Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Intimidation and fraud claims cast shadow over Afghan poll

by Sardar Ahmad, AFP

24 mins ago

Monday Business Edition

Monday Business Edition is an Open Thread

The Angry Rich

By PAUL KRUGMAN, The New York Times

Published: September 19, 2010

(I)f you want to find real political rage – the kind of rage that makes people compare President Obama to Hitler, or accuse him of treason – … (y)ou’ll find it … among the very privileged, people who don’t have to worry about losing their jobs, their homes, or their health insurance, but who are outraged, outraged, at the thought of paying modestly higher taxes.

…

(W)hen Forbes magazine runs a cover story alleging that the president of the United States is deliberately trying to bring America down as part of his Kenyan, “anticolonialist” agenda, that “the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s.” When it comes to defending the interests of the rich, it seems, the normal rules of civilized (and rational) discourse no longer apply.

…

Tax-cut advocates used to pretend that they were mainly concerned about helping typical American families. Even tax breaks for the rich were justified in terms of trickle-down economics, the claim that lower taxes at the top would make the economy stronger for everyone.

These days, however, tax-cutters are hardly even trying to make the trickle-down case. Yes, Republicans are pushing the line that raising taxes at the top would hurt small businesses, but their hearts don’t really seem in it. Instead, it has become common to hear vehement denials that people making $400,000 or $500,000 a year are rich. I mean, look at the expenses of people in that income class – the property taxes they have to pay on their expensive houses, the cost of sending their kids to elite private schools, and so on. Why, they can barely make ends meet.

And among the undeniably rich, a belligerent sense of entitlement has taken hold: it’s their money, and they have the right to keep it.

In Which Mr. Deling Responds to Someone Who Might Be Professor Todd Henderson

J. Bradford DeLong, Department of Economics, U.C. Berkeley

September 18, 2010

As best as Michael O’Hare could determine (and Professor Henderson or whoever it is does not challenge him), the Henderson annual family budget is this:

$455,000 a year of income, of which:

• $60,000 in student loan payments
• $40,000 is employer contributions to 401(k) and similar retirement savings vehicles
• $15,000 is employer contributions to health insurance
• $60,000 is untaxed employee contributions to tax-favored retirement savings vehicles
• $25,000 building equity in their house
• $80,000 in state and federal income taxes
• $15,000 in property taxes
• $10,000 for automobiles
• $55,000 in housing costs for a $1M house (three times the average price in the Hyde Park neighborhood
• $60,000 in private school costs for three children
• $35,000 in other living expenses

And of this budget, Professor Henderson (or whoever) writes:

Like most working Americans, insurance, doctors’ bills, utilities, two cars, daycare, groceries, gasoline, cell phones, and cable TV (no movie channels) round out our monthly expenses. We also have someone who cuts our grass, cleans our house, and watches our new baby…. [W]e have less than a few hundred dollars per month of discretionary income. We occasionally eat out but with a baby sitter, these nights take a toll on our budget. Life in America is wonderful, but expensive. If our taxes rise significantly… the (legal) immigrant from Mexico who owns the lawn service we employ will suffer, as will the (legal) immigrant from Poland who cleans our house a few times a month. We can cancel our cell phones and some cable channels, as well as take our daughter from her art class at the community art center…

Now it is time for a reality check on this “most working Americans.” The median household income in the United States today is $50,000. Half of all households make more than this. Half of all households make less. The big expenses in the Henderson family budget–their $60,000 a year in contributions to tax-favored retirement savings vehicles, their $25,000 a year savings building home equity, their $55,000 for housing, their $60,000 in private school costs, even their $10,000 a year for new cars–are simply out of reach for the overwhelming majority of Americans. Half of all households make less than $50,000 a year–the Hendersons make nine times that. 90% of households make less than $100,000 a year–the Henderson’s make 4.5 times that. The Henderson’s are solidly in the top 1% of American households, in the select 1% group that receives more than $350,000 a year.

By any standard, they are really rich.

But they don’t feel rich. They have a cash flow problem. When the bills are paid at the end of the month, the money is gone–and they feel that they have to scrimp.

…

Professor Henderson’s problem is that he thinks that he ought to be able to pay off student loans, contribute to retirement savings vehicles, build equity, drive new cars, live in a big expensive house, send his children to private school, and still have plenty of cash at the end of the month for the $200 restaurant meals, the $1000 a night resort hotel rooms, and the $75,000 automobiles. And even half a million dollars a year cannot (get) you all of that.

…

(W)hy does he think that that is the way things should be? … (H)ere is the dirty secret: Professor Henderson thinks that that is the way things should be because he knows people for whom that is the way it is.

