Month: June 2011

#rsrh Amazon ready to end California affiliate program.

A friend and colleague of mine just got this email:

Subject: Notice of Contract Termination Due to Potential New California Law

Hello,

For well over a decade, the Amazon Associates Program has worked with thousands of California residents. Unfortunately, a potential new law that may be signed by Governor Brown compels us to terminate this program for California-based participants. It specifically imposes the collection of taxes from consumers on sales by online retailers – including but not limited to those referred by California-based marketing affiliates like you – even if those retailers have no physical presence in the state.

We oppose this bill because it is unconstitutional and counterproductive. It is supported by big-box retailers, most of which are based outside California, that seek to harm the affiliate advertising programs of their competitors. Similar legislation in other states has led to job and income losses, and little, if any, new tax revenue. We deeply regret that we must take this action.

As a result, we will terminate contracts with all California residents that are participants in the Amazon Associates Program as of the date (if any) that the California law becomes effective. We will send a follow-up notice to you confirming the termination date if the California law is enacted. In the event that the California law does not become effective before September 30, 2011, we withdraw this notice. As of the termination date, California residents will no longer receive advertising fees for sales referred to Amazon.com [ http://www.amazon.com/ ], Endless.com [ http://www.endless.com/ ], MYHABIT.COM [ http://www.myhabit.com/ ] or SmallParts.com [ http://www.smallparts.com/ ]. Please be assured that all qualifying advertising fees earned on or before the termination date will be processed and paid in full in accordance with the regular payment schedule.

You are receiving this email because our records indicate that you are a resident of California. If you are not currently a resident of California, or if you are relocating to another state in the near future, you can manage the details of your Associates account here [ https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/network/your-account/payee-info.html ]. And if you relocate to another state in the near future please contact us [ https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/contact?subject=&ie=UTF8 ] for reinstatement into the Amazon Associates Program.

To avoid confusion, we would like to clarify that this development will only impact our ability to offer the Associates Program to California residents and will not affect their ability to purchase from Amazon.com [ http://www.amazon.com/ ], Endless.com [ http://www.endless.com/ ], MYHABIT.COM [ http://www.myhabit.com/ ] or SmallParts.com [ http://www.smallparts.com/ ].

We have enjoyed working with you and other California-based participants in the Amazon Associates Program and, if this situation is rectified, would very much welcome the opportunity to re-open our Associates Program to California residents. We are also working on alternative ways to help California residents monetize their websites and we will be sure to contact you when these become available.

Regards,

The Amazon Associates Team

Continue reading #rsrh Amazon ready to end California affiliate program.

Obama’s class warfare… against Obama’s stimulus program.

Even for Barack Obama, this is simultaneously: shameless; and clueless.

I’ve said to Republican leaders, ‘You go talk to your constituents and ask them, “Are you willing to compromise your kids’ safety so some corporate-jet owner can get a tax break?” ‘ ”

Just in case any viewer missed his class-clashing message, Obama referred to corporate-jet owners at least three more times before he took his second question.

It’s shameless because President Obama has only one rhetorical trick, and that’s to demonize everybody who disagrees with whatever faux-Hegelian position he’s ended up taking on any given day.  It’s particularly clueless because what the President apparently doesn’t know is that the latest iteration of the tax break in question was put into place as part of Barack Obama’s own 2009 “stimulus.”

Just a few months after lawmakers scolded auto executives for flying to Washington in private jets, Congress approved a tax break in the stimulus package to help businesses buy their own planes.

The incentive — first used to help plane makers recover from the 2001 terror attacks — sharply reduces the up front tax bill for companies who buy assets like business planes.

Continue reading Obama’s class warfare… against Obama’s stimulus program.

HuffPo sets groundwork for impeaching Obama.

I know, I know: that wasn’t the intent. The intent was to flog the concept that a debt ceiling is itself unconstitutional as per the 14th Amendment, thus obviating forever the need for Democratic politicians to stop spending money that we don’t actually have. Here’s the text from the 14th:

Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

…and it’s been argued – pretty much mostly by neo-Keynesian (and former conservative) Bruce Bartlett, which is something that the HuffPo author did not mention (can’t imagine why he’d think that actual conservatives would react badly to a Bartlett scheme) – that the text means that any attempt to enforce a real cap on indebtedness is thus unconstitutional, so there, neener neener. If you’re wondering, however, how you can make it unconstitutional to enforce a cap on indebtedness while not also conceding that it’s unconstitutional to incur that debt in the first place, well, I regret to tell you this: you are immediately disqualified from writing for HuffPo. Or writing fiscal policy for the Democratic party, apparently. Continue reading HuffPo sets groundwork for impeaching Obama.

