The Last Ephor

“If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom - go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!” ~ Samuel Adams ~

Then out spake brave Horatius,   The Captain of the gate: “To every man upon this earth   Death cometh soon or late.    And how can man die better   Than facing fearful odds For the ashes of his fathers   And the temples of his gods, Horatius at the Bridge Thomas Babington, Lord Macaulay (1800–1859)

Obamacare's Big Thinkers Forgot to Bring in the Doers - Bloomberg : "The yawning gap between what the IT people knew and what everyone else seems to have realized is staggering. Now, I’ve worked on some projects in which the business units seemed to have some sort of selective deafness that only materialized when we tried to tell them that they couldn’t have their magic fairy computer system that did everything they could imagine, only better, in the three months they wanted it to take, or for the paltry sum that they were willing to spend. And I learned the hard way not to assume that the business units, or even the chief information officer, had heard and understood what you said. That is how I became gifted in the art of writing CYA memos when I was directed to do the unwise or the impossible. " 'via Blog this'

Today's the day. Nine years gone and the rest of our lives to go. This blog honors Sean Thomas Lugano I knew Sean casually. We went to college together and were on the rugby team together. He was much better than I was. He was very fast and much stronger than he looked. Sean was one of those guys who was reserved but very funny. He wasn't one of those guys who garnered attention by being outrageous or demonstrative. He was just there, always with a smile and quick with a laugh or a joke. He took a lot of flack in college because of his modeling career. He used to model to make money for college and the idea of a rugby player being a model seemed absurd. The only commercial I ever saw him in was for The Gap and ironically, he was playing rugby in the commercial. That seemed to redeem him somewhat in the eyes of his teammates and we didn't rib him much after that. I didn't know Sean well enough to keep in touch with him after college. Occasionally, I'd see ...

Non-Americans of reddit, what aspect of American culture strikes you as the strangest? : AskReddit : "As a Texan currently abroad, it makes me so sad to not have this. When I'm walking somewhere, if we make eye contact there needs to be a friendly gesture! A nod, a smile, whatever. Its so weird when they just glare at you." Which prompted the following response: "You should never come to New Jersey."

Lessons From a Self Made Millionaire: Meet Adam Carolla - 5/16/2013 : "“You shouldn't be eating anything that takes six minutes to microwave.”" 'via Blog this'

Government Lab Reveals It Has Operated Quantum Internet For Over Two Years I'm not exactly shocked but I am surprised that it's been going in earnest for 2 years. I do take issue with the "perfectly secure" as I don't think anything is completely secure (at least not for long). The implications of such a network are amazing and frankly I wonder how long they can keep the genie in the bottle. How long before strong crypto is the norm on the internet. If it is the norm, what will that mean? The internet is history's greatest disrupter but I think the distortions will be even more pronounced. I am hopeful but leery.

"That said, there is no excuse to indulge with public office those who are quite simply amoral and unstable. We get the government we deserve – and are we ever." Read the whole thing. I'm seeing a template with the leftist politicians. Husband is philanderer but has personal charisma and proper liberal credentials. Long suffering but power hungry wife stands by him in a faustian bargain. Husband maxes out political potential and then wife emerges from his shadow to pursue her own ambition while he does whatever. c.f. Clilnton, Obama and Weiner

Meryl Streep On Margaret Thatcher: 'She Was A Figure Of Awe For Her Personal Strength And Grit' : "But to me she was a figure of awe for her personal strength and grit. To have come up, legitimately, through the ranks of the British political system, class bound and gender phobic as it was, in the time that she did and the way that she did, was a formidable achievement. To have won it, not because she inherited position as the daughter of a great man, or the widow of an important man, but by dint of her own striving. To have withstood the special hatred and ridicule, unprecedented in my opinion, leveled in our time at a public figure who was not a mass murderer; and to have managed to keep her convictions attached to fervent ideals and ideas -- wrongheaded or misguided as we might see them now --without corruption. I see that as evidence of some kind of greatness, worthy for the argument of history to settle. To have given women and girls around the world reason to supplan...

I didn't always agree with his politics but he nailed it on this one: "Let me tell you a story. The day after Columbine, I was interviewed for the Tom Brokaw news program. The reporter had been assigned a theory and was seeking sound bites to support it. "Wouldn't you say," she asked, "that killings like this are influenced by violent movies?" No, I said, I wouldn't say that. "But what about 'Basketball Diaries'?" she asked. "Doesn't that have a scene of a boy walking into a school with a machine gun?" The obscure 1995 Leonardo Di Caprio movie did indeed have a brief fantasy scene of that nature, I said, but the movie failed at the box office (it grossed only $2.5 million), and it's unlikely the Columbine killers saw it. The reporter looked disappointed, so I offered her my theory. "Events like this," I said, "if they are influenced by anything, are influenced by news programs like your own. Wh...

The Chinese economy explained. Seriously this anecdotal but important. My belief is that the Chinese economy is in far worse shape than our own. Their books are closed so we don't know what level of spending and debt they've incurred. The boom China has been experiencing is a bubble. Specifically, you have an economy that started to grow due to a huge increase in manufacturing. That lifted many people out of poverty which, in turn, made those workers more expensive. That led to the manufacturers moving further west in China where labor was cheaper. Lather, rinse and repeat. The other bubble is the real estate bubble. Allowing citizens to buy property was the only way they could alleviate capital flight. The Yuan is non-convertible for individuals. Only banks can convert their money so the people had no place to put their money (other than the bank). So they let people buy real estate. Sounds good. But it created an insane boom of builders trying to do things...

