- Stop Coddling the Super-Rich – NYTimes.com – Warren Buffett
- Our leaders have asked for “shared sacrifice.” But when they did the asking, they spared me. …
- The mega-rich pay income taxes at a rate of 15 percent on most of their earnings but pay practically nothing in payroll taxes. It’s a different story for the middle class: typically, they fall into the 15 percent and 25 percent income tax brackets, and then are hit with heavy payroll taxes to boot. …
- Twelve members of Congress will soon take on the crucial job of rearranging our country’s finances. They’ve been instructed to devise a plan that reduces the 10-year deficit by at least $1.5 trillion. It’s vital, however, that they achieve far more than that. …Only action that is immediate, real and very substantial will prevent [many Americans'] doubt from morphing into hopelessness. That feeling can create its own reality.
- More About the Texas Unmiracle – NYTimes.com – Paul Krugman
- …this graph should put paid to the notion that Texas somehow escaped the recession, or that there was something miraculous about its job creation. Once you take account of population growth, nothing special happened.
- Don’t Defend the University, Transform it! « STIR
- Could it be that rather than seize our placard shields, we should instead rejoice in the downfall of the institution? Or should we perhaps seize this opportunity to search for ways to re-imagine the university and radically transform its inner workings, to look at the actual functioning of the university, to question the kind of subjects it produces and the form of market-led ‘common sense’ that it reproduces?
- David Gregory Compares Perry’s Talk of Secession to Obama’s Health Care Law | Crooks and Liars • by Heather
- From this weekend’s coverage of the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa on MSNBC, another classic example of Villager, “both sides”, false equivalencies.
- Safety in Numbers? | ACLU Blog – Rachel Myers
- In the last decade, New York drastically reduced its prison population and at the same time experienced a huge drop in crime. Indiana, on the other hand, drastically increased its prison population — and consequently the burden to taxpayers — while seeing a much smaller drop in crime than the national average.
- A new infographic out from the ACLU today shows that, contrary to conventional wisdom, increasing a state’s prison population isn’t necessarily a good way to make that state safer.
- Extremism in the Defense of Corporate Interests is No Vice | Balloon Juice • by mistermix
- Rick Perry says a lot of crazy shit, but the most interesting piece of Perry stupidity that I’ve seen is what he tried to do with the HPV vaccine in Texas. Perry mandated that all sixth grade girls in Texas be vaccinated with Merck’s Gardasil vaccine in 2007, a decision that he’s only now walking back.
- Providing HPV vaccine for those who can’t afford it, and educating parents and children about the benefits of the vaccine are both positive, progressive policy steps. Mandating vaccination for a disease that can only be sexually transmitted is certainly something any real conservative wouldn’t support. But when Perry’s friends at Merck told him to jump, he jumped as high as he possibly could…
- Long Beach Police Frowns on Your “No Apparent Aesthetic Value” Photos
- According to police chief Jim McDonnell, who spoke to The Long Beach Post, if officers find someone taking photos “of something like a refinery…it is incumbent upon the officer to make contact with the individual.” Basically, if you’re not taking photos in “regular tourist behaviour,” the local Californian police feel they have the right to stop and question you. …
- Ah, terrorism. As PetaPixel’s Michael Zhang points out, “what if some terrorist is an awesome photographer?”
[My bookmarks live at delicious.com/camryl. In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. Also, signal boosts are awesome! --L.]
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