Jennifer Brunner writes:

When I saw the cover of the piece, it looked like it was an invitation to a Tea Party rally (there are lots of them in Ohio). My prospective Republican opponent in the fall, Rob Portman, has been courting their favor, so I thought, well, maybe it was from him. (After all, in the period of the last 5 years he served as former President Bush”s trade representative, shepherding anti-labor, anti-family trade agreements that have hurt Ohio”s working families.)

Or maybe, I thought, it”s the Ohio Republican Party, which keeps losing important Ohio elections and as of late blundered in sending absentee ballot applications for Republican primary ballots (Ohio”s primary is a closed primary) to Democrats with the enticement that they could get an extra ballot (for the fall election) with one request. (Ohio law doesn”t allow this, even though many wish it did, including me.)

Well, on the other hand, I thought, maybe this is a piece pushed out by the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which has targeted Ohio as one of the top three Democratic take-away opportunities in the nation.

Nope.

I opened up the piece, and there it was – a big, bright turquoise background with a color photo of my Democratic primary opponent, Lt. Governor Lee Fisher, wearing a big grin.

Hmmmm… Lee didn’t send me one of those. I wonder why not?

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog video excursion I present: From My Dad.

Found in my electronic chapbook.

Other adjectives are still more subjective. That the din is murderous is not a measure of volume, nor does it have anything to do with what is actually going on-the whale is already dead, so the act performed by the birds and sharks is only figuratively murderous. That the sight is hideous is similarly a conclusion of the author. Finally, fair and pleasant and joyous are wholly subjective, telling us nothing about the actual effect or appearance of the sea and the breezes but instructing us as to how they are to be perceived. p. 209

From Telling Lies for Fun and Profit: A Manual for Fiction Writers by Lawrence Block.

Does the State Peace and Development Council (aka, Myanmar’s military dictators give a shit what the rest of the world thinks? I doubt it, beyond those factors which directly affect the amount of money entering their coffers, of course. The Washington Post, however, disagrees with me. The editorial writer sees a lever. I see a stick.

In one sense, the farcical election taking shape in Burma, a Southeast Asian nation of 50 million people, offers good news. Burma’s generals would not go to such lengths to create the appearance of democracy unless they cared about global opinion. That suggests that outside nations with an interest in promoting peace and democracy in Burma have more leverage than is commonly believed. On the other hand, this is good news only if those nations are willing to use that leverage in a constructive way. On that front, there’s a long way to go.

Last week, Burma’s National League for Democracy formally decided not to take part in elections planned for some time this year. The decision had been almost inevitable since the ruling generals promulgated an election law that said parties could register only if they expel any members who are political prisoners.

Many of the nation’s most eminent citizens, including a sizable number of NLD leaders, are among Burma’s 2,000-plus political prisoners. Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who heads the party, is under house arrest.

“Without them, our party would be nothing,” party leader U Win Tin, himself recently released from prison, wrote in the Post on Tuesday. “They are in prison because of their belief in democracy and the rule of law. Their immediate release and participation in Burma’s political process are necessary for a credible democratic process.”

The generals can be expected to go ahead with their election anyhow.

That is undoubtedly true.

Since I toggled the lights at Have Coffee Will Write on Tuesday, 4 November 2004 a lot of words, images and videos have scrolled down the screen for my readers.

This is my 10,000th post, a milestone I never considred reaching.

To have 31,345 unique visitors stop in at my blog in a single month and come back for multiple visits totaling 57,667 in the same month was a high for me. I’ve been the editor of multi-million-dollar magazines that didn’t have a third of that readership.

To cross seven figures with 1,068,676 hits from those readers stretched my own credulity, but there it was, dutifully recorded by Awstats.

There are times that the Internet seems a cold and lonely place where my millions of words disappear down some black hole, but I know that that is not the case.

Thank you for stopping in, for reading and, most importantly for taking the time to enter the discussion. We create our community with our conversations.

0856: Why candidates for public office obsess over yard signs

Roldo Bartimole writes:

Is there a Cleveland city council member who can show any moxie when it comes to pursuing a bit of economic justice in this town? Nah. Too much to expect.

Public servants don”t seem to want to provide that service. Seeing justice is out of their line of sight.

Maybe it”s too much trouble too. Maybe they just don”t see the necessity. That happens a lot. They aren”t a very zealous crowd it seems. I don”t sense much passion there. More like bureaucratic. Short on compassion. Where”s Fanny Lewis?

Anyway there seems to be a dearth of people who even think Continue Reading »

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog video excursion I present: From My Dad.

