NoBullU Lesson: How Do We Get Out of the Economic Mess

Read The New York Times, The Big Fix.

Read and listen to the interactive attachment, How the Government Dealt With Past Recessions.

Tune in Friday to NoBullU from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line, courtesy of Cyber Smart Computers, to discuss.

NoBullU, just teachin ya to think for yourself.

WARNING: Republi-con may need remedial deprogramming, available at NoBullKinderCare, to begin to think for themselves again.

The Rest of the Story?

UPDATE: Read the New York Daily News, Tiger Woods' wife, Elin Nordegren, posed as golfer to trap mistress Rachel Uchitel on phone.

So again I ask, why has Ms. Woods not been arrested?

All kidding aside, did Tiger's wife hit him with a golf club? Read Bisher Unleashed, Updated Inside Story on Tiger Woods.

If she did, it would be a serious case of domestic violence -- much worse than the typical case -- and she should be prosecuted for felony battery.

Washington Doesn't Understand the Problem

As I've said not once, but twice before, the bailout doesn't seem to be working. The problem isn’t just $1 trillion in subprime loans, the problem is $62trillion in credit default swap (CDS) liability for collateral debt obligations (CDOs) that no one can unravel or value (or even understand).

But read this proposed solution, The New York Times, Time to Unravel the Knot of Credit-Default Swaps, that recognizes that credit-default swaps clearly played a role in this financial debacle, and it is crucial that they are part of the solution.

This would even benefit Goldman Sacks, a zombie bank. Goldman Sacks, you might recall, is the former firm of Treasury Secretary Paulson, the focus of an initial bailout proposal that never made sense, beneficiary of over a hundred billion bailout dollars, and then a hundred billion more.

These effort to reanimate Goldman Sacks have been insanely costly and fruitless, all because as I said in early October, the problem is $62trillion in credit default swap (CDS) liability for collateral debt obligations (CDOs) that no one can unravel or value (or even understand).

Someone in Washington should explain why the proposals in The New York Times article should not be implemented, or offer a better solution, or resign. I prefer the latter.

The money spent on the executive and legislative branches of government is, like the money spent so far on the bailout, wasted.

No Class Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Usually on Fridays 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 so Ken will substitute. Until the next show, post a comment or two.

WIll Wonder Boy Crash Sooner Rather Than Later?

Less than a week and already Obama is proving to be just another politician.

Tim Geithner should not have been nominated or confirmed as Treasury Secretary.

And the stimulus bill emerging in the House of Representatives should not be signed.

Unlike his predecessor, Obama should know better.

Taxpayers Continue to Be Treated as Chumps

Unbelievable, firms that received billions in taxpayer bailouts continue to pay dividends to shareholders and bonuses to employees.

This has been reported not once, but twice.

If you are tired of being treated as a chump, contact your Congressman or Senator.

More proof that the bailout was a con job.

Waskly Republi-cons

Why did US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts give Obama the wrong oath of office?

Was it all part of conspiracy to invalidate Obama's presidency:
























First the faux birth certificate issue, now this. Ya gotta watch those waskly Republi-cons.

Another possible reason might be that Justice Roberts was reading from Bush's copy of the Constitution:
























Of course, those who know Justice Roberts know that he has a fetish against 'split verbs' and "his inner copy editor overrode any instincts toward strict constructionism and unilaterally amended the Constitution by moving the adverb “faithfully” away from the verb."

No Monica

Last night in the White House:

So Long, Farewell

So long, farewell Mr Bush:


















And watch the farewell tribute to "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches" from David Letterman.

Time to Kill the Zombies

Two writers for The New York Times suggest solutions for the economic mess left behind by Bush and the Republi-cons:

In an article titled Time for (Self) Shock Therapy, Thomas Friedman, a two time Pulitzer Prize winning columnist, suggests that for his first meeting as president, Obama and his economic team should convene the 300 leading bank presidents and deliver a come-to-Jesus message something like this:

“Ladies and gentlemen, this crisis started with you, the bankers, engaging in reckless practices, and it will only end when we clean up your mess and start afresh. . .

“So here’s what we’re going to do: we’re going to unclog the arteries. My banking experts have analyzed each of your balance sheets. You will tell us if we’re right. Those of you who are insolvent, we will nationalize and shut down. We will auction off your viable assets and will hold the toxic ones in a government reconstruction fund and sell them later when the market rebounds. Those of you who are weak will be merged. And those of you who are strong will receive added capital for your balance sheets, after you write down all your remaining toxic waste. I am not going to continue rewarding the losers and dimwits amongst you with handouts.”

I like the part about not giving losers and dimwits handouts.

In an article titled Wall Street Voodoo Paul Krugman, the newest winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, writes that many influential people in Washington blink reality if they believe that by performing elaborate financial rituals we can keep a dead bank, which he calls a zombie bank, walking. He gives a fictitious zombie bank named Gotham as an example:

"To explain the issue, let me describe the position of a hypothetical bank that I’ll call Gothamgroup, or Gotham for short.

On paper, Gotham has $2 trillion in assets and $1.9 trillion in liabilities, so that it has a net worth of $100 billion. But a substantial fraction of its assets — say, $400 billion worth — are mortgage-backed securities and other toxic waste. If the bank tried to sell these assets, it would get no more than $200 billion.

So Gotham is a zombie bank: it’s still operating, but the reality is that it has already gone bust. Its stock isn’t totally worthless — it still has a market capitalization of $20 billion — but that value is entirely based on the hope that shareholders will be rescued by a government bailout.

Why would the government bail Gotham out? Because it plays a central role in the financial system. When Lehman was allowed to fail, financial markets froze, and for a few weeks the world economy teetered on the edge of collapse. Since we don’t want a repeat performance, Gotham has to be kept functioning. But how can that be done?

Well, the government could simply give Gotham a couple of hundred billion dollars, enough to make it solvent again. But this would, of course, be a huge gift to Gotham’s current shareholders — and it would also encourage excessive risk-taking in the future. Still, the possibility of such a gift is what’s now supporting Gotham’s stock price.

A better approach would be to do what the government did with zombie savings and loans at the end of the 1980s: it seized the defunct banks, cleaning out the shareholders. Then it transferred their bad assets to a special institution, the Resolution Trust Corporation; paid off enough of the banks’ debts to make them solvent; and sold the fixed-up banks to new owners.

The current buzz suggests, however, that policy makers aren’t willing to take either of these approaches. Instead, they’re reportedly gravitating toward a compromise approach: moving toxic waste from private banks’ balance sheets to a publicly owned “bad bank” or “aggregator bank” that would resemble the Resolution Trust Corporation, but without seizing the banks first.

