Cogitamus

Silver and Red

I've been mulling over a recent contretemps between bloggers David Sirota and Nate Silver discussed a few days ago by our friends at Donkeylicious and trying to decide whether it merited further discussion or should be dismissed as just another juvenile pissing match on the left side of the cyber-sandbox.  I've come down on the side of writing about it because I think much that Silver contributed to the "debate" actually needs to be slapped down pretty hard.

Let me first say I am surprised that this was my reaction  Like many people I became an enormous fan of fivethirtyeight.com during the election and was consistently impressed by Silver's statistical and analytical skills.  He is obviously an exceptionally bright guy and seemed to handle his new found fame as the campaign wore on with great grace  I'm not a regular reader of Sirota despite sharing what strikes me as a pretty similar ideological world view.  I've always found him a bit too abrasive, a not terribly captivating writer, and more of an aggressive self-promoter than I find aesthetically pleasing.  Given all of this, I started reading about this little battle over the appropriate direction of the left (very broadly speaking) with a presumption that Silver would have it right and Sirota wrong.

Silver begins by describing two forms of "progressivism", one which he characterizes as "rational" and the other as "radical"  (not that that isn't tipping the debate from the get go) -- when the positions on the further end of the American left are placed in opposition to the "rational" I think it is pretty clear where things are going.  Essentially Nate posits a world in which people of the more moderate center-left are empirical, analytical, expert-driven, flexible and pragmatic.  Those further out on the ideological left are assigned a series of contradictory attributes (both cynical and pessimistic yet advocating a politics that is transformative), but the ultimate quality he ascribes to lefter elements is a kind of reflexively confrontational demagoguery.         

Jindal Makes His Move

Governor Bobby* Jindal of Louisiana is going to refuse $98 million of federal stimulus money because he claims that it would lead to permanent changes in Louisiana state regulations.

That makes perfect sense, because there's no way that the Louisiana legislature could write a sunset clause into the changed regulations, so that they expire when the federal money runs out.  Nor would it be possible for them to change their regulations now and then readdress them after the money stops flowing.

It's like the 55mph speed limit.  The federal government withheld funds from any state that didn't comply with it, right, but the states only got the money, like, that one time and never got highway money from the federal government again, and since laws and regulations in the USA are permanent, we still have a national 55mph speed limit all over the country.

You probably think you've seen signs that say 65, 70 or even 75mph.  But who ya gonna believe, me or your lyin' eyes?

Or it could be that Jindal is making an incredibly cynical political play that allows him to appear prinicpled - in the GOP's sense of the word, which means, you know, "not principled" - while still accepting the majority of the money being sent his way.  If a few losers can't get an extra $25/week, or if they can't get any unemployment at all because they were at their jobs less than a year, well that's too bad for them.  An inability to feed their families is a small price for them to pay to help Bobby Jindal run for President.

*Why are right-wingers so hung up on Obama's use of "Barry" for a short time in high school, thinking that calling him "President Barry" is so incisively witty and all that, but don't worry about Piyush Jindal wanting to be called "Bobby" his whole life?  Is it because deep in their cold, black hearts they know that they're all racist fucknuts who require any non-whites among them to make some sort of concrete acknowledgement of the superiority of whitey sensibilities?

Friday Saturday Frank: Father O'Blivion; Stockholm, 1973

Here you go, then: one smoking solo after another, posted for your listening pleasure this chilly Saturday morning. Frank Zappa performs with his infamous 1973 lineup (and jacket), including Ruth Underwood, Jean-Luc Ponty, Tom Fowler, Ralph Humphrey, Ian Underwood, George Duke, and Bruce Fowler. Enjoy.

Bon Weekend, everyone.

