No Blogging Tonight

Went to an SCA event in Culpeper County, Virginia, about a 250 mile round trip, I just got home,  and my brain is fried.

Posted via mobile.

Headline of the Day

An Endorsement from Dick Cheney is Nothing to be Proud Of

—Current Affars

This is undoubtedly true.

For the last third of the 20th century, and for the first 15 years of this century, you would be very hard pressed to find a more perfidious font of incompetence, hypocrisy, and evil in national politics in the United States.

That, and he is a war criminal as well.

Henry Kissinger without the charm.

And It Is On

So, following an overwhelming vote against the Boeing offer, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers is on strike.

Heard a bit of coverage on NPR today, and once again, they were subtly anti-union in their slant, as they always are.  Remember that at pledge time. 

The numbers are kind of mind boggling, 94.6% voting to reject the contract, and 96% voting to strike.

The IAM members clearly have no f%$#s left to give.

While a lot of this is about the fact that the last deal was not a good one, there were a lot of concessions, I also think that a lot of this is that the rank and file want to make airliners, and they feel that management is an impediment to their doing so.

Boeing Machinists union members voted Thursday by an overwhelming majority to reject management’s contract offer and go on strike.

Boeing’s 33,000 blue-collar workers were instructed to walk out at 12:01 a.m. Friday and stay out indefinitely.

International Association of Machinists District 751 President Jon Holden, who on Sunday urged members to accept the deal, announced the result to raucous cheers and chants of “Strike! Strike! Strike!” to about 80 Machinists late Thursday at the union headquarters in South Park.

“This is about respect, this is about addressing the past and this is about fighting for our future,” Holden told the crowd. “We strike at midnight.”

He said 94.6% voted to reject the contract and 96% voted to strike, more than the two-thirds majority required by union rules to authorize a walkout.

At a news conference after the announcement, Holden said “I’m proud of our members, proud of them for standing up and fighting for more, for each other, for their families, for the community.”

………

Even before Holden delivered the result, a team of union officials outside was busily cutting holes in large metal barrels, carving the initials “IAM” into the side of each and adding a cylindrical chimney on top. They’ll be used as “burn barrels,” with fires lit inside to keep pickets warm in the nights and days ahead.

Inside the hall, buckets were filled with premade “On Strike” signs.

Votes were tallied from polling places across the Puget Sound region, as well as in Moses Lake; Portland, Ore.; Victorville, Calif.; and Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California.

………

They did not even accept that Boeing’s stated wage increase was really 25% over four years as the company presented it, since the Machinists at the same time lost their annual bonus, which might have been worth around 4% each of those years.

Do the math:  25% -(4%  x 4 years) = 9% over 4 years.  Given the Federal Reserve's target of 2% inflation, that is awfully close to running in place.

Brandon Phelps, 35, a former U.S. Air Force mechanic who installed weapons systems on Boeing F-15s in Afghanistan and is now a team lead in the Renton 737 assembly plant, said the increase is just over 10% over four years once that takeaway is considered.

Boeing's, has been very conciliatory since the walkout, with its CFO saying that the aerospace giant is eager to return to negotiations.

Boeing's new CEO is actually in the process of moving to the Seattle area, where he bought a home in the tony Broadmoor gated community, a move likely intended  to mollify the palpable anger of Pacific Northwest employees.

The workers are in the drivers seat here.  Boeing has been hemorrhaging cash for some time, and its credit rating is currently Baa3 according to Moody's, one step above junk bond status, so it is NOT in a position to raise money easily or cheaply.

They need to get their assembly lines up and running quickly, particularly the lucrative 737 lines.

Quote of the Day

My spicy view about just why some billionaires - people who seemingly have everything they could possibly want and are almost entirely unaffected by anything that actually happens to the rest of us - are so into converting the country into a neo-feudal hellscape is that there are a couple of things that, despite their unimaginable wealth, they would have a hard time getting away with anywhere in the world.

Specifically, they want literal slaves, including child slaves, with all that implies.

—Atrios

Obviously, Mr. Black intent here is to be provocative, but that does mean that this is not true.

In fact, I would argue that this is, to quote Charles Dickens, "True ……… as turnips is. It was as true ……… as taxes is. And nothing’s truer than them."

Billionaires want to be God Kings who are exempt from the ordinary norms of human decency.

This is not a good or a healthy thing.

It would be best for society to arrest them, deport them to China, and force them to work at a Foxconn.

It's Thursday ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Initial claims and firing


Continuing claims and hiring


InflationInitial unemployment claims were basically flat, up 2,000 to 230,000, which is basically statistical noise.

The same can be said for continuing claims, which rose by 5,000 to 1.850 million.

We also got the producer price index numbers, and it was 1.7% year over year, which is pretty good:

The number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits increased marginally last week, suggesting that layoffs remained low even as the labor market is slowing.

Other data from the Labor Department on Thursday showed producer prices rising slightly more than expected in August amid a rebound in the cost of services. The combination of a fairly stable labor market and still-high inflation further diminished the chances of the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates by 50 basis points next Wednesday, when the U.S. central bank is expected to start its long-awaited easing cycle.

The reports followed data this month showing the unemployment rate retreated in August from a near three-year high touched in July and underlying inflation indicating some stickiness last month. Financial markets have slashed the odds of a half-point rate reduction to less than 15%.

I still think that we are in the midst of a downturn, and I still think that the Fed will only cut rates by ¼%, but opinions are like assholes, everyone has one.

Speaking of the Positive Effects of Unions

Amazon is raising pay for its drivers by 7% year over year in an attempt to forestall unionization.

Even when unions don't win, the threat of unions produces a win: 

Amazon.com is putting billions of dollars toward the drivers that deliver its packages following union organizing activity among such workers.

The company said it is investing about $2 billion into its delivery services program this year, and that the money will result in average national pay for drivers delivering Amazon parcels to reach nearly $22 per hour, a 7% increase from last year.

Amazon has been delivering most of its own packages with the help of small businesses around the country since 2018. The average pay for drivers was $20.50 last year.

………

Amazon’s investment follows union organizing activity and changes to how labor officials view its drivers.

Officials with the National Labor Relations Board have recently designated Amazon a joint employer of drivers who are contracted to deliver packages for the company at facilities in Palmdale, Calif., and Atlanta. The rulings could change how the agency views Amazon’s relationship with drivers and could force Amazon to bargain with those workers if they unionize.

Of course Amazon is a joint employer:

• Amazon surveils the drivers with their own cameras.
• Amazon dictates the metrics that result in a driver being hired or fired. 
• Amazon dictates the specific root that these drivers take.
• Amazon dictates how often the drivers can pee.  (Hence the bottles)

Nice to see Amazon being forced against its will to do the right thing.

Now arrest Jeff Bezos for bad hair or something.

Nice to See a Win

The United Auto Workers Union has won the union election at the Ultium battery factory in Spring Hills, Tennessee.

This is the second victory at Ultium and the first in the historically union unfriendly South:

"The new jobs of the South will be union jobs," said Tim Smith, a regional director for the United Auto Workers, after the union announced Tuesday that 1,000 workers at Ultium Cells in Spring Hill, Tennessee had voted to form a collective bargaining unit.

The vote made the electric vehicle battery plant the second Ultium Cells workplace to join the UAW, and the second auto industry plant in the U.S. South to vote in favor of unionization following the launch of a major $40 million organizing effort in the region this year.

Anti-union companies such as EV automaker Tesla have eyed the South as a region to make a manufacturing push, due to its historical antagonism toward labor and low levels of unionization.

But Smith said the vote at Ultium Cells proves that "in the battery plants and EV factories springing up from Georgia to Kentucky to Texas, workers know they deserve the same strong pay and benefits our members have won. And we're going to make sure they have the support they need to win their unions and win their fair share."

The first Ultium Cells battery plant to join the UAW was the Lordstown, Ohio location, where employees ratified a contract in June that included a 30% raise over three years for production workers, an immediate $3,000 bonus, and health and safety protections.

