Topics

But it's not what you'd think.

Nearly half of U.S. employers test job applicants and workers for drugs. A common assumption is that the rise of drug testing must have had negative consequences for black employment. However, the rise of employer drug testing may have benefited African-Americans by enabling non-using blacks to prove their status to employers. I use variation in the timing and nature of drug testing regulation to identify the impacts of testing on black hiring. Black employment in the testing sector is suppressed in the absence of testing, a finding which is consistent with ex ante discrimination on the basis of drug use perceptions. Adoption of pro-testing legislation increases black employment in the testing sector by 7-30% and relative wages by 1.4-13.0%, with the largest shifts among low skilled black men. Results further suggest that employers substitute white women for blacks in the absence of testing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ebh6x6Bze_0#t=148

Not safe for work, unless your boss is hard of hearing and likes ice cream.

ok, I haven't even gotten into it yet, just reading the overview, and I am immediately struck by the fact that I was confused.  Then, I was reactionist.  What do you MEAN the state is immoral to punish.  It's a society of laws!  He who breaks the law goes back to the house of pain....

Something tickled the back of my head, that the punished are still members of society, and the state as an obligation to the citizen, which MAY have a slight opposition.

But I have a lot of resistance.  Which means I will be challenged by this book.  Which means I want to read more.

Your new anthem has arrived.


https://soundcloud.com/therealbigfreedia/big-freedia-explode-new-single


LETS GO!


RELEASE YOUR WIGGLE!

I managed to be in the office for eight hours, and didn't actually do anything.

Except meet my wife for lunch and drink margaritas.

I got paid for that.

You can thank me later.

http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/meta-study-confirms-homeopathy-doesnt-work

(With apologies to Roger for stealing one of his taglines)

This was alluded to in the dGrasse Tyson thread, but WHAT THE FUCKING SHITKNUCKLES CHRIST is this?

http://www.geekosystem.com/kate-mulgrew-to-narrate-a-film-about-how-the-sun-revolves-around-the-earth/

I don't even care that it's some actor who pretended to be a space captain.  That would be like thinking Jan-Michael Vincent has some sort of special insight when it comes to helicopters.

No, the point is that it's a show about heliocentrism.  Which we should have done away with IN THE FIFTHEENTH FUCKING CENTURY.

The kicker?  I'll leave it to the article:

Sungenis [the movie's principal] also happens to be a Holocaust  denier who believes in the "New World Order" and who writes articles about how Jewish people have aligned themselves with Satan. In fact, he's such a notorious anti-semite that even his own local bishop, Kevin Rhoades of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Harrisburg, has gone on record distancing himself from the guy and his "Catholic" organization. Seriously, do you know how much of an ass you have to be to get a bishop to notice you?

To sum up:

Supreme Court Strikes Down Aggregate Limits on Federal Campaign Contributions

Basically, there's no longer a cap on how much an individual can contribute to a campaign or PAC.

Maybe we should just skip the entire "voting" part, and just weigh the amount of money a candidate has collected by election day.

"As an educator, I try to get people to be fundamentally curious and to question ideas that they might have or that are shared by others," he told HuffPost Science. "In that state of mind, they have earned a kind of inoculation against the fuzzy thinking of these weird ideas floating around out there. So rather than correct the weird ideas, I would rather them to know how to think in the first place. Then they can correct the weird idea themselves. I don't just tell them no. That's pontifical."

Anti-Gay crusader tries to prove a point by demanding he be allowed to march during Pride carrying a "Straight is Great" banner.

March organizers say, "You go, girl!"

http://instinctmagazine.com/post/catholic-leagues-bill-donohue-wants-march-nyc-pride-parade-w-straight-great-banner

GLAAD's President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis says, "As a fellow Irish New Yorker, I'm hoping Bill will march with me at NYC Pride. I look forward to the day when I can march openly with Bill in the NYC St. Patrick's Day Parade, and not be turned away because of who I am."

So, a freind on FB wants to know why data mining is so bad, and is asking for documented instances where data mining has harmed an innocent person. 

It's an interesting request -- on one hand, extrapolating that corporations and governments will exploit every piece of available information isn't that hard to do, but on the other hand, she's looking for evidence rather than hype, which should be encouraged.

I found one example of employers using FaceBook to make hiring decisions, but I know there's jucier stuff out there.

Anyone know of something juicy offhand? 