Sheila Bair, the chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, recently tried to describe how this would work: “The aggregator bank would buy the assets at fair value.” But what does “fair value” mean?

In my example, Gothamgroup is insolvent because the alleged $400 billion of toxic waste on its books is actually worth only $200 billion. The only way a government purchase of that toxic waste can make Gotham solvent again is if the government pays much more than private buyers are willing to offer.

Now, maybe private buyers aren’t willing to pay what toxic waste is really worth: “We don’t have really any rational pricing right now for some of these asset categories,” Ms. Bair says. But should the government be in the business of declaring that it knows better than the market what assets are worth? And is it really likely that paying “fair value,” whatever that means, would be enough to make Gotham solvent again?

What I suspect is that policy makers — possibly without realizing it — are gearing up to attempt a bait-and-switch: a policy that looks like the cleanup of the savings and loans, but in practice amounts to making huge gifts to bank shareholders at taxpayer expense, disguised as “fair value” purchases of toxic assets.

Why go through these contortions? The answer seems to be that Washington remains deathly afraid of the N-word — nationalization. The truth is that Gothamgroup and its sister institutions are already wards of the state, utterly dependent on taxpayer support; but nobody wants to recognize that fact and implement the obvious solution: an explicit, though temporary, government takeover. Hence the popularity of the new voodoo, which claims, as I said, that elaborate financial rituals can reanimate dead banks.

Unfortunately, the price of this retreat into superstition may be high. I hope I’m wrong, but I suspect that taxpayers are about to get another raw deal — and that we’re about to get another financial rescue plan that fails to do the job."

As sci-fi movie fans know, a zombie is a reanimated human corpse. So the term zombie bank is appropriate.

And was Gothamgroup a paragram for Goldman Sacks, the former firm of Treasury Secretary Paulson, the focus of an initial bailout proposal that never made sense, beneficiary of over a hundred billion bailout dollars, and then a hundred billion more?

Let the zombie banks and other dead financial institutions go bankrupt.

The bailout leads nowwhere.

The only way to kill a zombie is with a head shot, preferably followed by a corpse burning.

Don't fall for the a bait-and-switch and don't take the raw deal, zombie meat is deadly.

Call your Congressman or Senator and tell them that it is time to kill the zombie financial institutions.

Wrongdoing Not Judicial Tyranny

A writer wrote a viewpoint today in our local mullet wrapper regarding the ACLU lawsuit against the Santa Rosa County School Board. The viewpoint, titled Santa Rosa prayer ruling wrong, states:

"anger does not even begin to describe what I feel over a federal judge's decision to halt promotion of prayer and religious influence in Santa Rosa schools ("Schools ordered to stop prayer," Jan. 13). Fury is perhaps a more accurate description. . .

This is judicial tyranny, plain and simple, and it must be opposed not just where religious issues are concerned, but everywhere."

Problem is, the writer doesn't know what he is taking about. There was no decision by the judge, just an admission of wrongdoing by the school board.

The decision was made by the school board to admit the constitutional violations. The order states that the school board "admitted liability on plaintiffs’ claims, as set out in their complaint filed August 27, 2008."

I have posted some of the court documents.

The writer, who claims judicial tyranny, listens to too much rabid Republi-con talk radio. If you know him, tell him to tune in today to NoBullU from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY before he writes his next viewpoint.

NoBullU, just teachin ya to think for yourself.

UPDATE: If you like the legal nitty-gritty of the issue, here is a table of important Establishment Clause cases dealing with religion and education. FYI, there are three pages of cases.

Class Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Listen to 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!!

NoBullU will be on air Friday from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line, courtesy of Cyber Smart Computers.


Topics:

The ACLU lawsuit against the Santa Rosa County School Board (the court documents and Pastor Poppins and his sugar); and

Bush and his Bushie's so long, farewell (how will history judge his presidency, don't forget to vote in the poll).

But I'll discuss anything. (Disclaimer: the host reserves the right to end any discussion and hang up on you.)

So tune-in, call-in, but only if you can handle the truth!

BDS Bull

Joe Scarborough writes a weekly column that is published in the local mullet wrapper. Yesterday's column was titled "History will treat Bush kindly." Morning Joe writes:

"This past week proves once and for all that some of America's most elite journalists are infected with the dreaded disease "Bush Derangement Syndrome."

Sadly, BDS has swept through the Washington press corps and caused even the most elite reporters' minds to melt into a boiling stew of bile, intent on beating the president's legacy to a pulp.

Their over-the-top arguments only make me want to defend him that much more.

So today I will write about the single issue on which liberals have claimed George W. Bush's presidency will be judged: Iraq.

Twenty years from now, historians will not rate the president for the mistakes made in 2003. They will place him in the history books based on how Iraq and the Middle East play out.

While we can't predict the future in that chaotic region, we can look at the last two years as a guide.

After Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, George Bush took a tragic situation in Iraq and turned it around. . .

Foreign policy experts tell me daily that Iraq is not Barack Obama's greatest challenge anymore. It is Afghanistan.

And liberals? They just try to change the subject.

We shouldn't let them.

Instead, we should focus on what George W. Bush did right as a lesson to future presidents.

Mr. Bush's greatest insight was understanding Americans should not settle for ties in wars. Our failures in Korea and Vietnam haunted U.S. policy makers for years. And allowing terrorists to run American troops out of Iraq would have empowered al-Qaida and brought about horrific consequences.

So while his generals were begging him to retreat, Bush fought back.

Bob Woodward's latest work on the Iraq War unwittingly paints the president as a courageous leader who stood alone and saved Iraq from failure."

My reply:

"$10+ T national debt, $1.2 T deficit this year, 2.6 M jobs lost in the last year swelling the ranks of the unemployed to more than 11 million people, failing economy, mortgage crisis, incompetent leadership, overstretched military, an unnecessary and disastrous war, politicized government, torture as government policy, Chinese ascension, Russian resurgence, oil addiction (did I miss anything) - it’s not reality, it’s all my imagination, here called the Bush Derangement Syndrome.

It is true that Bush saved Iraq from ‘failure,’ but he was responsible for that ‘failure.’ Would a man who set a house on fire be praised for putting the fire out? I think not.

Bush's record as a student, a military man, a businessman and the so-called ‘leader’ (I thought he was the Decider) of the free world is one of constant failure."

I wonder how Joe might vote in the poll. Email and ask him.

Bush's Place in History - an Example of What Not to Do

After spending hundreds of hours with key Bushies, reviewing thousands of pages of documents and notes, interviewing Bush for nearly 11 hours, writing four books totaling 1,727 pages, all amounting to a very long case study in presidential decision-making, Bob Woodward describes "10 lessons that Obama and his team should take away from the Bush experience." Read Washington Post, 10 Take Aways From the Bush Years.

