From the Philly Inquirer:
Looming unemployment-tax hike divides N.J. officials
A tax increase that could cost employers $1 billion is needed to replenish New Jersey’s depleted unemployment-insurance fund, according to Gov. Corzine’s labor commissioner.
With large shortfalls in the fund expected for several years, David Socolow said, the state needs to let an automatic tax increase take effect July 1 to rebuild reserves. Once the fund recovers, a process likely to take several years, taxes would begin to fall to previous levels.
“The time has come to let the trust fund replenish automatically and get that over with, so that it can be restored to full solvency and employers can then return to lower tax rates,” Socolow said this week.
He has publicly warned of a tax increase since at least April, but some Republicans say the state cannot afford another.
…
The fund, which temporarily aids workers who lose their jobs, is expected to have a $1.2 billion deficit on March 31. That would move the tax rate on employers, beginning in July, to the highest level allowed.The increase would add about $1 billion to the current $1.7 billion levy on businesses, according to the Department of Labor and Workforce Development.
…
With the impact of the recession still being felt in the labor market, the projected March 31 shortfall is so large that the tax rate is set to slide from its second-lowest level – Column B of the tax chart – to the highest, Column E plus 10 percent.For the hardest-hit employers, that could mean a tax increase of nearly $700 per employee. At the lowest end of the scale, the increase would be closer to $270 per worker. A business’ rate varies according to its history of firing or laying off workers. Workers also pay into the program, but their rates are not set to change.
first.
merry xmas.
SAS
Merry Xmas!
Merry Christmas All – and thank you Grim – A special happy day for you and Spooky.
Merry Christmas everyone… eat too much, drink heavy, and don’t drive.
BTW
march of the wooden solders- ch 11 @ 1pm
a Christmas story- all day ch 39
& is the honeymooners marathon on today? do you know what channel?
From the NY Times:
Brokers Tested on Proficiency
IN recent months, loan officers around the country have begun taking federally mandated licensing exams, which many in the industry consider beneficial for borrowers in the long run.
According to the Conference of State Banking Supervisors, which oversees the testing, 31 percent of the roughly 10,000 people who took the national test from July 30 to Nov. 30 failed it, and about 27 percent did not pass the state-specific component.
The results may give pause to some borrowers in New York and New Jersey, which only recently began administering the exam, and in Connecticut, which won’t offer it until April 2010. If nearly one in three loan officers can’t pass the exam, how can borrowers enter the mortgage process with confidence?
Happy Kwanzaa to everyone.
“Looming unemployment-tax hike divides N.J. officials”
Raise the taxes, keep jobs and people away from NJ.
Where’s Jamil today??
Mayor calls Gilly to rip health fix as bad for NY
“Bloomberg and Gov. Paterson have both been railing about what they see as the bill’s destructive impact on New York, while New York Sens. Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer have been praising the plan.
Paterson has called the legislation a “disgrace,” claiming it will “devastate” state medical care and cost New York more than $1 billion a year in Medicaid funds”
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/mike_calls_in_sick_mK8QL194xHEceBCbGJfoqI#ixzz0ahrgfEbt:
Merry xmas to you all!
Keeping thier eye on the ball:
http://www.northjersey.com/arts_entertainment/television/122409_NJ_lawmakers_ask_MTV_to_cancel_Jersey_Shore_.html
Feliz Navidad!
It’s official, parents everywhere are going insane:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/23/world/asia/23seoul.html?em
“Swayed by the increasingly popular conviction that height is crucial to success, South Korean parents are trying all manner of remedies to increase their children’s stature, spawning hundreds of growth clinics that offer hormone shots, traditional Eastern treatments and special exercises.
“In our society, it’s all about looks,” said Ms. Seo, 35. “I’m afraid my daughter is shorter than her peers. I don’t want her to be ridiculed and lose self-confidence because of her height.”
…..Nearby, sweat rolled off Lee Dong-hyun, 13, as he pedaled a recumbent bicycle while reading a comic book. Behind him, his sister, Chae-won, the shortest girl in her first-grade class, stretched to touch her toes on a blue yoga mat, squealing as an instructor pushed down against her back.
Two years ago, their mother, Yoon Ji-young, had tried giving Dong-hyun growth hormone shots, which have also increased in popularity here. But many doctors will prescribe them only for exceptionally small children with severe growth disorders. And parents have been discouraged by their high cost and fears of side effects.
Ms. Yoon said she was spending $850 a month on the shots but stopped after eight months.
Now she drives her children to Kiness three times a week. “Both my husband and I are short,” said Ms. Yoon, 31, who is about 5 feet tall. “I don’t want my children to blame us for being short when they grow up.””
Merry Christmas BC – Raise the ceiling, lower the floor.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/treasury-lifts-cap-on-aid-to-fannie-freddie-wsj-2009-12-25?reflink=MW_news_stmp
The U.S. Treasury agreed to provide Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac with as much capital as they need over the next three years, in an effort to reassure the investors who bought the giant mortgage companies’ debt, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Late on Thursday, the Treasury also said that it would stop buying the companies’ mortgage-backed securities and end a short-term-liquidity facility set up for both companies and for the Federal Home Loan Banks. That facility was never drawn upon, the Journal reported.
what’s wrong with this email header:
From: Current Foreclosures
Subject: Foreclosure Alert: Merry Christmas
lisooh, #10
Sometime this decade, I was waiting to get my hair cut and I picked up a copy of Marie Claire.
There was a story about Asians – I think the Chinese – who are so obsessed with height, the girls will take a year off and get their leg bones broken and reset to stretch their legs and add a couple of inches.
Job discrimination is overt – no short people apply. Short, being less than 5 4 for women. And marriage prospects are better.
So they think it’s worth a year’s time, plus the money and torture.
