August 16, 2013

Thoughts on Pres. Carter's grandson starting out in politics at the state senator level.

I was pleased to note in the OP article that President Carter's grandson is a state senator. Serving in a state legislature, as a statewide elected official (like state treasurer or attorney general) or in the cabinet of a state governor is an excellent and proven way to learn how the political system is designed, functions and impacts citizens in a myriad of ways in all aspects of their lives. And I'd add serving as chief of staff for a governor/congressperson would also provide the extensive knowledge/experience to jump into the political arena at the level of one's previous boss.

It offends me when individuals, particularly "legacy" kids of high level politicians - governors/presidents/vice-presidents/US congressmen start out their political careers running for their very first office at the federal congressional or state gubernatorial level. I don't care how many degrees one has accumulated, or how wealthy one is, or how politically connected one's parents are, or how big a corporation one has run.

Then throw in how some carpetbagging individuals move to a different state just in time to claim residency in order to run for high level office. The primary purpose of serving at a Congressional or gubernatorial level is to represent the interests of your HOME STATE constituents and the overall welfare of your home state. That means you should have extensive personal knowledge of and experience dealing with issues of prime concern to your state and its constituents. You should have a real, personal HISTORY in that state!

President Carter has never suffered from hubris, ego or greed. The fact that his grandson is starting a political career at the state legislative level is further evidence of the values Jimmy Carter has passed on to his family. His grandson sounds to be a very decent man, whose activities and pursuits reflect old-fashioned Democratic values. I hope he will eventually run for higher level office, whether in his home state or the U.S. Congress.
http://www.senate.ga.gov/senators/Documents/PrintBios/BioCarterJason720.pdf

Senator Jason Carter was elected to the Georgia Senate on May 11, 2010.
In his professional career, Jason is an attorney at the business litigation firm of Bondurant, Mixson &
Elmore, LLP. In addition to his business practice, he has received numerous awards for his pro bono efforts and leadership within the bar. Prior to joining his current firm, Jason served as a law clerk to the Honorable Frank Mays Hull of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

Jason is active in many aspects of community service and sits on the boards of several charitable and public interest organizations , including the DeKalb Women's Resource Center to End Domestic Violence, Hands on Atlanta and the Carter Center. Jason also served as a United States Peace Corps Volunteer in Lochiel, South Africa, and is active in many aspects of the Peace Corps's continuing mission. He has authored a book about South Africa, and he has published articles on legal issues and other topics.

Jason was born at Emory Hospital in District 42, and is a ninth-generation Georgian. He received his law degree summa cum laude from the University of Georgia, and received his undergraduate degree from Duke University. Jason and his wife Kate have two young sons. They live in DeKalb County, Georgia.

August 15, 2013

YELP has joined ALEC - let them know what you think!

Just heard from MoveOn.org that YELP has joined ALEC. With just over a thousand reviews, the average rating of ALEC is the lowest possible, i.e., one star.
MoveOn.org

Here's a few of the latest reviews/posts:



And another:

I'm absolutely shocked that Yelp would partner with ALEC. ALEC is the reason so many states have passed laws like "Voter I.D." and "Stand Your Ground."

This neo-con ultra-convervative group is behind awful legislation that in no way helps independent businesses and consumers. Why would Yelp support such a group - because it benefits the millionaire owner?

Booo, Yelp. Booo, ALEC.

and

Shame on you Yelp! This is my last log in to your site since you have joined forces with ALEC.

Lame!!

August 12, 2013

Water use stats from 10 years ago; golf course numbers have grown since then.

http://www.worldwatch.org/node/797

Number of photos in the January/February issue of Coastal Living that showed coastal wildlife (seabirds, crustaceans, turtles, or other fauna): 1

Number of photos in the same issue showing golf courses: 61

Amount of water it would take, per day, to support 4.7 billion people at the UN daily minimum:
2.5 billion gallons
Amount of water used, per day, to irrigate the world’s golf courses: 2.5 billion gallons

Number of golf courses in Japan before World War II: 23
Number in operation or soon to open in 2004: 3,030

Average amount of pesticides used per acre, per year, on golf courses: 18.0 pounds
Average amount of pesticides used, per acre, per year, in agriculture: 2.7 pounds

