Open Thread
— rdbrewer

What does this mean? The one on the bottom right.

These are toilet instructions from hotels at the Sochi Olympics.

And people fish in the toilet? more...

Posted by: rdbrewer at 08:32 AM | Comments (110)
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We're now living in a post-labor Utopia. Have you heard about this?
— Monty

Calling Mike Rowe! Calling Mike Rowe!

“GDP growth isn't a good in and of itself,” he says. “The question here is what's going to create the most happiness for the greatest numbers of people. Being in a situation where people have to work full time or 40 hours a week at a job that may not be the best match for them because that is the only way to get health insurance is not the way you create the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.”

Do read it all. This article may be the stupidest piece of tripe I've read in years, and that's quite an achievement in the era of His Majesty the King.

This is liberal elitism at work, believe it or not. The upper-crust Democrats see some guy mowing their lawn in the summer, sweating and grunting as he pushes the mower around the steeply-landscaped back yard. Or they see the trashmen coming by to collect the feculent, festering remains of the weekend cocktail party they threw over the weekend. God, I'd hate that job, they think, and then a light bulb goes on in their heads. I bet they hate that job too! No one would do that job unless they had to! It's an outrage! And then we're off to the races.

Upper-crust liberals tend to have cushy, white-collar jobs that pay well. They tend to have stable families and live in decent neighborhoods. To them, "work" means something far different than it does to the guy outside laboring over their landscaping.

The guy out pushing the mower, or hauling away their trash, probably doesn't hate his job. He may not love it, but he probably doesn't hate it. It pays the bills. To the extent that he feels any outrage, it's generally at the shitty hot weather or the lazy gringo kid he hired as a helper this summer but who didn't show up today. It's not like he dreams of being a neurosurgeon or a performance-artist. He'd probably like more free time (who wouldn't?) but not at the cost of losing income.

In other words: liberals who believe this "less work is good" argument are Utopian idiots. They think everybody lives like they do, and likes the things they like.

Further, and on a different track: remember that huge, bloated, unweildy, horrendously-expensive welfare state we've built over the past fifty years? Remember how we're supposed to pay for that? Tax receipts, which is directly related to per-capita GDP. Drive down per-capita GDP (which is what ObamaCare is doing), and you make the huge welfare-state we've built even more unsustainable than it already is.

People without meaningful work and copious free time don't write symphonies or create great works of art. They don't live a life of the mind. They drink too much, or get in fights, or watch a lot of internet porn, or commit crimes. They don't contribute to the economy or culture, as a rule. They just...exist. And it goes on like that, sometimes for generations.

Labor is the fate of all humankind. Always has been. We work to live. Work gives shape and meaning to our lives. It's not just the income we derive from it; it's the knowledge that we are able to function as adults in the wider world, and provide for ourselves and our families. It's feeling the satisfaction of having contributed something to the maintenance of civilization, even if it means we haul trash away or keep the grass mowed. It's all honorable work, necessary work, and not something to be ashamed of.

It's not an outrage, it's just the way things are. To try and embitter people about that, to make them feel that the natural order of things is unfair, is just to do an enormous amout of harm to the very people you're claiming to want to help.
----
UPDATE: Tyler Cowen also responds to this stupidity, but more betterer and smartlier than me. Read it all. Here's a taste:

A simpler possibility is that people undervalue the long-term benefits of having a job and thus in both settings the contraction in employment is a quite negative outcome. That is then very bad news for ACA, if only in expected value terms.

Posted by: Monty at 07:28 AM | Comments (424)
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Top Headline Comments 2-6-14
— Gabriel Malor

Happy Thursday.

BIG NEWS: Priorities USA, the enormous Democratic PAC, is sitting out the midterms. Why would they do something insane like that? To save money for Clinton's run in 2016.

Cover Oregon, which might just be the worst Obamacare exchange, knocking even the Maryland and Minnesota exchanges out of the running, continues to implode. It turns out the Cover Oregon project director may have lied to her state bosses and to the federal government in order to keep the HHS grants flowing.

As far as personal brands go, Tim Tebow won the Super Bowl.

Sony appears to be trying to get rid of its computer business.

---

AoSHQ Weekly Podcast: [ RSS] [On iTunes] [Download Latest Episode] [Ask The Blog]

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:47 AM | Comments (264)
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Overnight Open Thread (2-5-2014)
— Maetenloch

Well after the shame brought on the blog by the thread-now-banished-to-the-cornfield this is the content you're worthy of. Also reason #12 why we can't have nice things.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_{Perhaps after enough contrition has been shown non-Premium members will once again be allowed the privilege of readable fonts.}

more...

