READING FOR THE WEEKEND (7-31-15)

40 years ago today (July 31, 1975), the Teamsters' Jimmy Hoffa disappeared. 

Jimmy Carter: The United States is an "oligarchy with unlimited political bribery" (The Intercept).

When the hunter becomes the hunted - the American dentist who paid $55,000 to kill Cecil the Lion now receiving death threats (Business Insider).

After being asked to call, the hunter of Cecil the Lion contacts federal authorities (Huffington Post / CNBC).

China dumps U.S. treasuries at record rate (sott.net).


CONSERVATIVE NIGHTMARE:  EASY VOTING & EDUCATED VOTERS
Under new Oregon law, all eligible voters are registered unless they opt out (LA Times).

The rights fear of education: What I learned as a (former) conservative military man (Salon).


MORE CLIMATE NEWS
Climate change skeptics may be about to lose one of their favorite arguments (Washington Post).

We'll probably be paying for this too ... Florida leads nation in property at risk from climate change (Miami Herald).

Alaska's terrifying wildfire season and what it says about climate change (Washington Post).

It's not climate change - It's everything change (Medium Matter).


RACE IN AMERICA ... IS THIS THE 21st CENTURY?
This 1956 guidebook for black travelers - "The Negro Motorist's Green Book" - is an important reminder of America's racist past (Fusion).

'Collective Healing' at Black Lives Matter convergence ends with police pepper-spraying teen (Nation of Change).

TRYING TO UNDERSTAND DYSFUNCTIONAL AMERICA
It's not who he is, it's who he hates: The secret to Donald Trump's toxic appeal (Salon).

Texas governor vetoes mental health legislation because he doesn't believe mental illness is real (Green Village Gazette).

Addiction: It's not you, it's your cage (Huffington Post).

Growing Up Inside: How the cards are stacked against America's 'youngest murderers' (Yahoo News).


THE CHANGING FACE OF AMERICAN HEGEMONY
China and Russia lay foundation for massive economic cooperation (Foreign Policy).

How China and Russia are running rings around Washington establishment politics (Salon).

The balance of power just changed in the Middle East (Nation of Change).


DAMMIT, WE NEED MORE GUNS ... OR DO WE?
Florida road rage incident turns deadly in horrifying 'stand your ground' killing (Raw Story).

New Harvard study obliterates every single NRA lie about guns (Addicting Info).

MAPPING NORTH AMERICA
Which of the 11 American nations do you live in (Washington Post)?

Nine nations of North America, 30 years later (NY Times).


FOX NEWS & THE CLOSING OF THE CONSERVATIVE MIND
Sean Hannity is killing the GOP: Fox News & conservative media have the party in a stranglehold (Salon).

They don't give a damn about governing: Conservative media's influence on the Republican Party (Harvard's Shorenstein Center on MP & PP).

David Frum in 2010: "Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and we're discovering we work for Fox" (ABC News).

What David Frum's firing from the AEI tells us about conservative think tanks ... they're supposed to "serve as made-to-order propagandists" (Harper's Magazine).

David Frum and the closing of the conservative mind (Bruce Bartlett's Blog).

MISCELLANEOUS
What do you know ... cost growth in Medicare has been slower than in the private sector (Paul Krugman / NY Times).

Princeton Study: The U.S. is an oligarchy, not a democracy (BBC).

IMF: No bailout for Greece (Business Insider).

Deal with it - Tom Brady and the Patriots are cheaters (Boston Globe).

- Mark

REPUBLICAN PARTY: "PLEASE, DON'T VOTE ... BUT IF YOU DO, BE PREPARED TO BE HARRASSED"

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Over the years I've written or posted about Republican efforts to manipulate or discourage voting in America. Recognizing that their message and platform doesn't resonate with women, people of color, or America's youth the GOP has gone out of its way to make it harder for these groups to vote.

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To learn more about these efforts you can click on the links provided above, or you can check out this clip - which mocks the real goal behind GOP voter ID laws (among others). It's sardonic humor at its finest.

Enjoy ...

________________________________

And, yes, I'll try and post this again a few months before the 2016 elections.

