Rusted Sky

It's interesting looking at the expressions on the faces in this video.

RealClearPolitics - Video - CBS, Helen Thomas Challenge Gibbs On "Controlled" Town Hall Meeting

CBS' Chip Reid and Helen Thomas double teamed Robert Gibbs today at the daily press briefing on the "tightly controlled" town hall meeting President Obama will hold on health care. Gibbs kept saying lets have this discussion AFTER the meeting. Helen Thomas accused the White House of "controlling the press." She said almost all White House/Obama events are "prepackaged." She accused the White House of not "having any answers."

I think she'd better be careful, though. Puppets are replaceable - and I wouldn't be at all surprised to hear she's 'retired' in the next couple of months. She's asking question that aren't in the script.

This video is an interesting look at what we're not being told. I'm wondering if the press corps is starting to think they've grabbed the wrong end of the rope...

J.

When you're a political party - you would, I think, want an attractive figurehead. You'd want leadership that's at least SOMEWHAT charismatic and memorable.

And, let's face it - the Democratic Party's been falling down on the job in that respect. There's no visible figurehead at this point, nobody that actually is the 'face' of the Democratic party like Obama and Pelosi. And the faces that are being put UP on the news representing Republicans...

Sigh. It's a bit odd that Sanford's now the 'face' of the Republican party. Bizzare, isn't it?

Think quickly - who, aside from McCain, would you picture as being emblematic of the Republican party? Gingrich? Cheney? Bush? (Well, the last two aren't exactly major players in the political scheme of things now...)

How about Palin?

Oh, wait - we can't use her...

McCain's Camp Praises Sanford and Trashes Palin?

There something wrong, very wrong, when Sarah Palin, a bright, shining light for conservatives remains the prime target of the existing Washington machine, while Mark Sanford and other hypocritical liars are serenaded as getting a raw deal by the very public daughter of a defacto leader of the party.

Let's see - McCain lost, so it couldn't be he was out-charismaed by Obama and outmaneuvered by the Chicago political machine writ large in ACORN's tactics - no, far better to blame 'Caribou Barbie' for the loss.

Frankly, I think if it hadn't been for her he'd have lost by a much wider margin. I felt a lot better about voting for McCain because he picked her as a running mate.

The Republican Party badly needs to reinvent itself - and clean out a lot of the entrenched deadwood. It needs new ideas, it needs new faces. (And so does the Democratic party. Really, who would you rather listen to all day - Pelosi or Palin?)

But hey - what will actually happen is most likely the status quo staying quo - because nobody wants to upset the system that gives them their goodies...

J.

io9 - Movie Based On Asteroids Game Will Boggle Your Mind - asteroids movie

Though Hollywood excels in making plotless movies, the sale of Asteroids to Universal breaks new ground. The people who are bringing you GI Joe this month are about to make a movie about a triangle shooting a bunch of blobs.

J.

Insanity rules in Washington.

Breaking News: Manufacturing & Technology eJournal Poll Shows Clean Energy Act Could Force Nearly 20 Percent of Manufacturers to Close - Manufacturing & Technology eJournal

The cap-and-trade based system, pushed by the Obama administration and passed by the U.S. House, could cause energy costs to skyrocket and fuel more unemployment
Critics of the Waxman-Markey climate change legislation that narrowly passed the U.S. House of Representatives say energy costs will skyrocket if the bill - as it stands now - becomes law.

Manufacturing & Technology eJournal asked readers what actions they were most likely take at their company to offset the inevitable increases in energy costs.

And the responses weren't very encouraging.

More than 17 percent of those who answered said they would have to shut down their business because there is no way they could handle the kinds of increases being predicted.

I think Obama's finding out that the credit card's got a definite limit. The question will be whether it's low enough to keep us from going belly up when the bill comes due...

J.

Report: U.S. to block Iran sanctions at G8 summit - Haaretz - Israel News

The United States is opposed to enacting a new set of financial sanctions against Iran that are due to be discussed in the G8 summit next week, diplomatic officials in New York reported Friday.