Asians being obsessed with height is not new.
The Brits are biased against redheads – call them “gingers” or “gings.”
Lots of cultures have their lunacies.
Merry Christmas to all here, especially to you Grimster!
Frohe Weihnacht!
4 Cooper
I think The Honeymooners marathon is usually New Year’s Day.
Cooper 4 required viewing at 1 pm.
Merry Christmas all!
The Oblivion Express runs on holidays, too. However, I’m pretty sure I can at least turn on the telly today and not encounter Eraserhead or Man of the Year.
Uh oh. It appears that if I turn on the tube around noon, I can be exposed to the Knicks. And I thought ABC wanted people to watch basketball…
So far, this Christmas is delivering at about 70% of my expectations. Not so bad.
Hope your Christmas is firing at 90% or better.
Clot 18 to early to tell(in laws due at 1230)
so far swell.
Merry Christmas from the Midwest, we are going to grill a prime rib on a charcoal grill with a foot of snow on the ground.
Gotta love the tradition.
Re: growth hormone
Mrs Beer is in the Pharma research biz. They currently have a study involving a drug for “idiopathic short stature”. She says many of the subjects are the kids of short endocrinologists. Make of this what you will.
Short people got no reason to…
Lots of cultures have their lunacies.
Americans welcome stupidity and obesity with open arms.
mike (19)-
If you chug some whiskey before the in-laws come, it helps.
Merry Christmas all!
Merry Christmas from the shore where waves are crashing on a snow covered beach.
Gilbert, have your people call me. You may have some stuff I can put to use:
(AP) – Washington Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas stored unloaded firearms in a container in his locker, according to the team, and the NBA is looking into the situation.
The Wizards issued a statement Thursday night saying there was no ammunition in the locked container, and Arenas and the team have notified authorities and the league.
Arenas told The Washington Times he took his guns to the Verizon Center after his daughter, Hamiley Penny, was born this month. About a week later, he said he handed them over to team security to give to police.
“I wouldn’t have brought them to D.C. had I known the rules,” Arenas told the newspaper. “After my daughter was born, I was just like, ‘I don’t need these anymore.'”
Clot 23 sounds like a plan , will get right on it. They will be late anyway,
consistent if any thing! Naturally I have all the apps out waiting I guess I’ll never learn.
Coast 25 sounds nice. I have a winter wonder land up here in Sussex county. Precip froze on all the trees last night this morning beautiful.
Mike- OK ice storm- you win.
And to all those who don’t celebrate Xmas- enjoy the movies and chinese food.
I’m 5’4″ and I prefer “petite.” But I always wanted to be about 4 inches taller, truth.
Merry Christmas all.
Merry Christmas all. Haven’t been around in awhile, but as usual have learned something new from you. I am a “ging” or “ginger haired” spent lots of time in England, had no idea I was biased against. I just thought it was b/c I was American. ;o)
Enjoy the day no matter how you celebrate it.
“A tax increase that could cost employers $1 billion is needed to replenish New Jersey’s depleted unemployment-insurance fund, according to Gov. Corzine’s labor commissioner.
With large shortfalls in the fund expected for several years, David Socolow said, the state needs to let an automatic tax increase take effect July 1 to rebuild reserves. Once the fund recovers, a process likely to take several years, taxes would begin to fall to previous levels.”
Somewhere near Harrisburg, Ed Rendell is chuckling to himself, shaking his head, and thanking his lucky stars for the folks in Trenton.
[17] schump,
“It appears that if I turn on the tube around noon, I can be exposed to the Knicks. And I thought ABC wanted people to watch basketball…”
Sure they do. Knicks gotta lose to someone, right? Think people went to Harlem Globetrotter games to cheer for the Generals?
Merry Christmas from Key West. It’s snowing in Summerland Key courtesy fo the Weatherchannel.
I never thought of the South Park bar as a ghetto hangout until now. Or maybe someone was just pissed Starbucks was closed across the street…….
Gee, if only I had paid $700,000 for a 2 Bedroom at the Siena so I can watch a gang-style shootout outside my window. I guess this why they pay so much more in taxes for these benefits……
Man is shot on Montclair streets
By Sharon Adarlo/The Star-Ledger
December 25, 2009, 10:59AM
A Montclair man is listed in stable condition after he was shot early this morning, authorities said.
The 21-year-old victim was at South Park and Church streets at 1 a.m. when the shooting occured, said Deputy Chief Todd Conforti of Montclair Police. The man was transported to University Hospital in Newark for treatment.
Conforti said he did not have information on a possible motive or suspect, but said the case is under investigation.
Anyone who has information about this incident should call Montclair Police Detective Charles Cunningham at (973) 509-4716.
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danzud (36)-
You pay extra there for the “rich cultural diversity”. Ha.
Montclair is like Sesame Street…except if you enter the alley off Sesame St, you’d better be armed to the teeth.
Watching the NBA today has only served to convince me that the NBA is dying.
If they were smart, they’d downsize to 6-8 teams right now.
Clot 38 rather watch the Yule log.
There is a joke in there somewhere, but I’m sure in is in bad taste John John…..
Diversity… what a crock of sh!t. I wish the ivory tower, elitist liberal charlatans would go f^ck themselves.
Up 41 , don’t hold back.
We now have ice pellets everyone sleeping over. Hope I don’t run out of scotch!
Living in the country is such fun.
Nom:
PA is broke too. Not as broke, up if they don’t pass table games by year’s end they start layoffs.
d2b the hole USA is broke, fed gov, states & locally. “It’s just a matter of time.” Extra points if you can sing that line very old tune.
A message for the season:
Peace on earth and goodwill towards mankind, um, except for those families with the audacity to earn over $200,000 a year; those people should be taxed into the ground. It is, after all, the fair thing to do.
