Which then caused the Washington Post to note it.

Did NBCÂ’s silence have anything to do with the fact that one of its parent companies is General Electric?

NBC News representatives say that it didn’t. “This was a straightforward editorial decision, the kind we make daily around here,” said Lauren Kapp, spokeswoman for NBC News. Kapp declined to discuss how NBC decides what’s news or, in this case, what isn’t.

But to others, NBC’s silence looks like something between a lapse and a coverup. The satirical “Daily Show” on Monday noted that “Nightly News” had time on Friday to squeeze in a story about the Oxford English Dictionary adding such terms as “OMG” and “muffin top,” but didn’t bother with the GE story.

Ignoring stories about its parent company’s activities is “part of a troubling pattern” for NBC News, said Peter Hart, a director at Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), a liberal media watchdog group that often documents instances of corporate interference in news. He cited a series of GE-related stories that NBC’s news division has underplayed over the years, from safety issues in GE-designed nuclear power plants to the dumping of hazardous chemicals into New York’s Hudson River by GE-owned plants.

What’s more, Hart notes, NBC News has covered corporate tax-avoidance stories before — that is, when they didn’t involve GE.

Stewart calls NBC out near the end of this segment. Until then, it's a lot of liberal defense of teachers' unions and griping that corporations don't pay enough in taxes. more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:32 AM | Comments (228)
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These are tactical moves, of course, and not substantive ones, of course, but you can't win the battle without good tactics.

So here's the bill's branding.

They are currently preparing a resolution — dubbed “The Government Shutdown Prevention Act” — that would formally scold the Senate for failing to act (some 39 days after the House passed a long-term budget resolution, H.R. 1, to cut federal spending by $61 billion) and urge them to pass a spending bill. It would also publicly reiterate the urgency of the situation — the current resolution funding the government expires on April 8.

The resolution will stipulate that if the Senate fails to pass a bill before April 6 that funds the government through the remainder of the fiscal year (September 30), H.R. 1 would become “the law of the land,” and members of Congress would stop receiving their paychecks.

I have no idea what that is supposed to mean -- the House can't just resolve that a bill, not passed by the Senate, shall become law of the land. Still, gotta love the bit about forfeiting paychecks.

Meanwhile, it's reported that the Democrats plan to offer another $20 billion in cuts, although of course they refuse to actually put such an offer forward with any specifics. They do like floating trial-balloons about vague plans to the media, but not so much making actual detailed offers which can serve as genuine negotiation-starters.

Which, by the way, is an age-old negotiation tactic, of course: Never state your number first, make the other guy state his and start bargaining in your direction from his number. But of course the Republicans already did offer their (too small) number, and still the Democrats refuse to negotiate.

But it's our fault, right?

The GOP really should hammer this point -- if the Democrats are actually negotiating, where is their actual counter-offer? Which is what Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California says is exactly what the GOP's thinking.

McCarthy, in an interview, tells NRO that House Republicans will not be bullied into accepting a vague offer from Senate Democrats. In fact, he says, the GOP will soon bring a bill to the House floor that chastises Harry Reid and company for their failure to pass an alternative spending plan. By publicizing how Democrats are handling the negotiations via a floor debate and a vote, McCarthy and the leadership hope to force their upper-chamber foes into action, or at least highlight their inaction.

“This bill will send them a message,” McCarthy says. “It will show the American public that they are not acting. Right now, [Sen. Charles] Schumer [D., N.Y.] is just putting this on us.”

McCarthy says that the House GOP’s floor strategy will attempt to hammer Democrats into putting their spending proposals on the table via legislation, not backroom whispers: “If they want to be lazy, we are saying with our new bill that we will fund the government, but we will fund the government at this level, because you won’t act.”

...

If Senate Democrats do not take the bait, and enact their own long-term spending package, the government could shut down, McCarthy acknowledges. That said, he believes that it will become clear in coming days that House Republicans have made every effort to avoid a shutdown.

Makes logical sense. Of course we have a biased media that doesn't really care about logic but only narratives that favor the Democrats, so.

