Tag: Open Thread

May 08 2012

Punting the Pundits

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Richard (RJ) Eskow: Sarkozy’s Footsteps: Will the Democrats Be Next?

And another one bites the dust.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy just became the latest politician to lose his job because he wouldn’t let economic experience — or political common sense — sway him from the path of austerity.

Will Sarkozy’s downfall help Democrats learn what he never could? Democrats should consider Sarkozy’s fate a cautionary tale — and a call to action. If they rally around the cause of growth, jobs, and optimism, the nation will benefit and they’ll rewarded at the polls.

But if they keep pushing their own brand of “austerity lite,” they — and we — will have gained nothing from the lessons of Europe. iI won’t matter how much more extreme the Republicans are. Democrats, who hold the White House and the Senate, will still be seen as the party in charge — the one that presided over a terrible economy and, if the “Grand Bargainers” have their way, the one that cut popular government programs.

They’ll also run the risk of paying the same price Nicolas Sarkozy paid.

Dean Baker: Bernie Sanders Advocates a Free Market in AIDS Drugs

Drugs are cheap. Patent monopolies are expensive. These are simple facts that everyone should know but for some reason few do.

The point here is simple; the vast majority of drugs are cheap to produce. Chain drug stores sell hundreds of generic drugs for $5-$7 per prescription. They can do this profitably because few drugs require expensive chemicals or manufacturing processes.

However, many brand drugs sell for hundreds or even thousands of dollars per prescription. This is due to the fact that drug companies have patent monopolies on these drugs. The government will arrest anyone who produces these drugs without the permission of the patent holder. Since drugs can be essential for people’s health and/or life, if they can find a way to pay any price demanded by the drug companies, they will.

David Cay Johnston: Social Security Is Not Going Broke

Which federal program took in more than it spent last year, added $95 billion to its surplus and lifted 20 million Americans of all ages out of poverty?

Why, Social Security, of course, which ended 2011 with a $2.7 trillion surplus.

That surplus is almost twice the $1.4 trillion collected in personal and corporate income taxes last year. And it is projected to go on growing until 2021, the year the youngest Baby Boomers turn 67 and qualify for full old-age benefits.

So why all the talk about Social Security “going broke?” That theme filled the news after release of the latest annual report of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Federal Disability Insurance Trust Funds, as Social Security is formally called.

The reason is that the people who want to kill Social Security have for years worked hard to persuade the young that the Social Security taxes they pay to support today’s gray hairs will do nothing for them when their own hair turns gray.

Eugene Robinson: Death to Austerity

Economic austerity is a dangerous, self-defeating intellectual fad. Perhaps I should say that’s what it was, given Sunday’s election results in Europe. Perhaps I should also say good riddance.

Voters in France, Greece and even Germany-a hotbed of the austerity cult-told their political leaders, in no uncertain terms, that boosting economic growth is more important than cutting government spending. Here in the United States, I hope that Democrats, at least, were paying attention; I fear that the addled ideologues who control the Republican Party will never get the message.

On Sunday, French voters elected Socialist Party candidate Francois Hollande as president, ousting center-right incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy in what amounted to a referendum on Sarkozy’s embrace of austerity.

Michelangelo Signorile: Joe Biden Was for Marriage Equality Before He Was Against It

President Obama previously had the dubious distinction among politicians of being for marriage equality before he was against it. But now he’s not alone: his own vice president shares the honor!

Of course, in the case of Obama, he was for it for perhaps 8 years, depending on when he started saying he was against it (after having said he was for it in a questionaire in 1996, which his aides have spun themselves into a frenzy trying to explain). For Joe Biden it was just about 8 minutes.

Seriously, before Obama could even spend a few days basking in the glory of the Romney campaign’s hideous gay meltdown last week, another idiotic gay panic has gripped his own campaign. And it really makes you wonder, what are these guys thinking?

May 08 2012

On This Day In History May 8

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge

May 8 is the 128th day of the year (129th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 237 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1973, A 71-day standoff between federal authorities and the American Indian Movement members occupying the Pine Ridge Reservation at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, site of the infamous massacre of 300 Sioux by the U.S. 7th Cavalry in 1890, ends with the surrender of the militants.

