I Don't Like Thinking This Way

It's a pretty lousy feeling when you're not so sure the "good guys with the guns" are on your side.

And that lousy feeling doesn't get any better when you start thinking you may have something in common with these assholes:

We Teach Life, Sir

I am now officially in conflict with the current paradigm - OK OK, more in conflict...



Whether they are or not, Israel ends up looking like complete assholes.

hat tip = Facebook friend NFP

Living In The Penumbral Age

(paraphrasing) What the Deniers tell us to fear most - massive government intervention and over-reach and meddling in the free market - is exactly what we're going to get when catastrophic changes due to Climate Change really kick in.

The podcast at Inquiring Minds:

hat tip = MoJo

Today's Best Thing On The Toobs

Ya cain't say nuthin' more perfecter than this Wonkette headline:

Today's Pix

Today's Toon

Been Wondering

We've seen certain things pop up regarding the much slower growth in federal hiring under Obama; and the dramatic decreases in deficits and debt; and the low inflation numbers; and the uptick in hiring along with the steady drop in unemployment; etc etc etc.

And when I say "pop up" I mean "hardly a fucking word about any of it from the Press Poodles".

But hey - maybe that's just me.

Anyway, I've been wondering why the Repubs aren't jumping up and down screaming about how they've been right about everything, and how all these unicorns and rainbows came about because they forced the Prez to rein in all that reckless outa-control spending ... that wasn't and still isn't ... uhm ... you know - happening.

Well guess what, kids.

"Congress has severely damaged the economy with deep spending cuts in a misguided attempt to solve a short-term debt crisis that simply does not exist," wrote CAP economists Harry Stein and Adam Hersh.

The progressive think tank's analysis is based on the latest budget outlook from the Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan congressional research group, which was released on Tuesday.

So where are you, Democrats?  Why is there no talk from you guys about "the failed conservative policies of the past"?  Are you guys so inept that you can't see this opportunity?  Are you so truly bereft of testicular fortitude that Elizabeth Warren is the only one unwilling to remain comfortable in the role of battered spouse?

Get up on your hind legs and make some fuckin' noise, dammit.

Logical Fallacy #19 - Black Or White

A false dilemma (also called black-and/or-white thinking, bifurcation, denying a conjunct, the either-or fallacy, false dichotomy, fallacy of exhaustive hypotheses, the fallacy of false choice, the fallacy of the false alternative, or the fallacy of the excluded middle) is a type of informal fallacy that involves a situation in which limited alternatives are considered, when in fact there is at least one additional option. The opposite of this fallacy is argument to moderation.

The options may be a position that is between two extremes (such as when there are shades of grey) or may be completely different alternatives. Phrasing that implies two options (dilemma, dichotomy, black-and-white) may be replaced with other number-based nouns, such as a "false trilemma" if something is reduced to only three options, instead of two.

False dilemma can arise intentionally, when fallacy is used in an attempt to force a choice (such as, in some contexts, the assertion that "if you are not with us, you are against us"). But the fallacy can also arise simply by accidental omission of additional options rather than by deliberate deception.

Pay Up Or Get Out

BIll Moyers, on a simple (sounding) tax reform idea:

The epidemic of tax inversions represents just one of many ways corporations are dodging their taxes by taking advantage of our outdated and rigged corporate tax system. It is time for a serious debate about corporate taxes, and on Monday a new report by District Economics Group economist Michael Udell offered a bold new alternative that is so radically simple that even the most clever corporate tax accountant would have a hard time finding a way around its fair and universal proposition: If a company sells products or services in the US, it must pay taxes on the US proportion of its worldwide sales.

But first, let’s explore how today’s complexity enables corporate tax avoidance.

Are We “Broke” or Just Not Collecting the Taxes We Are Owed?

“America is broke,” declared House Speaker John Boehner a few years ago. But clearly the country is not broke; we are just being robbed, as many corporations create ways of avoiding, dodging, shirking and generally not paying their taxes. The share of federal revenue coming from corporate taxes has dropped from around 32 percent in 1952 to 8.9 percent now. As a share of gross domestic product, it has fallen from about 6 percent of GDP then to less than 2 percent now. Meanwhile the rest of us — including small domestic companies that don’t have armies of tax consultants — have to make up that shortfall, either through increases in things like payroll taxes, or through cuts in the things government does to make our lives better.

hat tips = Facebooks buds VW and DR 

What We Choose To Believe

If I project backwards 40 or 50 thousand years, it's not hard to understand how a species capable of rational thought could look at this and make the simplest Type 1 Error by ascribing agency to it.  How do you not when you have no way of knowing otherwise?



Now, as a species capable of rational thought, and knowing what we know, how do we look at this and stop wondering just because we're more comfortable with ignorance and superstition?

You're Not Alone And You're Not To Blame

Matt Dillahunty excerpted from NonProphets Radio:

Haves And Soon-To-Haves

Try not to think about Logan's Run or The Island or Roller Ball or whatever.

Feed A Child

Reaction to this ad has become what I have to consider an almost perfect snapshot of what's wrong with our "conversations" whenever we try to talk about any of the increasing number of Elephants In The Room.





The point is that way too many pets get way better treatment than way too many kids, and maybe we could do some tiny little thing to change that just a tiny bit(?)  Maybe we could just think about it?  Seems pretty simple.  But to hear some of the reaction, you'd think the ad was actually advocating in favor of keeping children as pets - or that black kids are dogs - or that - what exactly!?!

Seriously, when did everybody get so fuckin' stoopid?

Check out the Feed A Child website, or make a contribution of 20 Rand (SA only) by texting "child" to 40014.

You can make a contribution from elsewhere using PayPal.

Today's Eternal Sadness

At the nexus of our twin pathologies involving the worship of both Gun Violence and Celebrity:

JERSEY CITY, N.J. (AP) — A gunman who killed a rookie officer responding to a report of an armed robbery at a drugstore early Sunday never tried to rob the store and instead lay in wait for police, telling a witness to watch the news because he was "going to be famous," authorities said.

Lawrence Campbell shot Officer Melvin Santiago in the head shortly after he and his partner arrived at the 24-hour Walgreens at around 4 a.m., Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said. Other officers returned fire at Campbell, killing him.

Campbell, 27, of Jersey City, was one of three suspects wanted by police for a prior homicide, Fulop said.

Fulop said Campbell was carrying a knife when he walked into Walgreens and asked for directions to the greeting card aisle. He assaulted an armed security guard at the store and snatched his gun, Fulop said.

So that last bit - there was in fact one of Wayne LaPierre's Good Guys With A Gun on hand at the time, and several other Good Guys With A Gun showed up too.

When do we get hip to some of this shit?

Today's Pix