In other words, Woodward has concluded that Bush is unintelligent (#3) and incurious (#4), doesn't think long term (#9), is passive (#1), thinks he is always right (#5) so he doesn't broker decent (#6) and doesn't want to hear bad news (#2), hides things (#10) and lies to the public (#7), and is delusional (#8). Pretty much sums up the man and his presidency don't you think.

How will history judge George W. Bush's presidency? I think I know how Woodward might vote in the poll. Did you vote yet?

Again I Say, The Bailout is Not Working

Let me say again what I said in early October:

The bailout doesn't seem to be working. The problem isn’t just $1 trillion in subprime loans, the problem is $62trillion in credit default swap (CDS) liability for collateral debt obligations (CDOs) that no one can unravel or value (or even understand).

What is a CDO or CDS? Imagine taking paper debt like mortgages, subprime mortgages, car loans, credit cards loans, and pretty much anything you can imagine. Now combine and mix the paper in a blender, spiking it with worthless rhetorical hyperbole that derivatives are the new paradigm of investments. Then pour the mixture in a pyramid of champagne glasses, to represent the varying levels of return (and risk), with the higher the glass, the lower the return and risk. That represents the CDOs. Now as you sell the mess, insure against the risk of the CDOs decreasing in value with CDSs. Presto, $1 trillion of bad loans is transmuted into $62 trillion in faux wealth. An alchemist would be proud.

That I think is a fair metaphor for the problem, and because of the scope of the problem the Feds don't know what to do. The 1929 depression offers a valuable lesson. A recent article in Time, Are Paulson and Bernanke Running Out of Options? states that:

"After the 1929 collapse, which at its worst left a quarter of the workforce jobless, the U.S. instituted safeguards to ensure liquidity, confidence and trust in the U.S. financial system. There were four pillars: insuring the bank deposits of everyday Americans, allowing access to government funds in case of a panic, providing a regime for the orderly failure of badly run companies and limiting how much credit could be leveraged off a particular asset."

The government should do the same now, defend depository institutions and provide a regime for the orderly failure of badly run non-depository financial institutions and insurance companies. In the process the government and the public will have to make some tough choices and learn to live within a budget.

What do you think?

P.S. Somebody should pay me for this, I prefer gold until further notice.

Palin the Whiner

Apparently Republi-cons are still trying to figure out how Barack Obama got elected, and still whining about it.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Blamey Whinehouse

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Will interviews like this help Palin in the 2012 campaign?

BTW, Obama got elected because he got more popular (and electoral) votes than the other candidates, unlike Bush in 2000, which may explain the confusion. Republi-cons are waiting for the Supreme Court to invalid the election. Maybe they should hold their breath and wait.

Bush Should Just Leave Quietly

Ever wondered why Bush took 77 vacations but held only 47 press conferences. After watching this, with commentary by Jon Stewart, you'll know why.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Six Days Seven Nights

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Maybe he should have just skipped this last press conference and left quietly.

UPDATE: He refuses to leave quietly. Apparently tonight, in prime time, he'll bid us adieu.

But will anybody watch?

Republi-con Navel Gazing

Did you realize that Republi-cons have lost 54 House seats, 13 (or 14) Senate seats and the presidency over the past four years? Read Washington Post, Republicans' Navel Gazing and Why It Matters. The article says:

"As expected, the collapse of the Republican brand in the 2006 and 2008 elections has brought out any number of theorists from the woodwork -- offering their take on the proper prescription to heal what ails the GOP.

For the most part, we tend to ignore these amateur (and even some professional) analysts as they usually are pushing either a decidedly transparent personal or ideological agenda.

Not so, Tom Davis who left his northern Virginia seat in 2008 after weighing and ultimately deciding against a run for the seat being vacated by Sen. John Warner (R).

Davis is, without question, a fiscal conservative and socially moderate, but he is, also, one of the brightest strategic minds in the GOP. Need proof? When Davis chaired the National Republican Congressional Committee in 2000 and 2002, House Republicans netted six seats.

Given Davis's reputation -- and the current morass in which the GOP finds itself -- we were intrigued to come across an essay penned by the former Virginia member titled "The Way Back."

In it, Davis convincingly make the case that the alleged takeover of the party by social conservatives has worked to its electoral detriment."

Do Republi-cons have a way back or is it 40 years in the wilderness?

Bailout Bull, Cont.

The fat cats want more money. Read The New York Times, Banks in Need of Even More Bailout Money.

Bull@#$%! It was all just a Ponzi scheme. Don't throw bad money after worse. The government should just get it over with and manage an orderly failure of the banks, many of which have close ties to current or former government officials.

New government motto - take from the poor to prop up the Ponzi scheme(s).

Show Link

As discussed on the show with Mike, the video of Marcus Schrenker flying under the bridge:





Say good bye FAA pilot's license. Of course this video is the least of his problems now.

Maybe he suffers from 'hormonally caused irrational exuberance.' (Actually it might be his only defense.)

Try the Newest Shoe-ter Game

I'm told that the game, G. W. Bush Ego Shoe-Ter, is all the rage.

What was your score?

And don't forget to vote in the poll.

Was Wall Street Just a Ponzi Scheme, Part II

Another article comparing Wall Street to a Ponzi scheme. See Washington Post, Meet Lady Subprime. I am sure that stories like this are more common than acknowledged.

You might remember I first made the comparison in early December.

Male Hormones Destroyed the Economy

What are we in this economic mess? Male hormones, of course. See Washington Post, Study: Testosterone Correlated to Successful Financial Trading.

According to the article, "[t]he bubble preceding the current crash may have been due to euphoria related to high levels of testosterone, or high sensitivity to it." It seems that "[t]estosterone is the hormone of irrational exuberance."

Any woman could have told you that.

Tickle Me Elmo Joke

From an email:

There is a factory in Northern Minnesota which makes the Tickle Me Elmo toys. The toy laughs when you tickle it under the arms.

Well, Lena is hired at The Tickle Me Elmo factory and she reports for her first day promptly at 8:00 am.

The next day at 8:45 am there is a knock at the Personnel Manager's door. The Foreman throws open the door and begins to rant about the new employee..

He complains that she is incredibly slow and the whole line is backing up, putting the entire production line behind schedule.

The Personnel Manager decides he should see this for himself, so the 2 men march down to the factory floor. When they get there the line is so backed up that there are Tickle Me Elmo's all over the factory floor and they're really beginning to pile up. At the end of the line stands Lena surrounded by mountains of Tickle Me Elmo's.