Friday Sad Cat Blogging

So my day sucked on a cosmic level as I had to euthanize my beloved cat (pictured below in healthier times -- sort  of looks like one of Atrios' cats). .She was about sixteen years old and had been suffering from a variety of maladies that had seen her lose about 40% of her body weight over the last few months, so it shouldn't have come as a shock.  But her rapid down hill slide over the last 48 hours did catch me by surprise.  When I woke up this morning and found she couldn't really stand on her own I knew the time had come.  I worked from home so that I could be with her all day, giving her syringes full of water and hoping for a miraculous recovery.  It was not to be. 

I often joked that she was the only good thing to come of the Bush-Gore electoral debacle.  She belonged to a Washington Post reporter who got stuck down in Florida for several weeks.  Sam hated to be alone and we were asked to serve as kitty foster parents.  She ended up staying for eight years plus.  I can't really imagine waking up tomorrow and not having to feed her.  Martin Amis wrote that "what we take  from our pets (without trying and without asking) is a lesson about death, an overview of the shorter span."  I hope there is a bit more to it than that. Time for another drink and a sad night's sleep. 

Money, Sin, Forgiveness

Jesus once tried to explain forgiveness to Peter.  His point was that we pretty much owe God a tremendous debt, which he's willing to forgive as long as we're willing to forgive the comparatively insignificant debts owed us by our fellow human beings.  But Jesus's imagery is obscure; what exactly is the worth of talents and denarii?

A denarius was payment for a day's work.  If the median income for the USA is $50,000/year, and if Americans work 260 days a year, then a day's work is worth $192 today.  A talent is worth 6,000 denarii, which means that the wicked servant in Jesus's story owed his master $11,520,000,000.  Which means that each of us owes God the sin equivalent of $11,520,000,000. 

On the feast of Pentecost following Jesus's crucifixion, we're told that 3,000 people repented of their $11,520,000,000 worth of sin.  So on that one day alone, God forgave $34,560,000,000,000 worth of sin.

THAT'S ALMOST 44 AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACTS!  QUICK, LET'S PASS ANOTHER ONE BEFORE WE PISS GOD OFF!

Or we can just not give a flying fuck when Republicans make stupid arguments about money and Jesus.

Plus, You Don't Even Know What "Black Hole" Means

There are no former CEOs on Barack Obama's cabinet.  No one who, in the words of an idiot, "have answered to shareholders as well as voters—people who know by intuition how the business community is likely to react to any given day’s news."

First, shareholders are voters.  That's all they are.  Publicly held corporations are ostensible democracies, albeit ones where voting privileges are purchased instead of conferred.  Which probably goes a long way toward explaining GOP attitudes toward voting.

Second, "some White House observers."  Why are so-called journalists allowed to use weasel words that would earn any high-schooler in the country a failing grade?  They should at least accord their own profession enough respect to use the "some people, to whom I've actually spoken but who want/need to remain anonymous" formula.

Third, I would hope that the absence of CEOs on Obama's cabinet is a matter of design, not happenstance.  The myth of the superstar CEO is inimical to a successful company and even an economic system.  Until this nation's corporations get back to hiring CEOs based upon their ability to help the company do its actual business, instead of their ability to finesse stock prices among people who haven't got the slightest idea how to make or sell cars or cellphones, our economy is going to be in trouble.  If all you know how to do is sell stock, sooner or later your company is going to run out of stock to sell. 

People who write this crap should be sentenced to working as a journalist in Moscow whose beat is to make fun of Vladimir Putin's physique.

Florida's Apocalypse

I'm going to get in trouble for this post, but I don't care.  It's just too important, and dammit, sometimes people need help whether they want their problems publicized or not.

People, our own litbrit is in trouble.  And not just her, but millions of her fellow Floridians are about to have their entire world smashed apart. 

You probably haven't heard about it, because there's so much bad news going around right now.  But the crisis that's about to hit central Florida is as real, and as devastating, as anything you've ever heard of.  Actually, it's worse.

Here goes:  tomorrow night, in Tampa and surrounding areas, it's supposed to get down to 38 degrees.

Fahrenheit.

