Just the facts

They Don’t Even Know What They are Mad About

[Via Balloon Juice]

Here’s another awesome piece of news about the rocket scientists in the tea party movement:

Of all the very information that came out of the recent CBS News/New York Times poll, one question stuck out, that of taxes.

Here’s the poll question: “In general, do you think the Obama Administration has increased taxes for most Americans, decreased taxes for most Americans or have they kept taxes the same for most Americans?”

The answer:
• 24 percent of respondents said they INCREASED taxes.
• 53 percent said they kept taxes the same
• And 12 percent said taxes were decreased.

Of people who support the grassroots, “Tea Party” movement, only 2 percent think taxes have been decreased, 46 percent say taxes are the same, and a whopping 44 percent say they believe taxes have gone up.

The power of the wurlitzer. Taxes were decreased for 95% of the country.

It really is quite amazing what you can do with a group of people who are completely uninterested in the truth, unwilling to believe anything that comes from someone other than Rush or Glenn Beck or an “acceptable” source of information, and who have a vested interest in believing what they want to believe, reality be damned. It is why they can freak out about the stimulus bill as 800 BILLION IN PORK when damned near half of it was tax cuts and another 250 billion of it was simply money to prop up holes in state and local budgets.

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Federal taxes are lowered for 95% of the taxpayers in the country and only 12% know it. And only 2% of the teabaggers know the facts.

I wonder why? Frankly, it is much easier to confuse and mislead than to dispense correct information. We have a pretty well-funded groups to do this just know so I am not surprised that most people do not have the facts.

The wrong sponsors

by Thomas Ott

No We Can’t
[Via Eschaton]

As Herbert says, the Epic Fail is truly depressing.

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This was depressing to read . But coupled with this article about how China is using the current need for stimulus to not only employ 100,000 people to build bullet trains, but that they will have them done by 2012 instead of when they planed, it makes me very surly.

They may well become the leaders in green energy needs and a place where it is easier to take a train than to fly while we seem mired in past solutions that only succeed at failure. We have a government that is simply unable to make anything work, much less aspire to anything higher. We have one party that does not want anything done and another that is incapable of getting anything done.

In the last two years, $6.5 billion has been spent on lobbying in Washington. Less than 1% of that came from labor. In the 2008 election cycle, $2 billion was given to politicians, with 72% of it coming from business. In almost everyone of these cases, the business sectors spending the most money are the ones that do not want anything to change, that want things to stay the same, that want the government todo nothing.

And what a surprise that is exactly the government we have. We have political parties who both only aspire to the status quo, because that is what they are paid to do. In a changing world, that is a prescription for failure.

How do we stop the corrupting influence of money on our government? The only solution I have heard from either party is publicly funded elections. I expect that to never happen.

I wonder just how we will get ourselves out of this mess? We used to be MacGyver. Sometimes, I think we are Pepsuber:

“Are you sponsored by Pepsi or something?”
“What?Maybe! But who cares? I am 100% my own man!”
Boom!!

[Listening to: Clementine from the album "Song & More Songs" by Tom Lehrer]

Using technology to improve behavior

High school installs wi-fi on school bus, quiet ensues

[Via AMERICAblog: A great nation deserves the truth]

Neat idea. And predictable, yet still fascinating results.

[O]n this chilly morning, as bus No. 92 rolls down a mountain highway just before dawn, high school students are quiet, typing on laptops.

Morning routines have been like this since the fall, when school officials mounted a mobile Internet router to bus No. 92’s sheet-metal frame, enabling students to surf the Web. The students call it the Internet Bus, and what began as a high-tech experiment has had an old-fashioned — and unexpected — result. Wi-Fi access has transformed what was often a boisterous bus ride into a rolling study hall, and behavioral problems have virtually disappeared.

“It’s made a big difference,” said J. J. Johnson, the bus’s driver. “Boys aren’t hitting each other, girls are busy, and there’s not so much jumping around.”

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I love the idea of calming down a bunch of rambunctious teenagers by connecting them to the INternet, thus allowing those who waited too long to finish their papers while permitting others to talk about boy/girlfriends without allowing others to overhear.

When will all buses have this?

History from 2001

The first songs ever played on an iPod

[Via Edible Apple]

Steve Jobs announced the first iPod on October 23, 2001. Though famously lampooned at first, the iPod went on to become Apple’s most iconic product. So on a slow news day, we thought we’d go back and look at the first songs ever played on an iPod in public.

The first song demoed by Steve Jobs was “Building a mystery” by Sarah McLachlan which was followed by “Could You be Loved” by Bob Marley and The Wailers. Next came “Bach: Prelude, Cello Suite No.1″ by Yo Yo Ma’s, followed by “I should have known better” by The Beatles, and concluding with “Big Wave” by Southern All Stars.

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History happens so fast. I still have my 5 Gbyte iPod. I have to check to see if it still works. Along with my 128K Mac. I am such n Apple junkie.