The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising started 74 years ago today.
Let us remember Mordechaj Anielewicz (Z”L), Paweł Frenkiel (Z”L), and the rest of the fighters (Z”L), who managed to hold out almost as long as the the whole country of Poland did in 1939.
Month: April 2017
I Hate F%$#ing Plants
Note the syntax here.
The “F%$#” is an adjective that modifies “plants”, not an adverb that modifies “hate”.
When I come out in the morning, the windshield of my car has a thin layer of dust on it.
When I clean it off with the wipers, it turns out to be a yellow powder.
It’s a thin layer of pollen, i.e. plant sperm, and it is making my life a living hell right now.
Thankfully Fexofenadine HCl (generic Allegra®) takes a bit of the edge off.
Thank You DC!
By that, I mean DC at the Stellar Parthenon BBS.
I was engaging in self pity over my general lack of writing skills, and he posted this:
You Will be seeing this again on my blog.
It’s a Runoff in GA-6 is Close
It looks like he fell 1-2% short of an absolute majority:
Democrat Jon Ossoff is headed for a runoff in June against a Republican contender after failing Tuesday to score an upset victory to represent a suburban Atlanta district in Congress.
CNN called the race just after midnight.
The 30-year-old investigative filmmaker aimed for an outright win in the 6th District race, but a furious Republican counterattack joined by President Donald Trump appears to have kept him under 50 percent.
I would give him no more than a 1 in 4 chance of winning the runoff.
Political Panic in France
L’évolution de l’ensemble des sondages, avec le dernier @opinionway :#Macron 22,4%#LePen 21,7%#Fillon 20,8%#Mélenchon 19,1% pic.twitter.com/J9XXVMa7WD— mathieu gallard (@mathieugallard) April 17, 2017
Fasten Your Seat Belts
The French Presidential elections were predicted to be pretty ordinary.
François Holland, being about as popular as proverbial turd in the punch bowl, decided not to stand for reelection, and did so fairly late in the process, which left the “Socialists” in a lurch, and so it was expected that the right wing Gaullists would field a candidate which would face a runoff against the racist-nativist National Front, (FN) which has made it to the runoff election with alarming regularity in French Presidential elections in the past few decades.
Unfortunately for the Gaullists, they nominated François Fillon, who in addition to being fairly far right by the standards of French politics turns out to have made a habit of employing his wife and children in no show jobs, for which he is under formal criminal investigation.
As a result, Emmanuel Macron, a former Economic Minister under the Socialist government, who was instrumental in implementing the anti-worker Neoliberal reforms for Holland, effectively sealing the current President’s political fate, and is running under what is best described as a self-founded vanity party, En Marche !, (with the space before the “!”) became the favorite for contesting the runoff against Marine Le Pen of the FN.
So far, it’s pretty normal: You’ve swapped one stooge of the banksters for another, and they are virtually assured of beating Le Pen in the runoff.
Then something funny happened: A former Socialist who left the party because he felt that they had sold out their principles, Jean-Luc Mélenchon made a charge in the polls, and HE is closely associated with the movement known as the “Left Front” in Europe.
As you can see from the polling numbers, we now have all 4 of the candidates within the margin of error, and Mélenchon appears to significant momentum.
The prospect of having a Euroskeptic racist facing a Euroskeptic leftist facing each other in the Presidential runoff is freaking out the establishment throughout the EU:
A specter is haunting Europe — the specter of Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
In the latest plot twist in France’s highly contentious presidential election, Mélenchon — an outspoken 65-year-old leftist who often appears on the campaign trail via hologram and who has pitched his proposal to nationalize France’s biggest banks and renegotiate its relationship with the European Union via free Internet games and YouTube videos — is now soaring in the polls. With less than two weeks before the election, his meteoric and unexpected rise is already sending jitters through financial markets and shock waves through an increasingly anxious electorate.
For months, analysts have likened the upcoming French election to “Europe’s Stalingrad,” a crucial turning point that will determine the future of a country and a continent. But while commentators worldwide have focused on the steady rise of the far-right, fiercely anti-immigrant National Front of Marine Le Pen, few have paid any attention to the leftist fringe of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who has vaulted into the picture in the past week and who shares with Le Pen the desire to drastically alter France’s relationship with the E.U., the 28-state bloc it once designed.
