Originally Posted by Finch

I was one of the people in that long line (I was laid off with 1400 others at Microsoft.) I didn't even bother to wait until I got inside...

Sorry, Rick.

Originally Posted by Roadbldr '59

Hey, maybe we can get my shelved Yellowstone highway project built before 2015!

I don't know the condition of highways in Yellowstone, but for those who go through Yellowstone without stopping for the natural attractions, the park highway is effectively a high-priced and unusually-slow toll road (the park fee acting as an effective toll). Surely the weather (some of the harshest winters in the continental US) has done much damage and makes repairs more costly in contrast, for example, to the Blue Ridge Parkway. A park bypass? An upgrade of the park entrances? Or an upgrade of the park highways? Certainly it wouldn't be the establishment of an expressway through the Park!

The last time I posted here was in October of last year, I have been doing a lot of personal development, also suffered a lot of emotional pain as well and be doing a lot more in the next year or two.

I guess I am living outside North America, where the saeclum in a lot of places is like 4 years behind. However maybe it was the financial crisis, but the mood has changed suddenly down under and in Europe. I dare say the Fourth Turning has arrived, many people are still in denial although.

Originally Posted by Tristan

The last time I posted here was in October of last year, I have been doing a lot of personal development, also suffered a lot of emotional pain as well and be doing a lot more in the next year or two.

I guess I am living outside North America, where the saeclum in a lot of places is like 4 years behind. However maybe it was the financial crisis, but the mood has changed suddenly down under and in Europe. I dare say the Fourth Turning has arrived, many people are still in denial although.

A fair perspective. Many parts of the world have not been as engaged in the Middle Eastern insurgencies as the United States.

Welcome back!

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

I don't know the condition of highways in Yellowstone, but for those who go through Yellowstone without stopping for the natural attractions, the park highway is effectively a high-priced and unusually-slow toll road (the park fee acting as an effective toll). Surely the weather (some of the harshest winters in the continental US) has done much damage and makes repairs more costly in contrast, for example, to the Blue Ridge Parkway. A park bypass? An upgrade of the park entrances? Or an upgrade of the park highways? Certainly it wouldn't be the establishment of an expressway through the Park!

No, it wouldn't. Try floating that idea past the Landscape Architects in the Park, even in jest, and see if you return still wearing your head!

Currently, the closest thing to an expressway in Yellowstone National Park (and it's too close for comfort) is the Old Faithful grade-separated interchange, designed and built as "progress" during the "Mission '66" era of the late 1950s. It is scheduled to be removed, and replaced with a lighter-on-the-land facility by the mid 2010s.

Interesting post from Democratic Underground:

http://www.democraticunderground.com...ss=389x5004560

Went to a Town Hall meeting today put together by a far right nutjob who serves in our state legislature. He was talking about the cuts to the education budget (and of course trying to justify them).

Standing room only. It was awesome.

The crowd was clearly not on his side. After he gave his little speech where he managed to mention every Democrat who was opposing the cuts (he even said 'Democrat' instead of 'Democratic') first comment was from a man who asked him to quit pointing his finger at "Democrat" reps. Huge applause.

Lots more negative comments and then someone asked him about the coal plant. There is a movement by the corporate Republicans to build a coal plant in western Kansas and sell the power to Colorado because Colorado won't let the coal plant build there. This guy voted for the plant last year, it passed and Governor Sebelius vetoed it. So the state GOP brought it up again this year.

Again, the crowd was clearly NOT supportive of the coal plant. Then the idiot suggested we tear down the coal plant in our county and see what it's like to live without that energy. Only thing is, there is NO coal plant in this largely suburban non-industrial county.

He was even stupid enough to say "Well not everyone believes in global warming."

So after about 45 minutes of mainly negative comments and questions from the crowd, some lady stood up and asked us all to be more polite and said "He doesn't HAVE TO be here!"

The entire room literally shouted in unison:

HE WORKS FOR US!!



It was freakin awesome. And this is a very red county in a very red state.

What a great experience!!

Originally Posted by Finch

I was one of the people in that long line (I was laid off with 1400 others at Microsoft.) I didn't even bother to wait until I got inside...

That certainly sucks. Good luck finding another, better job.

Originally Posted by Odin

Interesting post from Democratic Underground:

http://www.democraticunderground.com...ss=389x5004560

There have been these Economic Recovery Town Meetings going on across the nation. To me, this is another clear sign that we have reached the Crisis regeneracy.

Grab Your Torches and Pitchforks...

Hundreds of people trying to save their homes from foreclosure flocked to Connecticut's wealthy Gold Coast this weekend to give financial kingpins a piece of their mind.

Stamford sits in the midst of one of the nation's wealthiest areas, and among the regions particularly hard-hit by the housing market collapse. Nearby Greenwich and other suburbs are home to many of Wall Street's wealthiest executives and financial managers.