According to officials, sanctions against Iran are expected to top the G8's agenda. Sources are also predicting a pointed debate between the heads of the industrialized nations over an appropriate response to Iranian authorities' suppression of reformist demonstrations in Iran led by Mir Hossein Mousavi and other Iranian opposition leaders.

Makes you wonder who Obama identifies most strongly with, doesn't it?

J.

Why DOES the left hate Sarah Palin so? Well, Dr. Socks thinks she sees an answer...

Reclusive Leftist » Blog Archive » Feminists and the mystery of Sarah Palin

This isn’t going to be the kind of post where I sketch out a pattern and then give you The Key To Understanding It All. This is going to be more like a stream-of-consciousness tiptoe through the violets of my reclusive thought processes. I’ve been puzzling over this stuff since last August. One reason I’ve written as many posts as I have about Palin is because I’m so baffled by the reaction to her. I can’t figure it out. It’s like quantum entanglement or dark energy: I make myself sick trying to understand it and worry that I’ll die before I get it sorted. (I know: Xanax.)

Of course, the first answer you’ll get if you ask feminists why they hate Sarah Palin is that “it’s because she ____” — and then fill in the blank with the lie of choice: made rape victims pay for their own kits, is against contraception or sex ed, believes in abstinence-only, thinks the dinosaurs were here 4000 years ago, doesn’t believe in global warming, doesn’t believe in evolution, is stupid and can’t read, etc., etc., etc., etc.

But none of those things is true. None of them. (Three links there, by the way, and worth checking out.)

Which brings me to my first puzzlement: why don’t people bother to find out what Sarah Palin really believes? I don’t mean people as in the usual sexist freaks; I mean feminists.

Sarah Palin is only the second woman in the history of this country to run on a major party’s presidential ticket. That alone makes her, to me, a fascinating figure worthy of serious investigation. When McCain announced Palin as his choice for VP, I immediately tried to find out as much about her as I could. I wanted to know who she was, what she believed, what her politics were. It never occurred to me that this interest would make me in any way unusual among feminists, but apparently it did. Apparently most feminists — at least the ones online — are content to just take the word of the frat boys at DailyKos or the psycho-sexists at Huffington Post. That amazes me. Aren’t you even interested in who she really is? I want to ask. She’s only the second woman on a presidential ticket in our whole fricking history!

But even weirder is what happens when you try to replace the myths with the truth. If you explain, “no, she didn’t charge rape victims,” your feminist interlocutor will come back with something else: “she’s abstinence-only!” No, you say, she’s not; and then the person comes back with, “she’s a creationist!” and so on. “She’s an uneducated moron!” Actually, Sarah Palin is not dumb at all, and based on her interviews and comments, I’d say she has a greater knowledge of evolution, global warming, and the Wisconsin glaciation in Alaska than the average citizen.

But after you’ve had a few of these myth-dispelling conversations, you start to realize that it doesn’t matter. These people don’t hate Palin because of the lies; the lies exist to justify the hate. That’s why they keep reaching and reaching for something else, until they finally get to “she winked on TV!” (And by the way: I’ve been winked at my whole life by my grandmother, aunts, and great-aunts. Who knew it was such a despicable act?)

I believe a lot of it is fear-based. The problem with Sarah is that she's an 'unknown' as far as the Washington in-crowd are concerned. She's a danger to the status quo, and they don't have any handles to control her with!

So she can't be allowed to get close... Better to lie about her than have her get anywhere near enough influence to change things inside the Beltway.

J,

Sometimes sooner, sometimes later - but whether sooner or later someone's GOT to pay it. And California's got a slightly

California’s Nightmare Will Kill Obamanomics: Kevin Hassett - Bloomberg.com

July 6 (Bloomberg) -- Last week, we discovered that the state of California will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.

