Candidates “R” Us

Lisa Benson

Today I’ll be doing a little follow up on Tuesday’s Nevada Primaries, specifically the Republican nominees. If you aren’t curious about who Harry Reid is running against, scroll down to In Closing.

Harry Reid will be running against Sharron Angle, who has been endorsed by at least one “tea party” group. But it seems that some of the stances that got her that coveted support might not sit too well in the general election. Her website has been cleansed of some of her more… controversial positions. Apparently the teaching of phonics is way too hot an idea to be confessed now. But she also thinks the Department of Education should be abolished, so who exactly will be insisting on phonics at the Federal level? She also ran for the nomination on saying global climate change is a hoax (tell it to a Las Vegan this week, honey), “free market” retirement alternatives should replace Social Security (maybe some sort of defined benefit pension plan?), we should drill everywhere, to hell with regulation, and she’s eligible to have a concealed carry permit. How impressive.

So, did the GOP discuss these minor changes to her site for greater electability, or did a brain cell go off in her campaign headquarters?

Meanwhile, voters in the Northwest side of Las Vegas have the opportunity to vote for incumbent Dina Titus, or challenger Joe Heck. Dr. Heck is an ER Doc who did a tour in Iraq and therefore thinks he has all the answers to our healthcare, economic, and security problems. As I’ve mentioned before, Vegas is a mighty small place when it comes to our medical community but I don’t know the man. Even though we have a Republican Governor, Dr. Heck brags about having the endorsement of Tim Pawlenty and Mitt Romney, the Governors of 2 states that are not Nevada. Heck had originally planed to run for Governor himself, so it’s quite understandable that he doesn’t exactly have Jim Gibbon’s backing. His platform seems to be classic Reaganomics: “a fair and predictable tax system and the elimination or reduction in some taxes, including estate taxes and long-term capital gains taxes, to encourage business growth. He argues for bringing back manufacturing jobs to bolster the economy, too.” No word on how to bring back those jobs. A really big lasso, perhaps? You can read a lot more about his views in this interview, which shows that he has a remarkable amount in common with Ms. Angle.

The more radical elements of the Republican party might have started as a made up movement, but it’s gotten momentum of it’s own. In the words of Pearl Jam, “Oh, but we unleashed a lion.”

In Closing: It is surely a sign of the apocalypse that I mostly agree with Glenn Reynolds, but he’s not the only one who wonders if “everybody ought to go to college” is what we really ought to be telling high school students; Massachusetts health insurance reform win and fail; bankruptcy filings back up to pre-“reform” levels; why the economy isn’t getting better; do negative calorie foods exist?; Afghanistan is now officially the longest war in American history; on teaching and poverty among children (who, you may recall, don’t have jobs and aren’t really responsible for their own poverty, conservative think tanks notwithstanding); the good news is there will be 400,000 new jobs driving trucks in the next 18 months, but the bad news is those jobs will be as long haul truck drivers; terrorists don’t even need real bombs anymore; don’t buy something just because the lady in the vitamin store says it’s good for you (pro-tip, do research at home, heavy on scientific papers as references, and take a written list of what you want!); economic opposite day; good advice; Congress can’t be bothered to make sure your Doctor gets paid properly; as if you didn’t know that retirement savings were endangered; on metabolic syndrome; on solar power; and it turns out that GTA doesn’t corrupt every soul that plays it.

Reid and Reid

Among states having a Primary election today is Nevada. Nevada voters were faced with two big decisions today in addition to a couple dozen local level races. The electronic ballot in some precincts was 9 pages long. While the nation has one eye on our race, it turns out that the majority of Nevadans won’t even bother showing up at the polls.

The headline star of the show here and across the country is of course the race for United States Senate. Majority Leader Harry Reid has been a fixture of Nevada politics for decades, having even been portrayed in the movies. Today he had 3 Democratic challengers in addition to a full dozen Republican candidates vying for his seat. It would appear that in terms of campaign finance, Reid has the ability to outspend all of them in the general election combined. A new front runner has emerged in that race, Sharron Angle, following Sue Lowden’s infamous chickens-for-doctors gaffe. The race itself is still close to call. Angle has a Tea Party endorsement, so it will be interesting to see how that plays in her campaign should she win today’s race.

Meanwhile, Senator Reid has laid out an ambitious summer agenda for the Senate. His “business as usual” approach is welcome considering the problems facing the nation, and the number one most important issue to most Americans is unemployment and the lack of health insurance that goes with it. It would appear that his campaign revolves around getting things done.