- Mark

ANOTHER LOOK AT AMERICA'S WELFARE QUEENS ... IT'S NOT WHO YOU THINK THEY ARE

Over two years ago I wrote how corporate welfare and tax breaks for the rich outpaces what we spend on general welfare programs. While tax breaks for corporations and higher income groups are confusingly referred to as "tax expenditures" the net effect is they cost the U.S. Treasury well over $1 trillion. 

These tax breaks are usually write-offs and deductions that come in the form of subsidies, legal protections, and various legislative gifts. Because they cover so many areas, they have also created a sense of tax entitlement for America's wealthiest class. For a glimpse into the entitlement mindset one needs to look no further than the state of New York's tax breaks for millionaire yacht owners.

The sense of tax entitlements is so entrenched that financial analysts and wealth managers (yes, my friends in the field too) speak of financial subsidies and specialized tax breaks like they're gifts of nature, as if they're part of the periodic table of the elements.

Below is a list of just ten tax expenditure categories, which contribute to our $1.1 trillion tax deduction bonanza each year.

The Washington Post took a look at these 10 deductions, which you can see here.

In the FYI category, the $1.1 trillion in tax expenditures discussed here does not include the more than $4 trillion we dumped into Wall Street after 2008.

At the end of the day, we need to think about our priorities as a society. For me, they're quite clear. And they don't include subsidizing the lifestyles of those who have the highest incomes, and then claim to be rugged individualists who get no help from the government.

- Mark

FYI: From Forbes magazine we get "15 Ways to Turn Your Bucket List Into a Tax Deduction."

WORLD RECORD SEMI TRUCK JUMP

In the FYI category, I would pay to see this event with my son ...

- Mark

RETIREMENT SCAMS, STRAIGHT FROM WALL STREET (Part II): Put Wall St. in Charge of Social Security?

Wall Street and their brokers want our social security accounts. What could go wrong?

In "Retirement Scams, Straight From Wall Street (Part I)" I discussed Wall Street's penchant for putting their interests above their clients. I wrote the post not just to "let the clients beware" of how their accounts are used by others. I wrote about Wall Street scamming clients because we are being told - once again - that Wall Street is the best place for your money since, you know, market players are rational and know what they're doing.

Never mind that Wall Street has been rescued so often since the 1980s that it's hard (for me, at least) to keep a straight face when anyone discusses the discipline and magic of the market today. 

Never mind that Wall Street has been the beneficiary of so much artificially cheap money from the Federal Reserve that the once mocking reference to the "Greenspan Put" has been replaced with a confused sounding "Quantitative Easing" so ordinary Americans never catch on to the financial welfare.

Never mind that after a string of market bailouts that Wall Street still needed the Mother of All Bailouts, which included an infusion of well over $4 trillion after 2008 - plus additional guarantees of $14 trillion - for their market bets. 

So, yeah, don't pay attention to the financial wizard behind the curtains. 

With neither history nor market fundamentals on their side, one has to wonder why we're being asked to trust Wall Street one more time. 

The reason why is built on a retirement scam for the ages, straight from Wall Street.

THE SMOKE & MIRRORS BEHIND PRIVATIZATION
The suggestion that market players know what they're doing is part of a larger strategy designed to transfer money in the social security trust fund over to Wall Street. To do this the Republicans need to talk about protecting social security. The problem is there's nothing wrong with social security. The reality is "protecting social security" is a deliberate scare tactic, and a GOP Trojan Horse. 

The GOP needs you and me to believe that social security is going broke. It's the only way they can propose their solution, which is to "privatize" the program. Don't be confused by the pitch. In real simple terms privatization is another way of saying let's transfer your social security account over to Wall Street.  

To do this the GOP is pushing impressively sounding plans that create "private retirement accounts" for you and me. Again, let's not be fooled by language. The real goal is to gut and destroy social security by shifting the trillions we have in social security accounts into Wall Street managed accounts. 

The problem with this plan is that - with the exception of Paul Ryan a few years back - no one in the GOP is saying, "Let's hand over the trillions we have in the social security accounts to Wall Street." That would be political suicide. Even Donald Trump isn't crazy enough to say it (then again, who knows about tomorrow). 

