Even ethicists do not understand

the difference between 'affect' and 'effect.'

Color me so surprised

That the government doesn't like competition:

Washington (CNN) -- A program that allows airports to replace government screeners with private screeners is being brought to a standstill, just a month after the Transportation Security Administration said it was "neutral" on the program.

TSA chief John Pistole said Friday he has decided not to expand the program beyond the current 16 airports, saying he does not see any advantage to it.

There is no advantage to people doing a better job for less money from the perspective of a government bureaucrat, nor from the perspective of the TSA's union, which supports the decision for obvious reasons. But while not surprising, it does provide a rather insightful glimpse into how government takeovers work. First, government provides a 'voluntary' solution, no strings attached and anyone can opt out. Then it makes itself the arbiter of who can opt out. Then it decides no one can opt out*. It always works this way. What's amazing is that it works every time.

The only solution for this specific problem is to kill the TSA (and probably the entire DHS) root and branch, which I expect the Stupid Party Republicans will at least make noises toward doing. But since they are the people who created it**, I suspect that effort will be more for entertainment than anything.

* If I was relying on a waiver from Obama Care, I would be very nervous right about now.
** And unionized it.

The black man's burden.

Sometimes the black man's problem is too many black men:

Too many Americans are delusional in thinking we have a national education system that is fair. It isn't. We all know that you can go from community to community and see some elementary, middle and high school campuses that look like college campuses, while others look like prisons.

Those districts with money hire teachers with master's degrees and Ph.D.s; those with little money rely on those with only teacher certificates. Those with money can invest in iPads and laptops; those without are thankful just to have enough chalk, erasers and pencils....

I like Roland Martin. He's a pretty clear thinker who is not afraid to step outside the accepted boundaries when it comes to solutions - in this case, the problem he is addressing is the case of a woman who illegally registered her daughters in a school district they didn't reside in.  She committed a fraud, but for the best of reasons. But Martin, who is absolutely correct in calling for a top-to-bottom redesign of the school system, including vouchers, single-sex schools, and ROTC options for parents, misses one very important point.  A lot of inner-city districts suffer from having too many black students in them, and the only way to save them, in cold Machiavellian logic, is to destroy them utterly. Now before you call Reverend Jackson to boycott my blog, hear me out.  It has no more to do with blackness than it has to do with money. It has everything to do with the kinds of students that attend those schools, the cultural attitudes toward learning that they bring, and their expectations of the value of education.

Martin is absolutely correct that some schools look like the cover of the Led Zeppelin album Houses of the Holy*.  He is also correct that such a look can only be paid for with lots of money.  Where he is incorrect is in correlating that look with academic achievement.  You see, I lived in KCMO a couple decades ago when their desegregation project was going on, when the federal courts ordered the state of Missouri to spend a couple thousand million dollars on the KCMO school district to make up for past discrimination.  The district built new schools with Olympic-sized pools, bussed kids all over, created a student-to-teacher ratio of less than 15-1. For more than a decade they spent more money per pupil than any other district in the state, and perhaps in the country. In short, they did everything possible to give every kid in Kansas City the Zeppelin experience.  It was an utter failure. The black/white achievement gap didn't close. Test scores didn't rise.

And the reason it was an utter failure was not because there was not enough money to spend, but because no matter how you sliced and diced the inner-city clientele, they were still a clientele made up of inner city kids, and the school board was still stuffed with race warriors, elected by an inner city clientele, who cared more about power than education.  Entire generations of students went through the 'new' Kansas City schools and reaped the benefits of all the money that could be spent - new buildings, exercise equipment, fencing lessons - and yet academics remained stagnant. After 20 years on the case, Judge Clark retired; now the schools are shutting down, the result of too much school and too few students and taxes to support them. But the problem was not that the schools were neglected by the state; they were instead neglected by the students.

It may be impolitic to say, but the problem with the schools remained that there were too many students in them who did not care about education. It's easy to say "black students," and Judge Clark's main desegregation measurement was black students, but the truth is that the problem was students who came from single-parent families, who cared more about basketball than math, and who happened to be black.  Once there was a critical mass of these students in the district, there was nothing money could do to change the outcome.

