Meat vs. Fur

I've got a simple question.

Why is this OK,

but this isn't?

A Little Pop Music

... from 1930.

This is from the Marx Brothers' Animal Crackers, written by Harry Ruby and Bert Kalmar and performed by Lillian Ross, Hal Thompson and Harpo Marx. It's one of my favorites.

Right Now, the Sun is High and the Tide is Low

... and I'm out filming sea creatures! I hope to have some good results to share some time this weekend.

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A Little More on Chinese Parenting

Amy Chua responded to some questions on her article in the WSJ about Chinese parenting vs. Western parenting. Here was a particularly interesting one.

Your method may work with children with a native high IQ—but demanding that kind of excellence from less intelligent children seems unfair and a fool’s errand. Demanding hard work and a great effort from children is the best middle ground we can reach philosophically, isn’t it? Your thoughts?
Jokes about A+s and gold medals aside (much of my book is tongue-in-cheek, making fun of myself), I don’t believe that grades or achievement is ultimately what Chinese parenting (at least as I practice it) is really about. I think it’s about helping your children be the best they can be—which is usually better than they think! It’s about believing in your child more than anyone else—even more than they believe in themselves. And this principle can be applied to any child, of any level of ability. My youngest sister, Cindy, has Down syndrome, and I remember my mother spending hours and hours with her, teaching her to tie her shoelaces on her own, drilling multiplication tables with Cindy, practicing piano every day with her. No one expected Cindy to get a PhD! But my mom wanted her to be the best she could be, within her limits. Today, my sister works at Wal-Mart, has a boyfriend and still plays piano—one of her favorite things is performing for her friends. She and my mom have a wonderful relationship, and we all love her for who she is.

Hmmm. That's more balanced than Amy appeared at first. I'm still not completely sold, but this gives a better understanding of the foundational principles and I have to say I agree with them.

Cat Colorings

I found this chart on Cheezburger to be fascinating.

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Click on it for the proper-sized image. It's loaded with good stuff. Check out the info at the bottom of the chart where it tells you how coloring happens in cat embryos.

Illinois Forgets That Competition Is Everywhere

All life is engaged in competition. We compete for mates, for jobs, for prizes and just about everything else. If you're good at something you get more rewards than if you're not. We compete at all levels - as individuals, as teams, as cities, as states and as nations.

Illinois is in deep fiscal trouble. They've spent and promised way more than they can deliver*. They recently decided to solve their problems with massive tax increases. How's that going to work out? Well, here's the governor of Wisconsin reacting to the Illinois tax hike.

Wisconsin is focused on wealth creation while Illinois is focused on wealth distribution. Those who create wealth will want to move to Wisconsin while those who expect it to be distributed to them will move to Illinois.

Illinois is about to find out that wealth creation is more important than they think.

* - This is probably the fault of Sarah Palin and right wing hate speech.

Cheezburger of the Day

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Link of the Day

Left Coast Rebel: Arizona Killer Fits Tea Party Profile Perfectly

A Thought on Political Violence

Barack Obama seems concerned about what the Arizona shootings portend for future political violence. I think he'd find out more about such matters if he sat down and interviewed his Chicago neighbors, Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorn. You know, the ones who hosted his first political event. The ones who are unapologetic about blowing things up in the name of politics. That might be more productive than talking to a paranoid schizophrenic.

(T)he available evidence dates Loughner's fixation on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords to at least 2007, when he attended a town hall of hers and felt slighted by her response. In 2007, no one had heard of Sarah Palin. Glenn Beck was still toiling on Headline News. There was no Tea Party or health-care reform. The only climate of hate was the pervasive post-Iraq campaign of vilification of George W. Bush, nicely captured by a New Republic editor who had begun an article thus: "I hate President George W. Bush. There, I said it."

Do you suppose the NYT or 60 Minutes has considered interviewing Bill Ayers about the Arizona shootings? Nahhhhhh.

The Fate of the Mentally Ill

Here's something to think about: For every victim of a murderously violent schizoid there are hundreds of mentally ill people who die on the street. You see them every day, begging at street corners. At some point in time, they'll die in their pathetic, little encampments under a bridge or in a thicket down by the river.

At a time when diversity and rights and concern for the environment are spoken of endlessly, it's a testament to the impotence of our society that such poor creatures as these wander about uncared for while we talk and talk and talk about social justice.

Loughner wasn't a homeless beggar, but he was insane. Tim brought up the key conundrum in a comment elsewhere on this blog.

I like to think that all of us who haven't committed any crimes have the right not to be pulled off the street and incarcerated, not just the mentally ill. I seriously hope that she isn't proposing that government officials be given the authority to haul in anybody that they deem to be "insane" and therefore a "danger to the public". That's much too loose of a standard, they'd be able to pick up pretty much anybody that the government found annoying or inconvenient.

All of life being imperfect, there is no answer to this. There are trade offs to everything that we just have to accept. We've chosen to prevent the government from rounding up political dissidents by labeling them as mentally ill in the same way as we have chosen to allow citizens to protect themselves by allowing them to carry weapons. Sometimes the crazies get guns and shoot people. It's going to happen. Life is imperfect.

Meanwhile, congresswomen get the best of care and the mentally ill die under bridges.

For some time I've wanted to collect a gallery of photos of the San Diego homeless to share on this blog, but I just can't bring myself to do it, even from a distance with a telephoto lens. They are, after all, God's children, too, not animals to be filmed on safari. This post will just have to go photoless.

Piranhas!

... or maybe just Koi.

Link of the Day, Arizona Shooting Related

This is worth reading.

Japan Promises To Help Save The Euros!

From Paris to Athens, they're dancing in the streets shouting out, "We're saved!"

Japan plans to buy bonds issued by Europe’s financial-aid funds, its finance minister said, joining China in assisting the region as it battles against a debt crisis that prompted bailouts of Ireland and Greece.

“There is a plan for the euro zone to jointly issue a large amount of bonds late this month to raise funds to assist Ireland,” Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda said at a news conference in Tokyo today. “It’s appropriate for Japan to make a contribution as a leading nation to increase trust in the deal. We want to buy more than 20 percent.”

Ah, Japan. The nation with more than 200% of GDP in debt and whose budget this year relies more on borrowing than taxes for its revenue. They're riding to the rescue of Europe and buying bonds. And where will they get the money to buy these bonds? Why, they'll borrow it, of course!

Take that, Euroskeptics!
Borrowing. Is there nothing it can't do?

