This is offensive! Your privilege is showing, heebs!
Anyhow the first link is NSFW as hell. I don't think that even qualifies as an orgy?
I am reappropriating the signifiers of my pwnification.
But it's cute because it's babies!
This thread used to be way funnier.
But at least LB will never know what's in it.
Some threads really are incomprehensible if you've just read the posts for the last week or so.
I'm posting this link as a volunteer because it's the kind of service-oriented activity that employers love. Hire me!
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Let me see
Felix Salmon on the Greeks thinking the Germans are Nazis. My correlating imagination inspired by the 11:44 comment
If you are a white person in Alabama or Mississippi you have, over the course of American history, had very negative feelings about Northerners. You fought a war to separate from the North at one point and then thought about them as occupiers. But you continue to accept those transfer payments.This is the cost of being in a union, political and fiscal. The Germans want the union but don't want to pay the cost. The Greeks want the union but don't want to live in forced poverty in order to have it. Which is being more hypocritical? Both, I suspect.
Because at Tyler Cowen's we have The Growing Concentration of Education which is about the vicious Pandemoniums of coastal cities like vampires sucking the best freshest flowers of rural youth away, this being the only real reason for the cities productivity and enjoyable life conditions, and then complaining that the countryside is so so stupid and poor and why spend money on them when we need more bike paths
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Unless you say what percentage of the whole population has attended college, it seems kind of silly to get worked up about the percentage of unemployed who attended college.
16: My theory is that heebie-heebie originally linked to a Nazi-themed orgy porno she made under her other pseudonym, geebie-geebie. Early comments are saying mean things about the quality of the porno, which geebie-geebie worked very hard on. Later comments are about constructing a cover story involving a post about unemployment.
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But #15 really inspired me to abandon the blogs and get back to David Harvey. Did you know that Immanuel Kant believed his most important work was in geography, that was his main teaching area, and yet his work on geography has never been translated into English?
Leave you with Matt Stoller from the last good blog. Barney Frank was Not a Liberal
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I don't always agree with Naked Capitalism or Matt Stoller, but I think that post is a fair assessment of Frank.
The very bad jobs report this morning tips me toward thinking the Rs will sweep this November.
When a conservative approach to governing fails, as it will when presented with a crisis, people turn to radicals. In this case, the only option is a collection of reactionaries and plunderers.
Wages 1984-2012
that's seppuku stuff, Obama. Resign.
from Tim Duy
21:could be 1980 redux, but I am still betting that that worthless piece of shit will do the only thing he is good at, getting re-elected and then getting on his knees to a super-majority of Repubs in Congress.
C'mon, Halford, Carp, parsi do you really want four more years of that chart in 23.1? Do you have any freaking idea what that will get us in 2016?
22: I agree. Obama is the conservative, and he is a timid one too.
At the end of the day I think Hillary would have been superior. Conservative in her way but less timid and with more space to move. She would have been less likely to be seduced by Geithner/Summers (she had spent a ton of time with types like those already), and I think she has a more genuine committment to the New Deal state than Obama does. Also frankly as an older white female she would have held the Rust Belt and rural W Va/PA, making reelection easier, which in turn opens up the political possibilities.
I sadly agree with most of 25.2, despite having worked for Obama in the primaries. I'm not sure she would have been much more or less electable, though.
I don't think the Rs or the general economy would have been any friendlier to Sec. Clinton. And so the same situation -- stupid austerity taking down even the modest moves out of recession* -- would have applied. I don't think people should be in a state of panic over May numbers, as there is still a long way to go, and the people who are going to decide this thing (low information voters in 4 or 5 states) aren't paying attention yet.
If Obama loses, he'll have earned it.
* Eyeballing, it looks like over 15% of too weak private sector job creation number was taken out by continued public sector job elimination. That this would seem to be cause to vote Republican is annoying, but that's the world we live in.
I don't think the Rs or the general economy would have been any friendlier to Sec. Clinton. And so the same situation -- stupid austerity taking down even the modest moves out of recession*
Presidents have a lot of power. There are two straightforward policy moves that I think would have made an appreciable difference in our economy and jobs numbers today -- channeling more money to states and localities to prevent layoffs, and doing more principal reductions on bubble-legacy mortgages. Obama did not get it done in either case. Geithner and the banking axis was a major block to principal reduction, which was quite attainable. I believe more money to states and localities was also attainable pre-2010 election (and I don't think Hillary would have been pounded so badly in 2010).
