Here's another color-coded annotation of an Obama transcript (via Kaiser), this one from his news conference right after Senator Max Baucus warned that ObamaCare would be "a huge train wreck". The contrast between Obama working from a prepared text (Inaugural, 2013; Hamilton Project, 2006) and Obama improvising at the podium is quite remarkable; we see no intricate verbal patterning at all.
Whereas the prepared texts are bright with color coding, Obama's health care presser -- and I know this will come as a shock to you -- codes as equivocation (with one neoliberal code word, "market," a little nonsense, and few lies). No secular religion or flights of populism whatever. Nevertheless, for all its banality and woodenness, the presser contains some remarkable passages. Read below the fold...
I brought back this delphinium from the Fedco tree sale and put it in the ground on Sunday, and it was very unhappy. All the signs of soil that's too cold: Wilting, weak stems, general collapse. As you can see, it's more or less recovered, and now it's much happier. The trick? Read below the fold...
OK, "mess" is a little strong. When all the flowers are in, and the hostas have leaved out, and the clover has filled in the bald patches,* my "front lawn" area won't look nearly so messy. But there's the problem, or rather the challenged. It's marked on the image in yellow: Read below the fold...
In Part One, I asked whether the Carmen Reinhart/Kenneth Rogoff study and book didn’t show that, on average, nations experiencing debt-to-GDP ratios above 90% had negative rates of economic growth? And I said the answer to the question was “no.” But I didn’t explain why that was true. Read below the fold...
I added the category, so it would be nice to have some science blogs! Nothing on the beaten track, please; as usual, there is so much great stuff out there that few people know about! Read below the fold...
This might be a live take in the studio. Listen for the astonished "holy SHIT!" right before the end.
I wonder if I'd have recognized a great performance like that in the moment. I like to think I would, but I suspect not. I'm a slow listener; it usually takes a few listens for me to get it.
Naomi Spencer in “Iraq war resister, a pregnant mother of four, sentenced to 10 months in prison” spells out the compelling tale of Army Pfc. Kimberly Rivera.
Kimberly and Mario Rivera, both natives of Mesquite, TX, met as fellow workers at Walmart. They had their first child when Kimberly was 19 and then a second baby three years later. Read below the fold...
No Plantidote, no Petidote, no Fruit-of-the-Month Club, no Friday Cat Blogging, even. Only, here and there, a glimpse of random beauty. Otherwise gloom, pre-revolutionary cell meetings, and whatnot. Well, at least we haven't had an earthquake lately. Read below the fold...
Submitted by DCblogger on Sat, 05/04/2013 - 3:56pm
The sound you hear is the thundering silence on the part of 2016 hopefuls on the subject of Social Security. Elizabeth Warren has said she was shocked by the President's proposal to for a chained CPI; but she has not said that she would oppose cuts to Social Security under any circumstances whatsoever. Clinton has maintained a deafening silence. If Clinton were to say that the program is just fine and no cuts should be made, it would immediately shift the national debate. Clinton could probably sink all proposed cuts just by herself. But she says nothing. Read below the fold...
Republicans are doing a good job explaining the adverse consequences of the law, but they need to do a better job making the case that the basic premise of the plan is inherently unworkable. To do that they will need to offer a far simpler, market-based health-care plan in which consumers can afford the insurance they want to buy. That was the purpose all along, right?