With California mired in a budget crisis, largely the result of a political impasse that makes spending cuts and tax increases impossible, Controller John Chiang said the state planned to issue $3.3 billion in IOU’s in July alone. Instead of cash, those who do business with California will get slips of paper.

The California morass has Democrats in Washington trembling. The reason is simple. If Obama’s health-care plan passes, then we may well end up paying for it with federal slips of paper worth less than California’s. Obama has bet everything on passing health care this year. The publicity surrounding the California debt fiasco almost assures his resounding defeat.

It takes years and years to make a mess as terrible as the California debacle, but the recipe is simple. All that you need is two political parties that are always willing to offer easy government solutions for every need of the voters, but never willing to make the tough decisions necessary to finance the government largess that results. Voters will occasionally change their allegiance from one party to the other, but the bacchanal will continue regardless of the names on the office doors.

I wonder what's next?

J.

The mainstream media’s worked hard to establish the boundaries of proper political thinking – establishing a ‘Maginot line’ for acceptable candidates, if you will. There are certain things that candidates should do, and should not - and if you displease the media you're going to be attacked with all the fury they can bring to bear. They've spent a lot of time gathering the influence, controlling the narrative, shaping the battlespace, so to speak... They are STRONG. They are MONOLITHIC. They cannot be beaten!

Yeah. Sure they are.

I'm reminded of someone else who tried that in the last couple of decades, who apparently believed his own hype in that fashion.

Saddam set up his defenses to counter the perceived threats in the Gulf War in 1991 – good, solid setups facing Saudi Arabia, miles and miles of trenches and tank emplacements and bunkers and berms... that an Allied force would break itself against. The trend of his thinking wasn't far beyond the very old British model of arraying two lines of forces out in the open and then blazing away, and the side with the most left standing was the winner.

Only Schwarzkopf didn’t play the game as Saddam had it set. He went over Saddam with the air war, he went around the setpiece battle Saddam tried to draw him into. He didn't play by the rules - he rewrote the book.

The thrust of his efforts was to get as much 'bang for the buck' as possible. And THAT wasn't to be accomplished by simply setting two lines opposite each other and banging away. He thought outside the box and realized there was a WIDE expanse to the north that was completely open to an attacker. He could go around and get behind the defenses... which were all pointing the other way.

Once you get behind the defenses, and you're unopposed - you've essentially won.

I get the feeling we’re seeing the same thing on a political level. Palin definitely bears watching – I think she’s identified some weaknesses in the arrangement and she’s aiming to split things wide open. And it's about time...

Rugged Cell Phone Comparison Test - Abusive Lab Test for Rugged Cell Phones - Popular Mechanics

However, there doesn't seem one that can stand being whacked with a baseball bat... repeatedly.

Seems like there'd be a market for that...

J.

SOMEONE will ignore the memo.

In this case, it was a paleo-biologist who noticed something...

The Medieval Warm Period linked to the success of Machu Picchu, Inca Empire ｫ Watts Up With That?

Here is the abstract.

The rapid expansion of the Inca from the Cuzco area of highland Peru produced the largest empire in the New World between ca. AD 1400–1532. Although this meteoric rise may in part be due to the adoption of innovative societal strategies, supported by a large labour force and standing army, we argue that this would not have been possible without increased crop productivity, which was linked to more favourable climatic conditions. A multi-proxy, high-resolution 1200-year lake sediment record was analysed at Marcacocha, 12 km north of Ollantaytambo, in the heartland of the Inca Empire. This record reveals a period of sustained aridity that began from AD 880, followed by increased warming from AD 1100 that lasted beyond the arrival of the Spanish in AD 1532. These increasingly warmer conditions allowed the Inca and their predecessors the opportunity to exploit higher altitudes from AD 1150, by constructing agricultural terraces that employed glacial-fed irrigation, in combination with deliberate agroforestry techniques. There may be some important lessons to be learnt today from these strategies for sustainable rural development in the Andes in the light of future climate uncertainty.