Cheezburger of the Day

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On Crises Spreading

I love the use of the word "spreading" to describe the Euro debt crisis.

It is difficult to see how a Portugal bailout can be avoided, however much the government might wish it. Many investors and analysts expect a rescue package, giving it a self-fulfilling character. True, the country may beat its deficit target for 2010 of 7.3% of gross domestic product, but a chunk of the credit for this goes to the one-time transfer to the state of Portugal Telecom's pension fund, worth 1.5% of GDP...Ideally, a Portuguese bailout would be accompanied by measures aimed at preventing the crisis spreading to Spain.

Spreading? What spreading? They're all in debt way over their heads and they just keep borrowing more and more and more. What's to spread? They're insolvent. They didn't get that way overnight and it's not like investors needed to see Ireland and Greece fall apart to figure out that this was a bad thing. They're down another 7.3% this year. If they want this thing to stop "spreading" then they need to run a surplus and pay off some of that debt.

She Is Now In Charge Of All Schizoids

Apparently, some people think the Arizona shooting is the fault of Sarah Palin.

It's like she's a god or something. She can cause just about anything to happen anywhere. Wild.

On Chinese Parenting

Amy Chua has a very provocative article today in the WSJ posting that Chinese parents are superior to Western parents. To me, there are some good parts...

What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you're good at it. To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child will resist; things are always hardest at the beginning, which is where Western parents tend to give up. But if done properly, the Chinese strategy produces a virtuous circle. Tenacious practice, practice, practice is crucial for excellence.

... and some not-so-good parts.

A lot of people wonder how Chinese parents raise such stereotypically successful kids. They wonder what these parents do to produce so many math whizzes and music prodigies, what it's like inside the family, and whether they could do it too. Well, I can tell them, because I've done it. Here are some things my daughters, Sophia and Louisa, were never allowed to do:

• attend a sleepover
• have a playdate
• be in a school play
• complain about not being in a school play
• watch TV or play computer games
• choose their own extracurricular activities
• get any grade less than an A
• not be the No. 1 student in every subject except gym and drama
• play any instrument other than the piano or violin
• not play the piano or violin

My daughter is just now starting to turn the corner in soccer. When we work out, she understands why she needs to work on a particular part of her game and she works harder and wants to stay at it longer than I do. She's showing the attitude and tenacity she needs to reach her goal which is to play on a high school team. However, she chose soccer, not me. I let her choose her passion, but I'm not letting her be mediocre at it and not letting her quit. I'm particularly happy that she chose something that helps her have a better social life - one where she does something as a group with other girls her own age.

Pushing her to do well in soccer has been difficult enough. I've had to drive home the concept that Amy Chua makes above about success leading to fun, but I tried to do it so she would get to the point where she chose to practice. I can't imagine how hard this task would be if I had forced her into something she didn't want to do or didn't have the talent to do.

Screw this. I'm going to Vegas with my daughter's soccer team to watch them in the Silver State Tournament. Party on!
In the end, I want her to know how to make her own choices, do what she loves, but not accept mediocrity. I'm not sure I can get there with Amy Chua's techniques.

Now That The Preliminaries Are Over

... we can get on to the real big fiscal catastrophes.

Iceland, Greece and Ireland were all pretty bad, but they were small enough to rescue, at least temporarily. Bigger, more problematic ones - Portugal and Spain - are still out there, waiting to fall, but even these aren't the main event. The main event is Japan.

Megan McArdle:

Japan's budget is in a truly terrifying state. Reading about the government's behavior reminds me of the worst accounts of compulsive spenders on the verge of personal bankruptcy--a sort of "What the hell, we're screwed anyway, so let's not think about it and maybe go to Cabo for the weekend." The budget's structural position is what is known technically to economists as "completely hosed"; borrowing now exceeds tax revenue, and debt service costs now eat up almost half of the tax revenue the government collects. "Unsustainable" is too weak to describe the situation; I don't know how they're doing it now.

Reuters:

With new debt issuance seen topping tax revenues for the second straight year in the initial budget, Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda reiterated the need to overhaul the country's tax systems -- code for a sales tax hike -- to meet rising welfare costs for the fast-aging population.

The Wall Street Journal:

Rather than fundamental reform to Tokyo's notorious inability to spend wisely, the hallmarks of this budget are the administration's scramble to secure revenue and fulfill unrealistic campaign pledges. Tokyo will raid non-budget accounts and foreign-exchange reserves for $86 billion to fill its revenue shortfall. This kind of budgeting just isn't sustainable.

With local elections scheduled across Japan in the spring, spending is jumping without strategic rationale. Agricultural income subsidies are set to skyrocket more than 40% to $9.5 billion. Rather than creating incentives to make farms bigger and more efficient, Tokyo is just putting this cash into farmers pockets. Child-care subsidies will expand, without consideration of the recipient's income level.

Way back when, across all of the developed world, fiscal conservatives fought against mammoth increases in government social programs claiming they would lead to bankruptcy. They were labeled as heartless and greedy.

What would you call them now?

Point Loma Sunset Evolution

Here's a better version of yesterday's sunset video. This one retains the wave motion at their original speed, but still gives you a feeling for the change in the sky over time. Leaving the segments at their original speed also allows you to leave the sounds of the waves in the video. The video is available on YouTube in 720p, so if you can handle the download, a fullscreen version might be worth it.

Enjoy!

Cheezburger of the Day

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Frantic Sunset

I got some great photos and video of an awesome sunset from the cliffs overlooking the Point Loma tidepools. I tried speeding it up the way I used to do sunset videos, but the result was quite frantic because of the waves in the foreground. You still get the dramatic evolution of the sunset against the clouds, but the timescale of the motion of the waves doesn't match the timescale of the sunset. I've got a different way of doing the same thing that solves this problem that I'll post tomorrow.

Why We Simply Must Get Rid Of All Incandescent Bulbs

Because the only solution to Global Warming

Jan. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Half a foot (15 centimeters) of snow may fall over the New York region starting today, the second winter storm in two weeks in an area recovering from a post- Christmas blizzard.

is quick and decisive action.

Jan. 6 (Bloomberg) -- Rare earth metals are key to global efforts to switch to cleaner energy -- from batteries in hybrid cars to magnets in wind turbines. Mining and processing the metals causes environmental damage that China, the biggest producer, is no longer willing to bear.

