another great roundup, fatster! was wondering if i should wait 10 days to comment as others seem to be doing; then i tho’t, “what the heck, it’s back to the future somewhere . . .” lol.

thanks for your excellent work; much appreciated.

Good evening, fatster (and allan, who must be lurking even if he hasn’t checked in yet as I start this), and may the struggles of our sisters bear fruit.

I’ve been watching the swearing in of Nicolas Maduro as Venezuela’s acting president live on al-Jazeera. I’m struck by the fact that although even the conservative presidents of Colombia and Chile came to Hugo Chavez’s funeral earlier today, the closest thing to a U. S. official in attendance was Rep. Gregory Meeks (D, NY).

And of course the attacks on Chavez’s tenure continue. I am particularly upset by Anne Applebaum, whom I normally respect for her astuteness (she is married to a Polish diplomat and so has a grasp of Realpolitik) even though she is right of center. Her Wapo column today viciously compares Chavez’s death to Stalin’s and gives a litany of (easily refutable) right-wing talking points against his regime. So it goes.

The UVA situation appears to have died down, as noted in my last comment on it.

Oh, you’re such a brave soul, karenjj2! An innovator! Pioneer!

(And we wouldn’t expect any less of you, either.)

Many thnx–so much.

” . . . the Board’s approval of Sullivan’s wish for a goal of increasing faculty salaries, which Dragas had deleted from the 65.” Sure fire to win friends and influence people–make sure they don’t get a raise.

Good grief, E. F. Beall–what a mess that is!

Not surprised to hear of the absence of US officials at the funeral. After all:

“Just hours before the announcement of Chavez’s death, relations between the two countries appeared to be souring, as Venezuelan officials said they were expelling two U.S. Embassy officials and accused them of plotting to destabilize the country.

“The U.S. officials, both air attaches at the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, are accused of having meetings with members of the Venezuelan military and encouraging them to pursue “destabilizing projects,” Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said.”

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/05/world/americas/venezuela-chavez-main/index.html

The common woman is as common as a common loaf of bread.

. . . And will rise!

God Bless’em all…! I’d posted this elsewhere, but, it needs some more luv… Abby with Medea…

Mahalo and Aloha, fatster…!

Meanwhile, the Venezuelan opposition is stepping up the hostility to Maduro, with some members boycotting his swearing-in and others only attending under protest, even though he backed off his original plan to hold the ceremony in the same venue as the Chavez funeral.

And aloha to you too, CTut.

Aloha, CTuttle!

Thanks for the link to Medea. Let’s hope Wyden keeps pushing for declassification–so the American people can know what’s going on. (And you know I’m going to add–what a concept.)

I do hope you get a good view of Pan-Starrs over the next few nights. Pls let us know.

The Venezuelan oppo may not be prepped but the U.S. plan to destroy Venezuela is ready.

Ah, yes, Capriles. He’s a real piece of work all right.

Thnx so much, E. F. Beall.

Yes, eCo, I saw that link when someone (maybe you) commented on one of the FDL Chavez threads. It’s a good exposé of the forces behind Capriles; and of course the AEI demand for “constitutionality” coincides with his faux claim that the accession of Maduro is not “constitutional.” Still, when the election takes place, probably in April, it will go a long way toward neutralizing him.

Lighter fare:

A decades-old recording by an actor telling commuters to “Mind the gap, please” is being restored to a London Underground station after his widow told staff she missed hearing her husband’s voice.

Good evening, all.

Awww, how nice, allan, and many thnx for that.

Two of us have linked it but it passed unnoticed, at least as long as I kept track.

It is an interesting phenomenon that even when U.S. plans are articulated in advance, few take them seriously.

Plans do not always work out, or work as intended. But when neocons say what they intend to do, it seems foolish not to regard them seriously.

Happy Friday, Fatster. You’re doing a great job with “The Roundup.” Thanks.

Thank you, tammanytiger. Have a great weekend, too!

” Women are the greatest invention in the history of the world since the bottling of beer. ” Klaus von Trippininit.

*heh* Reinheitsgebot has ensured a mighty pure beer, for many a year, M’dear…! ;-)

Hahahahahaha, Good one, wynota skunk. Many thnx.

Regarding the F-35′s shortcomings. . .

I think it’s as much about the advance of antiaircraft capabilities, and the costs and unknowns of keeping defensive countermeasures ahead.

