Tuesday morning links

I don't remember, if the SPLC was ever a mover and shaker. I suspect it's primary mission today is self perpetuation which requires stoking the fire in order to fleece the chumps. The Ben Carson thing smacks of reductio ad absurdum, but it will get air time and that is what counts.

#1 Exasperated on 2015-02-10 07:27 (Reply)

Back in the 70's (or thereabouts) they helped break the financial back of the Klan by seeking damages for survivors (or their family) and wound up selling at auction a few club houses, training camps, etc.

While they do include a few Black Separatists groups (mainly Nation of Islam) in their list, they ignore groups like Moorish Temple Science, La Raza splinter groups, Indian/Hawaiian separatists, their donors might not care about.

#1.1 walt moffett on 2015-02-10 15:20 (Reply)

Austerity hasn't really been implemented anywhere in the Eurozone, so the claims that it doesn't work are specious.

More importantly, I'm surprised anyone would claim the last 6 years are any kind of validation for Obama's massive spending spree. We have fewer people working than in the last 30 years, small businesses are struggling, and our infrastructure is no better than it was when he took office, despite the claim of spending on 'shovel ready jobs'.

Growth has not been outstanding, it is tepid at best. Our trade partners, who relied on our imports, are starting to fail (especially China and oil exporters) and the dollar's current strength is mainly because it is not as ugly as the other pigs in the currency market.

It's assumed that fracking has brought down oil prices, when it's really the decline in worldwide demand which has precipitated this (China especially).

Austerity actually does work, and it always has. But lying about what does and doesn't work seems to help people sell books and get appointed to public office.

#2 Bulldog on 2015-02-10 09:33 (Reply)

QUOTE:

Austerity hasn't really been implemented anywhere in the Eurozone, so the claims that it doesn't work are specious.

It's worse than that. Debt has piled up in almost every country and in spite of that, growth has been anemic at best pretty much everywhere.

As for fracking, I don't discount it's effect on oil markets. It certainly isn't the only reason for oil's decline, but it has changed the dynamic from the old status quo. OPEC is now trying to protect market share rather than fixing price. Russia is going broke and needs to sell more oil to fund itself all this while demand is indeed declining as you say.

#3 mudbug on 2015-02-10 09:54 (Reply)

Oh, I don't discount the impact of fracking. I just don't believe it is the root cause of the price plunge.

In fact, I looked at oil production, and its relative costs, versus the overall price change. The increased production due to fracking should only have had a very modest impact on prices.

The Saudis, and Mid East drillers in general, have incentive to keep prices lower, as you say. However, this also destabilizes their regimes due to the handouts they provide, so they are still incentivized to keep prices high.
Venezuela, the largest OPEC member not in the Mid East, has plenty of incentives to keep prices high, as does Nigeria.

So it's not an issue of pumping too much oil, as many claimed. Supplies are rising due to something else entirely, and it's not hard to see what that something is - reduced demand due to lower industrial activity worldwide.

#3.1 Bulldog on 2015-02-10 13:29 (Reply)

Agreed. It is a combination of oversupply and lack of demand. Sort of a perfect storm. The relative contribution of each is up to speculation. I don't have a strong opinion on which is the more dominant cause of lower prices.

#3.1.1 mudbug on 2015-02-10 13:59 (Reply)

Re: U of C divesting from the US

I notice there is no movement to refuse US tax dollars. If the US is so corrupt, I would think they wouldn't want it's money. Since that's not going to happen, I think the US should divest itself of the U of C.

#4 mudbug on 2015-02-10 09:59 (Reply)

Milkweed is necessary for monarchs diet. Plant some seeds. Contribute if you can to support the effort. One source of many:

http://www.livemonarch.com/free-milkweed-seeds.htm

#5 jma on 2015-02-10 10:55 (Reply)

"Austerity is complete horse sh*t!"