She has a roll of plush red fabric and a huge bag of small marbles.

The 2 men watch in amazement as she cuts a little piece of fabric, wraps it around two marbles and begins to carefully sew the little package between Elmo's legs.

The Personnel Manager bursts into laughter. After several minutes of hysterics he pulls himself together and approaches Lena .

"I'm sorry," he says to her, barely able to keep a straight face, "but I think you misunderstood the instructions I gave you yesterday..."

[Don't scroll down until ready for the punchline.] .

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"Your job is to give Elmo two test tickles."

Now didn't that make you smile.

Bush's Madoff Like Legacy of Malfeasance

Comparing Bush's eight year in office to Madoff's ponzi scheme, read The New York Times, Eight Years of Madoffs.

Bush's record as a student, military man, businessman and leader of the free world is one of constant failure. No wonder:

Lee Iacocca is no fan of President Bush. 'I campaigned for him because I knew his mother and dad for 30 years, and I figured he was from pretty good stock,' the auto-industry legend tells Details magazine. 'But Jeb was being groomed, too. They got the wrong kid. There's something wrong philosophically with how Bush's brain works. I feel sorry for him.'

In an appearance on CNN's Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, Donald Trump called U.S. President George W. Bush "probably the worst president in the history of the United States."

Even "Cheney is now putting the blame for all the messes squarely on W. shows once more how the bureaucratic master outmaneuvers his younger partner." Read The New York Times, An Extremist Makeover?

Don't forget to vote in the poll.

Class Today at NoBullU on WEBY

UPDATE: nothing tentative about it now, it is a go for launch at 4:05 PM CST. Barring any unexpected last minute developments, you can:

Listen to 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!!

NoBullU will be on air Friday from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line, courtesy of Cyber Smart Computers.

Topics: Mostly local (the PD office melodrama, media intimidation or cowardice, snotty breezers (or not if you are a breezer fan of mine), is it bad, just count the restaurant closings, will Milton arise from the ashes like a phoenix, and does it add up: 28 year old female + 16 year old male = 366 days in jail) and state (Republi-con corruption (<- a tautology?) and those insufferable Gator fans), but I'll discuss anything. (Disclaimer: the host reserves the right to end any discussion and hang up on you.)

So tune-in, call-in, but only if you can handle the truth!

Are Republi-cons Just Racist Whiners?

The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics Sciences is widely regarded as the most prestigious award one can receive in the field of economics. The prize is often awarded to a person who has analyzed data and identified previously unrecognized patterns.

So it is worth noting that the newest winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences thinks that Republi-cons are just a bunch of racist whiner who can't acknowledge that they got what they wanted and can't accept responsibility for what they have done. Read The New York Times, Bigger Than Bush.

Who can argue with a man of his credentials? Especially after Chip Saltsman, currently a candidate for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee, sent committee members a CD including a song titled 'Barack the Magic Negro,' which Rusty Limpballs has promoted on his radio show.

Happy New Year

If you like to reminisce, read Time, The Top 10 Everything of 2008.

The Year in Review

Uncle Jay Explains: Year-end!



Maybe this year will be better. What do you think?

Happy 2009!

Soldiers Need Arrest Warrant to Fight War

Where is the Republi-con outrage? Beginning tomorrow, American soldiers will be required to secure arrest warrants in order to detain Iraqi citizens. That's right, soldier will need arrest warrants. Read The New York Times, New Rules in Iraq Add Police Work to Troops’ Jobs.

We are long past time to turn over day-to-day security to the Iraqis. Bush is just kicking the can down the road til he is out of office.

What do you think, should soldier to required to get arrest warrant?

Robin Williams on Politics After the 2008 Election

He spares no one:




What part did you like best?

Who is Responsible for the Economic Mess, Part Deux

As the economic mess drags on, the blame games continue as the political parties spin. And there is plenty of blame to go around. Read these two series:

• Washington Post, The Crash: What Went Wrong?
• The New York Times, The Reckoning.

I say impeach or fire them all.

Holiday Lights

Happy Holidays!


Amazing Grace Techno.



Music Box Dancer 2008.


Double click to see the video in full screen mode. Watch other videos at Holdman Christmas.

Holiday Class Schedule at No Bull U on WEBY

Listen to 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!!

NoBullU will be on air Friday (12/19/08), and Tuesday (12/23/08) from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line, courtesy of Cyber Smart Computers.

Friday's topic: The bailouts, with guest Dr. Dennis F. Paulaha, Ph.D., to discuss his suggestion to remortgage America. See my previous post.

Tuesday's topics: Local, state, national and international events TBD.

Tune in, call in, but only if you can handle the truth!

Truth and BS

As you know, a favorite article of mine is The New York Times, Between Truth and Lies, An Unprintable Ubiquity.

Here is another interesting article on truth, The New York Times, A Highly Evolved Propensity for Deceit.

Santa Claus Bailout Hearings

A little holiday humor:

Downsize Congress

The government is running huge deficits so it is time to cut government spending. Here is a plan someone suggested in an email:

"When a company falls on difficult times, one of the things that seems to happen are they reduce their staff and workers. The remaining workers need to find ways to continue to do a good job or risk that their job would be eliminated as well. Wall street, and the media normally congratulate the CEO for making this type of "tough decision", and his board of directors gives him a big bonus. I feel our government should not be immune from similar risks. I therefore am recommending the following cuts to be implemented by the next president elect.

Reduce the House of Representatives from the current 435 members to 218 members and Senate members from 100 to 50. Also reduce remaining staff by 25%. Accomplish this over the next 8 years. (two steps / two elections)

Some yearly monetary gains include:

$44,108,400 for elimination of base pay for congress. (267 members X $165,200 pay / member / yr.)

$97,175,000 for elimination of the above people's staff. (estimate $1.3 Mil in staff per each member of the House, and $3 Mil in staff per each member of the Senate every year)

$24,294 for the reduction in remaining staff by 25%.

$7,500,000 reduction in pork barrel ear-marks each year. (those members who's jobs are gone. Current estimates for total government pork earmarks are at $15 Billion / yr)

The remaining representatives would need to work smarter and would need to improve efficiencies. It might even be in their best interests to work together for the good of our country?

We may also expect that smaller committees might lead to a more efficient resolution of issues as well. It might even be easier to keep track of what your representative is doing. Congress has more tools available to do their jobs than it had back in 1911 when the current number of representatives was established. (telephone, computers, cell phones to name a few)

Note: Congress did not hesitate to jump on a train for home this week when it was a holiday, when the nation needed a real fix to the economic problems. Also, we have 3 senators that have not been doing their jobs for the past 18+ months (on the campaign trail) and still they all have been accepting full pay. These facts alone support a reduction in senators & congress. Summary of opportunity:

$44,108,400 reduction of congress members

$282,100,000 for elimination of the reduced house member staff

$150,000,000 for elimination of reduced senate member staff

$59,675,000 for 25% reduction of staff for remaining house members

$37,500,000 for 25% reduction of staff for remaining senate members

$7,500,000,000 reduction in pork added to bills by the reduction of congress members.

