brainiac conspiracy

Gonna Party Like It's 1799

The marching orders have come in. Reimposing slavery looks to be off the table, but apparently, not much else.

---Vitelius

Things I Know Are True

There's no such thing as an individual mandate that's needed in a single-payer healthcare system since everyone's automatically covered. Something to keep in mind the next time our wise leaders submit a better-than-nothing health-insurance bill to the Federalist Society our independent judiciary to be dealt the death of a thousand cuts.

---Vitelius

Wishful Thinking

There's certainly been a lot of chatter on the Interwebs the last few days about this guy's Presidential prospects, though I cannot for the life of me figure out why. Using the bullet points in this post as a template, here's why Jon Huntsman will not be elected President any time in the foreseeable future:

1. A fresh face doesn't mean anything to GOP primary voters*. The only thing they care about is fealty to Glenn Beck's daily talking points. If Huntsman shows any signs that he's capable of thinking independently going into the presidential primary season, he's done.

2. Republican voters don't give a shit about foreign policy unless it relates to illegal aliens attempting to impose sharia law. The fact that Huntsman is the kind of sober-minded guy who can attempt to negotiate trade and monetary agreements with the Communist Chinese actually works against him. There is simply no reward to be gained from the GOP base for being knowledgeable in policy matters, or in caring about actually governing. The fact that he also speaks fluent Mandarin will not only bring him no credit, but may actually make him an easier target of ridicule for the Dittohead Militia.

3. Huntsman may indeed by electable in the general, but that presupposes he survives the GOP primary season. If someone can tell me how he manages to pull that off after having spent two years as Hitler's Obama's Willing Executioner in the Global Marxist-Maoist-Piven & Cloward Conspiracy to bring America's economy to its knees, I'd like to hear it. Then you can convince me how Ray LaHood has a legitimate shot at the White House, too.

4. So Huntsman's got money. So what? So does Romney, and Palin is nothing if not an accomplished wingnut-welfare sponge. Haley Barbour and Mitch Daniels will have shitloads of old-boy cash, too, if they choose to jump into the race.

5. Some of Huntsman's government "reforms"---like getting more, not fewer, people covered by state-run healthcare---are utterly anathema to the GOP base. Like I said before, this guy cares about making government actually work. That alone makes him persona non grata for at least half of all GOP primary voters.

And to top it all off, let's not forget that Huntsman is a Mormon with two adopted kids from overseas alien anchor babies in his household. Don't get me wrong---in a nation where both political parties were controlled by sane and rational people, Jon Huntsman would be a helluva strong candidate. But we don't live in that kind of nation anymore, and unfortunately for Huntsman, his party is in the hands of a bunch of paranoid-conspiracist crazy people. He can either do what Mitt Romney did four years ago---run away from his record of centrist governance and convince no one that he's sincere---or run as a voice of of sober moderation. Which doesn't win you primaries, it gets you primaried in today's GOP.

* Unless you're female, pretty, and insane.

---Vitelius

Some People Haven't Learned The Lesson

That their superrich overlords are more virtuous than they are:

The widening chasm between rich and poor in Cairo has been one of the conspicuous aspects of city life over the last decade---and especially the last five years. Though there were always extremes of wealth and poverty here, until recently the rich lived more or less among the poor---in grander apartments or more spacious apartments but mixed together in the same city.

But as the Mubarak administration has taken steps toward privatizing more government businesses, kicking off an economic boom for some, rich Egyptians have fled the city. They have flocked to gated communities full of big American-style homes around country clubs, and the remoteness of their lives from those of average Egyptians has become starkly visible.

The new rich communities and older affluent enclaves closer to the city were seized with fear over the weekend after a rash of looting Friday night.

At the ravaged City Centre mall, looters had pulled bank A.T.M.’s from the walls, smashed in skylights and carted away televisions, and on Sunday a small crowd was inspecting the damage and debating the causes.

A group of men standing guard said they had watched the police abandon the mall as if on command Friday at 11 p.m., and the first looters arrived in cars shortly after. They argued that the government had tried to create the impression of chaos. Others blamed hordes who poured in from impoverished neighborhoods, or Bedouins who they said came in from the desert.

Ayman Adbel Al, 43, a civil engineer inspecting the damage with his two teenage sons, blamed Mr. Mubarak, arguing that he had allowed the growing class divisions in Egyptian society to build up for years until they exploded last week. “I can say that I am well off, but I hate it, too. It is not humanitarian,” he said, showing a picture of himself with his family at the protests Saturday. The only people who wanted Mr. Mubarak to stay in power, he argued, were rich people “afraid for their money.”

