The Last Ephor

Several items of note carried virtually everywhere else. First, Obama's spokesman takes the heat for Teh 0ne breaking his oft repeated campaign promise not to raise taxes on the middle class: Liberal blogs are completely ignoring this one because: 1. It hasn't happened yet (fair enough) 2. No criticism of Obama is permissable. Similarly, Axelrod made the rounds with the same message: No embed, video here . This one is good because it includes The Man Himself making said pledge. This is just the latest of many broken promises. The crushing moral urgency of closing Guantanamo? The crushing moral urgency of ending "Don't ask, don't tell". The hints and winks and nods that he'd reverse DOMA. Well, no. That one, at least, was made clear in the debates. He specifically said he wouldn't do anything for gays who wanted to get married. He merely hinted and implied that it was important and would, therefore magically change somehow. I'm most bot...

I have been told, facts notwithstanding, that all our economic woes are caused by Phil Gramm. Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. How powerful is he? He has caused panic in Iceland : Iceland is on the brink of collapse. Inflation and interest rates are raging upwards. The krona, Iceland's currency, is in freefall and is rated just above those of Zimbabwe and Turkmenistan. Ireland fends off panic selling and write downs: The legislation allows the government to guarantee the liabilities of six Irish-owned banks up to a total of €400 billion, or $565 billion, nearly 10 times the country's national debt. The reach of Phil is indeed long! Benelux nationalizes Fortis: 80 percent of the value of Fortis has disappeared and shareholders of Fortis have been consistently misinformed, is not willing to live up to its legal obligations to shareholders a...

Text of the bill Earmarks in the bill: - Film and Television Productions (Sec. 502) - Wooden Arrows designed for use by children (Sec. 503) - 6 page package of earmarks for litigants in the 1989 Exxon Valdez incident, Alaska (Sec. 504) Tax earmark “extenders” in the bailout bill. - Virgin Island and Puerto Rican Rum (Section 308) - American Samoa (Sec. 309) - Mine Rescue Teams (Sec. 310) - Mine Safety Equipment (Sec. 311) - Domestic Production Activities in Puerto Rico (Sec. 312) - Indian Tribes (Sec. 314, 315) - Railroads (Sec. 316) - Auto Racing Tracks (317) - District of Columbia (Sec. 322) - Wool Research (Sec. 325) No way. McCain promised to "make them famous". He better damn well start now. I don't care what side of the aisle their on if they're putting this shit into this bill they ought to be literally tarred, feathered and run out of town on a rail. Screwing around like this after you've been declaring the nation on the brink of economic collapse is...

In my last post I was lamenting the fact that I cannot get into anything approximating a substantive discussion with people who do not share the same opinions and views that I do. Over at DelawareLiberal, I waded into the fray about corporations and profits with a question: "Please explain how you will tax corporations and not have them pass that cost on to consumers." Makes sense, no? My point is that any tax on corporations turns them into tax collecting agents not taxpayers. To a business, taxes are simply overhead like the cost of raw materials that have to be recouped from customers. Given that the DL crowd has a visceral hatred for corporations (despite the fact that they all seem to work for them) I should have known that there would be no explanations forthcoming. Jason responded with: Duffy asks… Please explain how you will tax corporations and not have them pass that cost on to consumers. Easy. They might not make $11 billion dollars in profit one quarter. ...

Demographic Inversion In the past three decades, Chicago has undergone changes that are routinely described as gentrification, but are in fact more complicated and more profound than the process that term suggests. A better description would be "demographic inversion." Chicago is gradually coming to resemble a traditional European city--Vienna or Paris in the nineteenth century, or, for that matter, Paris today. The poor and the newcomers are living on the outskirts. The people who live near the center--some of them black or Hispanic but most of them white--are those who can afford to do so. NB: Most white populations in large cities are liberals so blame the liberals for pushing the brown people out of range of their jobs and making their life more difficult for their own convenience. A large proportion of the city's 600,000 residents, especially those with money, want to live downtown... No American city looks like Vancouver at the moment. But quite a few are moving in...

I got a call from a recuiter about a position at a bank. It's a BI job (since nearly all of my readers have seen my resume you know that's what I generally do). It was sold to me as a PM job by the recuiter but when I spoke o the client they billed it as more of a tactical role. When I expressed confusion they were confused and asked which role I'd like to be doing I told them that tactical was losing its luster and PM is where I want to be. "Interesting" they said. No indication of "good interesting" or "bad interesting". From there I had two more technical interviews with Infrastructure and BI Champion which makes me assume it was more toward the "good interesting" side of things. Things went well and then went quiet. That's usually not a good sign. I called the recruiter a few days later and he said they were interested and would meet my quote (huzzah!). But...(you knew that was coming didn't you?) they had to rew...