China’s rare earth industry each year produces more than five times the amount of waste gas, including deadly fluorine and sulfur dioxide, than the total flared annually by all miners and oil refiners in the U.S. Alongside that 13 billion cubic meters of gas is 25 million tons of wastewater laced with cancer-causing heavy metals such as cadmium, Xu Xu, chairman of the China Chamber of Commerce of Metals, Minerals & Chemicals Importers & Exporters, said at a Beijing conference on Dec. 28.

You should immediately drive your Prius over to the local coop to buy compact flourescent bulbs. It's your duty to the planet.

How to Record Video in a Tidepool

Here are some lessons learned from my recent tidepool filming efforts.

1. Suspended sediment is your enemy. Tiny particles in the water act like fog, turning the movie into a hazy mess as they reflect sunlight from above. The first day I shot was right after a rainstorm and the tidepool was quite cloudy from runoff. The result was a wasted hour.


2. Canyons are your friend. The PlaySport has a minimum focal length of 39.6", so you need a bit of distance between the camera and your target. A water-filled crevasse in the rocks is perfect, so long as the end you're pointing at is in sunlight.


3. I shot entirely through as much sunlit water as I could and in retrospect that was probably a mistake. If there is no sunlight, the suspended particles have nothing to reflect and so they don't produce foggy, ambient light. Since the first 39" can't be made out anyway, you might as well shoot through 39" of shadow, so long as the scene you want to film is at least that distance away, is bathed in sunlight and you have a clear line-of-sight to it.


4. Deep tidepools, the kind large enough to submerge the camera and give you 40+" of shooting distance, are not loaded with animals. For example, the hermit crabs are all hanging out in the shallow pools. That means that if you want to capture some critters on film, you need plenty of patience. The video below shows the last few seconds of film where a tiny fish popped into the scene (lower right-hand corner) just as I was pulling the camera out. I ended up missing the only real drama in the scene because I didn't wait long enough.


5. You need two establishing shots to set the scene. First, you need a long-distance shot of the tidepools in general. Next, you need another above-the-water shot showing the layout of the tidepool you're filming. After that you can submerge the camera and get to work.

Video of the Day

I just thought this was cool ...

When Do We Reassess The Past?

The Democratic governor of a deep blue state is confronting reality, just like Jerry Brown is in California.

Andrew Cuomo, the newly elected governor of New York, seems determined to build a career as a budget hawk. His campaign platform included admirably detailed promises on how to end the state’s budget imbalance, including a pledge to not raise taxes. Even before he was sworn in, the governor-elect was sending a blunt message to the state legislature. This is “about numbers,” Cuomo said. “There’s no Democratic or Republican philosophical dispute here. The numbers have to balance, and the numbers now don’t balance … It’s painful, but it is also undeniable.”

Now that it's become obvious that the progressive agenda of massive government spending, entitlements, benefits, regulations and wealth redistribution has failed, when do we reexamine the arguments of the past and put a stake through the heart of this particular vampire?

40 years and $14T of FAIL and that's just at the Federal level.
Whatever the goals of the Great Society and its ideological brethren were, a static poverty rate wasn't one of them. So when do we go back and review the rhetoric and logical arguments made by Ted Kennedy and Barbara Boxer and all the rest and conclude that they were wrong? Not just mistaken, but flat-out, mathematically wrong. For 40 years we've fought poverty with government spending and it's now clear that strategy was totally wrong. That needs to be stated clearly, openly and loudly.

Is anyone out there saying that? I can't think of any pundit or politician who has made that his or her central theme.

Cheezburger of the Day

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Big Anenome

Another tidbit from my Point Loma tidepool filming expedition. I still need to blog my lessons learned from this trip, but that will have to wait. The Catican is cold this morning and I need to get going off to do other things. In the meantime, enjoy a little anenome action! There's an HD version, so if you can handle the download, you can watch it in 720p.

Jerry Brown Confronts Reality

... and does it with his typical candor.

The new governor’s budget will be introduced after former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger grappled with shortfalls that totaled $100 billion combined since June 2008. During that time, the state cut spending more than $45 billion and raised taxes by $12.5 billion. Another $36 billion of one-time or temporary solutions pushed some of the deficit into future years.

Brown is likely to propose even more cuts and call for a special election to ask voters for money, said Jaime Regalado, executive director of the Edmund G. Brown Institute of Public Affairs -- named for Jerry Brown’s father, himself a former governor -- at California State University, Los Angeles. Options include extending temporary tax increases on income, retail sales and vehicle registrations put in place in 2009. They are set to expire this year.

The reductions may include eliminating local redevelopment agencies, shrinking social-services benefits, slashing aid to state universities and closing parks, the Sacramento Bee reported today, citing a source close to Brown’s budget proposal.

Good on ya, Jerry. Just as only Nixon could go to China, perhaps only a Jerry Brown could slash spending.

From "Unsustainable" to "Unsustained"

Illinois is going over the cliff.

Jan. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Illinois lawmakers will try this week to accomplish in a few days what they have been unable to do in the past two years -- resolve the state’s worst financial crisis.

The legislative session that begins today will take aim at a budget deficit of at least $13 billion, including a backlog of more than $6 billion in unpaid bills and almost $4 billion in missed payments to underfunded state pensions.

The jig is up, but they're deluding themselves just a little bit longer.

Lawmakers meeting in Springfield will consider spending cuts, an expansion of casino gambling and a proposal from Democratic Governor Pat Quinn to borrow $15 billion to pay overdue bills and help fill the budget hole.

It's like watching an alcoholic hit bottom. The solution is gambling and borrowing? Good luck with that, boys.

Link of the Day

Troy Senik, writing at Ricochet, has a great post on presidential speeches. Here's a tidbit from something worth reading in full.

Have Something Interesting to Say -- This may sound extraordinarily basic, but it's a principle violated by most professional politicians on a regular basis. Part of the torpor of modern presidential speeches is that they mostly sound as if they're run off an assembly line. The same points are made in the same language, ad nauseam. And because the process of crafting a presidential speech combines the natural risk aversion of a White House communications operation with vetting by the bureaucracy, the language often ends up about as inspired as a workplace training video.

Trying Out Dropbox

Now that drop.io was sold off to Facebook and then closed, I'm in need of a place to store files and shuttle them from one computer to another. Dropbox looks like an excellent replacement, more capable than drop.io.

The Spoilt Child Around 2:00 Is My Favorite

Click here. Watch.

(The slide around 4:25 is great, too.)

