Train Link of the Day

Click on this (it's actually grosser than what you think it is), pronto!

Galtse

That is all.

More Lives, Money Down The Drain

Amazingly timed with the wikileaks data dump that confirmed what many of us had feared about our escalating war in Afganistan, there's this:

Washington (CNN) -- The House of Representatives held a heated debate Tuesday over whether to pass a nearly $59 billion emergency spending bill, the bulk of which would go toward the U.S. troop buildup in Afghanistan.

It took months to pass an extension on unemployment benefits, yet the funding for a war that even the commie hippies at the Council on Foreign Relations are beginning to question seems to be right on schedule.

I really thought the wikileaks disclosure would have put more pressure on the media and our politicians to ask a bit more about just what we're doing there, but everyone seems to have already moved on.

Leaving once we kill everyone who doesn't like us isn't a strategy, but from what I can tell that seems to be the plan. The sooner the Administration realizes this the better, and we can move on to other things, like not spending all of our money on pointless wars.

White Privilage Is A Myth, Says White Member of 99% White U.S. Senate

Adam Sewer has a great take down of Jim Webb's recent op-ed. The whole thing well argued and researched, but he really could have stopped after this:

There are a number of things about Senator Jim Webb's op-ed "The Myth of White Privilege" to dislike, starting with the fact that one of the awesome things about the existence of white privilege is that you can be part of a body like the U.S. Senate, which has a total number of zero elected black members, and write something titled "The Myth of White Privilege" without anyone batting an eyelash.

Webb is good on a lot of issues, but this is blindingly stupid.

#126- A mosque is constructed in New York. The Right goes mad.

Newt Gingrich: "A mosque and community center is being built near Ground Zero in New York? There's only one appropriate response: lose my fucking mind."

America is experiencing an Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to undermine and destroy our civilization. Sadly, too many of our elites are the willing apologists for those who would destroy them if they could.

No mosque. No self deception. No surrender.

The time to take a stand is now - at this site, on this issue.

"Hey Newt, I heard there's a mosque or two in DC as well."

*Gingrich pisses himself, shits pants, and barfs in between screams. Continues doing so until he collapses several hours later.*

Train of Thought Lounge: Mobb Deep

This is thanks to Iona for idea and the links:

Mobb Deep: Shock Ones Part 1 and 2

Financial Reform Becomes Law

After a long legislative fight, the financial reform bill finally passed the Senate. It's extremely lacking in some key areas, and definitely doesn't do nearly enough to break up the power of the megabanks. With that said, unlike how I felt after the passage of health care reform, I feel pretty confident that this is a major improvement over the status quo, and I'm very happy it passed.

A major way the reforms can have an intimidate impact is if the right person is nominated to head the newly formed Consumer Protection Agency. Labor and advocacy groups are pushing Elizabeth Warren, and it's such a no brainer you can bet it won't happen. Tim Geithner seems to be opposed to her nomination, which should tell you everything you need to know about why she'd be a good choice.

The PCCC is gathering signatures in support of her nomination, so sign on to show your support.

As for the point of financial reform ("so that we never have a crisis like this again") I'm far far less optimistic. The big banks are just as powerful as they were before, and the masters of the universe whose ideas caused the crisis are still highly thought of (or you know, in the Administration), while the economists who have been right remain marginalized and largely ignored by those calling the shots.

The Elizabeth Warren thing is huge. If Obama fucks that up, it's a pretty big black eye not only because she would be amazing, but because it shows the worst elements of his Administration really are calling all the shots. Warren's nomination would at least be a glimmer of hope that the Larry Summers and Tim Geithner Experience might finally be coming to an end, Jared Bernstein could be let out of his cage and the chance of better economic policy might be in sight.

This is a fork in the road for the Administration's economic policy, hopefully they make the right call.

Conservative Hacks Rule Their World

Step 1: A right wing asshole (who also happens to be a pathological liar) releases part of a video featuring USDA employee Shirley Sherrod with the sole purpose of making it look like she said scary stuff about white people.

Step 2: Tom Vilsak (Obama's Secretary of Agriculture) immediately fires her, reportedly with pressure from the White House because "Glenn Beck was going to talk about it".

Step 3: Various news outlets (and unlike the ACORN scam, most of the mainstream media as well) decided to do the slightest bit of research to realize the story is 100% BS. The tape was taken out of context, CNN actually checks out the family in question, who call Sherrod a "family friend".

Step 4: The White House says that the decision to fire Sherrod was "100%" on Vilsak, but that they stand by it.

Chris Bowers pointed this out, but it's fairly telling that it took a couple of minutes to make the decision to fire Sherrod based on a known liar's bullshit, yet as of now she doesn't have her job back. And even though they denied it earlier, new reports say that Rahm chief of staff Jim Messina celebrated how quickly they had fired her at their morning staff meeting.

I'm pretty happy that the fallout from this will probably force the administration to rehire her, and I'm sure everyone's sorry now, but they way this whole episode went down speaks volumes about the Administration.

If you're a conservative, no matter how much of a lying hack you are, the White House will always ask "how high?"

Now if you're a Nobel prize winning economist offering substantive criticism of how Obama is running the economy...