[/SARCASM]

So, I'm lucky enough to attempt a wireless house.  I've got Sonos, a Roku with Netflix and Hulu, and at least half a dozen computers and tricorders that feed off of WiFi.

So, the question I have is: Of those who are using Netflix, et al, how much lag, pausing, and dropping are you getting when watching shows and movies?  I want to hope that the standard experience is seamless, but from what I've gone through, a show will snag and hang at least seven times in an hour.

What should I be expecting, here?

Bob Casale died yesterday.

I has a sad.

Exactly what it says on the tin.

New bill passes house, will allow any individual, group, or private business to refuse to serve gay couples if "it would be contrary to their sincerely held religious beliefs." 

Bill can be found here.

This isn't one of those "whip up fury, then die in committee" bills, this has passed the House 72 votes to 49, and the Senate skews hard for hate-mongering assholes.

The bill would also allow government clerks to refuse to sign same-sex marriage licenses without threat of a lawsuit.

Basically, businesses can hang up "No Fags Allowed" signs without fear of getting sued.



          \

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKY0FsUEMyw

Pete Seeger, RIP.

http://gawker.com/94-reasons-pete-seeger-matters-in-2014-1510562885

57-year-old snowbird Doug Varrieur... was looking for a way to teach his eyesight-impaired wife how to shoot her self-defense pistol without the inconvenience of going to a commercial gun range... [So] he started shooting at cans and zombie cutouts right outside the door of his RV, around people he didn't know. He can do this because a state law prevents local municipalities from banning the discharge of firearms in residential neighborhoods.

The law says folks can fire anything they want on their own property, no matter how small the plot of land, as long as they're not "reckless" or "negligent"—terms that cops admit they're unsure how to interpret. And the first violation would be a misdemeanor anyway, meaning a police officer can't arrest an offender unless he witnesses the offense with his own eyes.

"... if they want to shoot a fully automatic weapon, and have a class 3 license, technically they would not be in violation of anything."

Many municipalities in Florida used to have local laws banning the firing of guns in residential areas. While the preemptive state law has been in place for almost three decades, many local governments ignored it and passed their own gun ordinances.

But in 2011, backed by the National Rifle Association, the Republican-led state Legislature put more teeth into the state law, creating penalties for local lawmakers who violate it. Gov. Rick Scott signed the law that now makes anyone who creates or upholds local gun ordinances subject to fines of up to $5,000. They also can be removed from office and forced to pay their own legal bills if sued over local gun ordinances.

So, basically, we just sit back and wait.

Squiddie, you may want to invest in Kevlar.

Yes, it's Slate, but it's interesting.

One consequence... is the division that DWYL creates among workers, largely along class lines. Work becomes divided into two opposing classes: that which is lovable (creative, intellectual, socially prestigious) and that which is not (repetitive, unintellectual, undistinguished). Those in the lovable-work camp are vastly more privileged in terms of wealth, social status, education, society's racial biases, and political clout, while comprising a small minority of the workforce.

Yet with the vast majority of workers effectively invisible to elites busy in their lovable occupations, how can it be surprising that the heavy strains faced by today's workers—abysmal wages, massive child care costs, etc.—barely register as political issues even among the liberal faction of the ruling class?
In ignoring most work and reclassifying the rest as love, DWYL may be the most elegant anti-worker ideology around. Why should workers assemble and assert their class interests if there's no such thing as work?

DWYL reinforces exploitation even within the so-called lovable professions, where off-the-clock, underpaid, or unpaid labor is the new norm: reporters required to do the work of their laid-off photographers, publicists expected to pin and tweet on weekends, the 46 percent of the workforce expected to check their work email on sick days. Nothing makes exploitation go down easier than convincing workers that they are doing what they love.
Instead of crafting a nation of self-fulfilled, happy workers, our DWYL era has seen the rise of the adjunct professor and the unpaid intern: people persuaded to work for cheap or free, or even for a net loss of wealth.

Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life! Before succumbing to the intoxicating warmth of that promise, it's critical to ask, "Who, exactly, benefits from making work feel like nonwork?" "Why should workers feel as if they aren't working when they are?" In masking the very exploitative mechanisms of labor that it fuels, DWYL is, in fact, the most perfect ideological tool of capitalism.

Kid gets out of manslaughter conviction claiming he was too much of a spoiled brat to know better.