The lesson to be learned from this is that success begets success. so the victory against the big 3 (2½) last year is responsible for much of this success.

For decades, unions have been trying to minimize their losses, and have come across as losers.

You lose every fight that you run away from.

Ecch (Tweet) of the Day

We’d like to announce that while we are not a hotel, we are a concept of a hotel.

— Four Seasons Total Landscaping (@TotalSeasons) September 11, 2024

This is the best snark of the Presidential campaign so far. 

Hell this may be the best snark of ANY Presidential campaign EVER.

Glorious.

Welcome to the Handmaiden's Tale

Corrupt Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing to override HIPPA so that he can prosecute women for going out of state for abortions.

Yeah, the party of small government wants to be able to pry into a woman's most private and personal decision:

Texas has sued to block federal rules that prohibit investigators from viewing the medical records of women who travel out of state to seek abortions where the procedure is legal.

The lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in Federal District Court in Lubbock, targets medical privacy regulations that were issued in 2000, and takes aim at a rule issued in April that specifically bans disclosing medical records for criminal or civil investigations into “the mere act of seeking, obtaining, providing or facilitating reproductive health care.”

Texas bans abortions in almost all circumstances. Women are not subject to criminal prosecution for obtaining abortions, but state law imposes penalties of as much as life in prison for those who aid in obtaining abortions.

The lawsuit claims that the privacy rules ignore federal law that lets states view medical records “for law enforcement purposes.”

In a statement on Wednesday, Texas’ attorney general, Ken Paxton, called the April rule “a backdoor attempt at weakening Texas’ laws.” He added: “The Biden administration’s motive is clear: to subvert lawful state investigations on issues that the courts have said the states may investigate.”

………

The April regulation came in direct response to abortion bans enacted by many Republican state legislatures after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. A number of those states, including Texas and Alabama, have signaled their interest in extending those bans to include women who cross state lines to get an abortion.

The lawsuit filed on Wednesday also asserts that the rule covers “hormone and drug therapy for gender dysphoria, surgical procedures related to gender dysphoria, and gender experimentation.” Texas bars minors from obtaining gender-transition surgery and related care like hormone therapy.

Whether Texas investigators have sought records of women who traveled out of state for abortions is unclear. But Mr. Paxton, a Republican, has demanded records on gender-transition care from organizations in Washington State and Georgia. In March, a judge temporarily blocked Mr. Paxton from forcing an L.G.B.T.Q. organization to turn over documents.

People like Ken Paxton are not the opposition, they are the enemy.

Tech Bros in Europe

It's not going well with the European Union, what with Google having to pay €2.4 billion in fines for monopolistic behavior:

The European Union's Court of Justice (ECJ) has dismissed Google's appeal of a €2.4 billion ($2.65 billion) 2017 antitrust ruling, finding it had abused its dominance in favor of its own Google Shopping service, diverting traffic that would otherwise have gone to rival comparison services.

The 2017 decision at the time was the culmination of a years-long antitrust investigation that began in 2010.

Alphabet already attempted, and failed, to get the 2017 decision overturned on appeal in 2021, when it claimed before the EU General Court that its treatment of searches on Google's shopping comparison service wasn't unfair. At the time it argued the consequences of the practice to the rivals were not so dire, pointing to differences in search traffic, which it claimed were not "substantial." But the General Court wasn't buying this, stating: "Those arguments take account only of the impact of the display of results from Google's comparison shopping service, without taking into account the impact of the poor placement of results from competing comparison shopping services in the generic results."

Google then appealed to Europe's top court, the ECJ. The final smackdown, in a decision delivered over 14 years after the probe began, dismissed all of Google's grounds of appeal, saying, among other things, that the search giant had "failed to meet the legal test for a duty to supply access to comparison shopping services."

Also, you see Apple having to pay Ireland €13 billion in back taxes, which the government of Ireland did not want to collect what amounts to about €2,450.00 for every person in the country.

If you are wondering why Ireland is on Apple's side in all of this, it's because the business model of the Irish state is to profit off of a race to the bottom.

Basically, they have decided that their role is to be a colonial possession of multinational corporations that operate in the EU.

The EU competition authority ruled that this was an illegal subsidy, and the ECJ, made that ruling final:

Apple has suffered a significant defeat after the EU’s top court ruled that the iPhone maker must pay 13 billion euros in back taxes, overturning an earlier decision in the Big Tech group’s favor.

The ruling relates to a 2016 case when the EU’s competition chief Margrethe Vestager said that Ireland had given the company an illegal sweetheart deal, amounting to a tax rate of less than 1 percent.

The European Court of Justice said on Tuesday in its final ruling that it “confirms the European Commission’s 2016 decision: Ireland granted Apple unlawful aid which Ireland is required to recover.”

A lower court had in 2020 quashed the commission’s order and the ECJ’s decision to overturn that ruling was unexpectedly decisive.

………

The Irish finance ministry said it would consider the ruling but added: “The Irish position has always been that Ireland does not give preferential tax treatment to any companies or taxpayers.”

The technical term for the statement by the FM is a, "Lie."

The case has been watched carefully across the bloc as a watershed moment over Big Tech’s tax affairs in Europe, with the EU’s efforts to probe the arrangements between companies and member states having previously suffered setbacks.

………

However, the ECJ on Tuesday affirmed the commission’s original finding that Apple’s tax structure in Ireland—which excluded the profits generated from the intellectual property licenses held by its international and European arms—amounted to state aid.

………

However, Dan Neidle, founder of the Tax Policy Associates think-tank, said the ECJ’s Apple decision would still have “significant implications” that will force member states and multinational companies to reconsider how profits are allocated between countries.

Neidle said: “It’s a massive victory for the commission—their strategy of using competition law and state aid to override domestic tax rules has succeeded. I and most observers thought it wouldn’t—we were wrong.”

If the various free trade deals were actually about free trade, the orgy of subsidies that we see directed toward companies, Amazon's attempted rat-F%$#ing of New York for example, and almost any sports franchise out there, would be explicitly banned.

Those deals are not really about free trade though, they are about labor arbitrage and rent seeking.

 

Bin Laden Won

Once again, on the anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, there can be no other conclusion.

Donald Trump was elected President in 2016, and he is the nominee of a major party for the 3rd time in a row.

The question, once again, is how with such limited resources he could have won.

He didn't.  He made us defeat ourselves.

Once again, I will the short novel by Eric Frank Russell, Wasp, in which a man is sent to be an agent provocateur on the planet of an empire at war with Earth, and his mission is not to collect intelligence or do damage, but rather to provoke an overreaction by the authorities:

"Phew!" Mowry raised his eyebrows.

"Finally, let's consider this auto smash. We know the cause; the survivor was able to tell us before he died. He said the driver lost control at high speed while swiping at a wasp which had flown in through a window and started buzzing around his face."

"It nearly happened to me once."

Ignoring that, Wolf went on, "The weight of a wasp is under half an ounce. Compared with a human being its size is minute, its strength negligible. Its sole armament is a tiny syringe holding a drop of irritant, formic acid, and in this case it didn't even use it. Nevertheless it killed four big men and converted a large, powerful car into a heap of scrap."

………

"However," Wolf went on, "the problem becomes less formidable than it looks if we bear in mind that one man can shake a government, two men temporarily can put down an army twenty-seven thousands strong, or one small wasp can slay four comparative giants and destroy their huge machine into the bargain." He paused, watching the other for effect, continued, "Which means that by scrawling suitable words upon a wall, the right man in the right place at the right time might immobilize an armoured division with the aid of nothing more than a piece of chalk."

Our car is headed toward a bridge abutment.

We Got the Inflation Numbers

Inflation is definitely low enough to justify some rate cuts from the Fed, but I'm still betting on the under for the next FOMC meeting:

Inflation eased in August to a new three-year low, teeing up the Federal Reserve to begin gradually reducing interest rates at a meeting next week.

The consumer-price index climbed 2.5% from a year earlier, according to the Labor Department, decreasing from 2.9% in July and extending its cooling streak to five months. Core inflation, a measure that excludes volatile food and energy costs, held roughly steady at 3.2%.

Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had expected overall prices to have risen 2.6% from a year ago, as well as a 3.2% increase in core prices.

The report likely cemented a shift in focus by the Fed from inflation, which has receded from 40-year-highs, and toward a cooling labor market, where softer hiring has sparked concerns of broader deterioration in the economy.

………

Firmer shelter inflation that contributed to somewhat stronger-than-anticipated core price increases in August will likely make it harder for officials to push for a larger half-percentage-point rate cut at next week’s Fed meeting, Wall Street analysts said on Wednesday.

Many of the central bankers have signaled they are prepared to cut rates, and Wednesday’s consumer-price index reading won’t change that outcome. But some officials hadn’t entirely ruled out the prospect of a larger cut, as opposed to a more traditional reduction of a quarter percentage point, or 25 basis points.

………

Cost increases for food slowed in August, while used vehicles and energy were cheaper than a month earlier. An intensifying selloff in oil markets suggests prices at the pump will continue to decline in the coming weeks, a key reversal in pressures that have colored Americans’ views of the U.S. economy.

Still betting on a ¼% cut.

Neener Neener Reader(s)

I know what you are all wondering following my drunk blogging of the Presidential debate, how bad was my hangover.

I had no hangover at all.

I have in fact never to had a hangover, though I did wake up drunk once, which was a bit disconcerting to put it mildly.

Some peculiarity in my metabolism and/or neurology that means that in the few hundred times that I have been drunk over the past forty some odd years, I have never had a hangover.  (I figure 2-4 times a year, I do not drink that much)

Don't hate me because I'm hangover proof.

I put this down to genetics.

I know 4 people who don't get hangovers, and three of them are definitely of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry, and I am not sure about the religious and ethnic heritage of the 4th individual. 

If you share this bit of biology, share it in the comments.

I will offer one warning to those so blessed, of the 4 people that I know, 2 are recovering alcoholics.

Without the prospect of a hangover, it appears that unrestrained behavior is more likely.

Shut It Down

Net-asset-value loans have always been central to private equity looting of the firms that they take over. 

It appears that the honeymoon is over:

UK regulators are scrutinizing how some of the world’s biggest banks help private equity firms layer on debt, prying into a controversial corner of the $8.2 trillion buyout industry.

The Prudential Regulation Authority has asked banks to provide more information about their offering of net-asset-value loans to buyout funds, according to people with knowledge of the matter. It’s asked some lenders how much capital they have dedicated to the effort and how much leverage they’ve offered to fund managers for these loans, the people said.

………

NAV loans are a type of debt that allows fund managers to borrow against a pool of companies they own, making them a controversial form of financing because they let private equity managers layer more leverage onto their funds. That’s because the borrowing comes on top of loans taken out by many managers when they first acquire a company.

NAV loans have existed for more than a decade but the recent slump in dealmaking has forced many fund managers to increasingly turn to these facilities as a way to offer liquidity to early investors, especially when the sluggish appetite for transactions takes company asset sales off the table. That’s caused the market for such loans to explode in recent years and it’s now sitting at about $100 billion globally.

NAV loans are predicated on the idea that PE firms are going to loot the assets of companies that they acquire. 

As such, they should be banned.

Live (Drunk) Blogging the Debate

My final, somewhat alcohol sodden analysis:

• The moderators were not great, but in comparison to the Bobsey twins, CNN correspondents Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, they f%$#ing sounded like f%$#ing Edward f%$#ing R. f%$#ing Murrow.
  
• I am profoundly drunk.
• I am stunned that I still have booze remaining.
• I am profoundly drunk.
  
• I am not listening to the post-debate analysis.  That is more annoying than Donald Trump.  Hell, it's more annoying than Donald Trump/JD Vance scat pr0n.
• I am profoundly drunk.
  
• I think that Harris won. I don't think that it was a big win, but it reinforces the whole "Weird," framing.
• I am profoundly drunk.
• Donald Trump is f%^$#ing deranged.
• I am profoundly drunk.
• Trump performed more sanely than I had anticipated. 
• I am profoundly drunk.
• I would have liked to see some more about anthropogenic climate change.
• I am profoundly drunk.
  

---

10:43 pm:
Trump is talking, and talking, and talking, and taking.  Brings up immigration again.
Take a shot.

10:41 pm:
Harris' closing statement.
Welcome to cliche theater. "Opportunity economy," etc.
Meh.

10:36 pm:
Another commercial break, then closing statements.
I still have some cordial left. I is surprised by this. I am very drunk though.

10:35 pm:
Trump brings up Hunter Biden.
Take a shot.

10:34 pm:
Trump's voice is like fingernails on a chalk board.  Harris' voice is better, but still not good.

10:33 pm:
Climate change comes up, FINALLY.
It's only the f%$#ing end of the f%$#ing world, so I understand why it was brought up so late.

10:30 pm:
Kamals brings up John McCain on defending Obamacare. F%$# that.
Take a shot.

10:29 pm:
"I have concepts of a plan," Trump on what to do about Obamacare.
Take a shot.

10:27 pm:
Trump claims that Kamala wants to take your guns out of nowhere,
Not surprising, but gun control should be a question that the mods asked/

10:25 pm:
If I were taking a shot every time that Trump that Trump calls himself the, "Greatist," I'd be dead now.
For context, I am pretty f%$#ing drunk right now.

10:23 pm:
Harris brings up his calls for the execution of the (innocent) Central Park 5, and birtherism vs Obama.
Not a major thing, but it reinforces the whole "Weird" meme.

10:20 pm:
Asking about Trump calling her not Black.

10:17 pm:
Afghanistan. Harris blames Trump

10:15 pm:
And Trump goes full, "Triumph the insult dog."
Take a shot.

10:14 pm:
Sh%$.  Kamala Harris goes full domino theory.
Take a shot.

10:08 pm:
The Ukraine is brought up.
I'll give Trump props on this, his call for an immediate peace is a right.
The US foreign policy Blob policies are risking WW III.
Kamala is willing to fight to the last Ukrainian.
Even a stopped clock is right once a day.

10:03 pm:
Commercial break.  Drinking water.

10:02 pm:
You can see trump stewing over being called weak, and goes back to immigration.

10:01 pm:
Harris calls Trump weak.  It's on.

9:57 pm:
Davis brings up the Gaza war.
Harris discusses vague goals, as opposed to any potential solutions.

9:55 pm:
Trump talks about how much Hungarian PM Victor Orban loves him?  Not a winning line.

9:53 pm:
David Muir and Linsey Davis are pretty good.
Muir asks about Trump's threats of legal prosecution against his political opponents.

9:52 pm:
Trump brings up immigration, and doubles down on the election theft statement.

9:51 pm:
Mods are definitely better than Tapper and Bash.
They ask about Trump's election lies.

9:49 pm:
Starting to feel the alcohol.
This is not shaping up to be a good drunk.

9:48 pm:
Harris bringing up Charlottesville and the antisemitic protesters that Trump called, "Very good people."

9:46 pm:
Mods press, ask if there is anything that he regretted on January 6.
Trump blames Nancy Pelosi.

9:45 pm:
Trump makes it about immigration.  I get it.  It's all that he has got.

9:44 pm:
Oh, they brought up the insurrections. The mods note his inaction as it was ongoing.

9:42 pm:
Trump says that Harris wants to perform transgender surgery on illegal immigrants.
What the f%$#?  Take a shot.

9:39 pm:
The moderators are actually pretty good.  I think that the heat that the hapless CNN mods took a lot of heat for being hopeless sad sacks, and this had an effect on the moderators.
Not liking the framing on their question about Harris flip-flopping on fracking, etc., but it is a legitimate question.

9:38 pm:
Last shot went down the wrong way.  Finished coughing.

9:37 pm:
Trump, who has promised weaponization of the justice department, claims that his felony conviction was weaponization of the justice department.