One of the tenents of AGW is that the MWP doesn't exist, didn't happen, and it wouldn't have made any difference anyway if it did, which it didn't.

Except it apparently did.

Now, in the Halls of Hot Air - the following exchange occurred.

EPA's Jackson and Energy Sec. Chu on the Senate hot seat ｫ Watts Up With That?

“I believe the central parts of the [EPA] chart are that U.S. action alone will not impact world CO2 levels,” Administrator Jackson said.

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) presented the chart to both Jackson and Secretary Chu, which shows that meaningful emissions reductions cannot occur without aggressive action by China, India, and other developing countries.

“I am encouraged that Administrator Jackson agrees that unilateral action by the U.S. will be all cost for no climate gain,” Sen. Inhofe said. “With China and India recently issuing statements of defiant opposition to mandatory emissions controls, acting alone through the job-killing Waxman-Markey bill would impose severe economic burdens on American consumers, businesses, and families, all without any impact on climate.”

Needless to say, Sec. Chu said he didn't agree.

Well, when your whole future is based on a fraud, you're going to try to maintain the fraude as long as possible... but it's kind of hard when you're being undercut by the EPA.

And this brings the third bit... and arguably the most important.

UAH global temperature anomaly - hitting the slopes « Watts Up With That?

UAH MSU has officially released their June 2009 data. This time, they're faster than RSS MSU. The anomaly was 0.001 °C, meaning that the global temperature was essentially equal to the average June temperature since 1979. June 2009 actually belonged to the cooler half of the Junes since 1979.

Global warming is supposed to exist and to be bad. Sometimes, we hear that global warming causes cooling. In this case, global warming causes global averageness. In all three cases, it is bad news. The three main enemies of environmentalism are warm weather, cool weather, and average weather.

But that ain't the kicker.

You may see that the cooling trends are dominating for most intervals shorter than 110 months; the trend in the last 50 months is around -6 °C per century. Only when the period gets longer than 150 months i.e. 12.5 years (but less than 31 years), the trend becomes uniformly positive, around 1.2 °C per century for the intervals whose length is close to 30 years.

Note that those 12.5 years – where you still get a vanishing trend – is from January 1997 to June 2009. If you consider the UAH mid troposphere data instead (relevant for the part of the atmosphere where the greenhouse warming should be most pronounced, according to both proper atmospheric science and the IPCC report, page 675), all the trends are shifted downwards:

You need to consider time periods longer than 180 months i.e. 15 years (at least from Summer 1994) – but shorter than 31 years – to see a uniformly positive warming trend. And the trend that you can calculate from those 30+ years is just 0.4 °C per century and chances are that this 30+-year trend will actually drop below zero again, in a few years. At any rate, the blue graph makes it clear that in the right context, the longer-term warming trend converges to zero at a very good accuracy.

Isn't that interesting?

We're at a point where a lot of people have been 'programmed' to basically gut the economy to stave off global warming. If Cap&Trade DOES pass - global warming won't be an issue.

Your thoughts?

J.

With the current obsession over Michael Jackson - was it too much, too little, or just right?

The media's coverage of the death of Michael Jackson has been ...
Too little 131

Just about right 109

Overkill 17751

Well, there wasn't anything MORE important to deal with, was there.?

J.

RSS Global Temperature for June 09, also down ｫ Watts Up With That?

Cold temps in Chicago, frost in Canada up in Prince Edward Island.

In JULY.

Warming? I don't think so.

It's like that old line from "The Princess Bride".

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

J.

We're broke, as you know. We can still borrow money - but what happens when we can't make the payments? We're not far from that point - yet the only solution that seems to even be thought of is to borrow and spend still more.

Maybe, just MAYBE the key to fixing the economic problems we're having ISN'T to spend a hell of a lot more money that we don't have!

