amp Archives - Where Is The Outrage?

Truth Competition Is Good

A new report has just come out from the FCC on AT&T’s proposed merger with T-Mobile. The FCC basically stated that AT&T and T-Mobile are active in almost every major market in the United States. Therefore, a merger would limit competition and increase consumer prices. There should be no surprise to anyone. Considering all the mergers that have occurred over the last decade or so, I haven’t seen one that has been helpful to us, the consumers. Finally, we have a government agency which is standing up for us. Let’s take our time, sit back and bask in the glow because it’s not happen again for another decade or so.

By ecthompsonmd|2011-11-29T22:34:37-04:00November 29th, 2011|Business|Comments Off

Free speech – More Than a Slogan (update)

A week ago, Emma Sullivan was simply another high school student in Topeka, Kansas. She had her circle of friends and family like all high school students. She was attending a Kansas Youth in Government program where Governor Sam Brownback addressed her and her fellow students. Sometime during this conference she tweeted: Just made mean comments at gov brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalot. Okay, no big deal, just a high school student expressing herself. Then, somebody from the governor’s office called the principal of her school. Let’s just think about this just for second. A high school student says something to the governor. As far as I know, she hasn’t broken any laws and hasn’t violated any code of conduct that I know of. Why would somebody from the governor’s office run whining to the principal’s office? Why would the principal’s office pay any attention to it? According to Emma Sullivan, the high school student, she was ordered by the principal to write letters of apology to Governor Brownback, the school’s Youth in Government sponsor and several other recipients.

This morning Emma tweeted “I’ve decided not to write the letter but I hope this opens the door for average citizens to voice their opinion & to be heard! #goingstrong.” Would you or would you not agree that we should all have the right to criticize our political leaders? She does not have the right to be rude, but she does have the right to express herself in a way that does not disrupt the class or the learning activity. If she’s able to do this, there’s no reason for the governor’s office to be offended. There’s no reason for the principal’s office to get involved.

Update: Finally, some common sense (and I didn’t think that Governor Brownback had any!)

From DK:

Oh, but there’s more:

In the uproar over a Prairie Village teenager’s tweet about Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback during a school trip, it is the governor who is apologizing. “My staff over-reacted to this tweet, and for that, I apologize. Freedom of speech is among our most treasured freedoms,” said a statement from Brownback’s office.

Overreacted, indeed. Ya think?

So let’s see. A teenager tweeted that her governor sucks. He does in fact suck, as is evidenced by his staff obsessively compiling an enemies list of teenage girls who don’t like him on Twitter. His staff complains, the school principal freaks out, probably correctly figuring that Brownback’s office will use it as excuse to cut their pencil budget again, this time down to one pencil per thirty kids, and tells the teenage girl she has to apologize. The wider world finds out about it, floods all parties with messages of support for the teenager in question and suddenly everybody remembers the First Amendment again.

By ecthompsonmd|2011-11-28T13:44:46-04:00November 28th, 2011|Civil Liberty, Civil Rights|Comments Off

Friday Morning News Roundup (plus Class Warfare from the Daily show)

Whether you think stocks are overvalued or not, the last several weeks have been downright ugly on Wall Street. Yesterday, Wall Street lost over 400 points. This morning, stocks opened sharply lower in Europe. Personally, I think we need to expect more volatility and a general downward trend on Wall Street until Washington and Europe decide that austerity is not going to get it done. We need to spend money to get out of this disaster. We need to put people to work.
Inflation indicators are ticking up. But, with gasoline prices falling, inflation should stand check with the rest of the year.
Another bank failure, this time in Maryland.
RE/MAX announced a 12.7% drop in home sales for July.
It appears that the Justice Department is investigating some of the shenanigans that Standard & Poor’s “may have been involved in” in writing those mobile mortgage securities. It appears that there will was some sort of internal debate at Standard & Poor’s. Some analysts wanted to downgrade the ratings. This could get interesting.

Allen West continues to prove that he may be the most delusional Congressman in Washington.
Of course, while we’re thinking about delusional, we would be remiss if we did not add Michelle Bachmann to the list. She believes that Americans fear the rise of the Soviet Union.
Rick Perry continues to position himself further and further to the right. Yesterday, he mentioned that evolution was a “theory that’s out there.” He went on to say, “In Texas, we teach both creationism and evolution in our schools. Because I figure you’re smart enough to figure out which one is right.” The stupidity of the statement cannot be underestimated. If you believe that time in the classroom is precious, why would you teach something that you know is wrong? Implicit in Rick Perry’s statement is that it is obvious that one of these “theories” is wrong. Why would you waste time teaching students something that you “know” is wrong?
Bank of America is cutting 3500 jobs.
Comparing and contrasting Rick Perry and Mitt Romney with regard to their “jobs plan” seems to be a little like sewing eyelashes together. There doesn’t seem to be much substance there but the Washington Post tries anyway.
The president is slowly, very slowly putting together a new jobs plan. Personally, I think we made a major stimulus to the economy. I think the president needs to put together not one or two but five different jobs plans. Each plan should total somewhere around $300 billion. The total package should be around $1.5 trillion. This total package equals approximately 12% of our GDP. The whole economy needs to be overhauled. The government needs to support the economy while it’s being overhauled. We need to get rid of the huge backlog of houses. This would stabilize home prices. We need to switch from a credit economy, where everybody spends more than they have based on credit, to a more cash-based economy where we actually have money left over and can save.