Tidepool Forest

Here's my first relatively decent footage from the local tidepools using my new Kodak PlaySport. I love the PlaySport - it's everything I'd hoped it would be. I've got some lessons learned from this exercise that I'll blog later. For now, here's the video. Try it in HD mode, perhaps even full screen. I love the veil of bubbles that comes up about a third of the way through. I'm anxious to hear what you've got to say after you watch it. There aren't any critters in the thing, so don't be disappointed that it's all flora and no fauna.

Something To Be Thankful For

2010 was a great year in the Catican, but we don't always show it. Here in our spacious editorial offices, the staff of The Scratching Post scours the Interweb Tubes each morning for odds and ends to comment on and synthesize into larger points. Too often, the stories are negative and commentary filled with scowling. How does that work? Life is beautiful and we're happy, but the blog is scowly. That can't be good. So let's see if we can find something fun to be thankful for. Hmmm. How about a little Bing from Road to Morocco?

And just who do we have to thank? Why, lots of people! Google for YouTube, Cisco for the Interweb delivery system, HP for the laptop where I'm watching it, Microsoft for the OS and browser, Paramount Pictures for the movie ... (Feel free to add to the list if you'd like.)

That's a whole lot of folks working to make sure we could enjoy a little of Der Bingle crooning. That's pretty cool.

India, China and Indonesia Were Unavailable for Comment

The EPA is swinging into action, preventing Global Warming*!

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued its plan for establishing greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution standards under the Clean Air Act in 2011. The agency looked at a number of sectors and is moving forward on GHG standards for fossil fuel power plants and petroleum refineries—two of the largest industrial sources, representing nearly 40 percent of the GHG pollution in the United States. The schedule issued in today’s agreements provides a clear path forward for these sectors and is part of EPA’s common-sense approach to addressing GHGs from the largest industrial pollution sources.

Hooray! This will be a major victory for planet Earth! The United States (pop. 350M) must take the lead in preventing Global Warming*! Soon, China (pop. 1,330M), India (pop. 1,173M) and Indonesia (pop. 243M) will follow.

I mean, they will follow us, right? This isn't just a collosal waste of time to make a bunch of smug, fatuous narcissists feel good about themselves, is it? I mean, because if they don't, their failure to take similar actions with their aggregate population of 2,853M will make this a totally worthless, self-inflicted gunshot wound to the American economy.

* - Err, not Global Warming, but Climate Change. Yes, definitely, it's Climate Change.

Kodak PlaySport Test

On Wednesday, I took my brand new Kodak PlaySport camera and put it in a tub of rainwater, looking up at the patio overhang and the water dripping off of it. I like the results.

Before I take it down to the tidepools, I need to do some focus tests to find the minimum distance from camera to subject. I've got a hot tub that will be perfect for this.

I'm a Wishy-Washy Mix of Friedman and Thatcher

... so sayeth the quiz that our Monastery of Miscellaneous Musings led us to.


My numbers: Left/Right: 3.50
Social Libertarian / Authoritarian: 2.26.

Juxtaposition

---

Yes, But Corporations Are Different!

Pallavi Gogoi had an excellent article in Slate yesterday about how American jobs continue to move overseas.

All but 4 percent of the top 500 U.S. corporations reported profits this year, and the stock market is close to its highest point since the 2008 financial meltdown.

But the jobs are going elsewhere. The Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank, says American companies have created 1.4 million jobs overseas this year, compared with less than 1 million in the U.S.

This being Slate, the comments attached to the article are all about how corporations are greedy and the fatcats are getting tax breaks and blah blah blah, but they all miss the point. Corporations, like the commenters, shop around to find the best prices for what they want to buy. In the case of the commenters, it's food and clothing and transportation. In the case of the corporations, it's labor. The corporations are just doing what the commenters do - buying what they need at the lowest price available.

If you don't want the jobs going overseas, then cut the regulations and wages that make us more expensive.

Tim Robbins explains how it all works.

The Best Hummingbird Video You'll See This Year

Click. Watch.

Thanks to our Grand Inquisitor for sharing this with us!

This Thing Needs To Be Melted Down And Formed Into Little Statues Of Hitler

It's a serrated blade attachment from my Cuisanart food processor. It's the single most destructive and dangerous kitchen implement in our house, responsible for more pain and bloodshed than everything else combined. I can't use the thing without it leaping up at me or falling down on me or sidling over towards me to attack. Slicing, poking, impaling, sawing, you name it, this hideous monstrosity has done it.

Evil? Oh yes. It's evil.

The blade and a Hitler statue. The resemblance is uncanny.

Intellectual Chaos

... is what happens when you mix mountains of government funds available for climate research with a pro-warming political agenda. The UK's Meteorology Office claimed the winter was going to be mild.

The Met Office’s forecasts of warmer-than-average summers and winters have been so consistently at 180 degrees to the truth that, earlier this year, it conceded that it was dropping seasonal forecasting. Hence, last week, the Met Office issued a categorical denial to the Global Warming Policy Foundation that it had made any forecast for this winter. Immediately, however, several blogs, led by Autonomous Mind, produced evidence from the Met Office website that in October it did indeed publish a forecast for December, January and February. This indicated that they would be significantly warmer than last year, and that there was only “a very much smaller chance of average or below-average temperatures”.

The New York Times tells us that the harsh winter was a foregone conclusion.

In Brooklyn and Newark, it exceeds 24 inches, and, in Boston, which has received 18.2 inches, the story has not yet fully been told. Nor is this a freak accident. Seven of the last nine winters in the eastern United States and Eurasia have been exceptionally cold.

And what do we learn from the Grey Lady? Listen to Judah Cohen – “director of seasonal forecasting at” a suspiciously nameless “atmospheric and environmental research firm,” which, as you might guess, depends on government funding to support its research – who writes in that estimable journal that “the overall warming of the atmosphere is actually creating cold-weather extremes.”

Got that? “We’re freezing not in spite of climate change but because of it.”

What did you expect? Climate forecasting is notoriously inaccurate, but there were millions up for grabs if you claimed you could do it or if you just claimed you could predict some kind of consequences. What we've ended up with is a hodgepodge of contradictory research papers that can be used to find anything you wish.

There was another comment thread somewhere on the web where the original article claimed the cold winter disproved global warming. In the comments, activists posted links to journal articles which had predicted that global warming would cause such winters. These were immediately countered by journal article links claiming it wouldn't. This is a natural outcome of politicizing science.

The global warming industry used the press to peddle tales of doom in order to get more politically-based funding for research. Now those (contradictory) tales of doom can be used by either side to prove anything you want since the predictions were all over the map. Meanwhile, reality provides one refuting data point after another to each of them.