A Texas teenager who killed four people while driving drunk was sentenced this week to 10 years' probation in lieu of jail time, after the defense argued that the 16-year-old was a product of "affluenza" — a condition in which growing up wealthy prevents children from understanding the links between their behaviors and the consequences, because they are rarely held accountable for their actions.

I can't even.

I GOT YOUR CHRISTMAS MUSIC RIGHT HERE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9Sen1HTu5o

We can not be trusted to observe reality accuately.

The newest Frost Heaves Remix: http://www.reverbnation.com/earfatigueproductions/song/19294947-frost-heaves-burnt-hair-earfatigue

So, in some thread somewhere, someone said something about music in the 80s sucking.

I really must disagree.  But rather than spend a lot of time breaking down the cultural and music environment of the music scene in the US circa 1980-1989, I figured I'd post a shitload of you tube links, along with a brief description of why I like these songs.  This isn't a music history thread, nor does it have any kind of arc; rather, it's just a bunch of songs that I really like that were released in the 80s.  And for the hell of it, I organized it by the year the album came out.  So, we begin.

1980

Public Image Limited released their second album in 1980, and it's a mind-bendingly uncomfortably brilliant record.  Turning away from the Pistols' bombast, they anchored everything with an almost-reggae bass. And then shoved knitting needles in your ears with shrill guitars winding through the whole thing.  Johnny proves himself a more nimble and ambiguous lyricist, as well.  For your consideration: Poptones and Albatross
 
We also see the Cure's first album.  The piercing sound of this album seems remarkable when you think about what they really became famous for (later in this decade, actually.  We'll get there).  Boys Don't Cry is one of those "missing link" albums that easily demonstrates how Goth music came from Punk culture.  Songs: Plastic Passion(with bonus Bettie Page), and Object

Speaking of punk, Stiff Little Fingers released their second album, Nobody's Heroes this year.  If you don't know who these guys are, they're pretty much Green Day's cooler grandfathers.  Much cooler.  Gotta Get Away, At The Edge

Just to make sure I don't forget that music was made that appealed to a lot more people, Judas Priest released British Steel in 1980, and pretty much blew the doors off the metal scene.  Also, listening back to the tracks knowing Halford was totally queer makes tracks like Grinder hilariously awesome.

While that was happening, Robyn Hitchock was doing his thing with The Soft Boys, which no one ever heard, but influenced so much of the Athens, GA scene a few years later it's not even funny.  If you're the kind of person who thinks Robyn got a bit too twee with his solo stuff, check out Insanely Jealous and Positive Vibrations.  Also, if you just don't like his voice, there's always You'll Have to Go Sideways

"But LMNO," you say, "what about bands we actually know about?" Well, how about Devo?  "You mean that silly New Wave band?"  Um, no.  I'm talking about the band that took satire to the fucking wall and then slapped you with it, only the public in 1980 had no idea what was going on.  I'm talking about Freedom of Choice.  'Nuff said.

Too cheerful for you?  Do you feel like wallowing in existential angst and despair?  Lucky for you, Joy Division's last album came out.  If you only know that song about love tearing you apart, and maybe the Nine Inch Nails cover of Dead Souls, it, um, gets even more bleak than that.  First, the JG Ballard-inspired The Atrocity Exhibiton (by the way, if you've never read that book, shame on you), and then The Eternal.  If you'll excuse me, I have a date with a length of rope.  All the same, it's a really beautiful album.

Ok, ok.  I like dark music.  And 1980 had its share.  Siouxie and the Banshees released Kaleidoscope, and songs like Red Light seemed as if it was made for overly romanticized nerds who think nightclubs should be filled with smoke and eyeliner.  And Happy House is filled with so much snark, it's dangerous.

You know what?  Fuck it.  Let's keep going with this.  You want some anger to go with your moping?  Try Killing Joke's eponymous album.  Eventually, dozens of more famous bands would cop to this style, but this was one of the first albums to have the harsh, cold, unrelenting razor blade guitar as the focal point.  Check out The Wait and War Dance.  Try not to look so uncomfortable.

Then there's Bowie, because Bowie.  Ashes to Ashes.

Aaand back into punk territory.  Dead Kennedys shoved Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables into America's face in 1980.  Do I have to tell you of the importance of this band?  Even if Jello Biafra turned out to be kind of a tool?  California Uber Alles and Holiday in Cambodia are two songs that you must absolutely have in your memory banks.

