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It might be a case of confirmation bias, but Dan Lyons (as Fake Steve Jobs) contrasts The New York Times' coverage of Facebook scam business Zynga (you might know them for "FarmVille") with TechCrunch's coverage just a few days' prior, finding it as evidence of what old media is doing wrong. TechCrunch exposed the company's skeezy business practices, while the Times made no mention of it. It's a small matter, but I think it's relevant. Traditional media outlets tend to be cautious where online outlets are bold. That conservative approach leads to calmer, more even coverage, but there are times—such as the instant one—when it's to their, and our, detriment.
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The Tea Act of 1773 actually *reduced* the price of tea, bringing its price below that of smuggled tea. Smugglers and colonists were angry about both that and the crown granting a monopoly to the East India Company, sort of the Walmart of its day. (Taxation without representation was a complaint, too, of course.) It was in no small part a protest against big business.
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Krugman argues—rightly, I think—that after years of stringing along the extremists to get them to vote their way, the Republican Party is being taken over by those very extremists. The result is not good for Republicans and it's not good for the country. (For reference, "extremist" refers to the kind of people believe that WorldNetDaily is a legitimate media outlet.) His conclusion is that the United States could go down the same awful path as California, a government with competing mandates that prevent anything from being accomplished. If you put it to a vote, the country will agree: they want lots of services and no taxes. It's bad enough that people believe that, but far worse when candidates get elected to office on such a platform and then try to accomplish it.
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The effects of the recession aren't evenly distributed. Are you a 19-year-old black male without a high school diploma? There's a 48.5% chance that you're unemployed. White instead? 25.6%. Black, female, college graduate aged 45 or older? 6.5%. Same specs but white? 3.7%. For my demographic, there's just a 3.9% unemployment rate.
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Eric Cantor says depicting health care reform with photos from Dachau is “inappropriate” and that Limbaugh’s comparing the President to Hitler is “not helpful”! I guess we’ll all have to settle for “sorry” when these nuts go high and right.
The California prescription for disaster — their residents want their taxes decided by libertarians and their government programs decided by socialists.
The tea party was not about big business it was about government-created monopoly – a rather large distinction.
A point many are making about health care today.
I’m saying it’s both. As I wrote, “smugglers and colonists were angry about…the crown granting a monopoly to the East India Company, sort of the Walmart of its day,” but that “it was in no small part a protest against big business.”
The key differences between the East India Company and the healthcare debate being, of course, that the price of a cup English Breakfast wasn’t surging year over year far above the rate of inflation and the growth of personal incomes on its way to quickly bankrupting both the government at large as well as individual families who lost their Earl Grey when they were laid off or the working poor who didn’t have access to Masala chai because they were employed by small businesses or were just below the hours threshold to qualify as fulltime employees.
Also, unlike in healthcare, the herbal varients actually are as good as the real thing.