News, Comments, Etc.

With the S&P lowering the U.S.'s credit rating (I suspect it is trying to blackmail Congress into more "austerity" measures to bail out the parasites responsible for the economic meltdown), capitalism itself is under a severe crisis of which there may be no return.

I would say that in this country the blame rests squarely on Washington for creating this mess.
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Believe it or not, Rupert Murdoch doesn't actually call the shots at Fox "News"; instead it is Roger Ailes, who Murdoch is actually scared to death of:

Many within Murdoch's family have come to viscerally hate Ailes. Murdoch's third wife, Wendi, has worked to soften her husband's politics, and his son James has persuaded him to embrace the reality of global warming – even as Ailes has led the drumbeat of climate deniers at Fox News. PR man Matthew Freud, Murdoch's son-in-law, recently told reporters: "I am by no means alone within the family or the company in being ashamed and sickened by Roger Ailes's horrendous and sustained disregard of the journalistic standards that News Corporation, its founder and every other global media business aspires to."

"Rupert is surrounded by people who regularly, if not moment to moment, tell him how horrifying and dastardly Roger is," says Wolff, Murdoch's biographer. "Wendi cannot stand Roger. Rupert's children cannot stand Roger. So around Murdoch, Roger has no supporters, except for Roger himself."

The family could pull out the money financing the operation or sell the damned thing if it bothers them so much.

The original piece is here.
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In more and more cities, it is a crime to be poor:

In Los Angeles, housing expert Peter Dreier says that "people who've lost their jobs, or at least their second jobs, cope by doubling or tripling up in overcrowded apartments, or by paying 50 or 60 or even 70 percent of their incomes in rent." According to a community organizer in Alexandria, Virginia, the standard apartment in a complex occupied largely by day laborers has two bedrooms, each containing an entire family of up to five people, plus an additional person laying claim to the couch.

No one could call suicide a "coping strategy," but it is one way some people have responded to job loss and debt. There are no national statistics linking suicide to economic hard times, but the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline reported more than a four-fold increase in call volume between 2007 and 2009, and regions with particularly high unemployment, like Elkhart, Indiana, have seen troubling spikes in their suicide rates. Foreclosure is often the trigger for suicide -- or, worse, murder-suicides that destroy entire families.

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Our society is so full of sexism and ageism, a few women who are old enough to know better are actually undergoing the knife despite possible health risks.

Don't hand me any crap it's about "feeling better." This is about attracting men, period. By the time you are in your late 70s, the men have pretty much died off or are in bad shape anyway.