I'm so shocked by this I don't even know what to do for them.  I mean, in Kansas City, 38 degrees in February means "lets go out and play."  But Florida?  Do they have houses to go into?  Seriously, litbrit, do stores down there have "coats" and "blankets?"  In many parts of the world, homes are equipped with "furnaces," which blow warm air throughout the house.  Have you heard of that down there?

I hope they get through this, I really do

My Plan To Save The Economy

Have you seen this gem of a video?

Here's part of Santelli's little sermon (via dday):

The government is promoting bad behavior... I'll tell you what, I have an idea. The new Administration's big on computers and technology. How about this, President and new Administration, why don't you put up a Web site to have people vote on the Internet as a referendum to see if we really want to subsidize the loser's mortgages, or would we like to at least buy cars and buy houses in foreclosure and give them to people who might have a chance to actually prosper down the road and reward people who actually carry the water instead of drink the water...

I'll tell you what, Santelli.  Howz about you and I meet in some public place and I beat your head with a large stick?  I'll get pledges from the people in this country "who actually carry the water instead" of getting massive government bailouts because they fucked up not only their own industry, but the entire economy - intentionally, because they knew that they'd make a bunch of money doing it and that they could leave the taxpayers on the hook for their criminal excesses.

People could pledge for all sorts of things, in our fun exchange of ideas.  I could probably raise enough for a whole new stimulus bill.

Bill Donohue /= Christian

The possibility that Kathleen Sebelius might become HHS Secretary has a predictable response from the antichrist Bill Donohue:

Sebelius’ support for abortion is so far off-the-charts that she has been publicly criticized by the last three archbishops of Kansas City. . . .Just yesterday, the pope admonished House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on this issue. Now we have the specter of another pro-abortion Catholic stiffing the Catholic Church. This is setting up a confrontation that pro-life Catholics will not walk away from.

Unfortunately for Bill Donohue, the number of "pro-life Catholics," as Donohue would define the term, isn't very large:

• 80% of Roman Catholics believe that one can be a "good Catholic without obeying the church hierarchy’s teaching on birth control."
• Only 11% think that the RCC hierarchy, all the way up to the pope, represent "the final moral authority" on birth control.

What makes Bill Donohue truly pathetic, aside of course from his grandiose delusions about the nature of his church and his role in it, is how neither he nor the theologically bankrupt archbishops he quotes condemn those many Roman Catholic politicians who are in favor of the death penalty, who enthusiastically supported the Iraq War - against the protestations of then-pope John Paul II - who subserviently prostitute themselves to corporate polluters and those that exploit the poor.

I couldn't find someone less Christian, less dedicated to following Jesus in the deepest, hottest pits of Hell itself, than Bill Donohue.  Kathleen Sebelius, who supports not abortion, but simply the right for individual women to choose what's best for them and their families, is a much better Roman Catholic than Donohue or any of the similarly attention-whoring archbishops who find it easy to criticize her while ignoring the many other politicians in their flock which completely disregard a host of church teachings.

Something tells me that when Sam Brownback is governor of Kansas - God help us all - he'll continue to escape any criticism from his pro-death stances on war and the death penalty.  Bill Donohue can go to hell.

Oh wait, according to his twisted, anti-christian theology, that's where people like him will spend eternity.  Ok then.

Sebelius To HHS

It should come as no surprise that I agree with Nicholas Beaudrot about the prospect of losing my governor to Obama's cabinet as HHS Secretary. 

FWIW, my not-at-all connected opinion is that if Kathleen Sebelius wants to run for the Senate in 2010, she'll do it, either as HHS Secretary or by refusing the possible offer from President Obama.  She doesn't broadcast her moves as much as most politicians, and really does seem to chart an independent course - in this case, independent doesn't mean "GOP-lite."  Ezra Klein's description of "predatory bipartisanship" for Sebelius's governing and political style is exactly right.  Not every registered Republican wants to be a full-fledged member of an insane death cult that should be put to flame by rational men, and Sebelius is very good at getting those few sane Republicans to work with her and even switch parties.  She shouldn't win as much as she does against the Kansas Legislature, but she manages to do so without the GOP even seeing it until after they've lost.