Nils-Axel Morner, head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics department at Stockholm University in Sweden, argues that any concerns regarding rising sea levels are unfounded. "So all this talk that sea level rising, this comes from the computer modeling, not from observations. ... The new level, which has been stable, has not changed in the last 35 years. ... But they [IPCC] need a rise, because if there is no rise, there is no death threat ... if you want a grant for a research project in climatology, it is written into the document that there 'must' be a focus on global warming. ... That is really bad, because you start asking for the answer you want to get."

The end result of all of this will be cynicism from the press, the politicians and the public. Anyone standing with the global warming alarmists will end up looking like a fool, just like the UK MET Office.

It's another mild winter in England due to global warming.

Underwater Videos Are on the Way!

Santa was good to me this year!


How about you? What kind of loot did you score?

Eucharistic Ministrations on Christmas

Yesterday I had the good fortune to be a eucharistic minister during Christmas Mass. Every time I do that I get choked up for some reason or another. I can't explain it and I didn't expect that when I started, but it just happens. Yesterday my wife and I served at a different Mass than usual and there was a larger than normal choir. Communion was out of rhythm - it was like square dancing with a new partner. It didn't seem like Communion was going to have the same emotional pop as usual because of the confusion. That is until the very last fellow came up to me.

He was a big, rugged man carrying his son who looked to be about 2 years old, maybe 3. I was serving the wine. The man took the chalice from me with a hearty, "Amen." His son watched him with a look of pure innocence, pure concentration and pure love. It was a beautiful, Norman Rockwell scene and I got to be a small part of it.

That was all it took. Another glorious, unforgettable moment. Thank you, God, for letting me be a part of that.

I hope your Christmas day gave plenty of the same kind of memories to you.

Merry (Digital) Christmas!

How to Time Your Blackened Prime Rib Steaks

It's 2 minutes a side for each steak. Nothing could be better to let you know it's time to turn them than a little Papa Nez, particularly with Micky's harmony in the background.

Monkees Trivia: Peter played guitar on this one as he did on Mike's other song on the first album.

Comment of the Day

... is this one by Julia Dye over at the Wall Street Journal in response to an article describing how legally childish the ObamaCare bill is.

If you truly believe that you should pay more so that others have better health insurance, buy someone who needs it a health insurance policy. If each American who wanted to see this happen did so, even just a catastrophic care policy for someone else, most of the problem would be solved. But that's not what pro-ObamaCare folks want. They don't want to pay for it...they want to force others to do so.

And yes, I have in fact paid for an insurance policy for a few others I know that need a temporary hand until they get on their feet. In each case, the person worked hard to get themselves solvent, and in some cases paid me back when they could. They knew a real person with a real face had helped them...which is quite different than a faceless handout happens.

Julia, you rock on so many levels!

Our Knight-Protector Now Has A Lady Fair!

Congratulations, old boy. Well done. The Feline Theocracy wishes you long life and happiness!

Do It for the Ardwargers

Really. Click here and you'll understand.

A Little Christmas Music

... because I felt like it. Enjoy!

Cheezburger of the Day

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AAPL as Tiffanys

Brett Arends is going to get a lot of hate mail from Apple fanboys for this article giving 10 reasons why he doesn't want an iPad. No matter what you think of his overall point, he's got at least one gem in his 10 reasons.

3. Check out those profit margins!

OK, I admit it: I've been wrong about Apple stock lately. After correctly turning bullish at $85 two years ago, I turned cautious waaay too early. My mistake? This isn't a technology company. It's a luxury brand, like Hermès or Tiffany. And it's wooed customers so they'll pay almost anything for its products. Last Christmas, Apple's gross margins were 41%. That's incredible. It's good for Apple, good for stockholders—but not so good for shoppers. Me, I don't want to support someone else's 60% markups with my own dollars. Generally speaking, the smarter move is to invest in the Tiffanys of the world—and shop at the Wal-Marts.

Bingo.

Remember, Charity Agencies Are The Government's Competition

... hence this editorial from Richard Thaler of the University of Chicago.

NOW that Congress has actually managed to enact tax legislation, it may be time to consider some bigger issues. I hope that broad-based tax reform will be high on the list of both major parties.

Any meaningful reform will face intense lobbying from those who stand to lose. The tax deduction for charitable giving is a case in point. Although changes will be fought both by the givers and the receivers of tax-deductible donations, there is good reason to disregard their pleas.

You bet there is, Ricky. If we allow private individuals to engage in charity and it turns out to be more effective than the government, who knows what could happen? Haven't we learned anything from the past 40 years of government intervention? Just look at the successes we've had! Poverty is higher and we're $13T in the hole.

Err, maybe we shouldn't look at the results of handing social work over to the government ...

Review: Transend Email Migrator

Short version: It is the greatest thing ever created by human hands.

Longer version: I'm reluctantly migrating from Eudora to Outlook 2010. I figured Outlook would be able to vacuum up all my email fragments into a single system, fragments created by more than a decade of hard drive recoveries and email upgrades. I was wrong. This is what I got from running the email import wizard in Outlook 2010:

Dear Microsoft: You suck.
I then did a Google search on email conversion and found Transend. Having nothing to lose, I bought it for $49 and it converted my email perfectly, importing it into my existing PST file, thoughtfully placing these new folders in a subfolder which was clearly labeled so I could move the folders around afterwards as required.

Transend rocks. It does exactly what I needed done. It's going to solve a long-standing problem that has been driving me crazy. I hope that each member of the Transend team gets one of these for Christmas.

It's the Regulations, Stupid, Part 3

Here in San Diego, we can't clean our storm drains.

Flood-control work across San Diego is stuck in the mud after a court ordered the city to stop for failing to do the proper environmental review...

The main hazard is flooding of lowland areas such as Sorrento Valley and Chollas Creek — an issue that pops up every rainy season. City crews want to clean out muck and plants that slow the flow of water and cause it to overtop storm drains. But they need a host of environmental agencies to sign off on the work, and the slow process has hampered efforts to reduce the backlog of clogged areas.

Awesome. Once upon a time, we built interstate highway systems and large hydroelectric dams. Now we can't even manage to clean out our storm drains.

Moving to MS Outlook

I've used Qualcomm's Eudora email client since the 90s. Sadly, I just can't use it any more. Qualcomm no longer supports it and the new version, based on Mozilla, is an open source piece of junk that won't import my old email. Due to hard drive crashes, I've got email chunks all over the place and the new Eudora can't pull them all together.

