lies

(Author's Note: This post updates Part One of a series reviewing Warren Mosler's book: The 7 Deadly Innocent Frauds of Economic Policy. The updating is prompted by a post by Hannah at DailyKos offering a “. . . a Review Sort of” of Warren's book. Read below the fold...

One of the oldest excuses for war is that the enemy is irredeemably evil. He worships the wrong god, has the wrong skin and language, commits atrocities, and cannot be reasoned with. The long-standing tradition of making war on foreigners and converting those not killed to the proper religion "for their own good" is similar to the current practice of killing hated foreigners for the stated reason that their governments ignore women's rights. Read below the fold...

According to the Pentagon's lawyer, Martin Luther King Jr., if alive today, would view the US war on Afghanistan as both the act of a Good Samaritan and as necessary self-defense.

Jeh C. Johnson, the "Defense" Department's general counsel, said, on the one hand:

"I believe that if Dr. King were alive today, he would recognize that we live in a complicated world, and that our nation's military should not and cannot lay down its arms and leave the American people vulnerable to terrorist attack."

On the other hand, he also said this: Read below the fold...

Swanson has just published War Is A Lie.  This article originally appeared on TomDispatch.

To understand just how bad the 112th Congress, elected on November 2nd and taking office on January 3rd, is likely to be for peace on Earth, one has to understand how incredibly awful the 110th and 111th Congresses have been during the past four years and then measure the ways in which things are likely to become even worse.  Read below the fold...

Yesterday, McClatchy ran a story that the Obama Administration was officially dumping its July 2011 withdrawal from Afghanistan. In this context, I thought it might be useful to present a few related snippets from my Obama scandals list entry on Afghanistan.

On December 1, 2009 at West Point and on primetime television, Obama announced his Afghanistan surge.

[] Read below the fold...

Daily Mail:

Vital evidence which could solve the mystery of the death of Government weapons inspector Dr David Kelly will be kept under wraps for up to 70 years.

In a draconian – and highly unusual – order, Lord Hutton, the peer who chaired the controversial inquiry into the Dr Kelly scandal, has secretly barred the release of all medical records, including the results of the post mortem, and unpublished evidence.

Read below the fold...

One characteristic of modern political and economic discourse is frequent asserting of beliefs about economics and money that have been variously described by some observers as 'myths', 'scares', Read below the fold...

Meet the new Ari/Scottie. A little history on Obama's new press sec'y--his role in destroying Dean while working for Kerry, reviving the "lincoln bedroom" against Clinton, and other totally Rovian and "old politics" methods. So far, we have Gibbs and Emanuel and Axelrod -- 3 old-school, old-politics, attack dogs. Who's next? Read below the fold...

A 16-year-old girl has asked to have her pro-bono lawyer removed from her case after she was the only minor child not returned to the FLDS last month. The lawyer says FLDS Spokesman and "enforcer" Willie Jessop has intimidated her client. The nastiness in the name of God goes on forever. Read below the fold...

“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.”

V.I. Lenin

Are there any limits to what can be said about political opponents? Should there be any limits? Does anything go, no matter who is the target? Are we all no better now than Karl Rove? Read below the fold...

Josh Marshall, what the frack? He's spreading this nonsensical meme that the gas tax holiday won't lower gas prices AT ALL. And furthermore, he's claiming that virtually all economists agree on this.

This, despite the experience of Indiana and Illinois, which saw at least a 60% decline in gas prices per dollar of tax cut.

Now you can argue about the efficacy of the policy, but to spread misinformation and lies is a bit ridiculous, no? TPM is basically now a haven for people who took Econ 101, barely understood it, and then stopped taking Econ because it was "too hard".

The email I sent to WKJM, which should have authoritatively ended his nonsense, but apparently hasn't.
_______________________________________________ Read below the fold...

It's all lies. Or distortion. Or confabulation. Or misdirection. But I found this example rather egregious. I bet you DFHs remember this sort of thing from back in the day:

Radio Sawa broadcast on December 11 the good news from the American forces that the regions of Arab Jabour and Al-Buaitha had been definitively cleared of the last vestiges of AlQaeda. Here's what their website reported that day

Read below the fold...

How low can you go, Mr. President? Read below the fold...

Down at the end of yesterday's Froom is an item he found over at US News:
Read below the fold...

The way kids used to take turn standing on each other's shoulders so the one on top could peek through the knothole in the outfield wall and watch the ballgame, we present today's host who frees Krugman from the paywall: the admirably named Free Democracy, bringing us "Sweet Little Lies." Or more accuratly, an honest discussion of the lies, named accurately as lies, and broken down into Little and Big Lies. Read below the fold...