Cynthia McKinney for President

As opposed to the future, the refreshing thing about 2008 is that you can support whosoever you please for the Green Party nomination with the absolute certainty that they're not going to win. And so, it is my pleasure to switch in this cycle from Kent Mesplay (but keep it coming Kent!) to Cynthia McKinney.

Now, there are many problems with Cynthia McKinney. She's a disaffected Democrat, her disgrace came from punching a security guard, and, as you can see from her announcement(which I ask that you take the 7 minutes and 21 seconds to hear), she's barely more articulate than Shrub. But, as she says

America deserves a government as good as its people, and as noble as its ideals.

McKinney, as far as raising our profile, raising money, and recruiting members, is the way to go. And, unlike the case with the Democrats, she means that we don't have to choose between choosing a black and choosing a woman. I know that a lot of Democrats liked Kucinich, but held their noses and voted for Hilary Clinton or Barack Obama out of practicality. And I know that whackjob wingnuts chose Dubya over Keyes in 2000 for the same reason. But, this is different. I don't think Cynthia McKinney would be a good president. She's be worse, probably, that Ralph Nader. But, I don't expect her to win. I understand that this is how at least one of the guys from Predator became governor, but I'm not voting for her out of apathy or protest. I'm supporting Cynthia McKinney because I believe that of all the candidates, she most supplies what we need now. Which are credibility, money and members.

That whole "The Green Party threw the 2000 election to Bush" meme kind of took hold. I mean, c'mon. First off, the Socialists took enough votes from Gore to tip the balance. Secondly, he actually won in the recount. Thirdly, if he'd run a decent campaign (by, for example, I don't know, oh, not selecting Senator Lieberman as his running mate? Nor showing up orange to the first debate? And, oh my God, what was that with Elián González?) there would have been no way it could even have been close. And, as Michael Moore made clear in Fahrenheit 911, it was Vice President Gore himself who squelched protest over the outcome. Instead of 5/9 of the Supreme Court being impeached and Gore being installed, we got what we got.

If Kat Swift starts to date me, or Kent seriously guilt trips me, I might flip. But, both are unlikely. Because, you've got too much pride, right, Kent? Notice that there are only three declared candidates for the Green Party nomination. The ones who've dropped out have thrown their support to Cynthia McKinney. As I'm doing.

I wonder if Al Gore's up for another VP stint....

Requiem For A Browser

So, in 2004 the government canceled the Comanche Helicopter Program, which resulted in my scrambling about for a job and not moving into a pastel townhouse in Manhattan Beach. Say what you like about LA, but it will have vastly more warning than Manhattan Island when Greenland injects oodles of water into the North Atlantic.

One of my options was product management for the Netscape Browser, at that (and this) point a Firefox derivative desultorily supported by AOL Time Warner. It would have meant moving to Columbus and trying to restart the browser wars with infinitesimal corporate backing and while I do select massive enemies, I don't choose to lose. Anyway, they've decided to kill it.

[AOL] released Netscape 7.2 Web browser developed by Time Warner's team and not Netscape staff.

As of December 2006, Netscape's market share was a pathetic 0.2 per cent penetration. The end was imminent.

This December, AOL announced that on February 1, 2008 it would drop support for the Netscape Web browser and would no longer develop new releases. This week, it was announced it Netscape's end would come after a month.

Still, if I'd had 0.2 %market share -- which I think I could have managed -- and still hung on to my job for another 15 months, I really feel I could have explored Columbus to its fullest. There was supposed to be a bar there that had a string quartet playing, which fascinated me. Here in New York? No violins in bars. In Boston, there was violence in bars, but it wasn't the same.

Does noone fear violent revolution anymore?

"The financial industry is bracing for a hurricane" of big write-downs to come in the next few weeks from companies holding complicated credit investments, said David Kelly, chief market strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management in New York. "But I think we're just going to get a squall."

Mr. Kelly said anxiety over risky credit instruments is understandable, although he believes a worst-case outcome, including bankruptcies by Wall Street firms, ultimately won't come to pass, in part because government policy makers have been increasingly aggressive about taking steps to avoid a broader recession.

