The Wallstreet Journal Hates California

The Wallstreet Journal Hates California

Have I mentioned how much I hate the Wall Street Journal lately? I mean, it's down right the most awful shit that can ever be printed. I say that with as much pride given how stupid my blog is. But that should show you that even my level of poor grammar and spelling errors is far better than the Wall Street Journal's dribble.

California: The Lindsay Lohan of States
Sacramento is headed for trouble again, and it shouldn't expect a bailout.

By ALLYSIA FINLEY

Listen up, California. The other 48 states—your cousin New York excluded—are sick of your bratty arrogance. You're the Lindsay Lohan of states: a prima donna who once showed some talent but is now too wasted to do anything with it.

After enjoying ephemeral highs and spending binges, you suffer crashes that culminate in brief, unsuccessful stints in rehab. This cycle repeats itself every five to 10 years, as the rest of the country looks on with a mixture of horror and amusement. We'd feel sorry for you if you didn't constantly flip us the bird.

Instead, we're making bets on how long it will be before your next meltdown. Oh, wait—you're already melting down.

Opinion Journal's Allysia Finley argues that California is suffering from spending addiction like starlet Lindsay Lohan.

You've racked up nearly $70 billion in general obligation debt, and that doesn't include your $500 billion unfunded pension liability. Your own analysts predict you'll face a hole of at least $80 billion over the next four years.

Your government's run by a brothel of environmentalists, lawyers, public-sector unions and legislative bums. When they're not taxing or spending, they're creating regulations and commissions like the Board of Barbering and Cosmetology and the California Blueberry Commission. Many businesses would leave if it weren't for your sunny climate.

Which may explain why you're so obsessed with climate change. If your climate changes, no one, including your Hollywood friends, would tolerate you anymore. So you've created a law to tax carbon emissions—no matter that it will kill jobs.

It's not as if you don't recognize that you've got problems. Roughly three-quarters of you say you're headed in the wrong direction, according to a recent survey by the Public Policy Institute of California. You're even more depressed than Illinois and New York, and you've got sunshine 10 months of the year!

You appropriately give your government low marks—28% approval for outgoing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, 16% for the legislature—yet you continue to re-elect the politicians who got you into this mess. Not a single incumbent state legislator lost re-election this year, including one Democrat who died a month ago (no joke). What's scarier is that you've just given almost all of the keys to statewide offices to Democrats.

Jerry Brown will be your new (old) governor. This is the man who acted as a gateway drug to your spending addiction three decades ago when he gave public-sector employees collective bargaining rights. Helping enforce your wacky laws will be Lt. Gov-elect Gavin Newsom, the San Francisco mayor who flouted state law by allowing same-sex marriage. On the plus side, he has nice hair and loves you just the way you are. This is what he had to say after winning his race:

"We're nothing but a mirror of our consistent thoughts. You tend to manifest what you focus on. If you look around for what's wrong, you'll find it. But as all we know up here in San Francisco, when you focus on what's right, you see it all around you. . . . There is absolutely nothing wrong with California that can't be fixed by what's right with California. . . . If you're from another state, you'd love to have the problems of California."

You've also just re-elected Barbara Boxer (that's Senator Barbara Boxer) to a fourth term. She boasted on election night that it's her "eleventh straight election victory, and what a sweet one it is . . . [since] everything was thrown at us, including the kitchen sink, and the stove and the oven and everything, millions of dollars of negative ads from known and unknown opponents, millions and millions of dollars."

We've tried to help you, California. Some spent millions on campaigns to entice you to change your reckless behavior. And you told them to kick rocks.

So here's our final warning: When you inevitably crash and burn, don't count on us to bail you out.

Ms. Finley, a lapsed Californian who still wears Birkenstocks, is an assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com.

Yup. That settles the year end debate. This is the worst article I've read all year. I swear officer, she was asking for it. She shouldn't have been wearing that short electoral process.

It's crazy that even though he has a pretty vast Network studio located in Los Angeles, Murdoch sure loves to hate California. Once he bought the paper they just gave up on anything resembling journalism and focused on the whole class struggle journalism for capitalist.

This article instills strange and totally unjustified California Pride. Yeah, we may have a tax system that will never lead to a balanced budget and forget even paying for the shit we're proposing every election, but still, this is my state and I'm damn proud of it. Even if California did it to itself through shitty proposition system.