9:34 pm:
Trump is going all purity of the national blood, and claims that the FBI, etc. are lying about the crime rate.
Take a shot.

9:33 pm:
Now he is claiming that he got more votes than Biden.  You knew it was coming, but still.....
Take a shot.

9:30 pm:
Trump brings up allegations or immigrants eating people's pets?
2 shots.

9:28 pm:
Harris just mentioned how Trump is deranged on the campaign trail, and that his audience leaves early.
Oh, Snap! Take a shot.

9:27 pm:
Harris goes first, and she notes that Trump killed an immigration bill that had bipartisan support because he wanted to run on the issue.

9:25 pm:
Lordy, they are bringing up immigration.

9:24 pm:
Harris brings up how abortion bans also criminalize IVF.

9:21 pm:
Trump makes abortion about student loan forgiveness?  Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?
Take a shot

9:18 pm:
The moderator calls Trump a liar and asks Harris about it.
Harris has clearly been working on this.
She promises to sign an abortion law when passed.

9:17 pm:
Abortion is brought.  That's the elephant in the room.
Trump lies about killing born children.  He lies about every legal scholar wanting it back in the states.
Take a shot.

9:15 pm:
Harris accuses him of selling chips to China, Trump accuses her of having no real policies at al.

9:13 pm:
Trump lies about what his tariff raised.
Not worth a shot.

9:10 pm:
Trump feels compelled to say that he went to Wharton, because a black woman is mean to him.

9:09 pm:
Oh, Harris touched a nerve with her Covid comments.  Trump is whining.
Take a shot.

9:08 pm:
Harris calls him a liar straight out of the box, makes a reference to the January 6 insurrection, mismanaging Covid, and mentions Project 2025.

9:07:
Trump talks about people from foreign insane asylums takeing Black and Hispanic jobs.
Take a shot, particularly when Trump talks about the "Best economy ever">

9:05 pm:
Harris goes first.  Talks about Trump's tax cuts for the rich.

9:03 pm:
First question from the ABC spokes-models "ZOMG Inflation!"

8:57 pm:
I have the cordial, a shot glass, and a bottle of ice water.
Let's do this.

8:55 pm:
The blog is now live.  I am absolutely not watching the pregame show.

---

I will be posting at the top, with each update having a time in H:HMM pm format. 

In a first, I will be getting plastered using a chocolate and pepper cordial based on a 400 year old chocolate recipe that I made myself.

My current plan is when ever something said is a clear lie or an extremely trite cliche or the moderators behave like potted plants, I will take a shot.

I will have a spotter to prevent death by alcohol poisoning.

What Happens When Your Employees Hate You

So, we had a tentative deal cut between Boeing and its Machinist Union, and it looked pretty good to me:

Boeing and the Machinists union leadership reached a last-minute deal Sunday that would avert a strike and give the aircraft manufacturer space to reset as it struggles to recover from multiple setbacks.

But many workers said the deal falls short of their demands, leaving the possibility of a work stoppage on the table.

The 11th-hour agreement — reached at about 2:30 a.m. Sunday, with the news publicly released a couple of hours later — will avoid a strike if a majority of the union’s members ratify the deal, as recommended by International Association of Machinists District 751 President Jon Holden, who led the negotiations.

The contract offers workers a 25% general wage increase, enhanced retirement benefits, fewer hours of mandatory overtime work and increased parental leave.

And, in what could prove a historic element of the contract for this region, Boeing offered a first-of-its-kind commitment that if it launches an all-new plane in the next four years, that jet will be built in the Puget Sound area by the local workforce.

It appears, however, that my initial impression was wrong, because Jon Holden,  the local president says that he expects members to reject the deal.

Seeing as how he was the one wot negotiated this, I'm inclined to believe his prediction: 

After an overwhelmingly negative reaction to a deal struck by Boeing and Machinists union leaders, union leader Jon Holden said Monday he expects rank-and-file members will reject the contract and strike late this week.

“The response from people is it’s not good enough,” Machinist union district 751 president Holden said in an exclusive interview with The Seattle Times at the union’s South Park headquarters. “Right now, I think it will be voted down, and our members will vote to strike.”

Boeing and union leaders announced the tentative agreement, which Holden has endorsed, early Sunday morning. Machinists union members will vote Thursday on both the proposal and whether to strike.

On Monday, hundreds of Machinists marched in protest through the Everett widebody jet plant during the lunch break, then gathered outside facing the factory’s giant doors, shaking their fists in the air and chanting “Strike! Strike! Strike!”

Boeing's credit rating is one step above junk, and they have been f%$#ing with their workers for decades.

The Machinists know that Boeing is in a cash crunch, and they do not trust Boeing not to f%$# them when the company recovers, so they are disinclined to to cut Boeing slack when they are up against the wall as a result:

………

With Boeing’s credit rating now just one rung above junk bond status, a lengthy strike that hits cash flow and increases debt could have a dramatic effect on its financial standing.

Holden said the union will try to convey to its members the benefits of the offer, and why he’s recommending it be accepted. However, he doesn’t think that will turn sentiment around and get to a “yes” vote.

“I don’t believe that’s going to happen,” Holden said.

………

Union members had hoped for a 40% pay hike and were disappointed by the contract’s 25% increase. But Holden said that’s the largest general wage increase for all members “in our history.”

………

Some Machinists were set on getting back their traditional pension, given up in 2013. Holden said no company has ever restored such a pension after taking it away, and Boeing wouldn’t budge on that.

No one has ever done this before?  Well, be the first. 

Boeing labor relations have always been contentious, but it was always in the context of the employees believing int he company.

They no longer believe in the company, and so have adopted the mindset of senior management, they want their money now, the company be damned.

This is what happens when MBA types run a company.

Of Course She Did

Ginny Thomas, Clarence Thomas' wife, was caught thanking a right wing advocacy group for fighting against ethics reform for the federal courts. What's more, the group has a taped group phone call where they say as much.

Both of these two have stated repeatedly that they never discuss court business among themselves.

I dunno.  Maybe expensive vacations, overpriced property sales, deals on motor coaches, and other sundry gifts have a way of talking all by themselves:

Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, privately heaped praise on a major religious-rights group for fighting efforts to reform the nation’s highest court — efforts sparked, in large part, by her husband’s ethical lapses.

Thomas expressed her appreciation in an email sent to Kelly Shackelford, an influential litigator whose clients have won cases at the Supreme Court. Shackelford runs the First Liberty Institute, a $25 million-a-year organization that describes itself as “the largest legal organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to defending religious liberty for all Americans.”

Shackelford read Thomas’ email aloud on a July 31 private call with his group’s top donors.

Thomas wrote that First Liberty’s opposition to court-reform proposals gave a boost to certain judges. According to Shackelford, Thomas wrote in all caps: “YOU GUYS HAVE FILLED THE SAILS OF MANY JUDGES. CAN I JUST TELL YOU, THANK YOU SO, SO, SO MUCH.”

Shackelford said he saw Thomas’ support as evidence that judges, who “can’t go out into the political sphere and fight,” were thankful for First Liberty’s work to block Supreme Court reform. “It’s neat that, you know, those of you on the call are a part of protecting the future of our court, and they really appreciate it,” he said.

………

The push to change how the court functions grew after a series of ProPublica stories showed that wealthy Republican donors have showered Thomas and Alito with free gifts and travel that they failed to disclose. Following ProPublica’s reporting, Thomas amended past disclosure reports, and the Supreme Court adopted the ethics code, its first ever. 

Both of the Thomases need to be frog-marched out of their respective offices in handcuffs.

Fascism Much?

Ron DeSantis is sending his private goon squad to harass people who signed the petitions to put abortion on the ballot.

This guy is a f%$#ing menace, and he should be awaiting trial with no bail right now:

Isaac Menasche remembers being at the Cape Coral farmer’s market last year when someone asked him if he’d sign a petition to get Florida’s abortion amendment on the ballot.

He said yes — and he told a law enforcement officer as much when one showed up at the door of his Lee County home earlier this week.