AIM was founded in 1968 by Russell Means, Dennis Banks, and other Native-American leaders as a militant political and civil rights organization.

snip

Their actions were acclaimed by many Native Americans, but on the Pine Ridge Reservation, Oglala Sioux Tribal President Dick Wilson had banned all AIM activities. AIM considered his government corrupt and dictatorial, and planned the occupation of Wounded Knee as a means of forcing a federal investigation of his administration. By taking Wounded Knee, The AIM leaders also hoped to force an investigation of other reservations, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and broken Indian treaties.

snip

The Wounded Knee occupation lasted for a total of 71 days, during which time two Sioux men were shot to death by federal agents. One federal agent was paralyzed after being shot. On May 8, the AIM leaders and their supporters surrendered after White House officials promised to investigate their complaints.

snip

In 1975, two FBI agents and a Native-American man were killed in a massive shoot-out between federal agents and AIM members and local residents. In a controversial trial, AIM member Leonard Peltier was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to two consecutive life terms.

snip

The U.S. government took no steps to honor broken Indian treaties, but in the courts some tribes won major settlements from federal and state governments in cases involving tribal land claims.

May 07 2012

Punting the Pundits

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

Paul Krugman: Those Revolting Europeans

The French are revolting. The Greeks, too. And it’s about time.

Both countries held elections Sunday that were in effect referendums on the current European economic strategy, and in both countries voters turned two thumbs down. It’s far from clear how soon the votes will lead to changes in actual policy, but time is clearly running out for the strategy of recovery through austerity – and that’s a good thing.

Needless to say, that’s not what you heard from the usual suspects in the run-up to the elections. It was actually kind of funny to see the apostles of orthodoxy trying to portray the cautious, mild-mannered François Hollande as a figure of menace. He is “rather dangerous,” declared The Economist, which observed that he “genuinely believes in the need to create a fairer society.” Quelle horreur!

Harold Meyerson: Europe finds austerity a tight fit

Europe has seen austerity, and it doesn’t work. [..]

The United States has austerity demons of its own, of course. While the private sector has rebounded somewhat from the 2008-09 collapse, creating 4 million jobs since the turnaround began in 2010, state and local governments have shed 611,000 employees – including 196,000 teachers – since President Obama took office, The Post’s Zachary A. Goldfarb reported. The shrinking of government ranks high among the drags on the U.S. recovery. The 2009 stimulus provided funding to states and cities that enabled them to keep many workers on the job, but when that funding began running out in 2010, layoffs, particularly among teachers, redoubled.

The lesson of 2008 was that unregulated finance ends in disaster. The lesson of the years since is that austerity in a time of economic weakness not only perpetuates that disaster but makes it worse. The world, one might think, would have learned this lesson from the 1930s; Germany, at least, should have. Alas, it apparently has to be relearned, painfully, again and again.

Robert Reich: A Question of Timing: What America Can Learn from the Revolt in Europe

Who’s an economy for? Voters in France and Greece have made it clear it’s not for the bond traders.

Referring to his own electoral woes, Prime Minister David Cameron wrote Monday in an article in the conservative Daily Telegraph: “When people think about the economy they don’t see it through the dry numbers of the deficit figures, trade balances or inflation forecasts – but instead the things that make the difference between a life that’s worth living and a daily grind that drags them down.” [..]

In truth, the choice isn’t simply between budget-cutting austerity, on the one hand, and growth and jobs on the other.

It’s really a question of timing. And it’s the same issue on this side of the pond. If government slices spending too early, when unemployment is high and growth is slowing, it makes the debt situation far worse.

The Guardian Editorial: François Hollande: the change France needs

François Hollande has a rare opportunity to reshape the political landscape in a country whose default position is to the right

François Hollande won a stunning victory, not just for himself, as a man who spent much of his career in the shadow of others, nor for France, but for the left in Europe, too. With the governing parties who preached austerity under attack from a voter revolt on Sunday- in the Greek elections, where the extreme right was set to win enough votes to enter parliament; in Schleswig-Holstein, where the vote of Angela Merkel’s coalition partners, the Free Democrats, collapsed – the breakthrough of the left in France was a huge achievement and, just maybe, a turning point.

