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Commencement ceremonies are joyous occasions, and Steve Carell made sure that was true this past weekend (mid-June) at Northwestern's commencement:
~~~ Carell's entire commencement speech was hilarious. The audio and video here isn't great, but I laughed till I cried.
CNN did a live telecast Saturday night (June 7) of the Broadway play "Good Night, and Good Luck," written by George Clooney and Grant Heslov, about legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow's effort to hold to account Sen. Joe McCarthy, "the junior senator from Wisconsin." Clooney plays Murrow. Here's Murrow himself with his famous take on McCarthy & McCarthyism, brief remarks that especially resonate today: ~~~
~~~ This article lists ways you still can watch the play.
New York Times: “The New York Times Company has agreed to license its editorial content to Amazon for use in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms, the company said on Thursday. The multiyear agreement 'will bring Times editorial content to a variety of Amazon customer experiences,' the news organization said in a statement. Besides news articles, the agreement encompasses material from NYT Cooking, The Times’s food and recipe site, and The Athletic, which focuses on sports. This is The Times’s first licensing arrangement with a focus on generative A.I. technology. In 2023, The Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, for copyright infringement, accusing the tech companies of using millions of articles published by The Times to train automated chatbots without any kind of compensation. OpenAI and Microsoft have rejected those accusations.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: I have no idea what this means for "the Amazon customer experience." Does it mean that if I don't have a NYT subscription but do have Amazon Prime I can read NYT content? And where, exactly, would I find that content? I don't know. I don't know.
Washington Post reporters asked three AI image generators what a beautiful woman looks like. "The Post found that they steer users toward a startlingly narrow vision of attractiveness. Prompted to show a 'beautiful woman,' all three tools generated thin women, without exception.... Her body looks like Barbie — slim hips, impossible waist, round breasts.... Just 2 percent of the images showed visible signs of aging. More than a third of the images had medium skin tones. But only nine percent had dark skin tones. Asked to show 'normal women,' the tools produced images that remained overwhelmingly thin.... However bias originates, The Post’s analysis found that popular image tools struggle to render realistic images of women outside the Western ideal." ~~~
~~~ Marie: The reporters seem to think they are calling out the AI programs for being unrealistic. But there's a lot about the "beautiful women" images they miss. I find these omissions remarkably sexist. For one thing, the reporters seem to think AI is a magical "thing" that self-generates. It isn't. It's programmed. It's programmed by boys, many of them incels who have little or no experience or insights beyond comic books and Internet porn of how to gauge female "beauty." As a result, the AI-generated women look like cartoons; that is, a lot like an air-brushed photo of Kristi Noem: globs of every kind of dark eye makeup, Scandinavian nose, Botox lips, slathered-on skin concealer/toner/etc. makeup, long dark hair and the aforementioned impossible Barbie body shape, including huge, round plastic breasts.
New York Times: “George Clooney’s Broadway debut, 'Good Night, and Good Luck,' has been one of the sensations of the 2024-25 theater season, breaking box office records and drawing packed houses of audiences eager to see the popular movie star in a timely drama about the importance of an independent press. Now the play will become much more widely available: CNN is planning a live broadcast of the penultimate performance, on June 7 at 7 p.m. Eastern. The performance will be preceded and followed by coverage of, and discussion about, the show and the state of journalism.”
No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. -- Magna Carta ~~~
~~~ New York Times: “Bought for $27.50 after World War II, the faint, water stained manuscript in the library of Harvard Law School had attracted relatively little attention since it arrived there in 1946. That is about to change. Two British academics, one of whom happened on the manuscript by chance, have discovered that it is an original 1300 version — not a copy, as long thought — of Magna Carta, the medieval document that helped establish some of the world’s most cherished liberties. It is one of just seven such documents from that date still in existence.... A 710-year-old version of Magna Carta was sold in 2007 for $21.3 million.... First issued in 1215, it put into writing a set of concessions won by rebellious barons from a recalcitrant King John of England — or Bad King John, as he became known in folklore. He later revoked the charter, but his son, Henry III, issued amended versions, the last one in 1225, and Henry’s son, Edward I, in turn confirmed the 1225 version in 1297 and again in 1300.”
NPR lists all of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winners. Poynter lists the prizes awarded in journalism as well as the finalists in these categories.
I've added a comments page on Off Times Square on the judiciary -- that third branch of government we so often ignore, a branch which GOP presidential candidates are only too happy to excoriate.