$8,073,383,400 per year, estimated total savings.

Big business does these types of cuts all the time.

IF you are happy with how our government is right now, just delete this message. IF you are not happy, I assume you know what to do"

I've suggested cutting all government payments and benefits, including social security and retirement payments. But Congress would be a good place to start.

WEBY is Crushing the Competition

If you haven't heard, the other local talk radio stations are giving up afternoon call-in shows. WEBY is crushing the competition.

So let's have a little competition at WEBY and see who you would choose as the last host talking. I challenge the other afternoon hosts to a host-off. Who do you like best:

Renee Giacino
Mike Bates (the owner/manager of WEBY)
Terry Gross
Ken Lamb
Your truly, No Bull Bert

Take the preliminary poll as I work with the others to develop the judging criteria.

Then, get ready for the Host-Off.

Told Ya So

It seems that the government will adopt my idea to preemptively reorganize the auto industry. An Washington Post has reported:

The troubled U.S. auto industry will receive emergency loans of up to $17.4 billion from the federal government in return for an extensive restructuring of its outstanding debt and labor costs over the coming year, President Bush said today.

I first proposed the idea on November 12.

I should be paid for this, gold preferred until further notice.

First Palin, Now Kennedy, Who Next Mickey!

I was critical of the Republi-cons for nominating Palin. (See previous posts, including those under the label 2008 Election.) Caroline Kennedy has not proven she is, you know, qualified to be a U.S. Senator. She should not, you know, be appointed to replace Hillary Clinton.

Politics has become a popularity contest, you know. No wonder the country is having problems.

UPDATE: Read this great article, Washington Post, The U.S. House Of Lords, that discusses some of the problems with nepotism in U.S. politics today.

See also, Washington Post, Caroline Kennedy Is No Sarah Palin, where Kathleen Parker (you remember her don't ya) says that the "real rub is that she hasn't earned it. The sense of entitlement implicit in Kennedy's plea for appointment mocks our national narrative."

Was Wall Street Just a Ponzi Scheme?

Bernard Madoff has admitted that his so-called hedge fund was just a $50 billion Ponzi scheme. But was what occurred on Wall Street over the last decade or two any different? One influential columnist, Thomas Friedman, thinks not and wrote:

"I have no sympathy for Madoff. But the fact is, his alleged Ponzi scheme was only slightly more outrageous than the “legal” scheme that Wall Street was running, fueled by cheap credit, low standards and high greed. What do you call giving a worker who makes only $14,000 a year a nothing-down and nothing-to-pay-for-two-years mortgage to buy a $750,000 home, and then bundling that mortgage with 100 others into bonds — which Moody’s or Standard & Poors rate AAA — and then selling them to banks and pension funds the world over? That is what our financial industry was doing. If that isn’t a pyramid scheme, what is?

Far from being built on best practices, this legal Ponzi scheme was built on the mortgage brokers, bond bundlers, rating agencies, bond sellers and homeowners all working on the I.B.G. principle: “I’ll be gone” when the payments come due or the mortgage has to be renegotiated."

Read The New York Times, The Great Unraveling. (If you want details, read The New York Times series titled The Reckoning.)

You might remember that I said more than a week before the Madoff scandal was made public that financial institutions might have been an elaborate Ponzi scheme.

So why does the government keep trying to prop up the scheme?

UPDATE: Another New York Times columnist, and the newest winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, compares Wall Street and the financial services industry to Madoff and Ponzi schemes, and calls it "America’s Ponzi era." Read The New York Times, The Madoff Economy.

Icing on the cake for Bush's legacy.

The Bush Dodge

The Best of Late Nite Jokes Edited by Newsmax.com:

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno

Looks like we’ve finally found something President Bush is good at — dodge ball.

As you know, yesterday in Iraq, President Bush was attacked by a shoe-icide bomber.

President Bush was speaking at a news conference in Iraq when a journalist threw two shoes at him. Here’s what he did to keep from being hit — something he’s never done before — he leaned to the left.

Even Bill Clinton was impressed. He is an expert at ducking shoes . . . and ashtrays . . . and lamps . . .

Late Show with David Letterman

Bush was in Baghdad at a press conference, and a reporter jumped up and started heaving shoes at him. He was screaming, “Here’s your farewell kiss, you dog.” That’s the same goodbye I got from NBC.

They arrested the guy — they’re trying to find out if he is shoenni or shoe’itte.

The guy bought the shoes at a Payless, and they didn’t even do a background check. . .

You've got to give Bush credit. I mean, the guy moved pretty quickly. ... Too bad he didn't react that way with bin Laden or Katrina, bin Laden or the mortgage crisis, bin Laden or Afghanistan, bin Laden or the Lehman Brothers.

I don't think Bush really has dodged anything like that, well, since the Vietnam War. [From another website.]

Late Night with Conan O'Brien

Yesterday at a press conference in Baghdad, an angry Iraqi threw his shoes at President Bush’s head. When he saw the shoes, President Bush said, “See? I knew you guys had weapons of mass destruction.”

The man who threw his shoes at President Bush is being hailed as a hero in Iraq. In fact, when he dies, he’ll be greeted in heaven by 72 podiatrists.

The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson

Bush has been accused of dodging issues in the past, but who knew he could actually dodge shoes?

He’s 62 years old, but he still has the reflexes of a cat. Mind you, I think his head has been on a swivel ever since Cheney shot his lawyer.

The irony of this shoe-throwing incident is, it’s as close as we’ll ever get to finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Should We All Send Bush a Shoe?

Why are we in Iraq - cherry-picked intelligence, allegations, rumors, exaggerations, fear-mongering, worst-case scenarios, propaganda. What has been the cost after five years - 4,200+ dead American servicemen and women, 10,000+ wounded, $1 trillion spent, an unknown number (100,000+) of Iraqis dead or wounded, 4 million Iraqis displaced, shattered U.S. prestige, a weaken military - to name a few.

Fed-up with Bush's continued denial of the nightmare that he created in Iraq, during a press conference an Iraqi journalist threw a shoe at Bush.

Maybe we should all send Bush an old shoe.

The address is:

President George W. Bush
1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington, DC 20500

Given the state of the economy, you might want to save the postage. In that case, the email address is:

comments@whitehouse.gov

Here are some shoes:

How Would You Spend $500 Billion?