Found in my electronic chapbook.

A second class of adjective includes those which, while still deliberately factual, are concerned as well with our response to what is going on. It is a fact that the sharks are insatiate, the fowls are rapacious and screaming, and the bulk of the dead whale is colossal, but how do we feel about the noise and appetite of the scavengers and the size of the whale is colored by the choice of modifiers. p. 209

From Telling Lies for Fun and Profit: A Manual for Fiction Writers by Lawrence Block.

If any citizens group were to suggest that the proper approach to a crime syndicate or drug cartel was to sit down and engage them in rational discussion, the police and the population at large would likely laugh out loud or suggest the group needed its collective heads examined. Foreign policy, however, is different. Right?

From Foreign Policy:

[Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and United States ambassador for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Scott] Marciel… acknowledged that the State Department’s new policy on mixing pressure with engagement in Burma has yet to show concrete results in persuading the brutal Burmese junta to govern more responsibly.

“Burma’s new election laws are a step backwards,” he said. “They are effectively preventing the main opposition party from participating. This is the opposite of the path towards national reconciliation.”

Regarding the new U.S. engagement of the junta, he said, “We predicted it would be a long and difficult process, and unfortunately we were right.”

When do we consider that long and difficult may be unending?

Roldo Bartimole writes:

Cuyahoga County taxpayers in these depression-like times have paid $91 million into the fund for the Medical Mart deal. Does anyone notice?

The Plain Dealer, our news media of record, appears to have forgotten that we have a near – or more – $1 billion project. The Med Mart has slipped off its radar apparently. Coverage seems to be much more interested in who is running for county council in who knows where and who cares less.

How about telling us something about the biggest money project since Gateway, PD. Hundreds of millions of dollars to be spent. All public dough. Or is it going to be the same old story – we”ll tell you when the overrun is drowning us.

Also, where ARE those candidates for new County offices Continue Reading »

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog video excursion I present: From My Dad.

Found in my electronic chapbook.

First we have these adjectives which simply describe, and do so in an uninflected fashion. The peeled white body of the beheaded whale-thee adjectives fill in a picture for us without telling us how the author feels about it, or suggesting how we ought to feel. The ship, we are told, is stationary. The body floats slowly. The sky is unclouded. p. 209

From Telling Lies for Fun and Profit: A Manual for Fiction Writers by Lawrence Block.

When reason and sense fail, humans turn to ignorance and superstition to make their case and prop up their agenda (see Tea Baggers). The State Peace and Development Council (aka, Myanmar’s military dictators) are no exception to the rule as their most recent rushing about the jungle proves.

From The Independent:

In the forested hills behind Ngwe Saung beach, elephants are used to haul timber. It was one of their handlers who spotted the rare albino among a herd of wild elephants in January. He reported the sighting to the head of the timber company, the military was informed and the news was quickly sent up the chain of command. According to soldiers in Ngwe Saung, Senior General Than Shwe – the country’s head – himself dispatched a company of some 50 soldiers, with an entourage of elephant handlers and veterinarians armed with tranquilliser darts.

Soe Tin, a local farmer, knew what this meant for him. The first sighting of the elephant in 2008 brought a swarm of soldiers to the area. The military commandeered the local workforce of banana farmers and charcoal sellers to assist in an unsuccessful three-month search. When the hunt resumed in January, Soe Tin was recruited again. “The village authorities demanded one person from each household,” the 41-year-old said. “We were forced to work without pay.”

The soldiers demanded that all the villages near the beach provided them with unpaid labour – a practice that is common in Burma. The men left their homes and their farms to act as guides and porters. “The soldiers ordered us around. I just did what they said. I didn’t dare speak up,” the farmer said.

Actually, I’m surprised the SPDC hasn’t just painted a normal elephant.

Robert Reich writes:

The Fed has finally came clean. It now admits it bailed out Bear Stearns – taking on tens of billions of dollars of the bank”s bad loans – in order to smooth Bear Stearns” takeover by JPMorgan Chase. The secret Fed bailout came months before Congress authorized the government to spend up to $700 billion of taxpayer dollars bailing out the banks, even months before Lehman Brothers collapsed. The Fed also took on billions of dollars worth of AIG securities, also before the official government-sanctioned bailout.

The losses from those deals still total tens of billions, and taxpayers are ultimately on the hook. But the public never knew. There was no congressional oversight. It was all done behind closed doors. And the New York Fed – then run by Tim Geithner – was very much in the center of the action.

This raises three issues.