I really can't decide what tracks off of Talking Heads' Remain in Light to post.  The whole album is really great.  But a track you may not remember is Listening Wind, a song about a terrorist bomber.  How oddly relevant.  It also may have been a while since you heard The Great Curve, so you're welcome.

Hey, you know who else was around in the 80s?  The mothefucking Clash, that's who.  Sure, Sandanista! was a self-important car crash, but did you know Black Market Clash came out the same year?  If you haven't heard their cover of Armagideon Time or the oddly inspiring Bankrobber Dub, now you have.

Oh, I'm sorry.  Did you want fucking weird oddball concept music?  Well, you can't go wrong with The Residents.  The Commercial Album  is forty one-minute songs, constructed as perverted and corrupted jingles.  Yes, I linked to the whole album.  Sue me.  Listen anyway.

Oh, hell.  Why not?  Art-Punk Gothers Bauhaus released their debut album in 1980, and Daniel Ash was a lot more pissed off than you'd think.  And Peter Murphy was, well, just as Peter Murphy as he became, only more so.  In the Flat Field and Double Dare

Dude, do you realize that Ace of Spades was released that year?  One of the best albums anywhere, anytime.  Much like no punk band could match Iggy's Funhouse, released in 1970, no metal band can match Motorhead, who have always said they're just playing rock and roll.  Title track, obviously, but The Hammer is fucking awesome, too.

Ok, now we get personal. The Birthday Party.  Their albums were a big part of my late teen/early twenties soundtrack, especially the "year off between colleges" period. I was completely hooked (oof. Bad heroin pun) from the first time I heard Harvey and Howard's squalling guitars. And, of course, Nick. There was a lot more anger and pain in his voice back then. Sometimes it bordered on savagery, but his images and use of language were still spot on. Most of the time the songs sounded like they were teetering on the verge of collapse, and that tension, that uncertainty, gave the music a life that isn't easy to find.  Their first album was released in 1980.  Anyway, here's a huge influence on the way I think about music: The Friend Catcher and Happy Birthday.

Another awesome band from across the pond, Gang of Four released an untitled yellow EP called, creatively, The Yellow EP.  Sure, these songs would appear on Solid Gold, but this is like, now, man.  So listen to indictments of society such as Outside the Trains Don't Run On Time and He'd Send In The Army

And then, and then... Hoo boy.  The number one band of my life.  Seriously.  More than Iggy, more than Nick Cave, more than Brian Eno (I  know, I know...).  The Minutemen.  Their first EP, Paranoid Time, was released in 1980.  When I first heard them, I didn't realize music could be written this way.  Angular.  Minimal.  Compelling.  Political. I mean, holy shit.  Fuck it, I'm linking the whole EP.  I'm not much of "that kind" of music guy, but I have this 7" on green vinyl, and fuck you.  It's worth it just for "Joe McCarthy's Ghost", but "Definitions" and "Paranoid Chant" are mind-blowingly good.

So, yeah.  All of that, that was in one year of the 1980s.  Ok, fine, I looked ahead, and it got a bit more sparse, but there's equally good stuff happening throughout, nevertheless. 

1981 next.

Plagarism.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2013/10/29/rand_paul_gattaca_did_rachel_maddow_catch_rand_paul_plagiarizing_wikipedia.html
http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/section-of-rand-pauls-book-plagiarized-forbes-article
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2013/11/05/rand_paul_plaigerism_buzzfeed_catches_gop_senator_ripping_of_the_week_column.html

I'm appalled that people think no one will check up on them.

That it was my birthday. Which means Roger also recently had a birthday.

I think.

Fuck it: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ROGER!

They say he hides on the other side of the wall.  But it's not like you could take a sledgehammer and try to get to him.  All you get is lathe, drywall scraps, and a new door to the bedroom.  He waits on the other side, you see. 

He likes waiting.  Really, it's his favorite part.  The anticipation, thinking about what he's going to do to you.  The eager hunch of his shoulders, waiting.  Almost there.  The frustration, even – it increases his rage tenfold, knowing he's so close to you, but not yet.  Not yet.

So he waits, on the other side.  He grinds his teeth, he clenches his fists, and he stares, under a furrowed brow.  Leaning slightly forward.  Staring at you.  Watching you.  Waiting.  A solitary vein, arcing from temple to brow, pulses with a steady, unstoppable beat.  Staring at you, through the wall.  To the other side.  Where you are.