I've never liked Outlook, but today I had to pay for it and downloaded Outlook 2010. It's a sad day in the Catican.

LA Towers

I took this photo while at Adobe MAX a few months ago.

Hilarious!

Click here.

Call Me Back in 2000 Years

... after some large, atheist society has had a nice, long run.

In a widely read and commented upon post, Nigel Barber examines some of the evidence and trends related to atheism and the decline of religion. Barber closes his thought-provoking post with the following:

"The reasons that churches lose ground in developed countries can be summarized in market terms. First, with better science, and with government safety nets, and smaller families, there is less fear and uncertainty in people's daily lives and hence less of a market for religion

Government safety nets. Oh yeah, that's working out well.

The third fear factor is: reality. In Washington and in statehouses around the country, the reality of the pending Fiscal Armageddon is starting to seep into the thick skulls of the elected class. Jerry Brown pronounced himself “shocked” once he got a good peek at California’s balance sheet. Off the record, politicians of both parties are starting to concede that a lot of the old ideological disputes at now moot, because there simply isn’t any money. It’s not a question of whether there are going to be deep cuts and fundamental restructuring, but when and how much.

Churches are losing ground? Err, maybe not.

Better science is linked to atheism? Not really.

The problem with claiming societal victory using data from a decade or two is that societal oscillations have a periodicity much greater than decades. It's more on the order of generations. Modern, enlightened, wealthy, secular nations are not not reproducing, are spending themselves into fiscally-induced convulsions and are crowing about non-existent links between science and atheism. Mike Austin's well-reasoned response is complete overkill. The entire premise of the article he's refuting is crumbling as we speak.

Before we rush about claiming that one or another societal structure is superior, we probably ought to let it play out for a couple of centuries and check the scoreboard then. Right now, in terms of personal freedom and living standards, it's a runaway for Christian, capitalist democracies.

Update: Our Monastery of Miscellaneous Musings has a short post illustrating the trouble with claiming that atheist regimes are the wave of the future.

Lord, Give Me Patience

I just accidentally pressed the doorbell as I was going out to the Catican. The dogs were right there and saw me do it. Despite knowing no stranger was there and knowing I was around to ward off any dangers, the doorbell set them off on a barking spasm.

Sigh.

Reflecting

... and in Other News, Moodys Picks the Washington Redskins to Win Super Bowl XVII

Talk about being ahead of the game! Nobody can beat Moodys!

LONDON—Moody's Investors Service Inc. downgraded Ireland's debt to Baa1 from Aa2 Friday, warning the government's financial strength could deteriorate further if economic growth were to miss its projections.

The five-notch downgrade was made as "Ireland's sovereign creditworthiness has suffered from the repeated crystallization of bank-related contingent liabilities on the government's balance sheet," said Dietmar Hornung, vice president, senior credit officer at Moody's.

Ireland has a debt servicing problem? You don't say! Who could have seen that coming?

Another successful prediction for Moodys!

Link of the Day

... comes from the Secular Apostate who has the best explanation yet as to why we're seeing such a jump in temporary employment.

“Kelly girl” used to be a term describing a pert and ambitious young person just beginning a career and working toward steady employment by building experience in temporary employment assignments. Very few Kelly girls imagined it as a way of life. But the jobs data show that Kelly girls are the New Normal.

I won't give away the ending. It's worth the read.

Opa!

Let's buy another round of ouzo for our Greek friends!

ATHENS — Thousands of Greeks took to the streets of the capital on Wednesday for a protest against a fresh wave of austerity measures which was marred by violence as a general strike brought international travel and public services to a standstill.

Why are they burning down their own city? Why, for justice, of course!

As dusk fell and tear gas lingered in the air, police helicopters circled over Parliament, where rows of police officers in gas masks and shields stood guard. “This is unacceptable — it’s worse than the junta,” said Giorgos Papageorgiou, a 52-year-old factory worker, referring to a seven-year military dictatorship in Greece that fell in 1974. Mr. Papageorgiou said the new law voted through Parliament would lower his monthly wage to ¤700 from ¤1,000 and make it harder for him to support his wife, who does not work, and their teenage daughter.

“Is this the democracy we fought for?” said Mr. Papageorgiou, wiping the white chalky remnants of tear gas from his face. “This is fascism.”

No, Mr. Papageorgiou, what you had was fascism. This is fiscal collapse, the natural denouement of fascism. Fascism is where an all-powerful government tells you what you can and can't buy, do, make and sell. Some markers of fascism are lots and lots of state-owned or state-controlled companies and rampant corruption because bribery is how you market to the all-powerful state bureaucracies. Sound familiar, Mr. Papageorgiou?

Too bad your school system taught lefty economic theory. Had it taught reality instead of garbage, you might have avoided this or at least been able to see these budget cuts for what they are - a well-deserved kick in the pants to a load of wastrels.

Oh well. Open another bottle of ouzo and drink deep, Mr. Papageorgiou. Tomorrow morning will come soon enough and you'll need to be out there with a broom and a dustpan.

A Little EuroDebt Factoid

Dig this.

Portugal held its last debt auction of the year on Wednesday, selling 500 million euros of three-month treasury bills, but at a punitively high yield of 3.4 percent. Last month it sold the same amount at 1.8 percent.

Two things jump out at me on this one.

• The interest Portugal is paying on its debt has doubled in the past month. Not year, month.


• Portugal is issuing three month bonds. That means those 500 million euros of debt will have to be resold this coming April, right about the time Spain should be slipping into obvious fiscal crisis. This bond issuance only bought them three months of breathing space.

The leaders of Portugal probably aren't so stupid that they can't see what's happening. To me, it looks like they've lost control of the situation and a 3-month reprieve is the best they can do.

Surreal

What is this? Seriously. What is it?

A Quick Comparison of Science Diet and Purina Cat Foods

... specifically, those our Maximum Leader would be fed.

	Science Diet m/d	Science Diet Mature Adult Indoor	Purina Healthful Life
Protein	51.5%	34%	36%
Fat	22%	20.1%	13%
Carbs	14.7%	31.9%	not listed
Crude Fiber	5.9%	8%	6%

Science Diet m/d is their weight loss and diabetes prevention diet. It's a prescription diet* that you can only buy at a vet's office. It looks to me like Healthful life compares reasonably well with Mature Adult Indoor. Regular Science Diet food can only be found at pet stores. I've got to take Her Serene Furriness in for a vet appointment soon and when I do I'll pose the question for them, but until then, it doesn't look like I'm doing any harm feeding her Healthful Life.