The thing is, I'm not sure that she will really be able to translate that knack to HHS.  Washington is a very different place than Topeka.  Sebelius is much freer to be an actual Democrat in her rhetoric and actions than she would be in DC - and I'm talking about pressure from other Democrats, let alone the press.  But Obama could certainly do worse.

One final note:  the GOP will get the governorship back no matter what happens.  There simply isn't any Democrat in the state that can mount a credible run, and Sam Brownback is already campaigning for it.  What my fellow Kansans aren't going to consider is that we like having a fairly liberal - for Kansas at least - governor to counter the lunatics in the legislature.  Bill Graves, the GOP governor who preceded Sebelius, was constantly accused of being a RINO, for good reason. Before him was a Democrat, and before her was another moderate Republican who fought with the conservative faction of the Kansas GOP.  If we get a certified death cult member like Sam Brownback as governor to match the whackjobs in the legislature, this state is going to board the SUPERTRAIN to hell.

If it ain't broke, don't break it more

It was really annoying to watch stem cell therapy get so heavily oversold in the 06 election cycle. Stem cell therapy seems to me like a fantastic way to give people cancer, and it turns out (registration required) that it is, at least in a recent case. Cancer is when your cells decide they're just going to keep reproducing past what the rest of your body can stand, and messing with the signals your body long ago relied on to stop making more of you strikes me as pretty dangerous - especially in the case of brain tissue.

Basically, if your brain keeps growing when you're out of the womb, your brain is growing cancer. A lot of brain cancer occurs in very young children, when the process of stopping the proliferation of brain tissue is critical, and prone to error.

Introducing non-native cells that will proliferate according to signals out of sync with what is going on in the rest of your body strikes me as extremely dangerous. When the rest of your body is letting your cerebral tissue degenerate, what is in-sync is already quite dangerous, but trading a degenerative disease for a malignant cancerous one doesn't make things much better.

But hey, I can't blame people for trying. Or give up on the idea after seeing a case report.

The Very Model Of A Modern Major Meltdown

I thought this quote from Anonymous at Naked Capitalism was worth repeating. He or she is talking about Tim Geithner's banking "stress tests," but it's a good summary of one of the underlying problems with credit default swaps as well. (Via Jane Hamsher/FDL-OG)

The complicated truth is that there is no modeling for reflexive systems as George Soros has been saying for years. As soon as the members of the system become aware of the model they attempt to game the outcome for personal gain. This changes the behaviour of the system and the model breaks. It's a problem of recursion that isn't fixable.

UPDATE: This slide presentation is a very useful visual aid.

Your Doctor - Now Zagat Rated

This really seems like a natural post for Ezra to be doing.  Evidently Zagat is branching out from restaurant ratings and reviews and beginning to evaluate doctors.  I picture something like this:

 "The prostate examination has become a bad cliche in most doctor's offices, but Dr. Ubermitz really gets back to basics and makes this gland his own.  I was still clearing my throat a day later."  Or

"I slipped the maitre'd a $20 and was treated to a warm speculum and one of the best tables in the office."

I'm just not sure this is the change our health care system needs.   

Monday Miscellany

Via Oliver Willis, the GOP solves all of your problems.

Buried deep within this very long and boring press release is one interesting little nugget:  Pepsi is going to start distributing Pepsi and Mountain Dew Throwback.  These sodas will be made with actual sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup.  If you drink the non-diet versions of Pepsi* and/or Mountain Dew, be sure to switch to the "throwback" versions when they arrive in your local stores.  Your taste buds, and ultimately your whole body, will thank you.  And if they're successful, more beverage and food producers will notice and follow suit.

For no particular reason, here's some color photographs of Nazi Germany.  FYI, one of the photos is of an artist painting a nude.

