Last Call

AT&T is still acting like a spoiled brat over the failed T-Mobile merger.  They are still taking shots at the Department of Justice and FCC, and in general bringing about some bad press with their whining and moaning.  The truth is, they were stupid to put up the earnest money for the deal, and their display of (over)confidence backfired in a most ugly way.

So why are they insisting on making it worse?

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson spoke of higher rates and more restrictions on data users.  The FCC did its job, and protected the market.  AT&T got caught being shady a couple of times, and it cost them dearly.  The failure was not the FCC's fault.  And it sure as hell isn't the fault of the customers, who pay for a service and expect to receive what they pay for.  Stephenson pretty much said tough luck to the customers, they are going to foot the bill for the failed deal.  As contracts expire, T-Mobile may come out a winner after all.  When AT&T starts putting the squeeze on aggravated customers, the more affordable T-Mobile will attract many customers.  Sprint will win over the power users who can't bear throttling.

Like many industry dinosaurs, AT&T may be taking themselves a bit too seriously.  With competition ready to snap up customers, they are doing little to improve their service.  In fact, they're pissing people off in large numbers.

A Texas-Sized Surrender

Now this is very good news if it plays out the way The Hill seems to think it will:  Texas Republicans are basically looking to settle their redistricting case with the DoJ, which would have to include approval by the minority representation groups that are the plaintiffs, that would give the state a number of new districts that would be won by Dems.

“They’re backed up against the wall and have to come to some agreement and it’ll be awfully favorable on our end,” said one of the plaintiffs in the case.

Another plaintiff agreed.  “It’s clear they know they’re in a vulnerable position and that’s why they want to settle,” he said.

Any settlement would need to get the multiple minority group plaintiffs on board, and would create more majority-Hispanic and majority-African American congressional districts. Two of the plaintiffs predicted that an agreement will be reached early next week.

That's pretty much a massive capitulation by Republicans in the state, who purposely drew the four new districts in the state legislature to favor Republicans precisely by splitting Latino and African-American neighborhoods across district lines and using pencil thin lines to connect them to overwhelmingly red districts, assuring that at least three of the four new districts would be safe GOP seats for the next decade. 

But the DoJ gets ultimate veto power over this sort of thing for states like Texas, and that decision by a three-judge panel is expected soon.  Texas Republicans are apparently so terrified of this that (especially after the Supreme Court punted the map back to Texas to work it out as a state issue) they are begging for a settlement before the DoJ takes them out back with a two by four and a grim expression.

If the state of Texas and the plaintiffs in the case reach an agreement it would solve a drawn out process with two separate lower court battles and a Supreme Court opinion already on the books.

Texas is gaining four seats in Congress and will have 36 total House seats next election.  Most of the state’s population growth has come from African Americans and Hispanics, but the Republican state legislators who drew the maps gave the groups few new opportunities in the state. 

Any agreement would lead to a minimum of 13 Democratic-leaning seats, and possibly a fourteenth seat depending on how the districts in Fort Worth are drawn.

With conservative former Rep. Nick Lampson (D-Texas) running for a Galveston-area seat, Democrats could win as many as 14 or 15 seats in the state, up from the nine seats they currently hold. Republicans would hold 21 or 22 seats, down from the 23 they currently have.

Dems picking up 5 to 6 House seats in Texas would go a long, long way towards regaining the House in 2012.  Republicans know this and they're looking to settle anyway, which shows you just how bad they think their position is in respect to the three-judge pre-clearance panel.

On the other hand, the districts that Texas is gaining is coming at the expense of states like Ohio and New York, and ultimately one of the reasons that I think the GOP is looking to take the settlement here is that they know redistricting Dem districts out of existence in other states they control like Missouri and Louisiana (and in Ohio especially) will make Texas into a wash at best for the Donks, especially given that GOP-controlled SC and Georgia are getting a new district and Florida two.  They were going for all the marbles in the redistricting pile, and they'll have to settle for merely half as a losing proposition, which was the point of the entire exercise given the level of state control handed to the GOP in 2010.

