Category: Society

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Stirring the Pot

No this is not a reference to a Tyler Florence cook book, but I wanted to revive some discussion I’ve had prior to the inauguration with a thread of emails with friends (“Interesting…” string)

Superbowl thread? Naw, AZ is going to “upset” the Steelers…

I just watched A Few Good Men and wanted to comment on Obama’s quick signing order to close Gitmo… Did he just “weaken a country” this week as Col. Nathan R. Jessep (known in this plot line as the GOP) claims, or is this just a symbolic statement to right the “America’s Human Rights & Justice” ship which has been tipped sideways in the last 8 years. This is very telling article in the Washington Post of how BushCo administration treated the situation down there.

Reading the first three paragraphs, my take (sourced from DKos) is that detention and interrogation (“torture”) were a higher priority to the former Administration than figuring out which cases actually merited prosecution. In other words, locking up some Arabs and torturing them was more important than determining if they were actually guilty and prosecuting them for their crimes.

While no such agency is doing a great job in monitoring, collecting and merging all kinds of data on all Americans especially the press (whistleblower video and shouldn’t really be a surprise given all the stories on this over the years in this area), this administration wasn’t interested in keep comprehensive files on their detainees to build a case against detainees.

Even with the closing of Gitmo, the new administration has such a cluster to deal with, it will be a miracle of governmental process to get this resolved within his first term. The Right meanwhile, is prepared to continually call Obama a terrorist sympathizer or a failure through out his administration regardless of actual Justice he’s looking to restore to not just Americans but all people.

Galloway: Tell your friend not to get cute down there, the Marines at Gitmo are fanatical.
Lt. Weinberg: Fanatical about what?
Galloway: About being Marines.

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Working 16 hours to Make 8

I just got off work, out of the office and back into my warm apartment. The ice hasn’t started but I’m thinking more about the realities of unemployment. I’m tasked this week with forecasting for the year and even if it’s not a project yet, I still have to come up with 13 Million in sales pipe. I work with thousands of customers across the country and there isn’t a one that is not hit by the economy, losing employees, cutting spending or just not working on projects right now.

My commute this morning was lightening fast, compared to most days where I feel like it’s multiball play in the 90s Checkpoint game. It’s been a long time since I didn’t have to push my way through crowds at Penn Station at 8 am. I participated in a management meeting and then, headed back to the apt to pick up a project I left behind in the morning rush out the door.

On the way down Sullivan I stopped into the sandwich nazi of SOHO: Aladoro. It’s by far my favorite shop in NYC, and Walter can craft a true balanced Italian sandwich (get the Daniella on focaccia. Unfortunately at 12:30 when I came in, he was intently watching Suspicion and hadn’t seen a customer yet. I guess those $12 sandwiches are the first to go for the lunch crowd.

My commute back up town, was notable for a lack of the usual in-your-face advertising and billboards. This trip, many were painted blank, vacant, or stripped of their usual promotions and in place local taggers throw ups. Lack of ad money I guess? I’ve seen the same thing on TV where the normal high priced ads have been replaced with law firm commercials, 5 ht energy and useless infomercial products (the snuggie?).

I made my way down Prince to the R train, and noticed none of the usual street vendors or artists were out hawkin their wears. What is happening to this city? Not only are the tourists no longer in the way (great!) but the street life is vaporizing (or just changing character). I got off at Times Square and purposely cut someone off at the turn stall and pushed a guy with a camera down the stairs just to feel better.

Then I worked till 11 pm so it’s a mute point now…

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NYC Unemployment at 7.4 % —Higher Than National Rate

New York City’s unemployment rate rose to 7.4% in December, up from 6.3% in November. According to Crain’s, this is the highest in almost five years and it’s over the national unemployment rate, which is 7.2%. The NY State Labor Department said, “In just the last three months, the state has lost more than 100,000 private sector jobs, including 49,300 in December 2008. This is the steepest one-month drop since October 2001 in the aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks.” Another NYC stat from the NYS Labor Dept.: “Since December 2007, the number of nonfarm jobs has decreased by 53,600, or 1.4 percent, and the number of private sector jobs has decreased by 49,100, or 1.5 percent.”

I, like many others, are getting the feeling we are just sitting around waiting to be fired. This is bad… very bad…
[source: Gothamist]