Even Supreme Court Justices get bored

I caught this link to a decision from Chief Justice John Roberts that was written in noir style.

Officer Sean Devlin, Narcotics Strike Force, was working the morning shift. Undercover surveillance. The neighborhood? Tough as a three­ dollar steak. Devlin knew. Five years on the beat, nine months with the Strike Force. He’d made [...]

Yes, I can be petty

FDR said

This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.

To me, that seems [...]

Palin was a dumb pick? No foolin!

The last line is all you need to read if you’re skimming.

Matthew Dowd, a prominent political consultant and chief strategist for George W. Bush’s reelection campaign eviscerated John McCain on Tuesday for his choice of Sarah Palin as vice president.

Dowd proclaimed that, in his heart of hearts, McCain knew he put [...]

Financial meltdowns of the past

The current financial meltdown isn’t the largest nor the first of its kind. We’ve had our fair share and we’ll probably have them in the future. Neatorama has a great list of them that includes highlights like

The Panic of 1907 Wall Street crash of 1929 Great Depression 1973 Oil Crisis Black Monday Savings [...]

One thousand, one hundred, and forty

Its hard to measure how the economy has grown and there are many different measuring sticks. Most use the gross domestic product. I was curious to see if I could use the Dow Jones index as a measuring stick. Since Jan 20, 2001 when Bush took office the dow has lost 1140 points. The [...]

The Debate

When I was in high school I loved debate class. I spent more of my time and energy on that class than any other subject. There was something about humiliating another person with logic, reason, and facts that drew me in from the start. For the large part, I spent my time debating varsity [...]

The bailout

It’s been all over the news and I’ve been watching the developments over the last few days but I still have my reservations with the plan. Over the past 80 years we have created a number of social programs to help fellow Americans that were unable to reach acceptable living standards. The degree of [...]

What was that?

If this information in this video is correct I’m probably not the only one that is confused. According to her report, an active duty army unit is going to be assigned to northern command and will be specifically stationed within the US Borders. They will respond to domestic threats as required. Don’t we have [...]

Economists on the bailout plan

A group of over 100 leading economists sent a letter to congress outlining their reservations with the proposed bailout plan. Their concerns mirror my own – I need more answers before anything is done. The full text is below

As economists, we want to express to Congress our great concern for the plan [...]

Bill Maher makes the best point ever

He’s got a good point – well worth the 3:41