Of course the elephant in the room for the Senate race is Yucca Mountain. Reid has been using his influence to thwart the nuclear waste dump just 90 miles from Las Vegas for decades. If Reid loses the fall election, his successor will most likely not have the political clout to keep the site closed. While Nevada’s other Senator, Republican John Ensign, also opposes Yucca Mountain, he has bigger things to worry about.

Of course Harry isn’t the only Reid on the ballot today. His son Rory hopes to be the Democratic nominee for the upcoming Gubernatorial race. Rory Reid only faces one other Democratic challenger, and in addition to name recognition, he’s a County Commissioner in Clark County. Las Vegas is in Clark County, which is home to roughly 80% of Nevadans and in fact has a bigger budget than the State of Nevada. Embattled Governor Jim Gibbons faces 4 primary challengers and the aftermath of a viscous divorce; despite his confidence, he is unlikely to win the primary. In addition to trailing the front runner by 14 points, his campaign is low on money. Most likely, Rory Reid will face Brian Sandoval in the Fall.

Rory is only 47. From the Governor’s Mansion, he can name a replacement for a resigning or deceased Senator and more. He can build towards a Senate run or even a Presidential run. And that makes Rory Reid a man to watch.

Cross-posted at The Moderate Voice, one of Associated Content’s Top 3 Centrist Websites!

2001 Maniacs: Field of Shorties

The Truth About Cattle Grazing: done correctly, it can help restore the land.

Two Funny Things and a Lot of Unfunny Ones about Racism: Let’s get rid of the Mexicans, and Who translated this for you? There’s a movement afoot to pass laws that violate the 14th Amendment on the grounds that not everyone born here has parents that are really not American enough. By not American enough, they generally mean “brown.” There are a number of problems with this, aside from Constitutional issues (funny how some people only like the Constitution some of the time). First, you might end up with people who can’t prove they were born anywhere because the law denies them a birth certificate. Second, you might end up with people who are effectively not citizens of any nation, because they weren’t born in the country of their parent’s citizenship. Third and finally, who gets to decide what constitutes “American enough”? At least “born in U.S.” is a simple to apply measure.

More on Friday’s lousy employment report: Good, bad, and ugly. Really ugly.

Obligatory Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Items: Woo, recapturing a whole 10,500 barrels a day. Really interesting that a BP exec managed to dump a third of his company stock a month before the disaster. You would think they could find a cable tie to keep stuff out of the way on the equipment BP is using a mile below the surface. Harry Reid thinks BP should pay for the clean-up (more on Harry come Tuesday with the Nevada Primaries, probably over on TMV). And on BP’s spill “plan”.

Civil Forfeiture Must Go: Guy sells truck on a payment plan. Truck gets seized by the cops. Cops don’t care that guy still has title and is owed money on said truck. Somehow I bet GMAC doesn’t have this problem.

And it’s only June 6: 22% of states have passed new abortion restrictions and 81 bank failures so far this year.

Speaking of the Banks: 6 made $51,000,000,000 last year; the other 980 lost money.

While we’re on the topic of making money: Just the threat of Federal enforcement makes companies want to restate their earnings.

How Laws are Really Made: Most people of my generation were taught that it works something like this, but the truth is a bit more complicated.

Run Sarah Run!: Ten reasons she should just keep doing the speaking circuit and stay the heck off the ballots.

Two Medical Items: Did you know that if enough doctors decide “No, that isn’t enough money for that procedure and we won’t take that insurance anymore,” the Government can decide they are in violation of anti-trust laws? And scroll down for a breakdown of infant mortality rates in developed nations, compared to health care spending per capita and military spending as a percentage of GDP. The United States has a shameful showing.

And Finally, Japanfilter: Fireflies.

A Couple Quick Follow-Ups

Remember Dipak Desai? Prosecutors want to bring criminal charges. [Update: 28 charges brought, including racketeering] What will this do to the drug companies’ appeal? I am no lawyer, but it seems to me that if what happened was a criminal act, then this is no different than suing Smith and Wesson over a handgun death. Except of course for the fact that the drugs weren’t the problem.

Just yesterday we were talking about the jobs report (no, not the Apple Computer kind of Jobs). Today the federal government released it’s own version of the report. It was, well, uninspiring. Ok, no, really it sucks, and so says an actual economist. Sure, 431,000 jobs were created, but 95% of them were temp positions with the Census. That leaves only 41,000 jobs that are likely to be around at Christmas, and for a change it’s a more pessimistic number than ADP reported.