Nicolas Sarkozy is the 11th European leader to fall since the banking crisis broke and this result is more than just a shot across the bows for the former Sarkozy loyalists in Ms Merkel or David Cameron. France’s new direction is a mortal blow to the austerity compact which has been Europe’s anchor response to the crisis. Mr Hollande is no radical. Conscious of how polarised France has become between left and right, he wanted his supporters to celebrate, not demonstrate. He has set himself just one year longer to balance France’s budget than the man he defeated. But he arrives in power at that point in history where the victims of boom and bust, rather than its perennially self-satisfied authors, have become the dominant political voice.

Joan Walsh: Let Biden be Biden

The VP comes out for same sex marriage. Then his office insists he “was saying what the president has said”

For cryin’ out loud.

Sunday morning on “Meet the Press” Vice President Joe Biden went completely Joe Biden on the issue of marriage equality, telling David Gregory “I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men marrying women are entitled to the same exact rights,” and crediting “Will and Grace.” That’s the Joe Biden we know and love. [..]

It seemed an important step for an administration that can’t seem to get the president all the way there. President Obama is going to have to come out for gay marriage one of these days – can anyone honestly believe he’s against it? – but having the Catholic Biden endorse it helps, too. The group Catholic Democrats immediately Tweeted the little known fact that Catholics are the most pro-gay marriage of all Christian groups. Yet the backwards politics of the U.S. Bishops means most people don’t know that, and thus view gay marriage as a no-fly zone during an election season when the  Catholic swing vote is particularly important. So Biden’s comment mattered.

A’ex Pareene: America’s idiot rich

The 1 percent is complaining louder than ever. There can be no reasoning with people this irrational

Some unknown but alarming number of ultra-rich Americans are now basically totally delusional and completely divorced from reality. This is now an inescapable fact, confirmed by multiple media accounts of billionaire thought and an entire special issue of the New York Times Magazine. [..]

There can be no reasoning with people this irrational. Any attempt to do so will fail, as Barack Obama, whose main goal is to maintain, not upend, the system that made these people so disgustingly wealthy, is learning. It’s growing harder and harder to pretend that the fantastically wealthy have a sophisticated understanding of politics – or math, or economics, or cause-and-effect.

Dana Milbank: Taking out Dick Lugar

When Indiana Republicans go to the polls on Tuesday, they will do more than choose a candidate for the Senate. They will choose between party and country. [..]

For years Dick Lugar has been the leading Senate Republican on foreign policy, shaping post-Cold War strategy, securing sanctions to end South African apartheid and bringing democracy to the Philippines, among other things. His signature achievement, drafted with Democrat Sam Nunn, was the 1992 Nunn-Lugar Act, which has disarmed thousands of Soviet nuclear warheads once aimed at the United States.

Enter Richard Mourdock, a tea party hothead attempting to defeat Lugar in the GOP primary. A cornerstone of his effort to oust Lugar is the six-term senator’s bad habit of bipartisanship – never mind that Lugar’s bipartisanship was in the service of protecting millions of Americans from nuclear, chemical and biological terrorism.

May 07 2012

On This Day In History May 7

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge

May 7 is the 127th day of the year (128th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 238 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1824, the world premiere of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Vienna, Austria. The performance is conducted by Michael Umlauf under the deaf composer’s supervision. It was Beethoven’s first appearance on stage in 12 years. Over the years the symphony has been performed for both political and non-political from the eve of Hitler’s birthday, to the celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, to the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan. The Ode to Joy was used as the anthem by Kosovo when it declared it’s independence in 2008.

May 06 2012

Rant of the Week: Stephen Colbert

The Word – Debt Panels

One of the nation’s largest medical debt collectors sneaks into hospitals to seize patients’ money before treatment.

May 06 2012

On This Day In History May 6

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge

May 6 is the 126th day of the year (127th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 239 days remaining until the end of the year.



On this day in 1994, English Channel tunnel opens.

