Posts filed under ‘Outrage Overload’
The ECB’s Klaus Masuch Can’t Say Why We the People are Bailing Out the Banks
Here is some truly amazing video. This is Irish journalist Vincent Browne (this is what real journalism looks like) confronting Klaus Masuch of the European Central Bank as to why the Irish people are bailing out the banks.
Browne asks: “You people are intervening into this society, causing huge damage by requiring us to make payments, not for the benefit of anybody in Ireland, but for the benefit of European financial institutions. Now, could you explain why the Irish people are inflicted with this burden?” Masuch’s answer? It’s breathtaking. At first there is silence, then he spews out 60 seconds of pure bullshit and then he literally fumbles around and can’t or won’t respond, claiming his line of bullshit was an answer.
Everyone in the world should see this because everyone in the world is paying for what the banks did.
It’s jaw-dropping; the most amazing thing I’ve seen in a long time. And oh to have more journalists like Vincent Browne.
(Via.)
The “Consumer Financial Protection Bureau” Caves to the Corporatocracy
Once again, a cleverly named government agency — the “Consumer Financial Protection Bureau” (supposedly created to protect consumers) — caves to the corporatocracy:
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has decided not to challenge credit card companies on introductory fees. Credit card companies had been more aggressive in charging fees to users before they use a credit card, ever since new regulations made it so they could no longer charge more than 25 percent of the total credit limit in standard fees.
The CFPB originally proposed regulations to eliminate the introductory fees, but on Thursday relented and decided not to pursue the matter.
This agency is a joke.
I’m so glad it’s Friday.
Obama Acting Like a Republican Homophobe
This is just so, so wrong it’s inexcusable that Obama refuses to stop it:
President Obama disappointed and vexed gay supporters on Wednesday with his decision, conveyed to activists by a senior adviser, not to sign an executive order banning discrimination by employers with federal contracts.
The executive order, which activists said had support from the Labor and Justice Departments, would have applied to gay, bisexual and transgender people working for or seeking employment from federal contractors. Current law does not protect against discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, and legislation to do so, which Mr. Obama endorses, lacks sufficient votes in Congress.
Employers who get “federal contracts” are employers who get our tax dollars via those federal contracts. An employer who gets so much as a dime of our tax dollars should not be permitted to discriminate against taxpaying American. Period.
I’m disgusted with Obama (Mr. Constitutional Lawyer) for not wiping this off the books once and for all. If doing away with this isn’t a core democratic (and Democratic) value, I don’t know what is.
Berkeley Police Chief Michael Meehan Has No Business Being a “Law Enforcement Officer”
The fact that the Berkeley Police Chief Michael Meehan would even think — even think — to do this is reason, imho, for his removal. Outrageous:
Minutes after reading a late-night news story online about him that he perceived to be inaccurate, Berkeley Police Chief Michael Meehan ordered a sergeant to a reporter’s home insisting on changes, a move First Amendment experts said reeked of intimidation and attempted censorship.
Meehans’s actions were “despicable, totally despicable,” said Jim Ewert, general counsel of the California Newspaper Publisher’s Association. “It’s the most intimidating type of (censorship) possible because the person trying to exercise it carries a gun.”
Bay Area News Group reporter Doug Oakley said he was shaken by the 12:45 a.m. Friday knock on the door of his Berkeley home. He said at first he and his wife thought something was drastically wrong or perhaps that a relative had died.
Meehan apologized Friday.
“I would say it was an overzealous attempt to make sure that accurate information is put out,” Meehan said. “I could have done better.” Meehan said he didn’t think Oakley would be upset or intimidated because the police sergeant, Mary Kusmiss, regularly deals with the media.
“I did not mean to upset (Oakley) or his family last night; it was late, (I was) tired, too. I don’t dispute that it could be perceived badly,” he said.
BS excuses, excuses, excuses. There’s no excuse for this kind of thinking or this kind of behavior. None. Meehan violated one of the most revered American laws and traditions — that of freedom of the press. Insofar as he obviously doesn’t fundamentally understand and respect that tenet, he has no business being a “law enforcement officer.”