Anyway, it's all what if now.
I agree that presidents have a lot of power, and that Obama deserves to get pounded for thinking debt mattered more than jobs in 2010 ever, but I really don't think Sec. Clinton would have done differently. She's just as far into that crowd as he is. It's a Village problem.
I think the people who think Romney might actually do better at getting a stimulus package that includes spending and not only tax cuts should put their bongs down.
Geithner and the banking axis was a major block to principal reduction, which was quite attainable.
What's the evidence that Hillary would have been any less deferential to the bankers than Barack? Also, I think the only way the Democrats don't get shellacked in 2010 is if they adopt the populist movement by aggressively going after the financial industry, instead of letting them get taken in by rebranded Republicans. That wasn't going to happen with any of these Democrats.
29.1(a)(1) said, I don't agree that a better stimulus package could have gotten through the Senate in 2010, no matter what the President was saying either in public or in private. People correctly calculated that failure was in their interest, and that there would be no penalty whatsoever from working for failure. It's as true now as it was then.
Obama could do it tomorrow and save the fucking world:
5-10 1-trillion dollar platinum coins, spent directly on goods and jobs (solar panels and installers). And fucking schools. (Where was that article about a Pennsylvania school district laying off one third of its workforce, closing 1 US and two elementaries. I can't believe this shit. I can't believe it.) He doesn't need Congress. Geithner might resign, House start impeachment...these would be good things. Bernanke raise rates? Probably another good thing (complicated)
Another 5-10 trillion
The best thing is the perception that somebody cares and has guts.
There are lots of things Obama could have done and can do without Congress. Shit-hitting-fan flying everywhere is exactly what we need. We don't lack business confidence, profits are insane and not being gambled/invested because every CEO thinks their money is perfectly safe.
"Another 5-10 trillion" spent on European bonds, SP GR IT Port. Yes. Why not.
- channeling more money to states and localities to prevent layoffs, and doing more principal reductions on bubble-legacy mortgages. Obama did not get it done in either case. Geithner and the banking axis was a major block to principal reduction, which was quite attainable. I believe more money to states and localities was also attainable pre-2010 election
On the first of these, I have some pretty solid reasons to think that HRC would have recognized that channeling money to state and local government was absolutely critical much, much faster than Obama did. That's my main reason for the (sad) conclusion that she would have been superior. It's totally unknowable in reality, of course.
Perhaps it is because I'm in a city where house prices didn't drop, but I don't see how principal reductions would have been politically popular.
On the first of these, I have some pretty solid reasons to think that HRC would have recognized that channeling money to state and local government was absolutely critical much, much faster than Obama did.
What are those reasons? I mean, they both had experience in state government, but HRC's was 10 years' further in her past than was Obama's.
25: She would have been less likely to be seduced by Geithner/Summers (she had spent a ton of time with types like those already)
Wait, the dominance of Summers, Rubin, and Geithner in the actual Clinton administration is evidence that these guys wouldn't have played as large a role in the hypothetical Clinton administration as in the Obama administration?
And channeling money to state & local governments was a huge part of the stimulus bill--it wasn't enough, true, but I'm not sure why changing the mix (at the expense of what?) would have made a huge difference. I think the real critiques have to be about who got appointed (Treasury, Fed), and the unwillingness to entertain more radical, unilateral moves.
36: Tom Vilsack was our last, best hope.
37: Hey, this is all guesswork, but that's exactly what I'm thinking. They are the most arrogant and domineering of the 90s crowd. Do you think she would have gone to all the trouble of getting elected just to let the boys tell her they would handle it? I think Hillary would have ended up with a different selection from the 90s group, people like Gene Sperling and Laura Tyson. From a distance that doesn't seem to make much difference (Sperling has worked for both Rubin and Geithner) but believe me it does. I also think Hillary would have listened to Christina Romer more, and just had greater main street sensitivity. There is a gender issue here.
38: the stimulus bill wasn't large enough, more money needed to be channeled over 2009, and it needed to be institutionalized in some way.
The opportunity was there for a president who made improving the main street economy the top short-term priority. Obama turned out not to be that guy; don't know whether Hillary would have been but all I'm thinking is that it's plausible.
