Archive | March, 2012

Dennis Kucinich and “wackiness” – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com

10 Mar

So let’s recap the state of mental health in establishment Democratic circles: the President who claims (and exercises) the power to target American citizens for execution-by-CIA in total secrecy and with no charges — as well as those who dutifully follow him — are sane, sober and Serious, meriting great respect. By contrast, one of the very few members of Congress [i.e. Kucinich] who stands up and vehemently objects to this most radical power — “The idea that the United States has the ability to summarily execute a US citizen ought to send chills racing up and down the spines of every person of conscience” — is a total wackjob, meriting patronizing mockery.

Beware the person who challenges Republicrat orthodoxy.

…the real reason anyone with D.C. Seriousness, including many establishment liberals, relished mocking Kucinich is because he dissented from the orthodoxies of the two political parties. That, by definition, makes one wacky and weird, even when — as is true for the Obama assassination powers and so many other bipartisan pieties — the actual wacky and crazy beliefs are those orthodoxies themselves (we’ve seen this repeatedly with those who stray from two-party normalcy). In reality, the actual crazies are those who fit comfortably within that two-party mentality and rarely challenge or deviate from it, while those who are sane, by definition, dissent from it…

via Dennis Kucinich and “wackiness” – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.

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America’s Fossil Fuel Fever | The Nation

10 Mar

The Obama administration is pursuing an energy policy that will just accelerate environmental destruction. Extracting oil and gas from unconventional sources (shale, tar sands, deep sea) is risky and uncertain, degrades the environment directly, and wastes energy and water in the process.

All drilling activity requires energy, which produces GHGs [greenhouse gasses]; producing unconventional oil and gas, however, usually requires far more energy than drilling for conventional fuels and so emits a correspondingly greater amount of GHGs.

Conventional oil and gas supplies are usually carried to the surface by natural forces once a well is drilled, whereas unconventional fuels are too dense to move by themselves (as in the case of tar sands) or are embedded in rock (as in the case of shale oil and gas) and so must be extracted using energy-intensive techniques. Hence, in addition to all the emissions we can expect from the prolongation of the fossil fuel era, we will experience a GHG increment from the growing reliance on unconventional hydrocarbons. Based on this sort of reasoning, the EIA calculates that global emissions of carbon dioxide will rise by 43 percent between 2008 and 2035, jumping from 30.2 billion to 43.2 billion metric tons. Such an increase will erase any hope of averting the apocalyptic consequences of planetary warming.

via America’s Fossil Fuel Fever | The Nation.

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Ohio Agency Says Fracking-Related Activity Caused Earthquakes – NYTimes.com

9 Mar

An Ohio state agency said on Friday there is evidence that the high-pressure injection of fluid underground related to fracking caused a series of Ohio earthquakes culminating in a New Year’s Eve tremor in any area not known for seismic activity.

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources, which overseas the oil and gas industry, said in a report that the state should pass a new law prohibiting drilling at what is called the Precambrian basement rock level (a depth that begins at 9,184 ft) and would require companies to “review existing geologic data” before drilling.

via Ohio Agency Says Fracking-Related Activity Caused Earthquakes – NYTimes.com.

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Americans Elect: Corrupt or Not?

8 Mar

Over at Crooked Timber there’s an interesting discussion shaping up about Americans Elect, a somewhat mysterious effort to use the internet to select a centrist candidate to run in the 2012 Presidential Election. The process is just complicated enough that I’m not going to try to explain it; you can start here on their website to find out for yourself.

The big mystery is that Americans Elect won’t reveal who’s funding them. Some people are OK with that, some are not. Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig is OK with that (FWIW, Lessig is on a Leadership list for AE). His reasoning, which is set forth in some detail at Crooked Timber, is that candidates won’t know any more about contributors than we do, so how could they be corrupted by them?

The problem, however, is that the board of Americans Elect retains the right to veto the ticket selected by the internet process. If they don’t like the result, they’ll over-rule that result though it’s not clear what happens then, though it seems at the point the process just folds. So, it seems rather important to know who’s footing the bills, for its likely that they’re the ones who’ll have to approve the ticket. Rumor has it that much of the money comes from hedge-fund honchos. Continue reading →

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Retired Gens to Obama: No War of Choice With Iran | Military.com

8 Mar

Several former high-ranking military, intelligence and State Department officials took out an ad in the Washington Post today urging President Obama to stand fast against political and lobbying pressure to attack Iran over claims it is trying to develop nuclear weapons….

“There is a national reflex on the conservative part [of the] political spectrum to reach for the military option first and others second,” said retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, commander of the Coalition Military Assistance Training Team in Iraq from 2003 to 2004, when he developed and oversaw the training of the Iraqi military and security forces.

President Obama and others in the administration believe they can stop Iran from pursing a nuclear weapon through economic sanctions.

via Retired Gens to Obama: No War of Choice With Iran | Military.com.

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Runaway Capitalism – Harvard Business Review

7 Mar

Capitalism, as it is practiced in rich countries, has taken two brilliant ideas too far. The first is return on equity (ROE), one way of measuring value creation that has managed to eclipse many other, and broader, ones. The second is competition, which has come to be seen as an end in itself rather than as a tool for promoting growth and innovation.