Amount of water used by 60,000 villagers in Thailand, on average, per day: 6,500 cubic meters
Amount of water used by one golf course in Thailand, on average, per day: 6,500 cubic meters

Current area of the wetlands of the Colorado River Delta, which now receives just 0.1 percent of the river water that once flowed through it: 150,000 acres

Area that could be covered to a depth of 2 feet with water drawn from the Colorado River by the city of Las Vegas, which uses much of that allotment to water its more than 60 golf courses:150,000 acres

Sources: Photos: Coastal Living, January/February 2004; Water usage: Chris Reuther, Know Your Environment, Academy of Natural Sciences, 1999; National Golf Foundation; State of the World 2004; Japan: “Japan Golfcourses and Deforestation,” TED Case #282, 2003; Pesticides: “EcoMall: A Greener Golf Course, 2004;” Thailand: U.K. Sports Turf Research Institute; Colorado River: Environmental Defense; Las Vegas: Associated Press.
Published in World Watch Magazine, March/April 2004, Volume 17, No. 2

August 12, 2013

Golf is $49 BILLION per yr. business; 4 BILLION gals. of H2O DAILY

During the past decade, there has been an explosion in new golf courses. The
United States is now home to nearly 18,000 golf courses, more than half the
world's 35,000 golf courses, according to the Worldwatch Institute, a think
tank that monitors global environmental trends.

In the United States, golf courses cover more than 1.7 million acres and
soak up nearly 4 billion gallons of water daily, the institute estimates.
They also use pesticides and fertilizers that contribute to water pollution.

A 1994 review of death certificates for 618 golf course superintendents by
researchers at the University of Iowa's College of Medicine found an
unusually high numbers of deaths from certain cancers, including brain
cancer and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

The results were similar to other studies that have found an elevated risk
for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma among farm workers and pesticide applicators.

http://www.organicconsumers.org/corp/golf042604.cfm

The "modern" game of golf originated in Scotland in the 1400's, Early Scottish golf courses were primarily laid out on links land, soil-covered sand dunes directly inland from beaches. This gave rise to the term "golf links", particularly applied to seaside courses and those built on naturally sandy soil inland.

Those original Scottish golfers would surely scoff at the pampered US golfers with their courses manicured, watered and chemically treated to look like some unnaturally green, Thomas Kinkade fairy tale.

On edit: And the Scots would also ridicule the ubiquitous use of golf carts. Today's golfers get minimum exercise - it's gotta be the least strenuous "sport" in the world.

August 8, 2013

Given how the War on Drugs turned out; time for a War on Jobs!

August 7, 2013

American Tourist Snaps Finger Off 600-Year-Old Statue in Florence Museum

Hoping to overcome the stereotype of the obnoxious, ignorant American abroad? An unidentified U.S. tourist who snapped a finger off a 600-year-old statue in an Italian museum hasn’t helped the cause.

No, the tourist wasn’t drunk, being belligerent, in a brawl, dangling from the statue wearing nothing but his skivvies or whatever other wild imagery your brain might conjure: The reportedly 55-year-old Missouri native was simply trying to measure the statue’s pinky finger, holding his own hand up to the statue’s outstretched one. But the museum — like most museums that harbor centuries-old works of art — has a no-touching rule that the tourist allegedly flouted, leading to the tragic act of digital disfigurement.

“In a globalized world like ours, the fundamental rules for visiting a museum have been forgotten, that is, ‘Do not touch the works’,” said museum head Timothy Verdon, via the NY Daily News, which reports that the tourist has since apologized and has been described as ”very disappointed.”

The statue, dubbed “Annunciazione” and located in Florence’s Museo dell’Opera del Duomo (“Museum of the Works of the Cathedral”), is of the Virgin Mary, by 15th century Florentine sculptor Giovanni d’Ambrogio. Apparently the pinky finger wasn’t original to the statue, having been made of plaster and added at a later point: The finger didn’t snap off entirely at the time the act occurred, and restorers were able to remove it before it fell to the ground; they’ll now work to reunite the statue with its missing digit.

http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/08/07/american-tourist-snaps-finger-off-600-year-old-statue-in-florence-museum/#ixzz2bJMf8gWq

My comment? In the name of all that's holy, keep Anthony Weiner and his smart phone away from Michelangelo's David, Praxiteles' Hermes and the infant Dionysus, Donatello's Bronze David or Rodin's The Vanquished.