In a ceremony presided over by England’s Queen Elizabeth II and French President François Mitterand, a rail tunnel under the English Channel was officially opened, connecting Britain and the European mainland for the first time since the Ice Age.

The channel tunnel, or “Chunnel,” connects Folkstone, England, with Sangatte, France, 31 miles away.  The Chunnel cut travel time between England and France to a swift 35 minutes and eventually between London and Paris to two-and-a-half hours.

As the world’s longest undersea tunnel, the Chunnel runs under water for 23 miles, with an average depth of 150 feet below the seabed. Each day, about 30,000 people, 6,000 cars and 3,500 trucks journey through the Chunnel on passenger, shuttle and freight trains.

Millions of tons of earth were moved to build the two rail tunnels–one for northbound and one for southbound traffic–and one service tunnel.   Fifteen thousand people were employed at the peak of construction.  Ten people were killed during construction.

Proposals and attempts

In 1802, French mining engineer Albert Mathieu put forward a proposal to tunnel under the English Channel, with illumination from oil lamps, horse-drawn coaches, and an artificial island mid-Channel for changing horses.

In the 1830s, Frenchman Aimé Thomé de Gamond performed the first geological and hydrographical surveys on the Channel, between Calais and Dover. Thomé de Gamond explored several schemes and, in 1856, he presented a proposal to Napoleon III for a mined railway tunnel from Cap Gris-Nez to Eastwater Point with a port/airshaft on the Varne sandbank at a cost of 170 million francs, or less than £7 million.

In 1865, a deputation led by George Ward Hunt proposed the idea of a tunnel to the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the day, William Ewart Gladstone.

After 1867, William Low and Sir John Clarke Hawkshaw promoted ideas, but none were implemented. An official Anglo-French protocol was established in 1876 for a cross-Channel railway tunnel. In 1881, British railway entrepreneur Sir William Watkin and French Suez Canal contractor Alexandre Lavalley were in the Anglo-French Submarine Railway Company that conducted exploratory work on both sides of the Channel. On the English side a 2.13-metre (7 ft) diameter Beaumont-English boring machine dug a 1,893-metre (6,211 ft) pilot tunnel from Shakespeare Cliff. On the French side, a similar machine dug 1,669 m (5,476 ft) from Sangatte. The project was abandoned in May 1882, owing to British political and press campaigns advocating that a tunnel would compromise Britain’s national defences. These early works were encountered more than a century later during the TML project.

In 1919, during the Paris Peace Conference, British Prime Minister David Lloyd George repeatedly brought up the idea of a Channel tunnel as a way of reassuring France about British willingness to defend against another German attack. The French did not take the idea seriously and nothing came of Lloyd George’s proposal.

In 1955, defence arguments were accepted to be irrelevant because of the dominance of air power; thus, both the British and French governments supported technical and geological surveys. Construction work commenced on both sides of the Channel in 1974, a government-funded project using twin tunnels on either side of a service tunnel, with capability for car shuttle wagons. In January 1975, to the dismay of the French partners, the British government cancelled the project. The government had changed to the Labour Party and there was uncertainty about EEC membership, cost estimates had ballooned to 200% and the national economy was troubled. By this time the British Priestly tunnel boring machine was ready and the Ministry of Transport was able to do a 300 m (980 ft) experimental drive. This short tunnel would however be reused as the starting and access point for tunnelling operations from the British side.

In 1979, the “Mouse-hole Project” was suggested when the Conservatives came to power in Britain. The concept was a single-track rail tunnel with a service tunnel, but without shuttle terminals. The British government took no interest in funding the project, but Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said she had no objection to a privately funded project. In 1981 British and French leaders Margaret Thatcher and François Mitterrand agreed to set up a working group to look into a privately funded project, and in April 1985 promoters were formally invited to submit scheme proposals. Four submissions were shortlisted:

   a rail proposal based on the 1975 scheme presented by Channel Tunnel Group/France-Manche (CTG/F-M),

   Eurobridge: a 4.5 km (2.8 mi) span suspension bridge with a roadway in an enclosed tube

   Euroroute: a 21 km (13 mi) tunnel between artificial islands approached by bridges, and

   Channel Expressway: large diameter road tunnels with mid-channel ventilation towers.

