"I don't think the report is true, but these crises work for those who want to make fights between people." Kulam Dastagir, 28, a bird seller in Afghanistan
RE: Obama's Real Opposition
Topic: Current Events
12:33 pm EST, Nov 6, 2008
flynn23 wrote:
Bill Clinton also campaigned as a moderate, but in his first two years he was unable to govern as Congress pursued liberal priorities, including a big boost in taxes and spending. Recall Roberta Achtenberg as the scourge of the Boy Scouts and Joycelyn Elders calling for the legalization of drugs? Mr. Clinton chose -- or was forced -- to take up gun control and HillaryCare before welfare reform. Next came Newt Gingrich.
Maybe Mr. Obama has absorbed these lessons, but even if he has he'll have to be tough. The Great Society liberals who dominate Congress are old men in a hurry, and they'll run over the 47-year-old neophyte if he lets them.
I've been saying that a win for Obama didn't mean squat, but I do think that a lot of this will be tempered. There's really big problems that need to be solved immediately, and moderation will be key in getting solutions that work. I think he can make a case for priorities. But I think the likelihood of a massive swing to the left is not impossible or even unprobable and will definitely be unfortunate.
Obama's win means a very great deal in many respects, I think, but it is no more a mandate for the liberal policies advocated by many who are celebrating this victory than the election of Bush in 2004 meant that the radical right was America's new majority. Unfortunately we're now immediately seeing the "elections have consequences" (and we're going to shove them right down your throat) rhetoric from the left that we were seeing from the right in 2004. The problem is that we have two radical political ideologies battling each other for power and America is caught in the middle, trying to keep a hand on both leashes... trying to keep either group from getting too far out of control. The only way to check one is to empower the other, and neither group seems to be capable of mustering any respect at all for anyone who doesn't accept their ideology wholeheartedly... in other words neither group really respects the political views of the majority of Americans.
8 years of holding back right wing excesses are now over. Welcome to 8 years of holding back left wing excesses. I suspect that in a few years everyone who now thinks I'm a liberal will think me a Conservative. Fortunately, they may have to boil the frogs a bit before they start cutting away at civil liberties, because they've made opposition to the Bush administration's cuts such a basic aspect of their politics. I'll bet they regret it already.
Eugene Robinson - Morning in America - washingtonpost.com
Topic: Miscellaneous
12:07 pm EST, Nov 6, 2008
I can't help but experience Obama's election as a gesture of recognition and acceptance -- which is patently absurd, if you think about it. The labor of black people made this great nation possible. Black people planted and tended the tobacco, indigo and cotton on which America's first great fortunes were built. Black people fought and died in every one of the nation's wars. Black people fought and died to secure our fundamental rights under the Constitution. We don't have to ask for anything from anybody.
Yet something changed on Tuesday when Americans -- white, black, Latino, Asian -- entrusted a black man with the power and responsibility of the presidency.
If you happen to be a lawyer in New York next week...
Topic: Miscellaneous
4:39 pm EST, Nov 5, 2008
Explorers and Exploits in Online Social Networking: Balancing the Risks to Copyrights, Privacy, and Security Thursday, November 13, 2008 6 PM – 9 PM
A panel discussion of online social networks, such as those formed through Facebook, YouTube, LOOPT and Twitter. The panel will explore the personal and organizational challenges of these networks and assess the efforts to balance the copyright, security and privacy risks.
Moderator: ROLAND L. TROPE Trope and Schramm LLP; Adjunct Professor, Department of Law, U.S. Military Academy; co-author of Checkpoints in Cyberspace: Best Practices for Averting Risks in Cross-Border Transactions
Speakers: STEVEN M. BELLOVIN Professor Computer Science Department, Columbia University, co-author of Firewalls and Internet Security: Repelling the Wily Hacker
TOM CROSS Internet Security Researcher with IBM's X-Force
CHRIS KELLY Chief Privacy Officer, Facebook
LOUISE NEMSCHOFF Entertainment and Intellectual Property Lawyer, Nemschoff Law Offices, Los Angeles, California, board member of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund
CADET ASHLEY OLDS United States Military Academy, majoring in computer science, Class 2009
JOHN PALFREY Henry N. Ess III Professor of Law and Vice Dean, Library and Information Resources, Harvard Law School; Faculty Co-Director, Berkman Center for Internet & Society; Co-author, Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives
Sponsored by: Committee on Copyright & Literary Property Law, Joel Hecker, Chair
Rainforest Fungus Naturally Synthesizes Diesel | Wired Science from Wired.com
Topic: Miscellaneous
4:34 pm EST, Nov 5, 2008
A fungus that lives inside trees in the Patagonian rain forest naturally makes a mix of hydrocarbons that bears a striking resemblance to diesel, biologists announced today. And the fungus can grow on cellulose, a major component of tree trunks, blades of grass and stalks that is the most abundant carbon-based plant material on Earth.
LinkedIn does appear to be all that it's cracked up to be. Nearly 60% of the professional-focused social network's users have high personal incomes...
Users with personal incomes between $200,000 and $350,000 were seven times more likely than those below that level to have over 150 LinkedIn connections.
It cannot be denied that this feels like a punch in the gut. It is. I'm not going to pretend that the wound isn't deep and personal, like an attack on my own family. It was meant to be. Many Obama supporters voted against our rights, and Obama himself opposes our full civil equality.
Doesn't it seem wrong that a simple majority can pass a Constitutional amendment in a referendum? I must confess some ignorance of state Constitutional issues, but no minority is safe from a process that can deny any basic civil right whenever a razor thin majority desires it. If not for incorporation of federal constitutional rights, this would be a recipe for unrelenting tyranny.
I had written a really good post this morning about the election result and lost it when my laptop died. Poetic really. We don't need my cynicism to tear celebrating liberals down from their post victory high. Reality will do that for us soon enough. In the meantime, the video I'm linking here will show you what the MSM isn't saying about this years election.
naked capitalism: "Goldman Sachs ready to hand out £7bn salary and bonus package... after its £6bn bail-out"
Topic: Business
7:51 am EST, Nov 3, 2008
Each of the firm's 443 partners is on course to pocket an average Christmas bonus of more than £3million.
The size of the pay pool comfortably dwarfs the £6.1billion lifeline which the U.S. government is throwing to Goldman as part of its £430billion bail-out.
I haven't seen this in like 20+ years. Weird to tap into memories that I haven't accessed in so long. I think its all there, in your head. Everything that happened to you. But you don't know how to get at it.
Morningside Analytics discovers and monitors online networks that form around particular ideas and identifies thought leaders with standing in these audiences.
