Wow! Oh, Wow!

Yes, normally it cars, water news and toones. Or laughing uproariously as Jon Stewart cleans the clock of Jim Cramer.

But two nights ago I was walking through my house with Keith Olbermann on in the background and I heard him mention to Howard Feinman executive death squads that report to Dick Cheney. I stopped in mid stride and tried to breath. Here, in America, death squads? WTF? The following are last nights reports as more details and analysis came out.









I look at this and cringe. The implications are monstrous. Granted, not as many people disappeared as did during Pinochet's reign of terror. And I am not naive enough to believe the US did not overthrow a duly-elected democratic government in Iran (hmm, I wonder why they are mad at us) and Chile. Yes, we did. And we should do better and NEVER do anything like this again. The talk is now that there may have been ten targets out there in foreign countries.

And the CIA was operating in the United States. On its own citizens.

Okay, maybe I am little crazy and suspicious, but it sounds to me like the last administration took advantage of a disaster in order to grab MORE power. Warrantless wiretaps on citizens soon followed 9/11. Okay, it actually preceded it. So thye were a paranoid group, to say the least. And records of who they were wiretapping still remains a mystery. Not being a generally trusting soul, I ma guessing that is one way the 2004 Presidential race was run. The republicans seemed one step ahead because they were stealing information. No question in my mind. The "Decider Commandeer Guy" was too much a buffoon who appointed similar true believers and idiots to most posts. Cheney was shrewd behind-the-scenes manipulator. Ashcroft ran away because he knew who he would have to prosecute. Hence, Alberto the Clown.

But then I start thinking about things that happened in the US. Ken Lay states he will testify to save his ass in his prosecution and damned if he does not commit suicide. The DC Madam states emphatically that if she is ever found dead, it will not be suicide. Then she is found dead from suicide. Paul Wellstone dies in a plane crash. Ted Kennedy was to be on that plane, but something came up. Mike O'Connell was going to testify on what happened to the White House emails and why the Ohio election control was given by the Ohio State Election official to the same server that runs the Republican Party servers in Tennessee (oh yes, the fix was definitely in in 2004.) Oops, he died in a plane crash. Too much coincidence. It's like talking to a teenager and seeing the same pattern over and over again. You they did something, but don't have the time and wherewithal to prove it. You know it is there.

Do we need a Truth Commission. Oh My God YES!!!! and no immunity. as a constitutional lawyer stated recently, the US was a dictatorship for seven years and few knew it.

rojo

Think as You Drink

I came across quite a few good articles today on water that I would like to share with you. The first is the formation of a committee to study water and energy. Great news!!! Outside Loveland, CO there is Flatiron Reservoir and Pinewood Reservoir where they pump water uphill at night during low energy demand and let it flow back down the pipes during demand hours, giving a net demand. This is very unusual in water storage and energy production practice. But getting water places (for example, that water comes from the other side of the Rockies and is transported via tunel under Rocky Mountain National Park) and treating wastes costs a ton. Almost all water treatment costs are electricity. Wastewater treatment costs are the same, giving impetus to cogeneration by anaerobic digestion. That is where raw waste solids are anaerobically decomposed in a digester and the gasses run generators lower the power demand of the waste treatment facility. The waste solids are then normally used for fertilizer that is distributed, Millorganite from Milwaukee is a commercially known brand.

Another has to do with climate change and water in the western states. Believe me, if the rain and snow patterns continue to change in the West, or in the Rockies, Vegas and LA, to say the least of the people in Mexico to whom the US had to guarantee clean water too will be hurting. Yes, The US had to build a plant to desalinate what little flow of the Colorado Rover made it to Mexico. In CA, there have been extreme issues with salmon spawns because of the change in rainfall patterns. and there have been pelican deaths aplenty this year in CA. The following article details many aquatic bird deaths and ties it to global warming.

There is a viscious cycle that has started. It takes a lot of energy to pump water to the deserts of the arid west, making them livable. This includes a geographic area from Arizona, to Vegas to LA. It costs a lot to produce the energy that produces 90% of the world's almonds and over 50% of the US vegetable and fruit crop. Just think of energy required to pump water from Sacramento to San Diego to grow avocados. The annual diversion of water in the California Aqueduct alone is 2.6 million acre feet. An acre foot is roughly 326,000 gallons and a gallon of water weighs 8.34 pounds, or 8.5 trillion pounds of water. I am really tired, but given a rise of about 4000 feet, and 68% combined motor and electrical efficiency giving you a demand of 1.8 million killowatts, if the water were only pumped once on that journey. It is not and there are two other canals that almost as big. The power usage is at least 8 times that amount, just for pumping. And as fresh water grows more scarce, desalinization looks good, but almost all its costs are electrical. It is very, very expensive. It is far cheaper to treat raw poop to drinking water and far less energy intensive. As long as we rely on fossil fuels to produce energy and it takes enrgy to move water and increased CO2 production leads to more warming, we are in very viscious cycle. Just to keep up the lifestyle we have grown accustomed to requires renewable and nonpolluting energy.

Mr. Cheery couldn't get this narrative the way he wanted because he was too tired, so good night and pleasant dreams.

rojo

Racism and America

I have been worried about racist attacks since the Denver convention when a couple of racist meth heads were picked up with the well-thought out plan of Kill Obama and a couple of rifles. No scouting, no hotel rooms with a view. None of that. Just some Aryan meth heads. Now this.

Why do racists hate America?

Ow.

rojo

State's Rights?

I was kind of pleased that CA is thinking of legalizing marijuana and taxing it. Get rid of debt, lower the criminal element and kick a whole bunch of dudes out of prison. State's rights in action. Then I see this. and wonder about state's rights. maybe I should just be wondering about the rights of dumb-asses.

rojo

Hey Moogs, Would You Buy That for a Quarter?!

NEW YORK (CBS) ― Bernie Madoff is accused of fleecing his clients out of billions, but he said Monday he shouldn't be forced into the poorhouse.

His lawyers are arguing that Madoff should be entitled to keep the $7 million apartment he's currently being held in while under house arrest and $62 million, including $45 million in municipal bonds.

Court papers filed on Monday state that Madoff and his lawyer say the Manhattan penthouse and the millions held in accounts of Madoff's wife, Ruth, are not subject to seizure.

The court papers say Madoff claims the apartment and the money are unrelated to a $50 billion fraud Madoff has been accused of carrying out.

Yes, this is money he made honestly. He says it so it must be true. The $50 billion? He must have blown on fast women and cars. Yet another case of how stupid do you think we are.

If he only bought his house in Florida, it would have been untouchable.

rojo

Rant O' the Day

From The Complete Social History of LSD...

This quotation concerns the internal testing of LSD on CIA agents and the unexpected results.

"...there were times when CIA agents found themselves propelled into a visionary world and they were deeply moved by the experience. One MK-ULTRA agent wept in front of his colleagues at the end of his first trip. 'I didn't want to leave it,' he explained. 'I felt I would where I wouldn't be able to hold on to this kind of beauty.' His colleagues assumed he was having a bad trip and wrote a report stating the drug had made him psychotic."(p. 30, Lee and Shlain)

Here a man has what for him was a mystical experience. He saw beauty in the world. Later, he admits to feeling oneness with the universe so he is labeled psychotic. GRRRR. What kind of small minded pissant ( I am being polite here!) Religion may have been defined as the opiate of the masses and spiritualism and New Age pursuits as hoaxes. Meditation as a means of sleeping wakefully. Sweat lodges as a means of purification and altered perception are pure evil. yeah, sure.

How sick a shithead must the person be to judge that as psychotic while he justifies his experiments and the invasion of Vietnam (substitute Iraq if you would like) as normal and great achievements. I definitely would never want to be normal if that type of judgment and achievement are normal. It is twisted. It is perverse!!!! If I ever felt a relaxed and continuous oneness with the universe, don't label me as psychotic. What more could you want? Universal love and creation. Can't have that, need killing and death. Move on nothing to see here.