You can feel him staring, when conversation drops off, or in the uncomfortably long pauses between songs on your MP3 player, as if the device itself is hesitating.  You can feel his stare at night, abruptly waking you from unconsciousness.  His stare is like a weight, like a searing heat, like an inevitability.  You don't want to, but you can hear his breathing, shallow and hoarse.  Or is that your own?  Is that sound, wheezing, panicked, actually coming from your own lungs?  He knows.  He watches.  He waits.

He's always there, on the other side.  When you're at work.  At the corner bar.  At the peep shows you go to, trying to distract yourself from the weight of his stare.  It doesn't work.  The girls now openly laugh at you.  Do they know?  Can they feel him, waiting?  Watching?  His body, tense with anger, on the verge of coming in, almost, any day now...

When he does come through, when he arrives, there's no point in running.  Because he will be coming over, not anywhere you are, but everywhere you are.  He will be the entirety of your vision, his stare will become your world.  And then, he will reach out.  He will grab you.  And he will show you.  He will show you things.

And then, finally, he will laugh.  It will be the last sound you ever hear, that terrible, horrible laugh.

Who the hell is Not your Nigel?

I missed a name change somewhere.

Some of you poli-sci folk want to take a crack at this?

http://www.salon.com/2013/10/20/a_modest_proposal_to_neutralize_gerrymandering/

If you register as the party that controls your disctrict, you can make decisions on who wins primaries.

New album will be coming back from production soon.

All those interested in a physical copy, please PM me your address.  Or, come to our CD release show on November 2.

Added bonus: We may have shirts.

CDs are free, shirts may have an associated cost.

So, before we even start this out, I have to tell you something – jazz is a really freaking big subject, and there's a lot out there that I probably won't get to.  I have a fairly good knowledge on the subject, but there's a high probability I'm going to get some things wrong, especially when we start getting into anecdotes, stories, and perceived motivations behind the music. 

There's also a fairly good chance that someone's going to step up and say that I'm "wrong".  Which could be true.  Let's just hope they're not a dick about it.

Anyway, jazz.  There are a few stories about how it came to be, some which are more entertaining than others.  One of my personal favorites is that by around the turn of the century (1900s), there were many blacks who had learned to play marching band instruments, as well as traditional marching band music.  Note the time signature in that piece.  It's what's called "6/8 time", where the pulse of the music is "1,2,3/4,5,6".  Apocryphally, when they were learning the marches and got to a section they didn't know, they just made stuff up that sounded good.  Now, if you mix that feel with the afro-Caribbean rhythms that developed during the slave trade, you get something like this, which is known as "Second Line", and is downright funky.  But that's a different story.  We're talking about jazz.

The other tale about the birth of jazz is that it was music that developed in various "houses of ill repute" in and around New Orleans, as the house piano player would crank out selections of ragtime.  When you listen to the rhythms on that piano, notice how it also has the same kind of "shuffle" feel as the second line, as well as a hint of the 6/8 from Sousa.  Again, when the piano players would forget the parts (or more likely, when they got bored playing the same thing over and over), they'd start making stuff up.

Roll all of this together, and you get some sort of approximation of the "birth of jazz", and a nice kid from New Orleans became it's first star in the 1920s.

Is that the complete picture?  Hell no.  There was a lot of stuff going on back then.  This is only a small part.  More to come.

Wow.  I realize I haven't really talked about myself that much.

First off, Mrs LMNO and I have bought a new house – new condo, but it's bigger, and a new construction.  And there are a lot of interesting problems a new construction has that an existing place doesn't.  Like an expectation things will be done right the first time.

Secondly, Frost Heaves are on the verge of releasing a new EP.  Release party is Nov 2.  It's really good shit.  Soon after that, my remixes will be hitting the interwebs.  PM me if you want a hard copy of the CD (or come to the release show.  Actually, just come to the release show.  Daniel Ouillete and the Sharp Lads will be there.  It's gonna be awesome).

Thirdly, I went to the doctor, and she told me I have liquid grease running through my veins and my blood pressure should have blown a gasket in my brain by now.  So, I have increased the amount of PILLZ HERE by about 935% and have stopped using salt.  Yesterday, the dok said I'm almost human.  Which is nice.

I think there's more, but those are the big ones.

I don't want this place to be one where anyone feels threatened or gets upset when I'm around.

I seem to have acted poorly, so I'll back out for a while.

