Month: March 2008

Caucus Delegates ARE Different

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Much has been made about Hillary Clinton’s comment as to the differences between primary and caucus delegates. Josh Marshall has an analysis that shows this is not a meaningless distinction.

Specifically, caucus goers do not select delegates. They select representatives who go to the next level, either county or state wide, and at the end of this process, a delegate is selected.

So, if Obama representatives do not show up at these meetings, it is possible, and completely within the rules, for Clinton representatives to pick up some delegates this way.

Of course, we have Obama supporters whining that it’s not fair, but given that he raised $55 million dollars in February, investing a million or so in making sure that their representatives actually show up to the higher level caucuses would be a good idea.

Oh Crap! I Agree With The Corner on National Review Online

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Specifically, I agree with David Freddoso when he says that a call to return Spitzer donations is patently absurd.

His money is neither the product of illegality, nor is is an attempt to buy access for an illegal or unsavory cause.

His quote at the end is prize:

If their PR pain threshold is low enough, then I suppose the candidates will return the money or give it to charity (perhaps to battered women’s shelters or something). But I’d actually admire any one of them who has the courage to keep the money and say:

“Well, at least this $2,300 won’t be spent on a whore!”

Then again, that may not be entirely accurate. It is being spent on candidates for Congress…

Amusing.

Maybe, Some Accountability

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As a result of the WaMu board decided that bad mortgages should not get in the way of obscene senior executive bonuses, it looks like some major share holders, and possibly some share holder rights groups are looking at trying to remove the board members.

It probably won’t come to anything, the regulations in place in the US make it very difficult for the owners (share holders) of a company to effect management decisions, but it’s a good start.

Many Security Exploits Financial, Not Technical Issue

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El Reg writes about an academic article that calls for making vendors liable for security exploits.

This is a good idea:

In the real world investment in risk avoidance may not be profitable. Security failures often arise due to perverse incentives rather than the lack of suitable technology. For example, credit card firms can rely on business models that push the cost of fraud onto merchants and consumers rather than investing in reducing the problem themselves. That’s because such investments would place them at a commercial disadvantage to their competitors.

Establishing economic incentives for IT suppliers to produce more secure products is arguably an even greater problem because software publishers are not held liable for the shortcomings of their products. These shortcomings may damage consumer faith in ecommerce but fail to effect sales, so a market-based solution in absence of regulatory pressure is difficult to imagine.

Microsoft would be bankrupt in 6 months.

Southern Baptist Agree that Global Warming is Real

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You know, when the Southern Baptist Convention decides to stop being the Republicans bitch on global warming, it’s pretty significant.

Reasons why it’s significant:

  1. They are saying that Al Gore is right.
  2. They are recognizing reality.
  3. They are realizing that their alignment with one political party is harming them.
  4. A realization that global warming is not a plot of the one-world-government liberals.

Give them time. I think it was 1995 when they finally admitted that they were founded to support slavery, and apologized, because slavery was a bad thing.

Climb Down on Latin American Tensions

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Venezuela has reopened its embassy in Columbia

This is another example how Bush and His Evil Minions™ have poisoned counterterrorism operations. Before Bush and his attempts to overthrow and murder Chavez and his invasion of Iraq, this would have been a major diplomatic incident, bit you would not have seen a mobilization on the borders.

There are legitimate “hot pursuit” situations, though this increasingly appears not to have been one, and I’m expecting a Sy Hersh article in the next week or so casting doubt on the provenance of the laptops “captured” in the operation.

Some facts are clear though.

  • The FARC is a terrorist organization that is not much more than organized crime with a veneer of politics.
  • Chavez is a pompous jerk and a lousy leader.
  • As bad as Chavez is, the political classes of Venezuela are all considerably worse.
  • Mending the relationship with Chavez may be one of the bigger challenges facing Bush’s successor, unless it’s McCain, in which case, he’ll invade.

