Deciders: Nancy Pelosi & House Democrats

The recent Dredd Blog post "Obama: The Republican Candidate in 2012?" will seem less far fetched today after President Obama caved in to rich republicans and agreed to tax extensions for two years for the daddy warbucks 2% over us.

What everyone seems to be forgetting at the moment is that the House of Representatives is still controlled by the democrats.

The House is still led by Nancy Pelosi, and thus, the House members are the deciders as to whether to give the tax cuts to the rich or not to.

In fact, they have already voted against it, voting instead to extend only the tax cuts for those making less than $250G a year.

So Obama may call it "bi-partisan", but since the House Democrats aren't part of that "bi", he must be calling the Senate Republicans & the House Republicans a "bi-partisan" group.

More than that, the democrats who lost their seats will cast a vote on whether or not to continue to lower the taxes of the rich, and they have nothing to loose.

They may have a little pay back for Mr. Obama in mind.

That is as it should be, since he seems to be going masochistic and needs to get it from both sides one would guess.

Sometimes the politicians are blown off course by their own bloviating so they forget their civics 101, forget that the congress is bi-cameral, and forget that budget bills must originate in the House of Representatives according to our Constitution (last time I checked anyway).

Thus, the President is dissing the House of Representatives, and specifically those of "his own party", by doing the bidding of the Republicans.

Call your representatives and tell them to shut down Obama's Stockholm Syndrome suffering with some good old fashioned House medicine.

Yes we should.

Cancun: "More Than Previously Thought"

I read and hear the phrase everywhere all the time.

It has now been applied to a vast area of the U.S.A., the interior of Alaska, which is about the size of the central plains of the lower 48 states - a huge area.

The phrase I am talking about is "more than previously thought".

The phrase must echo off the walls down in Cancun, Mexico, where national environmentalists are getting together again to try to agree not to destroy civilization.

Cancun is near the area where, about 65 million years ago, an asteroid impact destroyed 90% of land animals, created a 120 mi. wide crater, and spread the K-T extinction layer materials all around the globe.

"The phrase" has now applied to Alaska again, a phrase that is heard more and more in this epoch of criminal insanity, and heard probably more that any other phrase in climate science:

Climate change is causing wildfires to burn more fiercely, pumping more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than previously thought, according to a new study to be published in Nature Geoscience this week.

This is the first study to reveal that fires in the Alaskan interior -- an area spanning 18.5 million hectares -- have become more severe in the past 10 years, and have released much more carbon into the atmosphere than was stored by the region's forests over the same period.

...

"These findings are worrisome because about half the world's soil carbon is locked in northern permafrost and peatland soils. This is carbon that has accumulated in ecosystems a little bit at a time for thousands of years, but is being released very rapidly through increased burning."

(Science Daily). It is like the old war spending propaganda, or the Bush II pharmaceutical law calculations, in that "it will cost this much" sooner than later becomes "it will cost more than previously thought".

After hearing or reading it about a thousand times one comes to the conclusion that scientists are trying to understate the case of global warming & global climate change, so the herd does not stampede.

One of the reasons is that the national lizard brain gets all mavericky and rogue when reality implicates and stimulates the reptilian fear of death mechanism:

Put simply, people's beliefs about reality provide a buffer against the anxiety that results from living in a largely uncontrollable, perilous universe, where the only certainty is death.

...

A recent paper by the biologist Janis L Dickinson, published in the journal Ecology and Society, proposes that constant news and discussion about global warming makes it difficult for people to repress thoughts of death, and that they might respond to the terrifying prospect of climate breakdown in ways that strengthen their character armour but diminish our chances of survival. There is already experimental evidence suggesting that some people respond to reminders of death by increasing consumption. Dickinson proposes that growing evidence of climate change might boost this tendency, as well as raising antagonism towards scientists and environmentalists. Our message, after all, presents a lethal threat to the central immortality project of Western society: perpetual economic growth, supported by an ideology of entitlement and exceptionalism.

(Convergence - Fear of Death Syndrome, emphasis added). Publishers are very aware of the lizard brain mechanisms which trigger mobs with pitch forks and other ugly behavior.

That is probably why the article about fires in the interior of Alaska ends with a comment from the editor:

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Science Daily or its staff.

(ibid). The chicken little club of the world has subconsciously formed the united states of fear, fed voraciously by the fear mongers in the united states of war, who have a stronger lizard brain mechanism than the fear of death: denial.

Obama: The Republican Candidate in 2012?

If one reads the scuttlebutt around the tubeosphere, one may just wonder why Obama just doesn't switch parties and get it over with.

The folks are upset with the McFly Act, Transvestite State Secrets in place of Transparency, Tea Bagging Glory in place of Dance With The One Who Brung Yuh, and the like.