And once again we come back to the fact that voters picked a really awful time to give the Republicans more power by deciding President Obama and the Dems hadn't moved fast enough in Operation Ponycorn With Sprinkles.  The repercussions of that nonsense will be felt for, well, a decade.

War On Privacy: Where We Stand

Don't get me wrong  the CNN piece you can find here does a great job of covering privacy concerns.  It's well written and square on all counts.

But not to toot our own horn or anything, we've covered 99% of it right here already on Zandar VTS.

We are losing our rights to electronic privacy.  Ambiguous laws and fear tactics have cost us many levels of privacy.  There is a pressure on some services to comply, such as phone companies and Internet providers.  Well, there was right up until they were absolved of all repercussions for complying with a government order.  Now they have no fear of customer reaction, if those customers are even notified.  Right now, we are in danger from our own government thanks to the Patriot Act.  We can be snooped without a warrant, and our correspondence is monitored without or knowledge.

Most of what we do know is thanks to whistle-blowers, activists, academics and a few committed journalists. In 2004, Mark Klein, a technician who had just retired from AT&T, disclosed that in 2003 the National Security Agency built a secret room at the San Francisco facility where he worked, routing all e-mail and phone traffic through it.

Another whistle-blower, Justice Department attorney Thomas Tamm, confirmed that similar interception points were set up around the country to gather and analyze the e-mails and phone calls of Americans who were not suspected of any crime.

While the federal government is required by law to document publicly its wiretapping of phone lines, it is not required to do so with Internet communications. Over 50,000 National Security Letters, a kind of administrative demand letter requiring no probable cause or judicial oversight, are issued each year. Yet we know few details. Companies complying with these secret letters were barred from even informing customers about them until 2009 when Nick Merrill, an entrepreneur who ran a small New York-based Internet service company, successfully enlisted the help of the ACLU in challenging a blanket gag provision of the Patriot Act.

Please read the rest of this article. There is so much information here that we can't afford to forget. My prayer is that Obama made a good choice to put off some battles until his second term, when he can right some serious wrongs (like the Patriot Act).

One final portrait of why Google users should be concerned.  Google can't be held accountable if the government decided to snoop your email.  But it doesn't stop there.  Now they can see your text messages and call logs if you use Google Voice.  Your work can be checked if you use Google Docs. Your pictures through Google+ and Picasa.  Your GPS location if you use Google Maps or Latitude.  Your website information and hidden content can be viewed, including past versions, if you use Google Sites.  Your shopping habits, books you're reading, searches you are running, blogs you are writing, instant messaging and social activities can all be monitored through common Google services.  You can't opt out of this, and once that precedent is set it will fall rapidly across other service providers.  You still don't have to be alerted to the fact, and you can't even be pissed about it until you can prove you were snooped, which you can't.

Well, played, old chap.  Well played.

Don't you move mother f*****, I will shoot you!

A criminal on the run took a shortcut through Karen Granville's yard.  And he is very, very sorry he did that.

The 64-year-old woman loves John Wayne and has a permit to carry a concealed weapon.  The criminal was surprised to find himself looking down the barrel of her gun while she barked, "Don't you move, motherfucker!  I will shoot you!  I will shoot you where you stand!"  As the criminal moved and wiggled, she held the trigger steady and detained him until the police caught up with him.

This week has taught me a whole new respect for grandmas.  Thank you ladies, for keeping us safe.

Jim Pethokoukis And The Temple Of Doom

Having been booted from both US News and World Report and Reuters, my favorite econ blogger punching bag Jim Pethokoukis has given up any pretense of being balanced and credible and is now working directly for the right-wing Death Star of financial think tanks, the American Enterprise Institute.  And as usual, he's heralding the end of the Obama presidency.

In his State of the Union response the other night, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels neatly summed up Mitt Romney’s (who has a roughly 90 percent chance of being the GOP nominee according to Intrade) economic case against President Barack Obama: “The president did not cause the economic and fiscal crises that continue in America tonight, but he was elected on a promise to fix them, and he cannot claim that the last three years have made things anything but worse.”

