Glacier National Park, Montana, is losing some glaciers, according to a news report.
Global warming??
The press release states that the losses began in the 1850's.
Okedokie.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
ARIZONA
It seems that Arizona has a new law regarding illegal immigrants.
b.o. is asking his Justice Department to check into whether or not it is illegal to be an illegal immigrant.
‘Nuff said.
b.o. is asking his Justice Department to check into whether or not it is illegal to be an illegal immigrant.
‘Nuff said.
msm OBJECTIVITY
A naturalized US citizen told this old joke the other day.
It seems that President George Bush was in a rowboat with some foreign leader and that leader’s hat blew off into the water.
Mr. Bush got out of the boat and walked on the water to retrieve the hat.
He walked back, on the water, to the boat and got in.
msm saw the whole thing and were ecstatic.
The headline the next day was: BUSH CANNOT SWIM!
It seems that President George Bush was in a rowboat with some foreign leader and that leader’s hat blew off into the water.
Mr. Bush got out of the boat and walked on the water to retrieve the hat.
He walked back, on the water, to the boat and got in.
msm saw the whole thing and were ecstatic.
The headline the next day was: BUSH CANNOT SWIM!
GOD HELP US
You gotta love npr .
I listen to it daily, reactions running the gamut from disgust to real enjoyment.
But the best part is that I give them no money other than that which they get from the government.
Anyway, diane rheme (sp?) had convened one of her ‘expert’ panels a week or two ago and a caller called, wondering if the recent volcanic activity and earthquakes could have been caused by coal mining and oil drilling and global warming.
Say what???????????????
I put down the coffee cup, waiting for the ‘distinguished’ panel to gently and politely educate the buffoon who called in.
Guess what…to a man and woman, the panel opined that the caller had a good point; that there is a lot we do not know about ‘natural forces’.
No gently advisory of reality.
You gotta love npr.
I listen to it daily, reactions running the gamut from disgust to real enjoyment.
But the best part is that I give them no money other than that which they get from the government.
Anyway, diane rheme (sp?) had convened one of her ‘expert’ panels a week or two ago and a caller called, wondering if the recent volcanic activity and earthquakes could have been caused by coal mining and oil drilling and global warming.
Say what???????????????
I put down the coffee cup, waiting for the ‘distinguished’ panel to gently and politely educate the buffoon who called in.
Guess what…to a man and woman, the panel opined that the caller had a good point; that there is a lot we do not know about ‘natural forces’.
No gently advisory of reality.
You gotta love npr.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
THE UNITED STATES MAIL AND SOPHIE MATILDA
We love our mailman and so does Sophie Matilda.
Now, English bulldogs are not the smartest dogs in the world.
But they know things and they know what they like.
We like our mailman because he does a great job.
He does not make mistakes.
He brings oversize mail up to our door.
He is pleasant.
He is reliable.
And he is nice to Sophie Matilda.
She has learned to love him.
She even loves his mail truck.
A typical Sophie Matilda walk lasts about twenty minutes, round trip.
We start off powerfully with Sophie trotting along like any normal dog.
Near the end of the outward journey, she starts to slow down, panting a lot, regardless of the temperature.
On the return walk, she often stops dead still, gazing into the distance as though contemplating heaven knows what.
Unless the mail truck appears on the scene.
If the US Mail appears between Sophie and The Study, there are no stops, no gazings.
It is a steady trot, regardless of pantings and gaspings.
English bulldogs pant and gasp a lot.
Anyway, the mail truck overrides the need to rest.
The reason is that our mail man has won Sophie’s heart. And for Sophie, the mail truck can mean only one thing: inside is a very nice man who hands out very large dog bones.
When the mail is on our street, nothing short of fainting would keep the little creature from the object of her affection: a kind man in a uniform who dispenses those lovely treats.
Dear Wife was doing spring cleanup in the flower bed around our mail box the other day.
Sophie was watching her from inside the house, through the storm door.
She was really watching.
I had not yet put her cable around the crab apple tree which allows her in the front yard.
The mail man noticed her as he handed Dear Wife the mail, saying, in so many words, “I see we are being watched."
Dear Wife carried the mail in, with two large dog bones on the top of the pile, to the delight of one little dog.
Sophie’s affections were not disappointed.
Now, English bulldogs are not the smartest dogs in the world.
But they know things and they know what they like.
We like our mailman because he does a great job.
He does not make mistakes.
He brings oversize mail up to our door.
He is pleasant.
He is reliable.
And he is nice to Sophie Matilda.
She has learned to love him.
She even loves his mail truck.
A typical Sophie Matilda walk lasts about twenty minutes, round trip.
We start off powerfully with Sophie trotting along like any normal dog.
Near the end of the outward journey, she starts to slow down, panting a lot, regardless of the temperature.
On the return walk, she often stops dead still, gazing into the distance as though contemplating heaven knows what.
Unless the mail truck appears on the scene.
If the US Mail appears between Sophie and The Study, there are no stops, no gazings.
It is a steady trot, regardless of pantings and gaspings.
English bulldogs pant and gasp a lot.
Anyway, the mail truck overrides the need to rest.
The reason is that our mail man has won Sophie’s heart. And for Sophie, the mail truck can mean only one thing: inside is a very nice man who hands out very large dog bones.
When the mail is on our street, nothing short of fainting would keep the little creature from the object of her affection: a kind man in a uniform who dispenses those lovely treats.
Dear Wife was doing spring cleanup in the flower bed around our mail box the other day.
Sophie was watching her from inside the house, through the storm door.
She was really watching.
I had not yet put her cable around the crab apple tree which allows her in the front yard.