The cross-Channel ferry industry protested under the name “Flexilink”. In 1975 there was no campaign protesting against a fixed link, with one of the largest ferry operators (Sealink) being state-owned. Flexilink continued rousing opposition throughout 1986 and 1987. Public opinion strongly favoured a drive-through tunnel, but ventilation issues, concerns about accident management, and fear of driver mesmerisation led to the only shortlisted rail submission, CTG/F-M, being awarded the project.

May 06 2012

Punting the Pundits: Sunday Preview Edition

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt

The Sunday Talking Heads:

Up with Chris Hayes: This Sunday’s guests lineup may have me throwing things at the TV: Eric Schneiderman (@agschneiderman), New York attorney general and co-chair of the Mortgage Crisis Unit and Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force; Raj Date, deputy director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (@CFPB); Catherine Rampell (@crampell), economics reporter for the The New York Times; Alexis Goldstein (@alexisgoldstein), former Wall Street information technologist and member of Occupy the SEC; James Fallows (@jamesfallows), national correspondent for The Atlantic and author of China Airborne; David Frum (@davidfrum), former speechwriter for President George W. Bush and contributing editor for Newsweek/Daily Beast.

The Melissa Harris-Perry Show: No guest list at this time but after Saturday’s rah-rah Obama fest, your time may b better spent listening to some good music or taking a walk.

This Week with George Stephanopolis: Jake Tapper will sit in for George this Sunday. His guests are Obama campaign senior adviser David Axelrod and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).

The roundtable panel guests are ABC News’ George Will, former Obama economic adviser and ABC News consultant Austan Goolsbee, Romney campaign adviser and president of The American Cause Bay Buchanan, radio and television host Tavis Smiley, and Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren.

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer: Mr. Schieffer’s guests are former Republican candidate Newt Gingrich, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MI), Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, and former National Security adviser to Pres, Jimmy Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski.

The political roundtable guests are The Wall Street Journal‘s Peggy Noonan, The Washington Post‘s Michael Gerson, Mother Jones‘ David Corn and CBS News’ John Dickerson.

The Chris Matthews Show: This week’s guests are Helene Cooper, The New York Times White House Correspondent; David Ignatius, The Washington Post Columnist; Rick Stengel, TIME Managing Editor; and Katty Kay, BBC Washington Correspondent.

Meet the Press with David Gregory: The MTP guest is Vice President Joe Biden.

On the roundtable panel are Mitt Romney supporter Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH); Chief Economist from Mesirow Financial Diane Swonk; and NBC’s Chuck Todd and Tom Brokaw.

State of the Union with Candy Crowley: Joining Ms. Crowley are former Republican candidate Newt Gingrich; former Gov. Ted Strickland (D-OH) and former Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA); Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI); National Journal‘s Major Garrett and budget experts Douglas Holtz-Eakin, and Alice Rivlin.

May 05 2012

Health and Fitness News

Welcome to the Stars Hollow Health and Fitness News weekly diary. It will publish on Saturday afternoon and be open for discussion about health related issues including diet, exercise, health and health care issues, as well as, tips on what you can do when there is a medical emergency. Also an opportunity to share and exchange your favorite healthy recipes.

Questions are encouraged and I will answer to the best of my ability. If I can’t, I will try to steer you in the right direction. Naturally, I cannot give individual medical advice for personal health issues. I can give you information about medical conditions and the current treatments available.

You can now find past Health and Fitness News diaries here and on the right hand side of the Front Page.

Adding Mussel to Your Meal

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   I always associated high omega-3 content with fatty cold-water fish like salmon, mackerel and tuna, but it turns out that there are 1,472 milligrams of omega-3s in 6 ounces of mussels (the approximate amount of meat you get from a pound in the shell), only 400 milligrams less than the same amount of salmon.

   Farmed mussels are a much more ocean-friendly seafood choice than farmed salmon…. Look for mussels that are shiny and black, and somewhat heavy for their size. When you get them home, take them out of the wrapping immediately, give them a quick rinse and put them in a big bowl. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and refrigerate until you’re ready to clean and cook them.

