Psychopolitik 2.0

These should come as no shock at all:

-The banks that got the most bailout money spent the most on lobbying to influence that “reform” bill.

-CEOs that cut the most jobs during the ongoing collapse, regardless of the profitability of the company, got paid the best.

-”Y’know what would’ve cushioned the economic crash?  Bailing out Lehman Brothers.” — says ex-CEO of Lehman Brothers.  How convenient…

It’s a good thing some people don’t listen, otherwise we never would’ve been blessed with the following example of Conceptual Fail:

…isn’t having a dictatorship without a military a bit like having a burger without meat?  Or is this guy trying to also say that Obama is so bonkers that he doesn’t realize any dictator worth their salt traffics in militarism?

“Oh, I’ll show these unworthy peons!  First I’ll take over everything, then I’ll dismantle the armed forces!  They’ll be powerless to stop me!  MUAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!”

No particular unifying thread:

-There’s one societal norm that needs to shift (or, more accurately, be completely thrown out) that encompasses everything else on this issue: the deliberate ignorance of any line between your time spent as an employee & your actual life.  Matt refers to Germany here, but there have been reports of U.S. companies scouring social networking sites for ammunition against workers already.  To act as if there is no such thing as a social life for people independent of whoever they may work for is to build the technological equivalent of a Company Town around them.

-Shorter Daniel Larison: “No matter what Newt Gingrich says, there’s a wide range of Muslim opinion between Al-Qaeda-Sympathizing-Wackaloon and Neo-Con-Militarism-SockPuppet”

-Tim Lee questions the feasibility and desirability of of seasteading.

-Hopefully for Nate & co. they negotiated that their blog not get paywalled…

-dL has a good point about Wikileaks here.  It’s kinda like the states that they’re playing against each other are selling the bandwidth that’ll be used to hang them.  That said, I’m probably somewhere in the middle on this.  I think what makes Wikileaks so indispensable is precisely that their example hasn’t been implemented wide enough to do without yet.  In a way, you can say they’ve cornered the market for now, at least when talking about high-level whistleblowing.  It won’t be like that for long.

-Few minutes ago spotted a political commercial.  Had random people in it voicing opposition to an “energy tax”, followed by a screen saying “sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute”.  Considering how heavily subsidized oil is here, the ad is so internally contradictory that it’s practically a work of art.  The folks in the ad are already paying an energy tax, where do they think the oil companies get their welfare checks from?

-Hearts and minds y’all, hearts and minds…

I’m a stickler for accuracy:

Mehlman, The Atlantic said, acknowledged that if he had publicly declared his sexuality sooner, he might have played a role in keeping the party from pushing an anti-gay agenda been fired.

The former head of the RNC turns out to be gay.  Coming up: PETA member reveals that they’ve secretly been eating fried chicken in their home, at least once a week, for years.  But first, these messages from your local sponsors…

John Quiggin: “I will ignore evidence to the contrary & say libertarianism = Objectivism.  Going Galt is a ripoff, so settle for living among Republicans in the suburbs”

Jim Henley: “I dunno about that.  But…too bad the popularity of limiting gov’t, let alone doing away with it, tracks with irrational fear of waves of Undeserving Darky.”

dL: “Um…Jim?  Last I checked, writing off chunks of the populace as cockroaches led to calling the Orkin men, not ‘let us leave them be’…”

Yes, this conversation still exists.  A key to why it’s still so persistent is that John & his peers seem to take everyone who says they want “less gov’t” seriously, regardless of how incoherent they end up when asked to clarify.  What those suburban Republicans really end up saying when you scratch the surface is “don’t mess with ME, mess with THEM!!”, with the obligatory finger-pointing.  The lifestyle that he cites as a better deal than “going Galt” is only so because said Republicans are heavily subsidized.  “Red” states are on average tax-eaters (meaning they get more money from the federal government than they pay into the system); within a state, “red” areas act similarly, with regard to tax revenue vs spending, compared to the generally more HippieLibrulSocialist cities.

In other words: Wannabe Galts aren’t paying the market rate.

Want to know why they aren’t?  dL has that covered…

Since there isn’t enough contradiction out there already, a group of “tea party” activists –  you know, those angry right-wingers described as “anti-government” in the media without blinking — held a demonstration today in support of increased government scrutiny of migration:

Tea party groups converged on a remote section of the U.S.-Mexico border on Sunday to show support for Arizona’s controversial immigration law.More than 400 people gathered about 70 miles west of Nogales on a private ranch where the steel posts of the Arizona-Mexico border wall are set closely together to prevent people from crossing the border.

Demonstrators attached hundreds of U.S. flags with messages about curbing illegal immigration to the 15-foot posts, and chanted “U-S-A” when spectators gathered on the Mexico side of the border. (emphasis mine)

Hundreds of people gather by a fence in the middle of nowhere, with media, during temperatures in the mid nineties.  People who happen to live on the other side of the imaginary line wonder what’s going on.  According to the “tea party” gathering, the logical response to this curiosity is to treat it as intimidation.  Might wanna switch to decaf…

Since the Too-Many-Mexicans caucus is agitating about yanking the 14th Amendment…

Say hypothetically that amendment were repealed. An immigrant couple comes to the U.S., undocumented. They have a child. Since the rules of one government can’t address what another government chooses to do with regards to citizenship, wouldn’t the kid be, technically, a citizen of nowhere?

Me, 3 months ago:

60-40 confirmation, Scott Brown flips.  NEXT!

What actually happened:

The Senate confirmed U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan on Thursday as the 112th justice to the Supreme Court, making her the fourth woman ever to sit on the high court.  On a 63 to 37 vote, Kagan became President Obama’s second lifetime appointment to the court in the past year — the vote was held a year after Sonia Sotomayor won 68 votes for her confirmation as the court’s first Latina justice.

Five Republicans supported Kagan, 50, to succeed retired justice John Paul Stevens. One Democrat, Ben Nelson (Neb.), was opposed.

Brown voted no, btw.

Let’s try another prediction then: Ben Nelson is switching parties after the mid-terms.  He said he wasn’t, but politicians lie anyway, he will.

-Shorter U.S. Senate: “We don’t like you wild-haired hooligans messing with the reefers anyway, but DON’T YOU DARE cook with it!!”

-As if the “safeguards” on state surveillance aren’t loose enough…

-According to dL, the next thing someone should submit to Wikileaks is a dictionary, with the definition of “treason” conveniently highlighted so anti-transparency zealots can stop butchering it.  Calling for a non-citizen to be charged with treason is like saying a lifelong atheist should be excommunicated by the catholic church.

-Reading this, would you really be all that shocked if a future generation were required to be preemptively handcuffed to board a plane?

U.S. military documents, via Wikileaks: “Pakistan is playing both sides”

Afghans: “…that shocks you?  Really?”