The mail man noticed her as he handed Dear Wife the mail, saying, in so many words, “I see we are being watched."
Dear Wife carried the mail in, with two large dog bones on the top of the pile, to the delight of one little dog.
Sophie’s affections were not disappointed.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
THE TOP TEN PERCENT
Can it be true?
The federal income tax system of the United States “…exempts almost half the country from paying for programs that benefit everyone, including national defense, public safety, infrastructure and education. It is a system in which the top 10 percent of earners…paid about 73 percent of the income taxes collected by the federal government.”
The AP reported this little item in our local paper last week.
We have not checked it out…but we believe it. Sometimes the msm gets it right.
And if it is right, it explains a few things and raises a few concerns.
It explains why so many of our citizens are paying so little attention to the effects of b.o.’s tax strategies. It explains why the msm is paying so little attention, because so much of the msm's audience has no interest in something that seems to cost it little or nothing.
And because so many, and soon so many more, of our citizens will be getting so many new, costly benefits for which they are not personally paying, as far as they can tell, the importance of personally being responsible for paying for any of them will become a thing of the past.
Paying for those benefits will become the responsibility of the government, or more exactly, the responsibility of 10 percent of taxpayers to pay for 73 percent of those benefits.
Something happens to lots of folks who get good things and who do not pay for them.
A few of those things:
They do not see any need to work for the good things.
They do not understand the complexities of delivery.
They are eventually provided with a cheapened product.
They take little or no interest in making sure the delivery system is maintained, responsibly.
Folks become dependent on government, as never before.
What was a valued product to be worked for and sacrificed for, becomes an entitlement, something which is available for all, a freebie.
The problem, of course, is that entitlements are not free.
World class benefits, of any kind, cost big money, and to provide them free of charge to all is impossible.
An important definition to keep in mind:
Economics is the study of the use of scarce resources in order to make and distribute goods.
Programs that benefit everyone are goods. They are derived from scarce resources.
Scarce is the operative word.
They must be paid for.
Scarce means that there is a limited amount of such resources.
Fewer and fewer people are paying.
The resources are getting scarcer.
THERE WILL BE A REDUCTION IN QUANTITY AND/OR QUALITY of goods if scarce resources are the basis of greater and greater distributions of entitlements.
This is a no-brainer.
Think about it a little as we enter into another election cycle.
The federal income tax system of the United States “…exempts almost half the country from paying for programs that benefit everyone, including national defense, public safety, infrastructure and education. It is a system in which the top 10 percent of earners…paid about 73 percent of the income taxes collected by the federal government.”
The AP reported this little item in our local paper last week.
We have not checked it out…but we believe it. Sometimes the msm gets it right.
And if it is right, it explains a few things and raises a few concerns.
It explains why so many of our citizens are paying so little attention to the effects of b.o.’s tax strategies. It explains why the msm is paying so little attention, because so much of the msm's audience has no interest in something that seems to cost it little or nothing.
And because so many, and soon so many more, of our citizens will be getting so many new, costly benefits for which they are not personally paying, as far as they can tell, the importance of personally being responsible for paying for any of them will become a thing of the past.
Paying for those benefits will become the responsibility of the government, or more exactly, the responsibility of 10 percent of taxpayers to pay for 73 percent of those benefits.
Something happens to lots of folks who get good things and who do not pay for them.
A few of those things:
They do not see any need to work for the good things.
They do not understand the complexities of delivery.
They are eventually provided with a cheapened product.
They take little or no interest in making sure the delivery system is maintained, responsibly.
Folks become dependent on government, as never before.
What was a valued product to be worked for and sacrificed for, becomes an entitlement, something which is available for all, a freebie.
The problem, of course, is that entitlements are not free.
World class benefits, of any kind, cost big money, and to provide them free of charge to all is impossible.
An important definition to keep in mind:
Economics is the study of the use of scarce resources in order to make and distribute goods.
Programs that benefit everyone are goods. They are derived from scarce resources.
Scarce is the operative word.
They must be paid for.
Scarce means that there is a limited amount of such resources.
Fewer and fewer people are paying.
The resources are getting scarcer.
THERE WILL BE A REDUCTION IN QUANTITY AND/OR QUALITY of goods if scarce resources are the basis of greater and greater distributions of entitlements.
This is a no-brainer.
Think about it a little as we enter into another election cycle.
Friday, April 9, 2010
SORRY
We have been busy at The Study lately.
Busy, not efficient.
Lots of things are not being done that should be attended to.
And our national leaders are more distressing to us than usual.
And international affairs appear to us to be in increasing disarray.
And it is by no means clear that depressing trends and tendencies in the national and international sources that we monitor are showing any signs of improvement.
So, to our few readers, sorry for the negative notes so prevalent in these pages of late.
Lots of good things are going on out there and in here, but my goodness, there is so much of the other sort.
Today, God willing, we will do some overdue chores; pick up some badly-needed groceries; build a fire; hunker down for a chilly night outside; and thank the Good Lord for the blessings of the day.
Busy, not efficient.
Lots of things are not being done that should be attended to.
And our national leaders are more distressing to us than usual.
And international affairs appear to us to be in increasing disarray.
And it is by no means clear that depressing trends and tendencies in the national and international sources that we monitor are showing any signs of improvement.
So, to our few readers, sorry for the negative notes so prevalent in these pages of late.
Lots of good things are going on out there and in here, but my goodness, there is so much of the other sort.
Today, God willing, we will do some overdue chores; pick up some badly-needed groceries; build a fire; hunker down for a chilly night outside; and thank the Good Lord for the blessings of the day.
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