I wonder when it may ever dawn on many of these overachievers that they are partaking in a death cult the likes of which this world has never seen. Yes, the Funky Western Civilization is a death cult (aside from a dance hit), where the foundations are the ground bones and dried blood of those sacrificed to build power structures. And how many think they are really spiritual? Sad, how spiritual oneness is condemned as psychotic.

rojo

Why Does Bill Kristol Hate America?

from Americablog-

"Greg Sargeant over at The Plum Line has gotten his hands on a memo Bill Kristol wrote to his party in 1993, urging them to oppose Bill Clinton's health care plan because - well - it might work. And then all the newly healthy people might like government and see that it could actually do something good for them. Ben Smith summarizes the long memo:

The memo warns that a successful Clinton plan could badly damage the GOP by improving Americans' relationship with government, and makes the case for total, uncompromising opposition based on what would become the "Harry and Louise" campaign, focused on the damage the changes could do to citizens' relationships with their doctors.

The only way that the plan would improve America's relationship with government would be if it worked. Think about that. The GOP ultimately opposed major legislation that would have benefited every American because the legislation might have actually worked. You don't just see parallels to today's Republican party, they're doing exactly the same thing. The GOP is terrified that Obama agenda, from the stimulus plan to health care reform, might actually work. Then Americans would see that - surprise - government can work for the people. And where would we be then, if our government actually started making a positive difference in our lives? Better to vote Republican and ensure that never happens."

Isn't it nice to know people actually get their rocks off by staying in power, damned the consequences to others. Is Bill Kristol and American? or something else?

I'll get back to water issues tomorrow morning.

rojo

Today had a great front page article on the California water problems and its impact on the Central Valley, in terms of farming and unemployment, which is up to 40% in farming communities now. This state is in the third year of a drought and even if it gets lots of late season snow and rain, the reservoirs will be at less then 40% Currently Folsom Lake is at 25%. This is the largest dam on the American River and feeds many cities with raw water for the potable system, as well as controls the flow to the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta. Keep in mind, this is the same Delta where this year there is so little water, the State Water Resources Control Board is trying to decide if the smelt (the main feed fish in the Delta for larger species such as bass and salmon) should have a spring water flow allowing them to spawn, or an autumn flow allowing salmon to spawn. Which species needs to be pushed close to extinction (no joke, that is how bad it is)? Glad I do not have to play God myself with that decision. In the interim, the population has grown by 3,000,000 since the last drought and many acres of land have been placed into fruit and nut trees, or vineyards, which require annual water and cannot be allowed to go fallow, as they will die. So the State has to balance pumping water from the Delta to San Diego, LA and the Central Valley for farming, as well as keeping water for the fish and a flow to the sea. Except there is no water. Everyone needs to read Cadillac Desert to see how California and particularly LA have overstressed any natural system in CA in an attempt to urbanize, feed the country and grow economically in a desert. Unbelievable read and it really shows how overbuilt this fake paradise is.

My wife got to see the big canals for the first time last weekend as we drove to scenic Bakersfield (home of the Drillers, honest, that is the high school nickname and has more to do with oil than teen age hormonal pursuits). The canals have more flow than most rivers on the Front Range of Colorado. Yes, they pull more water out of a delta system than CO relies for life. I am not naive enough not to realize that Boulder, Ft. Collins, Greeley et al could exist oin their present form without taking water from the western slope and bringing it through the Rockies (there is one hell of tunnel under Rocky Mountain National Park from Grand Lake to Estes Park) to bring water to the front range.

We wil be having a fresh water crisis in America soon if global weather patterns continue to change. Just last year, Georgia tried to move its State line just a little north into Tennessee to grab river water as Atalata was going dry. Then they tried to divert Great Lake water through the Misssissippi drainage to Georgia. Israel tried to buy water from the Great Lakes to ship to Israel (they use immense baggies to ship fresh water over the ocean. google it, honest).The Aral Sea in Russia has been drained for cotton farming. This has led to health problems as the desert has grown with sea levels dropping, and the resultant dust storms have caused numerous health problems. Fishing boats there are so far out of the sea, they cannot be salvaged. That is how fast it has dropped.

Now turning sewage into drinking water is a big issue. You have to find water somewhere. This is not really a bad idea, and is much cheaper than turning salt water into fresh. Reverse osmosis is just an expensive process usiing lots of electricity to pump water through semi-permeable membranes using high pressure pumps. Now water laws in many states will have to catch up to this practice. In CO, I think that you may own water rights, but it is expected that you will return at least 85% of the water in your area back to streams, after first turning into drinking water and then processing the sewage. CA has no such laws.

There will be the problems of pollution if this is to become a common process (and it will, believe me--it is one of the reasons I really love my field, the alchemy of turning shit into clean water is really, really cool.) Coomon pollutants such as ammonia and phosphorus are tightly regulated in some states. CA is at least twenty years behind the curve because they believe in the economic benefit of communities and that the solution to pollution is dilution, the old engineers' chant. In other words, they will force higher treatment because it costs too much. And their water law would allow Sacramento to sell its treated sewage to the highest bidder, whether it leaves the Sacramento drainage or not. Time is short right now, but the Scaramento Bee has a great article on this today. I don't have time to find the link.

In fact, work is calling so I will continue this later...

rojo

Car Stuff

Toyota Prius has won an award for Consumer Reports magazine for a new award, Best Car Value. I have driven them. I own a Honda Hydrid. The Prius is a wonderful car, even better than mine. I just couldn't afford a Prius with no money down at the time.

And GM has lost $82 billion in the past four years. OW!!!!! It burned through $6.4 billion in the 4th quarter 2008 alone, including $4B from the bail out. What a conumdrum. They deserve to fail, but if they do, 3,000,000 become unemployed. They expect to burn through $14B this year, the losses are staggering and will need more governement assistance.

Yeesh. What do you do? Who wants Hummer? Who wants Saturn? I actually went to purchase a Chevy Malibu when I purchased my Honda. I drove both. The Malibu Hybrid had fold down rear seats, more power and was roomier. But it just felt cheesy. and the mileage was 30 mpg! I get 45 in my Honda. What a drag. I even had a GM employee discount and it still did not make it worth it. and the sales staff sucked. Here, wait and my manager can make you a better deal. Then the sales manager may sweeten the deal. Oh but that has to approved by the bigger manager. Fire some of the fucking managers, make the cost lower and you might have a deal, idiots. I bought my Honda at the dealership, but did most of the heavy lifting, including pricing and credit approval in line at home drinking tea. Probably in my sweats or shorts. Comfy and easy.

rojo

The Kiddie Table

After seeing Bobby Jindahl last night I almost felt sorry for him. Kind of like a little leaguer facing Randy Johnson in his prime. Except, I had to remember he exorcised the eeveel spirits out of his college sweetie. Just what we need is an exorcist in the White House, or any level of government. "Throw her in the water and if she floats, she is a witch and we will kill her. If she sinks and drowns..." Great, huh. And he had to follow someone who gave one of the best speeches since Kennedy. Go back to the kiddies table, the adults are here.

Also, Media matters put out a list of congress members who voted against the jobs bill. Maybe it is time for area activists to pull out recall petitions for these lucky guys, or anyone who voted against jobs. That might put the fear into some of the more provincial types.

rojo

It's A DayQuil Kind od Day!

After a fun-filled three days in Las Vegas, the most unreal town in America, I have have to do routine work. I did have a desultory epiphany or two there. 1) As much fun as the water show was to observe at the Bellagio, I had to wonder how the nature spirits of the desert really like having such egregious disregard for their home. I mean a water wonderland in the desert? How fitting! and I observed this with fellow water and wastewater operators, so we all walked away going "ooh" and later realized we were all thinking how many psi the pumps had to develop to get that height, what type of solenoid valves are being used to withstand the pressure and such. In fact, I was relieved that I was not the only nerd/geek wondering that. The questions came up as we relaxed in the bar afterwards.

2) Had dinner and drinks in Margaritaville. It is amazing that flip flops, shorts and hawaiian shirts (oh yes, and booze--no one mentions weed, or other drugs even though there are LOUD videos of Buffet and other jambands being pumped out continually. No one smokes weed at a String Ceese show) have been turned into a glorified life style, which attracts so many people for a brief drunken break into their routine lives. combine that with mediocre food and more booze and a floor show with men on stilts, a pirate captain and a bikini clad babe whose arms were better developed than mine--the show repeats every X amount of minutes and the babe changes her bikini, fake blonde hair still the same. Part of the floor show is to raise your drinks and chug. Imagine a bar that features ritualized drinking. what a great business plan.

More honest than Hooters, home the great wings! and I read Penthouse for the articles.