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:57 PM | Comments (857)
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Open Thread
— Open Blogger

You haven't earned content.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 04:28 PM | Comments (477)
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Thursday Morning News Dump
— Open Blogger

• Cooke: Obamacare's Attack On The Work Ethic
  
• Key Democratic Group Will Sit Out Midterms
  
• Wendy Davis Suddenly Supports Open Carry
  
• Scenes From A Militarized America
  
• New Cover Oregon Allegations
  
• Businesses Say NLRB Tilting Union Election Procedure To Benefit Big Labor
  
• Kelo's Wasteland
  
• The Obama Administration Doesn't Care Whether You Work Or Not
  
• Is Part-Time USA Permanent?
  
• America The Offended
  
• Polaris Appears To Be Getting Brighter
  
• Former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar: Build The Keystone XL
  
• The Troubled Future for Egypt's Copts
  
• Obamacare Demonstrates What The Democrats Really Want
  
• I Don't Fully Understand This, But It Sounds Cool
  

Follow me on twitter.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:02 AM | Comments (543)
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Evening (A Little East Coast Bias There) Tidbits And Open Thread
— DrewM

The GOP Officially Reduced To Farce:

House Republicans might have a new idea of what they could trade for a debt ceiling hike...restoration of military pension COLAs. You know the ones they, um, cut last month and Paul Ryan defended as necessary.

Obama Administration Has A Solution To The Problem Caused By All Their Health Insurance Rules....More Rules.

One of the few ways insurance companies can keep their costs down in the age of ObamaCare's mandated benefits is price control. And the way they can keep the price they pay for services down is by narrowing the networks they offer coverage in. If they say to a smaller group of doctors and hospitals, "we're going to funnel our customers to you, you have to cut us a big price break", they are going to get price deals.

Well people aren't enjoying paying more for lousy insurance AND having fewer provider options. Soooo...the geniuses in the administration are going to start reviewing the size and scope of provider networks offered by exchange complaint plans and if they don't like them, they will regulate increases. Which will lead to...increases in premiums.

It's almost as if the market will exert it's will no mater how many levels and dials the central planners insist they can twist and set to create the perfect system.

Metaphor Alert

After reading those two stories, check out the video of what happens to a cargo ship when it losses power and/or steering in a storm off a rocky coast.

Unlike the crew of the ship, I wouldn't expect a miraculous rescue by a courageous helicopter crew.

Bonus Stupidity:

Cop arrests firefighter at car crash scene because of where the firefighter parked the truck http://t.co/9MzojLAnsB pic.twitter.com/B6D89TMMG0

— Michelle Fields (@MichelleFields) February 5, 2014

Posted by: DrewM at 01:49 PM | Comments (437)
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Hey Conservatives! Are You Ready To Nominate One Of Your Own For President? Too Bad Because The Hottest New Establishment Darling Is....Jeb Bush.
— DrewM

Jeb Bush: Tanned, Rested, Moderate!

“Bush’s speeches are getting better, tighter, and more campaigny, from what I’ve noticed,” a senior Florida republican strategist says. “I still think Jeb is only a three-in-ten shot to go, but if you’re in his shoes, and Chris Christie has taken a huge hit in stock value — wouldn’t you wait and see? If Christie survives and runs, it’s a harder proposition by far, obviously.”

...

The third issue that could cause Bush headaches as a presidential candidate [after Bush fatigue and amnesty] is his support for Common Core. He’s not backing down, despite the controversy, declaring at a charter high school in Hialeah last week, “The aspiration ought to be: Every child should be college- or career-ready. And we should benchmark ourselves to the best in the world. The good-faith effort of Common Core State Standards and now these Florida standards is the right path to be on.”

The problem for Bush is that a vocal chunk of the conservative grassroots thinks Common Core is precisely the opposite of a “good-faith effort.”

Via Andy let me add a fourth issues that would cause heartburn if Jeb were to run...global warming.

“I can see him coming around to some combination of a cap-and-trade program as the best alternative to regulate and at the same time not completely abandoning his principles on something by going to a place where we’re scientifically uncertain,” said David Struhs, who served six years as the Bush-appointed head of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
“Those are the kinds of conversations that he can engage in in a way that a less familiar politician, particular in the Republican Party, can’t do, even if they’re intellectually capable of it,” Struhs added. “They have to go hard right to prove they’re conservative. Jeb Bush is given a pass there because he’s already been there. He’s already done it.”

