Author: Brian

I’ve owned a few of these.

We called them Bugs.

Reinsurance has been a popular topic since Warren Buffet noticed.

But protecting these funds will exceed the resources of most regional governments. The Army Corps of Engineers is stepping in, as it did after the Depression with projects like the Tennessee Valley Authority or the Mississippi levees.

The recent news is the Army Corps proposes a 21st Century answer to control waterways and protect urban centers from the devastation of flooding – especially as global warming promises many storms ahead.

Am I teasing?

During the era when we retreated from S.E.Asia after the Vietnam War, 100s of 1000s of immigrants were suddenly qualified and several regions of the USA were confronting new cultures from the far ends of the earth.

In San Francisco, school teachers were quickly hoping to accommodate thousands of children that only a few months earlier were living in thousand year old villages.

China bans dog from Olympic menu

Where’s the infomercial?

Get one for the rec room near you!

They call it “the best circular bike ever made” and they want you to leave it in public places where it can attract a variety of riders.

Top anti-gay loudmouth Alabama Attorney General Troy King is busted by his wife for having sexual intercourse with his male assistant in the couple’s bed.

“You can now make a new hypothesis that all food in the ocean contains plastic.” – Captain Charles Moore

An America where healthcare is more about health than medicine. – Melody Petersen

I believe Melody is offering one of the most astute and wise points of view on the health system of our country. Her diligently studied message is critically important and must play an important role as we revamp our public health system. We will make a terrific error if led only down the tired argument of whether healthcare is ‘socialism’ or ‘free market’.

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Britain is facing an election soon in a tiny region where liberty seems to be the issue. Bob Geldorf, knighted not long ago, is being highly praised for an essay published in The Telegraph.

He’s suggesting Britain, and other nations, are much too strong with the boots:

Let us be grand for once, for we talk of great subjects.

Ask “what is the point of Britain?” if we so casually give up the liberty which defines this country, its greatest gift to the world.

Still today, 800 years later, Magna Carta resonates: “To no man will we deny, To no man will we delay, Justice and Right.” Is that not grand, worthy of your vote? Is habeas corpus to be traduced in one sad moment of political expediency? Do we not clearly deny and delay Justice and Right when we imprison a person for 42 days without charge?

What existential threat do we face greater than those of the past 800 years? What great terror exists today that not civil war, not world war, nor recent other terrorisms could make our forefathers change the fundamental basis of this state? What is so dangerous that our oldest statutes could be upended for such a ha’p’orth of momentary panic?

What terrorises the terrorists is our civilisation. What those unthinking fools of fundamentalism fear most are the freedoms our representatives now strip away. This “war on terror” is against Islamist forces that reject the Enlightenment.

How can we ever succeed, if we side with our opponents in rejecting those ideals? Every moment we are spied on by the invisible watchers, every time we are monitored, every time we are logged on databanks, they win. And every time we accept it, we lose.

Just a reminder while McCain/Gramm sell us debunked supply-side rhetoric:

“We did an informal office survey by looking at the total tax footprint versus the total income. I earned 46 million and paid a tax rate of 17.5%. My rate was the lowest, the average was 33%, and my cleaning lady paid 40%. The system is tilted towards the rich. The Forbes 400 total net worth has gone from 220 billion to 1.54 trillion, an increase of 7-to-1. You see in legislature that there is lobbying carried on by the powerful over issues such as the estate tax and carried interest for private equity investments. We need to flatten income and payroll taxes, and those making under $30,000 shouldn’t be bothered.” – Warren Buffett 2/15/2008

The Washington Times interviewed Phil Gramm, the chief economic advisor on McCain’s team:

“You’ve heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession,” he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. “We may have a recession; we haven’t had one yet.”

“We have sort of become a nation of whiners,” he said. “You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline” despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth continues in the economy.”

Ordinary folk at Metafilter are discussing an article about the super rich going to personal therapists.

One comment at Neuroses of the Rich and Famous:

“If there’s one group of people I’d prefer to see in the care of a competent therapist, it’s the ultra-rich and ultra-powerful. A lot of the time, these people got to where they are by being less than human, and now that they have some sort of say in =my= life, through politics or finance, I’d rather they be on a progression path back to human.”

Another comment of many, some acerbic, some witty:

Seriously. Rich people seem have so little sense of ambition in the sense of accomplishing big projects in the real world. Their ambition all seems to be tied up in simply increasing their bank accounts, which I guess is why they’re rich in the first place, but you’d think they could do something with all that money.

Will we work together?

I think everyone, everyone, must be able to say “I helped you today” and “I brought this today” and “I am giving something today”. We must.

We must learn to stop everyone else, yes, all others who say “I’m taking this from you” or “You are here for me” or “I’m fooling you” or “I am abusing you”. There’s no good earth if cheaters outnumber children or if lies are common. I think this is an easy thing to achieve because it is personal and the best use of government. I think this is an easy thing because justice will appear.

