Good news out of Wisconsin last night:
A Wisconsin judge has struck down Governor Walker’s law ending most collective bargaining for public workers. A circuit judge ruled the law violates the state and the U.S. Constitutions and is null and void. It isn’t clear if the ruling means the law is immediately suspended. We’ll bring you more information as we get it.
Of course, Governor Douchebag will be appealing the ruling, but it’s a good first start (and it seems pretty obvious to me, but then I’m no lawyer).
As we all know, Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are going to balance the budget by reducing the tax rate and eliminating some secret tax loop holes. We know this will work, they say, because there are five studies proving it. Well, five-ish.
A closer examination, however, calls into question the fact that there are even five studies at all. Last week, the Romney campaign passed along the five documents that the candidate had referenced on NBC’s Meet the Press. Three of the five are blog posts or op-eds (as opposed to academic literature), and two of those three are written by the same author: Harvard economist Martin Feldstein.
Of the remaining two studies, one is the tax reform white paper authored by Romney-backing economists and paid for by Romney for President, Inc. (in an email to PolitiFact, the Romney campaign highlighted several Wall Street Journal editorials in place of the campaign white paper as the “fifth” study).
The final study, produced by Princeton University’s Harvey Rosen, backs the Romney campaign’s assertions by arguing that people will work more, accumulate more income, pay more taxes, and seek out fewer loopholes if their tax rates are lowered. But even that report has several nuances that complicate the candidate’s use of it
I dunno about you, but I’m pretty confident.
In other news, I was surprised that Justin Bieber had a BN of 4. So I turned to the definitive authority – the Oracle of Bacon (and, yes, there is an app for that).
According to them, Justin Bieber is a 2:
Justin Bieber was in Men in Black 3 (2012) with Josh Brolin.
Josh Brolin was in Hollow Man (2000) with Kevin Bacon.
Justin Bieber was in Men in Black 3? Yes, apparently so. He and Lady Gaga played aliens (not much of a stretch, there).
Google definitely has a faulty Bacon Calculator.
According to the Oracle:
BN # of People
0 1
1 2573
2 285162
3 955841
4 239029
5 18963
6 1754
7 170
8 27
Total number of linkable actors: 1503520
Weighted total of linkable actors: 4503281
Average Kevin Bacon number: 2.995
So we need to find those 27 folks with an 8. That should kill the whole weekend (and the work week, too).
Sam Seder is guest hosting UP with Chris Hayes this weekend. Almost as good as Ezra Klein subbing for Schultz but in a different way.
:pup:
Sam Seder’s Bacon number is 2
Sam Seder and Hope Davis appeared in Next Stop Wonderland.
Hope Davis and Kevin Bacon appeared in Flatliners.
Not sure what my Bacon number is but I used to distribute the Redwood Records label started and owned by women’s music stalwart Holly Near who is Kevin’s cousin. Holly also was an actor who appeared in ‘Slaughterhouse Five’ as Billy Pilgrim’s daughter.
:omg: Wow! THAT is really interesting. Holly Near is a huge hero to my Raging Grannies buddies who are in the Syracuse Community Choir . She has been a favorite around here for a long time and most recently was here last year. Thanks again, Vern. You are SUCH a Fount of Knowledge :bow: :bow: :bow:
Always nice to hear that there are people who appreciate Holly, RG.
Sam did a good job this morning
Yeah, I just think he wasn’t slick enough as a host for them to give him a show if they are looking to get out of jail on weekends or replacing a host or two.
The Lows of Higher Ed
By GAIL COLLINS
Welcome back, college students! Always nice to see you.
Although we are sort of worried by those bleak stories about student debt, which suggest a lot of you may graduate owing a ton of money and unqualified to do anything more remunerative than selling socks.
This year, Newsweek cheerfully welcomed the Class of 2016 by asking, “Is College a Lousy Investment?†And in The Times, Andrew Martin reported that the Department of Education is paying more than $1.4 billion per annum to folks whose job it is to collect on $76 billion in defaulted student loans. “If you wait long enough, you catch people when their guard’s down,†one debt collector told Martin after garnishing the savings of a disabled carpenter.