August 7, 2013

Letter from my 72 yr. old classmate who is part of Wisconsin's Solidarity Sing Along

(I posted this as a reply on another thread and was asked to make it an OP)

She's 72 years old - my old classmate/childhood friend/neighbor. A lifelong philanthropist who funded and worked daily at her own community emergency services office, and was often at the scene of disasters volunteering with the Red Cross. Whenever any pastor or priest in her small town came across someone in desperate need, they sent that person to her office. She wasn't one of those society do-gooders who wear designer gowns and get their pictures in the society pages writing checks at posh fundraisers. She's always been a down-to-earth, heart on her sleeve, boots on the ground toiler in the vineyard of human suffering.

I worry every day about her safety, and the safety of those demonstrating.

Here's her letter : a written comment submitted to the Wisconsin Department of Administration as part of the public input process on the promulgation of emergency administrative rules:

To the Department of Administration, State of Wisconsin.

Dear Colleagues,

I am writing in support of the efforts of the Solidarity Sing Along to maintain citizen consciousness in Wisconsin and in our nation; I don’t believe this activity should be restrained in any way. I see it as the ember of hope that we, the people, will once again have a voice in the future of the United States of America.

We are enormously out-resourced and out-powered by forces beyond our control: corporations whose only goal is taking money from the workers who actually earn it and “investing” (read, gambling) it in the casinos of commerce. The new restrictions are a manifestation of exactly where the power lies, and the desperation to which the feudal lords have succumbed. The only way we can counter this is by speaking—and singing—truth to power. Our society is becoming a place where Jesus would be very angry about the treatment of the poor.

The Solidarity Sing Along started as a way to focus the energies arising with the outpouring of response to the perceived betrayal of our ideals by Governor Scott Walker and his fellow money-suckers. It continues as a place-holder for democracy in a world we hardly recognize. The therapeutic value of singing our hearts out is what keeps us engaged and gives us hope.

Yes, we have our rowdies—but they’re OUR rowdies, and are committed to non-violence, as we all are. What they may lack by way of finesse or vocabulary, they more than make up for in spirit (and decibels). We try always to be respectful of the rights of ALL.

We’re still here. Wherever else we may be, we’re still here.

Yours for the life of our country,

August 6, 2013

Just how typical is it for a 30-something couple to spend $10 mil on a Manhattan apt?

Poster Beacool asked me upthread: "Why did you choose Chelsea and Marc as an example? . . .There are far wealthier residences in Manhattan." I beg to differ that other 30-something couples are spending over $10 million on apartments, and below are the reports showing median prices tend to be about ONE TENTH OF THAT AMOUNT, i.e, from $750,000 to $1.26 million, depending upon what part of the City you're in, and even in the luxury apartments, i.e,. the top tenth of all sales by price, the median price is "only" $4.2 million.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-02/manhattan-apartment-prices-climb-as-buyers-compete.html

The median price of all co-ops and condominiums which changed hands in the 3 months through March 31, 2012 was $820,555.
On the Upper West side, the median price of condo resales climbed 20 percent to $1.26 million, while co-op resale prices rose 4 percent to $730,000, Corcoran said.

Prices declined on the Upper East Side, with the median for previously owned condos falling 3 percent from a year earlier to $975,000, Corcoran said. Co-op prices dropped 17 percent to $726,000, as lower-priced studios and one-bedrooms made up more than half of all sales, according to Corcoran.

Listings for luxury apartments, the top 10 percent of all sales by price, didn’t decline as sharply as the broader market as owners were inspired to try their luck after record prices paid for co-ops and condos in 2012, Miller said. Luxury listings fell 15 percent to 1,025, Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman said, while the median price of completed deals fell 2.7 percent to $4.02 million.

Now granted, there are a few extreme outliers in the price range, but the owners are not 30-something years of age

Steven A. Cohen, the billionaire founder of SAC Capital Advisors LP, is seeking to sell his 10,000-square-foot (930- square-meter) duplex at One Beacon Court for $115 million, two people familiar with the matter said last week.
Steven A. Cohen (born June 11, 1956) is an American hedge fund manager. He is the founder of SAC Capital Advisors, a Stamford, Connecticut-based hedge fund focusing primarily on equity market strategies. (More of that hedge fund money!)