In other words, the Obama Recovery stinks. Even if today’s GDP report—for the fourth quarter of 2011—shows 3 percent growth or better, it would be just the fourth time that has happened since the economy began turning up in June 2009: 3.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009, 3.9 percent in the first quarter of 2010, and 3.8 percent in the second quarter of 2010. But no 3 percent-plus quarters since then.

The first nine quarters of the Reagan Recovery, by contrast, looked like this:  5.1 percent, 9.3 percent, 8.1 percent, 8.5 percent, 8.0 percent, 7.1 percent, 3.9 percent, 3.3 percent, 3.8, percent, 3.4 percent. In fact, the Reagan Boom went from the first quarter of 1983 until the second quarter of 1986 without notching a sub-3 percent GDP quarter.

Fourth quarter numbers came in Friday at 2.8% growth.  But here's what we weren't doing during the Reagan years:  fighting two wars in the Middle East, keeping the top marginal tax rate at 35%, paying a trillion-dollar plus prescription drug benefit to Big Pharma, and paying a multi-trillion dollar bailout to banks in the US and around the world.  Considering what this President has inherited, the fact that we're still even having positive GDP growth is astounding.

Meanwhile Republicans want to cut, cut, cut federal spending.  Looking at what austerity cuts have done to Spain's unemployment rate -- now at a staggering 22.9% -- does anyone actually think Republicans will follow through on such a plan knowing full well what it will do to the economy here and the politics it means?

Then again, that explains all the laws disenfranchising poor voters, doesn't it?

StupidiNews, Weekend Edition!

• Arrests have been made in the UK of News International employees on charges of payments to police in the company's far-reaching wiretapping scandal.
• An asteroid the size of a school bus missed the Earth by a mere 60,000 miles Friday, or "one of the top 20 closest misses" of astronomical objects in NASA history.
• State Democrats in California's Senate failed to pass a single payer coverage health care bill as several Dems sat out the vote and one joined Republicans against the measure.
• President Obama once again says he will press House Democrats to lower tax breaks for the rich as the Bush tax cuts will expire at the end of the year.
• Nintendo wants to make online purchases of games a lot easier on its coming successor to the Wii console.

Last Call

I may have my problems with Alan Grayson's effectiveness as a member of Congress, but when his Republican opponent in Florida's newly hatched 27th district is using bizarre ads depicting President Obama as the captain of a slave ship, I hope the guy stomps his GOP opponent into the ground.

Featuring the "USS Obamaboat," the animated ad urges voters to “turn this ship around” and criticizes Obama's levels of government spending, including bank bailouts, healthcare and a loan to the failed solar company Solyndra.

Children rowing the USS Obamaboat are told to “Earn! Earn! Earn! Don’t you care about the banks? Don’t you care about the 99 percent?”

A woman in a bathtub on deck says, “This ship stimulated my husband’s solar company” and is then handed money by a man in an adjacent bathtub.

Screw this asshole.  Alan Grayson, you need to win.

Orange Julius Gives Away The Game

House Speaker John Boehner expects the GOP to not only maintain control of the House in 2012, but to keep a majority in that chamber for another decade.  How does he expect to do it?  The power of playing the incumbency game during redistricting.

“I think it will be nearly impossible” for Democrats to win back the House in November, Boehner said. “I think our freshman members are doing a good job preparing themselves for the upcoming election. I would also note that redistricting across the country has helped those freshman members and others in tough seats who will now have better seats. So I think we’re in pretty strong shape for the year ahead.”

He brings up a good point.  Redistricting is the key to controlling the House, and the GOP had an enormous advantage in controlling state redistricting processes in 2010.  But should he be bragging about it?  Steve Benen rightfully thinks Congress's single-digit approval rating is going to be far more indicative.

For the record, Boehner’s confidence may well be misplaced. If Democrats pick up 25 seats in November, Boehner will have to hand his Speaker’s gavel back to Nancy Pelosi. Given that Congress’ approval rating has reached depths unseen since the dawn of modern polling, it’s not unreasonable to think we’ll see some electoral volatility later this year.

For that matter, several recent polls show Democrats doing quite well on the congressional generic ballot, including a National Journal poll released yesterday that showed Dems with an 11-point lead on which party Americans want to see in control of the House.