The Congo River is the second longest river in Africa, and may very well be the world's deepest.  At one point it is over 750 feet deep, which is just mind-boggling for a river.  It's also being described as "evolution on steroids," because so many sections of the river are isolated from the others, allowing/forcing fish to develop independently.  This small slideshow has some interesting examples.

*And if you drink Coca-Cola, diet or otherwise, there's no hope for you.  Bleah.

Snapshot

She is young, and very attractive. She is brilliant, and very quiet, an emigré from Lithuania, born and weaned behind the Iron Curtain. She speaks so little that, looking back (this was about seven years ago), I can't say for certain whether she struggles with her English on occasion. I think that she does — but it isn't very often — and she definitely speaks with an Eastern European accent.

Two Peoples Separated By A Common Language

That's the famous quote about the differences between English English and American English, right?  And it explains why the leader of Britain's Conservative Party is proposing a £2000 limit on bonuses paid to any employee of a bank "which has a significant taxpayer shareholding."  Right? 

Because, and I hardly need to say this to the Americans here, it's certainly not a conservative principle to refuse to give away taxpayer money as rewards to failures.  The last thing a conservative would be caught doing is suggesting that the taxpayers' money, a sacred trust as it were, is far too valuable to waste on a few individuals whose business acumen simply wasn't sufficient to ensure success in a capitalist economy.  Why, giving money to people who not only have done nothing to deseve it, but who have demonstrated that they will waste and abuse it, is entirely in line with conservative rhetoric and action.

So clearly the word "conservative" means something entirely different in England than it does in the USA, like "pavement" or "chips."  It's probably a word that, even though it sounds like a word we might use in America, simply has no analogue, like "treacle."

The alternative, which is too terrible to consider, is that the American conservative movement has no principles except power, no ideology except the idolatry of the American CEO, no guiding philosophy other than, "I got mine." 

Happy Presidents' Day!

Brad Neely's insane "Washington"

Thanks to Sara for introducing me to this.

ari and friends will have to weigh in on the historical accuracy of the piece.

Conservatism is the new Punk Rock . . . and also Disco

The intersection of the right wing blogosphere and popular culture is an endlessly amusing affair.  There are seemingly only two roads to hell that these journeys take -- bad writing by soulless creatures denouncing things they don't understand in ways that make George Will's bow tie look hip -- or -- and believe me the former is vastly preferable to the latter -- bad writing by soulless creatures desperately trying to claim things they don't understand as "conservative."  Or maybe it is better summarized by the ethos of the execrable site "Big Hollywood" which seems to be 1) Hollywood is horrible, an anti-American blight bent on destroying the society; 2) Hollywood really ought to give us right wingers a chance instead of meanly blackballing us; and 3) did you know much of what Hollywood produces actually reflects secret conservative values.  Yeah, well it does get a little confusing to follow and reflects a strange formula -- Savanorola-like denunciations + pity party = right wing triumph. 

Recently we've been treated to claims that "Republican is the new punk" -- sorry, no it isn't fuckstick, and I say this as one who was more or less present at the creation, nope, no way -- and then the "25 best conservative movies of the last 25 years" the perfect bookend to the wonderfully absurd "top fifty conservative rock songs."  I'm not sure what is more pathetic -- the inability to actually see a work of art (with the caveat that many of these films are "art" only in the loosest sense, see, e.g. "Ghostbusters" or "Forest Gump") as anything more than an affirmation of a political platform or the desperate need to try and commandeer aspects of the culture that just aren't in any way "conservative" - "Bodies" by the Sex Pistols as a glaring for instance.  Roy Edroso has a continually great time with this stuff and can skewer it with far more skill than I, but I just couldn't let it pass this time.without weighing in.  