So it's all smoke & mirrors for the GOP, and begins with the scary sounding plan to protect social security since it's going broke.

THE SMOKE ...
Here's the problem with the GOP plan. It's based on a lie. Actually, it's based on many lies. I'll discuss just two here.  

Lie #1: Social security is going broke.

I've written and spoken about this lie so often it's just easier for me to list several op-eds and other social security posts for you to review.

"The 'Social Security Is Going Bankrupt' Lie" (Bakersfield Californian, 12-17-12). 

"The Stock Market vs. Social Security" Part I (Which Pays More?), Part II (Worse Case Scenarios), and Part III (Privatization ... A Bailout in Perpetuity). 

"No 'Crisis' in Social Security: National Leadership in 'Crisis' as it Attempts to Dupe America" (Bakersfield Californian, 3-27-05)

Not only is the social security program good, but our nation owes the "trust fund" trillions of dollars. Why do we owe it trillions? Because the program is self funding, and has generated such a large surplus that successive presidents - both Republican and Democrats - have raided the surpluses to run the country.

There's more. Much more. So let me repeat. Social security is not going broke. The only "protecting" it needs is from the financial sycophants in Congress who want to hand social security over to Wall Street. 

This brings us to our second lie.

Lie #2:  We can rescue and protect social security by letting private market players - and especially those on Wall Street - manage "private" social security accounts. 

Incredibly, we've done something like this before. Let's take a look.

THE MIRRORS ... WE'VE 'PRIVATIZED' BEFORE

In 2009 I wrote about Bush administration appointee Charles E.F. Millard. He was put in charge of the Private Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), the federal agency that manages the retirement fund of 44 million retirees.

The PBGC is a government managed pension program that has absorbed retirement plans from collapsed industries and bankrupt companies. The goal of the PBGC is to make sure people who worked and paid into company sponsored retirement accounts get what they paid for, even if the company or industry went bankrupt or no longer exists.

Here's where it gets fun. 

For years the PBGC embraced a very conservative market strategy. They didn't go after "can't lose" or high paying "double your money" derivative markets. They played it safe and purchased boring but stable products, like government bonds. 

Then Charles E.F. Millard - who came from the financial sector - was appointed as head of the PBGC. Then he had a market epiphany. 

Months before the market crashed in 2008 Millard put almost all of the PBGC's very stable $64 billion account into the market. He wanted to grow the fund, as it were.

In effect Millard was "privatizing" the PBGC's portfolio by turning it over to Wall Street. A once stable and protected multi-billion dollar portfolio account was sent to a place where market players could bet on the stock market and emerging market accounts. 

Then the market collapsed. Oops.

Millard would later say that he can't be criticized for making such an ill-timed and famously bad decision because we don't know how the markets will look in the future. 

Yeah, and that lemon of an automobile the used car dealer sold you actually works, as long as you let it coast down hill.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS
With investors losing 5-10 percent of their long-term savings due to "conflicted" advice from brokers and wealth managers, we know that at least $17 billion from private 401k accounts gets transferred to brokers. And it's all legal. This alone should give pause to any privatization talk.

For those of you pointing to our soaring stock market, suggesting that private accounts would be soaring too - so none of this matters - I have one thing to say: Get a life. 

Wall Street's doing fine because we dumped over $4 trillion into the market in the Mother of All Bailouts, and have committed another $14 trillion. The financial magic we're seeing on Wall Street has nothing to do with market fundamentals, and everything to do with taxpayer backed bailouts, and "magically" appearing Federal Reserve credits and guarantees for market players. 

By now you're probably wondering, "So if history and market fundamentals aren't on Wall Streets side, why should we dump our social security funds into Wall Street accounts?". 

The answer is really simple.  We shouldn't. The proposal is a scam. 

Creating private social security accounts - or privatizing social security - guarantees that trillions of dollars will be dumped into the market, in perpetuity. It's designed to insure that the bailout gravy train for Wall Street that started in 2008 continues. 

Best of all, with the federal government insuring that the "rents" are collected Wall Street doesn't have to worry about the peasants doing something irrational, like stopping payments when market players screw things up again (and they will).