"If it comes right down to it, the (bond insurers) will be bailed out in some way because the financial system needs them to function," said Mr. Kelly. "The amount of money at stake is considerable, of course, but it's nothing in comparison to the resources of the federal government."

The 'resources of the federal government', of course, refers to taxpayer money. So, these people created this system of collateralized debt obligations on real estate asset backed securities which inevitably resulted or will result in mass homelessness and joblessness. And, to acknowledge how flaky the system was, they set up these fake companies which guaranteed a return on these highly correlated investments. If you believed that house prices would increase forever, well, you were a moron, but you wouldn't need insurance. Once you saw the need for insurance, you had to understand that you couldn't get it in any meaningful way.

But. Instead of saying, "Well, we bought insurance from agencies which would clearly fail if they had to pay out at all as part of the grand deceit to pad our bonuses for several years," investment bankers are starting to say 'government policy makers' 'will ... bail... out' 'bond insurers.'

Let's hope they're wrong. I don't think a bloody uprising would be good for my commute.

Compass Rose Decals Coming to subway exits

I went to http://nyc.gov to find some way to complain about the planned $1 taxi surcharge and found out about this. I'm so happy.

New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, Grand Central Partnership (GCP) President/CEO Fred Cerullo and MTA CEO Lee Sander today announced that temporary directional compass decals have been placed on the sidewalk at four subway exits around Midtown Manhattan. The compasses tell pedestrians what street they are on, and what street lies one block from them in each direction.

...

[P]rovide feedback on their experience by visiting [the] website at www.grandcentralpartnership.org.

Pro-nuke blurb from Psychology Today

via Schneier on Security

IX. We Love Sunlight But Fear Nuclear Power

Why "natural" risks are easier to accept.

The word radiation stirs thoughts of nuclear power, X-rays, and danger, so we shudder at the thought of erecting nuclear power plants in our neighborhoods. But every day we're bathed in radiation that has killed many more people than nuclear reactors: sunlight. It's hard for us to grasp the danger because sunlight feels so familiar and natural.

Our built-in bias for the natural led a California town to choose a toxic poison made from chrysanthemums over a milder artificial chemical to fight mosquitoes: People felt more comfortable with a plant-based product. We see what's "natural" as safe—and regard the new and "unnatural" as frightening.

Any sort of novelty—including new and unpronounceable chemicals—evokes a low-level stress response, says Bruce Perry, a child psychiatrist at ChildTrauma Academy. When a case report suggested that lavender and tea-tree oil products caused abnormal breast development in boys, the media shrugged and activists were silent. If these had been artificial chemicals, there likely would have been calls for a ban, but because they are natural plant products, no outrage resulted. "Nature has a good reputation," says Slovic. "We think of natural as benign and safe. But malaria's natural and so are deadly mushrooms."

DIDMCA & AMTPA

More for the timeline of legistlative, regulatory and enforcement failures which, if I haven't been clear, I would like someone else to put together.

Says Patricia McCoy, a law professor at the University of Connecticut: "Congress never likes to blame themselves, but in this case there's no question they bear some of the responsibility." Indeed, only now is Congress talking about enacting some tougher regulations that they could and should have pushed through 10 or 20 years ago.

McCoy points to two key pieces of legislation that are at the root of the current mortgage crisis: the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980 (DIDMCA) and the Alternative Mortgage Transactions Parity Act of 1982 (AMTPA).

The former abolished state usury caps that had limited the interest rates banks could charge on primary mortgages - and, in the process, gave banks more incentive to make home loans to folks with less-than-perfect credit.

Though DIDMCA did eventually open the door to some predatory lending in low-income communities, McCoy thinks that, on balance, the 1980 legislation was valuable in the way it deregulated the mortgage market and made home loans more available. It is AMTPA, the 1982 law, that McCoy sees as most problematic.

Prior to the passage of AMTPA, banks were barred from making anything but the conventional fixed-rate, amortizing mortgages. AMPTA lifted those restrictions, giving birth to all the new and exotic mortgages that have so many borrowers in hot water today.

...

"One of the problems was that there were no substitute regulations to make sure these new mortgages didn't turn out to be exploitative," says McCoy.