Um, I'm not sure conservatives buy Jeb Bush is a conservative.

Yes people will point to his work on school choice but is there any evidence that it moves votes? It's the right policy (at the state and local level) but there's no reason to believe that another massive reorganization of federal education policies will lead to more local control and choice. A truly conservative national education policy is...get the hell out of education policy at the federal level.

Some people are committed to running through every warmed over moderate before they are willing to even consider an actual conservative. Unfortunately those people are the ones who run and fund the GOP.

Related for fun: Mitt Romney is back to thinking global warming is a problem.

“It is a Democrat issue but I think it’s an issue for both parties,” he said. “If you think global warming is just in America, it’s not just America. There needs to be a global understanding and a real global effort. There’s no global effort whatsoever.”

Posted by: DrewM at 10:19 AM | Comments (428)
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— Slublog

The Winter Olympics begin on Friday. Athletes and journalists are starting to arrive in the coastal city of Sochi. The Russian government has spent seven years and $51 billion dollars preparing to welcome the biggest athletic competition in the world.

Well, mostly preparing.

Sochi? Well, three of the nine mountain hotels have not been completed, and the IOC estimate that 97 per cent of the rooms are ready appears to ignore the little things.

Almost every room is missing something: lightbulbs, TVs, lamps, chairs, curtains, wifi, heat, hot water. Shower curtains are a valuable piece of the future black market here. (One American photographer was simply told, “You will not get a shower curtain.”)

Be sure to scroll down for the worst hotel bedding tale you're likely to read this week.

Some of the pictures and stories coming out of Sochi are shocking or deeply weird, but Olympic corruption is nothing new. Russia just decided if there's going to be corruption, they might as well dream big.

The good czar's $50 billion gift to the world — by far the most expensive Winter Olympics in history (Vancouver's cost about $7 billion all in) — has raised a number of eyebrows.

An International Olympic Committee official, Gian Franco Kasper, has said that as much as one-third of the $50 billion has been siphoned off by corruption.

The CBC engages in a bit of wishful thinking and suggests that an unsuccessful games will hurt Putin's government. (Spoiler alert: Nope). Putin has always been more popular with Russians than with those in other countries, and if the games go forward without a major catastrophe (and if Russian athletes do well), he'll come out of this without much political damage in his own country.

That said, stories like this and this are unlikely to improve Putin and Russia's international image.

Well, until the next viral dash cam video.

Posted by: Slublog at 11:17 AM | Comments (394)
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No Keystone Or ObamaCare Bailout Repeal For Debt Ceiling Hike
— DrewM

At least they are cutting to the chase.

GOP leaders had been looking at pairing legislation boosting the debt limit to either an authorization of the pipeline or rolling back a portion of ObamaCare. But after presenting those ideas to members and huddling Wednesday, they determined neither would receive 218 votes from House Republicans.
That left Republican leaders with no clear alternative to addressing the debt limit, which the Treasury Department has said needs to be raised by the end of February.

Instead, it now appears that a combination of Republicans and Democrats will be needed to get a debt-limit boost through the House.

I know some House conservatives are saying there's no point attaching anything since the GOP will eventually cave but I find it hard to believe they'd have voted no if Boehner had brought a debt ceiling hike to the floor with either one of those provisions attached.

It's funny how after repeatedly telling conservatives he doesn't care about their votes (fiscal cliff, Sandy relief, Violence Against Women Act, re-opening the government, the sequester busting Ryan-Murray deal and agreeing to link food stamps with Ag subsidies) Boehner is suddenly acting as if he cares what House conservatives want.

In other news, Mitch McConnell has basically announced that if you're opposed to legalizing millions of illegal immigrants you better hope the GOP doesn't take control of the Senate next year.

McConnell indicated the Democratic-controlled Senate's insistence on comprehensive legislation is at impossible odds with the House Republican majority's preferred piecemeal approach to immigration reform.

"I think we have an irresolvable conflict here. The Senate insists on comprehensive. The House says it won't go to conference with the Senate on comprehensive and wants to look at step-by-step," he told reporters after a meeting with the Senate Republican conference.

"I don't see how you get to an outcome this year with the two bodies in such a place."

It seems the implication of his argument is that the only way to get to a deal is to have both Houses in the hands of the same party. Well, if we go the House GOP way we're still looking at massive legalization of some sort. So if you are opposed to that...you better hope the current stalemate holds. That's an odd pitch from the man who wants to be Majority Leader but there it is.

Posted by: DrewM at 09:14 AM | Comments (267)
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