Maybe we need Obama to come on and go "I'm looking at the world economic situation, and it's dire. We vastly need to revamp our governmental spending, and I'm sorry to say we're going to have to SHRINK the size and scope of public involvement.

"We are past the point where we have money to waste on patronage, on non-productive jobs awarded as favors, on back-scratching payola, on corruption and graft that's been business as usual. That ends, and ends now."

And pigs are going to fly over Mecca under their own power before we get THAT sort of speech from Obama. We need him to cut back spending - but it won't happen unless something goes seriously bust - and we're not there yet.

Unfortunately.

J.

Or in this case, the blogs. I'll be incommunicado for about a week - going down to the Kingdom of the Mouse for a few days, then over to St. Augustine for some beach time.

So consider this an open thread, put in what you think others might be interested in. Don't forget to check wattsupwiththat.com, nextbigfuture.com, instapundit.com, and io9.com - and I'll see you in a week or so!

J.

Contracts - Recipient Summary | Recovery.gov

Funding Amount$1,191,200
Project Location - Zip Code90058-1800
Completion Date2009-06-30
Congressional District CA-34

Recipient Information (Award)
Recipient NameCLOUGHERTY PACKING, LLC
Recipient Address 3049 E VERNON AVE
Recipient City LOS ANGELES
Recipient State CALIFORNIA
Recipient Zip Code90058-1800
Congressional District CALIFORNIA-34

Description of Work/Service performed
2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED

Now, I'd like to point out that there's at least some benefit of the doubt here - the description likely could be incomplete, in that it was a lot of 100,000 2-lb packages of frozen ham slices, which would bring it down to just about $6 a pound... which still seems a trifle excessive for a bulk buy like that. (About the same as what you'd pay at Publix, however, for deli meat over the counter...)

I won't be terribly surprised, however, if it does turn out to be a singular, 2-lb buy...

J.

As I stated before, we went to the Kingdom of the Mouse, I had tickets, gotten earlier this year, so it seemed a shame to waste them - though Florida in July wasn't my first option for using them. But I figured that using modern technology we'd be fairly comfortable, and we were.

The Borrego handled pulling the trailer easily - it's a world of difference between the old Mazda MPV and the Burrito. Mileage wasn't much different - but that's as may be. You haul a ton and a half at 70+ mph, you're going to pay for it some way or another.

Arriving at the Ft. Wilderness campground, I was surprised at how smoothly they checked us in. They had a registration packet ready with all the information we needed to know about the parks, the transportation system, the horse rides, wagon rides, boat rentals (we ended up renting a pontoon boat for an hour...) the trading posts, the pools and the campground amenities, up to and including a movie schedule (Wall-E was playing the night we arrived... which was fine since we didn't plan on visiting any of the parks the first day and we like the movie...) - it was seamless and professional and friendly. Almost like they get a lot of people through... (LOL)

We stayed on loop 1600 in the resort - there were two VERY clean bathhouses within two minutes walk of our site. And, for a change, the concrete pad we were on was LEVEL. Most campgrounds have a rather shaky idea of horizontal - Disney's was spot on. It was also CLEAN - to the point where it looked like the thing had been hosed down less than a couple of hours before. The roads were also smooth and well maintained - they spend a lot of time and effort making sure the place is attractive as possible.

Staying at Ft. Wilderness was the best economic choice I think we could have made. We could have stayed at a marginally less expensive campground outside the property - but that would have eaten up a fair amount of time commuting, and after a day or evening in the park you really aren't thinking of anything but getting to where you can collapse. And then there'd be the cost of the meals - the LEAST expensive fast-food style meal we got there was around $30 for the three of us, and that didn't include drinks. If we'd gone to one of the featured buffets, I was ready to pay $50+. That eats up your 'savings' really fast.

For what it's worth, you can save a considerable amount of money by taking sandwiches into the parks, and fixing meals in a crock-pot prior to coming down and freezing them in 2-quart blocks ensures they stay frozen (with applications of ice, of course) until you want them thawed. We're looking into getting a thermoelectric ice chest - anyone know how well they work?