...

McCoy gives a bit of a pass to the 1982 Congress, as it would have been difficult for them to anticipate the growth of the subprime market (in 1982, it was hard for low-income people to get any mortgage) or the willingness of lenders to give interest-only mortgages to the borrowers in the worst position to afford such a loan. ...

"Certainly by the late 1990s, Congress knew of the problems," says McCoy. "It had plenty of time over the past 10 years to do something, and it did nothing."

Cola's apparently pretty bad for you

So, almost two years ago I quit soda for about a year and a half. This did nothing for me, so I started up again a few months ago with gusto -- I'll have two or three cokes a day now.

It is well known that too much soda can increase the risk of diabetes and obesity. But when it comes to kidney problems, is there a difference between colas and other kinds of soda?

...

In a study published in the journal Epidemiology, the team compared the dietary habits of 465 people with chronic kidney disease and 467 healthy people. After controlling for various factors, the team found that drinking two or more colas a day — whether artificially sweetened or regular — was linked to a twofold risk of chronic kidney disease.

So, yeah. Obesity turns out to be a pretty easy thing to track; diabetes and chronic kidney disease less so. But, I guess I'll have to plan to quit again.

Ask the press to ask about climate change

Passing on a petition I got an email for, from somebody called "The Alliance for Climate Protection." Click the link to sign.

Dear friend,

The press has been asking the presidential candidates hundreds of questions on a range of issues, but seldom asks about the greatest threat to our planet: the climate crisis. I want to know how the next President -- Democrat, Republican or Independent -- is going to address this critical issue. Don't you?

Please add your name to this petition and we will deliver it to the key media outlets. Together we can ensure this topic gets the attention it deserves.

A League of Conservation Voters’ study found that ABC's George Stephanopoulos asked presidential candidates more than 767 questions -- only 5 of which were related to global warming. CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked more than 402 questions -- only 5 were about global warming. Sadly, other political commentators and reporters have shown a similar disregard for this key issue.

Please add your voice today.

Sincerely,
Cathy Zoi
CEO, The Alliance for Climate Protection

This follows an earlier email from MoveOn, who also have a petition.

Dear MoveOn member,

In the last year, the major TV networks asked the presidential candidates 2,679 questions. Pop quiz: How many were about global warming?

A) 514—after all, it's one of the top issues facing the country
B) 165—as many as were asked about illegal immigration
C) 3—the same number asked about UFOs

If you guessed 3, you're right: Reporters asked as many questions about UFOs as they did about the climate crisis—the biggest threat to our planet.¹

Can you sign our petition urging top TV reporters to ask the presidential candidates about global warming? Click here to add your name:

http://pol.moveon.org/climatequestions/o.pl?id=11909-5750246-pCuZYJ&t=165

The petition to the reporters says: "The American public deserves to know where all the candidates stand on the climate crisis and the solutions they propose to address it. Asking those questions is your responsibility."

Please forward this email to your friends, family, and co-workers.

The media help decide what's an "issue" in the '08 election. Unless climate change is on the '08 election agenda, it won't be on the next president's agenda. And the UN's top climate expert warned: "If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two or three years will determine our future."²

Climate change is one of the most pressing issues of our time. And polls show that voters care about it.³ But somehow, the TV networks never got the memo. NBC's top political reporter, Tim Russert, didn't ask a single question about global warming last year. Same for Sunday political show hosts on CBS and ABC. CNN asked just 1. Incredibly, Republican-leaning Fox bested them all with a grand total of 2.

Our friends at the League of Conservation Voters will deliver your signature and comment directly to the TV networks at a press conference in front of their Washington, D.C., headquarters. And they'll use our petition signatures to prove there's public demand for TV anchors to ask about climate change.

Sign this petition to urge TV anchors to ask about climate change. Clicking here will add your name:

http://pol.moveon.org/climatequestions/o.pl?id=11909-5750246-pCuZYJ&t=166

Thank you for all you do.