This message was brought to you by the Democratic party, taxing and spending for nearly 200 years.
“where waves are crashing on a snow covered beach.”
A rare and wonderful sight, and far less destructive than an ice storm.
Merry Christmas
PA – there is no “ging” descrimination in the UK, it’s just a nickname. Having been invaded by the Norsemen, there are plenty of redheads.
Yanks are a whole other story though.
The “lunacy” is a middle class thing. Rich people have too much money to care, poor people can’t afford such nonsense. Middle classes have just enough time, money and social drive to go through any nonsense in order to feel superior or get that one inch ahead. Be it leg lengthening, baby sign language or SAT prep. Never mind McMansions and a Lexus all tied up with a big red bow.
#46 – Shore, the Repugs suck just as bad. Instead of tax and spend it’s borrow and spend. If they have anything useful to offer nobody is holding them back from actually announcing it.
“A tax increase that could cost employers $1 billion”
Were the state more business riendly, I suspect that fewer jobs would have been lost in the first place. This tax increase should help the state’s reputation.
Shore 47 Not a problem just enough to be pretty. Had a real bad one last year looked like a war zone. Now we have ice in the form of pellets falling so everyone is sleeping over. Thank god i have plenty of room beds for all.
” If they have anything useful to of”
I have no problem thrashing the Rs who go against the TR Republican ideals and spend wildly. The last 10 yeard of Republican rule in DC was a joke as was the Republican leadership on the issueat the statehouse.
I say we outlaw pensions for elected officials and increase prison terms for those who sell their offices.
Can we do it? Yes we can.
Shore 50 That was my first thoughts on that one. Let me see raise rate companies leave more jobs lost higher unemployment, need more money raise again ….. repeat until it is a circle jerk of public employees.
This will work out well.
Run Shore run we’ll all vote for you.
On second thought maybe you would be better off just running from NJ.
“ice in the form of pellets falling”
Oh, that is not bad. It is the freezing rain (sipercooled liquid water that freezes on impact) that causes the big problems. It is amazing the damage it can cause. have been through ice storms that left 1/3 of an inch of ice on everything. Egads! Trees are not designed to carry such weight.
Mike,
I would never be elected, as people do not like to hear truth from political candidates. Given the choice between harsh truth and flowery lies, the public prefers to be lied to, it seems.
Shore that is what we had last year trees down all over no power 2 3 days just ducky. I lost plenty of trees lay in bed & listen to them topple all around the place really wild. Crack crack crack for hours .
Shore 56 A shame but true, we are lost.
Off to dessert!
What’s this planet coming to? Colored can’t even light up a fire cracker on a plane.
” David Socolow said, the state needs to let an automatic tax increase take effect July 1 ”
While I do understand the need to restore the unemployment insurance fund to health, this strikes me as like taking a swimmer who is having difficulty staying afloat in a raging storm and sticking a few extra rocks in his pocket. Unlike chicken soup, it can’t help.
Thebest thing for the unemployed is jobs, not unemployment insurance payments. This action will not help creat any jobs and will likely cost more.
Were political officeholding something that one did as a service, for a limited time, and not a “profession,” I doubt that we would have results as poor as we have.
Once again, al Qaeda has shown its passion for targeting aviation. I am not planning on doing any TV this weekend, but be sure to pay attention to the BS that is going to be spread, and the ineffective actions DHS will take to give the impression of improved aviation security.
The bottom line is, a well-motivated terrorist will bring down a plane where and when he or she wants to and there is littlewe can do about it. Even the next generation of screening devices are of limited effectiveness (even though we can be proud that they are being developed down near AC). The best we can do for now is stop the stupid and the careless terrorists.
And people wonder why I drive so much instead of flying.
Jobless fund out of money. Let’s just keep extending the benefits. Oh, wait, money can actually run out?
“Oh, wait, money can actually run out”
Not as long as thereare some turnips the government can squeeze.
Shore,
I was attending math analysis lectures only because of good jokes the lecturer threw. One of them:
Two mathematicians met next to the plane
First:
I don’t want to fly because there is high probability of a bomb on the board
Second
Don’t worry, I brought a bomb and calculated that probability of another one is close to 0.
Don’t be silly just look at the stat, your chance to die in a car is much more that in a plane.
[63,64]
I thought the extended unemployment benefits are paid from the fed budget rather than the state, no?
What is the alternative to replenishing the UI fund? To reduce benefits? Obviously, extra payroll tax is quite untimely – though in today’s conditions many an employer could simply reduce wages and/or hours to fee up money for the UI tax…
F,
The statistics you cite are accurate with respect to general safety issues and typical accidents. With respect to terrorism, not so much. Aviation is THE target.
” an employer could simply reduce wages and/or hours”
Or cut more staff.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704718204574616470817688220.html?mod=rss_whats_news_us
Sean – I’m bummed….
“How Overhauling Derivatives Died”
“Lobbying by Wall Street has blunted efforts to step up regulation on derivatives trading by carving out exceptions or leaving the status quo in place.”
im never drinking again
ouch make it stop
Happy Boxing Day.
Did anyone find a center-hall colonial on a half acre in (in a train town, of course) their stocking yesterday?
coops (70)-
Gotta have the hair of the dog. Just pour yourself a wee dram right now and get on with it.
#72 Shore guy
Nah. Why would any of us want to downsize like that?
Cindy Merry Christmas
75 Thank you Sean. You had my mouth watering yesterday with the tradition of cooking a prime rib on a charcoal grill…..
But snow – snow everywhere. Oh my no. I try never to get cold – I mean on purpose and all.
Trying a walk today. I will have to bundle up and wait until about noon.
This terrorism incident should not have happened, this guy was in the FBI watch list database as having known low level terrorist connections and fits the profile, he should have been denied his Visa.