He has an estimated net worth of $9.3 billion as of March 2013, ranked by Forbes as the 106th richest man in the world.[1][2] Cohen is 35th overall in the U.S.[3] In November 2012, he began to be implicated in a large criminal insider trading scandal. In July 2013, SAC was charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission with failing to prevent insider trading.[4][5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_A._Cohen

Then there's a triplex penthouse at the Pierre hotel that belonged to Martin Zweig, who predicted the 1987 stock market crash, is also on the market, for $125 million, the New York Times reported March 29.

Life More: Real Estate New York City
Late Investor Martin Zweig's Penthouse Hits The Market For A Record $125 Million

Wikipedia


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/martin-zweig-penthouse-listed-for-125m-2013-3#ixzz2bEQkZaFa


In new developments, the inventory of apartments fell 42 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman said. The median sale price climbed 36 percent to $1.33 million.

August 6, 2013

I'm so glad you asked!

(1)Because some here promote the idea that she will go into politics also, so we need to take a close look at how she chooses to live her life.

(2) She has sought publicity, whether in exclusive interviews and glamour photo shoots for high end mags like Vanity Fair and Vogue or on this current highly photographed trip with her father.

But most significantly, because it's worth looking at where the money for this lavishly extravagant purchase came from. (And you're wrong if you think there are 30-something couples purchasing "far wealthier residences in Manhattan - but I'll get to that later.)

(3) The money to purchase this came from where? You say, not "public funds". I say that the vast wealth of this young couple stems from their jobs, their families or some combination thereof. And all of those link back to the connections made by their parents while holding public office, which offices were funded by we taxpayers. Marc's' jobs were at hedge fund 3G Capital & investment banking for Goldman Sachs. (Unlike many people fleeced by scams backed by Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs, he likely did not use a balloon note to pay for the $4 million apt. he bought in 2008, or the more recent $10.5 Million place.)

Post Palo Alto,Chelsea opted to join a private international consulting firm, McKinsey and Company and then a hedge fund, specifically the Avenue Capital Group, big campaign donors for both her parents. These firms hire young people with connections - and this young couple definitely had blue chip family connections.

Marc's father was heir to a small supermarket chain fortune, but none of the 3 other in-laws were millionaires when they went into politics. They accumulated their wealth when they left office. (Marc's mother was a Congresswoman who is still talking about running for office again.) Marc's father, Edward, former congressman and head of Pennsylvania's Democratic party, lost millions and ended up penniless. He was convicted of fraud and served time in federal prison for shady business deals that had prosecutors calling him a "one-man crime wave." Prosecutors claimed that in 20 years of doing business between 1980 and 2000, every single deal he consummated displayed aspects of fraud. After his indictment in 2001, he pleaded guilty to 31 charges of bank fraud, mail fraud, and wire fraud. He tried to raise a defense of diminished capacity due to his suffering from bipolar disorder, but the judge disallowed it.

On Sept. 27,2002, he admitted that he bilked investors who handed over more than $10 million, including friends, law clients and even his late mother-in-law, and was sentenced to nearly 7 years in prison. Some tried to paint this as though he was the victim of scams. It started out that way, with him losing his own money - but then he kept doubling down and losing money of any one he could talk into "investing" with him. His rip-off of almost $10 million (ironic - there's that $10 million number agani!) got him seven years in ClubFed . He and his wife, Marc Mezvinsky's mother, eventually divorced. He reportedly is estranged from his son. http://congressionalbadboys.com/Mezvinsky.htm

Ed Mezvinsky got out of the federal lock-up in 2008. He remained on federal probation through 2011, and still owes $9.4 million in restitution to his victims. So safe to say the young couple got no financial help from him.
http://www.zoominfo.com/p/Edward-Mezvinsky/242942968

But getting back to parental connections stemming from holding elected offices, leading to very high paying first jobs, I'd call that "public funds" once removed.