…

Professor Henderson in 1980 would have known who the really rich were, and they would on average have had about four times his income–more, considerably more, but not a huge gulf. He would have known people who were truly rich, and he would have seen himself as one of them–or as almost one of them.

…

Now fast forward to today.

…

Of the 100 people richer than he is, fully ten have more than four times his income. And he knows of one person with 20 times his income. He knows who the really rich are, and they have ten times his income: They have not $450,000 a year. They have $4.5 million a year. And, to him, they are in a different world.

And so he is sad. He and his wife deserve to be successful. And he knows people who are successful. But he is not one of them–widening income inequality over the past generation has excluded him from the rich who truly have money.

And this makes him sad. And angry. But, curiously enough, not angry at the senior law firm partners who extract surplus value from their associates and their clients, or angry at the financiers, but angry at… Barack Obama, who dares to suggest that the U.S. government’s funding gap should be closed partly by taxing him, and angry at the great hordes of the unwashed who will receive the Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security payments that the government will make over the next several generations.

And in the real world-

Poverty stats show the damage

By Carol Morello, Washington Post Staff Writer

Friday, September 17, 2010

In the second year of a brutal recession, the ranks of the American poor soared to their highest level in half a century and millions more are barely avoiding falling below the poverty line, the Census Bureau reported Thursday.

About 44 million Americans – one in seven – lived last year in homes in which the income was below the poverty level, which is about $22,000 for a family of four. That is the largest number of people since the census began tracking poverty 51 years ago.

Business News below the fold.

Professional Throwball- Giants @ Traitors.  You know how to root.  Miss something last night?  See it tonight.  Not a lot of original programming.

• ABC Family– Where the Heart Is
• A&E– The Glades (premier)
• AMC– Rubicon, Mad Men (premiers)
• Discovery– Survival Night
• ESPN– Tigers @ White Sox
• Food– The Great Food Truck Race (Season Finale), Iron Chef America (premier)
• FX– Forgetting Sarah Marshall (again)
• History– Ice Road Truckers, Swamp People (premiers)
• Lifetime– The 19th Wife x 2 (again and again)
• National Geographic– Nazis
• Nick– Fred: The Movie (again)
• SciFi– Earth Shattering Disasters (just like History Channel, only with actors)
• Turner Classic– Wait Until Dark, Dial M for Murder
• TNT– 10,000 B.C. x 2 (and again and again)
• Toon– Sym-Bionic Titan, Clone Wars (repeats of Friday’s premiers), Delocated (premier)
• Vs.– Repeats of last night’s IndyCar race and Bull Riding
• VH1– ATL (again)

Later-

• Comedy– Classic Futurama
• FX– Dodgeball
• Turner Classic– The Red Lily (shhhh)
• TNT– Batman & Robin

The Venture Brothers Episode 2 of Season 4 and a half (premier), Pomp & Circuitry (last week’s episode summary).  Childrens Hospital, Joke Overload (premier).  Frankenhole, Heal Hitler (Episode 4).

How do you go about writing a detective story?

Well, you forget detection and concentrate on crime. Crime’s the thing. And then you imagine you’re going to steal something or murder somebody.

Oh, is that how you do it? It’s interesting.

Yes, I usually put myself in the criminal’s shoes and then I keep asking myself, uh, what do I do next?

Do you really believe in the perfect murder?

Mmm, yes, absolutely. On paper, that is. And I think I could, uh, plan one better than most people; but I doubt if I could carry it out.

Oh? Why not?

Well, because in stories things usually turn out the way the author wants them to; and in real life they don’t… always.

Hmm.

No, I’m afraid my murders would be something like my bridge: I’d make some stupid mistake and never realize it until I found everybody was looking at me.

Zap2it TV Listings, Yahoo TV Listings

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Twin Baghdad car bombs kill 29

by Sabah Arar, AFP

1 hr 46 mins ago

Ahoy matey!

Wikipedia, which as we know can be trusted in all things (especially Colbert Elephants), tells us that in the modern era celebration of Talk Like a Pirate Day started in 1995.  Those who accept Our Noodly Savior know that Pirates were the Original Apostles of Pastafarianism.  Unfortunately the Revealed Scripture (known as The Ramen Texts) is unavailable for modern study as it was consumed during a particularly long calm in the Doldrums.

Still it is accepted as an article of faith proven by the historical record that decline in Piracy is direcly correlated with Global Warming and many choose to spend this day in Worship at Church in addition to emulating the manners, customs, and language of their Pirate forbearers.  I myself have the good fortune to be 1/4 full blooded Pirate through my Viking ancestors (indeed Viking is a noun which means ‘Pirate’).