CW: Why I Think Barack Obama Will Be a Two-Term President:
The one thing that we absolutely know for sure is that if we don’t work even harder than we did in 2008, then we’re going to have a government that tells the American people, ‘you are on your own.’ If you get sick, you’re on your own. If you can’t afford college, you’re on your own. If you don’t like that some corporation is polluting your air or the air that your child breathes, then you’re on your own.... I reject an argument that says we’ve got to roll back protections that ban hidden fees by credit card companies, or rules that keep our kids from being exposed to mercury, or laws that prevent the health insurance industry from exploiting people who are sick. And I reject the idea that somehow if we strip away collective bargaining rights, that we’ll be somehow better off. We should not be in a race to the bottom where we take pride in having the cheapest labor and the most polluted air and the least protected consumers. -- Barack Obama, at a San Francisco fundraiser ...
... Devin Dwyer of ABC News: "At a million-dollar San Francisco fundraiser today, President Obama warned his recession-battered supporters that if he loses the 2012 election it could herald a new, painful era of self-reliance in America.... Obama’s pitch to donors has increasingly sought to raise the stakes for the 2012 race, and the interruptions of resounding applause and handsome fundraising hauls show his message is striking a chord."
In a Q&A with Justin Elliott of Slate, historian Michael Kazin puts Occupy Wall Street in historical context & looks at what the future of OWS may be: "... protests like this have to progress from tactic to strategy if they are going to endure. They have to either start their own organization — as the sit-in movement started SNCC — or link up with other organizations." ...
... Michael Scherer of Time has this video, shot by a protester, of "a protester [Michael Thomas Olsen -- see today's Ledes], who happened to be an Iraq War veteran, was bleeding from the head, having been hit by a projectile of unknown origin. (In addition to rocks being thrown at the time, the police fired non-lethal beanbag rounds and tear gas canisters.) Other protesters ran to his aid. A police officer tossed an explosive deterrant into the crowd. It detonated near to the wounded protester’s head":
... Read Scherer's whole post: "The effect has been devastating for the local mayor, who was already facing a nascent recall effort. In the age of social media, such incidents have enormous viral potential. Nearly a day after the event, Quan, who has gone through several police chiefs in recent months, issued a statement of near complete contrition." ...
... Mayor Quan's statement is here, via the San Francisco Chronicle. Reporters Aimee Allison writes, "Yesterday, the ACLU of Northern California and the National Lawyers’ Guild demanded a full investigation [of the police crackdon on Occupied Oakland]. ...
... Nicholas Kristof: "... while alarmists seem to think that the [OWS] movement is a 'mob' trying to overthrow capitalism, one can make a case that, on the contrary, it highlights the need to restore basic capitalist principles like accountability. To put it another way, this is a chance to save capitalism from crony capitalists." ...
... Jesse McKinley & Abby Goodnough of the New York Times: "After weeks of cautiously accepting the teeming round-the-clock protests spawned by Occupy Wall Street, several cities have come to the end of their patience and others appear to be not far behind." ...
... Kate Linthicum, et al., of the Los Angeles Times: "More than a month into the Occupy movement, officials are beginning to talk openly of moving protesters out of their encampments in parks and public squares around the country. But many activists show no signs of budging as the movement continues to generate heavy media attention and support from liberal circles. Looming large is the cautionary spectacle of Oakland."
Only the Military Can Create Jobs! Dean Baker: "Faced with the prospect of cuts to the Defense Department's budget, the defense industry is pushing the story of the military spending fairy on members of Congress. They are telling them that these cuts will lead to the loss of more than 1 million jobs over the next decade. Believers in the military spending fairy say things like "the government can't create jobs," but also think that military spending creates jobs.... [Actually,] during a downturn where there are lots of unemployed workers, any government spending will create jobs, regardless of whether or not it is on the military. In fact, military spending is likely to create fewer jobs than spending in most other areas (e.g. education, health care, conservation) because it is more capital intensive. When the economy is near full employment, military spending is a drag on the economy. It pulls resources away from private sector uses...."
Rule of Thumb. Every time President O'Bipartisan agrees to a Republican-backed bill or program, you and/or a decent, deserving neighbor will be screwed. Karen Garcia has two cases on point:
... (1) "... GOP leaders have agreed to pass the most right-wing portion of the president's American Jobs Act: ending a requirement that the government withhold three percent of payments to federal contractors to ensure tax compliance. [See also yesterday's Ledes.] But but but -- only on condition that it becomes harder for poor& people to qualify for Medicaid." Garcia, with a little help from Brian Beutler of TPM, explains how many currently-Medicaid-eligible seniors will have their benefits cut. "... in these times of social unrest and ever widening income disparity, the Democrats still buy into the conservative ideology that programs to further enrich the wealthy must always be paid for by our country's most vulnerable citizens."