Well, I dive through life today in a Dayquil haze and try my best at mitigating the fines of a sewage overflow my firm had nothing to do with--a city broke a sewer line and fixed it themselves, did not tell us and the County and EPA found out about it and asked us. Boy, did we look honest when we said "What?" We really did not know.

Before I go through that maze, I have to comment on the Swiss Bank and the scandal brewing there. They had code words for country of currency origin, animal names for denominations, really cool superspy stuff. But now the FBI wants them to turn over to the IRS the names of investors to see who was evading taxes in fake corporations that they set up. They made no bones about setting up fake corporations for tax-free investment for offshore profits.

Wait, wasn't that Phil Gramm's (McCain's economic advisor) bank and employer?

Kind of makes you wonder who invested in off shore accounts and tried to dodge taxes? Democrats or Republicans? Middle class (I know everyone in my family has a swiss bank account, how about yours?) How many of each? Upper class, lower class or Bush's base (upper 0.5 of 1%, as he joked). So who is using what are called the commons (defense, roads, subsidy for Post Office, etc.) in a disproportionate way as they try to escape taxes that pay for them? Another way of putting it more bluntly, who hates America and really is unpatriotic by being a greedy bastard and not paying their fair share? the lower classes or the mega rich? Yes, these are class generalizations and many in lower classes would do this if they could and many rich folk set up great trusts and things, but....

I hope they make the unpatriotic bastards serve time for tax evasion during a time of war!!!!!!!!!!

rojo

Is This Car News or a Management Rant?

"There was anger today as BMW confirmed that 850 jobs were being cut by ending weekend working at its Mini car plant near Oxford.

The cuts will mostly affect agency workers when they come into force from 2 March when the plant begins operating five days a week, instead of the current seven.

Union sources said workers booed and threw apples and oranges at managers after being told they were losing their jobs.

Agency workers leaving Cowley this morning expressed their fury at being given just one hour's notice of the redundancies.

"It's a disgrace. I feel as though I've been used," said one worker. "We should have been given one month's notice, not one hour."

Axed agency staff were given the grim news in meetings at the factory following weekend speculation that hundreds of jobs were to go.

Almost a third of the Cowley workforce are agency staff and some complained today they would not receive any redundancy pay.

The contract staff, who have few employment rights, were brought in to work alongside full-time employees on the production lines, which built 230,000 vehicles last year."

This story bothers for a number of reasons. The first and foremost is my business experience and my past bosses. I had one that in a managers' meeting, stated "Hire more women, they will work for 15% and raise our margins." another always wanted us to hire temps so we did not have to pay benefits, or at least delay the payment of benefits. and here we have contract labor (temps) working alongside full-time employees. This story does not give enough details. Were they hired to make Minis while the market was hot, soon to be discarded? Were they paid more than full-time workers to make up for no benefits? What were the promises made to them as they were hired?

Temporary workers should not be used as "scabs" to fill labor needs, and raise profit margins because they are paid less. That is unethical and shows no integrity of character. They are a viable labor alternative for short-term from a management stand point. Still, they need respect. Contract labor has become a predominant cheaper labor source because they seldom get benefits and can be discarded like "things". Workers are people and as such deserve a level of treatment that you would provide to a family member. Management wonders why morale is down. Because workers are treated as things. not people. They can sense this. The subconscious is an amazing organ of perception. (I won't go off on this today, but many drug and alcohol problems are brain chemistry, but others are an attempt at shielding and self-medication because subconsciously people can feel how vicious others really are.)

What is wrong with management that people are treated as disposable things? and why is this taught as a viable alternative to offering full-time jobs with benefits to workers? I can think of many "Joe" jobs my daughter has had that offer full-time employment when available, but employment often stays with 10 people working 24 hours/week so they don't have to offer benefits. And then employers wonder why they get ripped off by ungrateful employees!

Many companies now offer benefits after 90 days of employment, but if you hire an employee as a temp, or less than full time, that time does not go towards the 90 days. Bend over and spread them, we want to use you.

Sometimes management training and policies in this country just offend me.

rojo

Well, there will be no car czar, but a Presidential commission. Yep, to oversee the bailed out GM and Chrysler a committee oversee some of the worst run businesses in the world. Well, Wall Street is so poorly run that they deserve complete nationalization and firing of all the yahoos who ran it into the ground. I am sure there are plenty of talented business grads who could do no worse for a lot less money. Here is hoping the committee has LABOR representation. Otherwise the workers will be screwed and the unions broken. If that happens, kiss the vestiges of a middle class good bye!

and in other news, the Associated Press has stated that there is a whole bunch of life under the Arctic and Antarctic Oceans and ice caps that were unknown. Thousands of species. One specializes in eating snails. How slow must a snail move in that cold of water, one dares to ask? and if they get in your plankton garden, how do you place a saucer of beer there? Here is a link from the Canadian Press. and one with some pictures.

rojo

Too good a story not to be true-



rojo

The Two Americas

Honestly, I read the news today and wonder why there are two sets of rules for Americans based upon the economic class that they are from. I wondered this a long time ago during the Jon Benet Ramsey murder investigation. What would have happened to me if I said I would not respond to the police or "come downtown". The Ramsey's have said no and were honored. Try this as an Hispanic in East LA. Think it would work?

And now we have a clown,(sorry, no makeup) on the Falafel King's show stating that if the truth of the Bush administration and if the laws they broke were released for the public to know, it would be deadly. Huh? But they should be honored as heroes. Hello, they committed genital mutilation on at least one person. Genital mutilation--such a nice way of saying slicing up someone's dick and nuts with a knife. It sounds so less coarse because it was done with a scalpel, obviously making it professional. Oh My God!!!!! How do you get out of bed in the morning.

And now Conyers subpoenas Rove for the THIRD time through his lawyer, but his lawyer and the lawyer's assistant just can't reached until after the date of the subpoena. How convenient. Try that with your local court. Given the size of the game they are playing, there must be something to hide.

So, who has the stones to find the arrogant son of a bitch and let him meet Bubba in a dark cell somewhere? Or in Rove's case (and I firmly believe this), a woman. It is still a pet theory that the past administration had many sexual identity dysfunctions that came out in torture and bullying as a means of satisfaction, gratification and really was an expression of sublimation.

and on the other end of the spectrum, you can't pay for the cost of your registration, you lose your car, that was doubling as your house because you lost your roommate to cancer and can't afford the rent by yourself.

There is a large disconnect in America today!

rojo

And I quit writing for a while about the auto industry--There has been so much news. Toyota lost 30% of its sales, GM 49+%, Chrysler over 50% and GM is laying off 20,000. OW! An average worker makes $70,000-$80,000 with bennies. An average bonus on Wall Street is over $1,000,000 or about 15 workers.

Why Getting things Done Quickly Matters

This is part of a stream of comments that came from my other blog--

It is just maddening. as with any new boss, Obama had a 2-4 week window to get most of his new programs passed and in place. Then public opinion maybe could help push for more. His insistence on bipartisanship instead of civic duty is ridiculous. The lackeys who are obstructionist need to be called out in public by name, as well as defining the consequences of their action in a way even the village idiot can understand. The republicans are just gettting to grind everything to a halt because if these reforms and public works projects do help stimulate the economy; Reagan, free markets, Ayn Rand and Friedman are no longer saints, but discredited philosophers who just spout off. They cannot afford that as it discredits their party and its dubious achievements over the past 30 years.

Yes, we are living in bizarro world, except they don't speak backwards. Joe the Plumber, fresh from his stint as a reporter, where he said reporters should not have access is now political consultant to the GOP and Sarah "Caribou Barbie" Palin is a leader. And Rush is the de facto propagandizer.

Goldwater and Buckley must be shitting in their graves! It has come to this, an airport named after St. "Get Rid of Government" Reagan, who broke the air traffic controllers union (to hell with safety, seems like the kind of job for OJT). Making burgers is now manufacturing jobs in labor counts.

And I thought my acid dreams from the 60s were unbelievable.

I did not include the links. look up this sorry state of existence for yourself.

On another issue, I went to see the orthopaedist today and he said no more injections on my left knee. Replace it when my pain tolerance has hit its limit. I already moved to a one foor house becasue stairs were too much and walking 0.5 miles requires icing and a beer ot three. My boss asked for 6 more months. We'll see.

rojo

I Have a High School Hall Pass

Will that work? Can I get a pass to go anywhere and do anything with that?

To me the biggest story of the day was not the legislation that allows more than 180 days before you sue your employer for being underpaid because of gender, or the stimulus package, but this load of crap.

