Yeah, yeah, it's Kevin Spacey. For just a bit, pay attention to the writing - what the character says, not the off-camera shittiness of the actor.
Showing posts with label legalized bribery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label legalized bribery. Show all posts
Monday, April 09, 2018
Thursday, May 12, 2016
Quick Question
Why is this shit OK?
Politics is undoubtedly the Blunt family business: His wife, Abigail, is the top D.C. lobbyist for Kraft Foods. His son Matt served one term as Missouri governor and now leads the main lobbying group for Detroit automakers. Son Andy and daughter Amy are both lobbyists in Missouri; Andy is managing his father’s Senate campaign.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
A Giant Killer
Elizabeth Warren continues to be a great example of what political courage looks like; and what happens when somebody who knows a little something about leadership in a representative democracy stands up and speaks the kind of truth that makes oligarchs very uncomfortable.
But the red part's the real kicker. More and more, it's not about who lives in the White House. It's about who owns the US Senate and the Governors' mansions, and the state legislatures and on down the line.
So we're busy arguing over the Federal-level shit - where we get to have a president and a coupla dozen high-profile Senators and Representatives in order to maintain the illusion of "self-government" (and that's not bound to last much past the next few cycles if things don't change in a big fuckin' hurry) - while the American Aristocracy is even busier puppeteering the rubes into slashing and burning at the state- local- and municipal levels.
And one last item: I know it sounds like I'm railing against all the doom-and-gloom coming from "the right" by railing about doom-and-gloom from what you might see as "the left". If that's how you hear it, then you've internalized all the Middle-Ground bullshit we hear every day from practically every media outlet everywhere, and you must get the fuck over it.
The difference is that I'm arguing in favor of the firewalls that have to be in place as a way of preventing the toxic and corrosive effects of having too much power concentrated in too few hands, while the other side is pimping the wholesome goodness of outright authoritarian rule.
Get up on your hind legs and make some noise.
(Reuters) - Big Wall Street banks are so upset with U.S. Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren's call for them to be broken up that some have discussed withholding campaign donations to Senate Democrats in symbolic protest, sources familiar with the discussions said.
Representatives from Citigroup, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America, have met to discuss ways to urge Democrats, including Warren and Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, to soften their party's tone toward Wall Street, sources familiar with the discussions said this week.
Bank officials said the idea of withholding donations was not discussed at a meeting of the four banks in Washington but it has been raised in one-on-one conversations between representatives of some of them. However, there was no agreement on coordinating any action, and each bank is making its own decision, they said.
The amount of money at stake, a maximum of $15,000 per bank, means the gesture is symbolic rather than material.
Moreover, banks' hostility toward Warren, who is not a presidential candidate, will not have a direct impact on the presumed Democratic front runner in the White House race, Hillary Clinton. That's because their fund-raising groups focus on congressional races rather than the presidential election
Still, political strategists say Clinton could struggle to raise money among Wall Street financiers who worry that Democrats are becoming less business friendly.The bit that I hi-lited in yellow wins this week's Corporate Bullshitter award. A "cap" of $15,000 is window dressing. It's "symbolic rather than material"? Well dip me in shit and call me lonesome - whooda thunk it? When you threaten to take that away from a candidate, it's a signal - it means you'll (prob'ly) be spending hundreds of times that amount on attack ads and mailings and blowjobs for the pimps at AEI so they'll pop up on DumFux News & Meet The Press Poodles to spout warnings about all the horribleness that's just gotta happen if Bad Ol' Perfesser Egghead won't let the Giant Vampire Squid continue sucking the life out of everything we thought we were all supposed to be working for.
But the red part's the real kicker. More and more, it's not about who lives in the White House. It's about who owns the US Senate and the Governors' mansions, and the state legislatures and on down the line.
So we're busy arguing over the Federal-level shit - where we get to have a president and a coupla dozen high-profile Senators and Representatives in order to maintain the illusion of "self-government" (and that's not bound to last much past the next few cycles if things don't change in a big fuckin' hurry) - while the American Aristocracy is even busier puppeteering the rubes into slashing and burning at the state- local- and municipal levels.
