What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?

That about sums it up for me.

Ned?  Ned Ryerson?!

You like boats, but not the ocean. You go to a lake in summer with your family up in the mountains. There’s a long wooden dock and a boathouse with boards missing from the roof, and a place you used to crawl underneath to be alone. You’re a sucker for French poetry and rhinestones. You’re very generous. You’re kind to strangers and children, and when you stand in the snow you look like an angel.

How are you doing this?

I told you. I wake up every day, right here, right in Punxsutawney, and it’s always February 2nd, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

How appropriate

It’s the Mind

What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?

That about sums it up for me.

Ned?  Ned Ryerson?!

You like boats, but not the ocean. You go to a lake in summer with your family up in the mountains. There’s a long wooden dock and a boathouse with boards missing from the roof, and a place you used to crawl underneath to be alone. You’re a sucker for French poetry and rhinestones. You’re very generous. You’re kind to strangers and children, and when you stand in the snow you look like an angel.

How are you doing this?

I told you. I wake up every day, right here, right in Punxsutawney, and it’s always February 2nd, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

How appropriate

It’s the Mind

“A Silent Coup”: Jeremy Scahill & Bob Herbert on Corporate, Military Interests Shaping Obama’s SOTU

“Dirty Wars” Filmmaker Jeremy Scahill on the “Drone President” & Obama’s Whitewashing of NSA Spying

Also notably ineffective.

Transcript

Transcript

Transcript

Transcript

Reid Announces Opposition to ‘Fast Track’ on Trade

By Siobhan Hughes, Wall Street Journal

January 29, 2014, 2:47 p.m. ET

“I’m against fast track,” Mr. Reid told reporters one day after President Barack Obama renewed his call for Congress to pass fast-track legislation, which means Congress must consider trade bills on an expedited basis in an up-or-down vote with no amendments. “I think everyone would be well-advised just not to push this right now.”

…

Fast-track authority is seen as crucial to cementing the trade deals because of the reassurance it would provide negotiating partners in the final, politically-sensitive rounds of talks. Other nations are typically reluctant to make trading concessions unless the U.S. can offer assurances trading pacts won’t be amended or rejected by Congress at the last minute.

“You can kiss any new trade deals goodbye,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas.) “I think the majority leader’s focus is on the November elections and he doesn’t want to expose his vulnerable members to controversial votes.”

…

On Wednesday Mr. Reid made clear that he has expressed the depth of his opposition plainly, including to Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D., Mont.), who recently unveiled the fast-track bill, and Sen. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.), who is presumed to become chairman of the committee when Mr. Baucus steps down to serve as U.S. ambassador to China.

“Everyone knows how I feel about this-Senator Baucus knows; Senator Wyden knows; the White House knows,” Mr. Reid said, declining to say whether he would stop fast-track legislation from coming up for a Senate floor vote. “We’ll see,” he said.

Mr. Wyden has expressed concerns about the existing fast-track bill and thinks it needs to be rewritten, an aide said.

An aide to Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp said the Michigan Republican would like to have bipartisan support before moving fast-track legislation forward in the House.

…

Many Democrats are skeptical of recent free-trade agreements, saying they don’t do enough to stem the flow of jobs overseas and don’t require trading partners to observe strict labor and environmental rules similar to those in the U.S. Some are concerned the Asia-Pacific pact under negotiation will siphon U.S. jobs to low-income countries such as Vietnam.

“It seems there’s a great opportunity to get off the fast track to bad trade deals and open the policy window to a better deal for workers,” Celeste Drake, a trade expert with the AFL-CIO, said.

…

A poll released on Wednesday showed that 62% of voters oppose fast-track negotiating authority for Mr. Obama. The poll, conducted by Hart Research Associates and Chesapeake Beach Consulting, shows that Republican voters are more concerned about giving fast-track authority to Mr. Obama than Democrats.

Mirabile Dictu! Reid Tells Off Obama on Fast Track, Killing Toxic Trade Deals for 2014

by Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism

Posted on January 30, 2014

(M)y Congressional correspondents think another gambit is more likely: to make some cosmetic changes and try to get the bill passed during the lame duck session, on the assumption that some Democrats (particularly those who are leaving office) will use the cover and change positions.

However, that cheery view assumes that the situation is static, when opposition to these bills is becoming even more pronounced.

…

And the repudiation by Reid and the stiffening resistance to these bills won’t go unnoticed overseas. The Wikileaks publication of drafts of two critical chapters showed a wide gap between the US positions and that of many of its supposed partners. Our reader Clive has also described how the Japanese media (and Japan is essential to the TPP being consummated) is being uncharacteristically direct in saying the US was not negotiating, and it would need to make significant concessions to reach an agreement. The TPP was already going pear shaped, and whatever sense of momentum the US had been able to create is now kaput.

I have a sneaking suspicion that many regular readers of this site will be as little interested in #6 as they were in the previous 5.  If you feel compelled to share your outrage or something unexpectedly interesting occurs you’re more than welcome to share it below.

On the other hand perhaps you’re just looking for some alternative programming-

(listings from Zap2It)

Considering that much of the operations against terrorists is a mere chimera designed to keep money flowing into the pockets of the grifters and con artists of the military industrial security state, it’s hard to look at the ‘zero option’ as a scary concept.

Afghanistan Exit Is Seen as Peril to Drone Mission

By DAVID E. SANGER and ERIC SCHMITT, The New York Times

JAN. 26, 2014

If Mr. Obama ultimately withdrew all American troops from Afghanistan, the C.I.A.’s drone bases in the country would have to be closed, according to administration officials, because it could no longer be protected.

…

The C.I.A.’s drone bases in Afghanistan, including one in the eastern part of the country, allow operators to respond quickly to fresh intelligence. The proximity to Pakistan’s tribal areas also allows the Predator drones and their larger, faster cousin, the Reaper, to fly longer missions without having to return to base.

…

Other allied countries are within the Reaper’s range – in the Persian Gulf, for example. But the distances would be too great to carry out drone operations effectively, officials said, and it is very unlikely that any of those nations would approve launching the diplomatically sensitive strikes missions from their soil.

This is bad news only if you think the indiscriminate remote bombing of wedding parties and shepherds and the first responders who come to identify the dead and tend the wounded is a good idea.

What is becoming clear is that tomorrow’s “big” State of the Union speech will be a vacuous exercise in gasbaggery.  Not that they aren’t all that way, but this one is so obvious that even the Beltway Bootlickers are compelled to notice it.

For Obama, Investing in Brighter Futures Remains a Tough Sell

By JOHN HARWOOD, The New York Times

JAN. 26, 2014

As aides draft their 2015 budget plan, their 2014 version shows this bottom line for Mr. Obama’s sixth year in office: Government investments in infrastructure, research and development, and education and training, at 3.3 percent of the nation’s economy, match the level from President George W. Bush’s sixth year in office.

…

“It has not been possible to significantly shift the needle,” said Laura D’Andrea Tyson, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who headed Mr. Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisers. “We should be raising those levels, and we’re not.

“I guess the good news,” Ms. Tyson added, “is that the share hasn’t been plummeting.”

Over the last half-century, though, it has plummeted. Spending on what the federal government classifies as investments peaked in 1968 at 6.6 percent of the economy, twice the current proportion.

…

“We’ve been playing on a Reagan playing field – a cut-government, shrink-programs field – since 1981,” (Democratic Senator from New York) Mr. Schumer said in an interview. “It’s all turning around now.”

Yah think?  Really?

Oh, and I’d never use plummeted, plummeted.  How about ‘falling’ idiot?  Buy a damn Thesaurus you cheap bastard.