How can Karl Rove, the Kingpin of Crime, aka "doughboy" or one of the Gucker and Gannon butt boys (no proof, just conjecture), be given executive immunity on things he said he was not involved in? And after he no longer works for the Executive? If he knew nothjing and was not involved why would the President make sure his counsel gave Doughboy a hall pass. He was just covering his ass. this is not hard to see. If Rove ever had to testify, we would know how illegal everything was, including the rigged 2004 election. Anyone with any street smarts knows this.

Perhaps the bigger question is if that hall pass is seen as not applicable, what country will protect Rove or will he meet Kenny-boy Lay? (I know this is insensitive to the Lay family, but I have had questions about his untimely demise and if he really was depressed enough to commit suicide, I sincerely apologize to his family.)

rojo

A song about a van



rojo

The first is that Obama is going to let CA have stricter emissions standards and that will impact the US car market by making manufacturers meet them. This is in many news sources so I really have not added a link. But, In a few of the stories i have read, it states that this is using existing technology to reduce emission standards (narrower tires at higher pressures, variable valve timing, 4/6/8 engine run options). It also states that this will add $1400 to the cost of each car, make US cars non-competitive and end the world as we know it. Okay, I made the last part up.

I have to question that if this is existing technology, why it would add so much to the price of a car. Okay, the 4/6/8 option would becasue of the controls. Variable valve timing is only used in premium models and many foreign cars. Or is it this just more of the same news details leaked by manufacturers and lobbyists to back the regressive position that has gotten Amerian car manufacturers where they are today, with two of the Big Three needing government handout.

The other story is that American Honda is moving some jobs to China. It is the end of the world as we know it tone that bothers me, If you were making something at point A and they were not selling and you had to ship the product to point B 14,000 miles away, yet you could make them there at existing factories by expanding them, what is the smart and prudent business choice? This is not rocket science. There is an expanding market in China. Why should this surprise me that manufacturing is moving there?

This is the same principle as sustainable agriculture. Buy local. Because we were buying cars from Japan, they came here to build factories. It is not our right as god-fearing Americans that all factories be built here. What really should be the question is how to get the American economy rolling again to make sure we have people who can afford to buy a car.

rojo

New Energy in Spain

I'll take a day away from the auto manufacturing and sales news to look at solar power in Spain. This looks interesting and wonder what Nevada could provide, other than a bomb testing site for the military. Combine this with increased wind power and we have better national security, because we become less reliant on purchasing energy for our life style. As Americans, we use lots of energy per capita.

On a personal note, it is time for me to try vermiculture and see if it is a useful household methodology. I am going to buy the parts for the bins this weekend, I hope.

rojo

Why Not?



rojo

this was a comment I received from a friend to an earlier post--

Ironically, although gas prices are down, propane prices haven't dropped significantly - at least not in Wisconsin that I've noticed. So, although you can take that trip to Grandma's house in your new SUV out here, she could be freezing if she doesn't have any alternative to propane, because she can't afford to turn the thermostat up.

I wish someone was giving more thought to vehicles for farmers. Out here, trucks are tools and every farmer needs them or something like them to haul stuff. It seems to me that no one is serious about designing fuel efficient, much less alternative fuel vehicles for rural use. We have practical transportation problems in winter rural climates that make 4WD a necessity, for clearance as well as traction. We used to own a Toyota Tercel Hatchback that got excellent mileage and had to put it on blocks from November until April because it was totally useless on snowy back country roads. If we owned something like the little Smart Car we saw buzzing around in Milwaukee yesterday we'd have to do the same thing - store it until it was practical again. Let's hope Obama and Co. wake up where rural transportation is concerned.

How true is this? I was involved in a job where I was driving in the mountains in very rural areas every day and I drove a 4-wheel drive pickup every day. It was a necessary tool. I had to have a bed haul weight of 1,000 pounds so that put me over small pickups. I know, I tried a 4 cylinder ranger. Not an option for what I did.

rojo

Move Along, Nothing to See Here

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of whatever.

http://www.salon.com/wires/ap/us/2008/12/29/D95CK26O2_flooded_neighborhood/index.htmlWhen

the 1,000 pound gorilla (TVA) does not perform good and extensive safety and danger analyses, this is what happens.

rojo

More Car Stuff

On one of my favorite subjects, I see in a report in the USA Today Business section on Friday that now that gas prices are down, Americans have quit buying compact and economic cars (down 63% from when gas prices peaked) and are now looking at larger cars and I am guessing trucks. If nothing else the American consumer is amazingly stupid. Again, my opinion. I am not saying all consumers need small cars or should not drive trucks. But how often I see one person in a vehicle, I wonder how big, how fast or how uneconomical they need to be. In terms of national security, the less foreign oil we use the better. Maybe there is a market for upscale smaller cars.

Cars of quality--I rent many cars as I travel and some are underpowered, some are tinny, some are solid and some have neat little extras like really, really nice seats with adjustable bolsters and automatic headlights. Some are old rear-wheel drive dinosaurs (used when driving around three or more people and you don't want an SUV.) It is just hard for the American psyche, where cars are part of identity and not only tools. There are many good reasons for higher corporate fuel economy standards. I can remember the first time CAFE standards and emission standards were introduced, cars really became large, underpowered objects. In the last ten years more powerful cars with better controls and comfort were the norm. Try driving a '63 Bug to see how far amenities have come with the same gas mileage. Better handling, more quiet, more power and much safer. and in some cases, more fun. I think, regardless of what auto makers say, that if the CAFE standards were raised again, they would rise to the occasion and make better cars. I know deisel truck drivers feel that soot traps and emission standards will put them out of business. Probably not, the market will adapt and the roads and the air will be cleaner.

As an aside, I am always amazed at how many big SUVs and pick-up trucks proudly have "Support Our Troops" stickers on them, or America Proud (aka love it or leave it) on them. So let me get this straight--you want to own a vehicle that burns more fuel, keeps us on foreign oil, embroiled in conflicts to keep the pipelines open to America and then want to Support Our Troops?! Doesn't this begin to seem incongruous?

On another note, GMAC is now being recognized as a financial institution by TARP and will be eligible for bail out funds if they broaden their business to include banking. You know they will and GM will have less control over it. They have already sold 51% to Cerberus (the holding firm that owns most of Chrysler.)Time to pack.

rojo

Political Expediency and Obama

From my best friend's blog--

This is the best statement I have seen about Obama's choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inaugural.

"A couple of boys were calling my best friend a faggot one unhappy day at summer camp. Courses of action seemed slim to my adolescent mind. I could stand up for Jack branding myself a fag as well and insuring myself a miserable summer, or I could join in with the name callers, lose my closest friend, but assure my standing with the majority. I sacrificed my friend on the altar of popularity.

I don't think I need to tell you that political expediency was a terrific short-term solution but a long-term nightmare. My summer concluded uneventfully but none of those boys became my friend or did me any favors. And forty years later I still feel the loss of Jack along with a piece of my self respect that I can never win back. Mine was an act of cowardice and betrayal."

It seems Obama is now maneuvering through the summer camp of his political adolescence and is about to make the same bad choice as I. He can call the placing of a hate monger like Rick Warren on the world dais political healing or inclusiveness or any other nicety he'd like, but I call it pandering to the lowest instinct of the worst kind of politics."President Elect Obama, your victory was made possible in no small part to the votes and wallets of the gay and lesbian community along with our supporters. Turning your back on us does not make you more mainstream American. It just makes you a coward." -- Harvey Fierstein

Heartbreak in the Christmas Season

In Richmond, CA a woman has been brutally gang-raped because she was a identified as a lesbian. I cannot tell you how glad I am that the Mormons, Catholics and other legitimized homophobia. Nothing like religion and God to back up hate. Happy Yule season.

At least Richmond is recognizing this as a hate crime. Not so good for this man. The last line is a classic--
"Shreveport police say they are investigating and the FBI may also get involved to determine if this is a hate crime."

Let me get this straight in my head: black man wearing Obama shirt is beaten by someone who was acting like a redneck and saying "F Obama" and calling him the n-word. I don't know, could it be a hate crime? d'oh. The FBI should be on this with no questions.