The desperate attempt by the "husky dockers" set to be cool is amusing enough.  But what I find more striking is the inability to actually see themselves and their ideology as it actually exists today -- this is after all the party of pre-emptive war, of warrantless wiretaps, of torture and extreme rendition, of the market place as a holy thing.  Thus, attempts by these militaristic rightists to lay claim to actual small "c" conservative art such as that of Ray Davies is just an abomination.  National Review cites "20th Century Man" as one of its own ("The Village Green Preservation Society" would have been a better pick as "conservative art by the way), without noting that the main concern of the song is the nightmare of war -- "napalm, hydrogen bomb, biological warfare" and state sponsored violence -- "don't want to get my self shot down by some trigger happy policeman."      It is similarly amusing to have the number one film on the list be the wonderful East German movie "The Lives of Others" selected by a group of people who routinely scoff at civil liberties concerns and who fell into absolute and complete lockstep with the Bush Administration over warrantless wiretapping.  (I read this stuff and keep thinking of one of my favorite Billy Bragg lines - "He's a dedicated swallower of fascism.")  Anyway, please read the lists and note your favorite anomalous choice -- the righties should feel free,however, to claim Gump, Red Dawn, and anything by the band "Rush."  (They can also throw in "Titanic" as a refutation of global warming if they wish.)      

Saturday Night Song of Obsession

"Shadowplay" - Joy Division

To the center of the city where all roads meet, waiting for you,
To the depths of the ocean where all hopes sank, searching for you,
I was moving through the silence without motion, waiting for you . . .

February 14

h/t "Kitty" via celluloid blonde

Ah Yes, Charles Krauthammer and the Joy of Small Miracles

Charles Krauthammer, the Dr. Pangloss of carnage, castigates Obama today for failing to pay sufficient homage to the "miracle" that the U.S. has created in Iraq.  No I haven't been drinking.  Yet.  He really said that.  Here is the full quote:

When you become president of the United States you inherit its history, even the parts you would have done differently. Obama might argue that American sacrifices in Iraq were not worth what we achieved. But for the purposes of current and future policy, that is entirely moot. Despite Obama's opposition, America went on to create a small miracle in the heart of the Arab Middle East. President Obama is now the custodian of that miracle. It is his duty as leader of the nation that gave birth to this fledgling democracy to ensure that he does nothing to undermine it.

A small miracle indeed.  I am sure the hundreds of thousands of dead, their many relatives, the maimed, and the displaced all wish that they could thank Mr. Krauthammer in person.

Chuckles' partner in crime, William Kristol, also appears on the Post online today to mindlessly parrot Republican talking points about Judd Gregg's withdrawal (it was all about the census and Rahm Emanuel), while he gasps at the outrageousus partisanship exhibited to date by Obama and his administration (yes, Obama.)  I only post so that you can enjoy the many comments generated by the grinning death's skull.  Maybe he will boost readership after all. 

Friday Frank: The Returning! Budapest; (Televised); 1991

While browsing through YouTube, looking for an interesting Frank Zappa clip to post after too many weeks of abstinence, I stumbled upon this thrilling piece, which I'd never seen before and which apparently aired on Hungarian television back in 1991. In it, a graying and clearly-unwell Zappa plays some heartbreakingly beautiful guitar--I don't recognize the composition, and I'm afraid I don't speak or read Hungarian, either; can any readers identify this piece for me? Anyway, interspersed with the music is footage of Zappa speaking with an unidentified (but English-speaking) man in what I will describe as a fascinating, classic Zappa interview brimming with timeless political observations. Below, I've transcribed the money quotes for you (emphasis mine):

FZ: "I am in the process of doing what we call a feasibility study to see if it's possible for me to run for President in the United States against George Bush*."

Interviewer: That's quite a comment--do you feel there's a chance?

FZ: "Umm, yes. Not a good one--because, you know, he has more balloons than I do. [laughs] But I certainly don't agree with his policies, and I think that the Democrats have nothing to offer. And my idea is, if I do decide to run, to run as an anti-partisan candidate. Because I believe both the political parties in the United States have let the public down, and they generate more rhetoric than results. And it's not often that a voter in the United States gets a clear-cut choice between two candidates, because they tend to resemble each other physically, rhetorically, aesthetically--every other way; it's a choice between Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee. And, er, if the feasibility study works out right, I would at least be able to say, If you get tired of those other two guys, you know, take a look at me."