Lurking of course, because there's NoExit. But low profile, for certain.









See you spags around.

You block me on FB, you block my PMs on PD.

You want me to respond, I got a response. But I'm not the kind of girl to do those sort of things in public.

Loosen the reins, big boy.

...porn always proudly proclaims, "I was there first!"

http://filmdrunk.uproxx.com/2013/09/adult-film-actress-tasha-reign-is-selling-butt-plugs-for-bronies

Adult Film Actress Tasha Reign is Selling Horse-Tail Butt Plugs for Bronies

I'm not sure if this has been covered yet, I tend to gloss over drug threads when they becom circular.

Also, I apologize for another drug thread, and its ramifications.

So:
http://jezebel.com/crazy-clown-is-the-hot-new-drug-for-the-cool-dumb-te-1302380188

Weird "not-pot" alkaloids are being created, and re-created, to mimic pot yet fall outside of the prohibited substances laws. Like designer X, but for pot.

Thing is, it seems these Fake Weed products are much, much worse than Actual Weed. And because they're pseudo-legal, people (kids and non-kids) have greater access to them.

A system that allows a more harmful product while banning a less-harmful product is not rational. Legalizing weed would eliminate the market for harmful fake weed.

It's time for Suu to throw invictives against the New England Patriots while risking bodily harm by being a Bucs fan in Rhode Island, and for ECH to hilariously predict the Seahawks will win the Super Bowl.



...aaaaaand GO!

I was reading me some Krugman, and wouldn't you know I ran into this:

Ibn Khaldun uses the term Asabiyyah to describe the bond of cohesion among humans in a group forming community. The bond, Asabiyyah, exists at any level of civilization, from nomadic society to states and empires. Asabiyyah is most strong in the nomadic phase, and decreases as civilization advances. As this Asabiyyah declines, another more compelling Asabiyyah may take its place; thus, civilizations rise and fall, and history describes these cycles of Asabiyyah as they play out.

Ibn Khaldun argues that each dynasty (or civilization) has within itself the seeds of its own downfall. He explains that ruling houses tend to emerge on the peripheries of great empires and use the much stronger `asabiyya present in those areas to their advantage, in order to bring about a change in leadership. This implies that the new rulers are at first considered "barbarians" by comparison to the old ones. As they establish themselves at the center of their empire, they become increasingly lax, less coordinated, disciplined and watchful, and more concerned with maintaining their new power and lifestyle at the centre of the empire—i.e, their internal cohesion and ties to the original peripheral group, the `asabiyya, dissolves into factionalism and individualism, diminishing their capacity as a political unit. Thus, conditions are created wherein a new dynasty can emerge at the periphery of their control, grow strong, and effect a change in leadership, beginning the cycle anew.

We've been doing some talk about tribalism, nations, decoherence, and the collapse of political parties.  It's interesting to see it from this angle.

This thread is for discussing some of the entries in the LessWrong Wiki (http://lesswrong.com/). Some of the entries are fairly wordy and confusing, so why not talk them through?

I present to you:



Johnny Cash dressed as Elton John.

Could someone with more knowledge please vet this for me?  It seems kind of disturbing.

http://rt.com/usa/trespass-bill-obama-secret-227/

Hipster traps: http://laughingsquid.com/hipster-trap/

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/16/john-galt-and-the-theory-of-the-firm/
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-07-11/at-sears-eddie-lamperts-warring-divisions-model-adds-to-the-troubles

Eddie Lampert's big idea is that markets and competition rool, so he's forcing the different parts of Sears to compete for resources just as if they were independent firms, with individual division profitability the only criterion for success... The first issue that should pop into anyone's head here is, if the different divisions of Sears have no common interests, if the best model is competition red in tooth and claw, why should Sears exist at all?

...We may live in a market sea, but that sea is dotted with many islands that we call firms, some of them quite large, within which decisions are made not via markets but via hierarchy — even, you might say, via central planning. Clearly, there are some things you don't want to leave up to the market — the market itself is telling us that, by creating those islands of planning and hierarchy.

The thing is, however, that for a free-market true believer the recognition that some things are best not left up to markets should be a disturbing notion. If the limitations of markets in providing certain kinds of shared services are important enough to justify the creation of command-and-control entities with hundreds of thousands or even millions of workers, might there not even be some goods and services (*cough* health care *cough*) best provided by non-market means even at the level of the economy as a whole?