So, yeah, privatizing social security is a Trojan Horse. Worse, it's a retirement scam straight from Wall Street. 

- Mark

"DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO" ... CONSERVATIVE ADVICE, AND THEIR GROWING VICTIMHOOD REALITY

What conservatives say and do are two different things. The incredible part is they don't see it. Via fusion.net ... 

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- Mark

BILL COSBY'S ACCUSERS SPEAK OUT

This is an extraordinary review from New York magazine: "'I'm no longer afraid': 35 women tell their stories about being assaulted by Bill Cosby and the culture that wouldn't listen."

- Mark 

FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS AND HOLOGRAM CONCERTS ... EVEN A DIGITAL LIKENESS IS NOW A THREAT?

In this Rolling Stones piece, contributor John Knefel asks if city officials in Hammond, Indiana and Chicago, Illionois are treating rapper Chief Keef like a terrorist. After the city of Hammond shut down a digital performance by the artist, they claimed that the rapper's lyrics and show posed a threat to the safety of the general public.

Using language more appropriate for terrorist threats, government officials are arguing that public safety is the issue here. Their rationale seems to be that an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.

In Chicago the office of Mayor Rahm Emmanuel called off a Chief Keef concert, referring to Keef as "an unacceptable role model" whose music "promotes violence," which "posed a significant public safety risk" - even if he was not present but appearing in hologram form.

Without drawing any parallels to the messages, it's instructive to review Robert Kennedy's comments to the Sheriff and D.A. of Kern County (California) on how the First Amendment and the U.S. Constitution are supposed to work in America.

If we really want to do something about public safety I suggest we address the conditions that drive someone like Chief Keef to carve his message the way he does. Killing the messenger has never been a good idea, especially because of the threat it poses to America's First Amendment rights.

- Mark 

Addendum: In the FYI category, the Kennedy clip captures an iconic moment between Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Kern County Sheriff Roy F. Galyen in 1966. The exchange between Kennedy and Galyen focused attention on Kern County law enforcement in general, and Sheriff Galyen in specific, because they had a habit of arresting picketing farm workers organized by UFW co-founders Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, which I discuss here.

READING FOR THE WEEK (7-27-15)

65 years ago today - July 27, 1940 - Bugs Bunny made his film debut. 

Mutant daisies photographed near Fukushima plant go viral (The Weather Network).

Cool stuff ... Truck transforms into a comfy castle (San Francisco Globe).

Former deputy county sheriff indicted for her role in 'no-knock' drug raid that maimed a toddler in his playpen (FBI / TPM).

This chart shows how many people in your state are eating enough fruits and vegetables (Mother Jones).

SERIOUSLY?
British couple gets hit with $200,000 bill because their child was born during their vacation in New York city (Addicting Info).

$500 million program has only trained 60 Syrians to fight ISIL (Military.com).

Yes, Cheetos, funnel cake, and Domino's are approved school lunch items (Mother Jones).

Are we here already? Ignoring that Senator Bernie Sanders's family was killed during the holocaust, and the fact that democratic socialism has nothing to do with Nazism (or eastern European socialism), The National Review is saying Sanders is a national socialist - or a Nazi (Vox).


GOP INFIGHTING ... CRUZ vs. McCONNELL CAGE MATCH
A must watch ... Ted Cruz goes off on Mitch McConnell on the Senate floor, saying that he was lied to by Senator McConnell (C-SPAN).

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the GOP leadership humiliate Ted Cruz on the Senate floor (Salon).


COMEDIC RELIEF
Is this Donald Trump's campaign car (Ring of Fire)?

Comedian gets vengeance on telemarketer with interruptions and confused responses that eventually gets him cussed out by telemarketers supervisor [video] (Social News Daily).

Four old ladies in a car accident, play-by-play voicemail; hilarious (Youtube).


CLIMATE CHANGE INFO TO SHARE WITH YOUR IDIOT FRIENDS
Clip: The Bravery of Rachel Carson (Bill Moyers & Company).

Obama administration releases Third National Climate Assessment for the United States (NOAA).

Earth's most famous climate scientist issues bombshell sea level warning (Slate).

The National Climate Assessment says were in deep trouble. This chart shows why (Bill Moyers & Company).

