Here Comes the Sun. Da da da...da?

For shit's sake!

When, during the recovery process, do we begin to create wealth again? Anyway...so the fed is giving states a bunch of money to subsidize home appliances continuing the greenerizing of the country. Of course this will not happen for months down the line. So now everybody is going to know about it in weeks and if they were thinking of buying new appliances will hold off until this plan takes affect. Merry Christmas home appliance dealers!

My personal favorite snippet...

"The states are required to estimate how many jobs their programs will create. California, which will receive $35 million, preliminarily estimated that it will create 350 jobs. This was based on the assumption that for every $92,000 expended, one job would be created."

I hear they reported the 350 jobs straight into the one's teleprompter. Tragically, it was transmitted at dinner time in the middle of the blessing. Michelle reportedly did not even notice.

In related, predictable, and unavoidable news... The EPA has rendered it's endangerment finding regarding carbon dioxide (among other pollutants) allowing them to regulate at will. The interesting part of the AP story is that they don't say the EPA does not need congressional approval. The only way congress could rein them in is to cut funding, but that would mean the one would have to sign off on it.

Oh fuck it why stop now... Did you know..."The sun is in the pits of the deepest solar minimum in almost 100 years."

“The sun has been at an extended minimum for the past two years,’’ said Leon Golub, senior astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Institute for Astrophysics and a leading sun scientist. “But only about 10 percent of climate variation is due to the sun. That means 90 percent isn’t.’’

Wait Wait Wait, What the fuck did you say?! I need help with this one. It would just make far too much sense to think the thing that affects the weather more than anything is the Sun. So when they say...

"If the solar lull lasts, history suggests it could conceivably stall global warming by years or even decades. During the so-called Maunder Minimum - an 80-year stretch of low sunspot activity in the 1600s and 1700s - Europe and North America suffered brutal winters and truncated summers in what came to be known as the Little Ice Age."

they are telling me the Little Ice Age was caused by a ten percent variation of our climate due to the Sun? That would beg a question about what the fuck, presumably on earth, could account for the other ninety percent?

Ugh....quick, I need a kitten.

Ideas That Can Only Come From Academia Division: Abolishing Prisons

Theodore Dalyrmple, pen name of Anthony Daniels, is one of the most brilliant writers on cultural issues of our time. His reserves his special indignation for such things as nihilism, multiculturalism, and moral relativism. This month Dalyrmple has focused his attention on an argument made by a French professor of philosophy for the abolishment of prisons. I really don't have any comments, just awe. Enjoy.

Highlights...

"Whenever I am in France, I read the French newspapers (the French read fewer newspapers than any other nation in the western world, by the way). There is always plenty in them to infuriate me, and so they are well worth the reading; for it must be confessed that indignation is one of the most rewarding of all emotions, as well as one that automatically gives meaning to life. When one is indignant, one does not wonder what life is for or about, the immensity of the universe does not trouble one, and the profound and unanswerable questions of the metaphysics of morals are held temporarily in abeyance."

"...they should always remember that, in prison, small things become large; and therefore, if they have promised something to a prisoner, they must always fulfil their promise. For otherwise the prisoner will be eaten up by a sense of grievance, and there is nothing like grievance to prevent a man from examining his own responsibility for his situation."

"The desire to blur limits and boundaries, in order to overturn society, has long marked out a certain kind of leftist. Because in social phenomena there are always borderline cases, they wish to undermine the very idea of categories. They are like people who would deny that anyone is tall because there is a fine gradation between tallest and shortest. Thus, because some things were considered crimes that are so considered no longer, and some things that were once legal that are now deemed criminal, they deny that the crime is anything other that an arbitrary social construction. A criminal is someone who merely has difficulty in his relations with society as some men have difficulties in their relations with their wives (and vice versa). What more natural, therefore, than that they should all attend the same day care centre, where they will be cured of their difficulties by psychological means?"

Recession over, or Depression looming?

There is no shortage of opinion on the economic debate of the recession. Everyone feels the squeeze and certainty, in any form, is in short supply.

"The great recession in over" declares the National Association for Business Economics, after releasing a survey of 44 professional economic forecasters. However, Lucia Mutikani of Reuters quickly dispels any real joy of the news. "While the economy is believed to have rebounded in the third quarter, analysts believe that ordinary Americans will probably not see much difference as unemployment will remain high well into 2010, restraining consumption."

