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JHB
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JHB's Journal
September 27, 2016
Krugman: Trump On Trade
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/trump-on-trade/Even so, it seems to be conventional wisdom that Trump did well in the first 15 minutes. And I guess he did if you are impressed by someone talking loudly and confidently about a subject he really doesn’t understand. But really: Trump on trade was ignorance all the way.
There were specifics: China is “devaluing” (not so — it was holding down the yuan five years ago, but these days it’s intervening to keep the yuan up, not down.) There was this, on Mexico:
Gah. A VAT is basically a sales tax. It is levied on both domestic and imported goods, so that it doesn’t protect against imports — which is why it’s allowed under international trade rules, and not considered a protectionist trade policy. I get that Trump is not an economist — hoo boy, is he not an economist — but this is one of his signature issues, so you might have expected him to learn a few facts.
There were specifics: China is “devaluing” (not so — it was holding down the yuan five years ago, but these days it’s intervening to keep the yuan up, not down.) There was this, on Mexico:
Let me give you the example of Mexico. They have a VAT tax. We’re on a different system. When we sell into Mexico, there’s a tax. When they sell in — automatic, 16 percent, approximately. When they sell into us, there’s no tax. It’s a defective agreement. It’s been defective for a long time, many years, but the politicians haven’t done anything about it.
Gah. A VAT is basically a sales tax. It is levied on both domestic and imported goods, so that it doesn’t protect against imports — which is why it’s allowed under international trade rules, and not considered a protectionist trade policy. I get that Trump is not an economist — hoo boy, is he not an economist — but this is one of his signature issues, so you might have expected him to learn a few facts.
September 27, 2016
Jesus, who would have thought the top drinking game cue would be...
...Donald's sniffles?
Anything more than a micro-sip each and you'd be under the table by now.
August 1, 2016
Murdoch's NY Post has more Melania pics today
Not linking, but it's a nude photo shoot with another woman.
I don't care about the photos, but I'm dying to know WHY Rupert's NY tabloid is going this route.
July 5, 2016
It started as a tactic and turned into an industry
By the 1990s the Republicans had a formula for beating old-school postwar Democrats (call them soft on defense, soft on crime, pandering to "special interests" (unions, minorities, feminists, etc.), "anti-business" ). That formula wouldn't work against Bill Clinton, "pro-business" governor from a "right to work" state who didn't follow the "big government" narrative and was willing to go against "special interests" in his own party.
The Bush campaign fought this in two ways: 1) dig up whatever dirt hey could in Arkansas and 2) forget reality and just portray him as the conservative voter's ultimate bogeyman (draft-dodgin' dope-smokin' citizenship-renouncin' Baby Boomer Hippy Bill and his feminazi "partner", Homemaker Hater Hillary). Then, in a classic case of Republican Election Delusion, they were stunned that Bush lost.
Enter Rush Limbaugh: he devoted his radio show to rallying conservatives, saying Clinton was only "technically" president because he won by a plurality, painting him as holding the office of the president illegitimately. So, for the red-meat crowd, anything to remove the pretender from office was legitimate. For the more strategically-minded conservatives, a constant stream of investigations and scandals would be a drag on any Clinton attempt to revisit old Reagan-Bush scandals now that the investigatees no longer in in a position to stall investigators. And it would hamper attempts to reverse some key Reagan-Bush policies.
Add to the mix a media eager to show that it didn't have a "liberal bias" (one news magazine had a "Clinton suck-up watch" to chide any coverage that was seen as too favorable), and who grew up on how Watergate coverage created superstar journalists -- and were eager to get their turn.
So you had a conservative public stoked to believe absolutely anything about the Clintons (and eager to get the juicy details about their perfidy), a growing conservative media counterculture that was willing to supply them with "what's REALLY going on," a political establishment that saw advantage (and, eventually, possible revenge for Watergate) in nonstop attacks and a media that saw a potential career jackpot in becoming the new Woodward and Bernstein. And after the 1994 election ushered conservative true-believers into a House majority under the bomb-throwing banners of Newt and Rush, the brakes weren't just worn out, they were sawed off.
They've been operating under that system ever since.