And one last item: I know it sounds like I'm railing against all the doom-and-gloom coming from "the right" by railing about doom-and-gloom from what you might see as "the left". If that's how you hear it, then you've internalized all the Middle-Ground bullshit we hear every day from practically every media outlet everywhere, and you must get the fuck over it.
The difference is that I'm arguing in favor of the firewalls that have to be in place as a way of preventing the toxic and corrosive effects of having too much power concentrated in too few hands, while the other side is pimping the wholesome goodness of outright authoritarian rule.
Get up on your hind legs and make some noise.
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Ownership Society
Or more accurately: The owners of our society.
The last item on the To-Do List of Capital in the US is to purchase the government, which is all but complete now.
I don't advocate blowing shit up. I don't condone it; I don't approve of it; I see nothing but rationalized stupidity in a term like Creative Destruction, and it doesn't matter if you apply it to wrecking our manufacturing sector or you try to use it to justify revolution. I've spent my life trying to learn how to build things up and make them work, so I don't want anybody thinking I see anything noble or heroic in the actions of some jag-off who decides to set fire to something just to watch it burn.
But that's not to say I don't understand the impulse.
The last item on the To-Do List of Capital in the US is to purchase the government, which is all but complete now.
I don't advocate blowing shit up. I don't condone it; I don't approve of it; I see nothing but rationalized stupidity in a term like Creative Destruction, and it doesn't matter if you apply it to wrecking our manufacturing sector or you try to use it to justify revolution. I've spent my life trying to learn how to build things up and make them work, so I don't want anybody thinking I see anything noble or heroic in the actions of some jag-off who decides to set fire to something just to watch it burn.
But that's not to say I don't understand the impulse.
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Closing The Circle
The continuing bad news in West Virginia is that Freedom Industries "Oops-ed" again by neglecting to mention there'd been a second chemical spilled at the same time as the MCHM (it appears they occurred at the same time - tho' nobody's saying for sure). So there was also a spill of PPH (polyglycol ethers). But since this other shit is a bit less toxic, we can just kinda overlook all that.
Let's leave aside for just a moment that a 30-year campaign toweaken shitcan our Regulatory Infrastructure continues to produce this ongoing nightmare scenario - from Enron to Wall Street to Deepwater Horizon to Mayflower AR to Charleston WV to everywhere else there's still one GOP/Glibertarian moron bitchin' about how da gubmint just needs to leave us all alone.
OK OK - try a little harder to leave all that shit aside, cuz here's the thing: The circle is closing.
In West Virginia, the governor has come out and said he doesn't know what's up because he's not a scientist. The scientists are a little baffled because they've all been working on something other than Air and Water Quality cuz a guy really can't make much of a living doing that anymore (or they're all working for the chemical companies, so they're not likely to bite the hand that feeds 'em). Da Gubmint is pretty useless because the people who used to work on things like Environmental Health have been forced out by budget cuts etc (see "working for the chemical companies" above), plus the "regulators" who're still on the job were put there by Coin-Operated Politicians who needed to pay off their contributors by demonstrating how Business Friendly they really are. Of course the private-sector Water Utility can't be expected to do anything because they're held hostage to Big Coal just like everybody else.
And now, Freedom Industries has filed for bankruptcy protection - with a twist:
Everybody's guity; nobody's responsible; nobody can be held accountable.
So they close the loop, which basically indemnifies everybody who by right should be crucified - which is exactly how it's supposed to work - and guess who gets left holding the bag.
One last thing - while everybody's running around yelling about how they don't know anything and they can't do anything, and and and - there is this little thing called The West Virginia Poison Center, and there's a "branch office" right there at The Charleston Area Med Ctr, 3110 Maccorkle Ave SE, Charleston, WV 25304 (800) 222-1222
Let's leave aside for just a moment that a 30-year campaign to
OK OK - try a little harder to leave all that shit aside, cuz here's the thing: The circle is closing.
