Opening the Day: World Goes Crazy, Georgia, Russia, Pakistan

by: Matt Stoller

Fri Aug 15, 2008 at 08:30


I'm in Seattle after a long day of travel.  It's uncharacteristically hot here, almost as if there's an imbalance in the climate system leading to extremes.  Just kidding!  I had you there for a sec.

  • Pakistani President Musharraf will resign.  This is a nuclear-armed regime on the border of Afghanistan selling nukes to anyone with enough cash.  Not good.  At all.

  • Did Bush fuck up as badly as it looks?  Apparently he announced naval help to Georgia without getting Turkey's permission to get to the Black Sea.  So there may be no naval help, despite our President announcing it.

  • McCain made a bunch of freepers mad by saying he'd consider a pro-choice VP.  He will promptly choose a pro-lifer.

  • David Sirota points out that Obama is continuing to move very slowly on economic populism.

    Barack Obama's presidential campaign said on Thursday a potential hike in payroll taxes for wealthy Americans under an Obama administration would not occur for 10 years.

  • What the fuck is going on?

    The United States and Poland reached a long-stalled deal on Thursday to place an American missile defense base on Polish territory, in the strongest reaction so far to Russia's military operation in Georgia.

    Am I the only one who thinks we should put up a bunch of solar panels and leave everyone else the fuck alone?  Baah, that's not really my foreign policy framework but it's kind of my instinct after years of seeing us screw everything up.

  • This is interesting.

    Russians were told over breakfast yesterday what really happened in Georgia: the conflict in South Ossetia was part of a plot by Dick Cheney, the Vice-President, to stop Barak Obama being elected president of the United States.

    It's really irritating when Russian propaganda is obviously propaganda and yet also possibly true.  Remember how Rove used 9/11 specifically for the 2002 elections?  If Cheney really believes keeping the White House is the most important thing to do to protect our national security, then why wouldn't he use this strategy if he thought it would be successful?  Not saying this is what's going on, I don't think it is, just saying that it's really irritating that I can't dismiss crackpot theories like this out of hand anymore.

  • The AFL-CIO filed an FEC complaint against Walmart.

  • Obama has more than 2 million donors.

  • The Huffington Post launched a local Chicago version.

  • T-Mobile will be selling this phone, using Google's Android software.

    Awesome.

What are you reading?
Matt Stoller :: Opening the Day: World Goes Crazy, Georgia, Russia, Pakistan

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Opening the Day: World Goes Crazy, Georgia, Russia, Pakistan | 9 comments
Taxes ... (0.00 / 0)
I don't see this so bad .. Social Security wasn't the big thing at this point anyway ... it's regular taxes that are more important .. besides ... it oughta make Krugman happy .. since Krugman said there was no need to raise SS taxes .. it takes the issue off the table
Right (0.00 / 0)
Obama's tax plan raises taxes on income, capital gains and dividends for the wealthiest Americans, while giving middle class Americans a tax break.

Sirota focused only on the payroll tax, designed specifically to deal with Social Security. Seeing that Social Security's situation isn't so dire, holding off on that tax increase seems reasonable -- and neither a flip flop nor a move away from economic populism.  

[ Parent ]
Finally, a phone I actually want... (0.00 / 0)
But will it have a KILL SWITCH?

"Don't hate the media, become the media" -Jello Biafra
i love carrying around a bar of soap (0.00 / 0)
this is an HTC product. I'd like to see better images, but it looks the size of a damn brick. Touch Pro by HTC looks better to me. as does the Ericson Xperia

Michael Bloomberg, prince of corporate welfare
[ Parent ]
love that Poland deal (0.00 / 0)
Im all for sticking it in Putin's eye. I thought that was hilarious, you know the US and Poland suddenly we're like, "oh, I guess we can get this deal done" after watching Russia invade Georgia.

I also love the quote from the Russian Colonel General Anatoly Nogovitsyn, who suggested that Poland was making itself a target! ...Such an action "cannot go unpunished," he said. according to the nytimes. Now THERE is some crazy talk. Russia sounds stupid saying such things. What do they think they are going to do, Poland ain't Georgia.

Michael Bloomberg, prince of corporate welfare

Chicken before the Egg (4.00 / 2)
It is arguable that the United State's fanatic insistence that our that our unreliable, uber-expensive anti-missle system be placed on Russia's doorstep that has instigated Russia to take such bold power grabs like it is doing in Georgia.

As an added bonus, our anti-missile obsession will likely push China to use it's endless bin of (our) money to militarize space in its own right.

Yeah, that's stickin it to em!  

"Don't hate the media, become the media" -Jello Biafra

[ Parent ]
Poland might not be laughing (4.00 / 1)
Given how many times by so many different powers, I would imagine by now that Poland doesn't take such talk idly, particularly given the backroom whispering that we had promised to support Georgia and then backed out.  
[ Parent ]
Musharraf isn't exactly a white knight... (0.00 / 0)
The man is, after all, illegally holding power in the nation, disrupting its democratic process and denying the popular will of its people (who aren't exactly pleased with America) by enacting a pro-US foreign policy so he can bilk us for military and economic aid.  

Yeah, his resignation means instability, but honestly, it should be regarded as an opportunity not a threat.  Really, it's our support of such people in the first place that makes this a somewhat dangerous proposition now.  Historically, we've always endorsed conservative, anti-democratic and at times, reactionary leaders in countries around the world, and it's always come back to burn us.  

Were we intelligent enough to support the (legitimately-backed) revolutionaries once in a while, instead of autocratic governments we wouldn't have such a poor reputation around the world.  Yes, popular opinion in Pakistan right now hates our guts, but were we say, to get in front of the issue by vociferously and materially supporting the new (most likely anti-American) government, so long as it legitimately reflects the popular will, it would make it a lot more difficult for them to hate us.  Our support, even in the face of their obvious hatred for all things American, would likely give them pause and make them reconsider their dislike of our nation.  

Not happy with Obama's ads? Run your own! (0.00 / 0)
Even very modest sums can get an ad run in a small market.

Saw this at dailykos, http://www.dailykos.com/commen...


We Can Cheaply & Easily Air Them Ourselves (3+ / 0-)
Recommended by:denig, metamars, Amber6541
The "Get FISA Right" org that started life as a My.BarackObama.com group to pressure Obama to vote against any telco amnesty version of FISA has been using netroots self-organization to broadcast its ads around the country using SaysMe.tv .

With SaysMe.tv , all you have to do is go to their site, pick a local TV market, a TV channel there, and a timeslot (like primetime vs daytime), then pick an ad video uploaded to their library, and pay to buy the timeslot for airing the ad. Then SaysMe.tv and the TV networks do the rest. It's trivially easy - takes under 3 minutes.

Ad rates in these markets can be very cheap. Single showings during daytime in these underemployed Red State counties can be under $50.

If the netroots got together to raise a few thousand dollars in each local market targeting each of these people with the existing ad videos, or with new ones crafted to frame them, the sheer numbers of us could directly advertise in those markets.

This sounds like a simple and effective project for VoteVets to do. Or, if they give permission to just viralize their content, that anyone with (literally) a few bucks can do.

With that easy power at our disposal, the answer to the question "why aren't these ads on the air" will be "because we didn't do it ourselves".

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro." - HST

by DocGonzo on Fri Aug 15, 2008 at 07:46:21 AM PDT



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Opening the Day: World Goes Crazy, Georgia, Russia, Pakistan | 9 comments
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