June 14, 2016
Part 1
The Hidden History of the Privatization of Everything
Crossposting from Good Reads
Note From The Editor
Introducing Our Feature Series On Privatization
Josh Marshall
***
Today TPM is kicking off a richly reported four part series on privatization and the privatization movement in the United States. We’ll begin later this week with a detailed look at the history of the privatization movement, particularly its ideological origins in post-New Deal America, as intellectuals who feared the growth of government searched for ways to limit its growth. Later, their work combined with that of conservative political strategists who saw privatization as a way to eliminate key political constituencies supporting government spending. By the 1980s and 1990s, these principally ideological and political projects came together with a range of corporations, some new and some old, eager for access to the business opportunities privatization had and would continue to create.
From there we will look at public-private partnerships and particular industries like the corrections industry to see how privatization works in practice. Public debate on the issue often focuses on costs and savings. Does privatization really reduce costs to tax payers or simply enrich private businesses? Our series will look closely at that issue. But we will also focus on the way privatization often limits the scope of democratic government itself - taking key public policy decisions away from democratically elected or accountable authorities and handing them over to private corporations, whose methods and practices are either hidden from public view or are actually trade secrets they own.
Josh Marshall
***
Today TPM is kicking off a richly reported four part series on privatization and the privatization movement in the United States. We’ll begin later this week with a detailed look at the history of the privatization movement, particularly its ideological origins in post-New Deal America, as intellectuals who feared the growth of government searched for ways to limit its growth. Later, their work combined with that of conservative political strategists who saw privatization as a way to eliminate key political constituencies supporting government spending. By the 1980s and 1990s, these principally ideological and political projects came together with a range of corporations, some new and some old, eager for access to the business opportunities privatization had and would continue to create.
From there we will look at public-private partnerships and particular industries like the corrections industry to see how privatization works in practice. Public debate on the issue often focuses on costs and savings. Does privatization really reduce costs to tax payers or simply enrich private businesses? Our series will look closely at that issue. But we will also focus on the way privatization often limits the scope of democratic government itself - taking key public policy decisions away from democratically elected or accountable authorities and handing them over to private corporations, whose methods and practices are either hidden from public view or are actually trade secrets they own.
Part 1
The History of Privatization
How an Ideological and Political Attack on Government Became a Corporate Grab for Gold
Donald Cohen
***
Rising discontent with government during the 1960’s and 1970’s created fertile ground for privatization advocates like Savas and Robert Poole, founder of the Reason Foundation. Not only did they see opportunity for increased contracting out, but they seized the moment to recast existing municipal practices as living proof that their ideas were correct. Local governments had considerable experience contracting for basic services. San Francisco, for example, began contracting with private companies for trash collection in 1932.
The urban fiscal crises of the 1970s offered the perfect opportunity to create a rationale for contracting out public services. Cities across the country were facing declining revenues as middle class families and manufacturing companies fled to the suburbs and Great Society welfare programs increased costs. The lengthy 1973 recession pushed cities into crisis and toward Savas’ solutions. Privatization was no longer only a right-wing attack on popular government services, but increasingly becoming a managerial response to tight city budgets.
By the end of the 1970s, the table was set. Cities were in fiscal crisis and a new conservative think-tank infrastructure (Reason, Cato, Heritage, ALEC, and others) that embraced privatization as a core strategy to downsize government was ready for a frontal assault.
And then a new president was elected.
How an Ideological and Political Attack on Government Became a Corporate Grab for Gold
Donald Cohen
***
Rising discontent with government during the 1960’s and 1970’s created fertile ground for privatization advocates like Savas and Robert Poole, founder of the Reason Foundation. Not only did they see opportunity for increased contracting out, but they seized the moment to recast existing municipal practices as living proof that their ideas were correct. Local governments had considerable experience contracting for basic services. San Francisco, for example, began contracting with private companies for trash collection in 1932.
The urban fiscal crises of the 1970s offered the perfect opportunity to create a rationale for contracting out public services. Cities across the country were facing declining revenues as middle class families and manufacturing companies fled to the suburbs and Great Society welfare programs increased costs. The lengthy 1973 recession pushed cities into crisis and toward Savas’ solutions. Privatization was no longer only a right-wing attack on popular government services, but increasingly becoming a managerial response to tight city budgets.