I think one's choice of employment, especially when one is not faced with grabbing the first minimum wage job that comes along in order to survive, says a lot about one's character. And I think her recent move to pick up a master's in public health is a stragetgic move to improve her credentials for an eventual run for public office. She's not out working at some grotty public health office, "in the field" - she's doing occasional broadcasts for NBC. She is also teaching graduate level classes at Columbia - unprecedented for someone who does not have a Ph.D. to be teaching at the graduate level! Another boost to the resume and example of how she benefits from her parents' prestige/status.

"Hedge funds as they are now constituted were illegal from 1933 to 2000, as their type of activity was outlawed as it was considered as destabilizing speculation that helped cause the Great Depression. In the year 2000, Bill Clinton turned his back on 67 years of proven financial regulation and signed a bill legitimating speculation. Hillary was running for the U.S. Senate in the State of New York, Moloch's Big Town, and needed the big bucks from the free-booting financiers.

Hedge funds have been major financial backers of Democratic candidates ever since Bill Clinton made like Abe Lincoln, the Great Emancipator, and set them free. Chelsea's mother Hillary received mucho hedge fund loot during her 2008 bid for the Democratic Presidential nomination. Hedge fund managers hedge their bets, and they also heavily backed Barack Obama, who rewarded them with a watered down "financial reform" bill that left hedge funds unmolested and hedge fund mangers' incomes taxed at the lower capital gains tax rate.

(Do we all recall former Goldman Sachs trading desk honcho Rahm Emmanul became President Obama's chief of staff, whilst his Supreme Court nominee, Elena Kagan, worked as a paid "adviser" to the financial power house? Goldman Sachs is what J.P. Morgan and the House of Morgan and Paul Mellon and the Mellon Bank were to Republican Administrations in previous years, the marionette master who pulls the strings.)



http://voices.yahoo.com/who-marc-mezvinsky-chelsea-clintons-husband-is-6490028.html?cat=49

August 6, 2013

Obama's vaunted job creation mostly low-wage, dead-end jobs. Want fries w/that?

"Men suffered the biggest job losses in the financial crisis, but they also gained the most post-recession jobs." In other words, "post-recession jobs" translate into low-wage, no benefits (health insurance, sick time, etc.) often part-time and always dead end jobs. Hard to live on your own, let alone pay off any college loans while working at a fast food job or in an Amazon warehouse.
(On edit, to clarify: The following are MY comments: )

Well, in every world, we have winners and losers. Even today, all is not lost, all you naysayers. We have the shining example of one young American who boldly quit her hedge fund job to pick up an Ivy League master's degree (no student loans for HER) AND buy a $10.5 million pad in Manhattan. Hey! 6 bathrooms for 2 30-something adults - and a 250 foot hallway. As someone commented, it's a longer walk from her living room to her kitchen, then many Manhattanites have to get to their corner store. Sometimes people ask, re the transfer of wealth upward to the 1 percent, where does the money go? Well, here's where $10.5 million of hedge fund profiteering and board of directors' pay went.

(On edit, The Newsmax link was to get you to the basic story. Newsmax gave a straightforward news report and did not say anything negative about Chelsea Clinton.
http://www.newsmax.com/US/chelsea-clinton-luxury-apartment/2013/03/14/id/494723

Headline: Chelsea Clinton Buys $10.5 Million NYC Apartment

Chelsea Clinton and her husband have shelled out a cool $10.5 million for a luxurious Manhattan apartment that is ten times the size of most New York City residences. The former First Daughter and Marc Mezvinsky sealed the deal for the stunning four-bedroom, six-bathroom condo overlooking Madison Square Park in the city’s Flatiron District.

Their new digs — in the prestigious five story Whitman building — measure 5,000 square feet, take up an entire floor and are accessible by an elevator that operates with a private key.

By comparison, most standard Manhattan one-bedrooms are about 500 square feet or less.

The deal for the 5,000-square-foot apartment, located at 21 E. 26th St, closed last month, sources told The New York Post. “It’s great for them, because it is in a hot neighborhood and it is very private,” a source told the Post.

___________________________________________________________________________________
A recent DU thread: "Under Obama, we're off to our best Private-Sector Job Growth since 1999 - Inform the republicans and some on this site." http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023406668

Well, backatcha, cheerleaders. Low-wage, no benefits, dead-end jobs do not give you bragging rights.