2016: Dems should nominate a 99%er woman for President, Not Hillary Clinton

The two progressive waves of our time shouldn't be split: an authentic champ of the 99% and the understandable desire for Dems to nominate a female presidential candidate. Sen. Warren is the natural match, but if she isn't running I think we should raise up another. I don't think Sen. Gillibrand or Sen. Clinton (who both made her millions in awful, awful ways) qualify. All who qualify seem to lack Clinton's ambition/crave for power. But I think one needs to be motivated to step forward. Otherwise we'll have to deal with the sad social psychological experience of millions of Democrats rationalizing support for dynastism, bribery (6 figures each for hundreds of speeches to rentier industries), and returning to power a first family that had a big role to play in deregulating Wall Street and supporting militarism. Why nudge the progressive masses into becoming this?

The Thriller concept destroyed by Adam Carolla

Maynard, I share your tastes (Rainbow's End by Vernor Vinge) but I've never seen our aesthetic destroyed more completely than by Adam Carolla's thriller parody concept. Terrorists hold the U.S. Olympic team hostage. The young Olympians defeat the terrorists by slightly besting world record physical achievements in battle with the terrorists (an 8.96m long jump across building tops, a 98.49m javelin throw to stop a terrorist, etc.). The existential implication is that the path to our survival will be either unremarkable, unlikely, or we're living in a thriller simulation.

Jesus and Most Biblical Characters -Composite Mythology or Real People?

I've been digging on Wikipedia and elsewhere, and I can't get a bead on if Jesus and certain biblical characters like Peter, Joseph and Mary are real or composite/mythological people. I think the problem is the discussion throughout history on all sides of this has been filled with the worst sort of bad faith empiricists. Let's dig in in good faith on this thread, and look critically at the theories and narratives from all sides.

Raising taxes on the wealthy

Interesting article from a social justic perspective on the history of federal income taxes in the USA. I'm posting it as much to bookmark it for myself as anything else. http://www.alternet.org/labor/hidden-progressive-history-income-tax?page=0%2C0

Liveblogging Mr. Cain's Incompetence in the Cain-Gingrich Debate 830pm EST

Moderator: "Defined Benefit Plans or Premium Support, what do you think is better?"

Mr. Cain: *puzzled look on face* [To Speaker Gingrich]: Uhh ... you go first.

Best Of Breed European Technocrats all in the USA?

Like I did with Chinese macroeconomists, I wanted to look up the best european economists. I ended up reading a NY Times article about Olivier Blanchard from 2010 that implied all the top French economist academics have come to the United States, and the ones that stayed back have their talents underdeveloped by an inferior French research university system.

If that can be generalized beyond France, it may help explain why the same Europe that's so lauded by elite American social scientists for its social welfare programs has managed the global economic shocks so much worse than the US (and China?).

The relevant NY Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/world/europe/22iht-educSide22.html

Tax the rich to spend on infrastructure, full employment, and redistribution: Why can't the large states do this without the US Federal govt?

It's a question that popped into my head the other day that I've been meaning to post.