From the weekend's WSJ:

Governor Jerry Brown's wing-and-a-prayer budget in January predicted the Facebook IPO would help to close the Golden State's $9 billion deficit with a $2.5 billion tax windfall over five years.

...

Sorry, Jerry. Early this month the state's Legislative Analyst's Office reported that because of the near 50% decline in Facebook stock from its $38 a share offering price, "hundreds of millions of dollars of income tax revenue assumed in the state budget plan are at risk." It'll be even worse if other young tech companies don't go public or do so at lower valuations. The Facebook falloff comes after state tax collections in the first half of 2012 had already fallen $3.5 billion below earlier estimates.

Guess what, Californians. Your magnificent state government would never dream of cutting expenses to make up for this revenue shortfall. Lucky you.

Posted by: andy at 05:17 AM | Comments (71)
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Also the beginning of the home stretch for campaign season.

Posted by: andy at 03:49 AM | Comments (130)
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Welcome to the official Pre-Labor Day ONT party. As always pants are optional.

Leaked: Full Secret Agenda of the Democrat National Convention

Heh. Apparently the ritual stoning of the Boy Scouts and candlelight memorial for the victims of Mitt Romney have been moved to later in the week.

2012 Democrat National Convention
Schedule of Events

7:00 pm OPENING FLAG BURNING
7:15 pm PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE TO THE UNITED NATIONS
7:20 pm Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Barack Obama
7:25 pm OPENING PRAYER - Reverend Jeremiah Wright
7:45 pm CEREMONIAL TREE HUGGING - Darryl Hannah
7:55 pm Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Darryl Hannah
8:00 pm GLOBAL WARMING OMFG!!!!!!!!! - Al Gore
8:30 pm WHY FOURTH TRIMESTER ABORTIONS MATTER - Barbara Boxer
8:55 pm Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Barbara Boxer
9:00 pm CHARGING OUR TROOPS WITH WAR CRIMES - John Kerry
9:30 pm MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR SADDAM HUSSEIN AND MUAMMAR GADDAFI - Cindy Sheehan and Susan Sarandon
9:55 pm INCOHERENT RAMBLING ABOUT COWBOY POETRY, ETC. - Harry Reid
10:00 pm Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Susan Sarandon
10:05 pm COLLECTION DRIVE FOR THE OSAMA BIN LADEN MEMORIAL FUND - Cher
10:30 pm FREE THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS FROM GUANTANAMO BAY - Sean Penn
11:00 pm OVAL OFFICE AFFAIRS - William Jefferson Clinton
11:45 pm Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Susan Sarandon's Rack
11:50 pm A PLEA FOR MASS PARDONS OF THE OCCUPY WALL STREET RAPISTS - Howard Dean
12:15 am FREE THE MINUTEMEN IN AFGHANISTAN'S PRISONS - Michael Moore
12:25 am Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Jessica Alba
12:30 am SATELLITE ADDRESS - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
12:45 am NOMINATION OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA - Nancy Pelosi
12:55 am Barack Obama ACCEPTS NOMINATION, GRAMMY, AND TONY AWARDS
1:15 am THE TRUE STORY: HOW I KILLED BIN LADEN - Barack Obama
1:25 am Max Baucus SINGS NATIONAL ANTHEM
1:30 am CORONATION OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA
1:55 am Max Baucus PROPOSES A TOAST TO Mitt McRyan
2:00 am Bill Clinton asks Max Baucus to drive Hillary home.

Too Good to Check: The Obamas are planning to move to a modest $35million home in Hawaii in Jan 2013.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:19 PM | Comments (982)
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It's gone somewhere.

The resignation comes nearly three weeks after Barr went on leave over the allegations. The questions about Barr’s conduct were first raised in a lawsuit filed by an ICE official against Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano — the lawsuit, which alleged discrimination and retaliation, listed among the complaints that Barr cultivated a “frat-house”-style work environment.

That accusation was supplemented by two affidavits recounting incidents allegedly involving Barr in 2009.

In the affidavits, one of the ICE employees claimed that in October 2009, while in a discussion about Halloween plans, the individual witnessed Barr turn to a senior ICE employee and say: “You a sexy” (expletive deleted).

“She then looked at his crotch and asked, ‘How long is it anyway?’” according to the affidavit.

“Several employees laughed nervously,” the affidavit said. The names of the workers making the claims were redacted.

She also offered to perform oral sex on someone.

Posted by: Ace at 12:28 PM | Comments (536)
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Just kidding. It's racism.

She goes off at the end, at around 8:20-8:52. more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:25 AM | Comments (273)
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Afternoon my friends. Zakn here. I don't have a ton this week, so The Dude is bailing my ass out with tons of ~content~. You too can bail my ass out by sending me info on what you are up to in the world of gaming by sending me write ups to aoshqgaming at gmail dot com. None of you slackers beyond Dude have done it, so Thanks for Nothing!

