Choo to Rangers? What about that Yankees deal, Scott Boras?

Shin-Soo Choo, surely the top free agent left in this market, is NOT going to New York. He's instead headed to the Texas Rangers.

Terms? Reportedly seven years and $130 million. But, wait, what about that 7/$140 offer that agent Scott Boras said the Yankees made and he had Choo decline?

Well, Boras was either lying about that 7/140 contract, or else bluffing, or else Choo doesn't want to be on the big stage.

Wow.

Yeah, some writers are already playing up the "no income tax in Texas" angle. But is New York's income tax THAT bad? Just on straight money value, it would have to be above 7 percent. (New York State's top marginal tax rate is 8.82 percent. Allowing for deductions, exemptions, etc. plus lower rates on submarginal income, and we're probably right about that 7 percent. In other words, a wash.) Plus the Rangers contract doesn't have a full no-trade clause.

So, yeah, writers? Instead of the "no income tax" angle, why not focus on the "Boras slapped down" angle. Given all the money that's awash in this year's free agent market, that's a serious story. This on top of draft choice slotting and other things? It's hard to argue that Boras star isn't, finally, in at least a bit of decline.

On the other hand, Tim Brown of Yahoo says the deal includes (unnamed) bonuses. So, stand by. It may turn out to be a wash. But, it still won't be better; not comparing straight salaries.

As for the Rangers?

Nelson Cruz already seemed out the door. This guarantees it. The Mariners are a likely landing spot, perhaps.

And, a speculative trade with the Dodgers for Andre Ethier is also gone, it would seem. I'm venturing other Rangers moves in days and weeks ahead will be minor, on the salary side.

Choo's OBP proclivity aside, given the speed of Elvis Andrus, I think I bat Choo in the No. 2 hole, if I'm Ron Washington. His walks and plate patience can only help in taking pitches for Andrus. Then Adrian Beltre in the 3 hole and Prince Fielder cleaning up. That also lets Wash do the right-left-right-left to start the lineup.

On the Yankees' side, the firmness with Boras has to mean they still hope to get under the lux tax threshold. It's still doable — but, realistically, only if Bud Selig gets to give Alex Rodriguez the whole year off.

The Yankees' worst nightmare would be arbitrator Fredric Horowitz OKing a 100-game suspension or something. The Yankees would still need a 3B replacement, but have part of A-Rod's contract still like an albatross.

It's official: #H1N1 #swineflu hitting Texas hard

If you're feeling ill right now, and it seems to be kind of severe, there's a good, or not so good reason.

A certain strain of the H1N1 virus, often called "swine flu" because many of its strains hit hogs, is a serious issue.

Serious enough for three confirmed deaths in Houston and one confirmed death in greater Austin with another possible. That Austin link also reports four suspected flu deaths in Montgomery County in exurban Houston. 

Those at risk include the very young, those over 50 and especially the elderly, those with immune or respiratory problems and caregivers.

Folks, with this coming at Christmas, be careful. No matter how long its been since you've seen loved ones, if they're "buggy," be careful with the physical affection.

Two principles of liberalism collide in Duck Dynasty kerfuffle

First, this is NOT censorship, and I'm far from alone in saying that. (And kudos to L.Z. Granderson, whose background is in sportswriting, to note this.) Businesses have the constitutional right to control their company's communications, and in various ways, to control their employees' on the job communications.

And, all sorts of related things. Only governments can engage in censorship. And, too many liberals and conservatives alike get that wrong.

Now, per Charles Pierce, whether a corporation should be able to control OFF the job commenting is another thing entirely. As is whether liberals should support an idea like that, or even self-censorship.

In short, we have the idea of tolerance colliding with the idea of free speech.

Well, free speech USED to be a principle of liberalism.

But, with the surge in New Wave political correctness led by the social justice warrior types, it seems to be less and less that way. And, that's dangerous.

First, I'd rather have life real, than in a cocoon. It's good for Robertson to be honest about his statements, rather than hiding.

Second? Not too long ago, employers would fire employees for making PRO-gay remarks. Or, PRO-atheism ones. It's hypocritical to applaud A&E for putting Robertson on ice without wanting the same to happen to you.

The third riffs on this a bit. To use the old Texas phrase, "you dance with them what brung you." Stereotypes about rednecks aside, for A&E to not recognize they were getting a full human package from a Southern, red-state redneck is clueless. Or else lying by no comment.

Do you really want to applaud a corporation for acting like this just because it's worried about the monetary bottom line rather than principles?

So, social justice warriors? Especially those of you in the Gnu Atheism and Atheism Plus movements, who have been doing some dumb things pre-Christmas this year already anyway?

First, learn what censorship is, and is not. (Ditto on this one for wingnuts.)

Second, learn that "tolerance" is a sword that cuts both ways.

Third, learn that "tolerance" isn't the same as "acceptance."

Planned Parenthood, et al, get help in fighting Texas House Bill 2

HB2, lest we forget, is the bill restricting how late in a pregnancy a woman can have an abortion, and even more insidiously, putting many restrictions on abortion providers, including requiring hospital admitting privileges.

Well, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and the American Medical Association (AMA) filed a joint amicus brief in the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in support of Planned Parenthood’s challenge to Texas House Bill (HB) 2. A synopsis of why:

ACOG and the AMA oppose HB 2 because it imposes government regulation on abortion care that jeopardizes the health of women in Texas and denies them access to the safest and most effective evidence-based protocols for medical abortions.

The release notes the other big grounds for opposition:

ACOG also opposes Texas HB 2’s requirement that physicians follow an inferior treatment protocol for medical abortions. Legislators should not block advances in medical care by prohibiting physicians from incorporating the best, and most current, scientific evidence into their patient care.