Menasche said he was surprised when the plainclothes officer twice asked if it was really Menasche who had signed the petition. The officer said he was looking into potential petition fraud.

Though the officer was professional and courteous, Menasche, who has had little interaction with police in his life, said the encounter left him shaken.

“I’m not a person who is going out there protesting for abortion,” Menasche said. “I just felt strongly and I took the opportunity when the person asked me, to say yeah, I’ll sign that petition.”

The officer’s visit appears to be part of a broad — and unusual — effort by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration to inspect thousands of already verified and validated petitions for Amendment 4 in the final two months before Election Day. The amendment would overturn Florida’s six-week abortion ban by proposing to protect abortion access in Florida until viability.

Since last week, DeSantis’ secretary of state has ordered elections supervisors in at least four counties to send to Tallahassee at least 36,000 petition forms already deemed to have been signed by real people. Since the Times first reported on this effort, Alachua and Broward counties have confirmed they also received requests from the state.

This crosses a line from MAGAt bullsh%$ to criminality.

Before we are in a prequel for The Handmaid's Tale, he needs to be arrested. In public.  And made to do the perp walk.

Not a Surprise

Cory Doctorow has made an interesting observation, higher executive pay leads to worse pay for the employees.

Where do you think the highly paid executive gets his money from? 

He takes it from his workers:

Broadly speaking, the role of an establishment economist is to come up with new ways of saying, "actually, your boss is right." In other words, the world we're living in is the best possible world, and the fact that you got contact burns from collapsing on the scorching sidewalk outside of the grocery store where you couldn't afford your weekly shopping is unfortunate, but unavoidable.

I once had an economist send me an email to explain how misguided it was to focus on executive pay. Sure (he wrote), executives might be taking home eye-popping sums, but these weren't really coming at the expense of their workers' wellbeing. Just do the math: take those whopping CEO pay-packages and parcel them out to the hundreds of thousands of workers at Fortune 100 companies, and you'll find that each worker's paycheck is just a few dollars larger. Hacking away at CEO pay is an act of spite, not justice.

Meanwhile (the economist continued), just look at where those giant paydays are coming from: stock grants, not salaries. In the bad old days, CEOs' millions came in the form of cash. That incentivized short-term thinking, since anything the CEO did to goose the quarterly numbers would translate into a cash bonus, even if it set the company up for failure in the years to come. But if a CEO's payout comes long after their decisions – if their stock grants don't vest for three or four years – then the CEO's incentives are aligned with long-term sustainability, which is good for everyone.

It's all nonsense, of course – every bit of it.

Take the question of whether controlling CEO pay is useful as a matter separate from the impact it has on workers' wages. In our society, money is power, and the more money any individual is allowed to amass, the more power they amass. This power is then mobilized to acquire more money, and thus more power. Before you know it, the ultrawealthy are perverting every democratic institution we have. They buy the Supreme Court:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/06/clarence-thomas/#harlan-crow

They fill our elite universities with their doltish offspring:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/11/18/bipartisan-consensus/#meritocracy

They set the planet on fire:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/04/deferred-gratification/#selective-foresight

And they bankroll fascists:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/02/plunderers/#farben

So even if controlling wealth acquisition had no impact on workers' wages, it would be worth doing. But of course, cutting executive pay does have an impact on workers' wages. It's true that simply dividing a CEO's pay among their workforce yields pennies, but that's the wrong way to do the math (and economists know it).

Every year, the Institute for Policy Studies publishes a report called "Executive Excess," in which they track the gap between the compensation offered to corporate leaders and to the workers who generate all that money. This year's is a banger:

https://ips-dc.org/report-executive-excess-2024/

The report zeroes in on one weird trick that CEOs use to goose their compensation: stock buybacks. Buybacks are an illegal form of stock manipulation that is nevertheless widely practiced, thanks to the SEC's policy of stretching Rule 10b-18 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to creates a "safe harbor" for conduct that violates the plain language of the SEA.

Yes, I have made the same point, see here, here, here, here, here, and here.

………

Why would CEOs prefer buybacks to dividends? Because CEOs sit on tons of shares. Even if only some of those shares have vested, a CEO who uses this ruse to increase share prices can cash those shares out, borrow against the rest, and count on a big stock grant from shareholders who are grateful for their windfall.

………

Take Lowe's: over the past five years, CEO Marvin Ellison spent $43 billion on stock buybacks, netting $18 million for himself in the process. Now, Lowe's has 285,000 employees, half of whom earn less than $33,000/year. Divide Ellison's $18m among those workers and each of them would net a paltry $126/year. But if you were to share out the $43 billion Ellison had to piss up against a wall on stock buybacks among those workers, you'd be able to give every worker a $30,000 bonus, every year:

https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/09/02/the-low-wage-corporations-that-blew-half-a-trillion-dollars-to-inflate-ceo-pay/

Lowe's leads the "Low-Wage 100," IPS's index of the worst paying 100 companies out of the S&P 500. Over the past five years, the Low-Wage 100 has spent more than half a trillion dollars on stock buybacks. As with other companies, the CEOs of the Low-Wage 100 timed mass sell-offs of their shares to coincide with the buybacks:

………

The economists who campaigned to pay CEOs in stock were wrong about nearly everything. CEO compensation does come at the expense of a living wage for workers, and it doesn't build sustainable businesses focused on long-term value. The billions that Boeing spent on buybacks are billions that Boeing didn't spend on airworthiness:

………

What should we do about this? Well, for starters, the SEC should re-establish enforcement of the prohibition on stock buybacks and drop the absurd fiction that buybacks satisfy the safe harbor requirements of Rule 10b-18. We should end preferential tax treatment of capital gains, the money you get from owning something, which is taxed at a fraction of wages, the money you get from doing something. This would also have the side benefit of killing the "carried interest tax loophole," a rule designed for 16th century sea-captains (!!) that lets private equity looters duck billions in taxes:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/29/writers-must-be-paid/#carried-interest

On top of this, the IPS recommends:

• Taxing stock buybacks (the 2024 Democratic platform proposes quadrupling the existing tax on buybacks);
• Increase taxes for excessive CEO pay (a rule already in place in San Francisco and Portland and proposed in several federal bills);
• Ban companies that have absurd pay gaps from doing business with the US government (something a sitting president can do at the stroke of a pen).

Nice to see someone who is so stylish, what with the cape, goggles, and hot air balloon, agreeing with me:

Link

Not a Surprise

Remember when the various gig companies bought a proposition on the California ballot in order to take away their employees' rights?

The law, Proposition 22.  Replaced worker rights with phony weak tea protections.

Guess what?  Even those watered down provisions are not being enforced.  In fact there is nowhere that an abused employee can file a complaint with if the law is being violated.

My guess?  Various California politicos get a lot of money from Silly-Con Valley tech bros:

Nearly four years after California voters approved better wages and health benefits for ride-hailing drivers and delivery workers, no one is actually ensuring they are provided, according to state agencies, interviews with workers and a review of wage claims filed with the state.

Voters mandated the benefits in November 2020 when they approved Proposition 22. The ballot initiative was backed by gig-work companies that wanted to keep their workers classified as independent contractors and were resisting a 2019 state law that would have considered them employees. Prop. 22 stipulated that gig workers would remain independent contractors but be treated better.

The state Industrial Relations Department, which handles wage claims, now tells CalMatters it does not have jurisdiction to resolve those related to Prop. 22, citing a July 25 California Supreme Court ruling that upheld the law and therefore maintains that gig workers are not employees. That effectively passes enforcement responsibility on to the state attorney general, whose office was noncommittal when asked about its plans, saying that it does not adjudicate individual claims but does prosecute companies that systematically violate the law.

The lack of enforcement leaves in limbo workers who in many cases have already been waiting for months or years for the state to resolve their complaints. Workers have filed 54 claims related to Prop. 22 since it went into effect in December 2020. At least 32 of them are unresolved, state records obtained by CalMatters show, although at least two of those are due to workers not following through.