Twofer Thursday: This is Your Economy and Warren Buffett Redux

This is Your Economy:

The ADP payroll report is out today. They’re the people who print paychecks, so they have a very good idea how many private sector jobs there are. And in May, they say there were 55,000 more private sector jobs. All the gains came from the “service” sector: jobs that often begin with “how can I help you” and end with “is there anything else” (or alternatively, “would you like fries with that”). No new manufacturing jobs; no new construction jobs; no jobs doing anything that won’t be gone or irrelevant in 6 months. Tomorrow the Bureau of Labor Statistics will come out with their own numbers, which include government jobs. And since there are roughly 400,000 extra Census workers on the job right now, they are expected to announce something like 540,000 new jobs. Because those Census workers will be unemployed by Christmas, we should really call this 140,000 new and possibly permanent jobs. Once more, we haven’t added enough jobs to account for people entering the workforce (sorry, class of 2010!) let alone put the unemployed to work.

Speaking of the unemployed, the percentage of them who have been out of work more than half a year is at record levels. Sadly, unemployment is higher among parents, who have families to feed. Let’s not forget that the biggest reason for unemployment benefits is that those kids didn’t do anything wrong and still deserve roof-over-head and dinner-on-the-table. And in an unconscionable move, at least one employer is advertising that they won’t consider your application if you are unemployed! On what planet is it desirable to hire people who you know will jump ship for a better gig, when there are thousands of unemployed people desperate to work for you? Even without the public relations nightmare unfolding, how can this possibly be good business?

No wonder personal bankruptcy filings are up.

This is your economy. And now, in the face of a consumer revolt that threatens to turn into a voter revolt, Congress is actually considering doing something about the people who got us here. It sure sounds like too little too late, if it happens at all.

Warren Buffett Redux (a follow up):

Yesterday was the big day for the Oracle of Omaha. He had to sit down in front of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission and explain how the 3rd richest man in the world let a ratings agency he had partial ownership of overlook the real estate bubble. Well, he didn’t want to “look foolish” by sounding the alarm. After all, everybody was trying to make a buck in real estate. Nobody could have seen it coming, especially the company that was paid to see it coming. Which is it: he didn’t want to be the first to say anything, or nobody could have foreseen it?

Kind of unimpressive testimony. It’s almost like he was trying to invoke his right to remain silent.

In Closing: Androids don’t play Tetris; Wal-Mart’s lawyers warned the company not to be misogynist prigs in 1995; obligatory Gulf of Mexico oil spill items; Congressional slap-fight may make it hard to buy a home anywhere floods are a remote risk; Driving While Black (I feel certain that “brown” is close enough in many areas); cooking is hard; health insurance limbo; vaccine refusal puts everyone at risk; National Association of Evangelicals might actually be ready to face reality, that birth control prevents abortions; farewell Mercury; the 50 year “anomaly”; Governor Gibbons made the Real ID Zombie walk again, but the ACLU’s got a boomstick; and Star Trek insignia. Yes, I do try to always make the last item fun.

The Man is Right. Oops, I meant Correct.

Over the past few days, a Robert Reich piece has been making the rounds, and appeared today in the Christian Science Monitor. It’s called “Five reasons Obama should put BP under receivership.”

Now, just for review. Oil has been spewing into the gulf at roughly 3-5 times the rate BP says it has for over a month. Coverup and obfuscation from officials continue. Oil has hit multiple states. BP’s half-hearted attempts to stop the flow (and save themselves billions of dollars) are officially over, and they hope that relief wells will stop the problem when they are done — in August! The fact that it is still described as a “hope” does not instill confidence. In the meantime, hurricane season is upon us. While the problem is many feet underwater, the humans dealing with it must contend with weather on the surface. That doesn’t even address the issue of high winds and waves as a “dispersant.” It should be obvious to everyone who isn’t hopelessly addicted to wingnut commentators that there is an environmental disaster that is quickly becoming an economic disaster for the people whose livelihood depends on the Gulf of Mexico.

The CSM asks what kind of “reforms” this will trigger. If it’s anything like our health insurance “reforms” and our financial “reforms,” expect nothing and suffer no disappointment should we receive it in abundance.