Sometimes, the Invisible Hand gives you the finger:  Their stock has sunk 64%.

http://m.usatoday.com/article/news/2495815

A Kansas law allowing guns in the classroom causes an Iowa insurance company to cancel the majority of the KS schools insurance policies, due to the increased risk.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/after-wendy-daviss-filibuster-texas-abortion-bill-misses-deadline/2013/06/26/b76fd2a8-de68-11e2-b797-cbd4cb13f9c6_story.html

Lawmakers in Texas failed to approve a stringent new abortion law in advance of a midnight deadline Tuesday night after chaotic protests and an 11-hour filibuster by state Sen. Wendy Davis.

I must say, I was sucked in by this one.  Stayed up until 1:30 following various tweets and FB updates, and newsbloggers.  I especially like the part where the GOP decided it wasn't 12:06 when they put it to a vote, but rather 11:66.  Interesting to have a bunch of state senators committing fraud and abuse of power in "front" of 180,000 spectators.

But this morning, I (along with being very, very tired) felt vaguely let down.  I was part of the spectacle; and judging by how things went down in Wisconsin, there will eventually be another bill, or vote, or some such asshattery bullshit that will shut down abortion clinics in TX.  I really did feel the mob hype.  I was awed, elated, furious, and then... nothing much.

Wendy Davis was very impressive, staying standing and talking for 11 hours to a hostile and abusive senate. And there have been a few good memequotes you'll be seeing on FB for the next few weeks.  But was it truly successful, or did we just stave off the inevitable for another six months?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/14/us-usa-tax-irs-idUSBRE94B08I20130514?feedType=RSS&amp&dlvrit=992637

To sum up: Groups applying for 501(c)(4) status (tax exempt) with the words "patriot" or "tea party" received extra scrutiny from the IRS.  A lot of it.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2013/05/irs_tea_party_investigations_the_internal_revenue_service_s_targeted_conservative.html

That's easy to believe. A typical letter looked like the one sent to the Ohio-based Liberty Township Tea Party—35 questions, most of them with multiple sections. Question 3: "Provide details regarding all of your activity on Facebook or Twitter." Question 5 asked for biographies of "each past or present board member, officer, key employee, and members of their families," to check whether any of these people might run for office, or might have filed a 501(c)(4) request for somebody else. Question 12 asked for a tally of all activity ever engaged in by the group, by percentage, adding helpfully that the "total of all activities should equal 100 percent." Question 34 asked for "copies of articles printed or transcripts of items aired" if the Tea Party had been covered by the media.

Naturally, this has blown the fuck up.  So much so that it's all politics and knee-jerking.  So I bring this up here, where we might be able to look at it rationally.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/501(c)_organization#501.28c.29.284.29
A 501(c)(4) covers Civic Leagues, Social Welfare Organizations, and Local Associations of Employees. The tax exemption for 501(c)(4) organizations applies to most of their operations, but contributions may be subject to gift tax, and income spent on political activities - generally the advocacy of a particular candidate in an election - is taxable. The law allows Section 501(c)(4) organizations to self-declare and hold themselves out as tax-exempt; they do not have to obtain any approval from the Internal Revenue Service, though they may. Its primary purpose cannot be election-related and cannot overtly support political candidates.



My thoughts:
1) It seems obvious that since the Tea Party is a de facto political organization, then scrutiny should be used when one files for a 501(c)(4), as there is a higher than normal probability of it being used primarily for election-related uses.

2) The scrutiny as evidenced above is overly harsh, and most likely falls outside of standard practices.

3) Don't most Tea Party people claim not to be Republicans?

4) Didn't some newspaper prove that most of the tea party was founded and funded by the Koch brothers, which would underscore the potential overt political use of the 501(c)(4)?  I couldn't find it through a quick search.

5) If they could simply self-declare, it seems odd that they would report it, as if they were trying to get messed with...

No conclusions, but this seems both curious and well-timed.

I'm back from JazzFest. Good music, good food, good drinks.

Do I really need to read everything you spags vomited up over the last week?

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/18/world/asia/pakistan-politics/

Former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has been placed under house arrest, Pakistani media reported Thursday.

The Pakistan government said earlier Thursday it would obey an order by Islamabad's High Court to arrest Musharraf, Pakistan's interim Minister of Information Arif Nizami said.

I have nothing to add to this, because I am ignorant.  Was this guy a US figurehead, or did he just pray to the wrong Allah?