Mélenchon is running as the candidate of the Unbowed France political movement, in an alliance with the French Communist Party. The latest polls show him narrowly trailing Emmanuel Macron, long seen as the favorite, and Le Pen, expected to qualify for the final round of the two-round vote but to lose to Macron in the end. In the final days of a truly unprecedented campaign, Mélenchon’s unexpected surge is a reminder that radical change is in the air and that its extremist apostles — on the right or the left — may soon hold power.
Some have reacted with panic: Investors have begun frantically selling off French bonds, while the head of France’s largest trade union has decried what he described as Mélenchon’s “rather totalitarian vision.”
………
Perhaps more than any of the other candidates, it is Mélenchon who best represents 2017’s potential rupture with history, or at least the status quo. Central to his platform is the promise to abolish France’s Fifth Republic, the system of government established by Charles de Gaulle in 1958.
What Mélenchon detests in this style of government is its monarchical presidency — designed for de Gaulle himself — which can dissolve parliament at will and is subject to few checks and balances. Mélenchon has pledged to found what he calls the “Sixth Republic,” a vision that would “take us out of this presidential regime, notably with proportionality in all elections.”
It is an idea that resonates widely — even among those who do not necessarily support Mélenchon’s other more radical proposals, including taking France out of NATO and imposing a 100 percent tax on all income earned over 400,000 euros ($425,000).
Just how freaked out is the establishment?
They are so freaked out that the nominal front runner, Emmanuel Macron, has been forced to tell the truth about the EU and the Germans.
He is explicitly saying that Berlin is gaming the system as a predatory exporter:
Centrist French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron called for a “rebalancing” of Germany’s trade surplus in an interview with French and German media published Monday.
Even as he touted strong relationships with the German political leaders, Macron used the interview with Ouest-France newspaper and Germany’s Funke newspapers to call out German trade policy for hurting the Continent’s economy.
“Germany benefits from the imbalances within the eurozone and achieves very high trade surpluses,” he said. “Those aren’t a good thing either for Germany or for the economy of the eurozone. There should be a rebalancing.”
Macron, an independent, is facing fresh pressure from anti-EU candidates in the final week before the presidential election’s first-round vote. He has been running neck-and-neck with nationalist Marine Le Pen, ahead of three other candidates. However, recent polls suggest a surge for Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who rails against Europe from the left.
This is true, of course, but it is also as close to heresy as you can get from the any EU supporter.
The conventional wisdom, of course, is to inflict austerity on the ordinary folk, and then wait for the confidence fairy to make growth magically appear, all while capital and finance f%$# the bottom 90% of society.
If it ends up a race between Le Pen and Mélenchon, I fully expect the powers that be to pull for Le Pen, because for them, racism is preferable to economic justice. 
This is a No Lose Situation
A special election in Georgia’s 6th Congressional district is a no lose for the Democrats.
It’s clear that John Ossof, the only serious Democratic candidate, is going to get the most votes, there are 11 votes in the so called “Jungle”primary, in which the top two vote getters to on to the runoff.
The only question is whether he breaks 50%, which would obviate the need for a runoff.
If he breaks 50%, then he is elected, and the seat has a Democrat for the first time since Gingrich was elected in 1978.
If he does not break 50%, then it is almost certain that he would lose the runoff, and the Obama/Clinton establishment playbook, recruit a Neoliberal carpetbagger, shower them with money ($8.3 million more than the rest of the other candidates combined) would get a black eye.*
Remember that the Democratic National Committee could not be bothered to fund a real liberal James Thompson to the tune of one direct mailing in Kansas, because it’s more important to them that Bernie and his supporters lose than that Democrats win. (It was a 7% loss in a district that Trump carried by 40%.)
Once again, it’s the Iron Law of Institutions in action.
I am so glad that I am not in GA-6: I would have to choose between voting to make Republicans panicked, or slapping down the Democratic establishment, because it’s clear that in 2018, when it matters, Ossoff will lose.
Polls close at 7pm, and I’ll post an update around midnight.