In West Virginia, the governor has come out and said he doesn't know what's up because he's not a scientist. The scientists are a little baffled because they've all been working on something other than Air and Water Quality cuz a guy really can't make much of a living doing that anymore (or they're all working for the chemical companies, so they're not likely to bite the hand that feeds 'em). Da Gubmint is pretty useless because the people who used to work on things like Environmental Health have been forced out by budget cuts etc (see "working for the chemical companies" above), plus the "regulators" who're still on the job were put there by Coin-Operated Politicians who needed to pay off their contributors by demonstrating how Business Friendly they really are. Of course the private-sector Water Utility can't be expected to do anything because they're held hostage to Big Coal just like everybody else.
And now, Freedom Industries has filed for bankruptcy protection - with a twist:
Everybody's guity; nobody's responsible; nobody can be held accountable.
So they close the loop, which basically indemnifies everybody who by right should be crucified - which is exactly how it's supposed to work - and guess who gets left holding the bag.
One last thing - while everybody's running around yelling about how they don't know anything and they can't do anything, and and and - there is this little thing called The West Virginia Poison Center, and there's a "branch office" right there at The Charleston Area Med Ctr, 3110 Maccorkle Ave SE, Charleston, WV 25304 (800) 222-1222
Sunday, August 18, 2013
A Blind Hog
Even a blind hog roots up an acorn once in a while.
With that in mind, let's check in with the late great WaPo, where it doesn't matter what's true or what's good or what's right (this is the age of "New Media" y'know - all that matters is delivering readers to advertisers). But I'll pat 'em on the back on that rarest of occasions when they manage to break through the deafening clutter (that they're helping to create) with something that isn't just their usual Red Team / Blue Team bullshit:
But, of course in the end, it all fits neatly into the "Both Sides Do It" narrative.
If everybody does it, then there's nobody to hold anybody accountable for anything - and we're right back to status quo. Never mind.
With that in mind, let's check in with the late great WaPo, where it doesn't matter what's true or what's good or what's right (this is the age of "New Media" y'know - all that matters is delivering readers to advertisers). But I'll pat 'em on the back on that rarest of occasions when they manage to break through the deafening clutter (that they're helping to create) with something that isn't just their usual Red Team / Blue Team bullshit:
For prosecutors, the key question is whether there was a clearly articulated “quid pro quo.” If so, the gifts were bribes. If not, they were gifts. To me, as an anthropologist, this largely misses the point.
Across the massive cornucopia of human culture, anthropologists have found relatively few universals. One of the strongest of these, however, concerns gift-giving. Gifts are given in all cultures, and to remarkably similar effect. As every graduate student in anthropology learns, gifts by their nature create social ties and a sense of reciprocal obligation. To give a gift is to expect something in return, though it undermines the power and mystique of the gift to spell out too clearly what that something is. It would be uncouth to give a friend a birthday present and say “now when it’s my birthday I expect you to give me this model of this product,” but the expectation of a well-chosen gift in return is no less powerful for that. The failure to give something in response can end a friendship.--and--
When politicians accept gifts such as Rolex watches and Oscar de la Renta gowns from multimillionaires, they often lack the means to reciprocate as equals. Surely, Williams has wealthy friends — his equals — with whom he exchanges gifts, but the McDonnells are not wealthy. From an anthropological perspective, Williams gave McDonnell gifts that the governor lacked the means to repay in order to subordinate him. Unable to afford, say, a $10,000 purse for Williams’s wife in return for what was given to his own wife, the governor can only return Williams’s generosity by lending him the power of his office in some way. Whether the expectation of a return was ever crisply articulated as a “quid pro quo” is really beside the point — even if it is the whole point to lawyers.My guess is that Vaginal Bob will dodge the indictment, and maybe get slapped around a bit by an "ethics committee" stacked with politicians who will give us a great look at Irony In Action by deciding not to be so "hypocritical" as to condemn McDonnell for something most of them have been doing for as long as they've been in politics - all in the name of good government and bipartisanship and fairness.
But, of course in the end, it all fits neatly into the "Both Sides Do It" narrative.
If everybody does it, then there's nobody to hold anybody accountable for anything - and we're right back to status quo. Never mind.
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