The bottom line according to the NABE is that the recession is over but the recovery is going to be much slower than after a normal recession.

The NABE also went on to say, "We don't necessarily expect the U.S. economy to fall into a double-dip recession. This time round, consumers will be reluctant to join the party."

Thomas Pally over at the Financial Times thinks, "The future is fundamentally uncertain, which always makes prediction a rash enterprise. That said there is a good chance the new consensus is wrong. Instead, there are solid grounds for believing the US economy will experience a second dip followed by extended stagnation that will qualify as the second Great Depression."

The solid ground...

"Unemployment insurance is not up to the scale of the problem and is expiring for many workers. That promises to further reduce spending and aggravate the foreclosure problem."

"States are bound by balanced budget requirements and they are cutting spending and jobs. Consequently, the public sector is joining the private sector in contraction."

"...both the household and business sector face extensive bankruptcies that amplify the downward multiplier shock and also limit future economic activity by destroying credit histories and access to credit."

"Lastly, the US continues to bleed through the triple hemorrhage of the trade deficit that drains spending via imports, off-shoring of jobs, and off-shoring of new investment."
(Cash for Clunkers)

So, What is the conclusion? I am always skeptical of economic forecasters who look to past data to draw conclusions about current data. I still think things are going to get worse before they get better. How much worse is anybody's guess. The smart play is to save and rebuild your credit if possible. Yes, if everyone saves their money the economy will struggle to grow. But I'm afraid the prospects of growing will have to include vast changes in current monetary policy. The safe bet is to expect a good result for the next five to ten years will be to maintain our current wealth with eye towards improving our financial infrastructure (credit, savings) to build on in the future.

UPDATE (Loghueriat): The comment option has disappeared for some reason and I'm too tired/lazy/me to figure it out at the moment. Anyhow, I predicted on BPB a year ago that it would take two years for the Dow to get back over 10k consistently. That still sounds about right, especially with what you're saying about a "slow recovery." I have to say that we're on the same page lacking faith in the powers of deduction in economic forecasting, but that doesn't mean there aren't principles at work. Economics is a science, not a scepter. The devalued dollar will be the story of the next decade.

Done (As In Doing) er (About To Do)

The shock following Barack Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize should not come as such to anyone paying attention. The prize is to be awarded "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses." Overlooking the Nobel committees decision to redefine Done to include... political rhetoric (?), it makes all too much sense. The Nobel club just wants 'fraternity between nations'. They do not care which nations. No matter the rampant human rights abuses. (see appeasement of Iran) Nor do they care much for upholding democratic values. (See Iran and Honduras) They are just pleased to see the president talking. The committee has never pretended to have any illusions as to what it actually takes to guarantee peace. To these types war is always bad and the thought of a sizable standing army as a deterrent to violence and war has surely never crossed their "sizable" minds. They are progressives. They always have and always will promote progressive people and institutions. The only stick they carry is this award which, in essence, is almost sort of a bribe.(?) It's their way to nudge the president in the direction they see fit. So let them pat each other on the back and direct the outrage towards the Nobel frat boys.

Obscure Americanism

Chris Matthews answered some questions from a CNS News correspondent at the white house correspondent's dinner over the weekend. The gentleman asked Matthews if he still gets a thrill up his leg from Obama, to which came the response,

"I'm an American. Perhaps you find that obscure."

I was struggling to figure out what he meant by this when he went on to say,

" I have a feeling about my country. When he talked about it, I was inspired...I know other people don't report that...But I had that feeling and I will report it."

Matthews is then asked if it is okay to report his feelings.

"Oh, I like to report the truth. And if you have a feeling, that's part of your reporting."

Sadly it appears the new standard over at MSNBC is that reporting the truth is reporting the truth about how you feel. Matthews goes on to say the press doesn't need to be harder on Obama, but "I think we have to question the numbers though."

" We're going to have a debt by the end of the first term that is equal to our entire economy...it's scary."

At some point the gentleman asserts that it was the content of Obama's speeches that thrilled him. At which point he is cut off by Matthews, "No, what he said. The way he said it."

