But when you look at it with a finer granulation, the resolution gets pretty sharp.
(Click on the picture to get a good close look)
(hat tip = Democratic Underground)
Nov 17, 2012
50 Shades Of Purple
There are 2 pretty important things that usually get ignored when looking at how the voting splits out in a national election. First is the actual mix of Repub/Dem votes in any given location, and the second is the density of the voter population. So when you just look a the Electoral College map, all you see is big chunks of Red in the middle flanked by big chunks of Blue on the sides.
But when you look at it with a finer granulation, the resolution gets pretty sharp.
(Click on the picture to get a good close look)
But when you look at it with a finer granulation, the resolution gets pretty sharp.
(Click on the picture to get a good close look)
The Anonymous Thing
Lots of speculation and suppositioning about whether or not Anonymous had something to do with stopping a real or imagined attempt by Karl Rove to hack the vote for Romney.
From Wonkette (hard to tell what to think when these guys get goin' on something):
I guess I just have to wonder about something. Let's say Anonymous did have the goods on ol' Karl. The letter seems to indicate they knew an awful lot about the scheme and about how it worked (barn doors etc). If they knew all that, and they had all the evidence of tampering and what could easily be construed as a bunch of people conspiring to commit Wire Fraud, and Election Rigging and a host of other Federal Crimes - why did they just kinda fold the tent and say in effect, "Watch yer ass, fellas cuz next time we'll be on you like the sun covers Dixie". Why go all Batman, thwarting the evil genius, but then, instead of exposing him and delivering him to justice, you pat him on the butt and send him on his way with a warning? I gotta be missing something, or there's a lot more to be found out, but I don't get it - not yet anyway.
From Wonkette (hard to tell what to think when these guys get goin' on something):
Oh cool, Anonymous (we think it is Anonymous?) says Karl Rove was gonna vote fraud all the Machines, and that’s why he was so flabbergasted and refused to believe it when Fox called Ohio for Bamz, but they stopped him from stealing all the Machines by jamming up ORCA, because it was not actually a GOTV system but a “steal the vote” system, but they stopped him, we are pretty sure that is what the following letter, which we guess is from Anonymous probably, says. Seems legit!And here's the letter:
I guess I just have to wonder about something. Let's say Anonymous did have the goods on ol' Karl. The letter seems to indicate they knew an awful lot about the scheme and about how it worked (barn doors etc). If they knew all that, and they had all the evidence of tampering and what could easily be construed as a bunch of people conspiring to commit Wire Fraud, and Election Rigging and a host of other Federal Crimes - why did they just kinda fold the tent and say in effect, "Watch yer ass, fellas cuz next time we'll be on you like the sun covers Dixie". Why go all Batman, thwarting the evil genius, but then, instead of exposing him and delivering him to justice, you pat him on the butt and send him on his way with a warning? I gotta be missing something, or there's a lot more to be found out, but I don't get it - not yet anyway.
A Quick Tho't
I'm hearing way too much whining from people like John Schnatter et al about what difficulties they find themselves in, now that Obummer's been made King of Fuckamericastan. Poor Papa; it's quite possible he'll be unable to afford the upkeep on his richly deserved 40-room house and personal golf course. To that we can add the increasing volume of grumbling from those accursed unions and the under-employed. Here's a shocker: I can't help but feel more inclined toward the people who're actually doing the work.
So any-old-way. I'm coming to realize that the overarching failure of US Government in the last 30 years is that they've done almost literally nothing to protect the American worker's standing as a major contributor to the success of American business - even while they've said almost nothing except how great the American worker is. Really? If you love us so much, why do you treat us like such shit?
Here's CNN/Forbes trying to spin the death of Hostess Brands into a cautionary tale about what happens when "the unions" are all intractable and/or stuck in the 70s or whatever. It tries hard to do the Plenty-Of-Blame-To-Go-Around thing, but it's all about how the bad guy unions wouldn't let poor old Hostesscontinue to poison Americans with food that isn't really food do what a good entrepreneurial business knows it should do in a truly moral free market universe - which of course is ship all the jobs to Mexico blah blah blah. And the kicker is that they use this one case to illustrate how nice it is for a Democrat Hedge Fund guy to try to help out and all, but he's just being too touchy-feely and the grownups need to step in to get it straightened out.
BTW - a brief aside: Papa John's stock has been dropping since his little public tantrum - down something like 9%. So lemme see.I've posted before about an American Working Class that continues to get beat down while the Owner/Investor Class fattens up by getting a shrinking Management Class to work ever harder to maintain the status quo (ie: a continuation of the siphoning upward of as much wealth and power as possible). And my only problem right this very second is that I can't find those posts, so maybe I just dreamed how great a thinker I am - not that my talking about the whole Class-Fuck thing makes me a great thinker in any case; shit, everybody's talked about that one.
9% of a company worth $1.09 Billion is $98,000,000.
Papa John's "Obamacare cost" = about $6,500,000.
Question: Why are stupid people like John Schnatter in charge of these things?
