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Saturday, May 28, 2005
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Indian call staff quit over abuse on the line.
Indian call staff quit over abuse on the line Amelia Gentleman | New
Delhi | May 29The Observer - Abuse from British and American customers
is driving increasing numbers of Indian call centre workers from their
jobs, defeated by the strain of handling persistent rudeness. Irate
customers was cited as one of the main industry stress factors in a
recent survey of call centre staff and some organisations have begun
employing psychiatrists and counsellors to help employees to cope.
[The Agonist]
11:05:38 PM 
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What Are They Hiding?.
Hunter mentions this article, but I'd like to focus on the possible compromise: One
of John R. Bolton's leading Republican backers, Senator John McCain of
Arizona, signaled his support on Friday for a compromise in which the
White House might allow Senate leaders access to highly classified
documents in return for a final vote early next month on Mr. Bolton's
nomination as United Nations ambassador. This is good. This is
a compromise where the Dems get what they want - the documents they
requested. But the White House has other ideas: "The
Democrats who are clamoring for this have already voted against John
Bolton," Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman, said in a
telephone interview. "This is about partisan politics, not documents. They have the information they need." But Frist asked for the documents too: The
aide, who would speak only without being identified when discussing
conversations between the two leaders, also said Dr. Frist had
intervened with the administration to try to get an intelligence
briefing that would satisfy opponents of the nomination. This is about the White House hiding documents from the Senate: Mr.
Biden and Mr. Dodd [succeeded] in convincing fellow Democrats in dozens
of phone calls that the vote was not about Mr. Bolton but about
standing up for the Senate and its prerogatives against incursions by
the executive branch. So Frist, McCain and the Democrats think it is reasonable and right for the White House to turn over the requested documents.
What is the White House hiding? That is the question EVERY self
respecting reporter in Washington should be asking themselves right
now. Let's see if ANYBODY asks that question tomorrow morning on the
Sunday shows. They won't - proving that the Media is simply incompetent.
[Daily Kos]
11:03:58 PM
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Filibuster post mortem.
Mark Kleiman is absolutely right: What I'm sure of is that the deal
makes no Constitutional sense.Either the Constitution allows
filibusters to block judicial appointments, or it forbids such
filibusters. (It seems to me impossible to distinguish between
judicial-nomination filibusters...
[Majikthise]
7:09:07 PM
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David Francis on Mobility and Inequality.
Mark Thoma reads the Christian Science Monitor, and finds a good
article: Economist's View: Is The American Dream Fading?: This article
discusses the decline in income mobility in recent decades and asks if
the US "...is becoming less of a meritocracy, where skill and
intelligence determine success, and... more of a class-bound
society...": The American Dream gains a harder edge, By David R.
Francis, CSMonitor.com: The American dream, at least on the economic
side, is fading.... Today... nearly 1 in 5 American households has zero
net worth or actually owes more than it owns. And the odds of a son or
daughter rising above their parents in such a financial predicament
have shrunk. 'Income mobility has declined in the last 20 years,' says
Bhashkar Mazumder, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
What that means is that the US is becoming less of a meritocracy, where
skill and intelligence determine success, and becoming more of a
class-bound society, where economic background, including the better
education money can provide, matters more.... Most Americans don't
believe that to be true, surveys show. But academic studies suggest
that income mobility in the US is no better than that in France or...
[Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal]
10:05:18 AM
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Well, that didn't go very well, did it? Go read Suzanne Nossel on
Bolton's lack of leadership leading to the US losing control of the
agenda at the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference, which
wrapped up yesterday. Bolton didn't prepare...
[War and Piece]
10:03:14 AM
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Failing upward
Flowers in the street
Analysts Behind Iraq Intelligence Were Rewarded
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, May 28, 2005; Page A01
Two
Army analysts whose work has been cited as part of a key intelligence
failure on Iraq -- the claim that aluminum tubes sought by the Baghdad
government were most likely meant for a nuclear weapons program rather
than for rockets -- have received job performance awards in each of the
past three years, officials said.
The
civilian analysts, former military men considered experts on foreign
and U.S. weaponry, work at the Army's National Ground Intelligence
Center (NGIC), one of three U.S. agencies singled out for particular
criticism by President Bush's commission that investigated U.S.
intelligence.
As long as you tell Bush what he wants to hear, you will be rewarded. So do you think Bush really understands the war in Iraq?
[The News Blog]
7:55:10 AM
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Yes, I Would Like FRENCH Fries With That!.