There are times I am so sad for humanity, and wonder if we are really human.

rojo

Place This Plug Where the Sun Don't Shine

Great, now health-care givers with a conscience can refuse service to those who they feel are doing unethical things. You know, like abortion. Tony Perkins is probably having a party in his pants as I type! and federal funding can be cut off if a worker is not allowed their rule of conscience.

let's face it. This rule is a mysogynistic attempt by a group of true believers not to have to do what they feel is SIN. Well, I am loosely a Christian (in the gnostic sense). I am also defined by my profession as a health service provider. As a water operator, I am regulated by the same state body that regulates nurses in CA. Does this mean I have the right to refuse judgmental Christians (judge not, lest ye be judged) water and wastewater services. You know, go buy bottled water and use this plug to help until you get out of my district. I mean they are sinning.

If I see bumber stickers on a ginormous SUV or pickup stating I support the war, can I just shut off their war as they are murderers by association.

Let the games begin.

rojo

I See Germany, I see France, I See Conspiracies In People's Underpants

Karl Rove's internet guru died in a plane crash in Ohio. Sad. Seeing human life extinguished anywhere is somewhat sad.

But here we have a guy who was going to testify in a voter fraud case concerning voter fraud in Ohio. His firm ran many GOP servers. Much of the missing email traffic concerning the contested firing of Attorneys General ran through his firm, instead of the White House server (I didn't mean to get rid of the backup, I just lost the tapes). The vote-counting in Ohio in 2004, which gave Bush the Presidency for another 4 years, was diverted from Ohio to a site in Tennessee, which just so happened to house the GOP server too. So the crucial votes in Ohio were tallied in Tennessee by the same site that houses the GOP server. And only for a few hours. And this is what he was going to testify about.

His plane crashed as he was flying from Ohio to Washington DC. He ran out of gas around Akron. Excuse me, but if I am flying from Ohio to Washington DC, I would check the gas level before I left. Maybe fill the tank. So he did not even make out of the state of his departure when the gas ran out. Right before he was to testify. How convenient.

I wonder if he knows Ken Lay. He committed suicide before he could testify.

Hm.

rojo

The Sunday Morning Edition

Yes, today is Sunday, where I get a chance to relax, read the paper and do Sudoku. Ahhhhhh!

So I have gentler rants of things seen in the paper.

1) Honda had to pull out of Formula 1 because of the economy. They were getting little return on an annual investment of maybe $100,000,000 per year. Audi likewise pulled out of American Le Mans series (where they had won everything in site for over 10 years.) Reminds of the joke we used to tell in our old auto shop (we ran two Pro Rally cars out of the shop). "How do you make a little money racing cars?" Start with a lot of money.

2) Canada is bailing out US auto manufacturers in Canada to keep them there. There economy would be hurt worse than the American economy if the Big Three went down.

3) Great article in the NY Times about how companies are cutting out 101k matching contributions as credit has dried up. Pensions have basically disappeared as American workers were told that "the company will match the 401k contribution and you can live on your investments." I am so glad that Social Security was not put into Wall Street, even though I am betting the plan was to put Social Security into Wall Street to cover how bad it really was. The next president would have found that there was a time bomb there and would have had the recession named after them. Things fell apart before the hot potato could be passed.

Anyhow, the point being that there was great quotation in the article which I will paraphrase- "The last thirty has been a grand experiment of workers making their own investments for their own retirement and it has failed."

4) The Bush Administration did not know how big the housing bubble was. They were unaware as late as early this year. How long ago did Atrios nickname this the Big Shitpile?

5) Lost in all the verbiage over the health of the Sacramento/San Joaquin River delta and all the new regulations is one point that is very important to me. Background-I have wastewater treatment licenses in a mess of states and helped write the new Water Environment Foundation Wastewater Plant Operation Manual. For as large and environmentally progressive California is supposed to be, what I have seen is a stranglehold of regulations, three wastewater agencies that don't work and play well together, tons of reporting and mandatory fines unlike any other state. Yet, the discharge standards in this state are the most lenient I have seen in years. For example, I ran a small wastewater plant the mountains of Colorado. The discharge limit for ammonia there was < 1.3 mg/L ammonia because of fish toxicity. Here in CA, fish are dying, especially salmonoids, and no one talks about the lack of ammonia limits. Sacramento alone puts 14 TONS of ammonia into the river annually. The excuse from the State is the flows are so high, there will not be a toxicity problem. That is right--The Solution to Pollution is Dilution!!!!! This was an old refrain from engineers that few reasonable people use any more. Heck, San Diego places primary treated sewage (meaning let 50-75% of the solids settle and we'll let the rest of the shit and water combination be discharged to the ocean. It can be diluted there. Makes you want jump right out there and swim on the beaches, doesn't it. BTW, Anchorage does the same thing because the area around Anchorage is basically dead because of glacial till so their not really hurting wildlife (in their opinion). Ever here of tides, idiots??!!

Also, California has this great thing called economic benefit. Meaning it would cost cities too much to actually treat the sewage to the level acceptable around the country. Wow. I know other areas have that clause in their laws too. But CA pulls that one out a lot. And oddly enough, smaller towns and polluters have to clean up sewage more than big cities do (keep in mind, I do not know how well LA cleans up their sewage). Just like Denver in CO has lower effluent limits than small towns. Why, because of costs.

You would think the reason to have BIG central sewage plants would be that the economy of scale would mean better treatment than a whole bunch of little plants, but that is seldom the case. The smaller plants get hammered because they can afford less lawyers and have less political pull than big cities (aka polluters).

Given that large centralized wastewater plants in areas of low flow and water diversions like in CO, or other arid areas can actually move water from its normal runoff point in a stream to a more centralized location somewhere else downstream, you would think that state environmental protection departments would want more smaller plants discharging at various locations and not disrupting the historical flows in streams, so water right diversions would not lower river and stream flows to the point where wildlife would be affected. Sadly, that is not the case. Ride your bike down the Platte River trail in Denver when there is a drought and see that the river can almost be dry until you get to the Denver Metro Wastewater Plant and all the effluent from the Denver area gets back into the river flow.

The diversion of the Arvada WWTP similarly affects the flows on Ralston Creek. The lack of North Lakewood and Wheat Ridge WWTP effluent can let Clear Creek run almost dry as their flows go to Denver now.

rojo

Many things to opine about today--

Sunday's can be fun, when you actually have time to think...

1)

meridym

and I finally watched Iron Man two nights ago, got tired and shut it off at the credits. Today, I watched one of my favorite movies (hey, it combines good music, good food, pretty women and a romance. All its missing is American football and death and destruction and makes me realize I still can't make a good mole), Tortilla Soup, and saw in a later show a scene of Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury. I guess his scene in Iron Man came after the credits and I missed it. Well, time to rent it again, just to see that scene. And I am glad that Marvel is now working on their own movies. I can justify being a geeky kid who bought Marvel comics since they were 10 cents an issue. Quite unlike the $2.99 I paid yesterday for Wolverine, the Geriatric (or something like that. hey, it is definitely amusing and fun to read). Makes me wish I still had my 20,000 comics. Now I can be an informed geek, look cool in my intellectual knowledge of Thanos and Pipp the Troll. Or does that make just me an AARP nerd? At least I don't use pocket protectors anymore.

2) Government report out today showing that the government, when it could not prove how splendiforous things were in Iraq (aka Biggest Foreign Policy Blunder Ever That May Make America a Second-Class Debtor Country for At Least a Century), pulled shit out of its ass to make everything look great. Nice to know some people never get past being high school seniors. One Highlight--

The document has former secretary of state Colin Powell complaining that after the 2003 invasion, the Defense Department "kept inventing numbers of Iraqi security forces -- the number would jump 20,000 a week! We now have 80,000, we now have 100,000, we now have 120,000.'"

or

Not Even $1 Billion For Iraq's Reconstruction?

To oversee post-war relief efforts, the Pentagon created the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance, a brand-new agency put in charge only two months before the war began. While ORHA's troubles have long been known, the inspector general's report provides new details on the depth of disagreements between the Pentagon and ORHA's director, retired general Jay Garner.

“

Garner also approached Rumsfeld for reconstruction funding, but the Secretary similarly was not persuaded by Garner's list. Garner presented Rumsfeld with four rebuilding scenarios, from "do what absolutely needs to be done and no more" to "redo the whole country of Iraq."

"What do you think that'll cost?" Rumsfeld asked, regarding the fourth scenario.

"I think it's going to cost billions of dollars," Garner said.