Arizona’s New “Let Women Die” Bill Goes WAY TOO FAR! — Every Woman Should Read This –
I have a category called “Outrage Overload” that I don’t use very often but this post is going in it, IN SPADES! This is unbelievable. That anyone would THINK to do this sets my hair on fire:
It’s called a “wrongful birth” bill and it’s all about preventing women from having an abortion, even if it kills them. The Arizona Senate passed a bill this week that gives doctors a free pass to not inform pregnant women of prenatal problems because such information could lead to an abortion.
According to the Arizona Capitol Times, “the bill’s sponsor is Republican Nancy Barto of Phoenix. She says allowing the medical malpractice lawsuits endorses the idea that if a child is born with a disability, someone is to blame.” So Republicans are banning lawsuits against doctors who keep information from pregnant women so as to prevent them from choosing to have an abortion.
This is so wrong on so many levels. For one, there will be absolutely no trust between pregnant women and their doctors in Arizona if this is signed into law. And two, if I’m pregnant and I live in Arizona and my doctor discovers that the fetus I’m carrying will be a vegetable, and he knows I would abort if I knew that, he has the right not to tell me. But is the state going to pay for the care of the kid after he’s born, and over the course of his lifetime, or is that up to me?
OOOH, this is awful. What an incredible infringement on a woman’s relationship with her doctor and on her ability to control her own life.
American Exceptionalism is a Thing of the Past
On Monday I posted about how the good ol’ USA! USA! USA! is number one…number one in teen pregnancies that is.
Today we have more sad evidence that the idea of American exceptionalism is something we should probably put on a shelf somewhere until we get our act together.
This is not for the faint of heart.
First (bear with me), this is the mission statement of Equality Trust:
Compelling new evidence shows that large income inequalities within society damage the social and the quality of life for everyone. The Equality Trust campaigns to gain the widest public and political understanding of the harm caused by inequality.
The Equality Trust has released 10 graphs that reflect specific types on income inequality in the developed nations, but the folks over at The Society Pages.org have consolidated the graphs into an easier-to-read format.
That said you can view the graphs at either sight. They all show — all of them – that due to the dramatic income inequality in the United States (put simply, the 99% versus the 1%), the US leads the pack amongst the developed world in these areas:
Societies with more income inequality have higher infant death rates than other societies
Societies with more income inequality have higher rates of mental illness than other societies
Societies with more income inequality have a higher incidence of drug use than other societies
Societies with more income inequality have a higher high school drop out rate than other societies
Societies with more income inequality imprison a larger proportion of their population than other societies
Societies with more income inequality have a higher rate of obesity than other societies
Individuals in societies with more income inequality are less likely to be in a different class of than [sic] their parents compared to other societies
Societies with more income inequality have higher rates of homicide than other societies
Societies with more income inequality give less in foreign aid than other societies
Children in societies with more income inequality do less well than children in other societies
Again, check out the graphs. We are in a world of hurt folks.
Rand Paul’s Red Hot Hypocrisy
Not making this up:
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), son of White House hopeful Ron Paul, was detained by the TSA Monday after refusing a pat-down, his dad tweeted Monday.
The father-son pair, both renegade libertarians within their party, are harsh critics of TSA searches they brand intrusive, and have called for the agency’s elimination.
“My son @SenRandPaul being detained by TSA for refusing full body pat-down after anomaly in body scanner in Nashville. More details coming,” the Texas Republican congressman wrote.
[...]
The younger politician was heading to Washington to address the March for Life, a massive Pro-Life [anti-choice] rally marking Sunday’s 38th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
Grover Norquist (R) Hopes to Crush the Renewable Energy Movement
Here’s a heads up regarding Grover Norquist’s new project. (Was I asleep when he was elected president of everything?)
Rethink Renewable Energy Mandates
Sorry for the lack of a snipet. I’ve had it up to here with dictators today.
Read his craziness at the link above. He thinks building wind turbines and installing solar energy panels on homes across the country will kill jobs.
Ugh. There are no words…
Heartbreak in Egypt
I remember watching the demonstrations in Cairo’s Tahrir Square back in January and February — and seeing Hosni Mubarack crawl down from power — and feeling so proud of the people there.
Now it looks like it may all have been for naught.
This is the Egyptian army beating civilians yesterday:
Members of the army, once beloved by Egypt’s activists for standing by their side during the revolution in February, have sent hundreds of men and women to the hospital over the last 48 hours and have killed at least 10, some with live ammunition fired into crowds.
