Fuck its silent in here.......

[PenPho]

http://www.salon.com/news/jan_brewer/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/02/jan_brewer_opening_statement

Jan Brewer debate performance. Brutal.

Can we get a moratorium on Arizona politics?

Sigh.

We can't stop until the headless bodies are found.

http://www.azcentral.com/video/601325652001

Between Jan Brewer and Ben Quayle, it's been a truly horrific election season, even for those of us who couldn't care less.

Don't forget JD Hayworth, or McCain going full teatard.

So then...that's a "no" on the moratorium?

[Gilgamesh]

http://www.salon.com/news/jan_brewer/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/02/jan_brewer_opening_statement

Jan Brewer debate performance. Brutal.

Can we get a moratorium on Arizona politics?

Sigh.

We can't stop until the headless bodies are found.

http://www.azcentral.com/video/601325652001

Between Jan Brewer and Ben Quayle, it's been a truly horrific election season, even for those of us who couldn't care less.

Don't forget JD Hayworth, or McCain going full teatard.

So then...that's a "no" on the moratorium?

Yes.

[Eli]

http://www.salon.com/news/jan_brewer/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/02/jan_brewer_opening_statement

Jan Brewer debate performance. Brutal.

Good gord, I don't think I've ever seen a politician perform that poorly on camera.  She's rivaling Budd Dwyer* at this point.

It didn't end when the debate was over, either:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AL5KQ4Ao0ro&

This is almost as awesome as when RV posted the same thing 5 posts ago.

Well, as long as it's almost as awesome, I feel good about my contribution to this discussion.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

http://www.salon.com/news/jan_brewer/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/02/jan_brewer_opening_statement

Jan Brewer debate performance. Brutal.

Can we get a moratorium on Arizona politics?

Sigh.

We can't stop until the headless bodies are found.

http://www.azcentral.com/video/601325652001

Between Jan Brewer and Ben Quayle, it's been a truly horrific election season, even for those of us who couldn't care less.

Don't forget JD Hayworth, or McCain going full teatard.

So then...that's a "no" on the moratorium?

Yes.

There will be a moratorium on Arizona politics when Arizona politics decides to cut it the fuck out...

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/us/politics/07candidates.html

Mr. Pearcy and other drifters and homeless people were recruited onto the Green Party ballot by a Republican political operative who freely admits that their candidacies may siphon some support from the Democrats. Arizona's Democratic Party has filed a formal complaint with local, state and federal prosecutors in an effort to have the candidates removed from the ballot, and the Green Party has urged its supporters to steer clear of the rogue candidates.

...

"Did I recruit candidates? Yes," said Mr. May, who is himself a candidate for the State Legislature, on the Republican ticket. "Are they fake candidates? No way."

To make his point, Mr. May went by Starbucks, the gathering spot of the Mill Rats, as the frequenters of Mill Avenue are known.

"Are you fake, Benjamin?" he yelled out to Mr. Pearcy, who cried out "No," with an expletive attached.

"Are you fake, Thomas?" Mr. May shouted in the direction of Thomas Meadows, 27, a tarot card reader with less than a dollar to his name who is running for state treasurer. He similarly disagreed.

"Are you fake, Grandpa?" he said to Anthony Goshorn, 53, a candidate for the State Senate whose bushy white beard and paternal manner have earned him that nickname on the streets. "I'm real," he replied.

Gathered around was a motley crew of people who were down on their luck, including a one-armed pregnant woman named Roxie whom Mr. May befriended sometime back and who introduced him to the rest.

[R-V]

A bunch of stuff purporting to show how terrible and unfair the economy is and how it's all Bush's fault

I'm sure if I quoted the Heritage Foundation or Cato I'd be ridiculed, so I will generically ridicule you for using data from the CBPP, which exists mainly to promote the idea that the US economy is unfair and needs to have massive redistribution forced upon it.

Now, with that out of the way: income distribution statistics that compare income buckets that don't take into account income mobility are misleading at best.  As an example, I was in the bottom quintile for the first few years of my career post-college, and I'm in the top quintile today.  I'm pretty sure that would not be captured in the CBPP's data.  Thomas Sowell elaborates here: http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/ArticlePrint.aspx?id=517564

In terms of statistical categories, it is indeed true that both the amount of income and the proportion of all income received by those in the top 20% bracket have risen over the years, widening the gap between the top and bottom quintiles.

But Internal Revenue Service data following specific individuals over time show that, in terms of people, the incomes of those particular taxpayers who were in the bottom 20% in income in 1996 rose 91% by 2005, while the incomes of those particular taxpayers who were in the top 20% in 1996 rose by only 10% by 2005 — and those in the top 5% and top 1% actually declined.

While it might seem as if both these radically different sets of statistics cannot be true at the same time, what makes them mutually compatible is that flesh-and-blood human beings move from one statistical category to another over time.

Slate has taken a break from their usual insufferable contrarianism to post an interesting series on income inequality. Including this:

Stephen J. Rose is a labor economist at Georgetown best-known for publishing, since the 1970s, successive editions of Social Stratification in the United States, a pamphlet and poster much revered by the left that depicts economic inequality in the United States. In his recent book  Rebound, Rose made an apparent 180-degree turn and argued that worries about rising income inequality and a disappearing middle class were overblown. Rose built his case largely on the notion that the Census Bureau's preferred metric—"median household income"—was misleading.