There’s a lot out there to shoot down a fighter, from all directions, not just from the rear, and which even excellent visibility wouldn’t overcome anymore. I recall Vietnam was said to be the last war including any aerial dogfights with guns. They became mostly aerial dogfights with heat seeking and radar guided missles. And surface to air missles had come online, with the later ones nearly impossible to see or avoid in time even on a clear day.

I suppose today it would be cyberwarfare with airborne opponents screwing around with each other’s avionics — don’t the hackers always seem to have new ideas of how to raise havoc? Didn’t Iran steal one of our drones that way? How would excellent rearward visibility have overcome any of that?

With the F-35 maybe it’s time to cut our financial losses and cancel it altogether.

Been listening to some coverage of Intl Women’s Day.

I don’t understand why it was not a day of mourning.

Women’s control over reproductive rights is being slashed.

Pay gap remains an enormous 25%

Most women in high places are harridans.

Forgot one.

Wars started to ‘protect’ women.

re 22 months fifteen million dollars..

innocence project…

“About one-third of the people exonerated after proving their innocence have not been compensated for the injustice they suffered and the time they spent incarcerated.

Case in Point: Compensation in Florida

In 2004, Floridian Wilton Dedge was exonerated after having been forced to spend 22 years in prison for a rape and burglary that he did not commit. Upon his release from wrongful imprisonment, however, Mr. Dedge was entitled to absolutely nothing from the state. Mr. Dedge’s lawsuit against the state was dismissed by the trial court. His only alternative to the courts was to seek a private compensation bill from the legislature. ”

( changed law there according to the innocence project)

http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/Compensating_The_Wrongly_Convicted.php

With the F-35 maybe it’s time to cut our financial losses and cancel it altogether.

More likely, the next MIC project will be more expensive & more useless than F35.

“PNAC’s dyed-in-the-wool neoconservatives—the ideologues most responsible for the formulation of the Bush doctrine—have mostly stayed true to the priorities laid forth in the PNAC letter, and they’ve found new energy in calling for regime change in Syria. Most of the signatories to that September 2011 letter—including the likes of William Kristol, Jeffrey Bergner, Seth Cropsey, Midge Decter, Thomas Donnelly, Nicholas Eberstadt, Aaron Friedberg, Jeffrey Gedmin, Rueul Marc Gerecht, Robert Kagan, Charles Krauthammer, John Lehman, Clifford May,Richard Perle, Norman Podhoretz, and Gary Schmitt—have largely kept their initial worldview intact, even if their earlier predictions for a Middle East “democratized” by American arms has proved dramatically off mark.

Many of these same individuals and their fellow travelers are at the forefront of the current push to escalate Syria’s ongoing civil war, arguing that active U.S. support for Syrian rebels—or outright military intervention—would hasten the fall of Bashar Al-Assad and maximize U.S. interests. ”

http://www.fpif.org/blog/the_attack-syria_coalitions_neocon_roots

Thanks for that insight and link, mafr. I don’t read the people you mention as a rule, and so have been getting my understanding of the push for intervention in the Syrian civil war from liberals like WaPo’s honorary hasbarist Richard Cohen. But of course they are incapable of original ideas, so one should dig deeper as you do.

Yep.

Those people don’t disappear, they continue to influence events regardless of whether they are formally in power or not.

A different, but illustrative, example. is that Rummy & Cheney stayed part of the Continuity of Government exercises even when they worked for “private” corps. WTF was that about???? (Rhetorical Q)

My lament is that once W left office, people stopped watching what the neocons were doing, saying, planning.

Saw a suggestion recently that Kissinger & Zbiggie are same policy in diff bodies, wink-wink, nudge-nudge. I think it’s more complicated than that, but there is an element of truth to it.

It’s amazing how long these people, by proving their worth to some group or other, get to stay around, and grow wealthy …

no doubt sharp elbows are a big help

Jesus wouldn’t be welcome.

“Former secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld has been a central figure in Republican Party politics since the 1970s. Best known for his controversial role in pushing the Iraq War, Rumsfeld served as secretary of defense under two presidents—Gerald Ford and George W. Bush. Rumsfeld has held a number of additional posts in major corporations and government advisory bodies.
Although Rumsfeld has maintained a relatively low public profile since serving as President Bush’s secretary of defense, he has remained active promoting various public policies and causes.”

http://www.rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/rumsfeld_donald

Hi, there’s so much going on, it’s not possible to keep track of all of the evil in this world.

