- Police brutalize journalists at RNC
This video of police charging reporters, who are screaming “press, press, press” and the accompanying video at Democracy Now of Amy Goodman being arrested for asking the police questions, raises some serious concerns about freedom. Remember, Tim Pawlenty, one of the final picks for VP, is governor of the state where this oppression is taking place — the RNC set the tone for police.
- Forbes 100 Most Powerful Women — No Sarah Palin
I just got Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Women issue. Condi Rice is on the cover. Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany, ranks number 1 overall.
No Sarah Palin. There are, however, a number of prominent Republican women on this list that would have made excellent running mates for John McCain.
In fact, Sarah Palin has never been mentioned in Forbes based on this search. She appears in online results on Forbes.com only since being named VP nominee. Wow.
Just saying….
- Reality check from the FT
The plain fact is that the presidency is unique. The contest to win the top job offers some preparation, but every first-term president is on a vertiginous learning curve. Experience is not the only – or perhaps even the most important – predictor of success in office.
Ready to rule? Financial Times, Sept. 3, 2008
Besides experience, the point of the election is to choose a direction. The one we’ve been on, the one really represented by McCain/Palin, has been a disaster economically, geopolitically and ethically. I’m much more comfortable with a 90% change from the policies of George W. Bush and the Republican Congress than I am with continuing to spend the country into the ground to support trickle-down economics and growing inequality.
- Not a bad speech
Gov. Sarah Palin can read a speech. She lost it at the end, missing words in a way that suggests she’ll have trouble in debates. And there was a Manchurian Candidate line about McCain in Hanoi that fell flat in the room. I would like very much to see this candidate thinking on her feet, in debate and interviews. I agree with my wife, who said Palin cemented the conservative core but won’t bring many undecided voters to the ticket.
I’d say it was “Quaylie” — the low expectations for Dan Quayle made his speech, which was focused on the attack as well, his high water mark.
But the long and short of it is that she delivered the same jingoistic far right stuff that is killing this country.
- A virus in our genes, think about that….
I ended up writing a better version of this posting over at ZD Net. Please, go read….
- How we got in this hole
Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel Prize winner, explains in two sentences how we got where we are economically and why it was easy to fall for the story along the way.
Falling Down
The task of unraveling all that went wrong in our financial system is a difficult one, but in essence the financial system’s latest innovation was to devise fee structures that were often far from transparent and that allowed it to generate enormous profits–private rewards that were not commensurate with social benefits. The imperfections of information (resulting from the non-transparency) led to imperfections in competition, helping to explain why the usual maxim that competition drives profits to zero seemed not to hold.Remember all the talk about the miraculous new economy? Suckers born every minute.
Without sustained investment in American intellectual capital, we will end up living on the vanquished memories of when this country was great being doled out at the Republican convention this week.
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