The Beatles on Doctor Who

Bob Geiger

The Saturday Cartoons

Income Gap Chasm Is Widening

NYT

Income inequality grew significantly in 2005, with the top 1 percent of Americans — those with incomes that year of more than $348,000 — receiving their largest share of national income since 1928, analysis of newly released tax data shows.

The top 10 percent, roughly those earning more than $100,000, also reached a level of income share not seen since before the Depression.

While total reported income in the United States increased almost 9 percent in 2005, the most recent year for which such data is available, average incomes for those in the bottom 90 percent dipped slightly compared with the year before, dropping $172, or 0.6 percent.

The gains went largely to the top 1 percent, whose incomes rose to an average of more than $1.1 million each, an increase of more than $139,000, or about 14 percent.

The new data also shows that the top 300,000 Americans collectively enjoyed almost as much income as the bottom 150 million Americans. Per person, the top group received 440 times as much as the average person in the bottom half earned, nearly doubling the gap from 1980.

friday random ten

Photo by Ryan McManus


"Psychonaut" - DUSTdevils [Extant]

"Bomber" (Motörhead cover) - Girlschool [St. Valentine's Day Massacre EP]

"Morning" - Iowa Super Soccer [Iowa Super Soccer]

"Carnival of Sorts (Boxcars)" - R.E.M. [Chronic Town EP]

"Drunk For Lunch" - The Sheds [You've Got a Light]

"Fist City" -(Loretta Lynn cover) The Meat Purveyors [Someday Soon Things Will Be Much Worse]

"The Lord Hates a Coward" - Future of the Left [Demo]

"Herjazz" - Huggy Bear [Taking the Rough with the Smooch]

"Elvis Is Everywhere" - Mojo Nixon [Unlimited Eveything]

"Epitaph" - Two Cow Garage [Three]

listen

happy birthday erin

Elfgirl Mix II (disc 1)

My Tornado - The Raveonettes
Prole Art Threat - The Fall
My Academic Beard - Salty Pirates
I Don't Need Love, I've Got My Band - The Radio Dept.
He Gets Me So Hard - Boyracer
Love Song - Au Pairs
Dance, Girl, Dance - Cinerama
Frantic - The Lovely Feathers
K To Be Lost - Sister Vanilla
For Spy Turned Musician - The Besnard Lakes
Ears Like Golden Bats - My Teenage Stride
Eleven Miles Out - Doves
Heroes - David Bowie
Baby It's You - Casiotone For the Painfully Alone
Stunner - Charlene

Elfgirl Mix II (disc 2)

Hang On - Snapper
Flowers (live) - The Clean
The Second Line - Clinic
Spinning Round - Red Lorry Yellow Lorry
Half a Day - The New Year
Wild About You - The Saints
A Stare Like Yours - The Thermals
Sucking Ice Cubes - Luna
Homeboy - Adorable
Sun God - Squirrel Bait
Buckle Bunnies - Canoe
Electric Surgery - Experimental Aircraft
Goddess On a Hiway - Mercury Rev
All the Nights To Come - Shoulders
Lets Kill Ourselves - The Ponys

elfgirl mix 2 on Multiply

(streamed audio)

news briefs

The city council in Brooksville, Florida voted this week to advance a proposal granting city officials the authority to place liens and foreclose on the homes of motorists accused of failing to pay a single $5 parking ticket.

Injured Troops Request Extended Tours To Avoid Being Sent To Walter Reed

White House Secret Service Agent Anthony Panucci is being called a hero after intercepting what could have been a critically damaging question aimed directly at President Bush during a press conference in the Rose Garden Tuesday.

Police State

(NYT) City Police Spied Broadly Before G.O.P. Convention

For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention, teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities across the country, Canada and Europe to conduct covert observations of people who planned to protest at the convention, according to police records and interviews.

From Albuquerque to Montreal, San Francisco to Miami, undercover New York police officers attended meetings of political groups, posing as sympathizers or fellow activists, the records show.

[snip]

But potential troublemakers were hardly the only ones to end up in the files. In hundreds of reports stamped “N.Y.P.D. Secret,” the Intelligence Division chronicled the views and plans of people who had no apparent intention of breaking the law, the records show.

These included members of street theater companies, church groups and antiwar organizations, as well as environmentalists and people opposed to the death penalty, globalization and other government policies. Three New York City elected officials were cited in the reports.

In at least some cases, intelligence on what appeared to be lawful activity was shared with police departments in other cities. A police report on an organization of artists called Bands Against Bush noted that the group was planning concerts on Oct. 11, 2003, in New York, Washington, Seattle, San Francisco and Boston. Between musical sets, the report said, there would be political speeches and videos.