The dog ate my service records. The Pentagon has announced that the payroll records for National Guard service for three months between 1972 and 1973 have been accidentally destroyed. These three months coincidentally cover the disputed period of George W. Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard. (Similar Google link
here, via
dKos)
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Jul 9, 2004 -
71 comments
...According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the following are among the occupations with the largest projected job growth from 2000 to 2010: combined food-preparation and serving, including fast food; customer-service representative; registered nurse; retail salesperson; computer-support specialist; cashier, except gaming; office clerk; security guard; computer-software engineer, applications; waiter; general or operations manager; truck driver, heavy and tractor-trailer; nursing aide, orderly, or attendant; janitor or cleaner, except maid or housekeeping cleaner; postsecondary teacher; teacher assistant; home health aide; laborer or freight, stock, and material mover, hand; computer-software engineer, systems software; landscaping or groundskeeping.
Are We Still a Middle-Class Nation? comes from
The State Of The Union section in
The Atlantic. Compare and contrast
A Poor Cousin Of The Middle Class
posted by y2karl
on Jan 21, 2004 -
19 comments
Tom DeLay thinks of the children. The GOP House Leader is attempting to create a charity fund for abused and neglected children. Oh, the fund also pays for "late-night convention parties, a luxury suite during President Bush's speech at Madison Square Garden and yacht cruises" during the 2004 GOP convention. Unlike election funds now restricted by Campaign Finance law, donations to DeLay's semi-charity will be tax-exempt, and of course completely unreported to election officials.
(NYT Link)
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Nov 14, 2003 -
10 comments
Friedman quotes a former Swedish prime minister. "Our defining date is now 1989 and yours is 2001," I find this to be true. For most of the 90's, the US struggled to find a new purpose for its power. A few peace-keeping missions, a skirmish in Iraq (the first time), but for the most part, no real global strategy. Europe, on the other hand, has made significant progress with developing the EU, the euro (which no one believed would ever come about so quickly), and a semi-unified policy concerning the rest of the world (GB being the notable exception).
NY Times
posted by BlueTrain
on Nov 2, 2003 -
72 comments
You are fat because there is too much corn. [NYT, forfeit of first-born son required] I love good old-fashioned materialism, and Michael Pollan (author of
The Botany of Desire) scores one for the team with this article on the economics of corn production. Are we fat because New Deal agricultural policy was overturned in the 70s by Rusty Butz? Now there's a trailing question we can all enjoy.
posted by condour75
on Oct 11, 2003 -
31 comments
Dem Blogs This community is filled with bloggers and I wondered if anyone had seen Maureen O'Dowd's take on how the Presidential Candidates are starting to use, for better or worse, "blogging" as a method to get their "message" across. ( Registration required )
posted by RubberHen
on Aug 13, 2003 -
9 comments
Spinning the Environment One section of the memorandum, "Winning the Global Warming Debate," asserts that many voters believe there is a lack of consensus about global warming among scientists. "Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly," it says. "Therefore you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue."
Among the ways to "challenge the science," the memorandum says, is to "be even more active in recruiting experts who are sympathetic to your view and much more active in making them part of your message" because "people are more willing to trust scientists than politicians."
So much for science based decisions regarding the fouling of our nest. Sounds Green = Is Green in the bizarro world of spin.
posted by nofundy
on Mar 4, 2003 -
35 comments
Special Agent Crowley Speaks Up (NYTimes link , normal rules apply)
Ladies like this are the real heroes in our country and she has something to say before Congress about the new Bush agency. Ms. Dowd agrees and said, "The shape of the government is not as important as the policy of the government."
posted by nofundy
on Jun 11, 2002 -
8 comments
Government Will Ease Limits on Domestic Spying by F.B.I. (NY Times link)
As part of a sweeping effort to transform the F.B.I. into a domestic terrorism prevention agency, Attorney General John Ashcroft has decided to relax restrictions on the bureau's ability to conduct domestic spying in counterterrorism operations, senior government officials said today.
Here's the
Wash. Post's take on the story.
posted by Ty Webb
on May 30, 2002 -
21 comments
Dan Rather vs. The World (NY Times link) -- While the
conspiracy theorists and much of the mainstream media were jumping down Gary Condit's throat, Rather and company held firm and kept the "news" off the Evening News. Despite airing a few reports, they intend to keep a comparatively low level of coverage in the future. Is this how we'd like to see the media behave, or is this just a more notable example of The Media's Liberal Bias™ showing through?
posted by mrbula
on Jul 23, 2001 -
31 comments
I Love Paul Krugman! He, better than any writer I have seen, cuts through all the political BS to expose the Republican party, whose members, for the most part, obtain office by cleverly deceiving the little people on what is in their interest. I would love to see PK "debate" the President (link to the NYTIMES--make up a username/password if don't have one and you're
that concerned).
posted by ParisParamus
on Apr 11, 2001 -
20 comments
US Census not to be adjusted for undercounts. (NY Times, req'd registration)
Many political strategists, Democrats and Republicans alike, say that reliance on unadjusted population figures favors Republicans in the drawing of Congressional districts, since, they say, adjustment through statistical sampling would add to customarily Democratic neighborhoods most of those who have been uncounted.
They visited my home/office four times and never once brought the Long Form. Damnation.
posted by methylsalicylate
on Mar 2, 2001 -
13 comments
The official newspapers of staples.com gets huffy about integrity. Back in 1999 the L.A. Times produced a special section praising the Staples center and sort of forgot to mention that they were splitting the ad revenue with Staples. At the time their management was pretty upfront about tearing down the wall between news and advertistisement. Now they've decided to act like journalists again. However, I'm not so sure that what this guy did was all that unethical. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't.
posted by rdr
on Feb 12, 2001 -
5 comments
William Safire in the NY Times: "...to attribute racism to Ashcroft, who appointed more black judges than any Missouri governor and whose wife is revered for her years of teaching at mostly black Howard University, is to admit the bankruptcy of his opposition."
posted by ericost
on Jan 18, 2001 -
38 comments