So lets get this straight so we can watch hardball with some clarity from now on. Matthews will report the truth of how he feels. Which is not determined by the content of what the president says, but how he says it. Not to mention the president's actions and policy decisions, which apparently are not really connected to Obama since he will not be tough oh him, just the numbers. No doubt due to the fact, or should I say feeling, that the former president is still the culprit. Perhaps your right Mr. Matthews. You are an Obscure American.

The Last Waltz

DUBLIN (AP) -- When Dublin university student Shane Fitzgerald posted a poetic but phony quote on Wikipedia, he was testing how our globalized, increasingly Internet-dependent media was upholding accuracy and accountability in an age of instant news.
His report card: Wikipedia passed. Journalism flunked.

The sociology major's obituary-friendly quote -- which he added to the Wikipedia page of Maurice Jarre hours after the French composer's death March 28 -- flew straight on to dozens of U.S. blogs and newspaper Web sites in Britain, Australia and India. They used the fabricated material, Fitzgerald said, even though administrators at the free online encyclopedia twice caught the quote's lack of attribution and removed it.

A full month went by and nobody noticed the editorial fraud. So Fitzgerald told several media outlets they'd swallowed his baloney whole.

"I was really shocked at the results from the experiment," Fitzgerald, 22, said Monday in an interview a week after one newspaper at fault, The Guardian of Britain, became the first to admit its obituarist lifted material straight from Wikipedia.

"I am 100 percent convinced that if I hadn't come forward, that quote would have gone down in history as something Maurice Jarre said, instead of something I made up," he said. "It would have become another example where, once anything is printed enough times in the media without challenge, it becomes fact."

So far, The Guardian is the only publication to make a public mea culpa, while others have eliminated or amended their online obituaries without any reference to the original version -- or in a few cases, still are citing Fitzgerald's florid prose weeks after he pointed out its true origin.

"One could say my life itself has been one long soundtrack," Fitzgerald's fake Jarre quote read. "Music was my life, music brought me to life, and music is how I will be remembered long after I leave this life. When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head that only I can hear."

Fitzgerald said one of his University College Dublin classes was exploring how quickly information was transmitted around the globe. His private concern was that, under pressure to produce news instantly, media outlets were increasingly relying on Internet sources -- none more ubiquitous than the publicly edited Wikipedia.

When he saw British 24-hour news channels reporting the death of the triple Oscar-winning composer, Fitzgerald sensed what he called "a golden opportunity" for an experiment on media use of Wikipedia.

He said it took him less than 15 minutes to fabricate and place a quote calculated to appeal to obituary writers without distorting Jarre's actual life experiences. He noted that the Wikipedia listing on Jarre did not have any other strong quotes.

If anything, Fitzgerald said, he expected newspapers to avoid his quote because it had no link to a source -- and even might trigger alarms as "too good to be true." But many blogs and several newspapers used the quotes at the start or finish of their obituaries.

He said the Guardian was the only publication to respond to him in detail and with remorse at its own editorial failing. Others, he said, treated him as a vandal who was solely to blame for their cut-and-paste content.

"The moral of this story is not that journalists should avoid Wikipedia, but that they shouldn't use information they find there if it can't be traced back to a reliable primary source," said the readers' editor at the Guardian, Siobhain Butterworth, in the May 4 column that revealed Fitzgerald as the quote author.

"It's worrying that the misinformation only came to light because the perpetrator of the deception emailed publishers to let them know what he'd done, and it's regrettable that he took nearly a month to do so," she wrote.

Fitzgerald said he had waited in part to test whether news organizations or the public would smoke out the quote's lack of provenance. He said he was troubled that none did.
And he warned that a truly malicious hoaxer could have evaded Wikipedia's own informal policing by getting a newspaper to pick up a false piece of information -- as happened when his quote made its first of three appearances -- and then use those newspaper reports as a credible footnote for the bogus quote.

"I didn't want to be devious," he said. "I just wanted to show how the 24-hour, minute-by-minute media were now taking material straight from Wikipedia because of the deadline pressure they're under."

Guardian article on controversy, http://tinyurl.com/djqd8w
Soundtrack Geek blog on Jarre, http://tinyurl.com/d527zh
Wikipedia site criticizing itself, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism--of--Wikipedia

To Cure The Sobbing Heard

Peggy Noonan with some thoughts on...???