Who do we have to blame for all this? Well, for starters, how about everyone who voted in 1978. Prop 13 was and still is total shit. The idea that we put so many barriers between us and collecting state revenue while allowing more ways to create corporate tax loopholes is beyond reasoning. We're just really stupid for buying into it. It's not even politicians who are doing anything. It's proof enough that democracy doesn't work.

How else do you justify voting for limit on taxes and wonder why we can't fix our potholes and why your kid's tuition is so high? We can't really blame California government. They got little to do with their choices. But at the same time, don't call us Lindsey Lohan!

It really doesn't help that the federal government neglects urban development and focuses on rural policy on corporate handouts. Though I'm sure California voters would still find a way to fuck things up if we had some sort of helpful federal support in place.

No matter how beautiful the landscape that California has in its national parks and forests, it's not going to last. Especially given the fact that the proposition that would have secured non-discretionary funds for the state park system failed. Which will probably just lead to more loss in park access.

Prop 24 would have closed corporate tax loopholes, but California voted against it. I would call California voters retarded, but I am a Californian and I also have volunteered time working with disabled people and retarded people actually have better judgment than the state's prevailing opinion on most political issues.

In short, if Prop 19 was the main reason why you were sad this election process, you're pretty much not worthy of voting.

But hey at least we didn't elect a criminal for governor like Florida. To no one's surprise, criminal Florida Governor-elect Rick Scott may have already broken both tax and labor laws before ever stepping foot in office. It turns out that his campaign is trying to pay its workers in American Express Gift Cards, rather than through actual paychecks.

If you weren't familiar with it, Florida elected a Governor who's medical firm blatantly broke the law by overcharging the government by billions of dollars for Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements. So is it really much of a surprise when he's breaking the law again?

Mark Don Givens told Florida's WTSP News that he was expecting a paycheck after he made phone calls and knocked on doors for the Scott campaign, which made jobs a top issue in the election. Givens said he and other workers were upset after they were told by the campaign that they could not offer them a paycheck and given American Express gift cards instead.

"This would violate both tax laws and labor laws," Melanie Sloan, the Executive Director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) told TPMmuckraker in an email. "It looks like the newly elected AG will be investigating the newly elected governor.

I'm not sure, but I doubt that anyone in Florida realizes how horribly screwed they are right now. Let's just say they're more screwed than we are in California. Especially since Scott will also be able to pass anything he wants thanks to the massive GOP majorities in both the State Legislature and State Senate.

Though the only thing separating failing states like Florida and California from working ones like all the other 48 states is simply a couple of years.

Americans Are Stupid - Beach Fun

Americans Are Stupid - Beach Fun

This video ruined my week. Yes, I was fully aware that people were beyond stupid, but this video ruined my 4th of July weekend before it even started.



"Mommy get the oil off!"
"I can't get it off, rub your feet around or something"

Ha! Oh man. this shit. America, America this is you! This sort of thing is literally happening right at the feet of the average person, and they're still managing to ignore it. They're just swimming anyways like nothing is happening. As if the beach isn't completely filled with clear examples of pollution and certain death at your door.

This raises the question of exactly what minimum percentage of beach coverage is required to drive Americans away from the beach. I can't honestly understand the type of lifestyle that would compel someone to absolutely have to go to the beach, even when you know the water and sand is full of oil. Is it really that hard to just do something else? Is it the only way to get laid in Florida?

By god, they spent what meager amounts they had saved up on a beach vacation and dammit, they're going to have a beach vacation! Even if it cost them their lives and the lives of their children! At some point you just have to ask yourself how long would it take to drive to the other side of Florida?

A scary aspect about all this is that in the video he says how to get the oil off - "They have Goo-Gone further down the beach". If you didn't know, Goo-Gone is almost entirely xylene, that stuff's worse for you than the oil itself.

Why are so many people and public officials touching this stuff unprotected? There is going to be a huge leukemia spike in the coming decade. With this sort of mentality it seems like a pretty clear thing to say that Florida is literally killing children with their tourism campaign. Maybe their new motto should be Kill, Baby, Kill! Would not going to the beach be letting the hysterical liberals win?

Stuff like this just make me confused.

"I only went into the water up to my ankles. That's as far as I wanted to go," said Joe Chambers, 28, of West Pensacola as he scrubbed off oily residue from himself and his son, Ethan, 4, in the public showers at Casino Beach. "It doesn't smell like the beach. It smells like a gas station. There are no fish in the water. There's nothing alive in the water. I don't know how public officials can just look at the water and make a call to reopen it for swimming."

Carol Doster of Grand Isle, Miss., said her son Dallas, 12, was frightened by the oil that streaked his legs and arms after a five-minute swim in the Gulf on Friday. "It won't rub off," Doster said.