Homeowners are fed up – and many are frustrated that those who lead the companies that gave them their subprime mortgages live in luxury while they struggle so hard to meet their loan payments and not fall behind.

On Sunday, hundreds of angry homeowners and volunteers traveled in vans and minibuses and protested outside Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack’s multi-million-dollar mansion to tell the wealthy finance czar how they really feel.

The group, led by Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA), also went to Greenwich Finance CEO William Frey, among others, as part of what NACA calls the “Predator’s Tour.”

Sporting bright yellow shirts that read, “Stop Loan Sharks,'' protestors demanded more accountability from the CEOs of the financial institutions responsible for the millions of unaffordable mortgages in the state and across America.

"We can’t let them live quietly in a lap of luxury while they throw hard working Americans out on the street," NACA explains on its Web site. "This action is within our legal rights as Americans to peacefully protest and meet with those who control our family’s livelihood."

NACA coordinated the protest as part of its “Save the Dream” forum – a weekend of workshops to counsel stressed-out homeowners on ways to refinance their mortgages amid the nation's housing market meltdown.

Event organizers expected thousands to show up throughout the weekend for financial advice and mortgage assistance. NACA has helped restructure thousands of mortgages to arrangements homeowners can afford.

None of the protestors were arrested.

Well, having driven along the Gold Coast dozens of times, I can safely say that it's a fine place to protest.

Were mostly you heard on the news were culture wars, you now hear bombardied news of

the slippling economy and whether Obama could solve the whole problem in just 4 years?

Were we heard of TV shows if they script along lines, you now hear mass lyaoffs every day

in America.

While this article deals with today's unfavorable stock market reaction to the revision of the bank bailout, the last two paragraphs hit upon the change in corporate culture from the 1st, 3rd and current turning.:

Originally Posted by The Moderate Voice

In the 1950s the head of a company that was then king of the road said of this outfit: “What’s good for General Motors is good for America.” In recent years, and especially during the reign of Hank Paulson at Treasury, the attitude was: “What’s good for Goldman and JP Morgan and Citi and Wells Fargo and the rest of the Big Bank Gang is good for America.” And therefore we, the public, had to service these banks’ interests no matter what.

Well guess what, kids. There’s a new economic ethic abroad. It goes: “What’s good for the American government is good for America, and you have to accommodate.”

In terms of the related issue of overpaid CEO's, I'd have to blame Lee Iaococa for inadvertently causing the rise of the cult of the CEO. When he took over a troubled Chrysler near the end of the 2T and was paid one dollar a year plus future stock options the recovery of the company and his payoff really led the way to other CEO getting similar deals regardless of the merit of such rewards relative to the fiscal shape of the company.

I think I can see the future pretty clearly about overpaid CEOs.

We are in for several years of economic distress and huge deficits. (Which, unlike those of the last eight years, are actually necessary, but that's another story.) At some point however we will have to start reducing the deficits, if not eliminate them. And at that point we will go back to essentially confiscatory high marginal tax rates such as we had from about 1935 to 1964--as high as 90% over a certain amount.

Those most impacted will include the financial community, professional athletes, and entertainers. But no one will be feeling their pain by then.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

I think I can see the future pretty clearly about overpaid CEOs.

We are in for several years of economic distress and huge deficits. (Which, unlike those of the last eight years, are actually necessary, but that's another story.) At some point however we will have to start reducing the deficits, if not eliminate them. And at that point we will go back to essentially confiscatory high marginal tax rates such as we had from about 1935 to 1964--as high as 90% over a certain amount.

Those most impacted will include the financial community, professional athletes, and entertainers. But no one will be feeling their pain by then.

This looks like one of the safest predictions I've seen on T4T.

Originally Posted by Mr. Andrew Bacevich

in Commonweal...In short, after 9/11 President Bush put the triumphalist hypothesis to the test. As he left office, the results of that test clearly presented themselves. What we’ve learned is this:

First, liberalism’s widely touted victory is at best incomplete. Especially in the Islamic world, a stubborn search for alternatives persists. Our insistence that others do things our way exacerbates the opposition we face.

Second, unipolarity is a chimera, a dangerous refusal to acknowledge the world’s complexity.

Third, to pursue global hegemony is to court bankruptcy. To persist in imagining otherwise will only hasten America’s decline.

Fourth, although globalization may be real, the United States can neither direct its course nor fully insulate itself from its adverse effects.


Ideas {(sic) Emotions} have consequences. Post-cold war triumphalism produced consequences that are nothing less than disastrous. Historians will remember the past two decades not as a unipolar moment, but as an interval in which America succumbed to excessive self-regard{self-regard thy name is Boomer}. That moment is now ending with our economy in shambles and our country facing the prospect of permanent war.