Dennis F. Paulaha, Ph.D., suggests remortgaging America. The plan: "The US government offers every US citizen a 30-year mortgage at a 1½% fixed rate of interest."

Simple and fair. But his best argument: "It is better than what Washington politicians are doing now."

Can't argue with that.

Why Do Christian Conservatives Support Bush?

Chuck Baldwin asks why Christian conservatives support Bush:

"Where Are Dobson And PCC Now?
By Chuck Baldwin
December 12, 2008

I ask my non-Christian friends to bear with me on this column. As one will quickly see, this column is addressed to my fellow Christian conservatives.

Regular readers of this column know that one of my chief frustrations is the way Christian conservatives (otherwise known as the "Religious Right") are so easily deceived by Republican politicians. The all-time classic illustration of this foible is the way the Religious Right was (and is) so enamored with President George W. Bush. No matter what Bush did: no matter how egregiously unconstitutional, no matter how utterly stupid, no matter how blatantly evil his actions were, Christian conservatives (almost universally) either robotically accepted and approved what he did, or blindly looked the other way. It was maddening!

It was as if Christian conservatives lost all ability to reason; it was as if they lost all discernment and discretion. Because George W. Bush claimed to be a Christian, and because he was a Republican, he could do no wrong. To this very day, the only group of people who yet approves of Bush's Presidency is the Religious Right. Everyone else on the planet realizes that George W. Bush's Presidency will go down in history has one of the all-time worst.

George Bush took a prosperous and robust economy, and led America to the verge of a second Great Depression. He has taken a (relatively) free and independent republic to the brink of becoming a globalist Police State. He has pushed the envelope of executive power; he has trampled individual liberty; he has made a mockery of justice; and he has made America the laughingstock of the world. In addition, Bush has misused and abused our nation's bravest and finest by his illegal and inexcusable invasion of Iraq. No matter. The Religious Right still loves him. Why? Because he is a "Christian" Republican.

Since 2000, James Dobson, Pensacola Christian College (PCC), and their peers around the country have had an eight-year lovefest with George W. Bush. Life-size cardboard posters of Bush have stood in their bookstores for eight long, laborious years. Grade school children in their Christian schools have been subjected to Bush propaganda for eight tedious, tiresome years. To them, G.W. Bush ranks somewhere between Moses and the Almighty. And nothing Bush said or did seemed to matter.

I said all of that to call attention to a recent interview Cynthia McFadden had with President Bush on ABC's Nightline this past Monday. During the interview, McFadden asked Bush if the Bible was literally true.

Now, acceptance of the Bible's literalness is one of conservative Christianity's most sacred doctrines. There is not a professor at PCC (or any other conservative Christian college or university) that would keep his or her job for a nano-second, if he or she even questioned the veracity of the Scriptures. Right? You know it's true! Most conservative Christians would even go so far as to say that one cannot be a born-again Christian who does not believe that the Bible is the infallible Word of God.

Well, what was George Bush's response to McFadden's question? He said, "You know. Probably not. . . . No, I'm not a literalist." Notice, Bush twice denied the veracity of the Scriptures.

Now, Bush has no reason to "fudge" his answers, right? He has no more elections to face. No more, "He's got to say this to get elected," which was the flippant explanation given by the Religious Right to excuse Bush's numerous apostate positions during the past eight years.

So, George W. Bush clearly stated that he does not believe the Bible is God's Holy, inspired Word. Will Dobson and PCC still say that Bush is "one of us"?

Then, as Bush attempted to give a Christian testimony, he told McFadden, "It is hard for me to justify or prove the mystery of the Almighty in my life. All I can just tell you is that I got back into religion and I quit drinking shortly thereafter . . . ."

What kind of Christian testimony is this: "I got back into religion"? I doubt that this kind of testimony would grant membership in the Campus Church (which is not even a genuine New Testament church, you understand) at PCC or in virtually any conservative Christian church.

I am confident, however, that Bush's statements will do nothing to diminish his god-like status with James Dobson and the rest of the Religious Right in America. For eight long and bloody years, Christian conservatives have been selling their convictions, doctrines, and even their consciences to George W. Bush. I will even go so far as to say that, in many respects, millions of Christians have turned President Bush into an idol. Many of them would forsake their pastor, their friends, and even their own family before they would forsake George W. Bush and the Republican Party.

Of course, none of this would have happened had Christians--and especially Christian pastors--not lost touch with their American heritage. Had they maintained a studied understanding of constitutional government, and of the principles of Natural Law upon which it rests, they would not have become dupes for Bush and his fellow neocons.

I doubt very much whether Thomas Jefferson was a born-again Christian (after all, he, like Bush, expressed doubt regarding the Bible's literalness), but he fully understood--and embraced--the "Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" and was more than willing to inculcate those principles into our country's most sacred document: our Declaration of Independence. As such, Jefferson will be forever regarded as one of America's greatest Founding Fathers and Presidents. Believe me, America was far better off with Thomas Jefferson than with George W. Bush!

So, where are Dobson and PCC now? Will any of them utter a word of rebuke to their "Christian" President for his apostasy? No, they won't. (As a comparison, contemporary pastors most certainly did rebuke Jefferson for his public statements questioning Christ's divinity, even though he was a Founding Father and author of the Declaration of Independence.) Of course, Barack Obama will not escape the public repudiation of Dobson and Company. Why? He is a Democrat. You see, it's not principle; it's partisan politics that matters, after all.

While we are asking questions, when will our fellow Christians and pastors finally open their history books? When will they read the U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence? And when will they open their minds and hearts--even a crack--to the possibility that they might have been duped, and that there is more to being elected to the office of President besides being a "Christian" Republican? Probably never.

In four more years, there will doubtless be another "Christian" Republican for the Religious Right to fawn over. Where he or she stands on the Constitution won't matter; neither will it matter whether this newest "Christian" Republican has any commitment to national sovereignty, the Bill of Rights, or to fundamental freedoms. All that will matter is that he or she professes to be a Christian, and has an "R" behind their name. And, quite frankly, this last election proved that even a Christian profession is not necessary. All that is required is the "R" behind the name.

*If you appreciate this column and want to help me distribute these editorial opinions to an ever-growing audience, donations may now be made by credit card, check, or Money Order. Use this link:

http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/donate.php

(c) Chuck Baldwin"

Worth repeating:

"Everyone else on the planet realizes that George W. Bush's Presidency will go down in history has one of the all-time worst.