*Which, of course, they would blame on Bernie Sanders.
More of This
Well, it looks like one Trump administration disaster, Education Secretary Betsy Devos, is actually producing a positive response in the Democratic party, with pro education privatization Democrats being linked to the Amway Heiress:
It’s rare that Democrats are cast as puppets of the Trump administration. But on the issue of education, many Democrats who have long supported school choice are newly on the defensive within their party, forced to distance themselves from President Donald Trump and his education secretary, Betsy DeVos.
The unusual dynamic started soon after Trump’s inauguration, when a teachers union in Los Angeles sent voters mail depicting two charter-school-friendly school board contenders, both Democrats, as “the candidates who will implement the Trump/DeVos education agenda in LA.”
The message was repeated in New York, where the Alliance for Quality Education, an advocacy group partially funded by teachers unions, likened Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s education policies to Trump’s. The group urged online audiences to “stop Cuomo from doing Betsy DeVos’s dirty work.” In New Jersey, Sen. Cory Booker opposed DeVos’ appointment but came in for criticism for working with DeVos on school choice initiatives when he was mayor of Newark.
………
But with Trump and DeVos ascendant, defenders of traditional public education policies have a foil in Washington to bludgeon their reform opponents.“DeVos and Trump have been explicit about a message of privatizing education and defunding public education in a way that I think reflects us saying, ‘We need to push back on that. We need to protect and strengthen education,’” said Tony Thurmond, a California state assemblyman running against Tuck for the open schools chief post next year. “I’m being really intentional about speaking out against those things.”
While education in recent years has rarely risen to the top of voters’ minds in statewide elections, the effort to yoke reform Democrats to DeVos could prove effective, especially in heavily Democratic states.
I would note that until this January, the most powerful advocate of school privatization and the attack on teachers was one Barack Obama, and his Education Secretaries, Arne Duncan, and John King, Jr.
Now that a Republican is in control of the federal burocracy, and endorsing marginally worse policies, Democrats are suddenly against it.
Support for labor unions, and the dignity of workers should be a core Democratic Party value.
It wasn’t under Barack Obama, (he abandoned card check) it wasn’t under Bill Clinton, (NAFTA, etc.) and it certainly would not have been under Hillary Clinton.
We need better Democrats.
Quote of the Day
The politics of compensation is always subject to a problem that economists call “time inconsistency.” Before a new policy – say, a trade agreement – is adopted, beneficiaries have an incentive to promise compensation. Once the policy is in place, they have little interest in following through, either because reversal is costly all around or because the underlying balance of power shifts toward them.
It is a point that I have made many times: Promises to help people hurt by free trade deals are never fulfilled, because along with a loss of jobs and money, there is a loss of political power, and political losers almost never get the spoils.
On the Other Hand, Something Good is Happening in New York Too
Rather unsurprisingly, it does not come from the Governor, it comes from the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission, which is going to require that Uber allow tipping:
New Yorkers have for years been able to tip a taxi driver by adding a few dollars to their bill before swiping a credit card. But they cannot add a tip when they use the popular ride-hailing app Uber.
Now officials in New York City are moving to require Uber to provide a tipping option in the app.
The city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission announced a proposal on Monday requiring car services that accept only credit cards to allow passengers to tip the driver using their card.
“This rule proposal will be an important first step to improve earning potential in the for-hire vehicle industry, but it is just one piece of a more comprehensive effort to improve the economic well-being of drivers,” Meera Joshi, the city’s taxi commissioner, said in a statement.
The decision was prompted by a petition from the Independent Drivers Guild, a group representing Uber drivers in New York. The petition, which collected more than 11,000 signatures, argued that drivers were losing thousands of dollars without an easy tipping option. Passengers can tip an Uber driver using cash, but many do not carry cash or know whether they should feel obligated to provide a tip.
The lack of a tipping option in Uber’s app has been a sore point for drivers. If new rules are approved in New York, it would be a major change in how Uber runs its business in its largest United States market. Other cities could demand to have the same choice.
Uber has fought tipping tooth and nail, and I think that there are a number of reasons:
- Tipping makes the drivers seem more like employees, and Uber is all about extracting revenue while leaving the liabilities on the customers and drivers.
