I've said it elsewhere, but it bears repeating here: can we please, please have a moratorium on all championing of Ayn Rand's Objectivist "philosophy" in mainstream political discourse in this country?

I've read enough about her over the years to determine that I've no real interest in actually reading her "masterpieces" Atlas Shrugged and The ( Read more... )

New York Magazine's "Daily Intel" blog linked yesterday to a just under eight-minute interview that the Wall Street Journal conducted with Donald Trump, whose latest bid for media attention has been to jump on board the so-called Birther bandwagon (i.e., those folks who loudly insist that President Barack Obama is not an American citizen by birth ( Read more... )

Recently a co-worker brought in the card that a Census worker had stuck in his door, with the comment, "They are relentless." He went on to explain that, not only did he not fill out the 2010 Census form when he received it in the mail, but that he had no intention of allowing a Census worker into his home to fill out the absurdly brief ( Read more... )

In commemoration of my having put in 15 years (*SOB!*) at the salt mine, my employers gave me access to an on-line "rewards catalog," and told me to pick one item as my "reward for service ( Read more... )

I'm reading the fourth book in B. Traven's Jungle series, Trozas; the title is (Mexican-?) Spanish for logs, or, specifically, shaped logs of caoba (mahogany) prepared for transport. The series is set in Mexico during the first decade of the 20th century, specifically among the mahogany plantations (or monterías), where the largely Indian workers ( Read more... )

I'm reading Richard Henry Tawney's Religion and the Rise of Capitalism: A Historical Study (Holland Memorial Lectures, 1922) (Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith; 1962; 1926; 1937; 337 pps.), partly in hopes that it will put me closer to tracking down the quotation "Piracy and trade are often indistinguishable" (I think I paraphrase, but not by much), ( Read more... )

Heard a piece on Here and Now, the hour-long, noon-time news and arts programme on WBUR (an NPR station in Boston: "Boston's neeews station," to quote assistant news director and local Morning Edition anchor Bob Oakes), on Tuesday, 19 July about the scandal at Fidelity Investments, a privately-owned, Boston-based firm (owned by the Johnson family) ( Read more... )

On Wednesday, 13 July, former WorldCom CEO Bernard Ebbers (born in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada, but living in Mississippi; one might well question the mental stability of a Canadian who willingly moves to Mississippi, of all places, but that's another post....) was sentenced to 25 years in Club Fed, er, prison. Since Ebbers is now 63 years old and ( Read more... )

No "content" from yours truly this time; just the op-ed piece that Paul Krugman wrote in the Friday, 10 June New York Times, behind the cut. Yes, sometimes I treat my LiveJournal like an electronic scrapbook. Sue me.

( Waging class warfare. )

Last night (Friday, 29 April), I saw the movie Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, the documentary directed by Alex Gibney that's based on the 2003 book The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind. It didn't elicit the same degree of horrified fascination in me ( Read more... )