And while we’re at it, both the former chairman of the Republican National Committee and the former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee believe a Dem majority is in reach this year.

I think it's more than just "in reach", especially if President Obama is able to inspire voters like he did in 2008.  His coattails were long then.  I think they'll be as long or better now.

Epic Fail: Taco, Anyone?

After a federal indictment regarding treatment of Latino abuse, the police chief has decided to make things even worse.  After having an opportunity to say anything, even the usual recycled crap (we are investigating, we take this very seriously, blah blah) he instead lets the people know how they really feel, and why the feds were most likely on the right track.

Chief Gallo was not charged, but was referred to in the indictment as “Co-Conspirator No. 1,” who, it said, tried to thwart investigations of his officers and tried to have a priest who protested their behavior removed from his parish.

But on Wednesday it was Mr. Maturo facing the most immediate criticism, as he quickly backpedaled from comments he made to a WPIX (Channel 11) reporter Tuesday.

Asked what he was doing for the Latino community in light of the indictments and accusation of harassment, illegal searches and seizures and assaults on Latinos, Mr. Maturo responded on camera: “I might have tacos when I go home. I’m not sure yet.”

Facing a blizzard of criticism — Gov. Dannel P. Malloy called his comments “repugnant” and said they represented “either a horrible lack of judgment or worse” — Mr. Maturo apologized, at first grudgingly and then with a long statement offering his “sincerest apologies” for what he called an “insensitive and off-collar comment.”

His apology is lame, and too late.  He didn't accidentally say this, he flew off the handle and exposed the ugliness that lies beneath.  Since this story broke, several things have come forth.  As is the nature of breaking news, some are accurate and some are not.  However, among all the rumors some surely must be true, and others contain a kernel of truth.  That's enough for us to call for change.  Crime is crime, and police have a difficult job.  Skin color, material wealth and intelligence are not measures of criminal nature.  Our law enforcement must know this, acknowledge it and demonstrate it.  Epic fail on all counts.

Calling BS On Ourselves

The snippet below is quoting an awesome article that refers to an awesome quote.  It also echoes something I've really been thinking about lately, but they were far more eloquent and concise.  Still, I want to lay the groundwork for some themes and ideas that will reappear.  We cannot afford to bullshit ourselves, and yet we all do a terrific job of just that.

We are our own best friends.  When it comes down to it, nobody has our interests and benefits in mind quite like how we look out for ourselves.  Yet we do it so wrong.  We lie to ourselves, and like parents who raise spoiled children, we do ourselves a disservice.  We act in direct opposition to what we know is good for us, and justify it with a permissive mental wave of the hand.  Some folks are self-destructive, some truly sell themselves that what they want is the right answer no matter what, some don't think at all but follow some whispering instinct that somehow turns into a compulsion.  It's human to do so, but it's the human challenge to make the most of ourselves, so we can make the most of our lives.  So we are also our own worst enemies, not as a choice but as a byproduct of our actions.

This is something all people do, regardless of age, period in history, culture or religion.  It may be the one thing that truly ties all human beings together.  Nobody is perfect all the time, but we are challenged to fight to be our best, not be content to wallow in our weakness. How many thousands, or even millions of things could we prevent simply by being good friends to ourselves and refusing to allow those lies to root and take hold?

The article is more lighthearted, but the implications just continue to more serious levels.  I smiled, but then I realized that this root problem has major implications for the world, from simple friendships to wars and global relations.

Sometimes we shove problems aside because we don't have time to deal with them. We've all been there. Or we come up with a change—like buying bigger pants—that makes a problem like sneaky weight gain less uncomfortable, but as Mr. Money Mustache reminds us, this is really no cure.

A better solution, he suggests, is to actually stare your problems in the face and not mask them:

My solution is the opposite: put those damned tight pants on and keep wearing them. When they bite at you, it's a reminder to take the stairs instead of the elevator, eat a piece of grilled salmon instead of a chocolate bar and bologna sandwich, and to start walking and biking more. Those tight pants are your biggest ally in addressing the underlying problem – if you give them up, you'll be allowed to forget what the real problem is: your lifestyle has become unhealthy and you're doing everything with a dull saw!