Just When You Think that Drug Companies Can’t Get Any More Contemptible

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Pfizer is going to court to try and force the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) to reveal the names of its anonymous peer reviewers.

They are trying to subvert the most basic principal of scientific journals, the peer review process, and making the bogus claim that “Scientific journals such as NEJM may have received manuscripts that contain exonerating data for Celebrex and Bextra which would be relevant for Pfizer’s causation defence,” for cases involving its Cox-2 inhibitors Celebrex and Bextra.

One hopes that the just slaps them down.

Thoughts on Spitzer

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First, the definitive post on this matter is from Some Guy with a Website. I won’t quote it here, it’s about 4 paras long, but if you removed the F-bombs and the word “stupid”, it would be one sentence.

According to TPM, it appears that Spitzer was not caught as the result of an investigation of the Emperor’s club escort service, but that the Emperor’s club was caught as a result of an investigation of Spitzer.

It appears that Spitzer had a large number of cash withdrawals from his bank account that were not much less than the $10,000 level which would require notification under the law, and so the bank reported possible “structuring”, of the use of smaller transactions to obscure a larger one.

This is a red flag for things like bribery, so the US Attorney’s public integrity division looked into it, and in following the case, determined that there was no bribery, but that he was paying prostitutes.

I do believe that Spitzer will resign, but not until he has cut a deal, which makes sense. If he were to resign now, he would see a no holds barred felony prosecution by the corrupt politicized Bush DoJ with the goal of putting him in jail for decades.

His resignation would be ceding a major bargaining chip to the prosecution. As a former NY State AG, he knows this.

As to the possible prosecution under the Mann Act, it isn’t going to happen when the principals were both consenting, though it may be used as a lever by the prosecution.

I Don’t Think that I’m a Real Blogger

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I just discovered that both Matthew Yglesias and Duncan “Atrios” Black really hate making phone calls.

Personally, I’ve never done a whole bunch of phone calling for social purposes, except for when I was away from various girl friends, but I have used the phone to communicate information effectively.

I ran a bloody Science Fiction Convention with most of my staff on the other side of Massachusetts in 1990 and 1991, before meaningful email was common.

I would make phone calls, communicate my information, and get off. I wasn’t elegant of sparkling, but I worked the phone well.

I don’t understand “hating the phone”, any more than I understand hating postal mail, or email.

I do hate junk mail of all forms, that is content, rather than medium based.

Does Gary Hart Want Cheese with His Whine?

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Well, Gary Hart is saying that by suggesting that Obama is not fit to be president, Hillary Clinton broke the rules of Democratic politics.

As dhutchinson notes, what Hart said in 1984 was far worse, and he rolls the 1984 NY Times:

Senator Gary Hart said today that Walter F. Mondale, as Vice President, was part of an Administration that was “weak,” “inept,” “uncertain” and marked by “days of shame” in Iran…

“Walter Mondale now promises an America that can and will stand up for its vital interests,” the Colorado Senator told an ebullient crowd of hundreds of students at Texas A&M University here. “But Carter-Mondale actually gave us an America held hostage to the ayatollahs of the world.”

“In national security as in domestic policy,” he said, “we must not leave the American people with a bleak choice in 1984 between two failed pasts – that of Ronald Reagan and that of the Carter-Mondale Administration.”

‘Reagan’s Favorite Opponent’

“After reviewing the record of the Carter-Mondale Administration, I can understand why Walter Mondale is Ronald Reagan’s favorite opponent,” Mr. Hart added.

If Obama and his supporters want to win in November, they need to assume that they have the right where no such right previously existed, to be immune from certain types of criticism.

I was watching Olbermann today (and man does he hate on Hillary Clinton), and he puts up a clip of Obama complaining about how unfair the “red phone ad” was.

Compare that to Gary Hart, or, for that matter, what was done to Howard Dean in 2004 (where they were flat out calling insane), or Al Gore’s use of Willie Horton in 1988.