Don’t expect triumphalists to recant or apologize. Yet their time has passed{is passing}. The Age of Triumphalism has ended. The Age of Muddling Through has commenced. In this new era, over which Barack Obama will preside, grandiose ideas will take a back seat to figuring out what actually works and calculating how much we can afford. Instead of looking to transform the world, the imperative of this new age is to preserve what’s left and restore what’s been lost. The nattering about the United States as an almighty superpower has ceased. For this at least we should be grateful.

{VKS}

The Crown of Creation at Triumph still

Unlike the Augustan Final Settlement of the Classical World, Our Commercial Republic's seems to have lasted a mere Turning. And, whilst one hopes Mr. Obama will tend toward X-orcism; I fear that his Inner Boomer Wanna-be will rule. The 4T will be delayed yet a while. Mr. Obama is not HM Charles II, but rather Richard Cromwell...Restoration awaits another's more Xer hand.

Originally Posted by herbal tee

While this article deals with today's unfavorable stock market reaction to the revision of the bank bailout, the last two paragraphs hit upon the change in corporate culture from the 1st, 3rd and current turning.:


In terms of the related issue of overpaid CEO's, I'd have to blame Lee Iaococa for inadvertently causing the rise of the cult of the CEO. When he took over a troubled Chrysler near the end of the 2T and was paid one dollar a year plus future stock options the recovery of the company and his payoff really led the way to other CEO getting similar deals regardless of the merit of such rewards relative to the fiscal shape of the company.

I heard on NPR this morning that the ultimate cause of the massive bonuses was, ironically, a federal law requiring that executive pay and bonuses be totally public, which created an envy-based arms race in executive pay. BBC finance commentator Lucy Kelloway pointed out the same destructive dynamic in ordinary office jobs when everyone's pay and bonuses is totally public.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

I think I can see the future pretty clearly about overpaid CEOs.

We are in for several years of economic distress and huge deficits. (Which, unlike those of the last eight years, are actually necessary, but that's another story.) At some point however we will have to start reducing the deficits, if not eliminate them. And at that point we will go back to essentially confiscatory high marginal tax rates such as we had from about 1935 to 1964--as high as 90% over a certain amount.

Those most impacted will include the financial community, professional athletes, and entertainers. But no one will be feeling their pain by then.

The 90% marginal tax rates were on "unearned" income. For earned income the marginal tax rate was at most 70%.

It will be a good thing that the top earners in America recognize that they get high incomes because they serve us and not because we owe it to them because of a superiority among themselves that they have cultivated.

One thing that I notice: the era from 1935 to 1960 (WWII excepted) was a heyday of small business -- independent restaurants, pharmacies, stores, gas stations, repair shops, and even banks... the high marginal tax rates kept people from growing their businesses beyond a reasonable size. It was a time of competition, and competition among providers of goods and services is generally good for the customer -- and creates more job opportunities. We now have cartels that crush competition. Whether to ascribe that to 3T policies of low taxes on elites is up in the air.

Throughout the 3T, when the primary prison age population was "expendable" nomads, the punitive public example style of jail management was lauded. Now that civics are aging into the prime incarceation years, offical attitudes towards prisoners are changing.

Originally Posted by Emptywheel

You have probably heard of the shamelessly self professed "Toughest Sheriff in America", Maricopa County Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio...Today, the House Judiciary Committee made public a critical and public step to rein in the Most Abusive Sheriff In America.

IIRC, the chain gang went out of favor in the early 1930's when young GI's were the majority of the prison population. It didn't return until about the time that the joneser cohorts hit the high crime years. The cycle is coming full circle.

Now if the public will just make the connection between prohibition and the hopeless drug wars.

It seems as if the debates over "values" have entirely disappeared from this forum. Now, it is all about the economic crisis.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2...189/142/695504

Originally Posted by Mr. Reed

It seems as if the debates over "values" have entirely disappeared from this forum. Now, it is all about the economic crisis.

Definite evidence that we be 4T now.

Weren't people supposed to stop going to slasher flicks?

French and British Nuclear Submarines Collide

With the 'all things military' thread gone, I wasn't sure where to put this. Likely not here...

Anyway, ballistic missile subs are supposed to be absolutely undetectable. As far as I know, there would be no reason for them to be working together. Boomers don't generally travel in packs. Is there a downside to two absolutely undetectable ships wandering around in the same ocean?

Originally Posted by Mr. Reed

It seems as if the debates over "values" have entirely disappeared from this forum. Now, it is all about the economic crisis.

When people contemplate the possibility of going homeless, going hungry, having to sell off consumer goodies for plates of beans, and watching their wealth dissipate for no good reason... they first find fault with those who make that possible and then look for solutions. Those solutions do not include an abortion ban, school prayer, or creationism. Neither do those solutions include gay marriage or political correctness.

Originally Posted by Mr. Reed

It seems as if the debates over "values" have entirely disappeared from this forum. Now, it is all about the economic crisis.

The libertarian hypocrisy thread features quite a bit of ideology, though it is more about 'rights' than 'values.' There seem to be more libertarians at it than conservatives, though.