Author: Stable Genius

I am the very model of a Stable Genius Liberal.

Climate Change Deniers Write Another Fact-Free Op-Ed

Climate Change Deniers Write Another Fact-Free Op-Ed

The letter itself is based on a single claim. So let’s be clear: If that claim is wrong, so is the rest of the letter. Guess what? That claim is wrong. So blatantly wrong, in fact, it’s hard to imagine anyone could write it with a straight face. It says: “The U.K. Met Office recently released data showing that there has been no statistically significant global warming for almost 16 years.” This is simply, completely, and utterly false.

Worth a read.

Alan Grayson: Walmart is ‘the largest recipient of public aid in the country’

Alan Grayson: Walmart is ‘the largest recipient of public aid in the country’

“The taxpayer pays for the earned income credit,” he said. “The taxpayer pays for Medicaid. The taxpayer pays for unemployment insurance when they cut hours down. And the taxpayer pays for other forms of public assistance like food stamps. I think the taxpayer is getting fed up of paying these things when, in fact, Walmart could give every employee its got, even the CEO, a 30 percent raise and still be profitable.”

How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

Costco’s average pay, for example, is $17 an hour, 42 percent higher than its fiercest rival, Sam’s Club. And Costco’s health plan makes those at many other retailers look Scroogish. One analyst, Bill Dreher of Deutsche Bank, complained last year that at Costco “it’s better to be an employee or a customer than a shareholder.” Mr. Sinegal begs to differ. He rejects Wall Street’s assumption that to succeed in discount retailing, companies must pay poorly and skimp on benefits, or must ratchet up prices to meet Wall Street’s profit demands. Good wages and benefits are why Costco has extremely low rates of turnover and theft by employees, he said. And Costco’s customers, who are more affluent than other warehouse store shoppers, stay loyal because they like that low prices do not come at the workers’ expense. “This is not altruistic,” he said. “This is good business.”

RINO Hunters Fire Warning Shots At Republican Senate Candidates

RINO Hunters Fire Warning Shots At Republican Senate Candidates

Tea Party Express has a history of upsetting the Republican establishment. The group backed O’Donnell’s Delaware Senate run in 2010 and got behind Mourdock’s primary challenge against Lugar this year. Kremer said it was “way too early to make any decisions on what races we will be involved in during the 2014 cycle,”

The Tea Party has been more successful at getting moderate Dems elected in red states than the DLC.

Revenge of the Reality-Based Community

Revenge of the Reality-Based Community

At least a few conservatives now recognize that Republicans suffer for epistemic closure. They were genuinely shocked at Romney’s loss because they ignored every poll not produced by a right-wing pollster such as Rasmussen or approved by right-wing pundits such as the perpetually wrong Dick Morris. Living in the Fox News cocoon, most Republicans had no clue that they were losing or that their ideas were both stupid and politically unpopular. I am disinclined to think that Republicans are yet ready for a serious questioning of their philosophy or strategy.

Bruce Bartlett is attempting to pull the right back to reality. I wish him luck.

Only 3% of the very rich are entrepreneurs

Only 3% of the very rich are entrepreneurs

According to both Marketwatch and economist Edward Wolff, over 90 percent of the assets owned by millionaires are held in a combination of low-risk investments (bonds and cash), personal business accounts, the stock market, and real estate. Only 3.6 percent of taxpayers in the top .1% were classified as entrepreneurs based on 2004 tax returns. A 2009 Kauffman Foundation study found that the great majority of entrepreneurs come from middle-class backgrounds, with less than 1 percent of all entrepreneurs coming from very rich or very poor backgrounds

As someone who spent a few years working on a portfolio management system used to manage risk for high net worth clients, this doesn’t surprise me.

Robert Reich: Why BP Isn’t a Criminal

Robert Reich: Why BP Isn’t a Criminal

robertreich:

I’m appalled by the carelessness and indifference of the BP executives responsible for the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico that killed eleven people on April 20, 2010, and unleashed the worst oil spill in American history.
But it defies logic to make BP itself the criminal. Corporations aren’t people. They can’t know right from wrong. They’re incapable of criminal intent. They have no brains. They’re legal fictions — pieces of paper filed away in a vault in some bank.
Holding corporations criminally liable reinforces the same fallacy that gave us Citizen’s United