The central bankers recently had David Graeber, author of Debt: The First 5,000 Years, down to talk to them, where he told them about the need for debt relief. He reports that they were very receptive to his message, fearing another economic crisis if nothing is done, though they probably wouldn't go as far as his call for a Jubilee-style writeoff.
Does Natilo fancy a job in the finance sector?
But he would have much more fun if he was allowed to run the economy following an anarchist programme. Whether the rest of us would is a moot point.
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Troll it down here.
Yamada Yoji's
Kokyo "Home From the Sea" is another masterpiece. I link to this review which is good mainly so you see some of his compositions. Better than Wong Kar Wei, fuckers.
It's evident just by the inability to "crack" the film that it truly is something special. In a way it is almost a conventional film that simply is not conventional. There's obviously something much more than just a family with some superficial turmoil. This may all seem like textbook "art film about relationship" ideas but there's something very odd (in a good way) about it. Really, no director that I know of comes close to reaching whatever it is that Yamada has going on here. Sure, there's the obvious similarities with Naruse and Ozu
1) Gorgeous cinematography and compositions, Yamada is derided as making nostalgic travelogues, so what. But not just sunsets on the Inland Sea, but villages, Hiroshima, Onimichi, and especially here the industrial landscapes and port scenes are all heartbreakingly and interestingly beautiful. Interior compositions also terrific, with interesting choices easily overlooked. Editing flows.
2) From the first Tora-san to the Samurai Trilogy 40 years later Yamada is simple and profound and relentlessly fanatically blue collar: Family work place. Family work place. I have never seen so many scenes of people working as in the Yamada movies, probably 1/3 of the time. Humanist without being patronizing or condescending or pitying, neo-realist, never really melodramatic or tragic, no rags-to-riches or riches-to-rags his working folk never really succeed or triumph...they survive the machine. They manage to manage to carry on and enjoy and love.
3) Agenda? Humanism, and mono no aware. Things change and that's sad, we carry on, and that's beautiful. Heroes can save the world, most people got jobs to do and kids to raise. If you think he's trite and sentimental and reactionary you don't get him. The subtext is way left, Yamada is not capable of making a movie about rich fucks. They don't exist in his movies.
500 Japanese movies and Yamada is my most pleasant discovery.
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You know what? A factory is a) architecture, b) jobs, c) a place of socialization. A steel mill is only ugly to...you know. Wrong people, the wrong left.
If I had it to do over, I would vote for Clinton, but thinking that thing would have been significantly different is probably wishful thinking. There is a Serious Democratic Policymaker worldview that every national Democratic politician subscribes to. It was plausible before the election that Obama might not subscribe to that worldview, since he'd been in the Senate for so short of a time, but if even if he embraces it, I don't see any reason why Clinton wouldn't.
I'm feeling pretty pessimistic about the economy, and thus the election. Every time we've seen an uptick in the economy, it's been in the wake of a Fed action, so it seems like the economy currently doesn't have much ability to grow on its own. The Fed will dawdle until the signs are more unambiguously bad before they act again, and there's a delay before there's any effect, so it could be too late to help Obama. (I also suspect that the Fed deliberately tries to help Republicans win the Presidency -- on average the economy does better under Democratic Presidents, but the economy does better in Presidential election years under Republican Presidents than it does under Democratic.)
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W. G. Aston was a British diplomat and scholar resident in Japan and Korea roughly 1965-1899, important for helping the West with the language. His History of Japanese Literature was apparently the std text for quite a while.
Laughable and disgusting in many ways, it is OTOH fascinating for historical reasons. Virulently anti-Chinese, moving toward a promotion of State Shinto, admiring Japanese nativism while contemptuous of most of the history and literature all the way back to the Heian in a way that encourages Westernization. One can really feel Imperial Japan being midwifed by at least one Western power. Lafcadio Hearn also served the Empire of Japan, and taught it to a generation of young Japanese.
Yet this was a great scholar. I would like to know more, and contrast him with Waley.
I'd batcall Silbey, but we don't get along.
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s/b 1865-1899
The shocker, after an admiring section on Motoori, is the adulation of Hirata Atsutane, that charlatan, fraud, and racist proto-fascist. Wow.