The trouble, Rose wrote, was that households varied greatly in composition and size. A household might consist of a single young man just starting out on his own or an elderly widow in retirement. Neither would likely enjoy a high income, but that would be a function of mere circumstance (the young man was just beginning his climb up the greasy pole; the retired widow no longer worked at all) and need (neither was likely to be responsible for any children). Another problem, Rose suggested, was that some households were bigger than others. Couples tended to have larger household incomes than single people, but that was because they likely collected two paychecks rather than one. The proportion of Americans living alone had for various reasons increased over time; that needed to be taken into account, too. Correcting for all these factors, Rose calculated that median household income was 30 percent higher than the Census' official figure (about $50,000 in 2007).

That was the good news. The bad news was that even with these new calculations, Rose couldn't deny the existence of a Great Divergence. "Under all circumstances," he wrote, "inequality has risen considerably, and this is a bad thing for America. Those at the bottom of the income ladder have benefited only minimally from the significant gains in overall production over the past three decades."

[PenPho]

http://www.salon.com/news/jan_brewer/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/02/jan_brewer_opening_statement

Jan Brewer debate performance. Brutal.

Can we get a moratorium on Arizona politics?

Sigh.

We can't stop until the headless bodies are found.

http://www.azcentral.com/video/601325652001

Between Jan Brewer and Ben Quayle, it's been a truly horrific election season, even for those of us who couldn't care less.

Don't forget JD Hayworth, or McCain going full teatard.

So then...that's a "no" on the moratorium?

Yes.

There will be a moratorium on Arizona politics when Arizona politics decides to cut it the fuck out...

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/us/politics/07candidates.html

Mr. Pearcy and other drifters and homeless people were recruited onto the Green Party ballot by a Republican political operative who freely admits that their candidacies may siphon some support from the Democrats. Arizona's Democratic Party has filed a formal complaint with local, state and federal prosecutors in an effort to have the candidates removed from the ballot, and the Green Party has urged its supporters to steer clear of the rogue candidates.

...

"Did I recruit candidates? Yes," said Mr. May, who is himself a candidate for the State Legislature, on the Republican ticket. "Are they fake candidates? No way."

To make his point, Mr. May went by Starbucks, the gathering spot of the Mill Rats, as the frequenters of Mill Avenue are known.

"Are you fake, Benjamin?" he yelled out to Mr. Pearcy, who cried out "No," with an expletive attached.

"Are you fake, Thomas?" Mr. May shouted in the direction of Thomas Meadows, 27, a tarot card reader with less than a dollar to his name who is running for state treasurer. He similarly disagreed.

"Are you fake, Grandpa?" he said to Anthony Goshorn, 53, a candidate for the State Senate whose bushy white beard and paternal manner have earned him that nickname on the streets. "I'm real," he replied.

Gathered around was a motley crew of people who were down on their luck, including a one-armed pregnant woman named Roxie whom Mr. May befriended sometime back and who introduced him to the rest.

Well, if the moratorium isn't going to get passed, then we might as well go full retard and watch Sheriff Joe run for President.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

From the annals of false equivalence...

http://thepoorman.net/2010/09/09/like-also-too/

Snowflake Snooki:

Book burning is antithetical to American ideals. People have a constitutional right to burn a Koran if they want to, but doing so is insensitive and an unnecessary provocation – much like building a mosque at Ground Zero.

Similarly, calling black people ni**ers is insensitive, much like black people moving in to your neighborhood.

[Brownie]

Just out of curiosity, where does burning a Koran in Florida rate with the NEA funding a "Piss Christ" Art Exhibit?

[Internet Apex]

Just out of curiosity, where does burning a Koran in Florida rate with the NEA funding a "Piss Christ" Art Exhibit?

Right up there, I'd say.

[Bort]

Piss Christ is actually surprisingly beautiful.

[Gilgamesh]

Just out of curiosity, where does burning a Koran in Florida rate with the NEA funding a "Piss Christ" Art Exhibit?

Ah, the NEA, a conservative hobby horse if there ever was one.

[Eli]

Piss Christ is actually surprisingly beautiful.

Really, what I take from it is the importance of proper hydration.  

[R-V]

Just out of curiosity, where does burning a Koran in Florida rate with the NEA funding a "Piss Christ" Art Exhibit?

Right up there, I'd say.

Sure, but what does any of that have to do with a false equivalency drawn between building a mosque at an old Burlington Coat Factory and burning the Koran?

[J. Walter Weatherman]

Piss Christ is actually surprisingly beautiful.

Hear, hear.

The beauty (and, indeed, the surprise that urine could be so luminous) is really the crux of it.

(It's a juxtaposition rather befitting the elevation of the low seen in a religion whose deity manifested himself in base flesh to be born to an unwed mother and laid in a feeding trough, traditionally amongst a retinue of sheep and other creatures and all the shit and piss that would seem to entail. A god who hung out with hookers and touched lepers before ultimately being brutally tortured, humiliated and nailed naked to a plank to die, a form of death that would probably see its own unsavory share of bodily fluids.)

You really have to see Serrano's work in person to be able to appreciate its sheer beauty, though this image does a decent enough job capturing it...

[Eli]

(It's a juxtaposition rather befitting the elevation of the low seen in a religion whose deity ALLEGEDLY manifested himself in base flesh to be born to an unwed mother and laid in a feeding trough, traditionally amongst a retinue of sheep and other creatures and all the shit and piss that would seem to entail. A god who hung out with hookers and touched lepers before ultimately being brutally tortured, humiliated and nailed naked to a plank to die, a form of death that would probably see its own unsavory share of bodily fluids.)

Intrepid Reader: All of you heathens

Fixed.