This clearly cannot stand. Someone needs to throw that moocher in debtor's jail pronto, and get those beleaguered creators of wealth a fresh round of tax cuts.

---Vitelius

Dividends of Democracy

Our newest Friends in Freedom™ are discovering the wisdom of free markets.

---Vitelius

Stuff I Learned From the Post Today

Tax cuts will create jobs, build infrastructure, educate our kids, and solve everything else. And Kaplan Test Prep needs to implement a mandatory employee retirement age.

---Vitelius

Stuff I Learned From the Times Today

Now that Republicans are running the House, we should have another investigation into the roots of the financial crisis because they didn't like the results of the first one, and because some guy from Goldman told me the Democrats on the committee were mean to his boss. Also too because Richard Shelby is an honorable man, and Democrats didn't listen to him.

Broder's gotta be wishing he'd written that column.

---Vitelius

Very Serious People Agree

That invading other people's countries, killing their leaders and converting them to Christianity is the most awesome way to encourage the spread of freedom and democracy throughout the Muslim world.

Meanwhile, in the other Muslim world:

Gangs of armed men attacked at least four jails across Egypt before dawn, helping to free hundreds of Muslim militants and thousands of other inmates as police vanished from the streets of Cairo and other cities.

Egyptian security officials said that overnight armed men fired at guards in gun battles that lasted hours at the four prisons including one northwest of Cairo that held hundreds of militants. The prisoners escaped after starting fires and clashing with guards.

---Vitelius

Pass The Lord and Praise the Ammunition

Most virtuous. Practice. Of Christian principles. Ever.

I am willing to bet, though, that a provision excepting mosques will make its way into the final bill. Agreed?

---Vitelius

Lessons From Egypt

Spreading the blessings of democracy and freedom to the Muslim world is a generally awesome and desirable thing, unless the Muslims come to the conclusion on their own that having a democracy includes the freedom to raise the prices of their exports. Then, maybe it's not so awesome after all.

---Vitelius

The Fairy Godmother of Tea-Party Assholism

Was just as full of shit as her bastard stepchildren are:

An interview with Evva Pryror, a social worker and consultant to Miss Rand's law firm of Ernst, Cane, Gitlin and Winick verified that on Miss Rand's behalf she secured Rand's Social Security and Medicare payments which Ayn received under the name of Ann O'Connor (husband Frank O'Connor).

As Pryor said, "Doctors cost a lot more money than books earn and she could be totally wiped out" without the aid of these two government programs. Ayn took the bailout even though Ayn "despised government interference and felt that people should and could live independently... She didn't feel that an individual should take help."

Of course that's how she felt, but she mooched and looted anyway. A proto-Teahadi if ever there was one.

---Vitelius'

Infrastructure Spending

In general, it's a really good idea. It's even better if you spend the money on your own public-works projects instead of spending it on someone else's.

---Vitelius

Dealing With Congestion

There are all sorts of relatively simple ways to remedy a problem such as the one described here. Congestion taxes or commuter tolls, similar to what London has implemented, is one approach. Tax credits for businesses that offer carpools to their employees is another, though some additional costs to government are accrued to monitor and/or enforce such policies.

As an alternative, our wise leaders in Washington could take the most direct approach and simply raise the federal fuel tax. Yes, it's highly regressive, but as this graph suggests, it's perhaps the most powerful incentive---or, more properly, disincentive---to get individual drivers out of their cars and into multi-passenger carpools, vanpools, buses, etc. Plus, it would provide billions of additional dollars in the short term for government to spend on things like road maintenance and light-rail expansion, and the construction of bike lanes and green lanes and other socially beneficial stuff. Too bad we are now ruled by people who are convinced that raising taxes on anyone for any reason is a form of Marxist tyranny that's worse than the Holocaust. It didn't always used to be that way.

Granted, raising taxes on fuel will exert an upward pressure on the costs of goods and services, which may not seem wise in a recession, but those added costs can be ameliorated somewhat by gains in GDP that ensue when people spend more time in their workplace doing something productive instead of sitting on the Interstate for a hour and half each day doing nothing except belching billions of pounds of hydrocarbons into the atmosphere. There are also secondary cost savings to be taken into account, e.g., fewer cars on the road each day equals reduced wear and tear on infrastructure and hence lower maintenance costs. It's all a matter of trade-offs.