"My friend," Rumsfeld replied, "if you think we're going to spend a billion dollars of our money over there, you are sadly mistaken."

In the five years following that remark, the United States appropriated nearly $50 billion for Iraq's relief and reconstruction."

Maybe this is the CEO Presidency after all. And to get rid of The Shrub, maybe all we need to do is offer him a legacy and a bonus. We can dream, can't we?

3) Sarah Palin's church is burnt by arson. You know, I don't care how little I think of fundamentalist churches, that just isn't right. Would i like it if a Wiccan or Buddhist or Muslim place of worship were destroyed? No, No, No.

4) Bosnia and Hezegovina are poised to erupt again because of economic hard times. Nothing like a little hard times and lack of food and shelter for people to start blaming again. see number 3.

5) great little article in the Sacramento Bee (the best paper I have subscribed to in years!!! more news that both Denver papers put together) about how right-wing talk show hosts are scared that the fairness doctrine, if it is reenacted, may put them out of business. What happens if progressive voices had as much air time as regressive? They now control over 90% of the air time.

6) another good article in the paper today about Green Industry. Best Quotation:

"Smart companies, investors and policymakers know that this is hardly so. Consider this: Several studies verify that equivalent investments in renewable energy sources generate jobs at a 4-1 or even 6-1 ratio if compared with those created by industries exploiting fossil fuels such as natural gas."

because most green jobs are labor and the money stays in the State or local region as opposed to buying coal or gas or fuel oil, where it goes to another state or another country.

7) Finally, a great 8-page article on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and future plans there. Keep in mind, without water exports to the Central Valley there would be little food for America and people in SoCal would be without water, but if it is managed the same way it is now, it is probable many fisheries will die. period. Now, what to do? For background, it would be wonderful to read Cadillac Desert, as the ramifications of western water policy are laid bare and they are not pretty, but the question always remains, now what do we do? You can't undo what has been done and LA and San Diego need the water. Do you want to tell 6,000,000 people to move to the Midwest? There is more water law in Colorado than there is civil or criminal law. What to do rationally?

8) and you have to love the auto industry one more time. honest. Congress screws you over, turn to god.

rojo

Cars and Chemistry!

I see today that VP Lutz of GM is saying okay to the car czar. Tacit approval to have an overseer. How bizarre has this story become? We piss away money at banks and insurance companies, they continue to get bonuses for failing and auto makers have to walk over hot coals on their knees to get a loan. And southern states are pissed (Thanks, Senator Shelby of Alabama) because their non-union auto workers for foreign companies must be protected. In the 60s and 70s the mandate (no Jeffrey Gannon jokes, honest) to buy American was a conservative dictum. Nowadays, not so much. I think we have proven that fiscal conservatism really is not about free market economy, but free money for the upper class. The bailout has proved that. A real free marketer would say let the banks and economy go down! But get a chance to bust the unions and the chops of the car companies, just to show you can't push around money men and power brokers, and they will grind down those industries. Makes no sense. Except if you look at it as a power play. and it avoids the real issue of health care adding to the expense of every car. It will be resolved when a real President takes over. Will everyone like the resolution? Probably not, but at least some Adult will make a decision! The elephant in the room is health care costs borne by every employer, but no one wants to say it yet. The auto industry is asking for a LOAN for pity's sake. and are willing to accept strings. But that is not obsequeious enough for right-wingers who want to bust the UAW. Or for Democrats who feel the industry must be punished for piss-poor vision. Time to get over our petty squabbles and realize we need the industrial base.

On another subject completely--

The fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta/San Francisco estuary are disappearing. So much so that salmon fishing had to be stopped this year in hopes of possibly repopulating the salmon run, which dropped from hundreds of thousand salmon to less than 40,000 fish.

Surprise, surprise. Pollution is a cause, as is the continual diversion of water to Southern CA, where it used for drinking water and crop irrigation (take away the water and America goes hungry, period). Heck, the canals are larger than any river in CO and WY, except the Colorado River. In the long run, the water is getting so salty, eventually it will kill the land in the long run (my dire prediction, no references and this is based on salinity results I see at water and wastewater plants extrapolated over 100 years). Of note in an article in today's Sacramento Bee:

"If the fish living in this water are not healthy and are passing contaminants to their young, what is happening to the people who use the water, are exposed to the same chemicals or eat the fish," Ostrach said in a news release Monday.

These contaminants are PCBs, which have been outlawed for 30+ years and are still influencing the food chain, pesticides (which are continually being aerial sprayed over fields in CA--can't imagine aerial sprayers ever missing the crops and getting it in the water, not from flooded rice fields next to the rivers, or that pilots may overspray just to charge more. I am sure they are major environmentalists who just make their living spraying poison.) and fire retardants! Yes, those chemicals we use to keep babies clothes and furniture from burning are now in the food chain. and in such large numbers that it is showing up in breast milk routinely in SF. Better living through chemistry, eh!

The complete article is very interestig and can be found here.

rojo

These ads are running on TV now in CA. Thankfully!

Maybe someone will listen. If there was more diligence when it came to tracking down the criminals of Iran-Contra, instead of concerning ourselves with looking forward and healing--this administration would not have had a free pass. Or at least hired the same dudes. They would have been disgraced and behind bars.



rojo

Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

Okay, GM execs took a private plane to go to Washington to beg for money. Stoopid! with a capital S. GM leases its planes and had seven planes. They dropped two in December and are planning on cutting two more, leaving their fleet at three. Compare to Intel, where execs are mandated by policy to take coach. Which company makes money, or at least is not in line for a bail out? Hmmm. Let me see. Just so's ya know--OMG Palin-speech, language must be a virus! Ford exec Alan Mulally had a compensation of $22.8M and $750,000 of that was the use of the company jet by him, his wife and kids and guests. It was hard for him and his family to move to Michigan from Seattle.

My heart effin' bleeds. I got moved for my job and I still own my house in Denver because I could not sell it in the current economic environment. My kids rent it. I lose money on it. Notice the ambition of my son and his dog in the icon. (apologies to Jesse) Can I get a job where I can run the company into almost bankruptcy and make $22.8M? and fly in the company jet to see my kids and wife when I want? Oy!

And, yes, the auto companies need bailed out. Yesterday I mentioned that 2,000,000 American jobs depend on it. Today in the press they are saying 3,000,000 and I am glad that congress is asking for controls, a business plan and so on before they hand over the money. Management has made bad decisions. It needs to be changed. And when you ask for $25B, tough shit if you don't like having strings attached. I hope they can make them a world-wide industry leader again. BTW, link on Forbes.com states Detroit lacks salemanship. Isn't sales their business? D'oh!

One more auto-related item--GMAC, the financial arm of GM (mortgages, car loans, credit cards, etc.) has asked for bank status so it can get bank bailout money. and in the SacBee this morning they were stating that GMAC holds a controlling interest in Cerebrus Capital Management. That is incorrect. GMAC sold 49% of its holdings to Cerebrus earlier this year so it would have liquidity. This is important because Cerebrus owns 51% of Chrysler LLC. So, GM and Chrysler do have a connection through a management firm. That management firm holds Chrysler and GMAC, so with common management...

rojo

Now What?

Before I begin talking about the American Auto Industry, I need to say I am sad they need bankruptcy protection.

Why? Labor costs, pension plans, medical costs, bad strategy, bad marketing, lack of foresight. I mean how many Cadillac Cimarrons are out there right now as classic cars? Oh wait, you mean the Chevy Cavalier with wide whites and wire rim wheel covers and Iron Duke 4-bangers. Yes, those POSs. And why has Ford had "Build Bigger trucks" as their business plan for ever? They are lumbering giants of bumbling companies who make bad decisions. They are nor responsive to market demands. They are more like Refrigerator Perry running the ball, rather than Barry Sanders--go in one direction and not be able to change speeds or directions well. Strictly vertical management schemes. Peer review is unknown there. and bonuses are given to the most failed management. They are used to it. and broke because of it.

and worse yet, we need them. It may cost $50 billion to bail them out, but over $250 billion if they fail. and up to 2,000,000 lost jobs. Kaiser, Willys, American Motors didi not have enough capital to keep up.

The whole industry needs to be retooled. I wish I was smart enough to know how. Yes, you need trucks, you need profit, you need industry, you need electric cars, you need flex fule, you need hybrids (and I looked at a Malibu hybrid--got all of 30 mpg, big whoop). How do we make the bailout and then remake the companies. The executives who drove it in to the ground certainly can't (proving how stupid they are asking for bailouts in corporate jets).

