"The Worst of the Worst"

John McCain, the worst person in the world. 

When will we have a "Have you no decency?" moment with these lying hypocrites?

Rand Paul: libertarian hawk

""Second of all, I believe we should keep these people because they are hardcore jihadists who are responsible for 9/11," McCain continued. "Of course, nobody wants to release people who are responsible for 9/11, and these people that are released that were Taliban governing worked hand-in-glove with al Qaeda." Retired Air Force Col. Morris Davis, who was the former top prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay, told MSNBC on Saturday that the prisoners released in exchanged for Bergdahl were so inconsequential that he did not even know who they were. "My role as chief prosecutor was to review the information we had on the detainees to determine which ones we could potentially bring war crimes charges against," Davis recalled. "When I saw the names of the five individuals, when they were reported last weekend, my first reaction was, 'Who are they?'""

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/rand-paul-libertarian-hawk.html

This from Mr. Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran, the man who brought us Joe the Plumber and Snowbilly Snookie.

Oh, and the former prisoner of war released in a prisoner exchange, who demanded relief for Bergdahl, and now is railing against both prisoner exchanges and relief for Bergdahl.  

BergGhazi Sunday funnies

So true.

Sunday funnies

Sunday Funnies by digby New York Times : Surely, it must signal that it's time to cut taxes... .

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/sunday-funnies.html

I hope there is a special place in hell for Rupert Murdoch.

The Calm Before The Storm

The sprinklers in Carroll Park.

Within two hours, this space would be overrun with toddlers.  Sheer pandemonium.  The perfect place for a kids birthday party.  We could do with a bit of a sunshade here.  It was baking hot at the picnic tables by 9:30.

Student Loans: Cannibalizing The Mortgage Market

I've been talking about this for ten years now.  Kids coming out of college these days already have a mortgage on their education … and no house to show for it. Asset bubble inflation and ever-growing personal debt is not a sustainable economic policy.

"Economists Are Worried"

"But in 2012, the New York Fed reported that for the first time in at least a decade, 30-year-old student borrowers were less likely to take out home mortgages than other young people. Among people around 30 years old, homeownership was plunging fastest for student debtors. Economists are worried. Last month, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers said that student loan debt was taking the life out of the housing recovery, and the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz called the rising debt "an educational crisis" that is "affecting our potential future growth.""

http://www.eschatonblog.com/2014/06/economists-are-worried.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FbRuz+%28Eschaton%29

Forty years of policy choices to transfer every nickel of wealth in our society upwards to the 0.01% will do that.

Asymmetry Is A Thing

Just a friendly reminder to our journalists that the "both sides do it" trope is bunk. Charles Pierce states it more eloquently:

Piercing the Sovereign Nation

"Let's not kid ourselves. [Georgia shooter Dennis Marx] is a product of more than his own psychoses. He is a product of a conservative movement that has lost its moral bearings, a gun culture than imbibes paranoia the way some people drink iced tea, a media infrastructure -- from Roger Ailes's empire through the poison from which Clear Channel and other media conglomerate profit, all the way down to the guys broadcasting on short-wave from their root cellars in upper Michigan -- that enables and encourages and empowers armed political paranoia and does so for the cheapest possible reasons, for political power and for corporate profit. And, no, Both Sides do not do this. There is nothing comparable on the Left to the vast ideological bunker of the mind that has been created and sustained by the institutions of modern conservatism within which Dennis Marx found a home. In a week in which Bowe Bergdahl has been slandered for cheap points and cheaper laughs, the emergence (once again) of an actual American terrorist should be a very sobering moment."

http://gregmitchellwriter.blogspot.com/2014/06/sovereign-nation.html

Weekend Subway Service Advisories

The local:

From 11:45 p.m. Friday, June 6, to10:00 p.m. Saturday, June 7, Coney Island Stilwell Av-bound F trains skip Sutphin Blvd, Briarwood-Van Wyck Blvd, and 75 Av due to rail work south of Parsons Blvd.

From 11:45 p.m. Friday, June 6, to8:00 p.m. Saturday, June 7, Jamaica-179 St-bound F trains run express between Avenue X and Jay St-MetroTech due to rail work north of Ditmars Av and signal work at Church Av.

From 11:30 p.m. Friday, June 6, to8:00 p.m. Saturday, June 7, G trains are suspended in both directions between Church Av and Hoyt-Schermerhorns Sts due to signal work at Church Av.

And the big picture:

http://secondavenuesagas.com/2014/06/06/work-affecting-eight-subway-lines-as-weekend-m-heads-to-manhattan/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SecondAveSagas+%28Second+Ave.+Sagas+%7C+Blogging+the+NYC+Subways%29

Berg-ghazi-care*

Right-wingers whipping themselves into a frenzy over the Bergdahl swap has nothing to do with underlying facts. Depending on the person, it is either cynicism, emotional reaction due to visceral hatred of Obama, or some combination thereof.

On the worst of the worst. Well one of them anyway.

"And anyway, the idea that any single individual is so dangerous that to let them go is to jeopardize national security betrays either a very cynical PR strategy or a very stupid threat assessment. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but there will never come a day when we've imprisoned or killed all the "bad guys." New ones are born every day --- many of them because of that godforsaken black hole of a prison camp where we are holding people forever. If all these patriots were really concerned about national security they'd be for closing Guantanamo instead of holding on to a rapidly aging group of prisoners, turning them into martyrs, and pretending that it is keeping us safe. It's doing the opposite. "

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/on-worst-of-worst-well-one-of-them.html

*With apologies to Stephen Colbert.