The sources behind the relentless attack on climate scientist Ben Santer (Bill Moyers & Company).


AFTERMATH OF THE IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL
Europe backs Iran nuclear deal in signal to U.S. Congress (Reuters).

Israel may ask U.S. for more aid over Iran nuclear deal (NDTV).


PRISON ECONOMICS: IS THIS REALLY AMERICA?
How for-profit prisons have become the biggest lobby no one is talking about (Washington Post).

From a first arrest to a life sentence (Washington Post).

MISCELLANEOUS
Three unedifying lessons of the Greek deal (Financial Times).

Debunking conservative lies about taxes (Samuel-Warde).

Blood, manipulation, and lies: Press freedom in Mexico (COHA).

12 planes hit by blinding lasers in NJ among dozens targeted in U.S. in one night (NJ.com).

- Mark

BERNIE UNDERSTANDS THE BIG PICTURE ...

Health care, education, and our criminal justice system should not be privatized.

- Mark

ARE WE ALL GREEKS NOW ... AND STARRING IN OUR OWN GREEK TRAGEDY?

In Bill Moyers & Co. Chris Hedges comments on the slow but steady destruction of our freedoms through corporate capitalism. 

In "We are all Greeks now" Hedges explains how, like Greece, we have become tragic figures who embrace a mythical market system that promises a greater good for all. The tragedy comes from living in a system that ends up producing greater inequalities and distorted incentives, both of which undermine the human condition.

Human life is of no concern to corporate capitalists. The suffering of the Greeks, like the suffering of ordinary Americans, is very good for the profit margins of financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs. It was, after all, Goldman Sachs—which shoved subprime mortgages down the throats of families it knew could never pay the loans back, sold the subprime mortgages as investments to pension funds and then bet against them—that orchestrated complex financial agreements with Greece, many of them secret. These agreements doubled the debt Greece owes under derivative deals and allowed the old Greek government to mask its real debt to keep borrowing. And when Greece imploded, Goldman Sachs headed out the door with suitcases full of cash.

The system of unfettered capitalism is designed to callously extract money from the most vulnerable and funnel it upward to the elites. This is seen in the mounting fines and fees used to cover shortfalls in city and state budgets. Corporate capitalism seeks to privatize all aspects of government service, from education to intelligence gathering. The US Postal Service appears to be next. Parents already must pay hundreds of dollars for their public-school children to take school buses, go to music or art classes and participate in sports or other activities. Fire departments, ambulance services, the national parks system are all slated to become fodder for corporate profit. It is the death of the civil society.

The fact that no one seems concerned over the gaps that exist between our free market promises and the market reality we live is a problem.

It's especially troubling because it moves us beyond sharing a common embrace of free market myths with the people of Greece. 

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It means we're actually starring in our own Greek tragedy. 

- Mark

BANKING RULES IN AMERICA ... THIS IS WHAT CLASS WARFARE IS BUILT ON

This is short and simple. But, yeah, it's a two-tiered system.

THE RULES FOR US
When you and I take risks and end up in financial trouble we have a set of rules we must follow, courtesy of the banks and financial institutions ...

THE RULES FOR THEM
When our nation's financial institutions and banks gamble and bet too much - like on the reckless loans and assorted financial products they sold to us - the financial sector gets to operate according to another set of rules, courtesy of the U.S. Congress and the Federal Reserve ...

Just as you can not call a line crooked until you see a straight one, you can't see class warfare if don't understand how the game is rigged for those at the top of our financial food chain. 

- Mark 

TELEMARKETER HELL, COURTESY OF TOM MABE

This is hilarious, and a classic. This Tom Mabe "murder scene" call turns the tables on a telemarketer who's probably much wiser for experience ...

- Mark 

WHAT RECESSION? THE NUMBER OF BILLIONAIRES HAS DOUBLED SINCE 2008

Via Oxfam we get a look at how the wealth of the mega rich dwarfs the wealth of the top 1%, who make the rest of us look poor.

- Mark  

WHAT INEQUALITY LOOKS LIKE IN REAL TIME

In case you missed it ...

You can catch the story here.