–Noah, Wes, Ilyse, Justin, and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team
Tuesday, January 15th, 2008

Sources:
1. "What Are They Waiting For?", League of Conservation Voters
http://www.whataretheywaitingfor.com/facts.html

2. "Desperate times, desperate scientists," Salon News, December 12, 2007
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/12/12/ipcc_report/

3. "Poll: Finding Their Voice as Agents of Change," Democracy Corps, October 30, 2007
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=3317&id=11909-5750246-pCuZYJ&t=167

The both point at this same study, but MoveOn has apparently confused Wolf Blitzer with the press in general. What do you want from Democrats?

Dear attractive woman number 2

It's movie quote time.

Dear attractive woman number 2, only once in my life have I responded to a person the way I've responded to you, but I've forgotten when it was or even if it was in fact me that responded. I may not know much, but I know that the wind sings your name endlessly, although with a slight lisp that makes it difficult to understand if I'm standing near an air conditioner. I know that your hair sits atop your head as though it could sit nowhere else. I know that your figure would make a sculptor cast aside his tools, injuring his assistant who was looking out the window instead of paying attention. I know that your lips are as full as that sexy french model's that I desperately want to fuck. I know that if for an instant I could have you lie next to me, or on top of me, or sit on me, or stand over me and shake, then I would be the happiest man in my pants. I know all of this, and yet you do not know me. Change your life; accept my love. Or, at least let me pay you to accept it.

Dow 10,000

The problem with being right about impending disaster is that you can't eat smugness. So, I don't want to point out when the Dow Jones Industrial Average hits 12,000, as I've predicted it'll go all the way to 10, and I know that people get upset when the DJIA loses value. You pull your kids out of school, fire employees, sell your house (ah, oops,) all sorts of terrible things. And I don't feel a lot of schadenfreude, as the people who benefited most from the spurious inflation of the equities markets have already feasted on their ill-gotten gains, and can't be made to unfeast.

The market's haven't closed, and sometimes they pop up again at the end of the day, but they're at 12,137.51 now. On October 10, it opened at 14,010, so it's already 47 % of the way corrected, and that's with a dropping dollar.

So, since it doesn't really benefit me or anyone I know for the market to drop like this, I won't point out when it hits 12,000. But, I wanted to note the possibility.

You could try this book. I don't know much about it, but I wanted to end on a positive note.

In Conquer the Crash, Robert Prechter explains why he thinks the boom times are behind us. Based on his interpretation of the Elliott Wave principle (an idea premised on the notion that mass investor psychology is what really drives markets), Prechter believes that the U.S. economy is about to enter into a deflationary depression that few investors are prepared to deal with. In making his case, Prechter assembles an impressive array of data that in essence suggests that the bill for the last 10 years of market excess is about to come due. The second half of the book shows how to avoid becoming "a zombie-eyed victim of the depression" and offers advice on protecting one's assets in a deflationary environment (cash is king). If there's any good news in the future that Prechter sees coming (other than how to avoid it), it's that all-out depressions don't last very long. Conquer the Crash should appeal to gloom-and-doom investors and to those desperately looking for a safe haven from the uncertainties of today's markets. --Harry C. Edwards

Looks like it's going to be another year

Do you wonder why the big investment banks have been going back and saying, "Oh, you know those values I was putting on my assets? They were imaginary?"

It was to keep the bonuses up, in order to keep Manhattan Real Estate prices up, in order to keep hedge funds solvent. So, last year's losses had to look like profits. But, since I've largely given up on the idea of a Manhattan apartment's keeping any sort of value, this bothers me less than it would have four months ago.

Update: WaPo has more on this

Wall Street's five biggest firms together paid a record $39 billion in bonuses, even though three of them suffered the worst quarterly losses in their history and shareholders lost more than $80 billion.

Goldman Sachs Group, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Lehman Brothers Holdings and Bear Stearns together paid $65.6 billion in compensation and benefits last year to their 186,000 employees. Year-end bonuses usually account for 60 percent of the total, meaning bonuses exceeded the $36 billion distributed in 2006 when the industry reported all-time high profits.

The bonuses are larger than the gross domestic products of Sri Lanka, Lebanon or Bulgaria.

"To many people, it will be shocking and questionable," said Jeanne Branthover, managing director of Boyden Global Executive Search. "People in New York in the world of investment banking will understand it. It's critical that pay is still there or you're going to lose really good people."