Posted by: Ace at 09:16 AM | Comments (281)
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In Delaware, where they'd once fought such horrible burdens, they now support them.

In Delaware, where Gosnell was also known to perform his gruesome practices, even Democrats have introduced such legislation. Shockingly, they insist that the primary purpose of their bill is to regulate podiatrists and dentists. There should be little doubt in peopleÂ’s minds that more human beings are killed by abortionists than foot doctors!

Planned Parenthood in Delaware supports the legislation, which is a good indication they are on the ropes. While the legislation is part of GosnellÂ’s legacy, Kermit Gosnell himself is a legacy of Planned Parenthood, which fought against this type of legislation in Pennsylvania and other states. Had such legislation been enacted, Gosnell would have been behind bars years ago.

It's useful to compare the Democrats' position here to their general position on regulation of any other industry.

No matter what the regulation is, they generally support it (except in one case). They always seem to think that government regulations, inspections, and paperwork-compliance creates a better, more hygienic, and more moral industry.

Except here. In this one case, they find regulation, inspection, and paperwork-compliance unduly burdensome.

In the case of one industry and one industry only, they accept the general GOP brief that government interference is burdensome and saps the vitality of an industry.

With abortion, they support the sort of hardcore "Wild West" strong-form libertarian laissez-faire let-people-work-it-out-and-let-the-market-decide regime they decry as "extremist" in any other context.

It seems that there's only one industry where they are comfortable pursuing this growth-at-all-costs strategy.

Posted by: Ace at 07:55 AM | Comments (163)
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This seems like a sound strategy. I'm actually more on Monty's Team DOOM, because I doubt very much America's ruling class has the political will to save the country.

And that's not even exactly right -- It's not just America's ruling class which is slow-walking towards disaster, it's America's citizens themselves. There is a reason, after all, that our elected representatives have chosen the course of irresponsibility and crushing debt every time they've been given the choice. It's a popular decision. Our representatives aren't exactly voting against our wishes on this issue.

Still, I'm looking for some kind of ray of light here. Maybe Rubio's pairing of one unpopular policy choice (responsible reforms to entitlements, cuts in apparently-popular spending programs) with another unpopular choice (raising the debt limit) can wake some people up.

I will vote to defeat an increase in the debt limit unless it is the last one we ever authorize and is accompanied by a plan for fundamental tax reform, an overhaul of our regulatory structure, a cut to discretionary spending, a balanced-budget amendment, and reforms to save Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

...

Such reductions are important, but nondefense discretionary spending is a mere 19% of the budget. Focusing on this alone would lead to draconian cuts to essential and legitimate programs. To get our debt under control, we must reform and save our entitlement programs.

No changes should be made to Medicare and Social Security for people who are currently in the system, like my mother. But people decades away from retirement, like me, must accept that reforms are necessary if we want Social Security and Medicare to exist at all by the time we are eligible for them.

Finally, instead of simply raising the debt limit, we should reassure job creators by setting a firm statutory cap on our public debt-to-GDP ratio. A comprehensive plan would wind down our debt to sustainable levels of approximately 60% within a decade and no more than half of the economy shortly thereafter. If Congress fails to meet these debt targets, automatic across-the-board spending reductions should be triggered to close the gap. These public debt caps could go in tandem with a Constitutional balanced budget amendment.

Well, I don't like that last thing, really. Statutory caps can always be overcome by majority votes (though I suppose it would empower a minority of 41 senators to filibuster and thus defeat any attempt to override the cap). I'm not against such procedural changes to future spending procedures; I just know these are often used as an unsuitable replacement for current substantive action.

I also don't like the way he puts that bit about "draconian cuts to essential and legitimate programs." I think I'm growing more and more fond of the Rand Paul/Jim DeMint line of thinking on this, and am not happy about statements that implicitly, I think, seem to defend current spending -- which is absurd -- as "essential and legitimate." Domestic discretionary spending can and should be cut by 15%, 20%, or more.