Right at the beginning Salon states "With the U.S. going through a period of significant GDP growth, a decrease in the unemployment rate and a falling deficit..." as proof that austerity is complete horse shit. Think about that. They flatly state we are in a period of significant GDP growth, decreasing unemployment and a falling deficit. These three things are lies, absolute lies. Manufactured by the government and the left leaning media to shore up the president and Democrats in general. Keynesian economic theory is based on this kind of lie. We are all, willing or unwillingly, enduring a massive Keynesian economic experiment. If it ends in the way most serious economists think it will end it will be a disaster for most of us. This will not, however, be a lasting negative for the Democrats because once this house of cards begins to crumble much will be done to save the Democrats and in the fog of economic collapse the left will declare that at the last minute just before Keynesian economics saved us the greedy Republicans tried to steal your money and implement austerity to hurt the poor and minorities. The leftist media will support that meme and the left leaning historians will write it up that way. Don't believe it? To this day FDR is celebrated as having "saved the nation" during the terrible great depression. When in fact he dithered, did little that was useful and distributed money and jobs to cronies. If it wasn't for WW II we may well still be in the great depression. But the left leaning media resuscitated FDR and restored his reputation just as though he actually did save the nation. Obama will require and get similar treatment, his legacy will be rewritten with all the bad things removed and good things manufactured.

#6 GoneWithTheWind on 2015-02-10 11:08 (Reply)

Isn't intriguing that the "falling deficit" didn't really start falling until the sequester was factored in? Yes, it peaked in 2009 around $1.4 trillion and had fallen by about $300bb by 2012. But it dropped from $1.1 trillion to $669bb the following year - primarily due to the pressure of the sequester.

In other words, the falling deficit is really the result of political pressure to move toward AUSTERITY, rather than the desire to spend more.

#6.1 Bulldog on 2015-02-10 13:33 (Reply)

I was getting SPLC mailings until I returned one, remarking that I considered THEM a hate group.

7 Types of Clickbait: See Them NOW!

Greece: About to go down the toilet they made themselves, badly, with inferior materials and parts.

Today as History: Depends on who writes it. And how much they lie or tell the convoluted truth.

#7 Sam L. on 2015-02-10 12:47 (Reply)

"Does 'Downton Abbey' Have a Jewish Problem?"

The answer is no.

Indeed, I think Julian Fellowes has actually done a very creditable job of catching the essential angst of being Jewish in Britain during that era. Particularly the identity difficulties of successful Jews navigating the perils of upper class English society.

Ms Braunstein seems guilty of projecting her modern American Jewish perspective on 1920s British Jews.

#8 JJM on 2015-02-10 14:51 (Reply)

Re: learning to shave with our wiskers

This is the point Dr. Sowell often makes - that the intelligentsia/elites spout "solutions" or things that ought to be but pay no price for being wrong.

For example, rather than tearing down existing institutions or businesses by imposing their "common sense" them, they could start their own. If they failed, they would be the main ones who are impacted. If they succeed, the might be a model for the future. Of course, they are not after something that works, they are after power.

#9 mudbug on 2015-02-10 15:00 (Reply)

Re: next NBC Nightly News reader

My favorite wasn't on the list. I'd vote for Melissa Harris-Perry who once did her show (I think it was about the war on women) wearing tampon earrings and more recently in a serious interview said that she (positively) likened A.G. Eric Holder to a duck and asked him to 'quack'.

#10 mudbug on 2015-02-10 16:37 (Reply)

Bird Dog: More on the climate hoax

QUOTE:

A basic rule of science is that data, data collection methods and data normalization methods are always exposed to scrutiny.

True. In climate science, for instance, data analysis is subject to high levels of scrutiny.

QUOTE:

In climate science, the opposite is often true. Michael Mann, for example, refuses to expose his raw data to public scrutiny.

In fact, the raw data has always been available to anyone who took the time and trouble to aggregate it. Nowadays, it's easily available to anyone with an Internet connection.

QUOTE:

The “adjustments” are rarely explained and often hidden.

In fact, modern data analysis is subject to extensive scrutiny. Multiple researchers using differing methodologies have all confirmed the basic trend.

#11 Zachriel on 2015-02-10 18:20 (Reply)

Why won't Michael Mann show anybody his raw data?

#11.1 rj on 2015-02-14 11:29 (Reply)

rj: Why won't Michael Mann show anybody his raw data?

It's not his data.

You can find the temperature data publicly from a number of sources.
http://berkeleyearth.org/data

#11.1.1 Zachriel on 2015-02-14 11:39 (Reply)

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Tuesday, February 10. 2015

Tuesday morning links