Look on the bright side, students. Perhaps when you graduate, some of you will be able to qualify for a good job in the booming accounts receivable management industry.
Higher education is still the key to most good jobs, but the nation is starting to ask some questions about the way we finance it. Shouldn’t there be more of a match between the cost of school and the potential earning power of the graduates? Who speaks for the art history majors? And why is tuition so high, anyway? (Parents, if your kid is planning to take out student loans, you might want to avoid any college where the dorm rooms are nicer than your house.)
“People don’t believe much any more about the altruistic motives of colleges and universities,†sadly noted Pat Callan of the Higher Education Policy Institute.
Not without some reason. In his reporting, Martin uncovered a newsletter aimed at college admissions officers that advised them to avoid using “bad words†such as “cost†or “pay†in their admissions materials. Instead, it suggested: “And you get all this for …â€
In Washington, Congress is holding hearings! The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee is considering a bill — co-sponsored by Democrat Al Franken and Republican Charles Grassley — that would require all schools to fill out the same form telling the student loan applicants useful facts like exactly how much per month they’ll be forking over when they start paying.
That would be the superminimum, right? How amazed are you that this isn’t happening already?
“Some of the packages don’t delineate what’s a grant, what’s a scholarship, what’s a loan,†said Franken. “And the information all comes in an award letter, so you’re thinking: Award!â€
The Obama administration, which can’t do much about this without Congress, has been working to get the schools to voluntarily adopt a “shopping sheet†that would provide clear basic information so students could compare different schools’ financing before making a choice. “We’ve been encouraged by the feedback from the higher-ed sector,†one of the experts working on the program said. “I think we have 100 individual colleges and universities.â€
The good news is that controlling college costs really does seem to be an administration priority. The bad news is that there are more than 4,000 colleges and universities.
People, don’t you think young adults should get the clearest, most easy-to-compare information conceivable before they sign a huge, life-changing loan deal? Don’t you think there should be somebody in charge of calling them up once a week and yelling: “Eight hundred dollars a month until you’re 51 years old!â€
Maybe I’m underestimating the ability of teenagers to make serious, well-thought-out decisions about their higher education. All I can tell you is that when I was 21 years old, I signed up to go to graduate school at the University of Massachusetts because I had always wanted to live in Boston. I had no idea the main campus was on the other side of the state until I got there.
Franken is hoping the Senate might take up his proposal next year. I presume you weren’t expecting anything sooner. Congress can’t even get it together to keep the Postal Service from defaulting. And the Senate leaders admitted the other day that they’re not going to be able to pass a bipartisan bill to legalize Internet gambling on poker, which seems to be a really high priority for some important people. If they can’t do poker, they are not going to get to student loan transparency.
The House is planning hearings on student loans, too. The chairwoman of the subcommittee assigned to this task is Representative Virginia Foxx, a North Carolina Republican who once said that she worked her own way through college and had “little tolerance†for people who complain about their huge student loan debts.
“New ideas to advocate for financial aid transparency are always welcome in this discussion,†Foxx said in an e-mail on Friday. “But we have to question whether the federal government’s dictating the terms of every college and university’s financial aid communications will actually achieve the desired results.â€
So maybe a little less sense of urgency there.
Oh, THIS is interesting: Pete Sessions, Koch-sucking Texas Thuglican is here to stump for our favorite Amerika SweetHeart Ann Marie Buerkle — we do have some uncomfortably close neighbors in these rural parts who are sporting “Vote for Ann Marie Buerkle” signs :yuck: :barf: , although they are :hot: few & fairly far between at this point, so far…….. :tinfoil:
Spent some time here today Got some good HD video on my fancy schmancy Droid Razr & just have to figure out how to get it on YouTube without it taking fifty million years :doh: :ear: 🙄
Roger Craig on the Google Bacon is also a problem, I think.
Leave it to that good ‘ole competent corporation Halliburton:
Hunt launched after Halliburton loses radioactive rod in Texas desert
They are offering a reward, however.
:billcat:
Humm, baby!