"To me, one of the signal signs of the times is the number of people surfing the Internet looking for . . . something. One friend looks for small farms in distressed rural areas. Another logs on late at night looking for a house to buy in a small town out West, or down South, or in the Deep South. She is moving all around America in her imagination. I asked if she had a picture in her head of what she was looking for, and she joked that she wanted to go where Atticus Finch made his summation to the jury. I don't think it was really a joke. She's not looking for a new place, she's looking for the old days."

Could it be as simple as...people are surrounded by things they don't understand. Like you said...data data everywhere and no one knows a thing. How long would people have to live this way before the biology of it all caught up?

The Piggies Go to Market

Here are a couple interesting graphs representing the traffic to www.grants.gov, the site where you go to apply (buy raffle tickets? make demands?) for federal funding for... well anything you want I imagine...

There are lots of things I've been wanting to post about, they will be coming up shortly...

Removing The Blindfold

On Holder's comments...Here we go. I have a feeling like all of this is going to start reading like an episode of West Wing. The sight of our attorney general with a racial agenda spewing out of his pores means that justice is no longer blind. Now, in the form of Holder with infallible knowledge from 'the one', "justice" can see the scales and tip them to their liking.

However, I will agree with Holder in as much as race does still need to be talked about. I just wish one of those conversations would be a sit down with Heather MacDonald.

Well I don't know honey, It just doesn't look like a hybrid

James Taranto's piece today is a must read, some highlights.

"The desire for distinction is not simply a problem for democracy, however, but a problem of democracy. People who have social ambitions, but not necessarily political ones, will find it gratifying to regard themselves and be regarded by others as among Wilson's "instructed few," and appalling to be lumped together with the uninstructed many. "Let me smile with the wise, and feed with the rich," said Samuel Johnson. In our age of widespread affluence, when people can be dangerously well-fed without being rich, the desire to be numbered among the wise when smiles are shared becomes especially urgent. As Leon Wieseltier wrote about the controversial New Yorker cover depicting Michelle and Barack Obama as violent radicals, "The image was the creation of people for whom there is almost nothing more mortifying than not being in on the joke. That is the bridge and tunnel of the soul."

"The Toyota Prius is a testament to its driver's virtue, not a mark of his prosperity. Its distinctive homeliness has made it a hit, at a time when Honda has cancelled production of the hybrid version of the Accord: it turned out nobody wanted to buy a hybrid that was indistinguishable from an iceberg-melting V-6."

"The only status advantage to be gained by liking Disney World and Nascar comes from liking them ironically, conveying that you're in on the joke. As the author Tad Friend has argued, this desperate business of showing the world you have the aesthetically correct vantage point on popular culture "is rare among those who genuinely respect high art," since they find the alternatives to what they care about uninteresting, but also unthreatening."

The New American Landscape

Steven Stoll in Hapers looks forward to "the specter of a no-growth world".

""There is nothing intrinsic in the system that says it cannot exist happily in a stationary state.”
A stationary state. The term comes from John Stuart Mill, who argued, in 1848, that “the increase of wealth is not boundless.” Economists should know, said Mill, that “at the end of what they term the progressive state lies the stationary state, that all progress in wealth is but a postponement of this.”"

This is a more logical take on enviromentalism, one without sea kitten mentalities so to speak. Mckibben's Deep Economy sounds like a prominent step towards more autonomous communities, not unlike the Preservation Institute it appears.

Also, Richard Florida in The Atlantic looks at "How the crash will reshape America"

"The solution begins with the removal of homeownership from its long-privileged place at the center of the U.S. economy. Substantial incentives for homeownership (from tax breaks to artificially low mortgage-interest rates) distort demand, encouraging people to buy bigger houses than they otherwise would. That means less spending on medical technology, or software, or alternative energy—the sectors and products that could drive U.S. growth and exports in the coming years. Artificial demand for bigger houses also skews residential patterns, leading to excessive low-density suburban growth. The measures that prop up this demand should be eliminated.
If anything, our government policies should encourage renting, not buying. Homeownership occupies a central place in the American Dream primarily because decades of policy have put it there. A recent study by Grace Wong, an economist at the Wharton School of Business, shows that, controlling for income and demographics, homeowners are no happier than renters, nor do they report lower levels of stress or higher levels of self-esteem."