By the end of the 1970s, the table was set. Cities were in fiscal crisis and a new conservative think-tank infrastructure (Reason, Cato, Heritage, ALEC, and others) that embraced privatization as a core strategy to downsize government was ready for a frontal assault.
And then a new president was elected.
March 20, 2016
The Republican Munsters
January 21, 2016
At the time I thought it was a little odd that they'd latch on to that particular phrase, but then I remembered something else:
This was:
1) almost a year after the Soviets had been absolutely sidelined in the response to Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and the ensuing Gulf War,
2) almost six months since the failed coup by Soviet hardliners to oust Gorbachev, and
3) about a month and a half after the Soviet Union was dissolved completely.
In other words, it featured prominently in a heavily-promoted speech at the precise moment in history when even the most dinosaurine Conservative couldn't maintain the fiction that Liberals and Lefties were "on orders straight from the Kremlin" without losing all credibility beyond a relative handful of true-believing goobers.
The Soviets had become useless as a means of painting Liberals and Lefties as fools, dupes and active agents of a foreign power ideologically driven to wreck the country. Useless as a brush with which to paint L&Ls as traitors and as a DISloyal opposition, for stoking anger against them.
So they shifted gears and cloudsourced it: goodbye slavishly following "orders from Moscow", in the new version there's just this weird ideological cloud of anti-Americanism that motivates Liberals and the Left. In some ways it works even better, because it's even more malleable: it can cover whatever you want it to cover as long as you keep thumping the drum.
I remember the exact point where that phrase gained cachet ouside lefty circles...
February 10, 1992, in a speech by former Attorney General Edwin Meese at Harvard Law School, that was widely reported on and promoted, particularly on the Right.
Meese Speaks at Law School Forum
Stresses Importance of Ensuring Free Speech, Freedom of the Press
By Perry Q. Despeignes, CONTRIBUTING REPORTER February 11, 1992
Speaking at a Harvard Law School Forum last night, former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III defended federal restrictions on the content of Planned Parenthood consultations while warning of the danger that "politically correct" speech codes pose to First Amendment rights.
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1992/2/11/meese-speaks-at-law-school-forum/
Stresses Importance of Ensuring Free Speech, Freedom of the Press
By Perry Q. Despeignes, CONTRIBUTING REPORTER February 11, 1992
Speaking at a Harvard Law School Forum last night, former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III defended federal restrictions on the content of Planned Parenthood consultations while warning of the danger that "politically correct" speech codes pose to First Amendment rights.
At the time I thought it was a little odd that they'd latch on to that particular phrase, but then I remembered something else:
This was:
1) almost a year after the Soviets had been absolutely sidelined in the response to Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and the ensuing Gulf War,
2) almost six months since the failed coup by Soviet hardliners to oust Gorbachev, and
3) about a month and a half after the Soviet Union was dissolved completely.
In other words, it featured prominently in a heavily-promoted speech at the precise moment in history when even the most dinosaurine Conservative couldn't maintain the fiction that Liberals and Lefties were "on orders straight from the Kremlin" without losing all credibility beyond a relative handful of true-believing goobers.
The Soviets had become useless as a means of painting Liberals and Lefties as fools, dupes and active agents of a foreign power ideologically driven to wreck the country. Useless as a brush with which to paint L&Ls as traitors and as a DISloyal opposition, for stoking anger against them.
So they shifted gears and cloudsourced it: goodbye slavishly following "orders from Moscow", in the new version there's just this weird ideological cloud of anti-Americanism that motivates Liberals and the Left. In some ways it works even better, because it's even more malleable: it can cover whatever you want it to cover as long as you keep thumping the drum.
October 31, 2015
Time to repost this...
From a previous time this topic came up.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1017&pid=168930
Search on "video news release", "VNR", and/or "prepackaged news"
It's a PR tool that's become a staple, especially in local news. There's a suggested script for the lead-in (kind of obvious what it was with this example), followed by a video segment produced by some other party. And the big question is who the other parties are. It would have been interesting to see the video segment that followed, to figure out what they were trying to sell -- probably a retail association trying to promote a "come on, everybody's doing it" attitude to encourage more spending during the holidays.
They're very attractive for local stations because it gives them material to air at little or no cost, and the lead-in by the local station anchors gives the impression that it's something the station did on it's own, not something that they got from elsewhere and just used verbatim.