Quote:
Abdulmutallab applied for a Visa to visit the U.S. to attend a religious gathering. He was listed on the FBI Watch List, but he was not included in the No Fly List kept by terrorism experts in the U.S. Federal authorities said Abdulmutallab was determined to have “low level” connections to terrorists.
More on the FBI watch list. It only has about 400k names. I would think they all should be denied entry or subject to intense additional screening.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/31/AR2009103102141.html
Yup this guy should not have been flying here. His own father turned him in for his terrorist ties.
quote: The newspaper says the father, 70, recently grew “uncomfortable with the boy’s extreme religious views and had six months ago reported his activities to United States’ Embassy, Abuja and Nigerian security agencies.”
Terrorist ties.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/joshgerstein/1209/Report_planebomb_suspect_bankers_son.html
so, you got some knucklehead mentally disturbed man, doing something obviously fooish & dangerous and should pay the price for such a dumb act.
however, he yells the word “Al-Qaeda”, media does a little operation mockingbird, and everyone gets a little scared and says… we gotta go after those guys with the taco bell wraps on their heads. Hogwash!
don’t be fooled.
SAS
talking about the airline incident the other day..
SAS
btw: notice how you never hear how “Al-Qaeda” is defined?
junk politics.
SAS
SAS,
aQ itself is, in fact, well defined. It is also a small group. The problem I’d definition comes with the “related” groups. Some of these include folks who are or were part of aQ or went through a training camp. Others just sympathize with the tactics and goals of aQ.
One of the worst of these is al Shabab, which has support from Eritria and, thus, access to very sophisticated weapons; these characters are easy to want to make fun of or to downplay but they pose a real and present danger to US interests in Qfrica and elsewhere.
schump i tried to have a nip but i couldn’t do it… had big glass of water an a handful of aspirin
Also, with respect to al Qaeda, one has to give the Devil, UBL, his due. For an investment od a handful of millions of dollars, he has caused us to spend, what, $2 trillion or so in response. The last time we saw something like this it was SDI, where, for the price of a naval destroyer or cruiser, we caused the USSR to spend itself into oblivion.
One would hope that policy makers would take away a valuable lesson from the 80s. But, of course, we are different — exceptional, if you will — so no lesson of the past applies to us (except the good ones).
Shore, for once I’m going to agree with SAS. The Bush admin gave Al Qaeda a tremendous boost and much of their mythical power.
Nothing like an all-powerful secretive boogyman if you want to ride roughshod over the constitution and consolidate power.
Thanks Cheney.
Here we go pretty meaningless actions imposed by TSA to give the appearance of security and to put peoples’ minds at ease (but will do little to improve safety/security, and will inconvenience untold numbers of nonterrorists), just posted at the NY Times:
“According to a statement posted Saturday morning on Air Canada’s Web site, the Transportation Security Administration will severely limit the behavior of both passengers and crew during flights in United States airspace – restricting movement in the final hour of flight. Late Saturday morning, the T.S.A. had not yet included this new information on its own Web site.
“Among other things,” the statement in Air Canada’s Web site read, “during the final hour of flight customers must remain seated, will not be allowed to access carry-on baggage, or have personal belongings or other items on their laps.”
Okay folks, the only dangerous thing that one can be accessing is something they already smuggled onto the aircraft. The simple fact that our current screening is so porous is the real issue but TSA is giving the public a head fake.
Also, if someone has smuggled somethinonto a plane, all one need do is get it before the restriction takes place, say an hour and 15 minutes before landing. In fact, detonating an explosive at higher altitude gives the bad guys a better result. The NWA guy goofed by not going off to the rest room while up at 35,000 feet instead of at his seat at low altitude. Thank God he was an idiot, but the next miscreant to try tis may not be and we can’t depend on “show” security measures to distract and reassure us. Perhaps a tax on WS bonuses to upgrade airliner and airport security is what we need. I am sure the folks at GS et. would be pleased to help the nation; yea, right.
The real boogeymen: GS, MS, John Paulson
Article published on 12/24/09 when few would have read.
Banks Bundled Bad Debt, Bet Against It and Won
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/business/24trading.html?_r=1&ref=business
coop (83)-
Jesus. When you can’t have a nip the next day, you’re one hurting pup.
Try to find a bowl of menudo. That’s the ultimate hangover fighter.
Very surprised that there are not more terrorist incidents. I suspected that terrorists wishing to exact some revenge from Afghanistan/Iraq would do so on our own soil for maximum impact. One could do considerable damage anywhere if they are willing to trade their lives for it.
shore (86)-
Terrorism succeeds, even when it fails.
lisoosh,
I do not disagree with what you say. I for one believe, and have said here and in many places, including the WH itself, that Bush and Cheney were the biggest threatsto liberty that this nation ever faced.
That said, al Qaeda is in fact a threat, and our Bush-it former president dropped the ball at Torra Bora, endangering us all. Our refusal to pressure the Saudis to reign-in the Wahabiests is going to bite us and Saudis in the hindquarters.
The asymetrical nature of thethreat from al Qaeda and its sympathizers makes it difficult to eradicate with restrained military action, and we lack the willingness to enhage in total and unrestrained war against the enemy and those who harbor the enemy. Who here would support rounding up and imprisoning or bombing and killing hundreds of thousands or millions of people in order to neutralize a few hunderd or thousand miscreants? The Indian tribes and Japanese in WWII excepted, we tend to not do concentration camps.
escape (87)-
Old news. And, you evidently didn’t get the news that frontrunning your clients and selling them crap that you turn around and short is the new version of the American Dream.
fiduciary = easy mark
Shore (91)-
I think I’ve been pretty consistent in my call to turn most of the Arabic world into a parking lot.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126168307200704747.html
Just in case you wondered how they pulled this off w/o consent of Congress…
“U.S. Move To Cover Fannie and Freddie Losses Stirs Controversy”
Clot, you’re right. Guess I’m surprised that MSM finally acknowledges it.