Interviewer: Makes a lot of sense...the next time I interview you, I may be calling you Mr. President instead of Mr. Zappa?

FZ: [Shrugs and smiles] "Maybe..."

Frank Zappa died of prostate cancer in December, 1993. Given that his interest in--and involvement with--American politics was intensifying with every passing year, and knowing that he was both a fierce defender of the First Amendment and an active supporter of voting and participatory democracy, I don't doubt that, had he beaten the cancer, Zappa would have run for office at some point. And I've often wondered what he'd have to say about the nation electing the son of his then-nemesis, George Bush Sr.

Just as I've often wondered what he'd have to say about the condition of the country, the economy, and the Bill of Rights after the eight years during which Bush II lead us perilously close to becoming the "fascist theocracy" Zappa envisioned--and warned us about--during the Reagan years.

And, of course, I continue to muse about what Zappa would have to say about our new president, the unusually-named black son of a single mother. Our new president--he of the non-partisan approach to politics; he, an autodidact from a truly non-elite background. Our new president, who characterizes the philosophies of self-reliance and fiscal responsibility as being complementary to a belief in the power of union and the citizen's duty to community and nation. As did the great conservative president Abraham Lincoln; as did Zappa himself.

Our new president, a man who could hardly be described as resembling--physically, rhetorically, or aesthetically--any U.S. president elected heretofore.

* Zappa is referring to then-president George H. W. Bush, father of George W. Bush.

Also at litbrit.

The Stimulus Bill

So the deal has been struck, and the bill, while smaller than even Ben Nelson's towering sense of self-righteousness was able to accomplish, seems to be a much better bill than anyone thought could come out of the reconciliation process.

No one has a better rundown of the bill than nimh over at Observationalism.  I particularly like extension of unemployment benefits, and the tax cuts seem to be geared toward people who could actually use them - indeed, aside from fiddling with the AMT again, it looks like Obama managed to get direct cash payments included by invoking the Republican's favorite shibboleth.  It was also very encouraging to see Democrats finally responding to the GOP's falsehoods about who really pays taxes, pointing out that those who don't make enough to owe income taxes still do, in fact, pay taxes.

It's a far better bill that came out of the reconciliation process than I imagined.  And given the conservative tilt of so many Democrats coupled with the GOP's dominance of DC's conventional wisdom, it just might be the best bill possible.  Or, it might have been billions of dollars better if Obama hadn't tried to create a bipartisan bill all on his own, which he then tried to sell to 533 massive, turf-defending, credit-grabbing, blame-assigning egos.  As for a long term strategy in which this gives Obama the ammunition he needs to play hardball and traps the GOP into further marginalizing itself - I hope so.  Fervently.  But I'm certainly not convinced.

Stamps Are Going Up 2/100 Of A Dollar!

OH MY GOD STAMPS ARE GOING TO BE 44 CENTS EACH IN MAY WHAT WILL WE DO I KNOW LET'S PRIVATIZE THE GODDAMN POST OFFICE HEY THAT'S A GOOD IDEA!

I mean, come on.  I can send a letter - birthday card, bill, whatever - across the country, even Hawaii and Alaska, for $.44 and it will get there in just a couple of days.  And let's say that my Alaskan friend moved to the Florida Keys.  The horribly inefficient USPS would, automatically and with no further cost, forward that letter from the Arctic Circle to an island off the southern tip of Florida.  Would UPS or FedEx do the same?

UPS and FedEx are very nice to have around if you want something delivered quickly and you want to pay more for it - though I've found that I can actually get the same options at the Post Office.  In fact, as UPS and FedEx have lost their novelty and I've actually taken a look at the Post Office's options and prices, I see little use for the private companies at all.  I guess it's nice to be able to schedule pickups and all that, but that level of service costs more; it's not like market fairy dust lets them provide it for free.

Bus Evangelism

Via John in comments, there's an online bus slogan generator.  It's fun!