~Martha Rose Shulman~

Curry-Laced Moules à la Marinière With Fresh Peas

These are classic wine-steamed mussels, but the broth is seasoned with a little curry powder.

Oven-Roasted Mussels With Fresh Spinach

Mussels don’t have to be steamed. They will pop open in a hot, dry cast iron skillet, on a grill or in the oven.

Spicy Spanish Mussels

Inspired by a tapas bar in Valencia, this dish is made special by the crunchy almond and hazelnut picada added after the mussels are steamed.

Mussel Risotto

Brown rice can be added for a mixed-grains risotto.

Mussel Pizza

A dish typical of seaside towns in Italy or the south of France.

May 05 2012

Punting the Pundits

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

New York Times Editorial: A Clear Warning From the Jobs Numbers

This week’s economic news was mixed, but the employment report on Friday was unmistakably weak. The economy added only 115,000 jobs in April, versus 154,000 in March and 200,000-plus in each of the three months before that. Even taking into account that unusually warm winter weather probably distorted the recent results, the underlying trend shows an economy that has been creating about 175,000 jobs a month – enough to keep the recovery crawling along, but too weak to appreciably raise hiring or wages.

Nor is it clear where more growth will come from. Manufacturing picked up last month, but activity in the larger service sector slowed. Recent auto sales were up, and home sales have been slowly, if fitfully, improving, but home prices continue to fall. Consumer spending, in general, rose in the first quarter, but it appears to be driven by people who are profiting from a rising stock market. Increased market volatility, like Friday’s 168-point drop in the Dow Jones industrial average, would make them nervous and less inclined to spend.

Paul Krugman: The Rise of Orwellian Economics

These past few years have been lean times in many respects – but they’ve been boom years for agonizingly dumb, pound-your-head-on-the-table economic fallacies.

The latest fad – illustrated by a recent commentary article in The Wall Street Journal – is that expansionary monetary policy is a giveaway to banks and plutocrats generally. Indeed, that screed, titled “How the Fed Favors the 1 Percent” and written by the hedge-fund founder Mark Spitznagel, actually claims that the whole 1 versus 99 thing should really be about reining in or maybe abolishing the Federal Reserve. “The relentless expansion of credit by the Fed creates artificial disparities based on political privilege and economic power,” Mr. Spitznagel wrote.

What’s wrong with the idea that running the printing presses is a giveaway to plutocrats? Let me count the ways. First, the actual politics is utterly the reverse of what’s being claimed.

Robert Reich: The Stall Has Arrived

As I feared, the economy has stalled.

Friday’s jobs report for April was even more disappointing than March. Employers added only 115,000 new jobs, down from March’s number (the Bureau of Labor Statistics revised the March number upward to 154,000, but it’s still abysmal relative to what’s needed). At least 125,000 new jobs are necessary each month just to keep up with an expanding population of working-age people.

That means the hole is getting even deeper.

Most observers pay attention to the official rate of unemployment, which edged down to 8.1 percent in April from 8.2 percent in March. That may sound like progress, but it’s not. The unemployment rate dropped because more people dropped out of the labor force, too discouraged to look for work. The household survey, from which the rate is calculated, counts as “unemployed” only people who are actively looking for work. If you stop looking because the job scene looks hopeless for you, you’re no longer counted.

Howard Feinman: Kentucky Derby: As in Politics, You Need a Horse, and a Theory

LOUISVILLE — Once you come back here, as we did Thursday night, you remember what you used to know when you lived here but forgot: that everybody has to have a theory and a horse.

It doesn’t matter if you are a Louisvillian, or a regular visitor, or a first-timer. You are required to pick a horse, preferably a semi-obscure one, and have at the ready a plausible explanation — either impressively informed or simply wacko — for your cool choice.

There are 20 horses in the Derby, and already I’ve heard tips and touts about a half-dozen of them. Soon I will no doubt have heard an argument for each and every one.

The Derby is like politics in so many ways. Someone runs. Someone wins. People contribute money and get their hopes up. There is a weird sense that somehow all of your problems will be solved and the world will right itself if only you find the right contender.