Cardinal Dolan For Pope? There’s Suddenly A Very Real Buzz About Him In Italy Hmmm...I don't know about this one. Guessing who will be Pope is a fool's errand. So, here we go: I doubt it. An American Pope does have its advantages but I don't know how he would be received by the rest of the world. If I were a betting man I'd look to Africa, South America or Asia (long shot). Put Canada on the dark horse list. YMMV. We should know by April if not sooner.

Ubuntu for tablets hands-on: an intriguing mix of Windows 8, Android, and Kindle Fire | The Verge : This looks very good. If this is the beta version the release version might be a contender. I've been hankering for a tablet but was not going to buy an apple product. Yeah, I know blah blah blah but I don't like them. They're too locked down and I don't want to encourage other makers to follow their model in that regard. Here is another hands on demo which is a bit longer and more involved. My fear is that like other Ubuntu releases the degree of knowledge required to effectively use the thing will be significant. Time will tell.

The MSM, in its abject silliness, is trying to sink Marco Rubios political chances because, wait for it, he drank water. No, I am not making this up. Senator Menendez out of my home state of New Jersey is currently in the middle of a maelstrom of allegations of corruption, underage prostitutes and more. That is not mentioned as a career ender. No, that is not mentioned at all. If there was ever a more clear indication that they are in the tank for the Democrats I've yet to see it. No honest broker could look at those two stories and come to a different conclusion. As for the horrors of water drinking, the Interwebs remembers all: G20 summit: Mineral water company receives free advertising from Barack Obama Got that? Obama drink water = free advertising. Rubio drinks water and he's political dead.

Scores assemble at atheist church : I've often thought atheism is really a form of faith. You cannot prove there isn't a god (or gods) so you have to have faith that there isn't one. Taking that a step further, atheism becomes a religion. A moral philosophy shared by a community that seeks to explain (or at least understand) mankind and it's place in the universe. That they are gathering in the same place, at the same time as the religion they reject is rather curious. They seem to be trying to co-opt the church rather than avoid it. If someone revealed this all to be an elaborate hoax or prank I wouldn't be surprised.

As I was saying the other day, capital flight is a reality. Technology only accelerates that reality: Taxpayers Go Where Taxes Are Low : "Contiguous with the Empire State, Connecticut still is smarting over the relocation of hedge-fund manager Edward Lampert. With an estimated net worth of $3 billion, according to Forbes, Lampert was considered the fifth-wealthiest man in the Nutmeg State. In August 2011, Connecticut increased taxes by $875 million, retroactively to that January. It cut the maximum property-tax credit from $500 to $300 and lifted its top state income-tax rate from 6.5 percent to 6.7 percent. Then, on June 1, 2012, Lampert moved his company, ESL Investments, to Florida. Lampert also took with him the $10.6 billion that ESL reportedly controlled at that time. “We are all aware that the changes to the tax structure in Connecticut last year have given many people pause as to whether this is the best place to do business and reside,” Greenwich first selectman Pet...

One of the maxims I was continually hammered with when I was an undergrad was "Capital has legs". I understood the concept well enough but not the typical reasons behind it. In b-school they talk more about economies of scale, competitive advantage, capital formation, strategy vs. structure etc. As I remember it, we only talked about regulatory pressure and its effects in international business courses. That said, I've been beating my head against this particular wall with local liberals who have no concept that the businesses that have been lured here by the State are not here only for the Court of the Chancery and the well defined case law. Rather, Delaware allows the highest possible interest rates for lending as well as very good deals for corporations in terms of taxes and fees . Wall Street and it's attendant industries are the lifeblood of NYC. Without Wall Street and its employees to tax NYC is broke and I fear what would become of the place should they...

“Don’t tell your problems to people: eighty percent don’t care; and the other twenty percent are glad you have them.” — Lou Holtz “If you can’t excel with talent, triumph with effort.” — Dave Weinbaum “Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.” — Sir Francis Bacon

Obama visted San Fran this week and met with critics from both sides of the political aisle. As it has often been said; politics makes for strange bedfellows. Zombie has a report at the link but to me, the strongest criticism is shown below: Zombie » Left Hook, Right Jab: Obama battered from all sides at S.F. stop : "The radicals of World Can’t Wait had what I consider the best sign of the day, a 12-Step program for Obama voters:" 1. Admit you are in a self-destructive relationship with the Democratic Party. 2. Remove conflicting bumper stickers from your collection. “Shut Down Guantanamo” and “Obama 2012” are mutually exclusive. 3. Understand that kill lists and more unjust war is the wrong kind of change to believe in. 4. Stop lying to yourself. The President is not sucking up to the most powerful interests in the world because he loves you. 5. Cut off all contact with Obama, Holder, Clinton and Pelosi. No more phone calls or writing letters. They are aware of...

I don't read Taki's magazine often but occasionally something comes into view that is worth reading and even commenting. Exhibit A: 10 Things I Hate That Everybody Loves : I know you're dying to know how I feel about each of these so here we go. 1. Cigars. Actually, I do like cigars. The problem is that they are too expensive and I'm not going to smoke at home or in front of my kids. That leaves me with approximately zero opportunity to smoke them. Plus, for me, they're a social thing. Many a good evening has been over cigars which seems to put people in a bit more of a contemplative mood. 2. Fancy Scotch. Have to agree here. I like the idea of scotch more than the stuff itself. I never really developed a taste for it. I like it ok but I can't tell one from another or what flavors I would look for if ordering one. 3. Sports. Playing or watching? Big difference. I like playing soccer but again, I'm rather time poor. I do like watc...