I think it wonderful when a member of the wrong-wing publicly atones
for an error of his ways. Take Representative Walter Beaman Jones Jr. -
PLEASE! While representing the Third Congressional District of North
Carolina [PDF] - the most gerrymandered...
[The Left Coaster]
7:53:55 AM
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Friedman: Torture is so unattractive.
Guest post by Donald Johnson
Tom Friedman wrote one of his very rare columns on the torture issue
today. It's the type of argument one expects from him -- we should
close Gitmo because it is a tremendous PR problem...
[Body and Soul]
4:20:17 AM
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Been in so long it looks like down to me.
The Marines dropped all charges yesterday against one of their own who
admits he shot and killed two unarmed Iraqis and propped a scornful
cardboard sign nearby as a warning to others: The killings occurred on
April 15, 2004, near...
[Body and Soul]
4:19:03 AM
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Bob Rubin on Social Security.
From The Hill: Rubin urges Democrats not to reveal their hand: Former
Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, the steward of President Clinton's
economic policy, told the House Democratic Caucus yesterday that it
needs to continue to "hold firm"... and advised the Democrats not to
introduce their own plan, according to aides and lawmakers in the
meeting. Rubin, who has gained huge stature in the party for presiding
over the national finances during the Clinton boom years, counseled
congressional Democrats against engaging Republicans on specifics. He
urged them instead to cast the debate in terms of principles.... In a
sweeping review of the fiscal health of the country, the strength of
the dollar and international trade, Rubin said that Social Security
ranks third behind deficit reduction and Medicare reform as the most
important economic policy issue facing the country. He also warned his
fellow Democrats that they would need to work in a bipartisan manner
with Republicans to address Medicare's deep problems.... "From a
political standpoint, [Rubin] said, hold firm because you have a
difference in principles; their principle is a privatization plan, ours
is not to add to the deficit, and there's not a whole lot of room for
compromise. 'They...
[Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal]
3:08:17 AM
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Why Oh Why Are We Ruled by These Liars? (George W. Bush Smirks Edition).
Kevin Drum's shrillness level exceeds aleph-null: The Washington
Monthly: "George Bush's rhetorical stance is that democracy is on the
march and 138,000 troops are more than enough to get the job done in
Iraq. He knows perfectly well this isn't true, but in public he just
smirks and says that he'd be happy to send more troops over if any of
his generals asked for them.... George Bush... [is] one of the
shrewdest politicians to inhabit the Oval Office in a long time, but he
doesn't sound like he's being shrewd. He sounds like he really believes
that our current troop strength is perfectly adequate. So what's the
answer? As Juan Cole says, 'Sometimes You are Just Screwed.' Bush knows
near term success is impossible with current troops levels, just as he
knows that his economic policies are unsustainable as well. In both
cases, he seems to be hoping only that he can avoid disaster during the
next three years and then hand off both problems to his successor in
2009 while he retires to the ranch. Politics doesn't get much more
cynical than that....
[Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal]
3:07:14 AM
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Electricity in Iraq. Jim Henley notes:
Unqualified Offerings: Tim Lambert's tabular history of the "good news"
on the [Iraq] electricity front is a useful contribution to the field.
His summary: Due to lack of maintenance, electricity production fell
from 9000 MW in 1991 to 4400 MW before the war. Since then, there have
been many announcements of improved generating capacity and production
has fallen further to 3560 MW. Sadly, Dana Gioia's poem, "News from
1984," is not online....
[Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal]
3:05:22 AM
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Jim Henley Has Some Good Advice.
He tells us:
Things That Surely Go Without Saying But Don't:
Beating captives to death does not exhaust the list of "abuses" one can
commit against captives. We know of two people, so far, who had their
legs crippled and were hung from the ceiling until they died. We have
not been discussing the people who had their legs crippled but weren't
hung from the ceiling, the people who were hung from the ceiling and
didn't die, or those who were tortured in other ways at Bagram Air
Base, but what we know makes it pretty clear such people existed. (For
instance people whose legs were beaten, but not to the point of
permanent ruin.) The torture apologists will intone "two people two
years ago" because that's their established method: exaggerate a detail
until it obscures the full story. Don't fall for it. Fire Donald
Rumsfeld. Impeach Richard Cheney. Impeach George W. Bush. Do it now.
[Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal]
3:03:30 AM
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© Copyright
2005
Michael Mussington.
Last update:
6/1/2005; 1:35:28 AM.
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