Month: February 2013

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

I posted about this the other day, Bowles-Simpson 2.0 – The 'very serious people' of the Beltway media perpetrate a fraud on the American people. Now the editors of The Nation expose Pete Peterson's Fix The Debt fraud in Stacking the Deck: The Phony 'Fix the Debt' Campaign:

As Paul Krugman reminds us, “Inside the Beltway Simpson and Bowles have
become sacred figures. But the people doing that elevation are the same
people who told us that Paul Ryan was the answer to our fiscal prayers.”

Who does that elevating? Meet the Campaign to Fix the Debt, the
billionaire-funded project that uses Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles as
figureheads for a fearmongering campaign to convince Americans that the
deficits the United States has run throughout its history have suddenly
metastasized into “a cancer that will destroy this country from within.”
It is the latest incarnation of Wall Street mogul Pete Peterson’s long
campaign to get Congress and the White House to cut Social Security,
Medicare and Medicaid while providing tax breaks for corporations and
the wealthy.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

In this continuing series, the New York Times reports Buying a Gun? States Consider Insurance Rule:

Both sides in a nation sharply divided over guns seem to agree on at least one thing: a bigger role for the insurance industry in a heavily armed society. But just what that role should be, and whether insurers will choose to accept it, are much in dispute.

Lawmakers in at least half a dozen states, including California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania, have proposed legislation this year that would require gun owners to buy liability insurance — much as car owners are required to buy auto insurance. Doing so would give a financial incentive for safe behavior, they hope, as people with less dangerous weapons or safety locks could qualify for lower rates.

“I believe that if we get the private sector and insurance companies involved in gun safety, we can help prevent a number of gun tragedies every year,” said David P. Linsky, a Democratic state representative in Massachusetts who wants to require gun owners to buy insurance. He believes it will encourage more responsible behavior and therefore reduce accidental shootings. “Insurance companies are very good at evaluating risk factors and setting their premiums appropriately,” he added.

by David Safier

I pulled out of the Park Place Mall earlier today, turned right onto Broadway, went to the next left turn lane and made a U Turn. Half a block later, a policeman pulled me over for making an illegal turn. He told me that turn lane is only for turning into the Best Buy parking lot. There are two "No U Turn" signs posted that I didn't see.

Officer Lyons was a polite young man. When he returned with my ticket, I said, equally politely, "I'm not contesting the ticket, but I have a question. In what way is a U turn more dangerous in that spot than a left turn into the parking lot? They both involve crossing oncoming traffic."

He said he didn't know that one was more dangerous than the other. But he said there's a similar No U Turn posting heading west on a left turn lane that takes you into the Park Place parking lot. In fact, he said, he had ticketed someone there earlier today. I commented that it may have more to do with getting customers into the store parking lots than with traffic safety. He smiled and shrugged.