More details at that link.

The Fifth Circuit hearing starts on Jan. 6.  

#Obamacare: Further slouching toward Gomorrah?

True liberals know how I feel about Obamacare — a giveaway to insurers and if anything, a impediment toward the adoption of single-payer national health care, rather than a step forward in that direction.

Even worse, though, have been the technocratic failures with the implementation of Obamacare that have come out in the last couple of months, along with the ever-increasing Band-Aid fixes, the cheap kludges implemented to try to work around those failures.

The latest? The White House delaying the individual mandate for people who had old insurance plans cancelled. Along with the reason why — losing insurance is a "hardship" and one that falls under Obamacare's exemption hardships. Plus, as Ezra notes, this puts a crack in the individual mandate. With many younger people, especially, already indicating they'll pay the fine instead of buying insurance, chiseling away at your own foundation because of your slap-dash earlier work is pretty serious indeed.

And so, I can agree with conservatives like Arik Roy, even while disagreeing with their motives for attacking Obamacare:

These exemptions will substantially alter the architecture of the law’s insurance marketplaces. Insurers are at their wits’ end, trying to make sense of what to do next.

Problem is, of course, is that Team Obama first tried to do other fixes when the fire started over people losing old plans. However, most state insurance commissioners in states with state-level exchanges said Nyet to that. So, this is Obama's second fix on the same issue. And, like other fixes for other issues, no matter what he says, designed to punt it past the 2014 midterms, to make Senate Democrats, first, and House Democrats, second, breathe easier.

This, in turn, leads to two deeper issues.

One is that, as higher-doller opiners than me have noted, it undercuts the liberal idea that government works. In a twist on that, it undercuts the neoliberal idea that neolibs can make government work even better, and work much better when partnered with the market.

The other is that it further undermines the image of Obama's personal competence, which never was that high in my book. Some may not like to admit this, but his approach to his name project, after it passed, has been highly passive, as if he expected having his name on it, and his mellifluous voice talking about it, was all that was needed.

Wrong.

And, when he was shown to be wrong, we've seen that neoliberals, when scrambling under deadline, are no better, and no more ethical, than the general populace in such situations.

Meanwhile, Christ Mooney, proving yet once again he's an in-the-tank Democrat engaged in just as much motivated reasoning biased thinking as the conservatives he blasted in Republican Brain, now claims Obamacare will be a great tool for expanding atheism in the U.S.

Of course, to make this stupendous claim, he confuses Obamacare with a true national health care system, whether single-payer or not, that exists in other advanced developed nations:

Existential threat, in the form of an earthquake, produces more religiosity; existential stability—in the form of an established rule of law, universal health care systems, and strong welfare states—leads to the opposite. And that, says Norenzayan, helps explain low levels of religiosity in Europe, even as it may also explain why the US is an outlier among developed countries when it comes to religion. "Compared to other advanced democracies, there is much more existential insecurity in the United States,” Norenzayan says. We didn't have health security (until recently, anyway), and we have a large gap between rich and poor compared with many other industrialized countries.

No ... we still don't have "health security," Chris. We have a cobbled-together neoliberal hodgepodge of handouts to the insurance industry, plus the tech industry (electronic patient records).

He then doubles down on fellating Obama in the next graf:

What this line of thinking suggests is that passing a major US policy change like Obamacare could, in the long run, produce more atheism by making people's lives more secure. When life is good, stable, and unthreatening, it seems that you don't need religion so much to give you hope for a better future in the afterlife. You already have that hope—for this life.

We don't have other stability either. Obama's new-found religion on income inequality will be ephemeral. His continued push for "free trade" agreements shows that. His cybersnooping on Americans shows that.

NSA vs. neocons — game on!

Looks like the shit may really hit the fan now on that the National Security Agency stands exposed of spying on foreign governments, even foreign leaders. Well — on one particular government.

Per the header, Gen. Keith Alexander and his groupies not only spied on people like Angela Merkel, prime minister of Germany, but on Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, as well as (at least) two Israeli embassies.

Yep, I'm sure al Qaeda was hiding spies inside the Israeli Defense Ministry.

If this doesn't put paid to the cybersnooping, at least in its current format, what will?

In reality, it shows the NSA's vacuuming operations, in this case, are really nothing other than a massive extension of older traditions of government espionage for reasons of fixing foreign policy, or, as in the case of one other spying, for trade policy reasons:

Also appearing on the surveillance lists is Joaquín Almunia, vice president of the European Commission, which, among other powers, has oversight of antitrust issues in Europe. The commission has broad authority over local and foreign companies, and has punished a number of American companies, including Microsoft and Intel, with heavy fines for hampering fair competition. The reports say that spies intercepted Mr. Almunia’s communications in 2008 and 2009. 

I mean, that's all this is. The EC also harbors no al Qaeda operatives. But, it does have a stronger bent toward corporate regulation, in many cases, than does Dear Leader and his gang of merry neoliberals.

At the same time, don't forget that Britain’s General Communications Headquarters was a willing partner in much of this. The industrial side of the cybersnooping targeted a bunch of non-AngloAmerican companies, like French oil giant Total. Don't tell me that this isn't related to post-war Iraq oil drilling shenanigans involving big American companies plus Shell and BP.

So, it's more insidious than even previously known. And, as conducting industrial espionage, like Hannah Arendt on Adolf Eichmann, more banal. But, that's even worse.

Evil is at its most dangerous when it's at its most banal.

And, that summarizes not just the industrial espionage, but NSA spying in general.

It's always presented as if it's "for our own good," but when We the People ask for details of how it's been for our own good, we're either shushed or else fobbed off with lies. Those lies, in turn, are often based on FBI sting operations that border on, if not engage fully in, entrapment.