Still, I take some heart in the fact that leading members of the caucus don't seem to have given up and consigned the country to its fate.

Via Hot Air, which has some interesting quotes of the day from yesterday -- including Rubio's reluctance to rule out a vice presidential bid.

Posted by: Ace at 07:23 AM | Comments (125)
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At Hot Air.

His major claim (which he previously stated) is that his analysis was always according to the situation presented by President Obama's haphazard, slapdash decision-making.

He began by not encouraging a no-fly zone or direct military action. When Obama flipped a coin and decided it was a new national foreign policy imperative that "Qadaffy must go," he then supported the establishment of a no-fly zone and taking Qadaffy out while he was weak. Based, he says, on the changed situation that the foreign policy prestige of the US was now placed on a reckless bet against Qadaffy -- having made the bet, we now have to win it. Or, as he says, "if you ask me if we should jump in the lake, I'd say no. But now if we're in the lake, if you ask me to swim, I'd say yes."

His current position -- that we shouldn't have intervened directly -- is based, it seems, on two different beliefs: First, in accord with his originally announced statement, that the US should just not intervene directly. Second, based on Obama's Jenga-based foreign policy declarations -- if the president has taken the one decisive goal off the table (removing Qadaffy from power), then the military action is designed only to produce stalemate and civil war, not a stable and positive situation, and thus, minus that critical goal, the original position of non-intervention is reinforced.

The video he's released compiling a series of past statements doesn't exactly prove that was his thinking; the past statements are consistent with this narrative, but do not prove that was his thinking all along. Gingrich is a smart man and knows how to articulate his thinking clearly -- if this was his thinking all along, you'd usually expect a quick wit like Gingrich to say so.

On the other hand, the charge against Gingrich here is that he is playing partisan games with foreign policy, and the past statements do tend to show evolutions in thought -- and hesitancy. That's forgivable, I think; my own thinking on this changed (and, who knows, could change again).

But it's hard for Gingrich to push his central critique that Obama's making this up as he goes along, reversing past statements and generally guilty of muddled, rudderless thinking when Gingrich himself hasn't been coherent and firm throughout this.

I don't think someone changing their mind is necessarily a bad thing. But it does make it harder for Gingrich himself to carry this particular brief against Obama.

Posted by: Ace at 07:00 AM | Comments (66)
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The membership of the Loyal Order of the Terminally Boned (LOTB) has been growing by leaps and bounds! Today's inductee...Georgia!

Public employees adopt a new tactic to avoid taking cuts to their benefit plans: pre-emptive retirement. The generous spirit of public service lives on!

A government shutdown looms. They say that like it's a bad thing.

Public-sector employees vs taxpayers: it's class warfare, baby! Old Marxist wine in a new hip bottle!

Okay, now this is serious: Scotch whiskey exports decline as European demand weakens. A nation that cannot afford to get knee-walking drunk is on the brink of the abyss.

Dear GOP: W3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUKcOy9cP3DieyckcUsI">Why are you trying to kill Grandma? What did she ever do to you? (You're going to see a lot of this stuff in the run-up to the 2012 election, so get ready to be called a geezer-killer many times in the coming months.)

Portugal's credit-rating gets downgraded again.

[UPDATE] Who's to blame for the federal budget impasse? The Tea Party, that's who! Reid reminds me of Ahab in Moby Dick:

All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event — in the living act, the undoubted deed — there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask. If man will strike, strike through the mask! How can the prisoner reach outside except by thrusting through the wall? To me, the white whale is that wall, shoved near to me. Sometimes I think there's naught beyond. But 'tis enough. He tasks me; he heaps me; I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it. That inscrutable thing is chiefly what I hate; and be the white whale agent, or be the white whale principal, I will wreak that hate upon him. Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me. For could the sun do that, then could I do the other; since there is ever a sort of fair play herein, jealousy presiding over all creations. But not my master, man, is even that fair play. Who's over me? Truth hath no confines.

[UPDATE 2 - Via Insty] 13% of US homes are vacant. Highest proportion of empty houses is in...Maine? That's surprising. I would have guessed Nevada.