---Vitelius

But I'm Proud to Be An American

Where at least I know I'm a porn-addled wanker.

---Vitelius

Random Thought of The Day

It's a sad state of affairs when a unruly bunch of Arabs think they can bring about regime change in their own country without our benign supervision. Of course, when you've been shoveling a billion and a half dollars a year at the object of their wrath for the last three decades, it's probably a pretty fair bet you won't be greeted as liberators, no matter how much shock and awe you'd prefer to unleash.

Either way, now would be an excellent time to start discussing the wisdom in providing so much foreign aid to such a corrupt and crappy government. And, come to think of it, this government also too.

---Vitelius

The Bitch Had It Coming Act of 2011

It's really too bad we don't require warning labels on pieces of social legislation the way we do for packs of cigarettes, and for bottles of wine and liquor.

---Vitelius

This Should Help Create Thousands of Jobs

Institutionalizing the derangement:

So-called "birther" legislation aimed at President Barack Obama has been reintroduced at the Arizona Legislature.

A House bill would prohibit placing presidential and vice-presidential candidates on the state's ballot unless they submit specified documentation of their U.S. birth and other constitutional requirements.

Hawaii officials have repeatedly confirmed Obama's birth there, but so-called "birthers" contend Obama was actually born in Kenya, his father's homeland.

The House narrowly passed a version of the bill in 2010 but it died in the Senate without a vote.

This year's bill has not yet been assigned to a committee for a possible hearing. It has 41-co-sponsors, up from 40 last year.

If these people ever wanted to secede from the Union, I can't think of too many compelling arguments to keep them around, can you?

---Vitelius

Frankenfeed We Can Believe In

Argh.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced on Thursday that he would authorize the unrestricted commercial cultivation of genetically modified alfalfa, setting aside a controversial compromise that had generated stiff opposition.

In making the decision, Mr. Vilsack pulled back from a novel proposal that would have restricted the growing of genetically engineered alfalfa to protect organic farmers from so-called biotech contamination. That proposal drew criticism at a recent Congressional hearing and in public forums where Mr. Vilsack outlined the option.

Mr. Vilsack said Thursday that his department would take other measures, like conducting research and promoting dialogue, to make sure that pure, nonengineered alfalfa seed would remain available.

“We want to expand and preserve choice for farmers,” he told reporters. “We think the decision reached today is a reflection of our commitment to choice and trust.”

Mr. Vilsack in recent months has been calling for coexistence among growers of genetically engineered crops, organic farmers and nonorganic farmers growing crops that have not been genetically altered.

Organic farmers can lose sales if genetic engineering is detected in their crops, which occurs through cross-pollination from a nearby field or through intermingling of seeds. And exports of nonorganic but nonengineered crops to certain countries can be jeopardized if genetically engineered material is detected in significant amounts.

The genetically modified crop---developed by Monsanto and Forage Genetics, an alfalfa seed company that is owned by the Land O’Lakes farming and dairy cooperative---contains a gene that makes the plant resistant to the herbicide Roundup. That allows farmers to spray the chemical to kill weeds without hurting the crop.

Alfalfa is grown mostly to make hay fed to dairy cows and horses. More than 20 million acres are grown in the United States; it is the nation’s fourth-largest crop by acreage, behind corn, soybeans and wheat, with a value of about $8 billion. About 1 percent of alfalfa is organic.

While this is awesome news for Monsanto shareholders, it's insanely stupid policy on so many levels:

Two of our major concerns with [Roundup-Ready Alfalfa] deregulation are unintended gene flow from RRA to conventional and organic alfalfa, and the likelihood that introduction of RRA would worsen the ongoing epidemic of glyphosate-resistant weeds. Gene flow and resistant weeds have already caused substantial harm to thousands of American farmers, and thus deserve careful analysis in the context of RRA.

Alfalfa is a bee-pollinated, perennial plant, which makes transgenic contamination much more likely than it is with self-pollinating crops like rice or wind-pollinated crops like corn. Yet confinement efforts with these more easily contained crops have often failed, sometimes spectacularly. Conventional corn and rice growers suffered losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars from contamination episodes involving two genetically engineered (GE) crops: StarLink corn (2000/2001)i and LibertyLink rice (2006/2007).ii The organic canola industry in Canada was "destroyed" by pervasive transgenic contamination. Two key similarities between canola and alfalfa---long-distance bee pollination and ubiquity of volunteers and feral plants---suggest a similar fate could befall conventional and organic alfalfa.