Clinton is attacking, but she has little interest in making a charge stick. She does not have to.

She is interested in the response, which is always, “It’s not fair.” She is repeatedly bitch slapping Barack Obama, and the response of he and his campaign is, “but it’s not fair.”

It is a message of entitlement, weakness, and passivity, and it will be nothing compared to what McCain and His Evil Minions&trade have in store for him in the general.

Get over yourself and get to work. If you want to beat Hillary Clinton, and John McCain after that, you have to show that you can stand up for yourself before you will convince anyone that you will stand up for them.

Economics Update

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I’m not sure if it even qualifies as news any more, but
oil hit a new record today, topping $107/bbl. Gasoline prices are following this trend, with prices rising $0.09/gallon over the past two weeks.

When this is combined with the fact that houshold wealth fell by $533 billion, (3.6% apr), in q4 of 2007. That’s without considering inflation.

When inflation is taken into account, all of 2007 is down.

In the ever entertaining world of the monoliner insurance, MBIA, is asking Fitch to stop rating its insurance units. They think that Fitch’s model is inaccurate, because Fitch is still considering a downgrade.

MBIA is insolvent, Fitch gets it, and S&P and Moody’s don’t.

As a result of this, we are seeing more of the non-profit and state run college lenders unable to secure financing, and hence unable to make loans.

Remember, these loans cannot be discharged by bankruptcy, and they are federally guaranteed, and no one will buy the paper.

This might explain why Lehman Bros. is cutting 5% of its workforce, about 1400 jobs.

One bit of good news is that China’s trade surplus dropped 63% in February, though one wonders how much of that is currencies readjusting, how much is a slowdown in the world economy, and how much is the winter storm that shut down the country for about a week.

BTW, its official, Malaysia is a Kleptocracy. That’s the only way to explain why, following a defeat that kept the National Front in the majority, but at less than 2/3, that the Kuala Lumpur Composite Index fell so sharply that they had to shut down trading.

This wasn’t even a change in party rule, just a drop below 2/3, and everyone was scrambling to get out because their business positions were predicated on corruption.

O happy day.

For what it’s worth, things are not much better in the US, where hedge funds are seeing margin calls on US treasuries. If treasuries go bad, forget the Honda full of silver, you need ammunition and canned goods.

Arrrrgggghhhh!!!!! Tucker is being Replaced by Dick F*%$ing Gregrory

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Photoshop courtesy of Group News Blog.

Yes, this inside the beltway puke is smiling at Karl Rove doing rap.

Oh well, I guess that the old boyz club at MSNBC could not handle someone anchoring a prime time show with a pair of t***.

Chris “Tweety” Matthews’ man t*** excepted, of course.

There are some other schedule changes at MSNBC, primarily that as opposed to rerunning at midnight, Countdown will rerun at 10:00pm and 2:00am.

Another Bitch Slap

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So Hillary has an interview with Newsweek.com, and she says:

It doesn’t look bleak at all. I have a very close race with Senator Obama. There are elected delegates, caucus delegates and superdelegates, all for different reasons, and they’re all equal in their ability to cast their vote for whomever they choose. Even elected and caucus delegates are not required to stay with whomever they are pledged to. This is a very carefully constructed process that goes back years, and we’re going to follow the process.

And the Obama campaign goes into full whine mode.

Hello, clue here….She is not trying to get delegates to change their votes. She’s trying to make you whine about it so you look weak.

Seriously, if the Obama campaign cannot stand up to Clinton, they have no chance at all against McCain and the Republithug attack machine.

This is embarrassing, seriously. There are any number of responses that are strong, whining about playing hardball when specifically allowed by the rules does not make one look strong, or transformational.

It makes you look like a bunch of punks.

Barack Obama’s campaign sounds more and more like has a glass jaw. Does they shave, or use Windex?

You are being punk’d.