Disney has a program called 'Extra Magic Hours', where resort guests get a few less-crowded hours in the parks in the morning or evening. The plan rotates, with differing parks staying open early or late. So our plan (which worked pretty well, overall) was to go to the EMH park in the morning, stay until about 1 or 2, go back to Ft. Wilderness, hang out at the pool while dinner thaws, warm it up and have dinner around 7 then leisurely head over to the evening EMH park around 8 or so. And THAT helped a lot - I don't even want to think what it would have been like in the parks in mid-afternoon. But at night? Even the high-popularity rides like 'Pirates of the Caribbean' is pretty much a walkon after midnight.

(There is one ride I didn't get to go on that I really wanted to - that was the Carousel of Progress. Well, maybe next time.)

I must admit, I really like the Magic Kingdom after dark. The lights and colors in Tomorrowland just seem to make the place magical - and I still feel it more than 40 years after my first visit to Disneyland.

Was it crowded? Yes and no. EPCOT wasn't as crowded as I thought it would be. The Magic Kingdom was about as I expected, and got a lot less so as the evening cleared out. Animal Kingdom was worse than I expected, and Hollywood Studios was less so. Guess it depends on the hours... But for some reason, Animal Kingdom just feels cramped to me.

Anyhow - after being there 4 days we went over to St. Augstine, to the North Beach Camp Resort. Not as nice as Ft. Wilderness - it had an ocean close by that made up for the lack. Unfortunately, the weather was so pleasant that I figured I'd wait about half an hour to apply sunscreen. So Sue and Aaron went to play in the waves while I sunned and read. (You can see where this is going, right?)

The end result? A blistering sunburn across my shoulders and belly. On the good side, I finished David Weber's "By Heresies Distressed", but I'm not sure it'd be a fair tradeoff.

Two days of beach time helped a lot. Then we headed back to the normal grind.

And so it went. We got back late Saturday, then spent yesterday cleaning things up and getting ready for the next time we use the trailer.

This morning, we had a call at 6:30 from the assisted living facility my folks are at. My mother fell, hit her head and hurt her hip.

More on that later...

Your real tax rate: 40% - MSN Money

Politicians rarely talk about what real people experience: the true maze of taxes and government benefits. If someone put them all together, we could see what our actual tax burden was. We could see who pays at the highest or lowest rates. Discussions of tax policy wouldn't be a waste of time.

Well, two researchers did it.

In a study for the National Bureau of Economic Research, Boston University economists Laurence J. Kotlikoff and David Rapson have found that our all-in marginal tax rate is 40%, give or take a bit. Yes, you read that right: 40%.

When we were down in Orlando, there was a 7% sales tax.

Here in Cobb, it's between 5% and 6%. In NYC - it's 8.375%.

Remember this when Obama starts saying that we've all got to be taxed more to pay for 'health care'.

J.

CQ Politics | CBO Chief: Health Bills To Increase Federal Costs

The health care overhauls released to date would increase, not reduce, the burgeoning long-term health costs facing the government, Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf said Thursday.

That is not a message likely to sit well with congressional Democrats or the Obama administration, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., said Thursday she thinks lawmakers can find ways to wring more costs out of the health system as they continue work on their bills.

I don't see a benefit to reducing costs if quality of care is gutted. And that's what is looking like will happen if this wonderful bill is passed. Why put in a pacemaker when you can give a pain pill instead?

They're barely competent at governing - how foolish is it to expect they'll be competent in deciding medical issues?

J.

Obama goes prime-time to pitch healthcare - UPI.com

Political observers said Obama is at a pivotal moment in his presidency because how he handles the healthcare issue during the next few weeks could help shape the rest of his presidency and his relationship with Congress, among other things.