We knew that this would happen.  The business model of Uber and Lyft and Instacart is not as a platform, nor is it providing rides or delivering groceries:  It is defrauding their employee.

Damn!

NOOO!!!!

James Earl Jones has died at the age of 93.

It is impossible summarize his career, from his roll as Jack Jefferson in The Great White Hope, Lt Lothar Zogg in Dr. Strangelove, Darth Vader in Star Wars, the King in Coming to America, Admiral Greek in The Hunt for Red October,  Terence Mann in Field of Dreams, etc.

And then there was his voice.

We will not see his like any time soon.

Oh, the Poor Babies

The New York City Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association has a sad over a bill that would require cops to carry their own liability insurance.

I literally could not give less of a sh$# about their feelings about this.

You have a culture, and a contract, that makes any sort of accountability nearly impossible, so it's time to fight your evil with the evil if the insurance companies.

There are a lot of indicators that can find a likely bad cop, but police departments almost universally refuse to use this data.

Insurance companies will use this data, and jack up the rates for high rise officers.

What's more, they keep track of the cops that bounce from department to department following incidents.

Normally bad cops cost the taxpayer.  Let them pay their own way 

One of many ideas floated as a solution to police misconduct issues is the requirement that officers carry their own insurance. Almost every law enforcement officer is currently indemnified by the towns and cities that employ them, ensuring they’re never personally responsible for any judgments or settlements stemming from their misconduct.

And that’s a very small percentage of civil rights lawsuits. Far more frequently, officers are allowed to walk away from these lawsuits with application of qualified immunity, a Supreme Court-created doctrine that says officers can’t be held accountable if any “reasonable” officer would not have immediately understood their actions violated constitutional rights.

The liability insurance theory goes like this: officers who become uninsurable due to multiple lawsuits will become unemployable. Given that most law enforcement agencies currently do as little as possible to discipline officers who engage in rights violations and misconduct, any nudge of the needle towards the accountability ideal is welcome.

 

Took Charlie to his Birthday Dinner Tonight

His birthday is actually on September 10, but he will be back home in Gaithersburg.

He's turning 25, and I think this will be his first birthday where he isn't home.

I feel old.

Both Inevitable and Justified

It appears that activists are distributing information that would allow for anyone to make some of the most expensive medications in the world themselves.

A case in point is Sofosbuvir (brand name Sovaldi), which is at this point the only drug which cures Hepatitis C, which sells for $1,000.00 a pill but can be made in a relatively simple home lab for $0.87 a pill, a 114,943% markup.

This means that the treatment regimen can be had for less than $100.00, as opposed to almost $100,000.00.

Drug patents have gotten out of hand, and it needs to stop:

I’ve been video chatting with Mixæl Swan Laufer for about 30 minutes about an exciting discovery when he points out that to date, the best way he’s been able to bring attention to his organization is “the old school method of me performing a bunch of federal felonies on stage in front of a bunch of people.”

I stop him and ask: “In this case, what are the felonies?”

“Well, the list is pretty long,” he said.

Laufer is the chief spokesperson of Four Thieves Vinegar Collective, an anarchist collective that has spent the last few years teaching people how to make DIY versions of expensive pharmaceuticals at a tiny fraction of the cost. Four Thieves Vinegar Collective call what they do “right to repair for your body.”

Laufer has become well known for handing out DIY pills and medicines at hacking conferences, which include, for example, courses of the abortion drug misoprostol that can be manufactured for 89 cents (normal cost: $160) and which has become increasingly difficult to obtain in some states following the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs.

In our call, Laufer had just explained that Four Thieves’ had made some miscalculations as part of its latest project, to create instructions for replicating sofosbuvir (Sovaldi), a miracle drug that cures hepatitis C, which he planned to explain and reveal at the DEF CON hacking conference.

Unlike many other drugs that treat viruses, Sovaldi does not suppress hepatitis C, a virus that kills roughly 250,000 people around the world each year. It cures it.

“Normally you have a virus, and your body fights it off or your body fights it to a standstill and you just have it forever, basically, and hope it remains dormant more or less,” Laufer said. “The holy grail for every virologist is to find a way to drain the viral reservoir, and Sovaldi does this. You take one pill of Sovaldi a day for 12 weeks and then you don’t have hepatitis C anymore.”

The problem is that those pills are under patent, and they cost $1,000 per pill.

“Literally, if you have $84,000 then hepatitis C is not your problem anymore,” Laufer said. “But given that there are other methodologies for managing hepatitis C that are not curing it and that are cheaper, insurance typically will not cover [Sovaldi]. And so we’ve got this incredible technology and it’s sitting on the shelf except for people who are ridiculously wealthy.”

So Four Thieves Vinegar Collective set out to teach people how to make their own version of Sovaldi. Chemists at the collective thought the DIY version would cost about $300 for the entire course of medication, or about $3.57 per pill. But they were wrong. “It’s actually just a little under $70 (83 cents per pill), which just kind of blew my mind when they finally showed me the results,” Laufer said. “I was like, can we do the math here again?”

Our current IP regime, particularly with regard to pharmaceuticals does not work.

Furthermore, it runs counter to the Constitutional requirements of such a system, (Article I, Section 8, Clause 8) "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

This sort of looting and rent seeking does not promote the, "Progress of Science and useful Arts," it promotes corrupt business models.

Patent and copyright are a tax on the rest of us that is provided in order to benefit the public.

Our current IP regime does not do this.

Of Course There Is No Legal Basis, It’s Peter Thiel

The National Health Service (NHS) in the UK is trying to create what it calls a, "Federated Data Platform," to manage information in its sprawling healthcare system.

They contracted this out to Palantir Systems, the data analytics firm that has been notorious for opaque deals with intelligence and law enforcement agencies to engage in spying that would not be legal for its clients to conduct themselves.

It appears that critical parts of this program have no legal basis, according to both internal legal documents and lawsuits filed by privacy advocates.

This is not a surprise.  Thiel is a lawless individual who has expressed his contempt for the NHS, so abusing a few tens of millions of Brits is of no concern to him:

NHS England has received advice from lawyers saying key aspects of its controversial Federated Data Platform (FDP) lack a legal basis, meaning that unless a solution is found, it must allow citizens to opt out of sharing their data.

The FDP is being built by US spy-tech biz Palantir following the award of a £330 million seven-year contract by NHS England, a non-departmental public body under the Department of Health and Social Care. The total four-year budget for the project is actually £485 million, The Register revealed weeks ago.

In December last year, a group of campaign organizations led by Foxglove began preparing a legal challenge alleging there is no lawful basis to create the FDP, as described in procurement documents, within the current legal directions used to obtain and share data within the NHS.

At the time an NHS spokesperson said: "This letter fundamentally misunderstands how the Federated Data Platform will operate and is totally incorrect in both matters of law and fact."

However, documents shared with the FDP board in March show that NHS England had received legal advice showing a vital aspect of the program – its privacy-enhancing technology (PET), to be provided by IQVIA – lacked a legal footing to proceed.

Board documents seen by The Register state that NHS England got the advice from King's Counsel – its team of barristers – that PET "will require a separate lawful basis to process PCD [personal confidential data]."

It adds that unless NHS England finds a solution, it will have to offer all patients the opportunity to opt out of sharing their data with the FDP under the current legislation for the control of patient information (Section 251 of the National Health Service Act 2006).

Given that the plan was started under the Tories, who have been trying to destroy Britain's socialized healthcare system for (checks notes) 76 years, in part by gradually privatizing its core functions.

The fact that it has been outsourced to one of the most privacy hostile business in the world is just icing on the cake.

Good Policy and Good Politics

Consumer advocates are asking the FTC to ban product downgrades on already sold products.

You know, when Amazon demands a surcharge to not show ads on your digital picture frame, and then shows ads, or when Peleton retroactively places a charge on resold exercise bikes, or when an educational products company starts charges parents for access after selling it to the school system for a single low price, or pretty much anything Elon Musk sells.