(Video via.)
More here, including an up-close photo of a woman in the video:
For these men to pull her black abaya above her head and expose her midriff and chest is, for Egypt, a profound and sexually charged humiliation. And there is a certain awful irony of using that abaya, a symbol of modesty and piety, to cover her face and drag her on the street that, though probably not intentional, will not be lost on Egyptian eyes.
[...]
The Egyptian military, the strongest and most powerful institution in the country and perhaps the Arab world, has taken a dramatic and dark turn since winning power earlier this year.
[...]
As protests against the military have grown, the generals have abandoned their earlier pledges to support the people and refrain from violence against civilians. The SCAF — the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, a panel of top military leaders — increasingly looks like Egypt’s new dictator.
FYI, the United States supports the Egyptian “military” to the tune of $2 billion annually:
The United States has given Egypt an average of $2 billion annually since 1979, much of it military aid, according to the Congressional Research Service. The combined total makes Egypt the second largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel.
Slap Your Face Quotes from the Durban Climate Change Conference
I haven’t put up any posts about the climate change conference that took place over the last two weeks in Durban, South Africa because because, well, because of a general sense of outrage overload and a feeling that nothing would get done there.
I’ve been peeking in on it and now though and now that the conference has ended, I’m reading some summaries that pretty much confirm what I feared. Like this one from CommonDreams. (This is the second half of an article you can read in its entirety at the link above.)
Chris Huhne hailed the conclusion of the talks as “a triumph of European co-operation”.
I’m thinking we need worldwide cooperation, not just European cooperation.
“We have taken a significant step forward. This will give business confidence and stop us locking in a whole generation of high-carbon technology,” he said.
I’m sick beyond belief of thinking about giving “business confidence.” How about we give the planet and We the People confidence once and for all already?
But Martin Khor, director of the intergovernmental South Center in Geneva, said poor countries would be obliged to cut emissions proportionally more than the rich. “It’s like the starving will be made to give up half their small amount of food but the rich just a bit,” he said.
The powerful countries shit on the little ones.
Green groups said the ambition shown by countries to reduce emissions was paltry. “Negotiators have sent a clear message to the world’s hungry: let them eat carbon,” said Celine Charveriat, director of campaigns and advocacy for Oxfam.
When will the rich and powerful countries come to grips with the fact that we’re all in this together?
“Governments must immediately turn their attention to raising the ambition of their emissions cuts targets and filling the Green Climate Fund. Unless countries ratchet up their emissions cuts urgently we could still be in store for a 10-year timeout on the action we need to stay under two degrees [of temperature increase].”
Greenpeace International director Kumi Naidoo said: “The chance of averting catastrophic climate change is slipping through our hands with every passing year that nations fail to agree on a rescue plan for the planet.”
“This will force governments to admit their current pledges to cut emissions are not enough to achieve 2C rise and will have to be strengthened,” said Michael Jacobs, of the Grantham climate research institute of climate change.
Nnimmo Bassey, chair of Friends of the Earth International, said: “Delaying real action till 2020 is a crime of global proportions.
“This means the world is on track to a 4C temperature rise, a death sentence for Africa, small island states and the poor and vulnerable worldwide. The richest 1% of the world have decided that it is acceptable to sacrifice the 99%.“
I have friends and neighbors who have babies. Babies as in cherubic 7-week-olds and enthusiastic 2-year-olds. When I look at them I wonder what kind of world they will live in when they’re 30 or 40 or 60. I think it will be awful.
Gov. Sam Brownbeck (R-What’s the Matter With Kansas?) is Against Free Speech
Is freedom of speech dead in Kansas? I ask because Governor Sam Brownback (R) sicked the authorities on a high school girl who sent a tweet he didn’t like. Yes, unfortunately, you did read that right:
A Kansas teenager got in some trouble with her school for comments she posted on her Twitter account — in which she claimed to have trashed Gov. Sam Brownback (R) to his face during a field trip.