"He's got to be careful that while he ratchets up the pressure, he doesn't bet his whole presidency on whether this gets done before the August recess," said Kenneth Duberstein, who molded President Ronald Reagan's first-term legislative strategy. "He has a broad, broad agenda that he's in a rush to enact, and if he's not careful he will be viewed as a steamroller who tries to get things fast and not necessarily right."

J.

CongressDaily - Dems Start To Push Back Hard To Prevent A 'Waterloo'

A telling episode recounted by Senate Finance ranking member Charles Grassley reveals the Obama administration might be more worried than they are letting on that a Republican senator's comparison of the healthcare overhaul to Waterloo might be dangerously close to the truth.

Grassley said he spoke with a Democratic House member last week who shared Obama's bleak reaction during a private meeting to reports that some factions of House Democrats were lining up to stall or even take down the overhaul unless leaders made major changes.

"Let's just lay everything on the table," Grassley said. "A Democrat congressman last week told me after a conversation with the president that the president had trouble in the House of Representatives, and it wasn't going to pass if there weren't some changes made ... and the president says, 'You're going to destroy my presidency.' "

The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

That's not good for a cult-of-personality presidency, especially one dependent on a passive, unquestioning, unresisting population.

Obama figured his Presidency was 'all about him'. One of the best comments I've seen on this was found in a post on JammieWearingFool - "You're Going To Destroy My Presidency!" It was as follows...

When this man was elected, the only hope I had was that he would somehow soak up the vibes from great presidents past and rise to his office.

But not so. It's all about him, about his approval. About his presidency, and not about this country.

Folks, this is what a tailspin looks like. It does not look like Sarah Palin resigning. It does not look like W. being burned over and over in effigy by the insane zealots on the left. It looks like quiet statements said behind closed doors, wherein the leader of the free world hinges his presidency on telling me what meds I can take, when, how and why...not for his country (which he's supposed to love), not for its people (the most generous in the world), but so that he can CONTROL EVERYTHING.

Seriously. He may recover from this, but it looks unlikely.

Wendy | 07.22.09 - 10:50 am

J.

You ever wonder about the rush to get this 'health care' mess passed?

Democrats divided on health care overhaul - ajc.com

With a self-imposed deadline for action in jeopardy, the Democratic leadership juggled complaints from conservatives demanding additional cost savings, first-term lawmakers upset with proposed tax increases and objections from members of the rank-and-file opposed to allowing the government to sell insurance in competition with private industry.

"No one wants to tell the speaker that she's moving too fast and they damn sure don't want to tell the president," Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., a key committee chairman, told a fellow lawmaker as the two walked into a closed-door meeting. The remark was overheard by reporters.

Probably won't be long until they're accused of 'treason' for not supporting Obama's thefts - but that's the way it goes...

J.

The Futurist: The Technological Progression of Video Games

Go check it out. I'm already pretty well amazed by the things out for the XBox 360 - I'm wondering what the successor to it is going to be able to do...

J.

Air Force: NASA's New Rocket Unsafe for Astronauts - Science News | Science & Technology | Technology News - FOXNews.com

NASA's next-generation Ares I manned-mission rocket may be a death trap, at least for the first minute after liftoff, an Air Force study concludes.
If the Ares I rocket malfunctioned, the report says, the crew capsule's escape system would not be able to blast itself and the astronauts inside it to safety, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

Instead, a huge cone of red-hot rocket fuel would be spread over nearly three miles and the crew capsule's parachutes would be incinerated, causing it to fall thousands of feet to the Atlantic Ocean.

NASA's saying there's no real problem with that - but I'm unfortunately skeptical of NASA's credibility these days.

J.

Obama wants to do a massive, major overhaul of our medical system - grabbing up to 16% of the entire economy and putting it under government control. Now, that's an unusual thing for anyone to want - considering that the hallmark of government programs is that they usually underperform and cost a heck of a lot more than expected. The current estimate is from $1 to $1.6 trillion over the next decade, morphing health care into something not at all like what we've got now.