Lately the punditosphere has become more and more vocal about the cross dressing, and I ain't talking about Thanksgiving:

... hope for a surprisingly bipartisan conclusion to the lame duck Congress.


My questions are: What planet do he and they think they are on ...

(Fineman). Howard, we answered that question recently in the post On The Origin of MOMCOM.

An exasperated reporter recently ranted:

Within roughly 24 hours, President Obama preemptively capitulated to the Republicans and proposed an unabridged GOP idea -- freezing federal worker salaries, then, almost as if on cue, the Senate Republicans put their unflinching childish obstructionism in writing and pledged to block everything unless the president extends the deficit-ballooning Bush tax rates. And in that mix, the Republicans blocked extensions of unemployment benefits. Twice.

The upshot? The president looks extraordinarily weak. Weaker than at any other time in his presidency. It probably didn't help that he was literally beaten and bloodied when he announced the pay freeze, due to his weekend basketball fracas.

Of course the intention isn't to appear weak. The intention is to appear magnanimous.

(Cesca). In a similar vein there were very rich comments from one who does not like mince meat:

THOSE desperate to decipher the baffling Obama presidency could do worse than consult an article titled “Understanding Stockholm Syndrome”... This dynamic was acted out — yet again — in President Obama’s latest and perhaps most humiliating attempt to placate his Republican captors ...

(Rich). Republican rite wingers are calling him a close friend, while some of them are growing a goatee.

Like Alice said, "things are getting curiouser and curiouser".

Open Thread

Weekend open thread ...

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Some learn to "see" sooner than others:

Hey, hey, Woody Guthrie, I wrote you a song
’Bout a funny ol’ world that’s a-comin’ along
Seems sick an’ it’s hungry, it’s tired an’ it’s torn
It looks like it’s a-dyin’ an’ it’s hardly been born

("Song To Woody", Bob Dylan, 1962).

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Worldwide Oil Availability Has Peaked - EU Energy Chief

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The New Zealand Parliament released a study entitled "The Next Oil Shock?":

The US Department of Energy (DoE) calls oil “the lifeblood of modern civilisation”. Around 86 million barrels (13.7 billion litres) are consumed each day. Oil supplies 37 percent of the world’s energy demand, including 40 percent of New Zealand’s energy demand. It powers nearly all of the world’s transportation, without which production and trade would grind to a halt. Studies
have shown that GDP growth is very strongly related to increased use of oil.

When the price of oil increases, the cost of nearly all economic activity rises. This often induces recessions. High oil prices have been associated with three major periods of economic recession in the past 40 years, including the lead-up to the recent global economic crisis.

(NZ Report, PDF, emphasis added). Now I ask you, if a person is bleeding, knowing there is no more blood of her blood type to replace it, what can we say of her if she makes the cut larger on purpose?

Why are warlords of civilization bringing about the demise of current civilization with impunity?

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Ron Paul calls for more WikiLeaks:

"What we need is more WikiLeaks about the Federal Reserve," he said. "Can you imagine what it'd be like if we had every conversation in the last 10 years with our Federal Reserve people, the Federal Reserve chairman, with all the central bankers of the world and every agreement or quid-pro-quo they have? It would be massive. People would be so outraged."

Paul, a longtime critic of the US Federal Reserve, is the incoming chairman of a House subcommittee on monetary policy. His most recent book, titled "End the Fed," takes aim at central banks the world over, blaming fiat money systems and fractional reserve banking for the world's increasingly volatile economies.

“In a free society we're supposed to know the truth,” Paul insisted. “In a society where truth becomes treason, then we're in big trouble. And now, people who are revealing the truth are getting into trouble for it.

(Raw Story).

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The Newt's Gang Grinch That Stole Xmas

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Banker Jekyll Will Hyde Your Money - 7

In this series we have been dealing with the things the public does not know about the way the banksters have conducted themselves in closed, smoky back rooms where "the real deals are made".

The previous episode is here, the basic subject is how the banks, especially the Fed, do not want us to know what they do in the back rooms, and how Bloomberg sued the Fed to get the information under the Freedom of Information Act.

But the inquiry also goes into MERS, foreclosure madness, toxic assets, and a few other issues.

We now find that the Fed was shipping hundreds of billions of dollars out of the country to foreign nations:

... we now know the Fed also acted in a secondary bail out capacity, providing over $350 billion in short term funding exclusively to 35 foreign banks, of which the biggest beneficiaries were UBS, Dexia and BNP. Since the funding provided was in the form of ultra-short maturity commercial paper it was essentially equivalent to cash funding. In other words, between October 27, 2008 and August 6, 2009, the Fed spent $350 billion in taxpayer funds to save 35 foreign banks.

(Meet The 35 Foreign Banks, emphasis added). The Federal Reserve website indicates there are a few lawsuits over all of this:

Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee, Inc., v. Board of Governors, No. 09-2436 (D. District of Columbia, filed December 30, 2009), is a Freedom of Information Act case.