Fuck! How are they letting people swim in this shit? Come on in kids, the oil's fine!

You people better get down on your knees and pray to the mushroom gods. Pray that your benevolent mercy might again turn the waters sweet. I have friends who live on the East coast and they tell me they are hearing commercials about how Florida beaches are totally safe.. they they swear! Come and swim in their water, it's so cool.

I saw an ad this weekend online with a new spin on the travel plan: "The Gulf Coast: So Much More Than The Beach!" Ha! At the end of the commercial she says "Beach conditions may vary... but we won't get past this unless we all work together!" What they're essentially saying is "So come pay money to get cancer, because your part of the work is dying!" I'm sure Cover them in Crude oil/dispersant is one of the 101 ways to kill your child after giving him a stupid name.

So how could they just reopen the beaches like that? I guess they figure they aren't on the hook for any medical liability for the vast majority of potential deaths. Definitely the deaths of anyone who would get near the water without getting paid for it or otherwise having business with it. It really isn't worth the cost of the effort to stop poor gulf coast residents from swimming in the oil, because it doesn't cost BP any more than them not swimming in it.

Then again... Kids sure like poisons and can't stay away from them..



I'm just wondering if the cancer risk of the crude bath is like "I drink my water from non-bpa free containers/I heat my food up in plastic in the microwave" level or is it "I literally chase my whiskey with benzene." But considering crude actually contains benzene, I'm guessing it's the chasing it all down one. It's such high enough concentrations of it that you want to avoid breathing in the fumes if possible.

I like how they don't even know WHAT it is, let alone if it's bad for them. Imagine that state of blissful obliviousness needed to do that. Oh how I envy them. I just scratch my head when I read stuff like;

"I know this stuff's bad when it gets on animals, but when it gets on our children... I dunno, maybe we just clean it off??"

They really can't be to blame. Hell, even those who are somewhat in the know and listen to stuff like NPR get news like the following where NPR seems to endorse the idea that oil filled beaches are somehow safe.

HANSEN: Health officials actually have been warning people not to swim in some areas off the coast of Alabama and northwest Florida. You mentioned the Alabama beaches being closed. Is it safe in other beaches? I mean, for example, is it safe to swim even if there's no visible signs of oil on the beach?

Prof. LEATHERMAN: Yeah, I think you'll be fine if there's no oil on the beach or in the water. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection points out, even if you come in contact with these tar balls it's not like it's going to be deadly poison. Just wash it off - soap and water will usually do it - and let people know if you come in contact with it.

NPR is the worst/best example of wishy-washy pro-corporatist ivory tower jewish run liberal bullshit. Then again, what else are you going to listen to on the way to the soul-devouring job on your morning commute?

But seriously, NPR is full of shit on this one. You want to know some of the reasons why this shit is just not healthy to touch or handle in any way;

Exposure can occur through skin contact, inhalation of contaminated air or soil, and ingestion of contaminated water or food. Exposure may result in localized toxicity (e.g., irritation of the skin following contact), but many health effects are caused by systemic distribution of chemicals from crude oil, because ingredients can move throughout the body. Exposure varies based on the duration and concentrations in the contaminated material (air, water, soil, fish, etc). Differences in exposure will occur based on location, work and personal activities, age, diet, use of protective equipment, and other factors.

Concurrent exposure to other toxic chemicals at work and home must be considered when evaluating the potential for toxic effects to result from exposure to crude oil chemicals. Exposure to a combination of toxic chemicals, especially if they can damage the same organs in the body, increases the potential for health effects.

Detailed technical information is available on estimating the amount of exposure that people will have under various conditions (e.g., contaminated air inhalation volume) and on evaluations of children's unique exposure conditions: :
Adults (1997): http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncea/cfm/recor...17f6564a6e531a3
Children (2003)
http://permanent.access.gpo.gov/lps...-deid=55145.htm

These documents make it very clear that exposure can vary considerably from one person to the next, and that children's exposure is often much higher, in relation to their body weight. What that means is that they may have a much higher dose of toxic chemicals than adults, who are in the same location.

Basic Physiological Effects

Crude oil is a complex mixture of chemicals that have varying abilities to be absorbed into the body through the skin, lungs, and during digestion of food and water. Most components of crude oil enter the bloodstream rapidly when they are inhaled or swallowed. Crude oil contains chemicals that rapidly penetrate the skin and move through cell walls. They can damage cell structures, including DNA, and alter the function of the cells and the organs.

