Writer Kitteh Is Back

Last year was an eventful one for me personally and also for the world. We moved again, this time to a home of our own, I became a citizen of the country that has been my home for over two decades. Meanwhile the United States and India seem to have lost its collective mind and soul.

I have realized that we must keep speaking the truth as we see it, because those who want to destroy liberty, first try to obscure the truth and muddy it. This includes scientific truth. Power and money are no match for it in the long run. We know Galileo and Einstein by name while their detractors languish in relative obscurity.

There is so much to say that I haven’t said yet, where should I start?

ETA: Blogger kitteh made it to the FP of ICHC/lolcats.

She Is the Champion, My Friends

Yesterday, Hillary Clinton, became the first woman to clinch the nomination of a major party for the President of the United States. I was an Obot in 2008 and was not completely taken in by Hillary Clinton when the primary season started even this time around. I was hoping that some one else would emerge on the scene like Barack Obama had 8 years earlier. However, as the primary season went on I slowly drifted into Hillary’s corner, mainly because her competition was pathetic. Maryland governor O’Malley looked good on paper but failed to make any impression, Jim Webb seemed like he had wandered into the wrong primary contest, I just could not see the  appeal of his Scots-Irish shtick to the Democratic electorate.  I was always skeptical of Bernie Sanders because his record in office did not match his soaring rhetoric. When it came to issues like immigration and gun control Bernie Sanders positions as a Congressman and then a Senator had not been particularly progressive.

As the contest went on it became increasingly obvious that Sanders policy expertise was tissue thin and besides rhetoric he had little to offer. At this stage of the campaign he has proved himself no better than a toddler throwing a tantrum because he did not get his way.

Hillary Clinton is a survivor and a champion fighter. She has had more brickbats than bouquets thrown at her  and she still soldiers on. I salute her resilience and spirit. I envy the energy she brings to the fight day in and day out, no matter what.

So to celebrate her  historic win after a hard fought and a long battle I offer you, We are the Champions, by Queen for the Queen. The lyrics could have been written by Hillary  herself!

I’ve paid my dues
Time after time
I’ve done my sentence
But committed no crime
And bad mistakes
I’ve made a few
I’ve had my share of sand
Kicked in my face
But I’ve come through

 

Sunday Afternoon in November

The trees are mostly bare now and it is getting cold, however it hasn’t snowed yet. I decided that it was my last chance to throw some chicken on the grill.  This whole summer I have been struggling with my charcoal grill and now I think I have finally figured it out.  It was good to be outdoors even though I had to dress in many layers.  The apple tree is laden with apples and though they have blemishes they are delicious.   Neighbor’s chickens had wandered into the yard, it was like an idyllic pastoral scene right out of a Robert Frost poem.

Both Sides Don’t Do It

Dear Media Bots of the so-called Liberal Media,

The  both sides do it narrative is corrosive and enables the worst Republican behavior.  The truth is not the average of the Republican and Democratic positions on an issue.

Truth != ( Democrat + Republican)/2

• A debt default would be catastrophic
• Climate Change is not a hoax
• Austerity during a recession does not make the economy grow
• Tax cuts do not reduce the deficit
• President Obama was born in Hawaii
• Creationism is not science

I could go on…

Your job is to inform not give a moment by moment commentary on who is winning or losing. Unlike you politics is not a game to most of us, what happens in DC matters to our lives. You are not doing your job, that’s why you are losing viewers and readers, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are trusted more than you. If you don’t change you are headed the way of the dodo. I hope you change but I am not holding my breath.

Sincerely,

A frustrated consumer of the news media

False Media Equivalence is False

LoL by: two_kittehs (Picture by: soap17)

 

 

 

Fifth Anniversary of the Financial Crisis

Yesterday was the fifth anniversary of the collapse of Lehman brothers.  The banks and Wall Street investment houses have recovered quite nicely but the rest of the economy is still limping along.   Finance is the life blood of the economy,  it ensures that capital flows where it is needed, unfortunately in recent times finance has become an end in itself.  Like a cancer, it has grown unchecked and has overshadowed  the rest of the economy.  This has created an economy where the the 1% who have tremendous reserves of capital thrive, while the rest of us teeter on the  threshold of perpetual financial instability.

The collapse of Lehman and the ensuing crisis, gave us an opportunity to send the cancer into remission but political will to do so was clearly absent.  So instead of ruthlessly irradiating the underlying cancer we stabilized the economy by huge infusions of tax-payer funds to the very banks and investment houses that caused the problem in the first place.   We have not dealt with the underlying problem and it is going to come back and haunt us. It is not a question of if but when.

I have blogged about the steps to  avoid the next financial crisis earlier here.  Also,  here is a list of some of the issues around the financial crisis that I am interested in and will be writing about.

Robert Samuelson is back, Hating on the Internet

Dr Kitteh was right, there is no cure for Samuelson’s stupid.  He is back again, complaining how the internet killed the newspaper.

What Samuelson’s Editor should have said to him

LoL by: two_kittehs

Mr. Samuelson, don’t blame the internet, blame the newspapers. Your newspaper lost its readers because they don’t trust you to be objective or even informative.  You may have forgotten Washington Post’s relentless cheer leading for the Iraq War based on false premises but we the readers haven’t.     We are turning towards the internet for multiple sources of news because we don’t trust you.  Its not just the Iraq War either, this problem extends to the  coverage of the elections, where you ignore the issues and focus on the horse race and while covering the economy, you drive narratives which favor the already powerful.   We don’t want you to take sides or to entertain, but to inform, since you have failed to do so, you are going the way of the dodo.  The markets have delivered their verdict on the newspaper business, and too bad that you are at the receiving end of the creative destruction that you celebrate.

ETA:  Editor kitteh is now on the first page of ICHC/lolcats

Update: Overnight, editor kitteh also made it to the first page of ICHC, the launch page for all its sites. It is on pg 2 as of now.  I should thank Robert Samuelson, he has been a great mews!