Monday: Build That Wall

Poor Ireland. Poor Inishturk. To be forced to consider the onslaught of refugees fleeing political upheaval should one loud-mouthed, bigoted, multi-bankrupt idiot with bad hair win the U.S. presidency. I’m amused at how the Irish in this short film mirror the U.S. albeit in a more placid way. There are some who are ardently against him, some who’d welcome the business, and the rest cover the spread between the extremes though they lean more to the left than the right.

I find it appalling, though, that Trump would install a sea wall *now* after the golf course development has already been established, rather than do his homework upfront before investing in real estate which relies on natural dune formation. This kind of thoughtlessness is completely absurd, and the disgust evident in this film is well merited.

Keep your volume control handy; hearing Trump blathering may set your teeth on edge. Mute for a moment and continue.

Schtuff happens
I couldn’t pull a cogent theme out of the stuff crossing my desk today. I’m just laying it down — you see if you can make any sense out of it.

  • Ramen can get you killed in private prisons (Guardian) — The federal government may have to do more than simply stop using private prisons for federal criminal incarceration. This report by a doctoral candidate in the University of Arizona’s school of sociology suggests states’ prisons operated by private industry may be violating prisoners’ civil rights by starving them. Ramen noodles have become a hot commodity for this reason. Not exactly a beacon of morality to the rest of the free world when incarcerated citizens must scrap for ramen noodles to make up for caloric shortfalls.
  • World Anti-Doping Agency may have been attacked by same hackers who poked holes in the DNC (Guardian) — “Fancy Bear” allegedly had a fit of pique and defaced Wada after Russian athletes were banned at Rio. This stuff just doesn’t sound the same as the hacking of NSA-front Equation Group.
  • New Mexico nuclear waste accident among most costly to date (Los Angeles Times) — Substitution of an organic kitty litter product for a mineral product two years ago set off a chemical reaction un an underground waste storage area, contaminating 35% of the surrounding space. Projected clean-up costs are $2 billion — roughly the amount spent on Three Mile Island’s meltdown.
  • Build that wall! Americans blown ashore in Canada by high winds (CBC) — Participants riding flotation devices on the St. Clair River in the annual Port Huron Float Down were pushed by high winds into Sarnia, Ontario. About 1,500 Americans had to be rescued and returned to the U.S. by Canadian police, Coast Guard, and Border Service. Just a test to see if Canada’s ready for the influx of refugees should Trump win in November, right?
  • Paternity test reveals a father’s sperm actually made him an uncle (Independent) — Upon discovering a father’s DNA only matched 10% of his child’s DNA, further genetic ancestry revealed the ‘father’ had an unborn twin whose DNA he had absorbed in the womb. His twin’s DNA matched his child’s. This is not the first time paternity testing has revealed chimerism in humans.

Commute-or-lunch-length reads

  • Walmart is a crime magnet (Bloomberg) — Holy crap. Communities should just plain refuse to permit any more Walmarts until they clean up their act. Bloomberg’s piece is a virtual how-to-fix-your-bullshit task list; Walmart has zero excuses.
  • It’s in your body, what version is it running? (Backchannel) — Before the public adopts anymore wearable or implantable medical devices, they should demand open access to the code running inside them. It’s absurd a patient can’t tell if their pacemaker’s code is jacked up.
  • Dirty laundry at Deutsche Bank (The New Yorker) — This you need to read. Parasitic banking behavior comes in many forms — in this case, Deutsche Bank laundered billions.

There, we’re well on our way this week. Catch you tomorrow!

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4 replies
  1. wayoutwest says:

    I took a look at Trump’s latest acquisition and it is an amazing resort property that he picked up for about $15 million and the only area threatened by the rising sea is the 18th hole. They were aware of this problem and have already started remediation work under previously agreed environmental rules. The locals complaining about limited access to the beach don’t seem to understand there will be no beach unless some kind of barrier is constructed.

    The concern about refugees seems odd because Obama’s and Clinton’s policies are what has caused the refugee crisis and Trump has proposed policies that could reduce this problem. I doubt many refugees are heading to Ireland where the Celtic Tiger was turned into roadkill by the Great Recession and people are leaving not arriving.

  2. rugger9 says:

    The DB article is a bit of a long read but worth it. It describes exactly why Bernie Sanders has been railing about the banksters (along with Thom Hartmann and others), and why the Obama administration’s refusal to actually put the bad actors in jail like Reagan did (of all people) meant that Dimon and his cronies never learned to behave. This is also why concern over HRC’s speeches to Goldman Sachs will continue to have legs with respect to what she will actually do in office.
    *
    However, DB is also a big supporter of Trump, so if anyone thinks that Donald will rein them in is kidding themselves. I also note that Gen. Flynn and Jill Stein were present at Putin’s shindig in Russia not long ago, so I don’t think Stein will be the answer either.
    *
    Blaming Obama and Clinton for Shrub’s attack in Iraq without planning for the peace is typical wingnut revisionist history. Shrub, Darth and Rummy set in motion the entire mess currently playing out in Syria and Iraq when they decapitated Saddam’s regime and then tried to loot the region. Trump HAS NO POLICIES to solve it, only vague promises to do so. See how Trump has pivoted on the illegals already in the USA (deportation is now off the table), and tell me exactly what Trump’s policy is on the Syrian refugees. I think the Saudis and the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council need to provide for them here, and I don’t see Donald making them do it.
    *
    The recession was the triggering event for killing the Celtic Tiger, the other necessary part was the insistence upon austerity that followed (while letting the bankers off the hook), which as also noted in Kansas, was the recipe for job loss and disaster as it was in Greece as well. Austerity never works in recessions, show me examples where it has. Contrast this with Iceland that put the bankers in jail and refused austerity and pulled through faster and more completely.

  3. Rayne says:

    wayoutwest (11:10) — Dune. Beach. Two entirely different things, one of which was more directly impacted by construction. Nice Trump apologia, though. Save your breath, I don’t have time for it.

    rugger9 (1:54) — Yeah, New Yorker piece was really good, especially when read against Michael Lewis’ Flash Boys. Put those together and jeebus, the amount of money the oligarchs have skimmed off and carted away is absolutely breathtaking. The problem I see is that we’re talking about money so big it’s easy to buy “solutions” to any obstruction. Who will step in front of that freight train and survive the collision long enough to reverse course?

    • prostratedragon says:

      the amount of money the oligarchs have skimmed off and carted away is absolutely breathtaking. The problem I see is that we’re talking about money so big it’s easy to buy “solutions” to any obstruction.

      A better argument for redistributive taxation you’ll not be finding. Society requires it in the long run. It’s what I think is the critical point of Piketty’s book, if I may be so bold as to attempt interpreting him.

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