A detailed discussion of the uptake, distribution, toxic effects, and elimination of chemicals in crude oil is summarized in the 1999 CDC publication at: http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/ToxProfiles/tp123.pdf

One of the chemicals in crude oil that is of highest concern is benzene, because it has long been known to cause rapid toxic effects, and it is carcinogenic and mutagenic. A review the toxic effects and other characteristics of benzene is available at: http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxprofiles/tp3.pdf. Benzene health effects are discussed under "chronic exposure hazards" below.

And the scary part is that this doesn't even factor in the toxicity of the dispersant and its effects on crude's toxicity. I'm also willing to bet that nobody's studied the effects on people of literally swimming in crude oil and accidentally swallowing it/getting it in your nose and eyes. So if you're a health research or a health scientist, here's a golden opportunity for some lifelong research project for you.

I don't know about you, but when I go to the beach I seem to swallow a gallons worth of water while swimming. These parent's can't ever complain about any sort of bad chemicals BP releases since their gut reaction is to turn around and toss their children into the polluted water.

You really could call these kids Tar Babies and mean it. This all just adds more proof to my conclusion that the mountains are so much better.

Getting Burned

Getting Burned

Just as many season ending episodes for the regular season finish airing and you're starting to feel like you have nothing left to watch just remember that summer is here. Yes, sure. You could go outside and actually enjoy the longer days (longest day being June 21st), but just remember Summer Burn Notice is here and really, that's the best Burn Notice.

It's basically not summer if I can't have Psych, Burn Notice and Royal Pains. Oh USA, you make summer awesome. You and bikini's. I don't even care that Monk is over because I never cared for Monk. It was dead weight to me and while it's true that Burn Notice is shallow, it's still entertaining. It's really the perfect popcorn show and for summer time, that fits the need perfectly.



So yes, I'm so excited that I'm sure Michael Westin is happy to dance for the occasion. So why don't you join me and take in the awesomeness that is Burn Notice. It's really the show that highlights how fun and enjoyable USA can be. And while you already know that season 4 of Burn Notice begins tonight, you may not know that Burn Notice has now been officially renewed for two additional seasons. That's right, you can count on Seasons 5 & 6 appearing on USA in 2011 and 2012!

This means we have more Burn Notice episodes coming up than we've already had aired! Isn't that some amazing news? This also means that the Florida filming department will have at least a couple more years of production to pay for their local workers. This is all even more information to dance about, So can we get a little dance Fiona?



So where are we in the show? In case you missed the marathon that USA was showing all of today and don't know where we last left off on burn notice, it's here:

International fugitive Simon is loose and Michael's on the run from the FBI for his role in Simon’s escape. When Simon confronts Michael and threatens to blow up a Miami Beach hotel, Michael must call on his friends and an old enemy to help him avoid disaster and put Simon back in the dark hole where he belongs.

And so we return to night with Burn Notice: The Prisoner Edition! But you know what, with good news like all this and the excitement that the new season is here, there has to come some bad news along with it.

Fox has decided not to release the third season of "Burn Notice" on Blu-ray according to the official press release for the upcoming DVD release on June 1st.

The move isn't surprising. Though one of cable's best reviewed and most popular shows over on the USA Network, the show is shot on Super 16mm (aside from the Miami flyover shots) rather than in HD which accounts for a rather grainy image. As a result the difference in quality between the broadcast SD and HD versions is less noticeable than most other shows.

Fox then shot itself in the foot by releasing a Blu-ray with one of the worst-reviewed video transfers in the format's history and charging $20 more for it over the DVD version. It thus came as no surprise that sales of the Blu-ray proved disappointing.

The show now joins the likes of "Prison Break," "Nip/Tuck," "Damages" and "Rescue Me" which all started to release seasons on Blu-ray and then stopped after poor sales.

It makes sense. I thought that season 2's Blu-ray was pretty piss poor in video quality. I wasn't complaining about the price because I get employee discounts, but still, this does make my collection seem a little odd. I have season 1 on DVD, season 2 on Blu-ray and now season 3 will have to be on DVD as well? Oh well.



I look forward to this new episode wave of episodes. Yes, that's right. 8 episodes. That's how USA works. They order 16 episode seasons and then show 8, take a couple of months of a break and the come back for winter break. They're there when all the other networks abandon us for the vacation time. For that, I thank you USA. You make watching TV a pleasure.