So any-old-way. I'm coming to realize that the overarching failure of US Government in the last 30 years is that they've done almost literally nothing to protect the American worker's standing as a major contributor to the success of American business - even while they've said almost nothing except how great the American worker is. Really? If you love us so much, why do you treat us like such shit?
Here's CNN/Forbes trying to spin the death of Hostess Brands into a cautionary tale about what happens when "the unions" are all intractable and/or stuck in the 70s or whatever. It tries hard to do the Plenty-Of-Blame-To-Go-Around thing, but it's all about how the bad guy unions wouldn't let poor old Hostess
So far, in a courtroom near Manhattan and in a negotiating room in downtown Washington, they haven't come close, although a deal could happen even as you read this. The dramatis personaeare impressive: the Teamsters; two large hedge funds, Silver Point Capital and Monarch Alternative Capital; and the private-equity firm Ripplewood Holdings. In an acrimonious behind-the-scenes war -- refereed by a federal judge -- they wage hostilities over who will get what crumbs from a disintegrating corporate cookie; whether that business can and should be resuscitated; the degree to which fabulous pension plans are anachronistic; whether promises made in collective bargaining ought to be sacrosanct; and just how important it is to save 15,000 union jobs. "There aren't great options here," former U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt told Fortune. Gephardt is now a lobbyist and consultant with connections to Hostess and the Teamsters. "People will have to pick the one that's a little bit better."For me, Obama's whole tenure will be a ridiculous success if he does nothing else in the next four years but get our thinking turned around on how to bolster the fortunes of American labor while not flipping over into full-blown Protectionism.
Nov 16, 2012
A Fairly Simple Concept
I've been wondering pretty hard about how to articulate the basic shoot-yourself-in-the-foot strategy the GOP is trying to make work when it comes to winning elections and being able to "govern"*.
It just doesn't make any sense to alienate up to 95% of any given (eg: black) demographic if you expect to win - unless of course if you have a solid handle on ways to keep a sizable portion of those demographics from voting in the first place. And that's what all theVoter Suppression - I mean Election Integrity efforts were all about - fucking duh. (How many times do we have to hear about it from Maddow and every commentator left of Fred Barnes before we get it?).
Anyway, the GOP's real problem is this:
(hat tip = Balloon Juice)
...and the real real problem is that yes, actually it is indeed possible to fool some of the people all of the time. But we can hope that the "some of the people" demographic is finally starting to shrink a bit.
*is it really "governing" if you're elected by a self-selecting minority? I think there's a different word for that.
It just doesn't make any sense to alienate up to 95% of any given (eg: black) demographic if you expect to win - unless of course if you have a solid handle on ways to keep a sizable portion of those demographics from voting in the first place. And that's what all the
Anyway, the GOP's real problem is this:
(hat tip = Balloon Juice)
...and the real real problem is that yes, actually it is indeed possible to fool some of the people all of the time. But we can hope that the "some of the people" demographic is finally starting to shrink a bit.
*is it really "governing" if you're elected by a self-selecting minority? I think there's a different word for that.
Deficit And Debt
No really - all your talk about your horrible tax burden and your right to keep the money you (haven't really) earned on your investments, and all the rest of the crap Repubs are always on about means precisely dick.
Nov 15, 2012
It's Not A Cliff
First off, it's never about what they tell us it's about - almost exactly what Chris Hayes is saying here.
And I'll say this again - there's nothing better than listening to smart people talking about important stuff.
And I'll say this again - there's nothing better than listening to smart people talking about important stuff.
Nov 14, 2012
Say It Ain't So, Peaches
David Petraeus (nicknamed Peaches as a teenager) has seen a good bit of shittiness in his career, but I get the feeling he ain't seen nothin' compared with the enormity of what's coming down on him now.
So far, it's been just kind of interesting to watch the Villagers as they cluck their tongues and wag their fingers at him, acting shocked that he'd let himself in for something like this. I get the feeling that a bunch of 'em knew about it (or at least suspected it - because they go to the same parties as all of the players in this High School Fuck-Around Melodrama) and now they get to pretend they're not just jumping up and down on the guy's head yelling, "See? I told you this'd blow up in your face, and you'd end up helping us sell a shitoad of diapers and deodorant". For the Press Poodles, this is way better than the standard Dead White Girl story any day.
My take: unless there's a serious threat to People or Mission, I don't care if he's fucking frogs. Everything else is just Reality Porn you can get on basic cable 24/7.
Not that this is related - well maybe, but barely:
So far, it's been just kind of interesting to watch the Villagers as they cluck their tongues and wag their fingers at him, acting shocked that he'd let himself in for something like this. I get the feeling that a bunch of 'em knew about it (or at least suspected it - because they go to the same parties as all of the players in this High School Fuck-Around Melodrama) and now they get to pretend they're not just jumping up and down on the guy's head yelling, "See? I told you this'd blow up in your face, and you'd end up helping us sell a shitoad of diapers and deodorant". For the Press Poodles, this is way better than the standard Dead White Girl story any day.
My take: unless there's a serious threat to People or Mission, I don't care if he's fucking frogs. Everything else is just Reality Porn you can get on basic cable 24/7.
Not that this is related - well maybe, but barely:
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