This would be a good thing.  The whole, "You'll own nothing and you'll be happy," business model is an exercise in defrauding the consumer:(So is HP's program of locking out 3rd party printer supplies)

Consumer and digital rights activists are calling on the US Federal Trade Commission to stop device-makers using software to reduce product functionality, bricking unloved kit, or adding surprise fees post-purchase.

In an eight-page letter [PDF] to the Commission (FTC), the activists mentioned the Google/Levis collaboration on a denim jacket that contained sensors enabling it to control an Android device through a special app. When the app was discontinued in 2023, the jacket lost that functionality. The letter also mentions the "Car Thing," an automotive infotainment device created by Spotify, which bricked the device fewer than two years after launch and didn't offer a refund.

Another example highlighted is the $1,695 Snoo connected bassinet, manufactured by an outfit named Happiest Baby. Kids outgrow bassinets, yet Happiest Baby this year notified customers that if they ever sold or gave away their bassinets, the device’s next owner would have to pay a new $19.99 monthly subscription fee to keep certain features. Activists argue that reduces the resale value of the devices.

Signatories to the letter include individuals from Consumer Reports, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, teardown artists iFixit, and the Software Freedom Conservancy. Environmental groups and computer repair shops also signed the letter.

The FTC acting on this should be a no-brainer.

It's good policy, and GREAT politics.  Everyone hates it when manufacturers pull this crap on them.

This Is Not Taking the Time to Do It Right

You may recall that after a series of problems with Boeing aircraft, including a fuselage plug falling off mid-flight, Boeing has promised slow down production to focus on safety.

It appears that they are already reneging on this deal, pushing 777s through the factory as quickly as possible ahead of a threatened strike.

I think that their agreement with regulators, as well as their public statements, did not include a, "Backsies," clause:

For months, Boeing’s leadership has claimed repeatedly that slowing the pace of jet production and renewing the focus on inspections will ensure production quality. As a potential strike by 33,000 machinists looms next week, that’s not the reality mechanics see inside Boeing’s widebody jet plant in Everett.

Managers there are currently pushing partially assembled 777 jets through the assembly line, leaving tens of thousands of unfinished jobs due to defects and parts shortages to be completed out of sequence on each airplane, according to three people working directly on 777 assembly.

Though the production rate of 777 jets is at a crawl, with a total of just 11 deliveries so far this year, employees describe a chaotic workplace.

Mechanics are chasing airplanes through the Everett factory to install systems that should have gone in earlier and to complete rework of defects on 777 cargo planes that have traveled far down the assembly line and even outside onto the Paine Field flight line, said a veteran 777 mechanic who works on fuselages.

At the 737 MAX plant in Renton, Boeing has said it is severely limiting such “traveled work,” which requires installing parts out of the normal assembly sequence. The practice contributed to the Alaska Airlines door plug blowout in January.

“It’s not the way the hourly workers want to do business,” said the veteran mechanic, alarmed by the state of 777 production. “We’re shooting ourselves in the foot.”

A longtime 777 quality inspector in Everett — who, like the other employees quoted here, requested anonymity because he feared retaliation — said Boeing has moved new inspectors onto the assembly line who are unfamiliar with the work.

If someone wants to save Boeing, they need to fire all senior executives, ban stock buy backs, and install an independent monitor to address crap like this.

Well, It Didn't Blow Up

The #Starliner spacecraft is back on Earth.

At 12:01am ET Sept. 7, @BoeingSpace’s uncrewed Starliner spacecraft landed in White Sands Space Harbor, New Mexico. pic.twitter.com/vTYvgPONVc

— NASA Commercial Crew (@Commercial_Crew) September 7, 2024

The Boeing Starliner capsule undocked from the ISS and landed successfully at White Sands in New Mexico.

It was unmanned, and the astronauts who were originally supposed to be at the space station will now be returning early next year.

What a clusterf%$#.

Joke of the Day

Stranger:	Why you wearing a mask?
Me:	I’m getting into character for a film I’ll be starring in.
Stranger:	What character are you playing?
Me:	A survivor of a zombie apocalypse.
Strannger:	Sounds like a cool sci-fi movie.
Me:	It’s actually a documentary.

I am still masking, and I am continuing to have exactly this sort of conversation on a regular basis, albeit with a bit less sarcasm.

Monthly Jobs Report Today ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

See az Trend in NFP>


Unemployment Rate (U-3)Job growth was 142,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate fell by .1% to 4.2%.

You need around a 125,000 - 150,000 increase in the non-farm payroll to keep place with natural growth of the labor market, so this is at best flat.

Employers added 142,000 jobs in August, continuing a labor market cooling trend that has stoked fears that interest rates have been high for too long.

The unemployment rate ticked down to 4.2 percent.

The August jobs report released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics was among the most closely watched snapshots of the labor market since the coronavirus pandemic. The jobs gains were weaker than forecasters’ predictions of 161,000 jobs, but improved on July’s weak showing of 114,000. Still, downward revisions from the two previous months suggest that the labor market is cooling faster than the initial data may indicate.

Analysts were watching to see if the unemployment rate spike in July was a mere data quirk or indicative of a broader slowdown in the labor market. Data from August hints that July’s weaknesses were mostly a one-off, as temporary layoffs declined by 190,000, offsetting an increase in the prior month. Federal Reserve officials will be using the data to steer interest rate cuts later this month. And the presidential candidates will be looking to the report to make their case for who is better for the economy.

Wage growth was good, 3.8% year over year, which beats inflation, which is good, but the NFP numbers in June and July were revised down by 86,000.

My prediction stands, the Fed will lower rates by 25 basis points (¼%) at their next meeting.

I think that we are already in a downturn, and that the numbers will be getting worse.

Another Day, Another School Shooting

At Joppatowne High School, about 30 miles from my house, one dead.

This sh%$ needs to stop:

A 15-year-old Joppatowne High School student died after being shot in the chest Friday during an altercation in the school, according to Harford County authorities, who arrested a 16-year-old suspect.

Warren Curtis Grant died in a hospital Friday afternoon after being shot during the dispute in a first-story bathroom, Harford County Sheriff Jeff Gahler said at a Friday afternoon news conference. Police did not identify the suspect, a 16-year-old Joppatowne High student, noting they would release his name once he is formally charged as an adult, which Gahler said could be expected later Friday or Saturday morning.

Officers responded to the school at about 12:36 p.m. after the single shot struck the teenaged victim in the chest, Gahler said. The suspect fled the school grounds, and Grant was dragged out of the bathroom by other students. The wounded 15-year-old was tended to by school personnel, including a nurse, a resource officer and Principal Melissa Williams, before being airlifted to Johns Hopkins Hospital in serious condition, Gahler said during another news conference earlier Friday afternoon.

If I hear one more idiot offer, "Thoughts and Prayers," to the victims and the victims' families, my head might explode.

Filed Under, "Gee, You Think?"

It appears that people who run computer systems for companies have discovered that the honeymoon is over, and the monopolists at Amazon, Google, and Microsoft are aggressively raising prices for cloud services.

This sort of sh%$ is why people moved to PCs in the first place:

After an initial euphoric rush to the cloud, administrators are questioning the value and promise of the tech giants' services.

According to a report published by UK cloud outfit Civo, more than a third of organizations surveyed reckoned that their move to the cloud had failed to live up to promises of cost-effectiveness. Over half reported a rise in their cloud bill.

Although the survey, unsurprisingly, paints Civo in a flattering light, some of its figures may make uncomfortable reading for customers sold on the promises from hyperscalers. Like-for-like comparisons for a simple three-node cluster with 200 GB of persistent storage and a 5 TB data transfer showed prices going from $1,278.58 in 2022 to $1,458.68 in 2024 on Microsoft Azure.

For Google, the price went from $1,107.61 to $1,250.35. According to Civo's figures, the cost at AWS increased from $1,142.46 to $1,234.59.

Just as an FYI, this is 14.1% for Microsoft, 12.9% for Google, and 8.1% for Amazon.

As an aside, it seems to me that anyone managing IT for an enterprise had better be damn sure that they are not locked into a single provider.

