Also, many union leaders are grousing that the president they worked so hard to elect has not focused enough on job
creation and other bold plans to get their members back to work.

Jeeze.

See, the main problem with Obama is not “focus.” It’s not like he’s just been just so busy redecorating the kitchen that, whoops, he forgot to pay the electric bill this month.

It’s one of priority. If the union vote is snugly assured in his pocket, and corporate and finance arms are bit more mercurial these days, but also infinitely more profitable, Obama’s dark intentions should shock no one. Whinnying that he’s just not focused enough on jobs implies somewhere in Obama’s insidiously reptilian heart, the man cares about unions, or the middle class, or you, or me. The implication is one thing, and the reality, wholly another.

Silly fucking progressives still think Obama cares about them. Hahahaha! Reference, only to be recent, the thousands of arrests at the White House sit in over the Tarsands-fueled Keystone XL Pipeline or his failure to uphold basic smog standards. This is just this week! I could go on. I don’t want to. It makes me too tired. But I could go on.

We are people, and our lives have value.

We need to come to grips with the fact Obama doesn’t care about you or me, or “progressive values.” Or Americans. Or humans.

Labor remains a core Democratic constituency and union leaders will stand with Obama in Detroit this Labor Day, where he will address thousands of rank-and-file members during the city’s annual parade Monday.

Withold your vote. Problem solved. Deal with the resultat pain of an inevitable Republican victory. Because that’s the only thing that will unite us in our struggle against the rich.

Remember the Anti-War movement under Bush?

Remember the Anti-War movement at all?

Exactly.

We have previously discussed, in these lonely pages, how economics is the eugenics of our time, a neatly fraudulent epistemology that serves principally to permit all the inhuman varieties of psychopathy to flourish in the all-permissive cannibalistic abattoir of pseudoscience.

Some people are understandably alienated by IOZ’s prickly snark. But I don’t think he’s ever been accused of not being an amazing wordsmith. Not to mention, the bearer of  some of the best anarcho-excoriations of lefty apologia this side of the interwebz. If the dude wrote a book, I would gladly cough up some legal tender (petro-gold, twigs, corriander. whatever) for it. But then again, his dense, scrolly relevancy might be best suited for the blog format. Still though, sometimes when you observe talent you just want to see people get paid for it.

When the booster-triumphalism of your bloodthirsty liberal friends gnaws at your conscience, there’s always the soul-scrubbing moral clarity of Noam Chomsky to vindicate you.

In societies that profess some respect for law, suspects are apprehended and brought to fair trial. I stress “suspects.” In April 2002, the head of the FBI, Robert Mueller, informed the press that after the most intensive investigation in history, the FBI could say no more than that it “believed” that the plot was hatched in Afghanistan, though implemented in the UAE and Germany.

I made this point earlier this week, and this is the first time I’ve seen it elsewhere since Jafar’s stamping out. And it’s important because we have a suspect tenuously linked to a crime, this account fully digested by populace at large, and a suspect summarily and extrajudicially executed with out so much of an iota of evidence.

Then of course, there’s Chomsky’s particular talent for applying universal morality to the blinders of American exceptionalism:

We might ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush’s compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic. Uncontroversially, his crimes vastly exceed bin Laden’s, and he is not a “suspect” but uncontroversially the “decider” who gave the orders to commit the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” (quoting the Nuremberg Tribunal) for which Nazi criminals were hanged: the hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of refugees, destruction of much of the country, the bitter sectarian conflict that has now spread to the rest of the region.

Unflinchingly moral, Chomsky will always ask the difficult questions that the rest of find too distasteful and lacking in due reverence. When wading through the brute celebrations of cruise-missile liberals and chest-thumping conservatives alike, the immutable, razor-like conscience of Noam Chomsky makes the political landscape a little less lonely.

With the passing of both Chomsky’s wife and Howard Zinn, I think it’s also clear that he doesn’t have a lot of time left with us. I hope for our sake it’s later rather than sooner.

And we’ve also got to end tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans… We can’t just tell the wealthiest among us, you don’t have to do a thing… This is not a trade-off that I’m willing to make.

You tell ‘em, Barry! You rail against that law you, er, signed off on extending.

Oh, hey! Looks like Tim Geithner is churning along assiduously to bring your bold new vision into fruition

At a time when the two parties can find little common ground legislatively, strategists on both sides tell POLITICO they hope to advance their jobs agenda by finding a way to lower corporate tax rates… Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner plans to ignite the debate by unveiling a white paper that advocates lowering the top corporate tax rate from the current 35 percent to less than 30 percent and as low as 26 percent, according to aides.

But…

The godhead said all the vaguely reassuring stuff about “finding a way” to do a lot of stuff that appeals to my marketing demographic.