... (2) Behind closed doors and in the presence of a phalanx of big corporate CEOs who will benefit from the laws, President O'Bipartisan signed three free trade agreements negotiated by George W. Bush & backed primarily by Republicans in Congress. "... the 250,000 jobs it is forecast to create by Business Roundtable and Chamber of Commerce boosters will not be American jobs. That's why it was delayed. The Democrats insisted on adding a little token assistance to middle-aged American textile workers who are expected to lose their jobs to 40-cent/hour North Korean wage slaves allowed to work in the DMZ." ...
Just for you literary critics, Charles Pierce of Esquire does a masterful job of analyzing a short paragraph of a Paul Ryan speech, a speech Ryan delivered at the Heritage Foundation, so you know it is loaded with Ayn Randian dog whistles & red meat for the selfish. I came away thinking Ryan should be institutionalized, whether he's massively deceptive or pathetically deluded, he is one sick puppy. ...
Just last week, the President told a crowd in North Carolina that Republicans are in favor of, quote, 'dirtier air, dirtier water, and less people with health insurance.' Can you think of a pettier way to describe sincere disagreements between the two parties on regulation and health care? -- Paul Ryan ...
... Paul Krugman: "Just for the record: why is this petty? Why is it anything but a literal description of GOP proposals to weaken environmental regulation and repeal the Affordable Care Act? So Ryan is outraged, outraged, that Obama is offering a wholly accurate description of his [Ryan's] party’s platform.... You really have to be somewhat awed when people who routinely accuse Obama of being a socialist get all weepy over him saying that eliminating protections against pollution would lead to more pollution." ...
... ** Update: Jonathan Chait of New York Magazine has the most complete takedown of Paul Ryan & his crazy worldview. "Ryan cannot process the realities of this world because they are so at odds with the imagined world of his ideology. After his speech, he was asked about the CBO’s report on inequality, and he brushed it off, falling back on Rand-esque lingo the virtuous rich ... and parasitic poor...."
CW: here's a thought: middle-class conservatives are stupid. Some pretty good evidence: Kevin Drum of Mother Jones: "Middle-class conservatives have become completely convinced that 'good' tax policies include a flat tax, lower capital gains rates, and repeal of the estate tax, all of which are designed to benefit the rich almost exclusively."
I, like you, get a little incensed when you think about how much good all of you do, whether it’s volunteer hours, charitable giving we do, serving clients and customers well.... To the bank’s critics, I say, 'You ought to think a little about that before you start yelling at us.' -- Brian Moynihan, CEO of Bank of America, to BoA employees ...
Nobody cares how upset you are at being yelled at, ace. In 2009, the taxpayers of the United States gave you 20 billion reasons to shut your piehole. -- Charles Pierce, Esq.
New York Times Editors: "The revised No Child Left Behind Act that passed out of the Senate education committee last week goes too far in relaxing state accountability and federal oversight of student achievement. The business community, civil rights groups and advocates of disabled children are rightly worried that the rewrite of the law would particularly hurt underprivileged children."
** E. J. Graff in the American Prospect: "According to the Guttmacher Institute, widely considered the most reliable source of accurate facts on the reproductive debates, nine out of ten abortions take place in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. That’s not a fetus; it’s an embryo — a little cluster of cells smaller than a thumb.... To me, what matters is that new life happens. It doesn’t particularly matter which new life happens, whether human or mushroom.... I find it absolutely impossible to believe that spiritual magic strikes when a sperm fertilizes an egg, divides into a blastocyst, or curls into an embryo. If it’s okay to abstain from sex, or to use contraception, then it’s okay to clean out a uterus of those gathering storm cells as well.... Legislating others’ behavior based on a spiritual belief (and while Larimore says she’s not religious, her justification is still a belief) strikes me as theocratic, even totalitarian."
Dave Weigel of Slate: What Elizabeth Warren & Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrickactually said. Surprise: it isn't what the hit jobs on Warren claim. ...
Susan Saulny of the New York Times: "If Herman Cain feels his management skills are up to any challenge, some of his former staff members think he should have started with the disorder in his own campaign." ...
... Mark Benjamin of Time: Herman Cain's smokin' campaign guru Mark Block has had an unusual political career, marred by a charge of corruption, which he settled.
Paul Wallsten of the Washington Post: "Republicans who are eager to repair the party’s battered image among Hispanic voters and unseat President Obama next year have long promoted a single-barrel solution to their two-pronged problem: putting Sen. Marco Rubio on the national ticket.... But Rubio’s role in recent controversies, including a dispute with the country’s biggest Spanish-language television network and new revelations that he had mischaracterized his family’s immigrant story, shows that any GOP bet on his national appeal could be risky."