We don’t have the guts to do it, but overwhelming response is the only way to neutralize terrorism.
Congress, schmongress. If Phony/Fraudy end up needing to buy off Congress’ consent, they’ll do it.
go rent the movie Brazil, it pretty much nailed it.
When we light up Teheran or Riyadh like Dresden, then we’ll be getting somewhere.
Hi all…I have been asleep for two days….what’d I miss?
“Very surprised that there are not more terrorist incidents. I suspected that terrorists wishing to exact some revenge from Afghanistan/Iraq would do so on our own soil for maximum impact. One could do considerable damage anywhere if they are willing to trade their lives for it”
A small group of terrorists could break the heart of the nation by attacking the softest of targets, elementary schools, in a coordinated attack in 8 or 10 states.
The bottom line is that one cannot stop people who want to do such things. The key is either to prevent them from want to do so, killing them befor they do, or exacting such a price in retribution (or making clear that we will do so) that their own people, um, neutralize them before they act.
Think abouthe damage two vans filled with gasoline traveling 1/2 mile apart could do in one of the tunnels at rush hour and then tell me how we stop such an attack without turning the nation into a police state.
The means of inflicting damage are all around us and the costs of doing so is low; however, the cost of preventing attacks is enormous. Therin lies the rub.
Richard Reid redux.
shore (102)-
I’d say tactical nuclear strikes at Riyadh, Teheran, Islamabad and the entirety of Yemen and Sudan would put a pretty good initial dent in the terrorist effort.
Clot,
What may be effective on the battlefield is not necessarily something that would be tolerated politically.
If one kills 100 million people (or ten times that number) in order to rid the earth of Islamic Terrorism, and, arguendo, succeeds, what is the backlash?
We used tactics against Germany and Japan that approximate what you suggest, and they succeeded. Is there anyone here who believes that we have the stomach to use similar tactics in order to solve this particular problem?
It would be less expensive in the long run to jist spend what it takes to make the West and Japan independent of fossile fuels, and then use domestic hydrocarbon supplies for chemical industry use. Once we have no need to care about the Arab world, the Iranians, the Central Asians, and the Indonesians (add Nigeria and our friends in Hugo Land to the list) our terrorism problems will evaporate.
Shore –
“Transportation Security Administration will severely limit the behavior of both passengers and crew during flights in United States airspace – restricting movement in the final hour of flight.”
Standard Israeli policy for the past 2 years.
whats with the lure of the final hour? Why not just do it in the first 1/2 hour? Completely arbitrary.
Barbara – For Israel, it is keeping people in their seats while over Israeli airspace, in both directions. The goal being to limit collateral damage.
Shore – I realize that we are more or less in agreement concerning both Tora Bora and the wrongs of Bush/Cheney but I am really saying more than that.
Terror groups power is more psychological than anything. By making AQ the boogyman, by changing so much in the US and mentioning them whenever possible, that administration plus so many other individuals and the media gave them power far beyond their stature. They showed the rest of the world that the terrorist tail could wag the dog of the US, spawing copycats and wannabes the world over. As well as providing cover for every crazy nut out there.
Dealing with thugs means not just beating them but humiliating them in front of their “friends”. The US and every “with us or against us patriot” just made them look cool.
Do agree on the Saudis never being handled right either, all hail oil!
Shore [105]
It would be less expensive in the long run to jist spend what it takes to make the West and Japan independent of fossile fuels, and then use domestic hydrocarbon supplies for chemical industry use. Once we have no need to care about the Arab world, the Iranians, the Central Asians, and the Indonesians (add Nigeria and our friends in Hugo Land to the list) our terrorism problems will evaporate.
The way the politics works here it is much easier (and, generally, has more public support) to spend 2T $$ on totally non-decisive and even harmful Middle East wars than to raise the gas tax to even half the Euro levels to create incentives for non-oil based transportation system. Aversion to an industrial policy of any kind led to the cancerous growth of the finance sector and will eventually be a major factor in the downfall of this great nation.
#101 Essex,
Hi all…I have been asleep for two days….what’d I miss?
Houses are now undervalued. Peace has broken out all over the world. Frank has been nominated for a nobel prize for economics./off sarcasm
Cobbler 110
Did you take Clot up on his suggestion and start drinking again?
He suggested it to someone else, I’ve just just quit…
Shore 102,
i once again point to Rome. The Roman armies upon beginning a conquest a new region would over run a town. If there was any resistance, (ANY at all) they would promptly execute everyone (including animals) except for a few individuals. They would then then have the few they kept alive watch as the roman army disassembled the town brick by brick and burned the homes and fields. Once all trace of the town and been destroyed, the few surviving prisoners were released.
The survivors spread the tale of the romans total annihilation of the resisting town to all the surrounding towns and villages.
As a result, the roman ended up killing fewer people and fighting fewer battles as no one was willing to suffer the ultimate price of being annihilated down to the very cobblestones of the street.
As you pointed out, only that level of total war could actually stop terrorism as the rest of the members of their society would not be willing to risk such a price.
http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2009/real_estate/0912/gallery.State_population_migration__The_biggest_losers/6.html
Shore,
We now have a population thats wants the fruits of the roman empire but would lose their lunch if they ever considered the actual action that would be required to actually follow through, even if it would result in fewer overall deaths in the end.
Shote
what business is one in where you are involved with the defense/intelligence industry AND the RIAA?????
torture music for us intelligence agencies?
97.Schumpeter says:
December 26, 2009 at 12:53 pm
We don’t have the guts to do it, but overwhelming response is the only way to neutralize terrorism.
