Skip to main content

REWIND - A Week of Quotes and Cartoons

Wage theft, foreclosures, Karzai's petty cash,Gitmo, austerity and more ...

REWIND - A Week of Quotes and Cartoons

SUNDAY

Quote of the Day
April 28, 2013

'Americans like to think that a fair day's work brings a fair day's pay. Cheating workers of their wages may seem like a problem of 19th-century sweatshops. But it's back and taking a terrible toll. We're talking billions of dollars in wages; millions of workers affected each year. A gigantic heist is being perpetrated against working people: they're getting screwed on overtime, denied their tips, shortchanged on benefits, defrauded on payroll, and handed paychecks that bounce like rubber balls. A conservative estimate of unpaid overtime alone shows that it costs workers at least $19 billion per year.'

Lynn Stuart Parramore
AlterNet
April 28, 2013
 

Toon of the Day

7 Epic Congressional Fails
Brian McFadden - New York Times


MONDAY

Quote of the Day

If you like this article, please sign up for Snapshot, Portside's daily summary.

(One summary e-mail a day, you can change anytime, and Portside is always free.)

'All of this just confirms what we already suspected about the foreclosure settlement. This whole enterprise was conceived by the government solely as a means of dealing with the explosive problem of containing the private liability of these "systemically important" companies. Not only are we not prosecuting these firms anymore, we're also actively in the business of protecting them from litigation.

'No other conclusion is possible from this testimony, which shows that our two primary regulators not only withheld information about bank illegality and errors prior to the settlement, but plan on continuing to do so going forward. There can be only one reason for concealing that information from the people affected by those "errors".'

Matt Taibbi
Rolling Stone
April 26, 2013
 

Toon of the Day

http://media.cagle.com/95/2013/04/26/130871_600.jpg

McCain in the Cockpit
Dave Granlund


TUESDAY

Quote of the Day

'We've all suspected it. But for President Karzai to admit it out loud brings us into a bizarro world.'

Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah)
on report that  Afghan President
Hamid Karzai has acknowledged
that the U.S. Central Intelligence
Agency has been dropping off
bags of cash at his office for a
decade

New York Times
April 30, 2013

Toon of the Day

http://www.cartoonistgroup.com/properties/signe/art_images/cg517fb4822918e.jpg

Bangladesh Profits
Signe Wilkinson


WEDNESDAY

Quote of the Day

'I think of how many, and not just young people, are unemployed, many times due to a purely economic conception of society, which seeks selfish profit, beyond the parameters of social justice.'

Pope Francis in May Day appeal for
governments to tackle unemployment,
as 'work is fundamental to
the dignity of a person.'

Reuters
May1, 2013
 

Toon of the Day
http://www.trbimg.com/img-517f6806/turbine/la-na-tt-koch-brothers-20130429-001/600
The Kidder
David Horsey - Los AngelesTimes

THURSDAY

Quote of the Day
May 2, 2013

'Trickle-down economics is the first cousin of
austerity economics. Austerity is nuts when so
many millions are out of work. And as we've learned
before, trickle-down is a fraud. Nothing ever trickles
down.'

Economist Robert Reich

blog

Toon of the Day

http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ucomics.com/roge130502.gif

Waterboarding Billy
Rob Rogers - Pittsburgh Post Gazette


FRIDAY

Quote of the Day
May 3, 2013

'Obama’s inability to redeem his 2008 campaign promise to close Gitmo is not all his fault: Congress imposed roadblocks, including a prohibition on giving the prisoners civilian trials. But it is a real failure of presidential leadership even so, given Obama's many missed opportunities, including his weirdly passive refusal to be proactive in dealing with the 86 inmates who've been cleared by our own intelligence agencies for transfer out. It’s hard to see how he can let the status quo, or anything like it, stand now. This pointless facility has long been a blight on our national security; its mockery of our country’s ostensible humanitarian and legal principles serves as a rallying cry for anti-American rage throughout the world. The notion of American doctors force-feeding prisoners who want to kill themselves is a further danger to the nation’s interests even leaving aside the moral calamity. And Obama has the political clout to take action: Though his approval ratings are lately lackluster (at 47 percent), a new Times-CBS News poll shows that 56 percent of voters approve of his handling of terrorism. (The same poll shows that only 24 percent want America to intervene in Syria.) For all the roseate nostalgia that greeted the opening of the Bush Presidential Library last week, we are no longer in Bush and Cheney’s America. As far as Guantánamo goes, Obama can ignore the neo-con dead-enders of the McCain-Graham school and start using the executive powers he has weirdly neglected so far; he can lobby Congress on the rest. He’s in a race against time, and staying pat, or settling for the noble rhetoric he provided yesterday, are not options. “All of us should reflect on why exactly are we doing this,” he said. “Why are we doing this?” Well, hello — it’s past time for the president to end his own reflection and answer the damn question.'

Columnist Frank Rich
New York Magazine
May 2, 2013
 

Toon of the Day

http://assets.amuniversal.com/a7d5501093380130337b001dd8b71c47

Deflecting Blame
Jen Sorensen


SATURDAY

Quote of the Day
 

'The C.I.A.'s station chief here met with President Hamid Karzai on Saturday, and the Afghan leader said he had been assured the agency would continue dropping off stacks of cash at his office despite a storm of criticism that has erupted since the payments were disclosed.

'The C.I.A. money, Mr. Karzai told reporters, was "an easy source of petty cash," and he suggested that some of it was used to pay off warlords and power brokers.'

New York Times
May 4, 2013
 

Toon of the Day

http://media.cagle.com/53/2013/05/02/131155_600.jpg

BanglaTexas
Pat Bagley - Salt Lake Tribune