[UPDATE 3] Alas, poor Ezra! Juiceboxer agonistes. This so-called "easy fix" for Social Security, like all such madcap schemes, rests upon some very weak assumptions.

What I wonder about is how Klein himself seems so oblivious to how someone to the right of center would view a plan like Sperling’s. As Klein states, “Sperling suggests a 3 percent surcharge on all income over $200,000, which would wipe out half of Social Security’s shortfall. He suggests the rest could be made up through bipartisan agreement on benefits cuts or tax changes.”

Wow, what a bargaining strategy: you give me half of what I want and then we can bargain over the rest. IÂ’m shocked the administration doesnÂ’t have a bipartisan plan in hand already.

[UPDATE 4] Like rust, the pension-crisis deniers never sleep. They're just trying to defer the collapse until after they retire (or, hopefully, stave it off for a few more decades until they can shuffle off this mortal coil and leave the wasteland for the young 'uns to deal with).
more...

Posted by: Monty at 04:43 AM | Comments (204)
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Two things.

First and as already covered here, Judge Sumi issued an amended TRO (PDF) which, like the first one, purports to halt implementation of the budget repair bill.

Unfortunately for Judge Sumi, this injunction only orders the Wisconsin Secretary of State not to publish or implement the law. It suffers from at least two fatal flaws: (1) this law has already been published and (2) the Secretary of State does not "implement" the law in the sense that his office does not deal with withholding of union dues, setting pensions withholdings, etc. The Wisconsin AG says implementation is ongoing and will continue.

Second, though election day is next week for Justice Prosser's seat, he will continue on the Supreme Court until August. His term does not end until July 31, which means that no matter what happens next week, he will still be on the court when the TRO is considered. He will also likely still be on the bench when the merits of the Open Meetings argument are ruled on, though that will depend more on how much the liberal Chief Justice can drag her feet if Prosser isn't reelected. Keep in mind that there won't be a drawn-out appeals process here because the appellate court already took a pass on the case.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 03:35 AM | Comments (54)
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You successfully fall for twenty meters before you hit the bottom. You get a 4.1 from the Russian judge.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:55 AM | Comments (78)
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Obviously, petro-dollars translates into major arms purchases.

..."There is no U.N. embargo on Libyan oil," a U.N. Security Council diplomat told Reuters on condition of anonymity. "The rebels can sell oil. But they can't do it through the Libyan National Oil Corporation."...

Actually, it doesn't really matter what the "official" UN position on arms sales is once the rebels have a source of mega-dollar financing -- one being protected by no-fly zones preventing regime friendly forces from inconveniently flattening rebel oil wells and terminals. Allied ships "enforcing" the "arms embargo" could simply be positioned to allow freighters to ummmm..."slip through the cracks". The Med is big and you can't be everywhere all the time, right? Shit happens sometimes, right? Luck of the draw, one in a million, que sera sera.

If the Colonel has any neurons left firing in his addled brain, this is his wake up call to pack up what remains of his loot and head for the exits.

more...

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 02:25 AM | Comments (26)
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Thule Air Base: The US MilitaryÂ’s Most Remote Outpost

Located in Northern Greenland over 700 miles above the Arctic Circle Thule Air Base is the US's most remote base in the world. First built in the early 1950s it now houses over 600 personnel but is so far North that it can only receive supplies by ship for a brief period each summer and spends much of the year in darkness.

It's primary mission is to serve as a radar early warning system for ICBM launches (given its location halfway between Moscow and New York) plus a secondary role of tracking any space debris that might crash into satellites or the space station.

As an air base it's unique in that it doesn't have any aircraft but it does have its own tugboat. It's definitely a hardship station although the base's newcomers guide makes duty there seem like a cross between a cheap cruise and a ski lodge. So if you don't mind a little isolation, limited sunlight, and dealing with the occasional ice worm, it could be positively cozy there. Well just as long as no Ruskies or shape-shifting aliens show up.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:50 PM | Comments (747)
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