Yay!

Erin Burnett is a CNBC economics analyst. On the today’s Meet The Press she had this to say:

MS. BURNETT: Well, I think it’s interesting, because by the way, I don’t think the stimulus has been a failure, and I think that you are correct that it is perceived that way. But I don’t think it’s actually true. Without that stimulus, we would be significantly worse off than we are right now. There, there’s really no question about it. You can ask any economist on Wall Street or any CEO. I see you shaking your head, I know you disagree. But, but, but, but my reporting would show otherwise.

MR. DIONNE: Keep going.

MS. BURNETT: I–look, I, I, I think the problem is you have the fastest job creation in this recovery than you have in any recession in 25 years, but it is still not enough. You aren’t going to win this on jobs, and that is the problem. It’s going to take a long time. I don’t know how you get around that problem, but technically speaking, this recovery has not been tepid.

http://www.conservativerefocus.com/blog5.php/2010/03/14/evangelical-liberal-challenges-glenn-beck-to-debate-for-assailing-social-justice-proselytizing-churches

But now, something like 300,000 people show up and I have to acknowledge that someone’s listening to him. So who is that?

Well, its the Tea Party. Its the conservative Christians who think that President Obama is a Muslim. Its a legitimate group of right wing intellectuals who feel that our national debt is a real threat to this country. (The problem with this group is that they weren’t screaming when George W Bush was cutting taxes and spending $1 Trillion on two wars to fight a group of insane criminals who caused real damage one day in September.

And its racists. Come on. Admit it.
And its gun nuts. Come on. If they weren’t nuts then why did they artificially create a shortage of bullets, by buying an incredible number of bullets, because they believed President Obama wanted to take their guns away. A fear that was created out of whole cloth by the NRA and Rush Limbaugh (no doubt).

In short it is a disparate mix of rational and irrational groups that feel out of control of the country and afraid of the future for the first time in ten years. A disparate mix that would never ally themselves with a strange kind of paranoid who sees conspiracy around every corner (at least as much as I can tell from the few minutes I can stand to watch Glenn Beck occasionally.)

Yes, I think he may be paranoid.

But I’ve now seen a few clips of Glenn’s rally. And in it he declares that as of his rally America is on its way back, that a new era of religiousness has begun (presumably because of him). Its all a little messianic.

Then I realize just how many of these people are southern Baptist types – and it hits me. They must truly be desperate to follow … a Mormon.

And I get it.

Whistling past the graveyard?

Some of the Chinese workers who's salaries were recently doubled to $293

“This wage increase has been instituted to safeguard the dignity of workers,” said Foxconn Chairman Terry Gou in the statement.

Foxconn recent doubled its wages to $293/month. Most of America’s technology is now manufactured in a walled town of 350,000 to 400,000 people, euphemistically characterized as Foxconn City.

Steve Jobs gets his toys from here. America gets their toys from here.

This place needs unions.

(Excerpted from the Huffington Post)

For the past several years, two U.S. Army posts in Virginia, Fort Eustis and Fort Lee, have been putting on a series of what are called Commanding General’s Spiritual Fitness Concerts. As I’ve written in a number of other posts, “spiritual fitness” is just the military’s new term for promoting religion, particularly evangelical Christianity. And this concert series is no different.

if i

or anybody don’t
know where it her his

my next meal’s coming from
i say to hell with that
that doesn’t matter (and if

he she it or everybody gets a
bellyful without
lifting my finger i say to hell
with that i

say that doesn’t matter) but
if somebody
or you are beautiful or
deep or generous what
i say is

whistle that
sing that yell that spell
that out big (bigger than cosmic
rays war earthquakes famine or the ex

prince of whoses diving into
a whatses to rescue miss nobody’s
probably handbag) because i say that’s not

swell (get me) babe not (understand me) lousy
kid that’s something else my sweet (i feel that’s

true)

Last week Jen PO and I went looking for Osprey and all the natives of my favorite swamp. Ethel and Albert were, for the first time this summer, not at home. The kid has flown and maybe they were taking a break.

We never got real close to any of the big birds, but we got a few shots. We did see an eagle or two.

The nice thing was that the Egrets are back and that timing isn’t always easy to make. They pass through. Next time they might be gone.