* - A prescription diet?!? Huh?

Why ObamaCare Was Defeated In Court

... because if the government can force you to buy health care, it can force you to buy anything. Having a deal now where the government chooses to restrict this power over you to health care is no guarantee that the deal won't be altered in the future. Sort of like this.

That Sinking Feeling

... is shared today by two groups: insurance companies and sane Democrats.

Yesterday's court decision in the Virginia case that the government can't force you to buy a commercial product is a pretty serious blow to ObamaCare. There are two groups who are probably feeling sick right now.

First off, the insurance industry supported this bill for just this provision. They could deal with the price caps for everyone so long as they received legions of healthy customers forced through their doors at bayonet point. Without those healthy customers who would pay premiums, but not require service, the insurance companies are screwed. This deal is now all pain and no gain.

The other group has to be the Democratic party operatives who are not insane*. They just got killed in the elections in exchange for ... nothing. The entire effort to jam health care down our throats wasn't just a political disaster, it was a failure as well. ObamaCare is more unpopular than ever and now its financially untenable as well. Without the ability to force people to buy insurance, the whole thing falls apart. It's been a steady stream of failures already, but this removes the entire financial foundation of the scheme. A logical set of questions to ask the surviving, sane Democrats is this: "What in the world were you thinking? You actually thought you could tell us all what to buy? Are you crazy?"

Oops.

Think about this: If the government can force the healthy to buy insurance, it can force hipsters to get haircuts.
* - How to tell them apart: Use the phrase "Sarah Palin" in normal conversation and see if they go into a paroxysm of slanderous rants. If they can maintain their composure, they're sane.

Review: Healthful Life Purina Cat Chow

Our Maximum Leader loves the taste of Healthful Life Purina Cat Chow. I recently switched over to it from one of the Science Diet versions and she's completely bonkers for Healthful Life. It's nutritional value is great, too.

It is teh awesome!
Note: I get no recompense for this recommendation. She just loves it and I wanted to share.

Two Links for Tim

... and anyone else who like beautiful bugs.

Why dragonflies were larger in prehistoric times.

A very nice dragonfly video. Try it in HD.

North Korea's YouTube Channel

... is loaded with visual treats. This one seems like a real crowd pleaser!

Obama to Meet with Vulgar, Greedy Swine

Dig this.

Dec. 11 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama plans to extend his outreach to the business community by convening a meeting in Washington with about 20 chief executives, senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said ...

Since his party’s losses in last month’s midterm elections Obama has held meetings with current and former top executives including Michael Duke, chief executive officer of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Alan Lafley, a former CEO of Procter & Gamble Co., and Steven Reinemund, former chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. CEO Jamie Dimon.

How do you think these conversations go? How about this:

Obama: I hate you. You're poisoning the atmosphere and oppressing the workers.

CEO: Yes. Yes I am.

And why would the conversations go any differently if a Republican held them? Our political class does nothing but excoriate big business and demand that they pay their fair share, a share whose value is always a little bigger than what they pay now. Meanwhile, they eat because of Archer Daniels Midland, drive because of Exxon and email each other because of Apple, Microsoft and Cisco Systems.

If they're meeting, then it must be that Obama has something to learn from the CEOs. Just what would that be, given how he and his people speak of them?

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Video: Metrodome Roof Collapsing

Update: How rude of me! Our Monastery of Miscellaneous Musings posted the same thing. It's as bad as going to the holiday party wearing the same dress as someone else.

Odds and Ends

Here are some miscellaneous blog bits from the Catican. Enjoy!

• There's a great article in the WaPo today - 5 Myths About North Korea. It's definitely worth a read.


• I finally removed Mish Shedlock from my read list. Mish is an econoblogger with a huge following. He's right much of the time, but he has massive blind spots and his posts are endlessly gloomy and sneering. In Mish's world, the only wise person is Mish. There's got to be someone better out there.


• We went and saw Voyage of the Dawn Treader yesterday. I highly recommend it, but for Narnia fanatics like me, I'll have to see it a second time to really see the movie. It deviates sufficiently from the book that as I was watching, I was trying to figure out why they chose the plot lines they did. It's a fine movie, but the changes in the story were distracting.


• As I watched it, near the end, I got the uncomfortable feeling that the creative team didn't trust the original story. Just as they did in Prince Caspian, they amplified the action sequences and tightened the plot considerably. The slow and gentle story was revved up.


• If you're going to make changes to a classic, you'd better be a darn good writer. You're not likely to make changes for the better. The most you can hope for is to not screw it up.


• I'm starting to feel sorry for Obama. The episode the other day where he ran out of the room and left Bill Clinton to face the press was sad and disturbing. To me, it reeks of fear and a lack of self-confidence. He didn't want a side-by-side comparison. B-Daddy thinks Obama has thrown in the towel.


• As a secondary thought, it also reflects ill on Clinton. He couldn't be trusted to take a submissive role to Obama. Had they done a joint press conference, there's no way Clinton would have deferred sufficiently to Obama to make him seem like the top dog.


• Our Maximum Leader wants more food. Now.

My Take on the Obama - Clinton News Conference

... is that this is more interesting:  How come you didn't see the whole of the Moon? - Science, News - The Independent 

I didn't realize how limited those first space suits were.

It's the Regulations, Stupid, Part 2

On the same trip running errands with my dad described in a previous post, we stopped at a small appliance repair shop. It had only a few employees, maybe two or three. They repaired toaster ovens, clocks, lamps and assorted low-cost electronics. Judging from the customers I saw, each transaction had an average value of about $30.

ObamaCare was going to force this guy to fill out a 1099 form for every business transaction over $600. He was already getting 1099s from his suppliers in the mail in obedience with the new regulations.

He threw them away as fast as he got them. They were totally without value.

He told us he didn't have the staff to keep books to the level of detail required to fill out 1099s for every $600 transaction. It just wasn't possible for him to follow the rules, but he had experienced audits in the past for similar tiny infractions and expected more. This one was absolutely over the top for him.

Who is going to pay for all of our lovely social services once this guy quits?

HHS. They're here to help.

On Hostages and Ransom

Why didn't the president exhort his followers to do what it took to get rich and then pay more taxes? If the problem is that the rich aren't giving enough money to the government, then the people who want that should get rich and give the government their money.

Why not?