It's Friday at 3:30 and I get a call on my cell phone from my recruiter and account manager. For those of you who are consultants, you know this is not good news. I can practically hear the sympathetic head tilt in their voices as they start talking. I stop them in mid sentence. "They're cutting the contract aren't they?" "Yes. But it's not performance related." "Small consolation. How long?" "Two weeks which is generous." She's right. Most contracts end the day they cut the funding for the project. In any case I finished the job and on my last day home from work I stopped to get gas. When I got back in my car it wouldn't start. Had the car towed to the dealer who got me back on the road a mere $900 later. Cause that's what I needed now that I'm unemployed. Oh, and yesterday the A/C stopped working. I can only imagine what that's going to cost me. The long and the short of it is: I'm unemploy...

may be called that for another reason: American Digest points to a domestic field that holds between 200 and 400 beeeeelion barrels of oil. This will, of course give Leftists apoplexy. Look for immediate legislation declaring these lands protected because the Black Hills Newt uses it as a breeding ground or some sort of Native American Heritage Site or whatever conveniently environmental restriction will keep us from ever using it. This same group will simultaneously rail against our dependence on "foreign oil" without a hint of irony.

So Monday I'm standing in the kitchen making myself a sandwich. Kids are at school, baby is napping. Wife and I are talking about something or other and I smell the unmistakable acrid odor of burning plastic. I wheel around and see nothing on the stove. Oven is off...where...? My wife sees my dinner plate sized eyes and asks what's wrong. I can answer b/c I have a mouthful of sandwich and I try to gulp down my food while searching for the source of said smell. Dishwasher! Something plastic must be on the element. It's on and I open it. No steam and nothing on the element. The door, however, is very very hot. I close the door and see smoke coming from the vent that is normally reserved for steam. Shit. That is not good. I close it and the panel is dark. No lights, no numbers, no nuttin'. I check the warranty which, of course, expired in December. Fantastic. One phone call to Whirlpool/Maytag/Big Monopoly Appliance Company/Ha Ha Screw You You're Out ...

First, some good news: Hamas Leader's Son Among 19 Killed in Israeli-Palestinian Conflicts . Now if we can just keep climbing that ladder... Karl Rove was Satan incarnate. The Evil High Dark Master of dirty politics. So loved is he that now Hillary is imitating him. Lawrence Lessig calls this Clinton Swiftboating. More about her raw, naked ambition. http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/01/we-know-these-p.html For Sen. Clinton, something is true if it validates the myth of her striving and her "greatness" (her overweening ambition in other words) and only ceases to be true when it no longer serves that limitless purpose...What does matter is that she has since altered her position and attempted, with her husband's help, to make people forget that she ever held it. And this, on a grave matter of national honor and security, merely to influence her short-term standing in the Iowa caucuses. Surely that on its own should be sufficient to disquali...

A resounding NO. Key excerpts: After all, income inequality in America is increasing, right? Wrong. According to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) study released this month, the bottom fifth of families with children, whose average income in 2005 was $16,800, enjoyed a larger percentage increase in income from 1991 to 2005 than all other groups except the top fifth. Even more impressive, the CBO found that households in the bottom fifth increased their incomes so much because they worked longer and earned more money in 2005 than in 1991 -- not because they received higher welfare payments . The bottom fifth increased its earnings by 80 percent , compared with around 50 percent for the highest-income group and around 20 percent for each of the other three groups. This increase in earnings and total income by low-income families is the biggest success in American social policy of recent decades. Truly a success story. Liberals will doubtless get the vapors and declare that the people ...

Global Warming Swindle . Read the whole thing as they say. The destruction of the Grand Monolith of Scientists Who Believe In Man Made Global Warming continues apace. I'll continue to point them out over and over until we get to some sort of rational place where we're debating this not polemically shouting each other down (buckle up, it's going to be a long ride. -Ed). We should be good stewards of the Earth and should absolutely make every effort to "go green". There are, however, trade-offs and we have to be reasonable about them. Technology is the only way we're going to get greener. To think that we're going to get their by conservation is lunacy. Likewise this is not going to be pain-free. There will be things that we may have to curb or even do without to get to where we need to be.

First Things (recoil in horror ye liberals!) has an article about how Bono's "RED" campaign has spend $100MM in advertising to raise a paltry $18MM. That's a very bad ROI. I'm just sayin'. The article goes on to explain at length the caveats with charity and even cites the Kenyan economist who has shown that aid to the third world is a net negative not a positive.

Underwater Wind Turbines Make Rivers Renewable I suppose calling them "wind" turbines is a bit off but the point stands. The current of a river (Especially those not prone to flow changes due to weather) are an excellent source of consistent power. Next stop, Brandywine River!

The Worst Job in America I think I blogged this one before. If not, watch the video. Hilarous.