ANDthis column might not actually be by Paul Krugman. For one thing, the headshot seems somehow ... different.
Local News
CW: I'm a week late on this, but it's worth noting. AP: "The League of Women Voters sued [last] Thursday to block Wisconsin's new voter photo identification law, arguing that the state constitution clearly only bars children, felons and the mentally incompetent from voting, not people who lack photo IDs. In its lawsuit filed in Dane County [Madison] Circuit Court, the League's state chapter contends that Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican-led Legislature had no authority to bar a class of people -- those who don't have an appropriate photo ID -- from voting."
(Fort Myers, Florida) News-Press: "U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV, the Republican congressman from Fort Myers, is entering the race for the U.S. Senate." CW: CoMa is my Congressman, so it's nice of him to finally do something for those of us in Southwest Florida -- give us a reason to work to re-elect Sen. Bill Nelson, a ConservaDem.
News Ledes
Washington Post: "The Air Force has been secretly flying armed Reaper drones on counterterrorism missions from a remote civilian airport in southern Ethiopia as part of a rapidly expanding U.S.-led proxy war against an al-Qaeda affiliate in East Africa, U.S. military officials said."
Washington Post: "Amid a flurry of counter-proposals from the deficit-reduction committee, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Thursday rejected a Democratic offer to slash $3 trillion from future debts because it contained significant tax increases."
San Francisco Chronicle: California "Gov. Jerry Brown this morning unveiled a 12-point proposal aimed at shrinking the costs of public employee pension benefits in California in part by raising the retirement age for most new employees from 55 to 67."
Guardian: "Scott Olsen, the Iraq war veteran who suffered serious head injuries after being hit by a projectile fired by police during the Occupy Oakland protests, has woken up and is lucid as he awaits surgery, hospital officials and family members have said.... He has been upgraded from critical to fair condition."
The Hill: "A Pentagon official who was being investigated for what whistleblowers called incompetence, extravagant spending, cronyism and 'tyrannical' management has resigned. The Defense Department announced Thursday that Clifford Stanley, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, has submitted his resignation to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta."
Philadelphia Daily News: "Two women accused of participating in the ghoulish, deadly activities inside a filthy West Philadelphia abortion clinic, calmly told a judge on Thursday that they were guilty. The guilty pleas by Adrienne Moton 34, and Sherry West, 52, leave seven defendants to be tried in the ... crimes that took place inside Dr. Kermit Gosnell's Women's Medical Society.... Gosnell, 70, could face the death penalty.... He is accused cutting the spinal cords of seven babies born alive at his clinic. He is also charged with the third-degree murder of Karnamaya Mongar, 41, a clinic patient who died in November 2009 from an overdose of drugs prescribed by Gosnell."
New York Times: "European leaders, in a significant step toward resolving the euro zone financial crisis, early Thursday morning obtained an agreement from banks to take a 50 percent loss on the face value of their Greek debt."
San Francisco Chronicle: "Seeking to cool the violent tone set by Tuesday night's street clashes with Occupy Oakland protesters, police pulled down barricades Wednesday near City Hall, dramatically reduced their presence and said they would allow nightly demonstrations in the area until 10 p.m. Hundreds of protesters responded Wednesday night by packing the amphitheater at Frank Ogawa Plaza, where they voted to hold a citywide general strike on Nov. 2, when workers and students will be urged to stay home to show support of the Occupy movement." AP story here. ...
... Oakland Tribune: "In what appears to be the first serious injury nationwide in the Occupy Wall Street movement, a 24-year-old Iraq War veteran lay in an Oakland hospital Wednesday night with a critical skull fracture, adding a new level of intensity in a mass demonstration that has swept the country and led to clashes with police. Scott Thomas Olsen, 24, of Daly City, was struck in the head above his right eye with a tear-gas canister during a massive confrontation Tuesday night in which protesters threw rocks and bottles at police officers who deployed tear gas and fired bean bags to disperse the crowd of about 1,000." ...
AP: "Young South Africans brought their frustration over poverty and joblessness to the streets Thursday, responding to a call by the tough-talking youth leader of the governing African National Congress who has clashed with older party leaders over economic policy."
AP: "A Palestinian official says the Palestinian presidentwill meet with the leader of the militant Hamas movement next month to discuss uniting dueling governments in the West Bank and Gaza. The meeting will be the first between President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas' Khaled Mashaal since they signed a surprise reconciliation agreement in May."
AP: "The wife of disgraced Wall Street financier Bernard Madoff says the couple tried to kill themselves after he admitted to his loved ones that he'd stolen billions of dollars in the largest Ponzi scheme in history."
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