George Bush took a prosperous and robust economy, and led America to the verge of a second Great Depression. He has taken a (relatively) free and independent republic to the brink of becoming a globalist Police State. He has pushed the envelope of executive power; he has trampled individual liberty; he has made a mockery of justice; and he has made America the laughingstock of the world. In addition, Bush has misused and abused our nation's bravest and finest by his illegal and inexcusable invasion of Iraq. . .

For eight long and bloody years, Christian conservatives have been selling their convictions, doctrines, and even their consciences to George W. Bush. I will even go so far as to say that, in many respects, millions of Christians have turned President Bush into an idol. Many of them would forsake their pastor, their friends, and even their own family before they would forsake George W. Bush and the Republican Party. . .

You see, it's not principle; it's partisan politics that matters, after all."

Me thinks Rev. Baldwin would give Bush a W for Worst.

Take the poll, and tell me: how will history judge Bush's presidency.

No Class Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Usually on Fridays 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 so Mike will substitute. Until the next show, post a comment or two, and enjoy some holiday humor and this light show.

How Does This Market Compare?

There have been four major bear markets in the past century: today’s S&P 500, the Dow post 1929, the Nikkei post 1989, and the NASDAQ after the tech bubble. How do they compare? If you are curious, see this chart.

What Has the Bailout Cost?

According to The New York Times, government commitments as of November 26, 2008, were $7.4 trillion.

For more interesting facts, read The Big Picture, More Bailout Comparisons.

What is the Current the Unemployment Rate?

What is the current unemployment rate? The government's Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the unemployment rate in November was 6.7%.

But could the rate be much higher, perhaps even 12.5%. Read The Big Picture, NFP: Even Worse Than Reported.

Looks like the Republi-cons are winning the war on the middle class.

How to Fund Future Government Programs

The government has spent so much money bailing out fat cats that it may not be able to fund future operations. So if you have a favorite project, such as military defense, health care, education, global warming, or even a mission to Mars, read this suggestion on how to get government funding, The Big Picture, How to Pay for National Health Insurance By Barry Ritholtz

"Since the government has spent such an inordinate amount of taxpayer money cleaning up after the Wall Street ne’er-do-wells and the giant mess they made, there is not a whole lot of money left over for other projects.

Once such legislative work was National Health Insurance. Surveys have shown that a significant majority of Americans support this. It was one of the key planks that President-elect Barack Obama ran on.

Well, no worries over the lack of funding for health care. I have figured out a simple way to insure that every man woman and child int he US is covered by health care insurance. I took a page from the cleverest of the financial engineers on Wall Street, and all it took was a little of that street magic and derivative-based hocus pocus.

It goes something like this:

1. Set up a large, well capitalized hedge fund. About $5B should do it.

2. The prospectus of the fund should note its purpose is to “Seek out profit opportunities via arbitraging inefficiencies in the markets and health care system of the United States.” Include standard “Socially Conscious” fund language in clauses such as Do well by doing good.

3. Launch the fund — and promptly max out your leverage. Today’s environment makes it difficult to go 50 to 1, but getting 10 or 20 to 1 should not be much problem.

4. Use the money to write Credit Default Swaps with a notational value of $3 trillion dollars. The premia on these CDS should be about 10-15% or so.

5. Rollover the cash premiums — about $350 billion dollars worth — into a national fund. Use it to buy health care insurance for all US citizens.

6. Declare that due to current credit conditions, your unfortunately must announce to your counter-parties that you will be defaulting on these CDS. Note that significant amounts of this paper are held by JP Morgan and Citi. Another trillion is held by China and Japan, with Sovereign Wealth Funds owning the rest.

7. Send out a press release announcing “systemic risk.” Tell the Treasury Secretary and the Federal Reserve Chief that your imminent collapse will wreak global havoc. Apply for bailout.

Congratulations! You have National Health Care!

Repeat for any major government program: Alternative energy, School Vouchers, Mars Mission, Global warming, Missile Defense Shild, etc.

Note: This is how all government spending programs will be funded in the future."

This might be funny if it wasn't true.

Time to Panic??

Dow 4,000, food shortages, a bubble in Treasury notes. Fortune spoke to eight of the market's sharpest thinkers and what they had to say about the future is frightening. Read Fortune, 8 really, really scary predictions.

Of course, gloom begets gloom.

What do you think, is it the end of the world?

Some People Just Never Give Up

Read The New York Times, A 73-Year-Old Gives Basketball a Second Shot.

Enough said.

A Modern Parable About the Auto Industry

An email from a friend:

A Japanese company (Toyota) and an American company (Ford Motors) decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance before the race.

On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile.

The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for the crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action.

Their conclusion was the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person steering, while the American team had 7 people steering and 2 people rowing.
Feeling a deeper study was in order; American management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second opinion.

They advised, of course, that too many people were steering the boat, while not enough people were rowing.

Not sure of how to utilize that information, but wanting to prevent another loss to the Japanese, the rowing team's management structure was totally reorganized to 4 steering supervisors, 2 area steering superintendents and 1 assistant superintendent steering manager.

They also implemented a new performance system that would give the 2 people rowing the boat greater incentive to work harder. It was called the 'Rowing Team Quality First Program,' with meetings, dinners and free pens for the rowers. There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes and other equipment, extra vacation days for practices and bonuses. The pension program was trimmed to 'equal the competition' and some of the resultant savings were channeled into morale boosting programs and teamwork posters.

The next year the Japanese won by two miles.

Humiliated, the American management laid-o ff one rower, halted development of a new canoe, sold all the paddles, and canceled all capital investments for new equipment. The money saved was distributed to the Senior Executives as bonuses.

The next year, try as he might, the lone designated rower was unable to even finish the race (having no paddles) so he was laid off for unacceptable performance, all canoe equipment was sold and the next year's racing team was out-sourced to India .

Sadly, the End.

Here's something else to think about: Ford has spent the last thirty years moving all its factories out of the US , claiming they can't make money paying American wages. As a matter of fact, they recently opened the most automated and sophisticated assembly plant in the Ford Motor Corporation in Brazil!

TOYOTA has spent the last thirty years building more than a dozen plants inside the US . The last quarter's results:

TOYOTA makes 4 billion in profits while Ford racked up 9 billion n in losses.

Ford folks are still scratching their heads, and collecting bonuses.

IF THIS WEREN'T TRUE IT MIGHT BE FUNNY.

Class Today (and Monday) at No Bull U on WEBY

Listen to 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!!

NoBullU will be on air today, Friday, and Monday from 4:05 to 6 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line, courtesy of Cyber Smart Computers.

Topics: Local, state, national and international events.

Tune in, call in, but only if you can handle the truth!

How Old is Your Brain?