At present, Canada’s entire $320 million flax industry is threatened by GE contamination with a long de-registered variety that late in 2009 turned up unexpectedly in flax shipments to the European Union, which has rejected them. There have been over 200 transgenic contamination episodes documented over the past decade, many of which have triggered rejection of shipments by grain elevators or food companies. Conventional and organic growers undertake expensive and often unsuccessful “contamination prevention” efforts, and many also commission expensive testing of their supplies for the presence of unintended transgenic material. Things have reached the point where grain dealers are “offshoring” organic production (e.g. organic seed corn) to foreign countries that are able to ensure production of uncontaminated product, costing American farmers jobs and income.

There'a also the matter of liability. Or, rather, the lack of it, since the USDA's traditional definition of "regulation" has been pretty much identical to "self-regulation":

We note that Bayer CropScience (developer of LibertyLink rice) denied any culpability for the contamination episode noted above that caused such huge losses to American rice farmers, and instead blamed "unavoidable circumstances which could not have been prevented by anyone"; "an act of God"; and farmers' "own negligence, carelessness, and/or comparative fault." In this light, it is troubling that co-applicant Forage Genetics has a history of refusing to inform conventional growers of the locations of RR alfalfa fields.

The Department would have to oversee implementation and enforcement of these plans because the applicants’ conflict of interest disqualifies them for the task. Recall that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) delegated stewardship responsibilities for GE StarLink corn to Aventis CropScience, its developer, much as USDA proposes to let Monsanto-Forage Genetics (FGI) implement and enforce RRA stewardship via contracts or licenses with growers.x Aventis misbranded some StarLink seed bags by not including required planting restrictions. Iowa attorney general Tom Miller suggested that Aventis failed to inform many farmers of restrictions on growing StarLink for fear of losing them as customers. The result was a huge and costly contamination debacle for American farmers. Monsanto and FGI would be in a similar conflict of interest situation---reluctant to enforce contractual stewardship obligations for fear of losing customers disinclined to fulfill them.

Monsanto recently provided an illustration of how conflict of interest operates to undermine compliance with stewardship obligations. In the summer of 2010, EPA fined Monsanto $2.5 million for distributing misbranded GE insect-resistant cotton seed.xii Due to Monsanto’s failure to include in Grower Guides EPA-ordered language prohibiting commercial planting of the cotton seed in 10 Texas counties, the seed was widely sold and planted in those counties from 2002 to 2007. The planting restrictions were part of EPA’s program to forestall evolution of insect resistance to GE insect-resistant crops (no comparable program exists for herbicide-resistant weeds fostered by RR crop systems).

Monsanto clearly profited from its violation of EPA rules, gaining substantial revenue from illegal seed sales over a six-year period.

Bottom line:

Roundup Ready crops have led to use of 383 million lbs. more herbicide than would have been applied in their absence over the 13 years from 1996 to 2008. One important reason for this is the widespread evolution of glyphosate-resistant weeds they have fostered. According to the National Academy of Sciences, farmers respond to glyphosate- resistant weeds by “...increasing the magnitude and frequency of glyphosate applications, using other herbicides in addition to glyphosate, or increasing their use of tillage.” Pesticidal responses to these resistant weeds include toxic arsenic-based herbicidesxviii and increased use of 2,4-D, the dioxin-laced component of the Vietnam War defoliant, Agent Orange. Many farmers afflicted with GR horseweed have resorted to tillage to remove them, abandoning their no-till regimes and in the process increasing soil erosion. In 2009 in Georgia, half a million acres of cotton were weeded by hand, at a cost of $11 million, to remove noxious, glyphosate-resistant pigweed, increasing per acre weed control costs from $25 to $60-100 per acre. The Midwest is also seriously impacted. Noxious tall waterhemp (Amaranthus tuberculatus) resistant to glyphosate and two to three other classes of herbicides is spreading throughout the Corn Belt. Weed scientists in Illinois warn that it is poised to become an “unmanageable” problem that could soon make it impractical to grow soybeans in some Midwestern fields.

The replacement of conventional alfalfa with Roundup Ready alfalfa in rotations already dominated by Roundup Ready corn (70% of national acreage) and RR soybeans (93% of national acreage) would sharply increase glyphosate selection pressure and spur glyphosate-resistant weeds to evolve still more rapidly, as even supporters of RR alfalfa concede, exacerbating the many harms noted above. And to what end? RR alfalfa provides very little countervailing benefit, because alfalfa is a crop that simply does not require weed-killing chemicals. It grows vigorously in dense stands that crowd out weeds, and regular mowing effectively controls those that do emerge. This explains why just 7% of alfalfa hay acres in the U.S. are treated with any herbicide at all, and why USDA projects that substantial adoption of herbicide-promoting RR alfalfa would increase herbicide use by up to 23 million lbs. per year.