Will we stop cowering?

If you notice, there are many powers. We are giving favors to winners and too often to fools and we let bullies above us. Silly. And too common.

What would America be if justice were equal to power?

Don’t worry if you want it. Congress must fund it. Each branch of government must be equal. Let’s try to equal the branches until our Constitution is true.

It’s hard. She’s a multi-platinum recording artist in trouble. We defer to fame, wealth and power. Lesser kids and poor folk we sweep away.

The South Asian Women’s Forum in India prints it out loud, calling Amy Winehouse a British junkie singer. A celebrity rag says only she’s the troubled singer. A top newspaper writes that she’s “the star” as does People Magazine. Many writers only hint by saying she’s the “Rehab” singer and some repeat her publicity that skin damage is caused by an ‘addiction’ to tanning under ultraviolet bulbs…!

With sympathy, here’s an alarming larger pic revealing significant stress and probably more ‘chemistry’ than her body can handle.

There are 100s and 100s trading on her story. But I blog this with trepidation, because the truth might be disguised in the mire of press. I shouldn’t add to it, but this pic isn’t shown often and it reveals something in Denmark.

Shortage of oil and greater demand is not increasing the cost of oil.

Our Energy Information Administration shows us the top nations have been importing less oil.

Peak crude oil consumption is already behind us.

Japan’s peak year was 1996, Germany 1998, Italy 1995, Thailand 2005, Malaysia 2004, France 1980, United Kingdom 1996, Russia 1992 and the USA 2005.

China has increased oil consumption but in just one month the drop in USA’s 2008 consumption is more than two years of consumption growth in China, and India, and the new burgeoning economies.

Supplies of oil are at least 500,000bpd more than the world is using.

Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have dropped prices to the level of nine years ago. Their Official Selling Price is 1998’s price of $4.20 a barrel.

But since Phil Gramm and McCain tweaked the market, more than 45% of crude oil futures transactions take place without regulation of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Many are seeing these consumer price increases as the big banks merely recovering the cash they lost with crooked mortgages. Expect to see extra ‘market manipulation’ as we get closer to election day.

U.S. District Court learns that 40 percent of California’s inmates have become infected with hepatitis C. [AP]

Bush was at Monticello for a 4th of July celebration and proudly quoted Jefferson.

“May it be to the world, what I believe it will be — to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all — the Signal of arousing men to burst the chains, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government.”

He did not quote Jefferson. This is the actual quote.

‘May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government.”

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. – Thomas Jefferson

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When the rich steal from the rich, it’s Good Business.
When the rich steal from the rich for the poor, it’s Noblesse Oblige.
When the middle steal from the middle, it’s Corruption.
When the rich and the middle steal from the poor, it’s Fiscal Responsibility.
When the poor steal from the rich and the middle, it’s Crime.
When the poor steal from the poor, it’s Tough Luck. – BH

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A Banker has silver in his hair, gold in his teeth, and lead in his ass. – anon

From AP:

U.S. exports to Iran grew more than tenfold during President Bush’s years in office…

…more cigarettes to Iran — at least $158 million worth under Bush — than any other product.

…fur clothing, sculptures, perfume, musical instruments and maybe even rifles.

To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion. – Ayn Rand

From the BBC:

The recently freed Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt has urged an end to the Colombian government’s “vocabulary of hate” against her former captors.

Ms Betancourt, a former presidential candidate, was held hostage for six years by Marxist Farc rebels.

But, while praising President Alvaro Uribe’s work towards her release, she said it was time to end “extremist” language towards the Farc.

Miss Betancourt is in Paris, where she flew after her release on Wednesday.

“I think we have reached a point where we must change this radical, extremist vocabulary of hate of very strong words that intimately wound the human being,” she told French radio.

Angered by a jingoist ‘free market’ government, the heads of the British Medical Association issued a strong statement to stop the meddling with England’s National Health Service:

“The BMA wants to see an NHS untarnished by a market economy, true to its beginnings, giving the public a fair, caring, equitable and cost-effective health service.

“Not a service run like a shoddy supermarket war.

“Let’s stop pretending that healing the sick is like trading a commodity.” [The Herald]

Vincent Bugliosi, a former prosecutor with a perfect record in murder convictions, and a respected crime author, builds a case for murder against President Bush for the deaths of Americans in Iraq.

Vincent Bugliosi was perfect in murder cases: 21 trials, 21 convictions, including the Charles Manson case in 1971. As an author, Bugliosi has written three No.1 bestsellers and won three Edgar Allen Poe awards, the top honor for crime writers.

A NYTimes story linked to IHT.

The Dow Jones under each president since 1929. Bush is the worst two-term President. Compiled by Paul Kedrosky.

“As long as we’re not doing everything in our individual and collective power to solve the challenges we face, the conscience of our nation cannot rest.” – Barack Obama