Oh well! I’ll vote for him anyway!

Well now that the splintery woodplank of “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan has flattened Jafar into oblivion, I suppose it’s now time for him to spout cute and comfy pablum like:

We will be true to the values that make us who we are. And on nights like this one, we can say to those families who have lost loved ones to al Qaeda’s terror: Justice has been done.

And some of “Hacksaw’s” biggest fans can conclude:

His call to Americans to remember what unifies us, to remember that “justice has been done,” is a defining opening to seize. It is time to end the “global war on terror” we have lived with for this last decade.

Man, ever since the world don’t have a Jafar no more, everything has changed!  Peep this photographic evidence of a bro rockin’ it in the new Jafar-free golden age:

Sick! That dude is so stoked to be part of the 38th best country in the world!  And check out this awesome AP wire:

For now, the U.S. is insisting that bin Laden’s death will not trigger a rapid withdrawal.

“This victory will not mark the end of our effort against terrorism,” said U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry in a statement released in Kabul. “America’s strong support for the people of Afghanistan will continue as before.”

Similarly, NATO said the alliance and its partners would “continue their mission to ensure that Afghanistan never again becomes a safe haven for extremism, but develops in peace and security.”

Oh.

Listen, it’s obvious we crave an easy enemy to make sense of the bloodshed and carnage of the American empire and its subsequent blowback. But our reliance on cheap and simplistic binaries ensures that we will never grasp the true implications of this, I would say, almost significant assassination.

At best, Osama Bin-Laden was the spiritual mentor of dangerous, but fragmented paramilitary group called Al-Qaida that doesn’t have much to do with Afghanistan anymore. And unlike the currently Guantanamo-held Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Osama Bin Laden didn’t have all that much to do with 9/11. Which of course is a repugnant view shared by those conspiracy theorists at the FBI:

Rex Tomb, Chief of Investigative Publicity for the FBI responded, “The reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Osama bin Laden’s Most Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting bin Laden to 9/11.” Tomb continued, “Bin Laden has not been formally charged in connection to 9/11.”

On FBI.gov

Usama Bin Laden is wanted in connection with the August 7, 1998, bombings of the United States Embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya. These attacks killed over 200 people. In addition, Bin Laden is a suspect in other terrorist attacks throughout the world.

It’s not that Al-Qaida is not responsible for 09/11. They are. It’s been verified. But Jafar’s murder is a mere symbolic event to rally the peasants into a brutish frenzy. More opportunities to chant USA USA USA, and descend into the murky swamp of nationalism, violence, tribalism, patriotism, and stupidity. The permanent war machine needs the occasional lubrication to ensure acquiescence of the governed. I would say our streetlight scaling bro is in pretty ripe condition, so…Rage on, War Machine.

If anything is significant about bin Laden’s targeted assassination, it’s its extrajudicial nature and who carried it out… the Joint Special Operation Command, the ultra elite brigade of Navy Seals, described in Jeremy Scahill’s essential (no surprise) Nation piece, as “a surgical type of unit…if you need someone that can sky dive from thirty miles away, and go down the chimney of the castle, and blow it up from the inside—those are the guys you want to call on.” And as demonstrated in Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, and more these extrajudicial targeted assassinations are becoming increasingly commonplace in the axis of the Bush-Obama, post-9/11 military landscape.

More from Scahill

Several Special Ops sources say that President Obama has taken concrete steps to once again integrate JSOC more fully into the broader US military strategy globally… The primacy of JSOC within the Obama administration’s foreign policy…indicates that he has doubled down on the Bush-era policy of targeted assassination as a staple of US foreign policy.

What’s significant here is the insignificance of due process, truth, and ironically justice. If you read one piece about the assassination of Jafar, avoid the all self-stroking puffery and read Jeremy Scahill’s article.

Whoever tries to hurt and murder children, his blood will be on his own head.”

Waiting for a rimshot.

….

Or at least some sort of acknowledgment of irony?

A wink? A nod?

Nothing?

So that’s it then, Netyanhu taking a firm stance against killing innocent children.

Meanwhile, Ronald McDonald in excoriating comments the other day, condemned fatty, greasy foods and pandering to children.

The sun is also sick of everyone else being so hot and bright all the time.

And dogs across the globe united in a firm stance against 4 legged house pets.

Medicare enrollees would get a set amount from the government to purchase private plans. Those plans would cost considerably more than traditional Medicare, the CBO said, partly because private plans pay hospitals, doctors and other providers more and have higher administrative costs. At the same time, enrollees would pay a higher percentage of the overall cost of their coverage.

“What CBO is saying is beneficiaries would pay much less under traditional Medicare for two reasons: The overall cost of the plan would be much cheaper, and they would pay a lesser share of that less-costly plan,” said Edwin Park of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal research center.