A Communist Party

A Communist Party

50 years ago today Cuba faced a new change and Castro took over. You remember from The Godfather II or the Buena Vista Social Club... or Dirty Dancing 2: Havana Nights.. It was a crazy time and here we are 50 years later celebrating the festive years under a socialist dictatorship!

HAVANA (AFP) — Cuba on Thursday celebrates the 50th anniversary of its revolution with its iconic leader Fidel Castro withdrawn from power, still at odds with the United States and facing new economic challenges.

Fifty year festivities, led by President Raul Castro, 77, who officially took over from his older brother in February, were due to center on Santiago de Cuba -- the southeastern city from where the revolution began.

It was unclear how 82-year-old Fidel, who has not appeared in public since undergoing major surgery almost two and a half years ago, would participate.

Leftist Bolivian President Evo Morales has pulled out of the party and it was also unclear whether Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who considers himself Fidel Castro's "spiritual son," would attend.

"Celebrations won't be as grandiose as we had wished due to the economic situation," a Cuban official told AFP, requesting anonymity.

A 32-year-old Fidel Castro announced the start of the revolution in the island's second city after the victory of a 25-month guerilla war over dictator Fulgencio Batista.

The communist revolution -- also led by legendary Argentine guerilla Ernesto "Che" Guevara -- took on Marxist overtones in May 1961, one month after the attempted invasion of the Bay of Pigs by CIA-backed Cuban exiles.

Former US president John F. Kennedy declared an embargo in February 1962, before the Soviet missile crisis, which almost set off nuclear war.

US president-elect Barack Obama, due to take power on January 20, has, however, promised to soften the 46-year-old embargo, and Raul Castro has said he is ready for talks without "carrot or stick" with Obama.

The Cuban president has also promised "structural reforms" -- a departure from his older brother and leading members of the communist old guard.

The Cuban Communist Party is split between backers of the status quo who, like Fidel, refuse to loosen the regime's tight controls, and pragmatists pushing for a Chinese-style, controlled opening up of the economy.

But Raul's promised changes have taken a back seat to the global economic crisis as the president signaled in July, when he announced greater government control of revenues and tighter management of agriculture.

"It's my duty to speak frankly, because it would be unethical to create false expectations," he said after telling Cubans to expect tough economic times from spiraling international fuel and food prices.

On Saturday, the president called for new government spending cuts, but assured Cubans the economic and social reforms he had promised "have not been shelved."

The Caribbean island, also battered by three hurricanes in 2008, causing 10 billion dollars in damage -- equivalent to 20 percent of Cuba's gross national product -- no longer manages to meet its debt repayments.

It is still officially in the Special Period in Peacetime, an extended period of economic crisis that began in 1991 after the collapse of its main backer, the Soviet Union.

Although the island of 11.2 million people has since found new partners, particularly oil-rich Venezuela, life remains difficult for most Cubans who earn an average of 20 dollars per month and survive due to a parallel economy.

Branded US puppets by Havana, Cuban dissidents, divided and without a leader, say there are 219 "political prisoners" on the island.

During his decades in power, Fidel Castro expropriated foreign companies, jailed his political enemies and drove some two million Cubans into exile.

But he also introduced historic reforms, including major education and health advancements that raised the island nation to the level of leading western countries.

Cuba had Latin America's best life expectancy and infant mortality in 1959 and one of the highest literacy rates. Caloric consumption is significantly lower on average today than it was back then. The Cuban "revolution" was a joke. They overthrew the old rulers but had no idea of how to resist the U.S. by taking an independent path (like Albania did with a far smaller population) so they subordinated themselves and became a Soviet Neocolony. Their economy was organized around exporting agricultural products with horrible terms of trade.



Even though Americas embargo has been around for this long, I doubt it's as crippling as many would believe. If 50 years of supposed revolutionary socialism can't break free of dependency on rich nations, then they mustn't have been trying very hard. But hey... let's forget about all that cause it's PARTY TIME!!! I wonder if they'll have some Red Velvet Cake for the celebration. It's a shame that they can't trade with America as I've seen plenty of red party cups for them to use.



Then again, it's going to be like Weekend at Bernies. Imagine Castro's two year old dead body being draped around like a puppet. I suppose the celebration could be titled Cuba: At least it's not Haiti.

So hey, Cuba. Happy 50 years under some very strange times. I would come to visit, I really would. Your food is delicious and your music is very interesting. But I don't have a duo citizenship with any place that doesn't hate you. I would buy you a gift but.. yeah, that wouldn't be following that whole communism thing you seem to like. I suppose the closest I can get to you is in the Keys.