Both ideas began as effective solutions to a pressing problem—how to allocate resources to produce, as Jeremy Bentham would have it, “the greatest good for the greatest number.” Centuries on, the advanced economies cling tightly to these approaches, but the problem has changed. The mismatch has caused difficulties of such urgency that many people are now declaring capitalism a failure. The whole system has been indicted, not only because of the financial crisis but particularly since that event, as inherently unworkable.

via Runaway Capitalism – Harvard Business Review.

BP vs. Gulf Coast: It’s Not Settled Yet | The Nation

7 Mar

Big Oil has no interest in a trial and has been pushing BP to settle. The 72 million pages of documents and hundreds of witnesses gathered for the trial are likely to reveal damning evidence harmful not only to BP, Halliburton, and Transocean but to every major oil company working in offshore waters today. … the kinds of catastrophic errors that led to the explosions on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, killed eleven men, capsized the rig and created a three-month-long uncontrollable oil and gas spill are not only endemic throughout the entire industry, they also remain largely unaddressed. It is expected that even more damning evidence not previously made public would come out at trial. A settlement deal, however, would likely seek to require that all such evidence be kept from the public….

Evidence presented at trial could also prove damning to the Obama administration. In Black Tide, I document the administration’s failure to adequately hold BP to account for its catastrophic Macondo well operations and the subsequent disaster, as well as the administration’s own role in keeping the truth about the scope of the disaster from the public. Again, it is anticipated that even more damning evidence could come to light at trial.

BP does not hold all the cards. It is the world’s fourth-largest company. But it is, like all of the oil industry, heavily dependent on owning, producing and selling oil to maintain that position. BP is the largest producer of oil and gas in the US Gulf Coast. BP is likely willing to make sacrifices in order to maintain these leases and acquire more. A long, drawn-out trial revealing damaging evidence could renew public calls to cancel or at least curtail these leases. BP also does not want the economic uncertainty of a long trial. Finally, it does not want what could easily be a $60 to $70 billion judgment….

via BP vs. Gulf Coast: It’s Not Settled Yet | The Nation.

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Monoculture: How Our Era’s Dominant Story Shapes Our Lives | Brain Pickings

6 Mar

F. S. Michaels, Monoculture: How One Story Is Changing Everything.

The Middle Ages was dominated by an ethos of religion and superstition. The Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution was dominated by an ethos of machines and science. Our age is dominated by an ethos of economics.

Neither a dreary observation of all the ways in which our economic monoculture has thwarted our ability to live life fully and authentically nor a blindly optimistic sticking-it-to-the-man kumbaya, Michaels offers a smart and realistic guide to first recognizing the monoculture and the challenges of transcending its limitations, then considering ways in which we, as sentient and autonomous individuals, can move past its confines to live a more authentic life within a broader spectrum of human values.

via Monoculture: How Our Era’s Dominant Story Shapes Our Lives | Brain Pickings.

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How to Fund an American Police State | The Nation

6 Mar

All told, the federal government has appropriated about $635 billion, accounting for inflation, for homeland security–related activities and equipment since the 9/11 attacks. To conclude, though, that “the police” have become increasingly militarized casts too narrow a net. The truth is that virtually the entire apparatus of government has been mobilized and militarized right down to the university campus….

Government budgets at every level now include allocations aimed at fighting an ephemeral “War on Terror” in the United States. A vast surveillance and military buildup has taken place nationwide to conduct a pseudo-war against what can be imagined, not what we actually face. The costs of this effort, started by the Bush administration and promoted faithfully by the Obama administration, have been, and continue to be, virtually incalculable. In the process, public service and the public imagination have been weaponized.

Farewell to Peaceful Private Life

We’re not just talking money eagerly squandered. That may prove the least of it. More importantly, the fundamental values of American democracy—particularly the right to lead an autonomous private life—have been compromised with grim efficiency. The weaponry and tactics now routinely employed by police are visible evidence of this.

And then there’s the “fusion centers,” which have nothing to do with atomic power of with avant-garde cuisine. It’s about gather information together and letting all the government snoops read it: Continue reading →

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What if all sides are wrong about taxes? – Salon.com

6 Mar

A useful review of tax policies, right, left, and center:

My point is that the three currently-popular options for tax reform—the conservative flat tax, the liberal ultra-progressive income tax, and the centrist formula of lowering rates while slashing loopholes—are all unrealistic, in different ways. Sorry, conservatives—if the U.S. gets a VAT or another national consumption tax, it will be in addition to federal and income taxes, not in place of them. Sorry, progressives—while income taxes on the rich can indeed be raised considerably, there really is a point at which doing so will backfire by encouraging massive tax avoidance or capital flight. The experience of Europe suggests that it makes more sense to add a VAT to the mix of American federal taxes, if you want to fund a European-style middle-class welfare state.

Oh, and tax centrists—if your goal in your career is not just to trim but to completely eliminate tax expenditures for middle class Americans as well as the rich, you are going to have a sad, frustrated life.

via What if all sides are wrong about taxes? – Salon.com.

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