I generally celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate Day by telling the 3 Pirate Jokes.  There are only 3, all the others are just variations.  As Cap’n Slappy says:

Thar be only three pirate jokes in the world. The biggest one is the one that ends with someone usin’ “Arrr” in the punchline. Oh, sure, thar be plenty o’ these, but they’re all the same damn joke.

“What’s the pirate movie rated? – Arrr!” “What kind o’ socks does a pirate wear? – Arrrrgyle!” “What’s the problem with the way a pirate speaks? – Arrrrticulation!” …and so forth.

The second joke is the one wear the pirate walks into the bar with a ships wheel attached to the front o’ his trousers. The bartender asks, “What the hell is that ships wheel for?” The pirate says, “I don’t know, but it’s drivin’ me nuts!”

And finally. A little boy is trick or treatin’ on Halloween by himself. He is dressed as a pirate. At one house, a friendly man asks him, “Where are your buccaneers?” The little boy responds, “On either side o’ me ‘buccan’ head!”

And there ye have it. A symposium on pirate humor that’ll last ye a lifetime – so long as life is violent and short.

And singing some Pirate Carols, for which you can join me below the fold.

268 Stories served.  38 per day.

This is actually the hardest diary to execute, and yet perhaps the most valuable because it lets you track story trends over time.  It should be a Sunday morning feature.

• Sunday 9/12
• Monday 9/13 (Diary 600)
• Tuesday 9/14
• Wednesday 9/15
• Thursday 9/16
• Friday 9/17
• Saturday 9/18

College Throwball and lots of it including Irish @ State or Texas @ Tech.  Temple kicked UConn’s butt and deservedly so.  UConn is barely a Division I program and it is a big expensive mistake to pretend otherwise.  You won’t be able to use TV Guide Channel at all tonight because they’re running The Bridges of Madison County twice.  I might point out that unless it’s noted all sporting events are live.  Also all ‘marathons’ are at least 4 episodes or 3 hours long.

• ABC Family– The Wedding Date, Miss Congeniality
• A&E– The Perfect Storm x 2 interrupted by The Glades A Perfect Storm
• AMC– Airplane & II
• Animal– Cats 101, Pit Boss (premiers)
• Bravo– House marathon
• E!– Bridget Jones’s Diary
• ESPN– Clemson @ Auburn
• ESPN2– The other game that ABC is not carrying in your area.
• Food– Triple D marathon
• FX– Jumper, Two and a Half Men
• History– Sniper marathon
• Lifetime– Deadly Honeymoon, The 19th Wife
• MTV– Beauty Shop
• National Geographic– Collapse: Based on the Book by Jared Diamond (World Premier)
• Nick– Fred: The Movie (World Premier)
• Oxygen– The Pacifier
• SciFi– Final Destination 2, Vacancy 2: The First Cut (2 marathon day)
• Speed– Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge (Miller Motorsports Park in Salt Lake City, Rolex Sports Car support series)
• Spike– Band of Brothers marathon
• Style– How Do I Look?, Whose Wedding Is It Anyway? (premiers)
• TBS– Meet the Parents, You, Me and Dupree
• Turner Classic– Gigi, Love in the Afternoon (Maurice Chevalier night)
• TNT– Shooter
• USA– NCIS marathon
• Vs.– PBR Springfield Invitational
• VH1– ATL (hip hop rollerskating)

Later-

• ABC Family– Honey
• ESPN– Iowa @ Arizona
• ESPN2– Wake Forest @ Stanford
• Oxygen– Monster In Law
• SciFi– The Midnight Meat Train, Autopsy
• TBS– Nacho Libre
• Turner Classic– Man About Town (more Maurice.  This was really hard to track down.)
• TNT– Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life
• Vs.– IndyCar Japan 300

Boondocks– Smokin’ With Cigarettes, The Trial of Robert Kelly.  GitS: SAC– Escape From, Not Equal (Episodes 12 & 13).

Oh, cut the bleeding heart crap, will ya? We’ve all got our switches, lights, and knobs to deal with, Striker. I mean, down here there are literally hundreds and thousands of blinking, beeping, and flashing lights, blinking and beeping and flashing – they’re *flashing* and they’re *beeping*. I can’t stand it anymore! They’re *blinking* and *beeping* and *flashing*! Why doesn’t somebody pull the plug!

Zap2it TV Listings, Yahoo TV Listings

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Pope meets abuse victims, condemns ‘unspeakable’ crimes

by Gildas le Roux, AFP

2 hrs 38 mins ago

This is the Carnahan ad yanked from YouTube because of Faux’s false copyright claims.  If 30 seconds from an hour long broadcast isn’t fair use then ‘a’, ‘and’, ‘the’, and ‘is’ can be copyrighted.

h/t Crooks and Liars for hosting it.