It's the Regulations, Stupid

More data for my assertion that it's not interest rates and taxes that are killing us ...

On Tuesday, my dad and I stopped by a place where you buy soil in bulk. Topsoil, ground bark, gravel, they had it all, along with a single dump truck they used to deliver large orders to big projects. The owner told us that the truck was a 2001 model. The EPA had recently told him that the truck needed to have a completely new engine because the current engine's emissions were too great. The cost of replacing the engine was going to be $70,000.

EPA regulations, not high interest rates or onerous taxes, were going to cost him $70,000 to replace a perfectly good engine on a perfectly good truck. The guy sells dirt for a living. Where's he going to get $70,000? Meanwhile, in China and India, hundreds of thousands of far dirtier engines were pouring emissions into our common atmosphere.

The EPA was going to force him to spend $70,000 in exchange for absolutely nothing.

Ben Bernanke is going to print $600B to save the economy. The Republicans are going to give you a couple hundred dollars in tax breaks to save the economy. God only knows what Barack Obama thinks he's doing to save the economy. Meanwhile, a guy who sells dirt was getting a pointless $70,000 engine replacement shoved down his throat by a bureaucracy that didn't even know he existed.

You know all those entitlements we love? Who's going to pay them when this guy goes out of business?

We'd all be better off if this was replaced with a rickshaw. Green jobs at good wages!

Cheezburger of the Day

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Video of the Day

Dig this.

Digital Tutors

I recently came across a site called Digital Tutors that offers instructional videos for all kinds of Creative Suite products, general graphic design and color theory and 3D drawing and design packages. I love it. You have to pay for it, but if you're picking up this stuff for the first time or are trying to learn some more sophisticated tricks, it's worth the investment.

Link of the Day

If you haven't read the excellent The Economic Incompetence of the Political Class yet, you should. Here's a tidbit.

In the U.S. at least, the looming debt crisis among states and municipalities also reflects a lack of diligence on the part of the citizenry. This can be attributed in part to a naïve assumption by the electorate that those in government, freed from the profit motive, could be trusted to do what was "right" for the community as a whole.

Instead, what we now can see is that elected officials, following a power motive, can be as greedy and irresponsible as anyone in the private sector. In many cases, officials from both parties have been captured by powerful interests, including public sector unions and recipients of transfer payments. As a consequence, they have willfully committed current and future taxpayer money to benefit those with political power at the expense of the community as a whole.

Emphasis mine, placed there to reinforce the notion that the election of Jerry Brown will be the high water mark for progressives and liberals. The notion in italics is at the heart of the philosophy that lead us to endlessly grow the size and scope of government.

More and more and more and more leads to a POP!

I Blame the Pie

After letting our Maximum Leader out for her nighttime snack and stroll, I, too, had a late-night snack last night and then slept like a baby until 6:30. There was no time to blog when I got up.

It's all the pie's fault. It was down there in the kitchen, calling to me. I'm a victim of the oppression of Baker-Americans.

Surprised by Bernanke

I don't think I did a good job of describing my surprise at what Fed chairman Ben Bernanke said on 60 Minutes in my previous post, so here goes another try.

I was seriously shocked by his comments. I had always had an image of the Fed chairman being this fiscal Solomon, stroking his beard and tut-tutting at the economic novices in Congress and the Administration, regardless of the era. Back in the day, Paul Volker would utter words of warning about overspending against Republican and Democrat alike. Instead, Ben Bernanke turns out to be a true believer in the power of the state to manage the economy.

Instead of claiming that America's chickens are coming home to roost, as a certain racist, lunatic mentor of Barack Obama might say, he showed that he's one with the crew that thinks that our problems can be solved with government spending and Fed-set interest rates. Ben could have gone before Congress and refused to print the money or offered to print the money with strings attached. Instead, he didn't offer a peep of warning or advice to a gang whose new regulations* have made the business environment uncertain for all.

Ben Bernanke has reduced the Fed to the boiler room crew on a steamship. They feed the government, but have no control over the direction taken. I'm totally blown away by his (utter capitulation to or complete belief in) the government.

Shovel more money into the government! Captain Obama and First Mate Pelosi know what they're doing!
* - Don't think that the thousands of pages of laws that this group has passed is the end of it. Tens of thousands of pages of regulations interpreting these laws will be the real result. Want to hire someone? You have no idea at all what that will cost you.

Link of the Day

It's not political. It's not debt pr0n. It's not snarky. It's just clever, beautiful and wondrous.

Click here.

What Is Ben Bernanke Investing In?

Last night, Fed chairman Bernanke went on 60 Minutes and had this to say:

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said the economy is barely expanding at a sustainable pace and that it’s possible the Fed may expand bond purchases beyond the $600 billion announced last month to spur growth.

“We’re not very far from the level where the economy is not self-sustaining,” Bernanke said in an interview broadcast yesterday by CBS Corp.’s “60 Minutes” program. “It’s very close to the border. It takes about 2.5 percent growth just to keep unemployment stable and that’s about what we’re getting.”

When I buy shares or corporate bonds of Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), I'm investing in a company that supports all phases of American agriculture. I invest in them because I think they're going to grow by creating more of what people want and need and will pay for. Implicitly, I'm saying that ADM will create economic growth. ADM does so because their managers want to make a higher profit. When they make more profit, they can expand and hire more people to make still more profit.

When Ben invests his $600B in Federal debt, he's investing in an organization that is not motivated to produce profit or build things that people want and need and are willing to pay for. Why does he think this is going to lead to growth?

In simpler terms, if you wanted economic growth, would you put money into the hands of Congress and the President or would you put it in the hands of ADM?

If you don't like ADM, how about DOW? Watch this Kiwi commercial and ask yourself how that $600B given to the government will lead to more growth than this.

Help Support a Friend when You Shop at Amazon

Our Holy Scribe could use some help. He and I have corrresponded for some time on the blogs and elsewhere and I know him for a brave and hard working fellow.

Please click, read and see what you can do. It will cost you nothing at all and will help out someone who needs it.

The Inner Sanctum of the Catican

My wife, a devoted follower of our Maximum Leader, recently bought this charming one bedroom apartment for her which we have installed in the Catican.


It's been pretty cold in the Catican lately, so this snug little abode, with an additional plush blanket, keeps our Maximum Leader quite toasty. Lately she's been sleeping inside with us until about 1 AM when she wakes up and wants to go outside. That means she's outside during the coldest part of the night, so we sleep sounder knowing she's got a warm, soft place to snooze once her night time explorations are over.