Yeah. Wouldn't want those good people off looking for work in Bulgaria. Were the layoffs all of bad people? It seems like you could layoff fewer people if you just didn't give parasitic investment bankers bonuses, and watch them run off to make their fortunes as real estate brokers.

Snap

Numerous unpublished studies submitted to the Food and Drug Administration by pharmaceutical companies have found that many popular antidepressants have little or no effect on patients, according to a new review of the previously hidden findings.

...

Since the overwhelming amount of published data on the drugs show they are effective, doctors unaware of the unpublished data are making inappropriate prescribing decisions that are not in the best interest of their patients, according to researchers led by Erick Turner, a psychiatrist at Oregon Health and Science University. Sales of antidepressants total about $21 billion a year, according to IMS Health.

Group Marriage Debate Takes Another Step

Link from the Housing Bubble Blog:

Republicans and Democrats ... usually find some mutually acceptable midpoint and enact a stimulus package. Even in today's hyperpartisan Washington, the odds still favor such a deal.

This time, though, don't expect that to be the end of the story -- because the coming recession will not be normal... because we face an economy that's been warped by two developments we've not seen since FDR's time.

The first of these is the stagnation of ordinary Americans' incomes, a phenomenon that began back in the 1970s and that American families have offset by having both spouses work and by drawing on the rising value of their homes. With housing values toppling, no more spouses to send into the workplace, and prices of gas, college and health care continuing to rise, consumers are played out.

'Spouses' should read 'spice.' I'm not sure why that hasn't caught on. You'd think gambling on the spread of a plural change like that would be safe as hice.

Depression Meme launched in the MSM!

Link from Slate:

“It looks like the financial sector as a whole will see a big decline in profits, and the only time this happened in the last 100 years — financial firms’ going from making good profits to negative profits — was the Depression in the 1930s,” said Richard Sylla, a professor of financial history at New York University. “I don’t think it will be as bad this time; the Federal Reserve is fighting the problem as hard as it can.”

Yeah, they've shown such ontopofitness, sticktuitiveness and cluefulness to date that we needn't worry about a thing. Every little thing is going to be all right.

Mesplay: The Climate Is Changing, and we are largely unprepared

Green party rocks. Pick up the stream now!

Hording firearms against civilization's collapse is not an approved reason to get a Federal Firearms License

See below for some context.

The Federal Firearms Licensing Center (FFLC) is responsible for determining eligibility and acting upon applications for Federal firearms licenses. Inspections of applicants are coordinated with regulatory field offices. Such applications are required to be filed by all persons who intend to engage in the business of manufacturing, importing, or dealing in firearms. Firearms licenses are also issued to persons who wish to be collectors of curio and relic firearms.

So, you could import them. Or rely on blunderbusses. Manufacturing? ... Man, you can get inspiration from anywhere.

Green Party Presidential Debate

Back to GP.org Don't Miss This: Tonight! Special Rebroadcast of the Green Party Presidential Debate Tuesday, January 15th, 7:00 - 10:00 pm (PT) In the Bay Area: KPFA radio - 94.1 FM Outside the Bay Area: other Pacifica network stations, or Online at www.KPFA.org THE KPFA SPECIAL RE-BROADCAST OF THE GREEN PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE With hosts Larry Bensky and Aimee Allison Two hours of edited debate moments And one hour of direct listener call-ins from anywhere in the world See www.kpfa.org/greenparty2008 for call-in numbers and more info... Spread the Word! Information on Green presidential candidates, with links to candidates' web sites: http://www.gp.org/committees/pcsc/index.shtml Please help the Green Party in its efforts to elect Green Party Candidates to office. Donate to the Green Party of the United States Email: office@gp.org Office: PO Box 57065 Washington, D.C. 20037 202-319-7191 or toll-free (US): 866-41GREEN

Carbon offsets are being marketed to induhviduals

I don't even know how to think about this. What's your response? Should I ask for these for my birthday?

e*Trade upside down on Savings Interest

E*Trade is currently paying 5.05% annual percentage rate on Savings. This is nice, but what's interesting about it is that their 6-month CD has an APY of 5 %, which, not to belabor the point, is less. The 1-year and 3-month CDs are at 4.5% and 4.35%, and anything over a year is at 3.75 %.