Judicial Watch, Inc. v. Board of Governors, No. 09-2138 (D. District of Columbia, filed November 13, 2009), is a Freedom of Information Act case.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington v. Board of Governors, No. 09-2113 (D. District of Columbia, filed November 10, 2009), is a Freedom of Information Act case.

McKinley v. Board of Governors, No. 09-1263 (D. District of Columbia, filed July 8, 2009), is a Freedom of Information Act case.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington v. Board of Governors, No. 09-663 (D. District of Columbia, filed April 16, 2009), was a Freedom of Information Act case. On November 19, 2009, the district court granted the Board's motion for summary judgment.

The New York Times Company v. Board of Governors, No. 09-2645 (S.D. New York, filed March 23, 2009), was a Freedom of Information Act case. The court dismissed the case on the parties' motion on November 30, 2009.

Freedom Watch, Inc., v. Board of Governors, No. 09-331 (D. District of Columbia, filed February 19, 2009), was a Freedom of Information Act case. The district court granted the Board's motion to dismiss the action on August 12, 2009.

Fox News Network v. Board of Governors, No. 09-272 (S.D. New York, filed January 13, 2009), is a Freedom of Information Act case. On July 30, 2009, the district court granted the Board's motion for summary judgment (639 F. Supp. 2d 84). The plaintiff's appeal to the Second Circuit (09-3795, filed September 11, 2009) is pending.

Murray v. Board of Governors, No. 08-cv-15147 (E.D. Michigan, filed December 15, 2008), is a challenge to the constitutionality of federal expenditures relating to American International Group (AIG).

Bumgarner v. Paulson, Bernanke, et al., No. 08-cv-5245 (D. New Jersey, amended complaint filed November 21, 2008), was a challenge to the implementation of the Economic Emergency Stabilization Act of 2008. On August 10, 2009, the district court dismissed the action.

Bloomberg, L.P. v. Board of Governors, No. 08-cv-9595 (S.D. New York, filed November 7, 2008), is a Freedom of Information Act case. On August 4, 2009, the district court granted the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment (649 F. Supp. 2d 262). The Board's appeal to the Second Circuit (09-4083, filed October 1, 2009) is pending.

Schulz v. United States Federal Reserve System, No. 1:08-cv-991 (N.D. New York, filed September 18, 2008), is an action relating to the Federal Reserve's loan to American International Group. On September 25, 2008, the district court denied plaintiff's request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction. On September 30, 2008, the plaintiff appealed the district court's order to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (No. 08-4810).

(Federal Reserve). So it isn't just Dredd Blog who has been a bit suspicious about some of these practices.

On The Origin of MOMCOM

This post is a new type of literature, science friction, which is akin to science fiction.

Science fiction is usually based on a healthy amount of truth, mixed in with an abundant supply of imagination, extrapolation, humor, and the like, so science friction will follow suit.

The Dredd Blog System has mused about some solidly incredible mysteries being discovered in the cosmos around us, such as The Great Hexagon, the virgin mother lizard which does not copulate but instead replicates, and The Cosmic Bubble.

Discussing the latter, the story of The Origin of MOMCOM (focusing on the economist sub-class of the MOMCOM realm) began:

My theory is that the bubble is a very ancient runaway economic system developed by the ancestors of our current bankster species, before some of them migrated to our planet.

They are constantly talking about bubbles, constantly making them, constantly trying to keep them from popping by putting more and more "bubble stuff" into them.

(Economists - Aliens From Cygnus?). When the ancestors of MOMCOM first arrived in our solar system, they settled on the planet Mulantis, which once existed between Mars and Jupiter, but they destroyed it, then had to move on.

Once most of the debris from the explosive destruction of Mulantis had bombarded the planets in our solar system, abundantly cratering them and their moons, then had settled down, the ancestors of MOMCOM returned to this solar system and settled in on the Earth.

Once in awhile debris (for example: asteroids, comets, the renegrade groups orbiting Jupiter and Saturn), that had been thrown far and wide into out solar system when Mulantis exploded, would cause great destruction on the Earth, but eventually it settled down to the current phase of relatively few dangerous chunks of Mulantis still flying around out there.

Some of the microbes from Cygnus and Mulantis survived through all of that destruction (as did the ancestors of MOMCOM who were once human-like, by morphing into beings that do not have corporeal bodies) but who are now only able to influence species that still have corporeal bodies.

Some of that ancestor influence is seen by reading some of the scientific literature which teaches that humans must morph into machines, or religious literature which teaches that humans must morph into beings without corporeal bodies.

Religionists have a theory for the origin of the toxins of power that talk about evil beings without corporeal bodies, while scientists look for quantum elements in the mind somewhere.

We have wondered about the extent of the toxins of power, and how they replicate.