- It servers to disintermediate Uber, because passengers can simply provide a tip as a way to rate drivers, and drivers can consider tips when they rate passengers, which removes a level of control from Travis Cordell Kalanick and his Evil Minions.™
- It is against the law for Uber to take a cut.
- It provides an alternative to Uber’s policy of
price gougingsurge pricing. - It’s just dickish, and wherever possible, Uber chooses the dickish move.
In any case, I am amused.
Conservadem Policies in a Nutshell
Andrew Cuomo unveiled a “free” tuition program recently, and rather unsurprisingly, on closer examination, it turns out to be mindlessly punitive and difficult to use:
………
The Fine Print
Interestingly, coverage of Cuomo’s plan was by no means uncritical, suggesting that he may not get the tailwind for 2020 that he expects. (For early negative reactions, see here and here.) From my perspective, Cuomo’s plan has one critical flaw:Cuomo’s “Tuition-Free College” Plan is not a universal benefit
That is, Excelsior is not a left program providing universal concrete material benefits to everyone, especially the working class. So it’s not a program from the left. Rather, it’s a typical liberal program, directed only at the “deserving,” hedged about with complexity, and targeting the (so-called) middle class, and not the working class. More specifically, Cuomo’s plan:
- Is means-tested
- Does not cover fees
- Covers full-time students only
- Has a residency requirement
- Has clawbacks
- Has a “crapshoot” clause
Let’s consider each of these points in turn.
Let’s go through these one at a time:
- Means testing creates a situation where popular support is limited, and allows for a the program to be killed by gradually tightening the clause. Additionally, as Lamberth Strether notes, “Third, means-testing and gatekeeping generally are in essence a jobs guarantee for the professional class, and one can’t help but think that’s a key consideration for the Democrat establishment, since that’s their base.”
- Fees, not just room and board, and constitute as much as ⅔ of the cost of school, and as shown by a number of state schools, most notably my alma mater UMass, it drives schools to move costs from tuition and fees. Additionally, this program applies to the last dollar, so a dollar in something like Pell grants must be applied to tuition, and not to fees or living expenses, or text books. (If you get a $1000 grant or scholarship, the amount that you get under the New York program is cut by $1000).
- The full time requirement means that it’s impossible for poor students to take advantage of the the program, since they need to pay something north of 20 grand in fees.
- While handling tens of thousands of dollars in fees, you have to earn 15 credits a semester or pay the grant back, which makes it impossible to work your way through school.
- The residency requirement is not one that people normally think of, which requires that you be a state resident to benefit (thought it does that too), but rather that if you live or work outside of the state for Five Years After Graduation you have to pay back the grant.
- The crapshoot function says that the program shall be terminated if the lotto under performs in any given year year, and schools are allowed to arbitrarily redefine the conditions to qualify.
This is a classic Blue Dog/DLC/New Dem program: It adds complexity, it does not provide the benefits promised, it contains an unneeded bureaucracy, adds a dose of humiliation, and sets up conditions that convince people who want the benefit that government does not work.
If it were any more half assed, you would think that it came from Bill Clinton’s White House.
The primary purpose of this grant is to boost Andrew Cuomo’s prospects for a 2020 Presidential run.
Headline of the Day
Andrew Sullivan Is Still Racist After All These Years
—Nathan Robinson in Current Affairs
The former editor of The New Republic, who devoted an issue to promoting Charles Murray’s racist screed The Bell Curve, an act that was breath takingly racist even in comparison to the disgraceful history of that magazine under the ownership of bigot Marty Peretz.
Linkage
- Amid allegations of unpaid taxes, neo-Nazism, and sex offender, Denver furry convention canceled(Denver Channel) Goddamn furry Nazis!
- Being Anti-Trump Isn’t Enough (Jacobin) The subhead says it all, “Silvio Berlusconi’s tenure reminds us that the Left needs to attack the neoliberal center, not just the populist right.
- How Uber conquers a city in seven steps (The Guardian) It is important that NONE of these techniques actually translates into a profitable company unless you achieve monopoly status and then can gouge consumers.