Now why would this aspect be left out of every conversation of the housing bubble seen on MSM television? Do they just not do their research? Are they in the tank? Or maybe it's just that they don't think the people who watch their stations are capable of understanding it? Whatever the reason, there is no excuse.

Given the fact the market did not cause the housing bubble...For about five years now I've wondered where do we go from here. It seemed like we had hit a wall, but I always conceded that I just wasn't smart enough or creative enough to see all of the posibilities for growth. So, idk, do we have to keep growing? Or is that just a Marxist ideology, as far as I know he is the only one to say it. Did any of the "classical economists" ever say things must continue to grow?

Beau, Barney, & The Great Bear

What's Portland like this time of year...Oh.

How could I have never asked the question. Seriously had no clue.

Is Russia going to be a problem?

And now to work on my chops...Hackery, Sorry Mr. Taranto

Congress still flips too soon, just can't avoid grilling tough bankers
"Wall Steet bankers nervous in face of tough congressional grilling" - Guardian.uk

Served with a side of greens and a lemon wedge
"Bank CEO's Grilled On TARP" - Business Week

Fecicious puts forth ultimatum
"Sirius, your days look numbered" - Fortune

Proof, Trigg can't be Todd's child
"Behind the Palin Pull Out" - The Atlantic

After talks fall through with nightcrawler
"Caterpillar offers retirement to 2,000 employees" - Bloomberg

News of the Tautological
" Rains present flooding threat" - The Comercial News, Danville, IL

Some Vintage Scroot

I'm not sure how I ever missed this from The Scroot...

Money Shots:

"Most religions stifle our metaphysical questions with myths..."

"Happiness depends upon the approval of people who are no longer living"

The lush context of each is worth the exploration. Check em out.

Also, you read the latest Scroot out at CJ yet?

Bubbling Up

Forbes points to the next bubble about to burst.

Jay's got the wrong way.

How kind of them to stop rising tuition. God forbid we cut funding for such fine programs as this and this.

A side note on the e-research program. James Bowman points out in Is stupid making us Google,

"as an elementary school principal told Bauerlein, proceed as follows when they are assigned a research project: “go to Google, type keywords, download three relevant sites, cut and paste passages into a new document, add transitions of their own, print it up, and turn it in.”

A Daimond in the Kos

I usually check DailyKos everyday; I prefer anger to anxiety. In any case, I actually found something I somewhat agreed with for the first time ever! King Kos's himself includes a link in a post to the The Preservation Institute. Reading through the site a little bit I see a lot I like. They haven't got all the kinks worked out yet though imho:

[on] Human Nature: Genetic engineering, psyychiatric drugs, and other new technologies threaten to change what it means to be human. We believe these technologies should be banned.

Yikes! I can't help but laugh. That's all they have to say on human nature? What to expect from a movement that has systematically ignored it, if not explicitly undermine it for generations.... Anyhow, I see some Howard Kunstler in these ideas that may be my only nexus of agreement with the left.

Wikipedia info here.

Apparently The Congress for a New Urbanism has a website, but I can't get it to load to see what they have to say. Sounds interesting.

I can't decide if it's ironic or appropriate that the left champion this issue considering the socialist Bauhaus-style worldview that inspired the destruction of urban communities in the first place.

Dollar Bet

A gratuitous prediction that the dollar declines sharply today... But then again I haven't been asleep yet...

Digression Analysis

I forgot I had wanted to post this awhile back. It's a little more nuanced that "what's the fucking point of dividing by one?" but I think the idea is the same.

A math grad
by Dan Brown

Math’s a matter some make
More of than the norm. I’m
Thinking of a math grad
I shared a loft with for a time.
Who a while back had had a break-
Down, he once confessed from bed

To bed. Nothing he thought about
A lot… . He pauses. Then goes on
To speak, sane-seemingly enough,
Of a funny class of functions. One
Whose characteristic graph starts out
With the usual smooth take-off,

Somewhere along the line goes
Into a beauty of a loop-
De-loop for whatever reason, then
Picks its rising right up
Where it left off, and never does
Anything like that again.

The Power of Samantha

From LGF

Remember "I trust him, because I don't believe him?" This is pure, 100% distilled Obamka... This is the essence of our president. File this in your mind along with that phony head-shake and elbow-tap he gave Biden the other day after his comment towards Roberts. There are no extenuating circumstances. Pathetic.