- Mark 

RETIREMENT SCAMS, STRAIGHT FROM WALL STREET (Part I): Let the Clients Beware ...

Salon has an article with a video clip of Senator Elizabeth Warren questioning financial executives during a congressional hearing. Primerica's President Peter Schneider was the target. He had been invited by Senate Republicans to help defend their opposition to financial regulations. It didn't go well. 

Schneider couldn't answer whether it was the financial industry's duty to operate in the best interest of their clients. With Schneider acting conveniently confused (or stubborn), Senator Warren cut to the chase and made the question even simpler:

Do you believe that people like these firefighters from Florida who are near retirement and have secure pensions with guaranteed monthly payments, should move their money into riskier assets with no guarantees, just before they retire?

The best Schneider could come up with was that "each situation is very different." 

What Schneider wants us to believe is that the financial world is too complex to make broad statements about customer service, like putting the interests of your clients first.

If you're as stupid as Schneider probably thinks everyone else is your head probably hurts from all the complex thinking here. So let's alleviate the pain.

If you are getting paid for a service it's your duty to put your clients interests first. Period. 

Strangely, some people on Wall Street don't seem to understand this simple principle, as the following makes clear.

LET THE CLIENTS BEWARE
Let's make this real clear. In the aftermath of the 2008 market meltdown, some of the biggest firms in the financial industry have fought to deny that their clients interests come first. 

What they've done in the past help us understand why they think this way. 

Not many know this, but it's a regular practice for market players in the industry to dip into client accounts, and then to use that money in the pursuit of company profits. While the industry refers to the practice as repo borrowing, stripped of the market jargon it's really an interest free loan from your account to the firm. 

Then we have the examples of the biggest financial firms getting caught luring clients into purchasing products that are so complex and toxic that it's hard to detect whose interests are being served, let alone if the products were built to explode down the road. 

Conceptually we can think about it this way. With the help of Goldman Sachs Greece signed derivative deals in 2001 that only kicked their financial can of troubles down the road. The Goldman Sachs escorted deals also piled on more debt, which set the table for successive bailouts that have primarily benefited the banks. 

Now ask yourself this question: Would the EU have been so receptive to Greece's Euro application if Goldman Sachs had actually served Greece's interests first - by telling them that hiding and piling on more debt wasn't a good idea - instead of serving their own fee-driven interests? 

The Goldman-Greece derivative deal earned Goldman Sachs $300 million, but did virtually nothing to help Greece. How is this good for our markets, or clients like Greece?

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
These and other examples, make it clear that financial firms often see "clients not as valuable customers but as 'objects' for making profit."

If you don't want to believe this is the case consider the following: Current and past bankers from Goldman Sachs openly disagreed during a congressional hearing whether the firm has a duty to act in the best interests of its clients.

So, yeah, when it comes to dealing with Goldman Sachs and other financial firms on Wall Street," let the clients beware."

The Elizabeth Warren questioning of Peter Schneider makes this abundantly clear.

- Mark

Next: Retirement Scams, Straight From Wall Street (Part II): Put Wall Street in Charge of Social Security?

THE ARRIVAL OF MAN-MADE EARTHQUAKES

From The New Yorker: 

Until 2008, Oklahoma experienced an average of one to two earthquakes of 3.0 magnitude or greater each year ... In 2009, there were twenty. The next year, there were forty-two. In 2014, there were five hundred and eighty-five, nearly triple the rate of California. Including smaller earthquakes in the count, there were more than five thousand. This year, there has been an average of two earthquakes a day of magnitude 3.0 or greater.

So, what's happening? You can read the article here.

- Mark 

THE "PARTY OF NO" IS REAL, AND ALWAYS HAS BEEN

With the nation's economy on the verge of economic collapse, and facing two wars in 2009, Senator Voinovich's "just say no" confession should be surprising. In fact, it reaffirms everything we already knew about the GOP's planned obstructionism at the beginning of President Obama's first term. It also tells us that what the GOP did was not based on a principled difference of opinion. It was rooted in sabotage and sedition that borders on disloyalty to country.

While I wrote about this in 2009 and 2011, Time magazine has Senator Voinovich's comments here.

