Thursday, September 30, 2010

So Long Suckers!

"The Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP [its legal authority expires on Sunday], may have staved off financial disasters, but it treated too gently the people who presided over the disaster, an economist writes." Read The New York Times, TARP, the Long Goodbye.

Taxpayers were suckered big time, but don't believe those Republi-con fairy tales denying blame for the mess.

Will Crist Win?

UPDATE VII: More than a month til election and "Rubio commands a double-digit lead among likely voters in Florida's U.S. Senate race, harnessing a split among Democrats over their nominee Kendrick Meek and independent Gov. Charlie Crist." Read The Associated Press, Rubio leads Crist big in Fla. Senate race.


UPDATE VI: More on those Florida Republi-CON fiscal CONservatives. Read the Sarasota Herald Tribune, Senate hopeful Rubio plagued by money problems and the Sunshine State News, Audit Nails Charlie Crist, Jim Greer For 'Inappropriate' Spending.


UPDATE V: "Florida's three-way Senate race between former state House Speaker Marco Rubio (R), Gov. Charlie Crist (I) and Rep. Kendrick Meek (D) is one of the marquee contests of the 2010 election cycle.

It also appears to have moved in Rubio's favor since the Aug. 24 primary and, as a result, we are moving the Senate contest from "toss up" to "lean Republican".

Read the Washington Post, Florida Senate race moves to "Lean Republican".


UPDATE IV: "Gov. Charlie Crist is the man in the middle in Florida's high-stakes race for the Senate, a candidate without a party whose hopes of moving from Tallahassee to Washington depend on his ability to fend off a squeeze play from his Democratic and Republican rivals. " Read the Washington Post, Florida Senate race starts without a clear favorite.


UPDATE III: Support is dwindling for Crist. Read the Pensacola News Journal, Crist losing ground in Senate race, poll shows.


UPDATE II: Who will Crist's opponents be? Read the Pensacola News Journal, Poll: Scott, Greene lead in races.

It would be ironic if he rode the national anti-incumbent, anti-establishment wave to D.C.


UPDATE: The title says it all. Read Reuters, Crist leads 3-way Senate race in Florida.

As I said before, Crist's decision to run as an Independent might be a wise move. Read the Washington Post, Will Charlie Crist be Florida's Arlen Specter?

Lingerie Football, Is It a Sport?

"[B]uxom young women wearing little more than René Rofé lingerie (tight-tight boy shorts, fringe-cut sports bras), shoulder pads, garters and small helmets with clear plastic visors across the face." Read the Washington Post, Baltimore Charm, a new Lingerie Football League team, plays up sheer talent.

Doesn't surprise me in a country where DWTS is considered entertainment.

Sub Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Usually on Thursdays you can listen to me, the voice of wisdom and reason in a wilderness of partisan rhetoric -- no political insanity, no conservative hypocrisy, no liberal foolishness -- just straight talk, straight at you, and that’s no bull!!

But I can't make it today. I'll be back next week to deprogram you. Until then, have a laugh.

School of One

UPDATE II: The "new documentary 'Waiting for Superman' for ratcheting up the interest level" in education. But charter schools are not the whole answer. A "study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes found that only 17 percent did a better job than the comparable local public school, while more than a third did 'significantly worse. . . The best charter schools are laboratories for new ideas. But the regular public schools are where American education has to be saved. " Read The New York Times, Waiting for Somebody.

And Randy, the article also notes that "there’s no evidence that teachers’ unions are holding our schools back. Finland, which is currently cleaning our clock in education scores, has teachers who are almost totally unionized. The states with the best student performance on standardized tests tend to be the ones with the strongest teachers’ unions. "


UPDATE: And another article about education. Read The New York Times, Studying Engineering Before They Can Spell It.

For Randy, and anyone else concerned about modern education. Listen to Freakonomics Radio, How Is a Bad Radio Station Like the Public School System?

It reviews the New York City Department of Education pilot program 'School of One,' which "re-imagines the traditional classroom model. Instead of one teacher and 25-30 students in a classroom, each student participates in multiple instructional modalities, including a combination of teacher-led instruction, one-on-one tutoring, independent learning, and work with virtual tutors."

Choose your modality!