All Hail Porkulus!

I was sifting through the stimulus bill today and one line struck me as rather funny, oh and I found a typo!

"None of the funds provided by this Act may be made
4 available to the State of Illinois, or any agency of the
5 State, unless (1) the use of such funds by the State is
6 approved in legislation enacted by the State after the date
7 of the enactment of this Act, or (2) Rod R. Blagojevich
8 no longer holds the office of Governor of the State of Illi9
nois."

So what if this bill were to pass during the impeachment hearing and they decided not to impeach him? No money for Illinois? I'm sure they would just pass a new provision or something to say...oh it's okay now for Illinois to get the money even though Blago is still there. Call it the "Caught scoring political point provision" or something idk.

I also noticed that this will create a special oversight committe just for this bill and then another board or something to direct the oversight committe. All of these people to be hand picked by the president. Recovery.gov will be the website to follow the money trail, should be blogger fodder for...oh...the next century.

Viva Zyprickxa

Dude, you should have a talk with your uncle about this. Awfully discouraging, although not suprising, to see the daddy and baby Bush connection here. I'll bet they come out with a new miracle drug to help all of these Zyprexa users lose weight and make a few more billion dollars.

Sarah Palin or Nancy Pelosi?

"Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those--one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government."

Wait, so the way to help children in the midst of this "terrible fiscal budget crises" is to fund the people who want to help prevent their birth? Now that's change!

Even if this wasn't completly insane and we actually look at this statement on it's merits as James Taranto does...

"In the real world... while it is true that prosperity tends to be correlated with lower fertility, the latter is an effect rather than a cause. Today's unplanned pregnancy is tomorrow's consumer of baby products and next month's worker and taxpayer, so that subsidizing contraception, whatever its merits, is the opposite of an economic stimulus."

On Barney

My hatred for Barney Frank knows no bounds. As hatred tends to do, my ability to produce meaningful language seizes up any time I think of him. So, I'm thankful for VDH for his thoughts on the big Purple Chair of the House Financial Services Committee:

"...he enjoys the exemption accorded to the proverbial raving but glib street-corner prophet who accosts you, flips you off on the street, and shouts in your ear and in public all the way to the car before trying to mount the hood and grab the windshield wipers."

Thank you sir, may I have another...

Puerile Pledges and (to?) Our President

I guess I'm just parsing words...



Pay close attention now!



Is it just a semantic slight of hand? A little linguistic legerdemain? Incontinence? hmmmm.....

A montage of puerile pledges to Change. Or to Obama? He wants us to believe in ourselves, just not too much... Nevermind, he's not the change either, you see; he's just got the vision. But it comes from him... to us: The Word.

I remember hearing the tripe, "be the change you wish to see" a lot lately. Read: "Be the change I see." I must be unfairly parsing words, because it seems to me like some guy is just trying to get people to do what he says...

The caterpillars of totalitarianism are beginning to re-emerge... Pretty!

That Depends on What Your Definition of "Do" Is

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Just a random quote I found that kinda relates to the last post.


UPDATE: That swearing in was bizarre. Roberts fucked it up and Obama knew it.

"Our Constitution... Documents That Are Imperfect"

[Obama is talking]

"...but with the blood, sweat, and tears, of future generations... like our nation itself, [it has] a capacity to be made more perfect..."

This is beyond "Living Constitution" stuff, this is Android Constitution (no, I can't do better than that)...

He just stopped his speech to respond, "I love you back," to a fan, er, citizen -- "I love tur-ur-urkey, oh I love you!"

...next breath...

"What's required is a New Declaration of Independence not just in our Nation, but in our own lives, our own hearts, from ideology and small thinking..."

"I'm like, all I hear is clapping..."

The reason he ran for President was that, "Our politics had grown too small for the scale of the challenges we face." i.e. I can be George Bush better than George Bush was George Bush...

...random identity group montage...

I know Chris Mathews had that chill up his leg or whatever, but Obama sounds like he's the one with the chill (or is that just the cold?) when he says he's heading to Washington. Seriously, it's almost like he's tripping and saying, "this is soo sweet" to his buddies; his voice cracks when he says, "I'll be taking you with me!" It's almost like he's just your "average... person" that is just so amazed he has the opportunity to fill such big shoes... But don't be mistaken! That would make him an unqualified token. Nah, move along. He went to Harvard, remember?