It's a PR tool that's become a staple, especially in local news. There's a suggested script for the lead-in (kind of obvious what it was with this example), followed by a video segment produced by some other party. And the big question is who the other parties are. It would have been interesting to see the video segment that followed, to figure out what they were trying to sell -- probably a retail association trying to promote a "come on, everybody's doing it" attitude to encourage more spending during the holidays.
They're very attractive for local stations because it gives them material to air at little or no cost, and the lead-in by the local station anchors gives the impression that it's something the station did on it's own, not something that they got from elsewhere and just used verbatim.
A video news release (VNR) is a video segment made to look like a news report, but is instead created by a PR firm, advertising agency, marketing firm, corporation, or government agency. They are provided to television newsrooms to shape public opinion, promote commercial products and services, publicize individuals, or support other interests. News producers may air VNRs, in whole or in part, at their discretion or incorporate them into news reports if they contain information appropriate to a story or of interest to viewers.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_news_release
Critics of VNRs have called the practice deceptive or a propaganda technique, particularly when the segment is not identified to the viewers as a VNR. Firms producing VNRs disagree and equate their use to a press release in video form and point to the fact that editorial judgement in the worthiness, part or whole, of a VNR's content is still left in the hands of Journalists, Program Producers or the like. The United States Federal Communications Commission is currently investigating the practice of VNRs.
***
VNRs have been used extensively in business since at least the early 1980s. Corporations such as Microsoft and Philip Morris, and the pharmaceutical industry generally, have all made use of the technique.
According to the trade-group Public Relations Society of America, a VNR is the video equivalent of a press release.[2] and presents a client's case in an attractive, informative format. The VNR placement agency seeks to garner media attention for the client's products, services, brands or other marketing goals. The VNR affords local TV stations free broadcast quality materials for use in reports offered by such stations.In March 2000, Candace White, marketing professor at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, co-authored a report with Mark D. Harmon for the Public Relations Society of America titled "How video news releases are used in television broadcasts." On the panel with Moscowitz and Potter, White said that the same self-interest that encourages news directors to use VNRs dictates that the material is used responsibly. "I trust news producers to be able to weed out true news value; I give them credit for being able to recognize blatant sales pitches. Our study found that the corporate videos were used the least, and the ones about health and safety were used the most," she said.http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Video_news_releases
The Center for Media and Democracy's Executive Director John Stauber disagreed. "The use of VNRs amounts to systematic deception of viewers, both by the hidden interested parties behind them, and by news organizations with impure motives themselves," he said.
Reporting on a September 2005 seminar on new media, Media Daily News noted that VNRs "which can look like regular news stories to the unaided eye--can be placed in local or national newscasts." On that panel was Larry Moskowitz, the president and CEO of Medialink Worldwide. "If there is news in your brands we'll find a way to put your brands in your news. In a sense, it's product placement, but it's earned a place on the shelf," Media Daily News reported. [14]
Medialink Worldwide, one of the largest producers and distributors of VNRs, states in its 2003 annual report that a "VNR is a television news story that communicates an entity's public relations or corporate message. It is paid for by the corporation or organization seeking to announce news and is delivered without charge to the media." [15]
While the company likens VNRs as akin to the traditional hard copy news release, it acknowledges they are widely used in newsrooms. "Produced in broadcast news style, VNRs relay the news of a product launch, medical discovery, corporate merger event, timely feature or breaking news directly to television news decision-makers who may use the video and audio material in full or edited form. Most major television stations in the world now use VNRs, some on a regular basis," Medialink states.
More evidence of that–if any is necessary–comes in the form of this clip reel put together by Conan O'Brien's Conan show, which shows a large number of TV anchors reading from the same script about a story of immense public importance: a smartphone app for ice cream delivery:http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/07/19/local-tv-news-now-with-ice-cream/
As O'Brien comments, "I don't find that funny–I find it scary."
This would appear to be one more example of what Free Press and others were warning us about a few years back–fake news segments that are really just corporate PR planted in the middle of a "newscast."
The FCC should, in theory, do something about this manipulation of the news on the public airwaves. But the commission has been extremely slow to act. As James Rainey reported in the L.A. Times (3/30/11), two stations faced slap-on-the-wrist fines for airing commercials dressed up as news–four years after the offending broadcasts aired.
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