- Legislation allowing warrantless student phone searches dies for now (Ars Technica) Legislation in California has been tabled, so it’s not on the agenda ……… Live in obedient fear, citizen.
- Why Society’s Biggest Freeloaders Are at the Top (Evonomics) A nice survey of the rentier parasites sucking the marrow from society’s bones.
- Pharmaceutical giant ‘plotted to destroy cancer drugs to drive prices up 4,000%’ (The Independent) They changed the names and destroyed existing stocks of the drugs so that could increase prices charged Britain’s NHS. (See Rentier Parasite above)
- #BlackLivesMatter Introduces a New Visa Debit Card, and Revives the Toxic Old Myths of Black Capitalism (Black Agenda Report) We truly live in Bizarro world.
- Schumpeter: The University of Chicago worries about a lack of competition (The Economist) Yes, the f%$#ing Chicago School is calling for increased action against monopolies. Cats sleeping with dogs, real end of the world stuff,
Monty Python revealed the 2016 Republican Party platform in 1974:
Pass the Popcorn
An “Alt-Right activist is threatening to out embarrassing details of leading Republicans personal lives if Steve Bannon gets canned:A week after President Donald Trump began to publicly distance himself from White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, alt-right ringleader Mike Cernovich threatened to release a “motherlode” of stories that could “destroy marriages” if Bannon is formally let go from the administration.
Cernovich made the claims that he’d release a series of “scoops” if Bannon is officially pushed out of the White House on an eleven-minute, self-recorded Periscope Thursday night.
What would be uncovered?“If they get rid of Bannon, you know what’s gonna happen? The motherlode. If Bannon is removed, there are gonna be divorces, because I know about the mistresses, the sugar babies, the drugs, the pill popping, the orgies. I know everything,” said Cernovich.
“If they go after Bannon, the mother of all stories is gonna drop, and we’re just gonna destroy marriages, relationships—it’s gonna get personal.”I so hope that there is an actual dossier, and that it sees the light of day.
I am so looking forward to a blowup.
Linkage
- The Gig Economy’s False Promise (New York Times) Significant, because this is from their editorial board.
- Migrants from west Africa being ‘sold in Libyan slave markets’ (Guardian) We make a desert and call it peace.
- A multi-level analysis of the US cruise missile attack on Syria and its consequences | (The Vineyard of the Saker) Interesting and coherent analysis. Note though that Saker is a Russian nationalist site.
- GETTING REAL: the raging fire in the hold of SS Eutanic (The Slog) Equates the EU and the Titanic. Interesting.
- Symantec attributes 40 cyber attacks to CIA-linked hacking tools (Reuters) This doesn’t mean that it was the CIA, just that someone used the tools. Anyone could once they were released into the wild.
- DNAinfo reporters join Writers Guild of America-East union (Crain’s New York Business) This needs to happen more often. Nice to see employees of internet companies starting to see that they are being abused.
- War on Surveillance Camera: Bosnian Man used Bazooka on Police Camera (Slavorum) Lucky bastard, I’ve always wanted to do this.
I’ve always wondered about this:
Cold War: The Sequal
We now have credible reports that Russia is relaunching production of its Tu-160 Strategic Bomber:
The serial production of the upgraded Tupolev Tu-160M2 (NATO reporting name: Blackjack) strategic bomber will begin in 2020, a source in Russia’s defense and industrial sector told TASS.
There are plans to produce two or three Tu-160M2 planes annually, the source added.
“Work to manufacture the plane has begun. Under the contract signed between the United Aircraft Corporation and the Defense Ministry, the Tu-160M2 plane is expected to perform the first flight in 2018,” the source said.
“The Gorbunov Aircraft Plant in Kazan [an affiliate of the Tupolev Company] is expected to launch the serial production of the plane in 2020. It will produce two or three strategic bombers for the Aerospace Force annually,” the source added.
According to the source, it will be an absolutely new plane.
“The upgraded Tu-160M2 plane will retain only the airframe of the baseline model, which meets all modern standards. The plane’s equipment, including its avionics, electronics, cockpit, communications and control systems and a number of weapons, will be replaced. This will considerably improve the plane’s operational capabilities, in particular, the thrust of the NK-32 engines and the unrefueled range,” the source added.