Richard (RJ) Eskow: Geithner’s World, Part 1: Three Years Of Immunity

Here’s a walk down memory lane that’s worth taking, even if it makes your blood pressure spike a little: Three years ago Tim Geithner was in the position of having to explain why the Federal government wasn’t going to nationalize the nation’s failing banks. In 2009 many people expected that to be part of the government’s bank rescue plan.

Only three years. It seems so long ago, doesn’t it?

In 2009 there was a very compelling argument for a Federal takeover over these failing institutions, which had been so negligently (and very possibly criminally) mismanaged could no longer survive on their own. And while nationalization wasn’t the only course worth considering, this snapshot from our national past reflects the gravity of the crisis caused by bankers.

It’s also a useful reminder of the extent to which bank CEOs failed to pass even the most basic test of executive competence – namely, not destroying your own corporation.

Charles M. Blow: Teaching Me About Teaching

Next week is National Teacher Appreciation Week, and, as far as I’m concerned, they don’t get nearly enough.

On Tuesday, the United States Department of Education is hoping that people will take to Facebook and Twitter to thank a teacher who has made a difference in their lives. I want to contribute to that effort. And I plan to thank a teacher who never taught me in a classroom but taught me what it meant to be an educator: my mother.

She worked in her local school system for 34 years before retiring. Then she volunteered at a school in her district until, at age 67, she won a seat on her local school board. Education is in her blood.

May 05 2012

On This Day In History May 5

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge

May 5 is the 125th day of the year (126th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 240 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1862, the Mexican Army defeated the French forces at the Battle of Puebla

Certain that French victory would come swiftly in Mexico, 6,000 French troops under General Charles Latrille de Lorencez set out to attack Puebla de Los Angeles. From his new headquarters in the north, Juarez rounded up a rag-tag force of loyal men and sent them to Puebla. Led by Texas-born General Zaragoza, the 2,000 Mexicans fortified the town and prepared for the French assault. On the fifth of May, 1862, Lorencez drew his army, well-provisioned and supported by heavy artillery, before the city of Puebla and began their assault from the north. The battle lasted from daybreak to early evening, and when the French finally retreated they had lost nearly 500 soldiers to the fewer than 100 Mexicans killed.

Although not a major strategic victory in the overall war against the French, Zaragoza’s victory at Puebla tightened Mexican resistance, and six years later France withdrew. The same year, Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, who had been installed as emperor of Mexico by Napoleon in 1864, was captured and executed by Juarez’ forces. Puebla de Los Angeles, the site of Zaragoza’s historic victory, was renamed Puebla de Zaragoza in honor of the general.

Mexico

Cinco de Mayo is a regional holiday limited primarily to the state of Puebla. There is some limited recognition of the holiday in other parts of the country.

United States

In a 1998 study in the Journal of American Culture it was reported that there were more than 120 official U.S. celebrations of Cinco de Mayo, and they could be found in 21 different states. An update in 2006, found that the number of official Cinco de Mayo events was 150 or more, according to Jose Alamillo, professor of ethnic studies at Washington State University in Pullman, who has studied the cultural impact of Cinco de Mayo north of the border.

In the United States Cinco de Mayo has taken on a significance beyond that in Mexico. The date is perhaps best recognized in the United States as a date to celebrate the culture and experiences of Americans of Mexican ancestry, much as St. Patrick’s Day, Oktoberfest, and the Chinese New Year are used to celebrate those of Irish, German, and Chinese ancestry respectively. Similar to those holidays, Cinco de Mayo is observed by many Americans regardless of ethnic origin. Celebrations tend to draw both from traditional Mexican symbols, such as the Virgen de Guadalupe, and from prominent figures of Mexican descent in the United States, including Cesar Chavez. To celebrate, many display Cinco de Mayo banners while school districts hold special events to educate pupils about its historical significance. Special events and celebrations highlight Mexican culture, especially in its music and regional dancing. Examples include baile folklorico and mariachi demonstrations held annually at the Plaza del Pueblo de Los Angeles, near Olvera Street. Commercial interests in the United States have capitalized on the celebration, advertising Mexican products and services, with an emphasis on beverages, foods, and music.

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