The test program is written in Japanese so review these instruction first:

1. Touch 'start'
2. Wait for 3, 2, 1.
3. Memorize the number's position on the screen, and then click the circle from the smallest number to the biggest number.
4. At the end of the game, the computer will tell you the age of your brain.

Good luck! Take the test.

Tell us, how old is your brain?

Mine was 33. I'm not sure if that is good or bad since I am not 33 years old.

Tell your friends to take the test.

UWF Football

For years there has been talk of starting a football program at the University of West Florida. Someone should just start a club football team like a student did at the University of Vermont. See The New York Times, A Year of Toil and Sweat, Then They Played a Game.

It would be relatively easy, quick, and cheap. And if it proves popular, it would justify a varsity program.

Go Argonauts!

Civics Quiz

Here is the civics quiz that Renee and Mike discussed on Monday's show.

(NBB editorial comment - a few of the questions seem unrelated to civics and/or ask for an answer closer to opinion than fact.)

Mike got 33 of 33 correct, I got only 32 of 33 correct.

What was your score?

UPDATE: Read this editorial about the quiz by Walter Williams, TownHall.com, Ignorance Reigns Supreme.

Do You Like Jokes?

A friend sends me jokes all the time and sent me this:

A store that sells new husbands has opened in New York City , where a woman may go to choose a husband. Among the instructions at the entrance is a description of how the store operates:

You may visit this store ONLY ONCE! There are six floors and the value of the products increase as the shopper ascends the flights. The shopper may choose any item from a particular floor, or may choose to go up to the next floor, but cannot go back down except to exit the building!

So, a woman goes to the Husband Store to find a husband. On the first floor the sign on the door reads: Floor 1 - These men Have Jobs.

She is intrigued, but continues to the second floor, where the sign reads: Floor 2 - These men Have Jobs and Love Kids.

'That's nice,' she thinks, 'but I want more.' So she continues upward. The third floor sign reads: Floor 3 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids, and are Extremely Good Looking. 'Wow,' she thinks, but feels compelled to keep going.

She goes to the fourth floor and the sign reads: Floor 4 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids, are Drop-dead Good Looking and Help With Housework. 'Oh, mercy me!' she exclaims, 'I can hardly stand it!'

Still, she goes to the fifth floor and the sign reads: Floor 5 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids, are Drop-dead Gorgeous, Help with Housework, and Have a Strong Romantic Streak.

She is so tempted to stay, but she goes to the sixth floor, where the sign reads: Floor 6 - You are visitor 31,456,012 to this floor. There are no men on this floor. This floor exists solely as proof that women are impossible to please. Thank you for shopping at the Husband Store.

WHAT FLOOR DID YOU STOP ON?


PLEASE NOTE: To avoid gender bias charges, the store's owner opened a New Wives store just across the street.

The First Floor has wives that Love Sex.

The Second Floor has wives that Love Sex and Have Money and Like to Drink.

The Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth floors have never been visited.

Should I post things like this?

PR Strategy or Just Clueless

Just read the article and watch the video, New York Magazine, Sarah Palin’s PR Strategy Gets Weirder.

Is Palin a PR genius, or just clueless?

If Palin keeps this up, as the article said it should be an entertaining few years.

The Bailout Bull, Cont.

Why all the effort to prop up failed financial institutions? The whole sector might have been an elaborate Ponzi scheme. There seems to be a lively debate about letting the auto industry work its problems out in bankruptcy. Why not the same for the financial sector?

Will Wilkinson, a research fellow at the Cato Institute, thinks that the government should stop "trying to prop up already failed financial giants. We'll best ensure continued investment in our still-vital economy if we let new financial players rise from Wall Street's ruins." Read or listen to his opinion.

Should He Change His Name to George Herbert Hoover Bush

First there was George Herbert Walker Bush, and he beget George Walker Bush. But given the son's response to the economic mess, should he now change his name? Read Washington Post, Bush's Final Fiasco.

And tell me, should the 43rd President of the United States change his name from George W. (The Worst) Bush to George Herbert Hoover Bush?

Harry Reid Should Resign

Behind schedule and hundreds of millions of dollars over budget, the new Capitol Visitor's Center in Washington, D.C. opened just in time. Thanks goodness it was before another summer. Senate majority leader Harry Reid was tired of smelling the tourist. No kidding, he said:

"In the summertime, because the high humidity and how hot it gets here, you could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol."

Someone should tell Reid that most of those smelly tourists are U.S. citizens, the people that he works FOR. This is just one example of the contempt that politicians have for the people they represent.

I'm sure his opponents are preparing the 2010 campaign ads already.

Reid should do us all a favor and resign now.

Did You Hear About the White House Christmas Tree Ornament

If not you might want to read Washington Post, Christmas Colors for the White House: Red, White and Impeach.

An appropriate farewell to George W. (The Worst) Bush, don't you think.

UPDATE: After asking members of Congress to pick artists from their districts to decorate ornaments, Laura Bush has decided that the ornament made by Deborah Lawrence, who created a red and white ornament that salutes Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) and his support for a resolution to impeach the president, was “inappropriate and it's not being hung.”

The ornament embedded a "subversive" message, the text from a resolution to impeach Bush.

No word on whether copies of the ornament will be offered for sale to the public at the White House Gift Shop.

Our New Pompous-Elect

Is it just me, or is he overdoing it, with the faux office, staged announcements nearly everyday, too many press conferences and interviews, simulated blue-collar connectedness (thinking the comment about the hypoallergenic mutt here).

I don't know if I can take 4 (or even 8) years of this.

What do you think?

The Bailout Bull

First AIG, now Citigroup. The common thread, both companies had close ties with a current or former Treasury Secretary. It is all about who you know, but is that capitalism or communism? Read:

• The New York Times, The Reckoning, Citigroup Saw No Red Flags Even as It Made Bolder Bets
• The New York Times, All Fall Down
• Washington Post, From Market Economy to Political Economy

And why is the government trying to save the financial sector when much of it might be a fraud. Michael Lewis sounded the warning nearly 20 years ago when he wrote the book, Liar's Poker, in which he portrayed "the 1980s as an era where government deregulation allowed less-than-scrupulous people on Wall Street to take advantage of others' ignorance, and thus grow extremely wealthy." Now read his latest article at Portfolio.com, The End, in which he writes:

In the two decades since then, I had been waiting for the end of Wall Street. The outrageous bonuses, the slender returns to shareholders, the never-ending scandals, the bursting of the internet bubble, the crisis following the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management: Over and over again, the big Wall Street investment banks would be, in some narrow way, discredited. Yet they just kept on growing, along with the sums of money that they doled out to 26-year-olds to perform tasks of no obvious social utility.