From tight jeans to civil rights to wars, being truthful to ourselves and overcoming our obstacles is what makes us better people.  Whether we try to be better or let ourselves drift and go along is what defines us.

I'll Take A D, Pat

D stands for drunk.

It appears Pat Sajak and Vanna White were tipsy on more than one episode of Wheel of Fortune.  Everyone is pretending to be shocked and appalled, but I am taking the "meh, whatever" approach.  It's Wheel of Fortune, not brain surgery.  If we couldn't tell, and Vanna never flipped the wrong letter (I mean, they lit them up for her, for Pete's sake!) then who really cares? Except that they may need treatment for drinking problems, it's not our business.  And seriously, if you flipped the same letters for multiple decades, wouldn't you be tempted to have a liquid lunch as well?

Just my two cents.  I'm not shocked, but I do hope they are not suffering from anything worse than poor work ethic.

A Troubled Bridge Over Water, Part 3

Yet another bridge in Kentucky is damaged, this time by a transport ferry that hit the Eggner Ferry Bridge over Kentucky Lake on US 68 near the Tennessee border.

No one was injured after a supply vessel struck the Eggner Ferry Bridge in Western Kentucky Thursday night causing a central portion of the bridge to collapse, according to a Kentucky State Police dispatcher in Mayfield.

The incident happened about 9 p.m. and there were no cars near the collapsed portion of the bridge, Lt. Ron Easley, public affairs officer for the U.S. Coast Guard Ohio Valley Sector, said late Thursday night.


He said the the motor vessel Delta Marine, a 312-foot supply ship carrying empty rockets and space hardware, struck the main channel of the span. Easley was unsure if it was NASA equipment.

A cause is under investigation, Easley said, and the Coast Guard’s Marine Safety Unit as well as Kentucky Fish & Wildlife, the U.S. Forest Service and Marshall County emergency services were on the scene as of late Thursday night.


Kentucky Transportation Cabinet officials were also en route to the scene late Thursday, the state police dispatcher said.


Easley said the Coast Guard has set up a “safety zone” on the Tennessee River between mile markers 41 and 43 to keep non-emergency boats away from the area.

It's another nasty wreck, with reports that heavy fog last night and the fact the bridge had no lights on it contributed.  A bit of prevention might have saved the bridge from millions in damage, but putting safety lights on the bridge would have of course cost money (unlike fixing the thing with a massive hole in it now.)

Meanwhile Republicans are too busy cutting programs and Democrats are too busy giving tax breaks to arks.  Gotta love this state.

The Big GOP Debate Thread: Flori-duh

Naturally, the big topic at the final Florida GOP debate before Tuesday's primary was immigration, and all four candidates traded shots on the subject.

Early in the evening, Romney drew frequent applause when he pushed back attacks by Gingrich over immigration.

Gingrich called Romney the most anti-immigrant candidate on the debate stage, repeating a charge in a campaign ad Gingrich eventually pulled after a complaint it was unfair by Republican Sen. Marco Rubio.

Romney responded with outrage, accusing Gingrich of using "highly-charged epithets" irresponsibly and denying he wants to deport all of the nation's estimated 11 million illegal immigrants.

However, Gingrich and Santorum also agreed with Romney that at least some illegal immigrants would be likely to "self-deport" if the government were to crack down on employers who hired illegal immigrants. All three men advocated a system of identification for immigrants that would help employers verify an employee's legal status.

Ron Paul chimed in with much the same, that if businesses made the economic climate uncomfortable for undocumented immigrants, they'd leave.  In a state where the Latino voting population could make or break a candidate, all four of these clowns agreed that the chief role of government as far as immigration was concerned was to make life as miserable as possible for Latinos, even Ron Paul.

Not a one of them noted that enforcement under President Obama increased deportations much higher than under previous Presidents either, they were all too busy attacking the President's "weak" immigration policy.

On the issue of health care, Gingrich didn't have too much ammunition.  Rick Santorum saw his chance and took it.