Think about it, why is our civilization headed for destruction by its very way of life, why is a portion of our civilization criminally insane in that sense?

MOMCOM seems so alien to this planet.

The ancestors of MOMCOM must have created the toxins of power long ago when malfunctions occurred during their morph, and those toxins still animate MOMCOM today.

That's the "troof of troofiness" nation.

The Keystone Complex To The Rescue - 6

Dredd Blog has been saying that officials of the Obama Admin. are members in good standing of "The Circle W Cowboys".

The propaganda media outlets, like Morning Joe on MSNBC, a brand of the toothpaste empire, robber baron corporation GE, nevertheless portray Obama as a far left socialist (out in the open anyway).

Meanwhile, hard right congressmen begin to grow goatees and call Obama their "close friend".

This is the realm of Jabber The Whut without a doubt.

Somebody is right, because now we find out that there was a deal not to prosecute any Bush II regime criminals because, well just because:

In its first months in office, the Obama administration sought to protect Bush administration officials facing criminal investigation overseas for their involvement in establishing policies the that governed interrogations of detained terrorist suspects. A "confidential" April 17, 2009, cable sent from the US embassy in Madrid to the State Department—one of the 251,287 cables obtained by WikiLeaks — details how the Obama administration, working with Republicans, leaned on Spain to derail this potential prosecution.

The previous month, a Spanish human rights group called the Association for the Dignity of Spanish Prisoners had requested that Spain's National Court indict six former Bush officials for, as the cable describes it, "creating a legal framework that allegedly permitted torture." The six were former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales; David Addington, former chief of staff and legal adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney; William Haynes, the Pentagon's former general counsel; Douglas Feith, former undersecretary of defense for policy; Jay Bybee, former head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel; and John Yoo, a former official in the Office of Legal Counsel. The human rights group contended that Spain had a duty to open an investigation under the nation's "universal jurisdiction" law, which permits its legal system to prosecute overseas human rights crimes involving Spanish citizens and residents. Five Guantanamo detainees, the group maintained, fit that criteria.

(Too Big To Jail). The Circle W Cowboys always get to the same place, because they all use The W Compass to do their police work:

When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that
In Paterson that’s just the way things go
If you’re [Barak] you might as well not show up on the street
’Less you wanna draw the heat

(Hurricane, Bob Dylan). We have a new police force in town folks who have had a talk with Mr. Obama, and the force is out to plunder "purtek your money".

Due Process Of Law Is A State Secret - 2

In the previous post in this series, and in other posts, we have noticed that the graphs are astoundingly clear.

The increase of the obsession the government has for "secrecy" parallels: a) the increase in government wrongs here at home and around the world, b) the increase in war, c) the increase in cold heartedness, d) the increase in income for the wealthy 2% who have most of the wealth, e) the increase in poverty, f) the decline of the middle class, and g) the decline in sanity.

The solution the politicians have is to blame "it" on other politicians, try to make it worse so as to win elections, and then lie about all of that.

The paranoia the government spouts infects the rest of us, so there are indications that our empire has passed the peak of sanity.

As it turns out now, Country Joe & The Fish had a lyric that probably sums this attitude up:

"Well there ain't no time to wonder why,
Whoopee! we're all gonna die."

(Variations On A Theme). Now we head into the winter with a chill on the congress, a chill on those whose unemployment benefits are going away, and a chill on the wealthy who want a big fat tax cut for xmas.

The Obama Moratorium On Federal Pay

At first blush in a time of discontent concerning government in general, it may seem like a win win to stop raising the salaries of federal government civil servants, who earn more than their counter parts in the private sector.

But it becomes clear that more is needed than angry bias when it comes to messing with anyone's livelihood, including federal employees, when we consider that the average of $61,051 and $123,049 is $92,050.

So if we spout off about $92,050 it makes folks getting $61,051 look a bit more well oiled than they are, and it makes those getting $123,049 less well off than they actually are.

So, why not just do a pro rata freeze on the pay increases of those taking home more than the national median income, and leave those below the national median alone?

They are members of the middle class after all:

At a time when workers' pay and benefits have stagnated, federal employees' average compensation has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

Federal workers have been awarded bigger average pay and benefit increases than private employees for nine years in a row. The compensation gap between federal and private workers has doubled in the past decade.

Federal civil servants earned average pay and benefits of $123,049 in 2009 while private workers made $61,051 in total compensation, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The data are the latest available.

(USA Today). Those collecting Social Security Insurance, who are primarily those below the median income level, have already had their benefits frozen.

The corporations and the banksters are raking it in like the bandits they are.

Meanwhile, today unemployment benefits for a couple of million Americans out of work stop, yes they lose all unemployment benefits just before the holidays.

This as the republicans cry out for tax cuts for the 2% million-dollar-a-year income folks who Bush II called "my base".