The longer you commit to their having your money, the less they'll pay you for the privilege. For a regular bank, it goes the other way. E*Trade apparently believes that money will be cheaper the longer they wait. Well, here's hoping.

You gotta love this guy

[T]he $3 trillion dollars that evaporated on Greenspan’s watch was in fact stolen from the American people while the Fed chief concealed the crime behind the smokescreen of low-interest rates. In the final analysis, Greenspan will be seen as a greater traitor than Bush.

No comment, really. Just wanted to point to another blog.

I ... but ... that's crazy. Hillary Clinton's saying we would have invaded Iraq without her help

Hillary made the case, as she has before, that the vote for the war was really a vote to give Bush increased diplomatic leverage over Saddam, something she claimed made war less likely.

But this time she added that there would have been a war without any such resolution in any case.

The leverage was the statement by the camerae that they wouldn't stop an illegal war. You can't say both that it increased the leverage and didn't make war more likely. It's nonsensical.

Antarctica's Melting, Too

Link from Slate:

The Washington Post also fronts news that melting is increasing in Antarctica in areas that scientists had presumed would be safe for a time, raising the possibility of significant sea level rise if the trend continues.

The story makes it sound as if the IPCC sort of felt Climate Change would save Antarctica for when it had done melting all the other ice.

The new finding comes days after the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said the group's next report should look at the "frightening" possibility that ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica could melt rapidly at the same time.

"Both Greenland and the West Antarctic ice sheet are huge bodies of ice and snow, which are sitting on land," said Rajendra Pachauri, chief of the IPCC, the United Nations' scientific advisory group. "If, through a process of melting, they collapse and are submerged in the sea, then we really are talking about sea-level rises of several meters." (A meter is about a yard.) Last year, the IPCC tentatively estimated that sea levels would rise by eight inches to two feet by the end of the century, assuming no melting in West Antarctica.

And, you know, there's always a mechanism. I'm free to make broad qualitative statements whereas scientists always need mechanism, if you were wondering how I was so far ahead of the curve.

"Without doubt, Antarctica as a whole is now losing ice yearly, and each year it's losing more," said Eric Rignot, lead author of a paper published online in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking despite land temperatures for the continent remaining essentially unchanged, except for the fast-warming peninsula.

The cause, Rignot said, may be changes in the flow of the warmer water of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current that circles much of the continent. Because of changed wind patterns and less-well-understood dynamics of the submerged current, its water is coming closer to land in some sectors and melting the edges of glaciers deep underwater.

"Something must be changing the ocean to trigger such changes," said Rignot, a senior scientist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We believe it is related to global climate forcing."

It seems like he's going out on a limb here, right?

Anyway, growing horror in others always makes me feel a little less isolated, so it's nice to see.

Update: And by the way?

Ohio State University professor Lonnie Thompson ... described a significant speed-up in the melting of high-altitude glaciers [on] Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya.

Kilimanjaro is in Tanzania. There are foothills in Kenya, but I don't think they're glaciated.

Classic Arbitrage or Theft?

The Wall Street Journal reports, you decide.

Magnetar helped to spawn CDOs by buying the riskiest slices of the instruments, which paid returns of around 20% during good times, according to people familiar with its strategy. Back in 2006, when Magnetar began investing, these were the slices Wall Street found hardest to sell because they would be the first to lose money if subprime defaults rose.

For the Wall Street firms underwriting the deals, selling the riskiest pieces was "critical to getting the deals done because they were designed to act as a cushion for other investors," says Eileen Murphy, principal at Excelsior CDO Advisors LLC, a structured-finance consultancy.

Magnetar then hedged its holdings by betting against the less-risky slices of some of these same securities as well as other CDOs, according to people familiar with its strategy. While it lost money on many of the risky slices it bought, it made far more when its hedges paid off as the market collapsed in the second half of last year.

So, if you say "this is all a sham that will fall apart as a piece," then this is a pretty obvious strategy. Buy the piece that ev