They need to be able to move to local machines, or another cloud provider on a few days notice.

It's Thursday ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Short version, initial unemployment claims fell, which was a better than expected result, but a Challenger, Gray, and Christmas report shows a surge in layoffs.

The number of Americans filing new applications for jobless benefits declined last week as layoffs remained low, helping to allay fears that the labor market was deteriorating.

The weekly jobless claims report from the Labor Department on Thursday, the most timely data on the economy's health, also showed unemployment rolls shrinking to levels last seen in mid-June. It reduces the urgency for the Federal Reserve to deliver a 50 basis points interest rate cut this month.

Economists shrugged off other data showing private employers hired the smallest number of workers in August. Most expect the U.S. central bank to kick off its easing cycle with a quarter-point rate reduction as domestic demand remains solid. A step-down in hiring, which pushed the unemployment rate to near a three-year high of 4.3% in July rattled investors and fanned concerns that a recession was stalking the economy.

"There are signs of a slowdown in hiring with fewer job openings, but until payroll jobs actually decline there is no recession," said Christopher Rupkey, chief economist at FWDBONDS. "At the moment, it does not look like the Fed is behind the curve."

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped by 5,000 to a seasonally adjusted 227,000 for the week ended Aug. 31, the lowest level since early July. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 230,000 claims for the latest week.

Continuing claims fell by 2,000 to 1.838 million the best number since the start of Summer.

That all looks good, but as I noted above, layoffs rose a lot in August:

U.S. employers in August unveiled the greatest number of layoffs in five months, led by cuts in the technology sector, amid a cloudy outlook for growth and ongoing cost concerns, a monthly tally of workforce reduction announcements showed on Thursday.

Firms announced 75,891 layoffs last month, roughly triple the number in July and the largest month-to-month increase in a year, outplacement firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas said. Still, announced staff reductions are down 3.7% year to date.

"August's surge in job cuts reflects growing economic uncertainty and shifting market dynamics. Companies are facing a variety of pressures, from rising operational costs to concerns about a potential economic slowdown, leading them to make tough decisions about workforce management," Challenger Vice President Andrew Challenger said in a statement.

My take is that the official numbers, which come out tomorrow, for the non farm payroll will be rather grim.

It appears to be a lock that the Fed will lower interest rates at its next meeting, but I am still predicting a 25 basis point (¼%) cut, not a 50 basis point cut.

Quote of the Day

There’s This Hysteria That We Apparently Have a Gang Problem, but What We Have Is a Slumlord Problem in the City of Aurora

—Aurora City Councilwoman Alison Coombs as quoted by the Denver Post

A slumlord operating buildings in Aurora, Coloradowho has been sued by multiple times by the city of Aurora as well as by current and former tenants.

They have been so bad at this that the city has already closed down one of the apartments operated by CBZ Management, LLC. (They have refused to provide legally mandated assistance to the tenants evicted as a result)

In response to their cruelty and greed, they hired a PR firm and started claiming that the problem was that Venezuelan criminal gangs had taken over the complexes.

Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman (a Republican) made extensive statements to this effect, as has the Donald Trump campaign.

As to CBZ management, they are located in Brooklyn, New York, and the owner is Zev Baumgarten, and two other senior managers are Shalom Baumgarten and Shmary Baumgarten.

Yeah, these jerks are Jewish.  It's a Shanda Fur die Goyim.

As Shalom Alechem once wrote, "Shver TSU Zayn a Yid (שװער צו זײן א איד)."*

They have used these claims to get delays in its trials.

CBZ is run by horrible people, and should be shunned by all people of good will:

The frenzy over a Venezuelan gang’s presence in Aurora reached a fever pitch over the holiday weekend, fueled in part by viral video of men with guns knocking on an apartment door and by a presidential election in which immigration and border security will be key issues for voters.

Right-wing social media influencers and citizen journalists seized on video shared by Denver’s Fox31 television station showing armed men at an Aurora apartment complex, often adding their own captions and commentary, as it made the rounds on TikTok, X and Facebook.

Even former President Donald Trump weighed in during a podcast interview, repeating unverified claims that gangs were taking over big buildings with “big rifles” in the city.

Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman appeared on national TV and posted about the Venezuelan gang on his Facebook page, contradicting his police chief about the severity of the situation, and saying the city was preparing to go to court to get a judge’s order to clear out the apartment complexes where the Tren de Aragua gang operates. However, city staff on Tuesday said that is not the immediate plan.

Aurora and Denver police have publicly acknowledged there are Tren de Aragua gang members in their cities, but they say the gang’s numbers are not large and they operate in isolated areas. Others say the Tren de Aragua presence in Aurora, a city of nearly 400,000 people, has been overhyped.

“Those stories are really overblown. If you didn’t live here, you would swear we were being taken over by a gang and Aurora was under siege,” Aurora City Councilwoman Stephanie Hancock said Tuesday. “That’s simply not true.”

………

“There’s this hysteria that we apparently have a gang problem, but what we have is a slumlord problem in the city of Aurora,” City Councilwoman Alison Coombs said.

This makes me sick to my stomach.

^*It's tough to be a Jew.

Neologism of the Day

Sanewashing

(I really wish that the blink tag was still around)

Best defined as, "What mainstream journalists do when they paraphrase the insane rantings of Donald John Trump to make them appear to be coherent policies."

Needless to say, this is a mark of journalistic dysfunction.  (I'm talking to you, New York Times) 

Four years ago, in an article for Media Matters for America, I warned that journalists were sanitizing Donald Trump’s incoherent ramblings to make them more palatable for the average voter. The general practice went like this: The press would take something Trump said or did—for instance, using a visit to the Centers for Disease Control to ask about Fox News’s ratings, insult then–Washington Governor Jay Inslee, rant about his attempt to extort Ukraine into digging up dirt on Joe Biden, and downplay the rising number of Covid-19 cases in the U.S.—and write them up as The New York Times did: “Trump Says ‘People Have to Remain Calm’ Amid Coronavirus Outbreak.” This had the effect of making it seem like Trump’s words and actions seemed cogent and sensible for the vast majority of Americans who didn’t happen to watch his rant live.

Flash-forward to today, and it’s clear this problem has only worsened. As Trump’s statements grow increasingly unhinged in his old age, major news outlets continue to reframe his words, presenting a dangerously misleading picture to the public.

For instance, last week, Trump posted the following to his Truth Social account:

I have reached an agreement with the Radical Left Democrats for a Debate with Comrade Kamala Harris. It will be Broadcast Live on ABC FAKE NEWS, by far the nastiest and most unfair newscaster in the business, on Tuesday, September 10th, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Rules will be the same as the last CNN Debate, which seemed to work out well for everyone except, perhaps, Crooked Joe Biden. The Debate will be “stand up,” and Candidates cannot bring notes, or “cheat sheets.” We have also been given assurance by ABC that this will be a “fair and equitable” Debate, and that neither side will be given the questions in advance (No Donna Brazile!). Harris would not agree to the FoxNews Debate on September 4th, but that date will be held open in case she changes her mind or, Flip Flops, as she has done on every single one of her long held and cherished policy beliefs. A possible third Debate, which would go to NBC FAKE NEWS, has not been agreed to by the Radical Left. GOD BLESS AMERICA!

CNN described that rambling, insult-laden, conspiracy-riddled wall of text—itself a pretty good example of what he spends his time off the campaign trail doing—by writing, “Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced he has ‘reached an agreement’ to participate in a September 10 debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, noting that ‘the rules will be the same as the last CNN debate, which seemed to work out well for everyone.’”

Does that really capture what Trump posted?

………

This “sanewashing” of Trump’s statements isn’t just poor journalism; it’s a form of misinformation that poses a threat to democracy. By continually reframing Trump’s incoherent and often dangerous rhetoric as conventional political discourse, major news outlets are failing in their duty to inform the public and are instead providing cover for increasingly erratic behavior from a former—and potentially future—president.

Seriously, this is why I try to get my news from non-US sources.