 

This is certainly true, and as convincing as anything that Paul Ryan will gladly eat your grandparents if it means a free meal. But that curious imbalance of higher premiums funneled into a diminished output is a symptom of all private healthcare coverage. You pay more for the profligate administrative waste of a private insurer and get less coverage because of their profit motive. The Congressional Budget Office’s comments underscore, perhaps unintentionally, how much more efficient a single payer, medicare-style healthcare plan is over our current outmoded, private model.

That being said Paul Ryan is SUCH A FUCKING ASSHOLE. SHEESH! Really, there’s no argument for privatizing social safety net programs like medicare and medicaid, other than “WANT EAT OLD PEOPLES MONEY”

Mitchell told Netanyahu that Washington has not taken a position on the proposal yet, noting that his job was simply to present Abbas’ offer to Israeli. The U.S. envoy told Netanyahu that Abbas indicated to him that if Israel were to accept the offer, he would be ready to enter direct talks immediately.

CONTEXT: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, known primarily for his humanitarian work and infrastructure development in Gaza, rejected a proposal by Palestian Authority President Mohmoud Abbas to agree to the creation of an autonomous Palestinian State. The proposal would effectively restore the 1967 borders that existed prior to the occupation of Gaza and West Bank.

Essentially, this is what’s known as “The Two State Solution,” which purportedly has been the desired outcome bandied about by preening and ineffectual US presidents when they preside over these Middle East peace talks. Of course the only problem is when peace is genuinely pursued, not merely enshrined as a quite lovely but ultimately unattainable ideal..well, y’know, there’s that whole US/Israeli military industrial complex, neocolonial axis thing. The one that profits from militarized checkpoints, and punishing rains of bombs in densely populated areas, and flares of skin-scorching white phosphourous, and prostestors who are bulldozed , and protestors who lose eyes from tear gas bombs, and destroyed houses, and apartheid.

According to Palestinian sources, the United States rejected two earlier proposals put forth by Abbas to jump-start direct talks. One called for U.S., Israeli and Palestinian officials to meet in order to reach agreement on a framework for direct talks. The other called for U.S. President Barack Obama to issue a statement spelling out the terms of the framework.

Whoops! Maybe next time! (But not really)

UPDATE: It’s concurrently heartbreaking and amusing (but altogether unsurprising) that corporate reportage (on CNN.com and TIME.com) of this event emphasizes Abbas’s heinous “preconditions” rather than the much more relevant fact that Netenyahu is refusing an offer widely considered, according to established conventional wisdom, to be the most sensible resolution to Isareli/Palestinian conflict. Especially since implicit in Abbas’s offer is an acknowledgment of Israel’s right to exist (hence the whole “two state” part of the “two state solution”). But we would all need to use our brain muscles to figure that one out. And that’s like, really really hard and stuff. Meanwhile, reporting within Israel (Ha’aretz in particular) is way more honest and direct and less beholden to certain interested parties. It’s a fun activity to compare the two.

UPDATE II: All these updates make me feel like Glenn Greenwald.

On Sunday, two former Treasury secretaries warned against introducing more federal stimulus. Former Clinton Treasury head Robert Rubin, appearing on CNN, said such a move would be “counter productive,” and that policy-makers instead should craft a deficit-reduction plan that would go into effect by the end of President Barack Obama’s term.

You can most-assuredly count on a brain cell massacre when an article about how anemic the post-crash economy is fails to identify Robert Rubin by his proper title: Monstrous Oligarch Technocrat Responsible For An Economic Cataclysm That Has Destroyed Millions of Lives (It is also to acceptable shorten this to “Devourer of Children’s Souls”). Instead the Journal, unflagging arbiter of truth and justice, just casually weaves him in as another policy-chirping bureacrat by referring to him simply as “Former Clinton Treasury.” Bob Rubin? Why, he’s just another respectable and intelligent statesmen furrowing his brow and expressing his deep concern about how “counter-productive” additional economic stimulus would be.* And I know he only has our best interest at heart, CUZ DA WOOL STREED JURNAL TOAL MEE SO!

You’d be right if you were to accuse me of shooting fish in a barrell when I say, “Hey, guys, I think that perhaps Wall Street Journal might be somewhat biased towards the financial elite.” But I’m currently stranded in glamorous Mahwah, New Jersey for some job training. And our hotel, which is in the fucking NYC metro area, lacks a complimentary New York Times (truly the souffle of the power-serving, establisment press). So I’m stuck with this silly fucking daily rag, along with a pair of glazed-over eyeballs.

*This, by the way, is an unbeliavable, jaw-droppingly ballsy claim. Pretty much the equivalent of pointing to a picture of a rectangle and confidently declaring “Triangle!”