China Hack

Via HuffPo:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Chinese hackers broke into the computer networks of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management earlier this year with the intention of accessing the files of tens of thousands of federal employees who had applied for top-secret security clearances, according to The New York Times.

Senior U.S. officials say the hackers gained access to some of the agency's databases in March before the threat was detected and blocked, the Times reported in an article posted on its website Wednesday night. How far the hackers penetrated the agency's systems was not yet clear, the newspaper said.

Accusations of hacking by China and counterclaims of such activity by the U.S. government have strained U.S.-Chinese relations. Chinese hacking has been a major theme of U.S.-China discussions this week in Beijing, though both sides have publicly steered clear of the controversy.

First off, who didn't think this kinda thing was going on - or wasn't going to happen eventually?

And then, let's consider how the Press Poodles are shocked - shocked I tells ya - about revelations of dirty dealing.

High School Fuck-Around Drama du jour.

I Figured It Out

OK, so I've got it now - maybe.

Republicans are pretty much all about an authoritarian top-down central control business-model power structure where you're all welcome to voice your opinions, but we're gonna need ya to get in line here pretty soon and just do what we're tellin' ya'll to do.  Kinda like religion.

Democrats are more of a make up your own mind; we're all in charge cuz nobody's better than anybody else in this community; do your own thing and we'll try to meet - later - somewhere in the middle and see if we can't get to something that resembles a consensus so we can make some decisions about what's best for the most.  Kinda like atheism.

Why did it take me so long to figure this out?

At about the 3-minute mark, this guys nails it for me.

Dear HBO

...I'm kind of intrigued by your new series - The Leftovers.  It's an interesting premise, and it seems to have some real potential.

But there's one little problem.  The flag patch on Garvey's right shoulder is backwards.  Protocol requires the field of stars always to be on the forward edge - ie: never "in retreat".

Just a nit I felt needed pickin'.

Today's Monster Of The Id

The Former 1/2-Term Governor is a real star in the DumFux firmament.  Her skill at taking random sentence fragments (generally composed of buzzwords and coded phrases), and cobbling them into TV-friendly 30-second sound bites that can then be repackaged as common sense political reality is practically unrivaled.  And the simple fact that her "commentary" is unfailingly incendiary - to the point that she should come with her own HazMat label - puts her in a class where calling the roll is a very much abbreviated exercise.

That's Odd

From Yahoo News via Democratic Underground:

Beginning in January of this year, 13 states individually increased their own minimum wages, creating a sort of natural experiment in which the remaining states could serve as a control group. All that was left was for someone to do the math, and the Center for Economic and Policy Research, building on research conducted earlier in the year by Goldman Sachs, delivered that in a report last week.

Of the 13 states that raised their minimum wages, all but one saw job growth in the first five months of 2014. To be sure, that’s a small achievement in an environment where the national economy is adding something on the order of 250,000 jobs per month.

The really interesting finding is that the states that raised the minimum wage saw job growth that was, on average, higher than states that did not. The 37 states that did not raise the minimum wage at the beginning of this year saw employment increase by .68 percent. Those that did raise the wage saw employment increase by .99 percent.

So those hippie-dippie mush-brained libruls were right - again?  And what about all the death and destruction foretold by all those "grownups" on the other side? - the ones who were so absolutely certain that raising the Minimum Wage even a tiny bit threatened the natural order of the universe, and would surely call down the wrath of a vengeful Mammon to lay waste the land and curse all humankind forever, and blah blah fucking blah.

Is it at all weird that none of this has popped up on MSNBC's Morning Blow or on DumFux Business Channel?  Or is it just that I've missed too many of their riveting, insightful and mission-critical segments lately?

Today's Pix

One Bit More

...on the Cliven Bundy thing.

I seem to recall that ol' Cliven said the only authority he was willing to acknowledge was the local sheriff.

From the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

Rancher Cliven Bundy must be held accountable, Clark County Sheriff Doug Gillespie said Thursday.