Strump: My wife asked me whether there was some kind of bomb threat in the news. My 3 year-old son said “what is a mom threat? Is she making dinner?” My wife starting laughing “I didn’t think my cooking was THAT bad!”
A little primer on why Chicago does not suck…..I have to look up the definition of stone pony…
WSJ
SIGHTINGS
DECEMBER 26, 2009
Definin’ the Blues
What were they singing about?
By TERRY TEACHOUT
When I was 12 years old, I found a Count Basie album in my father’s record collection that contained a 1941 performance of “Goin’ to Chicago Blues” by Jimmy Rushing and the Basie band. That was the record that made me fall in love with the blues—though it goes without saying that I couldn’t understand all of the lyrics, especially when they touched on what for me was the still-unexplored land of adult relationships. I found the first stanza in particular to be impenetrably puzzling: Goin’ to Chicago, sorry that I can’t take you / There’s nothin’ in Chicago that a monkey woman can do. What on earth, I wondered, was a “monkey woman”? Teetering as I was on the edge of puberty, I boggled at the exotic possibilities.
In time I was to discover that every field of artistic endeavor has its own unique argot, and that many artists get a kick out of mystifying “civilians” by trotting it out in public. Sometimes it’s satisfyingly pithy (ballet dancers always refer to George Balanchine’s “The Four Temperaments” as “The Four Ts”), sometimes downright gnomic (“Macbeth” is customarily known among actors as “the Scottish play”). But few of these specialized vocabularies are as inaccessible to a middle-class kid as the language of the blues, which abounds with words and phrases that you aren’t likely to hear at the dinner table—at least not when your mother is around.
Enter Stephen Calt, a blues historian and amateur linguist whose new book, “Barrelhouse Words: A Blues Dialect Dictionary,” published by the University of Illinois Press, is an impeccably scholarly, irresistibly readable guide to the language heard on the recordings of the great blues singers who were active in the first half of the 20th century. If there was ever a time when you found yourself wondering what it means to get a “stone pony” or “make a panther squall,” Mr. Calt is your man. As far back as the late ’60s, he was interviewing aging blues singers and sifting through arcane printed sources in the hopes of untangling the verbal mysteries of the music he loved.
On one notable occasion described in the preface, the author of “Barrelhouse Words” actually dared to accost a fellow customer of a bus-terminal diner who got mad at the counterman and called him a “jambooger.” Having heard the word on Barbecue Bob’s 1930 recording of “Jambooger Blues,” Mr. Calt took decisive action: “The belligerent customer (whom I anxiously followed outside) was willing to indulge my curiosity about the term, though he obviously regarded me as something of a lunatic.”
Mr. Calt may well be a lunatic, but he’s my kind of lunatic, a fellow obsessive who demands the straight dope and is prepared to get it by any means necessary. Thanks solely to his lunacy—and determination—future generations will know that a “jambooger” is “a derogatory black slang term for a black male.” His most significant discovery is that “the most striking expressions found in blues songs were not, as usually depicted, poetic or metaphorical turns of phrase, but rather were slang terms . . . that seemed to belong to the ordinary vocabulary of the singers and their peers.” Hence the blues recordings of the ’20s and ’30s are not only works of popular art but also repositories of vernacular black speech, time capsules whose contents shed light on the way ordinary folks used to talk:
• What does the phrase “dry long so” mean? Answer: For no good reason.
• What was Alcorub, and who drank it? Answer: A brand of rubbing alcohol “imbibed by some derelict alcoholics of the blues era.”
• How do you “jump a rattler”? Answer: You board a train without buying a ticket.
All this and much, much more is made manifest in the pages of “Barrelhouse Words,” perhaps the only dictionary on my bulging bookshelf that can be read for pure pleasure from cover to cover.
Part of the pleasure arises from Mr. Calt’s donnish sense of humor. He must have been smiling quietly to himself when he defined “crying shame” as “an exceedingly lamentable occurrence.” No less enjoyable, though, are the examples of contemporary usage that accompany his definitions, all of them drawn from classic blues records. A few are genuinely poetic, while others are drop-dead funny. Look up “business, pork-grindin’,” for instance, and you’ll be confronted with this stanza from Kokomo Arnold’s 1935 recording of “Sissy Man Blues”: Lord, I woke up this mornin’ with my pork-grindin’ business in my hand / Now if you can’t send me no woman, please send me a sissy man. This is a family newspaper, so if you can’t figure the rest out for yourself, turn to page 42 of “Barrelhouse Words.” I haven’t laughed so hard while reading a reference book since the last time I consulted H.L. Mencken’s “New Dictionary of Quotations.”
On top of everything else, Mr. Calt’s book answers a question that has vexed me at odd moments for the past four decades. No sooner did I open “Barrelhouse Words” for the first time than I turned to page 164, where I found this admirably concise definition of “monkey woman”: “An overly obliging or compliant female.” Now I can die happy.
Might have to buy this….
http://www.amazon.com/Barrelhouse-Words-Blues-Dialect-Dictionary/dp/0252076605
Was hoping stony pony was something lewd and profane, but it ain’t….
stony = stone
Chicago, a good friend of mine used to sit-in / blow harp for Howlin’ Wolf and occasionally Muddy when they were in NYC back in the early 70s. Got to know / party with a few of them over a couple year period Detroit Junior, Hubert Sumlin, Eddy Cleanhead Vinsen. Nice guys, not a mean one among the bunch.
SHore,
Didnt they try to use PETN on the detriot flight the other night? If so then that guy had to be an idiot to not bring the plane down
PETN in action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZENvUVG6TE&feature=player_embedded
Ket,
Let’s just say I lead an interesting life and have known some interesting people.
Ket,
I have been talking to some DC folks today but the holiday makes it hard to reach those with the best information. Bottom line, I don’t know yet what he used. I suspect the papers filed in court on monday will spell-out the explosive used.