Back to Mr. Reich. He’s one of the Clinton Era fixtures that wasn’t returned to the White House when Mr. Obama arrived. All things considered, I suspect it’s because he’s too “L word” and I don’t mean “Lesbian.” (as an aside, where did this idea come from??) Anyway, Mr. Reich has 5 key reasons that BP needs to be temporarily taken over by the Feds. And unfortunately they are good reasons. They’ve been lying to us. We have no idea if they really are doing enough to stop this thing. They want to go ahead with risky strategies to (maybe) stop it, and the Feds currently have no way to stop them from making matters worse. For that matter we have little authority to do much of anything. Many on the Right want to blame Mr. Obama, but he’s not in charge and can’t be unless he’s willing to nationalize BP (a very Left position), in essence making their property forfeit due to bad management.

Liberal rock, meet conservative hard spot. That oily bit in between is what’s left of the libertarian position.

Only the Federal government is big enough to stop the environmental destruction that will eventually circle the world, and they can only do that if they are willing to seize the day — and the company.

In Closing: What morons thought this was a good idea and more importantly have they been fired yet?; Bank of America doesn’t care that she owns it free and clear, they’re foreclosing anyway (why exactly do I pay my mortgage?); Congrats to the many college grads, who are unfortunately both drowning in student loan debt and unprepared for the workforce; U.S. insists that Afghan peace plan must preserve women’s rights (which means there will be no peace); Dalian, China may look like this today, but to me it will always look more like this (turns out there is a Dalian Power Plant!); We just can’t afford to continue spending 155% of our average after tax income, at least not without serious debt and destroying the worth of our assets; bank failures continue; European unemployment is as bad as ours; Brad DeLong wonders if Washington really cares about the problem of unemployment (they will when the “unemployed” turn into the “angry mob”); solve the childhood obesity problem, the reputation of cops, and the made up problem of stranger danger in one brilliant move; it’s not 1967 anymore; basic economics at work (some would argue it’s a less dangerous crop than corn); and how to put on a yukata.

Oh Great Oracle of Omaha, START TALKING!

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission has requested the company of the world’s 3rd richest man next week. And then, when he declined their invitation, they sealed the deal with a subpoena. CNN helpfully points out “If you don’t know how a subpoena works, this one begins with capital letters, ‘YOU ARE HEREBY COMMANDED to appear and give testimony.'”

Why have they summoned the Oracle to Washington?

Warren Buffett is the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. Berkshire owns a lot of things; some of the ones you are likely to recognize are Dairy Queen, GEICO, Fruit of the Loom, Acme Bricks, and Pampered Chef. Berkshire also holds a lot of big stock positions in things like American Express, Bank of America, General Electric, Coca Cola, and Moody’s. Moody’s is a company that does business and economic analysis. While you might think that AmEx and B of A are what the FCIC is interested in, they want to know more about what happened at Moody’s regarding the investment ratings of mortgage backed bonds.

I wonder what the FCIC expects to hear from Mr. Buffett.

In Closing: the 3 ring circus that is the Nevada race for Senator; California health insurance rates going up (again); none of the 10 Commandments are in the Constitution; Social Security is sustainable; American citizen almost deported to Mexico; Wish List; joblessness among those under 24 at record levels; and Cat Cafes.

It’s an update kind of week

I seriously hope to have something more interesting posted this afternoon. I just wanted to let you all know that I’ve just almost finished updating FitLike.Us. I still need to populate the links and fix the contact script. If you see anything else, let me know.

In the meantime, who knew that shark attacks are most likely in shallow water, to people in black or white swimsuits, on Sundays, during a new moon?

Welcome to the New and Improved ShortWoman

Perhaps you noticed a brand new theme here at ShortWoman. The old theme had been in place many years now. It was so old it didn’t support a lot of modern blogging features. Of course any transition has its problems, and I will be working to fix them as I learn there is an issue. As a result, there may be a few hiccups and tweaks over the next several days. Some new things may be implemented; some things that aren’t working might get deleted. Since there have been no real changes to my server, there should be no complete outages.

I’ve also taken the opportunity to clean out the blogroll and do a better job of organizing it. A lot of dead links and things I no longer track are gone, and some new items from my RSS lists have been added. There is room for some additions, so feel free to put a link request into comments. Likewise, if you notice a problem, please let me know about it so it can be solved.

Thank you to all my readers for visiting.

Happy Towel Day

Happy Towel Day.

In Closing: “Words of Power” go far beyond framing; Oh, so that’s why they’re anti-tax and anti-government-anything; innocence and stupidity; obligatory gulf oil leak items; Spock’s Obama’s Brain; the text message can wait until you are not moving; it’s hard to stay enthusiastic about a reform for a broken system that will take 4 years to get here; Nevada, this is your Governor; where does the time go?; the Detriments of Eating Low Carb; the truth about hospital emergency room traffic; and Abandoned in Antarctica.