Now what?

rojo

"When Bremer started issuing legal decrees in Baghdad, Joseph Stiglitz, the former World Bank chief economist, warned that Iraq was getting 'an even more radical form of shock therapy than was pursued in the former Soviet world.' That was quite true. In the original Washington plan, Iraq was going to become (an economic) frontier just as Russia had been in the early nineties, but this time it would be American firms--not the local ones or Eurpoean, Russia or Chinese competitors--that would first in line for the easy billions. And nothing would deter even the most painful economic changes...the transformation would not involve a mannnered dance between the IMF and quixotic local politicians while the U.S. Treasury called the shots from down the hall. In Iraq, Washington cut out the middlemen: the IMF and the World Bank were relegated to supprting roles, and the U.S. was front and center. Paul Bremer was the government...there was no point in negotiating with the local government because 'at this point, we'd be negotiating with ourselves.'

...All the careful efforts during the nineties to present 'free trade' as something other than an imperial project were abondoned...seizing new markets directly for Western multinationals on the battlefields of preemptive wars."

The Shock Doctrine, p. 434, Naomi Klein

Three things this brings to mind:
1) Is it any wonder the U.S. is so loved across the world in its current administration and incarnation? Start a war so we can take over. simple. The catharsis across the world of seeing Barack as the country's new leader will bring large crowds, because we are so disliked in our current form.
2) Free market should not even be a debate anymore, it has worked so well for us over the past 16 years (NAFTA and CAFTA come to mind)--through the Enron debacle, the energy market bubble, the dotcom bubble, the housing bubble. This has all worked well for the middle and lower classes. Trickle down is such BULLSHIT!!!! It can't work, won't work and is not even worthy of discussion. So get proponents of it off of my TV. Oh, wait, the station owners want us to hear more about its virtues. I wonder why? The deregulation of the airwave ownership and the deregulation and submergence of news into "fair and balanced" profit centers (keep in mind that for every 300 hours of Republican or further right commentary, there is one minute of left wing commentary--but, let's not go there in this post) has provided propoganda to fuel that fire for over twenty years. Iran-Contra headed by Saint Reagan never received honest coverage (hell, Ollie North and G. Gordon Liddy are commentators on news channels instead of being Bubba's cell wife). All it has done is redistribute the money to the upper 0.5% of the population and those that won it, love it and will fight for their right to party while you don't. and they have the funding.
3) This administration is the most important administration in my lifetime. Maybe the most important since the New Deal. The WORLD'S economy is kind of crumbling and who Barack picks as economic advisors will tell us whether it can recover and recreate itself as a possible paradise. Or will it continue as a free market Stygian thievery? I hear Albright being part of the transition team and that scares me. The world will need a hybrid economic theory (not free market, not socialism, not communism--but something withhheart that recognizes the failures of all the systems and put in place safeguards so human nature and ethics cannot get in the way of what is fair) and practice if it is to survive as something other than a class structure.

As an aside, I have read many stories of Prop 8 maybe being the base of a right wing revolution, or maybe having a Black President. I have been in Kern County CA and talked to men at a gas station driving to Bumfuck rural nowhere to buy the parts to convert their weapons to fully automatic weapons because they feel the need to defend themselves from the gays and the blacks. The need for revolution is near the surface to them and they have guns. This will be a very tense time in our country's history. I don't feel these guys were aberrations. What they believed the country to be, based on God-fearing bible-toting white folks is changing. Add in home repossessions and economic crunches and we are sitting on a tinder keg.

Prayers, good vibes, reiki, whatever are needed at this crucial time.

rojo

Send Lawyers, Cars and Money, The Shit Has Hit the Fan!

In the celebratory atmosphere many of us are feeling after the election (some exceptions are...), I am waiting to see who is the most trusted advisor on the economy. Will it be someone with a free market bent, a Friedmanite or a Keynsian? or some mixture in between. If you have not read The Shock Doctrine, read it. For me, it puts into an understandable context Confessions of an Economic Hitman and fills out so much of the background of South American politics I was just too stupid or naive to understand when I was younger. It makes listening to Thom Hartmann easier too. It is hard to drive, listen to him on the car radio and have your brain hurt. and it also helps put into perspective Rush Limbaugh's comments of the necessity of rolling back the New Deal.

Speaking of New Deals, I see the US auto industry may become part of the bailout. GM was looking at purchasing Chrysler LLC, but has no money with which to do it. GM needs $19.4 billion to meet commitments to retirees, payroll, benefits and suppliers. They are about out. They have already cut 401k matching payments. The industry is needed for an American economic recovery. There is no doubt about it. They are meeting with Pelosi to see what can be done.

But how should these industrial giants retrench? And can their administrations which have made so many STUPID decisions (just last week Ford, for the third time in ten years, is placing hopes of recovery on big pick ups and SUVs - do they know more than one note?) Ford could not figure out how to make small cars profitable earlier in this decade and now has problems. The November 2008 issue of Automobile magazine lists 10 cars that are needed for today's world and three of them are are already existing Fords, one GM (Opal/Saturn). They are out there and will be needed.

I often wonder if we are not in a situation now where you need to make a product and break even, just to keep the doors open. I am sure that will get you no bonuses (at that level are bonuses really tied to economic metrics or are they just expected. evidence recently shows the latter option as the way it is done.) You may even lose your job as investors take no dividends for a while. Aren't we in a situation where country needs to come before return on investment. Maybe keeping the doors open and lowering ROI is a necessary step.

rojo

Krugman is Kool, But...

There is a great read by Paul Krugman today. he states that the Monster Years are over. I have thought of this a lot over the past few years and I hope the following is a coherent encapsulation of many and various trains of thoughts I have had. In my not-too humble opinion, the cultural war against mon sters has posted a small victory this past election, but....for years, I have never understood why the Monstrous Ideas spouted as truth by ninnies and feebs was given any serious thought at all. As a child, I would visit downtown Cleveland with my grandmother and be amazed at how streetcorner preachers ranting about the upcoming "end of the world as we know it" could generate some listeners, but how most reasonable people shook their heads and walked away, paying it no more attention. why, when teaching evolution was challenged as a source of the violence of Columbine, or when 3 presidentail candidates stated they did not believe it, there was not more of a shrug and dismissal of fools who said something like that, still amazes me. just that DeLay was not exiscerated by the news and was not an embarrassment followed by recall to his District lets me know the fool quotient in his District.

Just yesterday I had breakfast with a man from Houston who said now America is in for problems because we now have a President who will deal with terroroists rather than a strong leader like Bush who will slap them down all the time. I reminded him that Clinton bombed Al Qeada sites and wanted to bomb more until Lewinski, as he was then accused of "wag the dog" by very serious people. his rejoinder was that at least Bush bombed the Iraqis who funded and housed Al Qeada and that Rush just spoke of that yesterday. People still get information from fools and tools and do not think or read critically. there is not much of a broad opinion and fact palate among people, or time taken to develop one as they strive to achieve the american dream. or in the recession, pay for housing.

maybe it is time for progressives to realize that the victory over monsters is short-lived if there are still a preponderance of propagandists out there speaking foolish things in large markets, that the work of debunking fools still needs to be continuously done. I will use Houston as an example. Basic cable in a few motels I have stayed in on business has no MSNBC, but 4 Fox channels. Air America or NovaM is not heard, but Rush, Medved, Beck et al are omnipresent. In North Texas, at one time, you had America Freedom Network and the America Family Network as radio choices once you drove west of Amarillo. If there are no choices, people will still think monsters are real serious people.

one of the problems is who can fund a choice for Truth to Power, as hate sells. And deprogramming the message of propagandists takes time and money. In a short-term profit-driven world, even Sacramento could not support progressive radio, let alone North Texas. This is where the culture war against monsters needs to happen.I want no short-term pyrrhic victories, but there needs to be more public discourse, more Truth in the public air waves. Maybe PBS can start to be non-biased again. But I feel there needs to be more in the mass market for people to hear. my problem is how do you start that? In my hometown of Sacramento, what does it take to start an AM radio station, willing to generate living wages and small profits and how can funding be obtained?

rojo

Very Sad

I was semi-joking about the American car industry and how there might only be one standing yesterday, but this came out today. I was bummed years ago when reading the history of the American auto industry that Studebaker, Packard, Auburn and Duesenberg disappeared. You, see, I love cars and some of those were classics. Engineering, design and performance classics that could not compete with mass production at Ford. I really felt sorry for Kaiser when he proudly stated Kaiser-Willys (pre-American Motors) had millions for R&D when GM had billions. You make one mistake when that underfunded and bye-bye company. Haven't seen many Kaiser-Willys or Kaiser Nashes lately, or heard "Hey Javelin" either. Yet they were unique and had a place in history. They were placed out of business because while their products were good, they were underfunded for business development and R&D.

