all Americans who work full time at the federal minimum wage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/14/upshot/wall-street-bonuses-vs-total-earnings-of-full-time-minimum-wage-workers.html?_r=0&abt=0002&abg=1

Wages are a tax on the job creators. That’s why they hate unions. Union members get paid more. Employer costs for union workers averaged $46.50 per hour worked in December 2014. The average for nonunion workers was $29.83. Benefits accounted for 40.3 percent of compensation costs for union workers, compared with 29.2 percent for nonunion workers.

http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2015/employer-costs-for-union-and-nonunion-workers-in-december-2014.htm

Nick Hanauer’s speech, “Why a $15 minimum wage will make Seattle stronger,” at Seattle’s Mayor Ed Murray's Income Inequality on March 27th, 2014:

http://crosscut.com/2014/03/why-15-minimum-wage-will-make-seattle-stronger/

Seattle’s $15 minimum-wage law is scheduled to take effect on April 1st. Seattle voted in favor of a $15 per hour minimum wage last summer. It is the highest minimum wage in the country, and more than twice the federal rate of $7.25.

The International Franchise Association is suing the city of Seattle on charges that the new law unfairly discriminates against franchisees and violates the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Paul Clement, the franchise association’s attorney, cited an email from Nick Hanauer, who served on the city’s minimum-wage-advisory committee, calling franchises such as Subway and McDonald’s “not very good for our local economy … economically extractive, civically corrosive and culturally dilutive.”

That attitude is fine for an individual, said Clement, “but when a city embraces it as a policy, that runs square into the Commerce Clause. That’s 100 percent forbidden by the Commerce Clause. It’s not a permissible government objective.”

http://www.seattletimes.com/business/economy/franchises-say-seattles-minimum-wage-discriminates-against-them-2/

Corporations are people, my friends. McDonald’s and other franchises are suing Seattle over its new $15-an-hour minimum wage law, arguing it violates its corporate personhood rights.

Let the poor suffer.

Arthur C. Brooks, president of the American Enterprise Institute, defends the virtues of suffering,

“…in this season of Lent, hundreds of millions of Catholics are pondering their own inadequacies and inviting discomfort through abstinence and fasting. In a postmodern era, where death is taboo, pain is pointless, and sin is a cultural anachronism, what could be more rebellious?

But the spirit of these practices is open to everyone, religious or not. Think of it as a personal declaration of independence. The objective is not to cause yourself damage, but to accept the pain and fear that are a natural part of life, and to embrace them as a valuable source of lessons to learn and tests to pass.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/12/opinion/arthur-c-brooks-lent-its-not-just-for-catholics.html …

Bill Sprague said...

This is great to read. Sorry about your kitchen and lets not settle for platitudes!

Pearl said...

Offering a Choice to the Terminally Ill http://nyti.ms/1AoLQbq

Not only an intelligent editorial about the need for choice in right to die in the U.S. but almost all the comments approve. My comment to the editorial was that I was lucky to be living in
Canada at the age of 91.
I will add the new Canadian guidelines practically in effect in my next comment.

This on the heels of the recent scuffle about the article of finding joy in someone's death between me and most of the comments I wrote about recently in Sardonicky. So I was not alone in my thinking.

Pearl said...

How Canada's right-to-die ruling could boost movement in U.S.
http://ti.me/1D6cOsv via @TIME