I am glad the guy was a fcuk up and was not able to succeed. The problem is, we can’t depend on the next schmuck to be as incompetent.
It is sad, aviation is the primary target yet we spend money on protecting Wyoming from all manner of ground attacks. It seems that counterterrorism is just another form of pork now.
News said it was PETN
Sean, shore
I have seen limited info, but assuming it was PETN and that the explosive was not a “dud”, then it would seem that you would almost have to fail on purpose.
I am not suggesting a crazy conspiracy or anything, but it seems like these “terrorist” activities are run by a bunch of 5th graders as anyone with any drive and a little reading on military history should be able to wreak havoc given their resources.
If it was PETN, I suppose there is little chance this guy was a lone wolf. Were he, he would have known how to set it off. He also would have been dmarter about where and when he detonated the device.
Thank God he is an idiot. And let us all hope hestarts singing like a canary. If 5-10 planes go down in a single day, the aviation industry will tank, for years.
shore,
if they are willing to go suicide, why not just implant a suitable bomb in the carriers body cavity with a preset timer then sew them up and pump them full of antibiotics, you remove the idiot factor and now have a dumb mule that just needs to walk onto the plane?
The guy supposedly was using a syringe – that is, instead of a blast cap (which PETN is quite sensitive to but could be detectable in the magnitometer) he was trying to initiate an explosion via some sort of heat-releasing chemical reaction. This is not straightforward.
Re. the body cavity thing – you’ll get minced meat all over the place and not much other damage (no blast wave), unless they use a couple kilos of stuff or more.
cobbler,
be creative, steel bearings.
kettle, 133
steel bearings might set off metal detector…
*but* steel bearings encased with triangular metal shards would cut open the mule, then release the bearings, minimizing the dampening effect of tissue… no?
sl
Or..
skin closure only. leave the abdominal muscles open (secure with binder that is removed prior to detonation.)
sl
So glad I woke up in time for this thread….
*looking aghast*
sl
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPvqFkCtAqw&NR=1
122 Chicago Stone Ponys
sl [135]
I am not sure the perp will be able to walk and sit down after the “procedure”…
Seriously, the only foolproof way of securing the flight is to strip the passengers completely, have them CT-scanned and then change to some pre-checked clothing. (like it is done in the factories that e.g. process large quantities of shiny). Short of this, I guess the change from pc bull$hit to some serious profiling could do the trick.
I’d take the Stone Ponys right now- instead I’m stuck at the Starland with Danzig and I forgot my earplugs. Oh bother.
I’d take the Stone Ponys right now- instead I’m stuck at the Starland with Danzig and I forgot my earplugs. Oh bother.
“if they are willing to go suicide, why not just implant a suitable bomb in the carriers body”
This more or less happened in Saudi Arabia in August when a guy with a bomb inside him tried to kill the king.
140 NJCoast
I forgot all about that show! D@amn!
The Stone Ponys, wasn’t that with Linda “Poor poor pitiful me” Ronstat (or however she spelled it)?
It will be easy to spot NJC in a crowd this week, she will be the one saying, “What?” “Huh”
Ket,
As I recall, it explodes at about 400 degrees, so he must have been cooking it to set it off. Had he gone off to the rest room earlier, the news would have been deradful, I suspect.
The whole hub and spoke thing works against counterterrorism folks as well, for reasons best discussed off-line.
139 NJCoast – That was my era folk/rock. Then I remember when Linda Ronstadt started doing country/western – oh my.
I was singing in Lake Tahoe at The Christiana on Saddle Road in Heavenly Valley – Summer of ??? 70 I guess. Chet Atkins came in and told me I should be doing country western. He was playing at the Sahara or some such club and dropped by with some other folks. True story even though I can’t remember details for sh!t.
shore [145]
Yess, 400F – but it melts at ~285, which matches what one of the news articles described as “something burning and melting”.
Just be glad that the yutz tried to do this in his seat.
Cindy,
Even though she had dark hair, I sure liked Linda R back in the 70s:
tp://m.youtube.com/watch?desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DKKv_vJks2gM&v=KKv_vJks2gM&gl=US
Didn’t the shoe bomber idiot try to do blow up the plane from his seat too? We should be happy these morons haven’t yet figured out that the seat area doesn’t work.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DKKv_vJks2gM&v=KKv_vJks2gM&gl=US
lost,
Reid was not as stupid as he seems at first. His seat was, DHS people told me, above the center fuel tank.
There are several spots in a plane where one can do maximum damage and it will not take long before some cell figures out what to do. One can only hope that TSA finally gets its act together before then.
153 Shore
I wasn’t aware of that. Great. Maybe driving for our next vacation wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
lost,
The holes in aviation security would curl your hair.
On the other hand, there are also some spots wher flight crews on each aircraft are able to place a found explosive and barricade it in such a way as to minimize the damage. Like chicken soup, it couldn’t hurt, not thst I would want to be the flight attendant ordered to hold the snack cart against the device and bulkhead. It adds a new meaning to taking one for the team.
where
Why would any one in the right mind buy these days?
2 bedroom in Hoboken rents for less than $2000/mth meanwhile taxes and maintenance fees will cost you $1000. So the cost equivalent should not be more than $100K. Meanwhile the market is more like $500K.
Buyers must be swimming in cash and are expecting massive inflation, I see no other reason to buy.
Look at these new Hoboken listings:
http://hudson.fnismls.com/publink/default.aspx?GUID=e639a123-4fe4-4cf8-bd5f-f63c6d81ab63&Report=Yes
shore [156]
They should just put it in a bucket of water. It is very difficult to make an improvised device waterproof (it’s not a depth charge…), so all the electrical pieces inside will get disabled very quickly.