- Mark 

IF YOU THINK GRADUATING FROM COLLEGE DEBT FREE IS A GOOD IDEA THEN TAKE A LOOK AT BERNIE SANDERS

This is one of the reasons why I like Senator Bernie Sanders ...

Bloomberg has the details here.

- Mark 

CAN YOU CHEAT, AND STILL HOLD THE MORAL HIGH GROUND? APPARENTLY, YES, IF YOU'RE NOT UNDER OATH

Via the Washington Post, we learn how and when it's OK to cheat on your spouse, while still holding the moral high ground ...

Here's the logic in a nutshell.

Representatives Newt Gingrich (R-GA), Denny Hastert (R-IL), and Bob Livingston (R-LA) pursued impeachment charges against President Clinton for lying about having an affair. However, all three had also cheated on their wives, in the process breaking the oaths and bonds of love they had committed themselves to in front of family and friends (and presumably "God"). But they didn't lie about their sexually charged affairs under oath.

Only a true scoundrel would do that, right?

It's this distinction that gave them the moral high ground to go after President Clinton, while maintaining the dignity of our institutions.

Cough, cough ...

- Mark 

AN AMERICAN JOBS PROGRAM; IT HELPS AMERICA TOO

For the record, we've already spent $2 trillion on Iraq, and more than $4 trillion on the bailout for Wall Street. Incredibly, we've committed at least $10 trillion more for the bailout in perpetuity for Wall Street too.

Let that sink in for a moment.

- Mark 

MID-WEEK READING (July 21, 2015)

How different groups think about scientific issues (Pew Research Center).

NBA owners crying poor mouth (again). My former hallway chatter colleague, and rising sports economist-commentator, David Berri, explains the truth behind the claim (MSNBC's Sports Matters).

Cops being cops? Arizona cop arrests naked woman after entering her home illegally (RT).

Ronald Reagan: "Social Security has nothing to do with the deficit" (Samuel-Warde / Facebook).


WHEN POVERTY BECOMES A CRIME
How driving while poor became a crime in California (Think Progress).

To prison for poverty (Brave New Films).


WAL-MART BUSINESS MODEL ... TAX HAVENS AND PUBLIC ASSISTANCE
Wal-mart has $76 billion in undisclosed tax havens (Bloomberg).

Report: Wal-Mart workers cost taxpayers $6.2 billion in public assistance (Forbes).

Bombshell report finds that Wal-Mart is hiding billions of dollars to avoid paying taxes (Politicus USA).


JUST INTERESTING
'We had no idea it was going to do that': See 'incredible' result of throwing basketball over the edge of a dam (The Blaze).

Check out JFK's winter home in Florida, which just sold for $35 million (Lonny).

The father of the American shopping mall hated what he created (Quartz).

Mom receives surprising bill after 3-year-old son damages neighbor's car (Opposing Views).


THE MILITARY
U.S. efforts to intervene and influence conflict zones threatened by growing Chinese arms exports, which are flooding international markets (Foreign Policy).

The U.S. military's trillion dollar boondoggle ... faulty fighter planes show the defense industry's focus is on 'industry' not 'defense' (Al Jazeera).


EL CHAPO GUZMAN ESCAPES
Photos of Mexican drug kingpin enjoying life after escape (RT).

Prison break: New footage released of Mexican drug baron's escape tunnel, with video (RT).

El Chapo Guzman 'vows to make Donald Trump swallow his words' (Telegraph).

Pitbull responds to Donald Trump, telling him to watchout for "El Chapo" (Business Insider / World Star) 


GOOGLE NEWS ... IT'S NOTHING PERSONAL
Google's first self-driving car in accident involving injury, passengers suffer whiplash (RT).

Germany to test drive self-driving cars, 'won't rely on Google' (RT).


MISCELLANEOUS
The Republican Party has literally become the party of stupid (Forward Progressives).

Poll: 30% of GOP voters believe Obama wants to impose martial law in Texas (Samuel-Warde).

Thomas Piketty: Germany has never repaid its debts. It has no right to lecture Greece (The Wire).

Half the world already gets more power from renewables than from nuclear (Quartz).

- Mark