Video: Puppy with head stuck in small box

Give me an "awwww."

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63% support military action against Iran

Some people - in this case 63% - never learn. What part of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars are people missing? People really need to stop listening to the war machine who is chomping at the bit to have constant war. The US not afford another costly war that drags on forever.

It should be obvious that wars aren't the answer to every international problem by now but apparently, it's not. The US military success rate is not what people imagine it is and this has to change. WWII was a long time ago and our military record isn't nearly as impressive as it was back then. Get a grip people and wake up.

Some 63 percent of Americans would be in favor of taking military action to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, according to a new survey.

The Pew Research Center asked 26,210 people in 21 different countries to give their views on Iran’s alleged plans to get nuclear weapons, finding widespread opposition to the idea in the West and also in some countries in the Mideast.

More than nine in 10 people in the United States, U.K., France and Germany were against Iran getting nuclear weapons. Two percent of Americans said they were in favor.

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VA GOPer defends discrimination against gay judicial nominee

Virginia Delegate Bob Marshall (R-Prince William) took to CNN on Friday to defend the legislature's failure to confirm Tracy Thorne-Begland as a judicial appointee. Check out the exchange:



Delegate Marshall's argument boils down to this:

1. Laws are set up to discriminate against homosexuals like Tracy Thorne-Begland.
2. Thorne-Begland was coerced into hiding his identity and, in doing so, breaking said discriminatory laws.
3. When Thorne-Begland breaks discriminatory laws, and when he advocates for reforming such laws so that no one is compelled to break them, he disqualifies himself from being a judge.

Delegate Marshall refused to answer whether or not a gay man could ever be an acceptable judicial appointee in his eyes.

Kudos to the other members of the discussion, who handled Marshall's bigoted logic as well as they could (even pointing out that, despite Marshall's assertions, sodomy is a civil right and has been since the 2003 Lawrence v. Texas ruling). Read the rest of this post...

Music: Lambert, Hendricks and Ross at the Playboy mansion, 1959

I was going to offer you quite the treatise on a particular version of the Beach Boys' wonderful "Vegetables" — a version I have on my iPod from god-knows-where. But I couldn't find that version on the iTubes, so there you go — five-part-harmony and episodic-contrapuntal analysis down the drain. Oh well.

In its place, this treat. Lambert, Hendricks & Ross — the geniuses of three-part jazz scat — performing on the earliest Playboy TV show, Playboy's Penthouse (not Playboy After Dark, a later show that included clips of the earlier show).

The first video is the three of them scatting away. If you don't know what scat-singing is, just watch. Genius stuff. The piano is Count Basie, which you'll see if you watch the second vid (below). First this:



Now Annie Ross sings the ever-popular "Twisted". Not their best, but far from their worst, and perhaps their most famous. Note Count Basie's piano solo — the man has touch:



And now, if you want to hear the LH&R; recorded version of "Twisted" click here (opens big in a new tab). It's excellent — a triumph of professional producing.

Five-part contrapuntal analysis at a later date. (If anyone can locate the 3:30 version of "Vegetables" that includes the cross-fade to the last (fifth) section, please email or Twitter me. I've got the whole post written. Sigh. And thanks.)

I hope you noticed, by the way, that this is an inter-racial trio — in 1959. Courage, folks; and persistence.

GP

To follow or send links: @Gaius_Publius
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JPMorgan's exit plans look better than most workers standard pay

Wow, screwing up at JPMorgan looks pretty good compared to working a normal job. The "trader at heart" who was supposed to be managing risk for JPMorgan (Ina Drew) received a very comfortable exit package. Yes, she was making millions each year and had been there for decades for let's not forget that Drew, like everyone else in that industry, never had to pay back a dime from business that was wiped off of the books during the crash.

JPMorgan may have escaped the worst of the banking crisis earlier, but they still had their fair share of bad business. Also, after a taxpayer bailout to save Wall Street's lifestyle, it's unthinkable to fire someone and see them still walk away with an exit plan that is worth millions. If Wall Street wants capitalism, for god's sake have it but this is not capitalism. The Telegraph:

One of the best paid women on Wall Street, Ms Drew last year received a remuneration package worth $15.5m.

Corporate filings show that following her resignation she is entitled to $400,000 in severance as well as a share award that was worth $16m yesterday. On top of this, she has unexercised options that were valued at the end of last year at $3.44m, a series of retirement benefits worth a further $2.63m, and a $9.87m deferred compensation pot built up over several years.

Ms Drew, who spent over 30 years at the bank, is not expected to be the only executive to depart in the wake of a loss that has damaged JP Morgan's reputation for risk management. Achilles Macris, who ran the London division of JP Morgan's chief investment office (CIO), and Javier-Martin-Artajo, a trader who worked in the unit, are also reported to be leaving.

It was reported later in the week that "The Whale" was on his way out but it doesn't look like he or the others in that team are gone yet. European and UK workers do have more legal protections and with the amount of money involved all around, negotiations are likely to be longer.

As mentioned earlier, workers can be fired in Europe or the UK but the process always takes longer. One would think that such gross negligence would be easier but the bank is in CYA mode. It is almost certain that the failed risk managers at JPMorgan will all come out of this process making much more money that anyone in any other industry.

Once again, the game is rigged and the bankers walk away laughing with pockets full of money regardless of performance. Nice work, when you can get it. Read the rest of this post...

Obama tells EU leaders to focus on growth

He's right, but our own soft economy could have been doing better had he been more aggressive about this from the beginning. Unfortunately he listened too much to conservative economists such as Larry Summers, who scaled back the stimulus, thus limiting the recovery.

At least Obama is seeing the light now and Europe is finally waking up to the failed concept of austerity. Will Europe cut the baby in half like Obama or will they embrace a stimulus program that really is about jobs? BBC News:

Speaking to reporters at the end of the summit, President Obama said: "As all of the leaders here today agree, growth and jobs must be our top priority."

Emphasising that the United States had taken this approach to its own financial crisis, he said he was "confident" that European countries were moving in the right direction.

But he acknowledged that the European situation was "more complicated" than America's. Earlier, the G8 leaders said "the right measures are not the same for each of us".

"More complicated", certainly. But the general problem is very much the same. Read the rest of this post...

Norman Greenbaum - Spirit in the Sky

Jojo and I met up with occasional AMERICAblog contributor "Bicycle Mark" last night for some great Indian vegetarian food up around Metro Sainte-Chapelle. Mark's site is CitizenReporter where he does regular video podcasts on unreported issues of the day. Mark is a great guy who has some really interesting stuff in the pipeline for this year. I can't wait to hear the podcasts that he has in the works as the year goes on. Read the rest of this post...