So here we have a situation where Chrysler is going down. Daimler has given them a cash value of zero. If GM picks them up, that is basically a life preserver. They had the best 4-wheel drive technology (which is why they bought Jeep). They still have market niche with their hemi engines (even though in the world of high gas prices, it seems out of step, says the hybrid owner). A moment of silence for a company that really had "hot" cars during the 60s and 70s and never really recovered in the emissions era. They tried to downsize and still have fun cars--the Omni GLH by Carrol Shelby comes to mind, but the product line at that time Cordova, Aspen/Volare followed by the Kcar shows what happened. The minivan genre was their idea and is so copied that they deserve a cut of the profit and theirs is still the standard of the American industry. Their marriage with Daimler never worked and they lost, in a purge, the designers who brought you the Prowler and the small retro wagon whose name escapes me now. Ah yes, the PT Cruiser. Their brand niche was changed and identity lost and not quite recovered. I mean, who can point out an Aspen, Sebring or Pacifica in traffic? The Crossfire, yes, but the others--computer sez no.

On the other hand, VW is doing well. Puegot and Renault had their credit ratings cut. As an aside, in one of the biggest blunders in auto history, Ford turned down owning VW as reparations for WWII because "no one would buy a car like that." and then they had to rush out the Falcon to compete.

rojo

enjoy







rojo

Is That Yellow Cake? For me? on my birthday?

Remember, Nukular power is safe.

The lynch pin of McCain's energy policy is safe.

rojo

I ran across this story this morning at Americablog. The same group was at the local Safeway with many, many sign in please petitions. The ranked from "No Gay Marriage", to "No Abortion" to voter registration to "Protect Children from Cruelty" to "Stop the Endangered Specie Act" to I don't remember what. There were eight sign in sheets. I know this is where I registered to vote in CA. I signed up to vote and registered to the workers dismay as a Democrat and bandied with him back and forth on the others, asking where the gun control petitions were. Yes, they tried to make me sign in as a Republican, but I refused and then refused the other ones.

There are times you need to read what you sign and know some basic rights.

rojo

Too Stupid to Breed

It takes election season for me to see how stupid many Americans are.

On the October 15 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, Bob Grant said: "[W]hat is that flag that Obama's been standing in front of that looks like an American flag, but instead of having the field of 50 stars representing the 50 states, there's a circle?" He then said: "Is the circle the 'O' for Obama? Is that what it is?" Grant later said: "[D]id you notice Obama is not content with just having several American flags, plain old American flags with the 50 states represented by 50 stars? He has the 'O' flag. And that's what that 'O' is. That's what that 'O' is. Just like he did with the plane he was using. He had the flag painted over, and the 'O' for Obama. Now, these are symptom -- these things are symptomatic of a person who would like to be a potentate -- a dictator." '

Grant did not further elaborate on what he meant by the " 'O' flag." However, conservative blogger Michelle Malkin stated on October 13 that she had "received several e-mails today from readers complaining about Barack Obama's backdrop in Toledo today. Apparently, some talk show hosts have also gone ballistic over what they think is an 'Obama flag.' " But, as Malkin noted, the flag appearing behind Obama during his October 13 speech was actually the Ohio state flag.

From Malkin's blog post:

I received several e-mails today from readers complaining about Barack Obama's backdrop in Toledo today. Apparently, some talk show hosts have also gone ballistic over what they think is an "Obama flag:"

Relax, folks.

That's not an "Obama flag."

It's the state flag of Ohio:

source--www.mediamatters.com

Any school kid who had to learn the flag, back when civics was actually taught would know the State flag of Ohio.

god help me.

I am beginning to think that there needs to be a citizenship to allow voters to vote. Maybe voting should be seen as a privilege instead of a right. I would prefer the latter when you realize the slippery slope the former choice opens up, but allow me a moment of disgust. Just like yesterday I saw a video claiming Obama was raised in a Unitarian Universalist Church making him a communist Wiccan using black magic to mesmerize the crowd in his speeches. I will post that later.

time for work.

rojo

What? No Rapture? Damn!

Here we hoped that Christ Dude had come back to perform more miracles and battle the Anti-Christ in a match that would put Mixed martial Arts to shame. maybe even a cage or ladder match. But sadly, no. No Apocalypse, No Rapture. Nothing.

Just human error.

rojo

Election Thoughts

I watched some of the debate. Enough to see Grampy say "That One" and variations of "He did it." You could hear his disdain for the junior senator. There are times I could see him in my head at family reunions leering at younger women, drinking and saying pull my finger. It may be me, but I swear you could almost hear the n word in his brain. I was waiting for him to break into "Get off my lawn!" He did come across as a curmudgeon.

That said, he got his ass handed to him in what was supposed to be his forum, with a sycophant as a moderator (Oh, he was better then Gwen Awful, but has anyone seen the real Tom Brokaw lately). Town Hall meetings are very different if they don't vet the town first and only allow regressives in. OMG, he sounded like an old fart last night. He reminded me of great-grandmother giving me $2 one night after I was married and telling me to take my wife out on the town. She was well over 90 at the time and $2 for her was a lot of money. I cherished it, but in 1976 that wouldn't even buy popcorn at a theater. Time had passed her by.

Face it. He was the best candidate for the Republicans in 2000 and Bush kicked his ass and he has been waiting since then to come back out on a reunion tour. Except he had to sell his soul to keep whatever chops he had left. It is sad to see someone so past his prime still go to the Crossroads and make a deal with the devil to keep his chops, but his body won't do it anymore. No offense, but even guitar and banjo heroes normally aren't as nimble at 70 or 80 (see Earl Scruggs) as they were at 50.

So how dirty will they get??? to win? I swear, Sarah Palin's (aka Governor Gidget) boy bringing back Osama from Iraq himself may not help at this time.

and if either Grampy or Vampy do not tell their crowds that calling a Senator a terrorist or saying "Kill him." is absolutely inappropriate and not fitting, if not downright repulsive to the American ideal in their whistle stops, they are contributing to the problem. Fomenting hate to win is a last ditch campaign strategy and at best gets you an office where people will expect you to be a pugnacious, mean son of a bitch and anything less is not good enough. At worst, fomenting hate gets people killed. That is truly unacceptable.

rojo

About Time Someone Talked About It!

Since Sarah Palin has been calling Obama the radical's best friend, Obama is fighting back. At noon today, he will have a full 13 minute video available on the Keating Five scandal showing how McCain, the reformer, really is doing some of the same things that led to the Savings and Loan bailout. About time some of this shit hit the fan. 

rojo

Hee!

"Ever mindful of the danger that George Bush will lead us down the road to socialism, we will be monitoring this closely," Barnie Frank told the House today after the rescue heist vote.

rojo

Joe Biden was talking too much about McCain. I know it is his job. He was very specific and knows his shit. I have confidence that he could make a knowledgeable, sensible decision. And when he choked about maybe his sons not making it was great.

Sarah Palin came out and looked good and chipper. Then she opened her mouth. She refused to answer questions that were asked but told everyone what she wanted them to hear. Sorry, the rules of a debate are to answer the effin" question asked.

What is your Achilles Heel? Why it is that I am a hockey mom and like soccer moms and joe six pack we work together to find solutions and blah, blah, blah. Okay, your achilles heel is you don't listen and twitter on endlessly with the social skills you learned by fluttering eyebrows and having joe six pack's penis do his thinking for him.

Just answer the god-damned question. and let's move the Israeli embassy. and as VP I want more power.

Why the hell did not the moderator slap her silly and say answer the damned question. drill baby drill and many more answers to catenations that were not relevant to the question? So it tells me she has no discipline, thinks she is great and does not need to listen and really, really reminds of someone who has been pampered her whole life like a star athlete. I mean why play by rules if I can flutter my eyes or wink and get what I want.

Christ, save me from assholes like this.

rojo