Cheerleader below the fold...maybe. more...

Posted by: Gang of Gaming Morons! at 09:05 AM | Comments (103)
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In this morning's news, I see that Mitt Romney's convention bounce is being assessed as 5 or 6 points, depending on your source.

Six points (or 5 if you have faith in the integrity of the NY Times, whatev) is a nice bounce, but not a gamechanger in historical terms. That's why I think that the tone for this fall will be set this upcoming week. The Romney team needs to not only build on their alleged lackluster momentum from Tampa, but they need to tamp down the bounce from the Democratic Convention as much as possible. Conventional Wisdom says that the Democratic bounce will bring this race back to "normal" with Obama/Biden back to a solid 4 point lead nationally; however, in the words of Lee Corso......"Not so fast, my friends".

Now it won't be easy. The Echo Chamber in North Carolina is going to be one big week-long hosanna to Barack The Magnificent. Everyone involved will be working hand in hand to create a groundswell for The Sun King. It's going to be hard for the Republicans to put a dent in this machine.

Thankfully for our side, we've got a secret weapon. President Kick-Ass and his New York-style thin crust skin. Playing "me-too" in visiting storm ravaged Louisiana in the wake of Romney/Ryan? Check. Acting like a teenage girl in a Facebook spat after Clint Eastwood's "empty chair" stand-up routine? Check.

Now the Tangental Football Reference: One thing I noted this weekend watching Iowa State beat Tulsa in Ames, Iowa? A quick jump to a 7-0 lead is nice, but knuckling down when you're down 7-16 and going into the half with a 24-16 lead is even nicer.

Putting points on the board is nice, but preventing your opponent from putting points on the board is not only nice, it can be very dispiriting to the other team's fans. Especially the fans that work at MSNBC and tend to interact with non-Obamoids like Sean Penn punching out paparazzi. This is the test. Can Romney's team make moves that will short circuit this week's bounce?

If they can't, Romney can still win down the stretch. If they pull it off, it's Mondale City, baby!*

*Technically, Mondale carried his home state of Minnesota in 1984. Unless I'm mistaken, Indonesia and Kenya don't have electoral votes in the American electoral process, so this might be even more of a landslide.

(I keed, I keed. Keep your panties unwadded)

Posted by: Russ from Winterset at 07:48 AM | Comments (228)
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Aboard the USS Missouri, anchored in Tokyo Bay, General Douglas MacArthur and Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz prepare for the signing ceremony that ended World War II.

Somebody, LauraW I think, found this color video of celebrations in Hawaii on VJ-Day. Pretty spiffy.
more...

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:53 AM | Comments (69)
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Heh. That picture just about says it all, doesn't it?

Good morning morons and moronettes and welcome to the stir-fried and clarified Sunday Morning book thread.

Books About Conventions

With the GOP hootenanny down in Tampa this week, I thought I'd look around for books about such political conventions. My requirements were that the books should be both comprehensive and reasonably priced. I would have also liked them to use lots of small words, large print, and maybe puppets in order that the resident AoSHQ trolls would be able to follow along, but you can't have everything. Unfortunately, the books I found were both very specialized and very expensive, even the Kindle editions.

I did, however, manage to find a couple of books about political campaigns that appear to be worth looking at, and the prices are relatively low.

The first one, Anything for a Vote, is subtitled 'Dirty Tricks, Cheap Shots, and October Surprises In U.S. Presidential Campaigns'. Think today's campaigns are nasty? How about these:

1836: Congressman Davy Crockett accuses candidate Martin Van Buren of secretly wearing women’s clothing: “He is laced up in corsets!”

1864: Presidential candidate George McClellan describes his opponent, Abraham Lincoln, as “nothing more than a well-meaning baboon!”

1960: Former president Harry Truman advises voters that “if you vote for Richard Nixon, you ought to go to hell!”

Looks like fun. The Kindle edition is less than $10.

And then there's Presidential Campaigns: From George Washington to George W. Bush which probably contains much of the same information as the first book, but looks to be a bit more comprehensive. From the description on the Amazon page:

In the old days...campaigns were much rowdier than they are today. Back in the nineteenth century, the invective at election time was exuberant and the mudslinging unrestrained; a candidate might be called everything from a carbuncle-faced old drunkard to a howling atheist. But there was plenty of fun and games, too, with songs and slogans, speeches and parades, all livening up the scene in order to get people to the polls.

The Kindle edition is a little over $7.

The only downside with these books I can think of is that, given the odds, the authors are probably liberals. So you can probably expect to see a certain degree of bias, especially when they're talking about the modern day presidential campaigns.

By the way, Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections is the best site I've found for examining the results of past presidential elections, even as far back as 1789.
more...

Posted by: Open Blogger at 06:43 AM | Comments (94)
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Wow. I found an entire book of racist dogwhistles online.

Posted by: andy at 04:39 AM | Comments (231)
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