What a waste, and our response will be more waste.
To quote Ike, “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”
Stating the Obvious
In the Guardian, Jamie Peck, a columnists for the online publication Death and Taxes, observes that the Democratic party establishment finds it more important for real Democrats to lose than for the Democratic Party to win:
Since losing the presidency to a Cheeto-hued reality TV host, the Democratic party’s leadership has made it clear that it would rather keep losing than entertain even the slightest whiff of New Deal style social democracy.
The Bernie Sanders wing might bring grassroots energy and – if the polls are to be believed – popular ideas, but their redistributive policies pose too much of a threat to the party’s big donors to ever be allowed on the agenda.
Even a symbolic victory cedes too much to those youthful, unwashed hordes who believe healthcare and education are human rights and not extravagant luxuries, as we saw when the Democratic establishment recruited Tom Perez to defeat the electorate-backed progressive Keith Ellison for DNC chair.
The Democrats demonstrated this once more this week when, in a special election triggered by Trump’s tapping of Mike Pompeo for CIA director, a Berniecrat named James Thompson came painfully close to winning a Kansas Congressional seat that had been red for over two decades, and his party didn’t even try to help him.
………
After beating an establishment Democrat in the primary, Thompson promised to take on Trump and the Republicans, as well as the state’s unpopular Republican governor Sam Brownback and Kansas-headquartered oligarchs the Koch brothers.
………
Given our current political climate, you’d think the Democrats would have jumped at the chance to take back a Congressional seat and demonstrate opposition to Trump, but you’d be wrong. While Thompson managed to raise $292,000 without his party’s help, 95% of which came from individuals, neither the DNC, DCCC, nor even the Kansas Democratic Party would help him grow that total in any substantial way. His campaign requested $20,000 from the state Democratic Party and was denied.
They later relented and gave him $3,000. (According to the FEC, the Party had about $145,000 on hand.) The national Democratic Party gave him nothing until the day before the election, when it graced him with some live calls and robo-calls. He lost by seven percentage points.
………
In defending their decision, party mouthpieces have taken the absurd line that giving Thompson money would have actually hurt his chances of winning, because then everyone would have known he’s a Democrat, and Kansans hate Democrats. (Let’s take a moment to appreciate these are the same people who keep saying the party doesn’t need a new direction.)
………
One person the party does not think will be hurt by their help is Jon Ossoff, who is running in a similarly red, but much wealthier, district in Georgia. To date, the DNC has raised some $8.3m for him and has committed to sending nine field staffers to organize on-the-ground efforts.
Although he is young, he’s an acolyte of the Democratic establishment, having worked for Representatives John Lewis and Hank Johnson, and he endorsed Hillary Clinton in the primary. He went to Georgetown followed by the London School of Economics and speaks fluent French. He has the support of several Hollywood celebrities.
Democrats think Ossoff is just the guy to bring his affluent suburban district back into the fold. (Clearly, losing a national election was not enough to reverse course on that most doomed of 2016 strategies: trading blue collar whites for wealthy, suburban ones.)
………
By refusing to fund the campaigns of anyone but centrist, establishment shills, the Democratic Party aims to make the Berniecrats’ lack of political viability a self-fulfilling prophecy: starve their campaigns of resources so they can’t win, then point to said losses as examples of why they can’t win.
It’s very simple. Refer to the Iron Rule of Institutions:
The people who control institutions care first and foremost about their power within the institution rather than the power of the institution itself. Thus, they would rather the institution “fail” while they remain in power within the institution than for the institution to “succeed” if that requires them to lose power within the institution.
These guys need to be taken down. They are a cancer on the body politic.
This is an Interesting Way to Deal with Anti-Vaxxers
Michigan, which is a hotbed of anti-vaxx sentiment has boosted vaccination rates through the simple expedient of making getting a waiver slightly less convenient:
No amount of objective discussion or scientific data may ever be enough to convince some people that vaccines are indeed safe and effective at wiping out a slew of hellish and deadly diseases. But what does seem to work at convincing people to vaccinate their children? Bureaucratic hassle.
