Tag Archives: politics

When remembered at all, Edward Abbey is mostly thought of as an environmentalist and anarchist but there is no gainsaying the racism and xenophobia on display in his 1983 essay, “Immigration and Liberal Taboos.” The opinion piece was originally solicited by the New York Times, which ultimately declined to publish it — or to pay him the customary kill fee. It was subsequently rejected by Harper’s, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Rolling Stone, Newsweek,...

So there wasn’t the groundswell of interest in my old axes in comments, so all continued grinding after the jump. Just to recall I stopped after 3 on a list which continued 4) John Kerry is much too stubborn. He won’t admit it when he is wrong. He should be more willing flip flop 5) Al Gore is a bearer of inconvenient truths who deserves much of the credit (or blame) for the existence of the internet 6) Bill Clinton is an ultra wonk who is relatively...

This post is self therapy and probably not worth your time. Outline before the Jump 1) Hillary Clinton is very honest. Too honest 2) Mitt Romney is extremely dishonest. He lies often and without shame. Also he made his money conning ex friends. 3) John McCain was a major flip-flopper 4) John Kerry is much too stubborn. He won’t admit it when he is wrong. He should be more willing flip flop 5) Al Gore is a bearer of inconvenient truths who deserves much...

Lloyd Alter at treehuggers: The only thing that really works for recycling is full producer responsibility. If a producer sells a product, the container is theirs and the contents belong to the customer. This is how it used to work with beer, pop, milk, water for the water cooler, and it is what consumers and producers have to get back to achieve zero waste and a circular economy. California has a long history of calling for deposits on both PET plastic,...

half showed no signs of a prior, undiagnosed illness.” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), and plainly speaking, they were not mentally ill. Yesterday on Monday morning; President Trump: “Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun. We must reform our mental health laws to better identify mentally disturbed individuals who may commit acts of violence and make sure those people not only get treatment and if necessary, involuntary confinement.” This is...

(Dan here…lifted from Robert’s Stochastic Thoughts) by Robert Waldmann The optics are as bad as they look  Dean “The Optics aren’t as bad as they look” Baquet just confirmed that he actually doesn’t do his job any more. He doesn’t decide what is on the front page of the New York Times. He doesn’t explain what he does (except force reporters to tone down their story on the Trump campaigns connections to Russia until it falsely asserted that the FBI had...

This post will be especially confused. I am thinking about cash bail and how it is unacceptable that richer people have more liberty than poorer people. For some reason my thoughts turned to Jeffrey Epstein currently held without bail, because of course. Now he hasn’t been convicted yet, and I do support the 5th and 6th amendments, so I have a problem. I will try to solve the problem. I’m going to start with Hobbes, Locke, Mill and Nozick (which one...

. H/T Holly Nelson

I have met this man on several occasions. He is one of the most unimposing and quiet people I have ever run across. You would never know he is one of the most knowledgeable and capable constitutional attorneys in the nation having testified to Congress on SCOTUS appointments. Erwin Chemerinsky: In Marbury vs. Madison, in 1803, the Supreme Court declared that it is “the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.”Quoting Chief...

(Dan here…lifted from Robert’s Stochastic Thoughts) by Robert Waldmann Nomoremisterniceblog almost states the bitter truth, but he’s too nice to tell us what fools we are. He wrote: I don’t want to relitigate the McGovern and Mondale campaigns, but Dukakis? “Free everything and impossible promises” weren’t what defeated him. My comment I want to relitigate events of 1984, which Delaney has sent down the memory hole. Mondale was not hammered because he...