"In our own lives, let's build a government that's responsible to the people." WTF, does that mean?

He did say at the beginning that our rights come from our maker, not our laws... That was the closest I got to agreeing with him on anything. But do we "cling" to those rights? Agh, who cares... FREE HEALTHCARE DUDE!

BTW, Fox News "respects" and "admires" Obama for trying to "heal the country."

Obama at WaPo!?

"'There goes our journalistic objectivity,' one reporter quipped."

That reminds me of being a teenager when my parents would ask me on a Sunday morning what I was up to the night before. "Got drunk and drove around while trying to avoid the cops," I'd say with a big smile. If they were fooled it was only because they wanted to be.... But I digress...

Hellcat, did you see him!?!?!?

A Confession?

Yes it is five in the morning...no sleep for the weary.

So I just finished watching a Hitchens interview where he talks a little about the fact that he had always known from a young age he would be a writer. He said he knew this because that is what he was, he could never imagine himself doing anything else. Which got me thinking how much I've always envied people who've had this same experience. I've thought long and hard about who I am and what I should be doing and in doing so realised I don't have a 'knack', as Hitch put it, for anything whatever. At least not for anything monetarily tangible. What I have discovered is the truth that it really does take all kinds to make our secular experiment work.

Mark Steyn does a beautiful job making my point in a different context. When asked how he reconciles, so to speak, all of the different things he writes about, music and theatre ect, he says that in an ideal world he would love to write more about music, theatre, and film but the fact is we don't live in an ideal world. He goes on to say that at some point if there are great things going on in the world and you want to say something about them and you don't, it's not going to be any concelation to have a great cd collection as western civilization falls apart. That if you value the freedom to stroll into a piano bar and hear a great singer sing 'The way you look tonight', that even that small experience is at the apex of the whole cultural foundation. You can't "share off the pleasures of a 32 bar song from all the big geopolitical issues, they are explicitly connected".

Perhaps those of us not blessed with the assuredness and talent of Hitch still have an equally important roll to play if only we could realise it. Once we realise that you can't "share off" the neccessity of the plumber from the accountant, or the janitor from the ceo, can we truly take and hold our place with dignity. As much or as little, it's hard to tell right now, as I believe this to be true, I also fear it to be a life long struggle. So I guess the best that we can do is to surround ourselves with people to share that struggle with.

News of the Day

Eliot Spitzer is recomending stimulus money be spent on transformative investments, not bridges and buildings.

"It is a unique moment to build a new foundation. It would be wise to ensure that a significant portion of the stimulus package is spent on new investments that may not be quite as ready to go but are surely more important to our long-term economic viability."

Among his recomendations is to set up a smart grid to increase efficeincey in the energy sector. This is already being done in numerous countries most notably Italy which is experiencing a payback of about 500 mil Euros a year. The cost of the set up was about 2 billion creating an astounding four year payback. Spitzer also encourages the new administration to set up the infrastructure needed to sustain non gasoline vehicles, giving more incentive for consumers to actually buy these vehicles.

Spitzer also includes electronic record keeping for healthcare as a top priority and providing funding for a robotics team at every school. Overall he says these changes will set the stage for the next "great American economic miracle".


Paging Dr. Gupta, diagnosis "Tokenitis"

The Washington Post reports that Barak Obama wants CNN Journalist Dr. Sanjay Gupta to be our next Surgeon General. According to the post "His appointment would give the administration a prominent official of Southwest Asian descent and a skilled television spokesman".

Personally, I think it's brilliant.

I Miss Grey Area

Bill Ayers is now an official blogger at Huffington Post. Color me surprised; but it appears as if grey is in short supply. It's black and white these days: the dim-witted and the enlightened.

So, here's a random thought on how I think Mz. Huffington is going to die some day: tricked into her debut snuff film by a "distinguised" Hamas leader and "scholar" -- her as the star of course... He was just so mysteriously intruiging!!

Another random thought/prediction... When they start figuring out where Bernie Madoff spent all the money, as they have started a bit, they will find out it all went to "charity." And to his lifestyle of course, but most to "charity"...