IMO, Venezuela is one of the most important locals in the world. However you want to argue what Chavez did or didn’t do for the poor, the performance of the economy (yeppers, everyone ought to copy U.S. econ policy /s) his biggest contribution from world POV is that he was one of the few who stood up to imperialism. There are no lengths the U.S. won’t go to destroy Venezuela as a lesson for all others who would defy U.S.

Agreed. Thanks for good discussion last night… I went to sleep. What were you DOING up so late? heh..

Heard the propoganda on NPR this am – I cautiously dip my toes in NPR every so often just to see what the propoganda line is – and yes, of course, they were in full-court press dissing Chavez’s dreaded socialism, blah blah and how there’s “hope” for “reform” during the next election, which could come soon.

There is no question that V. economy grew and improved by nationalizing Oil. Just think how much better we’d do here if BigOil had to – gasp! shriek! moan! – pay some royalties for the resources that they extract from “our” ground??? ha ha ha ha ha… I know! I am too funeeeee today.

Sadly almost none of us – myself included – think much about Internat’l Women’s Day anymore. Used to. Now, not so much.

Thanks to Fatster for pointing it out.

And yes: sadly women’s “rights” in this country have been eroding for decades after some small, slight improvements in the ’70s & ’80s. Said slight improvements happened only through much pushing & struggling & striving to get them.

The PTB have done their usual “good job” at sweeping Women’s “rights” under the carpet and making it seem – just like Unions – that we don’t “need” to do anything more these days. After all, it’s all good now, right???

Well NO. It stinks now. That said, I’ve done a TON to push for women’s rights over the years, including organizing quite a few bus trips to various capitals around the globe to protest in favor of improving women’s rights wherever I’ve happened to be living. Esp active on the abortion issue and organized a lot of protests around that.

I am much less active these days in this regard, but I sure don’t see younger women doing much of anything to take the baton from the hands of the older generation. I hear a lot of younger women whining about how feminists are just ugly women who couldn’t “get a man.” I find it very sad that the younger gen has been so heavily propogandized and cannot see the nose on their faces. But there you have it. The youngsters – most of them but not all – don’t seem to realize that one has to continue fighting for our rights…. or they will and DO disappear… and rather quickly.

Don’t forget Chavez nationalized oil corp without compensation. How dare he do that.

Of course, all those years when foreigners earned ridiculous returns by looting Venezuela’s oil, shhhhhh.

I did what I could on Wall St. There were 24 (or was it 26) professional women when I joined Goldman Sachs in 1976, out of maybe 1000 professionals. By the time I left Wall St, the proportion was up, it may have gone down again since I left, the environment has become so much more lawless.

But even when the proportion of women was higher, pay & promotion still lagged. I’ve told my Bob Diamond (yes that Bob Diamond) story a few times, but I’ll tell it again if you haven’t heard it.

The F-35 news links to a broken page. Found a better link – http://www.pogo.org/blog/2013/03/20130306-air-forces-f-35a-not-ready-for-combat.html

My recent fave on women’s “equality” is it’s militarization. U.S. does everything with it’s military. Incapable of using any other method.

Heh. Gaddafi’s stock of weapons & fighters must have run out or gone to Mali. U.S. now supplying Syrian terrorist invaders with Yugoslav leftovers.

“According to the Croat newspaper, the first cargo planes involved with the shipment were from Turkey, but most have been from Jordanian International Air Cargo, whose Russian-made Ilyushin jets have been seen regularly at Zaghreb airport in recent months”

Viktor Bout used Illyushin transports, operating out of UAE, Kuwait I think.

Maybe he’s still in business.

Bout is in jail.

I saw a special on him, Corbett report maybe. Found it.

Bout’s involvement in illegal arms shipping was vastly exaggerated. He started shipping fruits & vegies in old Ukrainian planes. (I mock; cargo in general to remote Africa.) After that the stories diverge. Certain people billed him as the most dangerous illegal arms dealer in the world; others that he was being set up.

This is a project too many for me, so not going to investigate further.

“With the F-35 maybe it’s time to cut our financial losses and cancel it altogether.”

Thanks for your comments, maa8722. I guess as long as the cash flows to them with such ease they’ll forego thinking about efficiency (including efficient use of taxpayers’ $s).

Just gets my goat, mafr, that they can be so gung-ho about putting people in jail and prison–even executing them–but when the system fails and people have been so egregiously hurt, they can be so slow to make amends.

Thnx so much for the link. And . . . Good Morning!

Hi!

❖ From the US National Library of Medicine, an article on marijuana and Alzheimer’s

That is very interesting, thanks.

For Fatster on a belated Int’l Womens Day