The DSCC Limited Resources Map.

Consider this map (via Politico) showing what the DSCC calls a “Limited Resource Plan” for the 2012 elections:

 

…which is, of course, being waved around by the DSCC for the purpose of convincing wary Democratic donors that donating money in 2012 to the group that lost seven* Senate seats and struck out on four prime pickups** in 2010 is a good idea.  This did not sit well with the Ben Nelson campaign in Nebraska, which (nervously) pointed out that taking this map seriously suggests that DOOM was coming not only to Nebraska, but Virginia and New Mexico as well.

Well, yes. Continue reading The DSCC Limited Resources Map.

John Lennon: Reagan Republican?

You know, I don’t know if I WANT to check this one out:  the mere fact that there’s a credible source out there claiming that John “Imagine” Lennon* was secretly fond of the Gipper (and couldn’t stand Jimmy Carter – but then, what sane person can?) is enough, in some ways.  The source is Fred Seaman, one of Lennon’s assistants during the last years of the singer’s life, and Seaman essentially said that Lennon’s change of heart was because Lennon grew up:

“He was a very different person back in 1979 and 80 than he’d been when he wrote Imagine. By 1979 he looked back on that guy and was embarrassed by that guy’s naivete.”

Mind you, a 95% marginal tax rate can have a way of clarifying one’s mind when it comes to working out one’s political philosophy.  There’s a reason why so many British bands moved here in the Sixties and Seventies; well, a reason beside the obvious one…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

*No, that’s George “Taxman” Harrison that you’re thinking of.

#rsrh Supreme Court Fight Club Watch: 06/28/2011.

Not much to report on this, except that:

  • NRO has a report on the entire Bradley attack that looks… about like how I thought it happened, really.  Short version: Bradley wigged out, Prosser was defending himself, the Left needs to just deal with it.  Not to mention, zip their pants back up.
  • Ann Althouse has just discovered that proper feminists are apparently supposed to simply parrot whatever narrative that the Democrats need them to parrot; if they don’t, they get to be attacked by hyper-progressive men!  Who generally seem… to really get into it, IYKWIMAITTYD.
  • Joy McCann (now of The Conservatory) is having none of that, by the way.  I add this link mostly for the H/Ts, and to encourage my readers to check out Joy’s new digs.

George Stephanopoulos thinks Ben Franklin isn’t a Founding Father?

Via Instapundit, Jeffrey Lord is having fun lecturing George Stephanopoulos by mentioning Founding Fathers who opposed slavery, contra Stephanopoulos’ rather ignorant statement here to Rep. Michele Bachmann:

For example earlier this year you said that the Founding Fathers who wrote the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence worked tirelessly to end slavery. Now with respect Congresswoman, that’s just not true.

We can go ’round and ’round about whether John Quincy Adams counts – I personally would have him count as one, or at least not quibble overmuch over it – but let’s talk about some non-Virginians, shall we?

  • Benjamin Franklin. If Ben Franklin isn’t a Founding Father, then the term is meaningless anyway. Long sympathetic to abolitionist views, he spent the last years of his life (and the first years of the public) as an open advocate for abolition and integration.
  • John Adams. Also on every list of Founding Fathers that there are. Balance his reluctance to push for too-public a dispute over slavery with his writing the Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts portion of the Massachusetts Constitution.
  • John Jay. Likewise on the lists (also, first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court). Despite being a slaveowner himself, Jay pushed for abolition and manumission in New York for over twenty years; he finally succeeded in passing manumission legislation as Governor.

Continue reading George Stephanopoulos thinks Ben Franklin isn’t a Founding Father?

#rsrh Bias Watch: “Bias Watch: The Palin Emails.”

…I was going to try for the same pseudo-legal blather that Eric Wimple was using to try to pooh-pooh the idea that the Washington Post really needed to get its readership to paw through Sarah Palin’s emails, but fortunately I realized that all I actually wanted to say was “Eric Wimple is being a schmuck here.”

Well.

Eric Wimple is being a schmuck here.

Yeah, that’s a lot more straightforward. Continue reading #rsrh Bias Watch: “Bias Watch: The Palin Emails.”