Emma Sullivan, an 18-year old high school senior, was at an event in Topeka this past Monday for Kansas Youth in Government, which was addressed by Brownback. During the event, Sullivan posted to her Twitter account:
Just made mean comments at gov brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalotBut as it turns out, Brownback’s office watches Twitter for comments about him. Brownback spokeswoman Sherriene Jones-Sontag told the event organizers about the comment, “so that they were aware what their students were saying in regards to the governor’s appearance,” the Wichita Eagle reports, also adding: “We monitor social media so we can see what Kansans are thinking and saying about the governor and his policies.”
Brownback’s office flagged the tweet to the event organizers, who in turn passed the complaint on to Sullivan’s school. This got her called to the principal’s office.
Is Brownback so insecure he’s willing to trample a high school senior’s First Amendment rights in order to intimidate people into only saying nice things about him? Apparently so.
CALM DOWN AMERICA!
Think back to when you were 12-years-old and imagine (or maybe you don’t have to imagine) that you kissed a boy or girl on the school playground. A teacher saw you, reported the incident to the assistant principal and the assistant principal called the Department of Children and Families and then she called the f**king sheriff’s department because she saw shades of a possible “sex crime!”
Two 12-year-olds faced a police investigation for a sex crime after being caught kissing at school.
[...]
The incident took place at Orange River Elementary School in Fort Myers, Florida.
According to local reports two girls who had a crush on a boy were talking about which of them liked him the most.
One of the girls approached the boy and briefly kissed him.
A teacher on duty noticed the kiss and reported it to the assistant principal Margaret Ann Haring.
She said it was a ‘possible sex crime’ and called social workers at the Florida Department of Children and Families [DCF].
They told her to report the matter to the Lee County Sheriff’s office who responded by sending deputies to the school.
Fortunately, the Sheriff’s Department didn’t take any action but there is “ongoing involvement with the DCF.”
For God’s sake America, calm the hell down!
NYC “Foiled Terror Plot” — The Terrifying Evidence
Here is the terrifying, terrifying, evidence Michael Bloomberg displayed tonight when he announced he and his police department “foiled” a “terror plot:”
Run for your life!
Outrage Overload Links
There are many days when I come across articles or bits of info that I think are worth posting but I just don’t have the energy because of, well, pure and simple: outrage overload. So I guess my new thing is going to be, at the end of such a day, to put up a post and let you all decide what you think is important; what you want to take a look at.
So, here are my outrage overload links for today:
●●● Where governments get their surveillance technology (I’m thinking boycotts here).
●●● A slide show: Suppressing Nonviolent Dissent — An anthology of police brutality at encampments across America. Check out this tank used by police in Tampa:
What happened to “protect and serve?”
●●● Journalist Suspended from National Press Club for Aggressive Questioning of Saudi Royal. That should read: Journalist suspended for being a real journalist and for not kissing Saudi royal’s ass.
●●● Michelle Obama Booed at NASCAR Race. I’m waiting for every single Republican who said we should respect the office of the presidency “during times of war” to scream bloody murder about this. So far? Crickets.
●●● The never-to-be-missed Glenn Greenwald: The Roots of the UC-Davis Pepper Spraying. (Not the best title.) He talks about the right — on paper, as in the Constitution — of American to freedom of speech and a right to assembly but how that is rather quickly being quashed by our authoritarian government:
The genius of this approach is how insidious its effects are: because the rights continue to be offered on paper, the citizenry continues to believe it is free. They believe that they are free to do everything they choose to do, because they have been “persuaded” — through fear and intimidation — to passively accept the status quo. As Rosa Luxemburg so perfectly put it: “Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.” Someone who sits at home and never protests or effectively challenges power factions will not realize that their rights of speech and assembly have been effectively eroded because they never seek to exercise those rights; it’s only when we see steadfast, courageous resistance from the likes of these UC-Davis students is this erosion of rights manifest.
Pervasive police abuses and intimidation tactics applied to peaceful protesters — pepper-spray, assault rifles, tasers, tear gas and the rest — not only harm their victims but also the relationship of the citizenry to the government and the set of core political rights. Implanting fear of authorities in the heart of the citizenry is a far more effective means of tyranny than overtly denying rights.
●●● Quote of the day: From Greenwald’s piece, immediately above:
Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.
– Rosa Luxemburg.
Wow.
●●● Reminds me of Martin Luther King, Jr’s:
A riot is the language of the unheard.
