Peter’s Blog

Normally I really like Roger Cohen’s columns but today’s, “The EU in an Irish bog,” is atrocious. He buys hook, line and sink into the rediculous argument that because the Irish have benefitted significantly from EU membership their No vote is dumb, crass, ungrateful, etc, etc. He even says their voting was ‘unconscionable’! I hate this attitude towards politics, as it reduces people’s options to the ‘right choice’ or being guilty of false consciousness.

Los Angeles’ carbon footprint is a light one — sort of - Los Angeles Times

“The Mississippi River roughly divides the country into high and low emitters,” it says. “In 2005, all but one of the 10 largest per capita emitters were located east of the Mississippi.”

Proof again of the inherent superiority of the West Coast! =)

Bushs veto threat provokes skirmish on housing bill - International Herald Tribune

Bush, in threatening to veto Franks bill, has called on Congress to pass those two measures as stand-alone legislation. As Democrats tried to bring their bill to the floor on Wednesday, House Republicans threw up procedural roadblocks, including a series of votes on motions to adjourn.

The majority leader, Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, gave a floor speech early in the evening accusing the Republicans of an “abuse of process.”

In response, the Republican leader, Representative John Boehner of Ohio, accused the Democrats of cutting Republicans out of the legislative process.

“We dont have many ways to express our grievance on the housing bill because we have no amendment we can offer,” Boehner said. “All we are asking is to be treated fairly.”

What goes around, comes around, and every time it’s stupid.

A.O. Scott likes Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay

But they’re not stupid, and to the extent that the movie is, its idiocy serves the cause of good sense and intelligence. And no, I’m not smoking anything.

Captain Kidd, human rights victim - International Herald Tribune

While the French were flying six of the captured pirates to Paris to face trial, the British Foreign Office issued a directive to the once vaunted Royal Navy not to detain any pirates, because doing so could violate their human rights. British warships patrolling the pirate-infested waters off Somalia were advised that captured pirates could claim asylum in Britain and that those who were returned to Somalia faced beheading for murder or a hand chopped off for theft under Islamic law.

Condoleezza Rice Must GO

You can make a good argument that most senior members of the Bush Administration are war criminals. It’s small consolation that Alberto Gonzales can’t get a job.

Big Tax Breaks for Businesses in Housing Bill - New York Times

The Senate proclaimed a fierce bipartisan resolve two weeks ago to help American homeowners in danger of foreclosure. But while a bill that senators approved last week would take modest steps toward that goal, it would also provide billions of dollars in tax breaks — for automakers, airlines, alternative energy producers and other struggling industries, as well as home builders.
The tax provisions of the Foreclosure Prevention Act, which consumer groups and labor leaders say amount to government handouts to big business, show how the credit crisis, while rattling the housing and financial markets, has created beneficiaries in the power corridors of Washington.

It also shows how legislation with a populist imperative offers a chance for lobbyists to press their clients’ interests.

Every day is government handout day!

BBC NEWS | Africa | Mugabe party demands poll recount

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s party has asked electoral officials to delay the results of the presidential poll and to recount votes, reports say.State media said the governing Zanu-PF party requested a recount because there had been “errors and miscalculations”.

Bernanke Nods at Possibility of a Recession - New York Times

In his bleakest economic assessment to date, the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, said Wednesday that the American economy could contract in the first half of 2008, meeting the technical definition of a recession, and he encouraged Congress to help homeowners caught up in the mortgage crisis.

Unemployment is going up, the housing market is in freefall, the currency keeps sliding, you have just offered unprecedented loan guarantees of tens of billions of dollars to (previous) titans of the the financial industry – why yes, the economy just might, perhaps, potentially, eventually, in the worst case, with many qualifications see some trouble! What would really wow me would be if there wasn’t a recession. Way to go to all those ‘prudent’ reporters (The Economist especially) that have held off from saying the US economy is in recession until now.

The triumph of ugliness - National - smh.com.au

“Political correctness wants us to believe that democracy and good taste are compatible, but they are not.”