After Romney described his health reforms and noted his pledge to repeal Obamacare, Santorum shot back that Romney said “government-run top down medicine is working well in Massachusetts and he supports it.”

“That’s not what I said,” Romney replied. But Santorum kept rolling.

“Think about what that means going up against Barack Obama, who you are going to claim, ‘well, it doesn’t work and we should repeal,’” he said. “He’s going to say, ‘Wait a minute, governor. You said it works well in Massachusetts.’ Folks — we can’t give this issue away in this election. It is about fundamental freedom.”


Almost confirming Santorum’s point, Romney responded by defending the aspects of his own law that were most directly reproduced in the Affordable Care Act: a mandate to require people to have insurance and a subsidized exchange in which individuals can choose between private health care plans.

“Rick, I make enough mistakes in what I said not for you to add more mistakes to what I said,” he began. “I didn’t say I’m in favor of top down government-run health care…If you don’t want to buy insurance, then you have to help pay for the cost of the state picking up your bill because under federal law if someone doesn’t have insurance, then we have to care for them in the hospitals, give them free care. We said no more free riders. We are insisting on personal responsibility.”

But given the fact that some 400,000 Floridians have already cast absentee ballots, the final debate may not have mattered much.  We'll see what happens on Tuesday.

StupidiNews!

• In the final day of his current campaign swing, President Obama will visit the University of Michigan to talk student loans and college debt.
• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirms she will step aside in a second Obama term, saying after two decades of public service that she's tired.
• Florida Republican Congressman David Rivera has reintroduced a modified DREAM Act, but only granting citizenship to members of the active military.
• Apple says it will not turn a blind eye to its supply chain problems, with reports of disturbing and dangerous labor conditions among plants in China.
• New scientific findings on the eyes of jumping spiders may help the world build better robots who can judge distances better.

Last Call

Reiuters conveniently gives the Republican party a way out of having to consider Sen. Marco Rubio for the Veepstakes later this year by noting of all things that like thousands of Floridians who are his constituents, Rubio is way, way underwater on his ritzy Miami mortgage.

In some ways, the story of Rubio's finances is similar to those of hundreds of thousands of his constituents in a state where more than 40 percent of homeowners are "underwater," owing more on their homes than the homes are worth.

It is a crisis driven by falling property values and ill-advised home equity loans that drove up homeowners' debts.

Rubio owes far more on his $384,000 Miami home than it is worth, and at times has had difficulty paying his mortgage.

He bought the home in 2005 for $550,000 with a $495,000 mortgage. He soon had it appraised for $735,000 and took out a home equity line of credit for $135,000.

In 2008, despite earning a declared $400,000 - including his $300,000 salary from the Miami law firm Broad and Cassel - Rubio failed to pay down the principal on his home for several months, according to Florida campaign finance disclosures.

During the same period he did not make payments on a $100,000-plus student loan from his days at the University of Miami, the disclosures said.

Rubio's spending habits also have gotten attention in Florida.

Before joining the Senate last year, he was caught up in an Internal Revenue Service investigation of the Florida Republican Party's use of party-issued credit cards. He frequently had used his party credit card for personal use, and later reimbursed the card company for about $16,000.

Rubio's handling of his personal finances contrasts sharply with the image of him on his Senate website, which highlights Rubio's efforts to prevent Washington from "piling up debt."

"We need a government that stops spending more money than it takes in," the website says.

Rubio's financial issues have led Florida Democrats to cast him as a hypocrite.

I'm honestly not sure whose neck Rubio would be a bigger anchor around:  Romney (who could pay off Rubio's debts with the collective change in his couch cushions in all of his many, many houses) or Gingrich (whose awful comments on Latinos "not understanding" wealth and entrepreneurship aren't exactly going to resolved by a guy who can't pay off his debts in a fiscally austere party of wackos.)

And that's before you factor in what race would mean to Republican voters with Rubio on the ticket.

On the other hand, counting anyone out when the party in question nominated Sarah Palin last time this happened is a huge mistake, frankly.  Guessing veeps at this point is an exercise in futility.  But I finally get to break out the Veeps tag again, huh.