And this would be seen as a radical improvement by some. I'm kind of puzzled at how - but then, I tend to look at things with an eye to a workable solution - not an ideal solution. Ideal - well, when the unicorns start pooping gold then we'll be able to afford everything. Until then, let's do the best we can with what we've got - not throw trillions out on some undefined plan that will supposedly make everything better. (For a really, really nebulous definition of 'better', too...)

So what's my solution? Well - it's not complex, it's not expensive (at least, on governmental terms - Bill Gates could likely fund it, but only for a couple of years.) and it doesn't massively grow government. I know - three strikes right there, but bear with me.

The first step in coming up with any solution is to define the problem. The ostensible problem is - 45 million people don't have health care. (Estimates are that up to 15 mil could be illegals, 10-15 million can afford it but don't want it, and the other 15 want it but can't afford it. But what the heck, let's just use 45 million as the number. Let the INS and IRS hash it all out...)

There are programs which provide welfare, WIC, unemployment and the like to folks who need it.

Add an additional one - a debit-style card to be used for health care payments.

Now, currently there are programs available at major chains like Walmart, Walgreens, CVS and the like, providing generic prescriptions for $4 for a 30 day supply. Coupled with that - in a lot of the Walgreens, Walmarts, CVS pharmacies are walk-in clinics staffed by nurse practitioners. They handle minor stuff - things like heart attacks and such would have to go to a hospital. At THAT point, it's gone beyond a minor problem, and it becomes something that would be taken care of through Medicare or Medicaid.

As I suggested, issue a medical debit card to those who need it.

Preload the card with $1000. That’d give you ten visits @$70 each and 5 prescriptions @$4 each for 12 months. (or shall we call it 240 prescription-months? Kind of like a man-day, in pill form...) For 45 million people that’d be… (let’s see, carry the 7, add the 5, divide by the square root of -7.441…) $45 billion a year. Add $5 billion for administrative overhead, and you’ve got a $50 billion program that covers the folks who need it most.

$50 billion. Heck, that’s practically petty cash for the government any more…

Now, make it so that money could ONLY be spent for health care visits at approved locations (which could include GPs that wish to be included in the system) and for generic prescriptions from approved pharmacies. Have the card’s account automatically refreshed each year - but keep the amount ON the card at $1000. If they don’t use the card, nothing needed to be put back onto it, so the money wouldn’t need to be spent.

We issue the cards out attached to the users’ SSAN. Three in the family? Three cards. And yes, it'd be possible to swap balances between cards in a family. But outside the three? No way.

Of course, such a thing isn’t foolproof. And it wouldn’t cover such things as ambulance rides, MRIs and the like - but anything that gets to that stage would likely be covered by Medicare/Medicaid in the first place. The thrust of this proposal is to get primary care coverage for the folks who need it NOW, quickly, for a low cost.

But you know - I don't think that's what is even really desired.

Just for grins, I posed the above solution up over on a leftward leaning blog. The objection wasn't that it wouldn't work - it's that it wasn't GOOD enough. 10 free visits, free prescriptions - and that wasn't good enough. It was second-class (never mind there was a decade when I'd have LOVED to have such second-class health care...) and thus wasn't even considered as being remotely acceptable.

'Perfect' rapidly becomes the enemy of 'Good Enough'. And what we need is something good enough to get health care to people who need it, and get it to them rapidly.

This would do it.

What do you think - should I write it up a bit more comprehensively and try sending it off to my senators and representative?

J.

CNSNews.com - Conyers Sees No Point in Members Reading 1,000-Page Health Care Bill--Unless They Have 2 Lawyers to Interpret It for Them

(CNSNews.com) - During his speech at a National Press Club luncheon, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Democratic Congressman John Conyers (D-Mich.), questioned the point of lawmakers reading the health care bill.

“I love these members, they get up and say, ‘Read the bill,’” said Conyers.

“What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?”

Yes, the Democrats really are that dumb, and expect YOU are also...

J.