But, the sheriff added, the federal agency trying to do it must reconsider its methods in order to prevent the bloodshed that was so narrowly avoided in April.

Gillespie, speaking to a Review-Journal editorial board, minced no words when recounting the mistakes made in the days and weeks before an April 12 standoff between armed protesters and the Bureau of Land Management on Bundy’s Bunkerville cattle ranch, about 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas.

The sheriff harshly criticized Bundy and said his family committed “serious errors” when BLM officers tried to round up more than 500 of the rancher’s cattle. Bundy, who believes the public land is his to use, hasn’t paid his federal grazing fees for 20 years and ignored a federal court order to remove the cattle.

Gillespie said he spoke to Bundy many times in the months before the roundup. He said he made it clear to Bundy that, if his family was going to protest, it must be peaceful.

But Bundy crossed the line when he allowed his supporters, many of whom were armed militia members, onto his property to aim guns at police, the sheriff said.

“If you step over that line, there are consequences to those actions. And I believe they stepped over that line. No doubt about it,” Gillespie said. “They need to be held accountable for it.”

Yer move, Clive.

hat tip = Addicting Info

Kaili's Pissed

One observation - the Hobby Lobby decision is a near-perfect metaphor for exactly the kind of botched abortions that are prob'ly headed our way because of this mis-guided and poorly- informed, deliberately ignorant "conservative movement" that seems bent on pulling down American Democracy and replacing it with Christian Sharia.

But here's Kaili Joy Gray to girlsplain it to us from a perspective that's only shared by - oh I dunno - a few gazillion other women:

Of course I am mad. My vagina is getting uncomfortably crowded, what with all of that compelling government interest to protect me from myself, and those sincerely held religious beliefs, and the counseling, and the men telling me JUST DON’T HAVE SEX. There’s hardly room for my doctor to even get up in there to make sure my oh-so-important vagina is actually in fine working order, which I know is beside the point to everyone else taking up space for freedom and liberty and Jesus. But it’s really the only point that should matter.

But also too - keeping in mind my first basic tenet (it's never about what they tell us it's about):  This decision is being sold to us as if it's Rep vs Dem, or Librul vs Conservadope, or Godless Big Gubmint vs Holy Little Guy Business Owner - that's bullshit - or mostly bullshit anyway.  This ends up being about furthering the cause of establishing and reinforcing the primacy of Corporation-as-Citizen.

SCOTUS just found another way to push the envelope, using the 1st amendment for cover - Corporations are people who now have the right to free speech (Citizens United) and (the right to nullify federal law by claiming) religious freedom (Hobby Lobby)...and at some point I think we can look forward to a lawsuit on behalf of some poor mistreated corporation whose 'freedom of association' is being denied by the mean ol' bureaucrats at SEC and DoJ et al - so we can say good-bye to Anti-Trust laws and every trace of rules and regulations that prohibit the use of important business tools like Collusion and Price-Fixing and Market Manipulation, and all the other elements of a Libertarian Free Market Utopia.

So let's go ahead and fuss at each other about Church and State, and Bodily Integrity, and  Red Team vs Blue Team - all of which are plenty important btw - just let's be sure we're paying attention to what's behind the curtain too.

Logical Fallacy #18 - Genetic

The genetic fallacy, also known as fallacy of origins, fallacy of virtue,[1] is a fallacy of irrelevance where a conclusion is suggested based solely on something or someone's origin rather than its current meaning or context. This overlooks any difference to be found in the present situation, typically transferring the positive or negative esteem from the earlier context.

The fallacy therefore fails to assess the claim on its merit. The first criterion of a good argument is that the premises must have bearing on the truth or falsity of the claim in question.[2] Genetic accounts of an issue may be true, and they may help illuminate the reasons why the issue has assumed its present form, but they are irrelevant to its merits.[3]

Today's Riddle

Q: Why don't blind people go skydiving?

A: It scares the dog.