SCOTUS: Rebuke
A lot of people, including "anonymous" sources within the bushbot hive, are reading the Gitmo 5-3 decision as a serious defeat of how Bush has fundamentally governed over the past 5 years. You can get a lot of analysis over at
AmericaBlog with a
couple of posts. And this quote from that anonymous source:
"It appears to be about as broad a holding as you could imagine," said one administration lawyer, who insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the ruling. "It's very broad, it's very significant, and it's a slam."....
Mind-Mapping Software
Couple of mind-web style software programs out there that people may find interesting; these were based on a conversation I had over lunch with a guy who was asking about whether it would be posible to extend the life of our sun over the several millenia by bleeding hydrogen from it now over several hundred thousand years until it starts to burn helium (that's when the sun would expand in size to become a
red giant) and then feed the H back in, thereby accomplishing two things:
1) the gigantism the sun will suffer from will be reduced (less mass of He to begin with) and
2) bleeding H back in will extend the life overall...phew.
Anyway, here are some links to click through. I may want to try the freeware one out since my brain is so stream of consciousness:
MindJetFreeMind (Freeware)I found these by
googling this.
Rediculous. The Kudlows and Nordquists of the world probably think this is right and proper. I prefer the Ben & Jerry's rule of thumb - no more than a 7:1 ratio.
From March 16, 2003 on Meet The Press (just a few days before invading Iraq):
Russert: If your analysis is not correct, and we’re not treated as liberators, but as conquerors, and the Iraqis begin to resist, particularly in Baghdad, do you think the American people are prepared for a long, costly, and bloody battle with significant American casualties?
Cheney: Well, I don’t think it’s likely to unfold that way, Tim, because I really do believe that we will be greeted as liberators.
They seem to continually do this - put on righty-bushbots to spew silly things. Coulter, Scarborough and now this guy whom I've never heard from before to cherry-pick from a WSJ article and avoid the op-ed conclusion, which of course conveniently was opposite of what Campbell Brown and this other random bushbot were spewing...at least they had on lefty bulldog James Carville to refute the silly arguements. It was good to see Carville call Norah O'Donnell to task too, since she's some sort of borged-bushbot as well.
I just don't understand NBC's love for these jive turkeys.
Welcome To "The Gumbinator"
I've invited one of my close friends to contribute to my blog, and in aligning with my practice he shall use a nomme de guerre -
gumbinator (chances are he's none of these guys).Seeing as that over the past few months I've essentially used this as a personal RSS aggregator and not done much with actual blog POSTING, my hope is that adding another voice from a person who takes a different look at events than I do will lead to a more dynamic environment here and, hopefully, a more thoughtful presentation of events which will lead to, well, more lengthy posts and a also lead to a conversation - even if its a two-way conversation!
;o)Welcome aboard!
We'll be changing the green signature section to the right to something more appropriate to a two-man effort v. my [previously] one-man show.
YearlyKos is Here
Here's what I'm interested in:
the Science Panel with Chris Mooney, Darksyde, Gen. Clark and others...
A new phrase coined by Kos regarding what 21st century progressives, like me, believe.
And he apparently peppers it with self-depricating short jokes :)
Seriously, tho, this guy is to progressives like Kudlow is to the business class and corporate-cons.
Update: Now I remember where I get my understanding of the definition of the unemployment rate - this post from angrybear (and this post too) tells it all... employment-to-population ratio (below) is a better indicator:
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
WaPo link (above) to story about how jobs creation was way below estimates (only 75,000 created). My issue is with that numbskull, outgoing Treasury Sec'y John Snow, who has never know his ear from his elbow makes this statement:
Outgoing Treasury Secretary John Snow said on CNBC that "the number
we've got to focus on" is not the monthly job figure which "jumps around alot," but the falling unemployment rate. It "shows continuing strength in labor markets," he said.
As I've stated before as have others, that the unemployment rate is an estimate based on monthly surveys on whom among us is looking for work; if you take yourself out of the market, then you're not counted in the denominator. Looking at full employment is a much better indicator of how labor is doing in an economic cycle - there are probably others, but sadly I'm not that technical about economic matters...I'm sure somebody has the sabermetric "Win Shares"- job growth equivalent out there. The other thing to look at is compensation rates rising or falling (they been falling since 2001). Did somebody say stagflation again??