#158 frank
We have a bull market in dolts. Their families/friends/tv tell them to buy no matter what the rent vs buy calculations show.
A previous landlord bought at the peak. He was complaining to me that his carrying costs were at least 1k a month more than we were paying in rent. I really wanted to ask why did you buy it , and then why did you rent it out knowing you were losing 1k a month on a house that was dropping at least 4k a month in value.
155 Shore
If my hair wasn’t already curly I’d be scared.
156 Shore
I’m thinking I wouldn’t want to be that flight attendant. Of course, every person is different. A supervisor at one of my former schools asked me if I would agree to come to school to volunteer during a flooding emergency. I said “You know I have friends that survived Katrina in New Orleans. What do you think?” Sorry, I wasn’t going to take one for that team.
this figgy pudding is fantastic.
SAS
“Al qaeda”
nothing but CIA funded group, which was once Mujadeem.
funded to have your own little terror group in your back pocket. Be provacative to justify about anything you want, and make good little guerrilla.
But, you are correct, with any loose knit operation, you will have spin offs that are real threats. no doubt.
A very good explanation of this was done, of all places, a movie: battle of algiers. A great movie.
In there, a scene is done where an explanation of how the terrorist networks/groups are fanned out. some being bought and paid for and used as “alias” for your operation, and things get spun out in become threats.
watch & learn.
but,, if you really want to end terrorism, don’t engage in it.
throwing stones & dropping bombs rarely ever solves anything. Only thing it does is make some small few big money.
and you ain’t one of them.
SAS
Gtor,
Urban is leaving Florida I see.
Gator even.
Here is an article on Stoops going to Florida:
http://www.sportingnews.com/college-football/article/2009-12-26/sooners-stoops-would-have-tough-time-turning-down-gators
Shore – I will start praying that Bob Stoops comes back to Gainesville. Last thing we need is another Ron Zook. Sigh…
In other exciting news, Stu, Lil Gator and I will be spending New Year’s in glorious Cincinnati, OH. I can already foresee a glamorous evening that includes Skyline Chili and Graeter’s Ice Cream.
And a Bearcats win.
All this terrorism talk is lame. Our reaction to it is lame as well. First, the US has too many open borders to defend. Second, it is past the point of cost prohibitive. Third, if morons wants to create havoc, I would expect a few of ’em to succeed. Terrorism is really new to this side of the Atlantic. Rather than creating reactive and hugely inefficient air travel policies when an occasional plane gets blown out of the sky, our energy would be much better spent on planting seeds for our independence from foreign resource requirements. The most effective and cheap way to secure our peace is through not giving Islam a reason to hate us. Bomb Mecca into oblivion and even the non-fundamentalists will turn postal. Want to hurt the Islamic fundamentalists where it counts? Stop enriching their corrupt leaders through your oil purchases. As much as the MSM wants you to think that Al Queda hates our way of life, it’s really our support of Middle-Eastern tyrants that rubs them the wrong way.
Stu, I agree with you but the problem is deeper than resources, it is our imperial foreign policy. “A Republic, Not an Empire” is an excellent read.
http://www.amazon.com/Republic-Not-Empire-Patrick-Buchanan/product-reviews/089526272X/ref=cm_cr_pr_hist_5?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addFiveStar
“New Year’s in glorious Cincinnati, OH.”
This is the first Gator Family trip I have not envied.
Stu,
I agree with what you said above and, I said something similar earlier this thread and in the past:
Shore Guy says:
December 26, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Clot,
What may be effective on the battlefield is not necessarily something that would be tolerated politically.
If one kills 100 million people (or ten times that number) in order to rid the earth of Islamic Terrorism, and, arguendo, succeeds, what is the backlash?
[snip]
It would be less expensive in the long run to just spend what it takes to make the West and Japan independent of fossile fuels, and then use domestic hydrocarbon supplies for chemical industry use. Once we have no need to care about the Arab world, the Iranians, the Central Asians, and the Indonesians (add Nigeria and our friends in Hugo Land to the list) our terrorism problems will evaporate.
RE: “The most effective and cheap way to secure our peace is through not giving Islam a reason to hate us.”
Spoken from pure ignorance. Muslims have hated and killed “infidels” for thousands of years. As a kafir you have 2 choices: submit to the will of allah, or die.
Islam is an expansionist ideology, not content with ‘getting along with others’ but rather seeks to eliminate kuffar lands via either battle or demographic change.
In islam there are two houses: Dar al-Islam (The House of Islam) and Dar al-Harb (The House of War). ALL THAT IS NOT THE FORMER, IS CONSIDERED THE LATTER.
Not all muslims subscribe to the above islamic doctrine, but estimates put the number who do at 15-20% which is about 200 million people.
I’m amazed that this far along after 9-11 most people still have not learned about those who seek to destroy us, and why.
There is no “cheap” or quick solution to the problem, but like the Cold War, it will cost trillions and last many decades.
RE: “…make the West and Japan independent of fossil fuels … our terrorism problems will evaporate.”
A common refrain, but our current problem existed long before the automobile was invented.
Qwerty,
“demographic change.”
They are already winning this.
And you are right. This isn’t about fossil fuels. They believe the future is an all Islamic world.
By reproducing at a rate that far exceeds non Muslims, they will outnumber everyone else in only a matter of a few generations.
This is even more advanced already in EU.
Barring some other cataclysmic event, it’s only a matter of time.
sl
Still 174 We & the EU will be on the ropes in the future but I don’t think the Chinese will go down easily. They maybe more of a future allie than most suspect. As they plan ahead & are patient they will try to weaken us but long term it will be them & the round eye Americans against Islam.It is in there interest to weaken but not cripple us totally. Given time America in the war mode (all out not like now) can be a powerful allie.