Or, 23 million reasons why the manufacturer of Roundup is cheering today.

Yes, we know that the introduction of GMO crops can result in greater and more cost-efficient crop yields, which translates into lower feed costs to ranchers and lower beef prices at the supermarket. But what in the world has ever been intrinsically desirable about this? Artificially low beef prices---that is to say, the cost of GMO-fed livestock versus the cost of their organically-fed counterparts---stimulate overconsumption; Americans stuff themselves with more than 60 pounds of the stuff per year (only Argentines consume more per capita), with accompanying diet-related illnesses and healthcare costs stretching into the billions of dollars annually:

Eating red meat increases the chances of dying prematurely, according to the first large study to examine whether regularly eating beef or pork increases mortality.

The study of more than 500,000 middle-aged and elderly Americans found that those who consumed about four ounces of red meat a day (the equivalent of about a small hamburger) were more than 30 percent more likely to die during the 10 years they were followed, mostly from heart disease and cancer. Sausage, cold cuts and other processed meats also increased the risk.

Previous research had found a link between red meat and an increased risk of heart disease and cancer, particularly colorectal cancer, but the new study is the first large examination of the relationship between eating meat and overall risk of death, and is by far the most detailed.

"The bottom line is we found an association between red meat and processed meat and an increased risk of mortality," said Rashmi Sinha of the National Cancer Institute, who led the study published yesterday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

There's also the the myriad of disastrous environmental impacts of industrial beef production beyond whatever happens when you inject 23 million pounds of Roundup into our topsoil each year, but that's the subject of another post. Oh, and let's not forget the absurdly wasteful energy costs required to produce each pound of beef versus other nutrients.

Finally, the USDA's concerns notwithstanding, the higher-yield, lower-cost economics of biotech have tended to discourage more costly traditional (i.e., organic) farming methods while encouraging the establishment of less biologically-diverse monocultures nearly everywhere GMO crop seeds have been introduced---often, with calamitous consequences. (For the record, I consume beef, too. It's just not my primary source of proteins.)

If Michelle Obama really wants us all to eat healthier and live longer, she really needs to have a little chat with Secretary Vilsack---and perhaps with her husband, too.

---Vitelius

The Most Anti-Business President Since Hitler

There are people who believe passionately in basic human rights, and there are other people who don't. Guess which group our President is going to hold a high-profile meeting with next week?

Yep, you guessed it.

---Vitelius

Your Tax Dollars at Work

Yes, I know our wise leaders in Washington labored mightily against the forces of global capital to pass the Dodd-Frank bill, and there are some good provisions contained within it. But on a deeper systemic level, they still haven't fixed a goddamn thing:

Goldman Sachs collected $2.9 billion from the American International Group as payout on a speculative trade it placed for the benefit of its own account, receiving the bulk of those funds after AIG received an enormous taxpayer rescue, according to the final report of an investigative panel appointed by Congress.

The fact that a significant slice of the proceeds secured by Goldman through the AIG bailout landed in its own account--as opposed to those of its clients or business partners-- has not been previously disclosed. These details about the workings of the controversial AIG bailout, which eventually swelled to $182 billion, are among the more eye-catching revelations in the report to be released Thursday by the bipartisan Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission.

The details underscore the degree to which Goldman--the most profitable securities firm in Wall Street history--benefited directly from the massive emergency bailout of the nation's financial system, a deal crafted on the watch of then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who had previously headed the bank.

"If these allegations are correct, it appears to have been a direct transfer of wealth from the Treasury to Goldman's shareholders," said Joshua Rosner, a bond analyst and managing director at independent research consultancy Graham Fisher & Co., after he was read the relevant section of the report. "The AIG counterparty bailout, which was spun as necessary to protect the public, seems to have protected the institution at the expense of the public."

Translation: It used to be your money, and now it belongs to Goldman. They didn't really earn it, they just made a bet, and claimed it as their winnings.

There used to be a time when such behavior would have been considered a form of embezzlement, but I guess we've long passed the time when people in positions of power in this country can be held accountable for virtually anything they do, save receiving sproadic blowjobs from interns.

---Vitelius