By adding an extra, in-person step to the process of obtaining a vaccination waiver (which allowed a child to forego the necessary vaccinations), Michigan quickly and significantly boosted its vaccination rate, as Kaiser Health News reports.
In the 2013-2014 school year, the state had the fourth highest rate in the country of children entering kindergarten with a vaccine waiver. But just one year after the extended waiver application process went into effect in 2015, the number of waivers issued dropped by 35 percent statewide. Vaccination rates rose accordingly.
………
“The idea was to make the process more burdensome,” Michigan State University health policy specialist Mark Largent, who has written extensively about vaccines, told KHN. “Research has shown that if you make it more inconvenient to apply for a waiver, fewer people get them.”
………
State legislators added the inconvenience factor after outbreaks of whooping cough and measles hit Michigan children. At the time, parents who didn’t want to vaccinate their kids could easily apply for a waiver over the Internet, by mailing in a form, or even via phone call in some places. But in a quiet, unfussy ruling in December of 2014, the state’s Joint Committee on Administrative Rules changed the waiver application process to require that parents consult in person with a county health educator before a waiver would be granted.
It used to be easy for politicians to pander to anti-vaxxers, but since outbreaks in California and other states, the general public has become aware that they are a menace, and politicians have been less accomodating.
This is a very good thing.
Tweet of the Day
It’s true. pic.twitter.com/D0oocPcR4i— PORP (@TheOfficialPORP) April 9, 2017
I know that the original tweet is about a year old, but it is brilliant.
This is as true … as taxes is. And nothing’s truer than them.
Facebook Post of the Day
Mitchell Robinson
April 11 at 11:33pm · Okemos, MI ·
The best argument yet for public schools…
Donald Trump, Kew-Forest School and New York Military Academy, private
Betsy DeVos, Holland Christian Schools, religious
Sean Spicer, Portsmouth Abbey School, private
Steven Mnuchin, Riverdale Country School, private
Mick Mulvaney, Charlotte Catholic High School, religious
Wilbur Ross, Xavier Prep High School, private
Alex Acosta, Gulliver Schools, private
Jared Kushner, Frisch School, religious
Ivanka Trump, Chapin School, private
H/t Diane Ravitch.
OK, this is a Big F%$#ing Deal
Recently revealed tape recordings indicate that the Bank of England actually ordered some of the illegal manipulation of the LIBOR rates:
A secret recording that implicates the Bank of England in Libor rigging has been uncovered by BBC Panorama.
The 2008 recording adds to evidence the central bank repeatedly pressured commercial banks during the financial crisis to push their Libor rates down.
Libor is the rate at which banks lend to each other, setting a benchmark for mortgages and loans for ordinary customers.
………
The recording calls into question evidence given in 2012 to the Treasury select committee by former Barclays boss Bob Diamond and Paul Tucker, the man who went on to become the deputy governor of the Bank of England.
………
In the recording, a senior Barclays manager, Mark Dearlove, instructs Libor submitter Peter Johnson, to lower his Libor rates.He tells him: “The bottom line is you’re going to absolutely hate this… but we’ve had some very serious pressure from the UK government and the Bank of England about pushing our Libors lower.”
Mr Johnson objects, saying that this would mean breaking the rules for setting Libor, which required him to put in rates based only on the cost of borrowing cash.
Mr Johnson says: “So I’ll push them below a realistic level of where I think I can get money?”
His boss Mr Dearlove replies: “The fact of the matter is we’ve got the Bank of England, all sorts of people involved in the whole thing… I am as reluctant as you are… these guys have just turned around and said just do it.”
………
Banks have been fined more than £6bn for allowing submitters to be influenced by requests from traders or bosses to take into account the bank’s commercial interests, such as trading positions.
Central bank independence, and central bank secrecy have led to corruption, as evidenced by the this incident, as well as the resignation of the resignation of Richmond Federal Reserve President Jeffrey Lacker for leaking insider information to Medley Advisors, a so-called “Expert Network”. (An expert network is basically a cut out to supply inside information to speculators, most notoriously by Steve Cohen).
It is the inevitable result of how this organizations are structured: When you combine extreme power with a complete lack of accountability, corruption follows.