Which brings us back to Martin's now-felony-convicted mother.  She's black. She wanted her daughters in a predominantly white school in a predominately white district.  But it was never the argument that black students learn better when the kid next to them has a white face, and it's a foolish argument that a critical mass of white kids is needed for blacks to learn.  A critical mass of students who are there to learn is what is needed for any school, a critical mass of students who come from intact families is needed to create a culture of learning, and unfortunately for her, neither could be found in her local 'black' school.  So she tried to get them out. Good for her. I just wish she had moved in with her dad so it was legal.

Black parents who care about education understand that their kids are not going to learn in a school where these things don't exist. It's easiest to focus on the white faces, and to assume that there's something about the whiteness that makes the school better. In truth, it's a matter of culture.  The black student is not likely to get a fair shake surrounded by black students because their culture, not their race, makes learning near impossible. And so the only way out is to flee the black schools and leave them to the rappers and the ball players. If that school eventually looks like a prison, it's likely because it houses prisoners**, not students.

The real solution is the destruction of inner-city districts altogether and the creation of autonomous schools dedicated to learning, not housing prisoners. Those blacks who want to learn need the chance, those who don't need their freedom to work on layups. But it makes no sense to put them together and even less to blame the problem on money. The problem is not money. The problem is that schools presume a willingness on the part of students to learn, the expectation that academics are important and a way out of the inner city. Until that expectation arises - and until it is actually met by the rest of society - good parents who care about their kids' education are going to be forced to choose between moving and lying.

It's far better for them if they move, in a lot of ways.

* there were many steps and columns. It was most tranquil.
** Or future prisoners.

It's not really that scary

Give Americans a little credit:

Citing the need to keep Americans better informed about specific terror threats, President Barack Obama's top US security official announced Thursday an end to the color-coded alert system drafted in the wake of 9/11...

"[The new alerts] may recommend certain actions... and they will have a specific end date. You can clap on that one, yes," [Napolitano] said in an apparent acknowledgement of the frustrations many Americans voiced over the constant state of heightened alert that critics of the system say left the country in a perpetual state of fear. 

I never saw that 'perpetual state of fear' caused by the government's scary thermometer. What I saw was people look at it twice, recognize its intrinsic worthlessness, and then completely ignore it. What is the terror level right now and when did it last change? I have no idea. No one has any idea*.  Either you're so scared that your brain has locked away that knowledge to preserve your sanity, or you don't remember because it's not worth remembering.

Not that the new one will matter any more than the old one.  I'm sure it will be contain a lot more words and probably cost more. That's how government programs work. But I have a hard time believing that the government is going to provide actionable recommendations that are going to help individuals avoid an actual attack**. They are likely to be more of the "Snoop on your neighbors" rubbish that usually comes from the feds.

I could be wrong. Interplanet Janet may surprise us all with a flash of usefulness. If that is the case, this new system will likely be replaced far more quickly than the old one.

* Psyche. Actually, the answers are 'orange' and '2006.'
** like 'Don't take the E Subway Thursday morning'

A new SocSec song

to go with the new projections.

Good news from Topeka

Well, mostly:

Speed limit ought to be going up to 75. Frankly, I think it ought to be eliminated west of Topeka anyway. Kansas has some of the best, straightest, flattest 4-lane interstates in the country. And almost nobody drives on them. What a waste of good adrenaline.

Arts leeches advocates will be rallying at the Capitol at 1:00 today. Hope they pass a hat*.

Liquor reform may be coming, which should mean wines at the grocery store instead of state-controlled hovels that charge 50% more than they ought. Due to its Progressive and Populist history, Kansas has long had some of the most restrictive and frankly bizarre liquor laws in the nation. Suffice it to say that except on rare occasions, I buy all my wine and liquor in Missouri.

The House budget committee has passed a bill that would reduce the amount spent on Kansas salaries by 7.5%. Now, obviously I would rather not have my salary cut, but as it applies to all elected officials too**, I'm cool with it. Everybody's gotta suck it up here.

An incredible number of people are whining about past tax cuts in Kansas and how that has hurt the state's finances.  As is often the case, they are exactly wrong.  It is the states with the highest taxes that have the most trouble, because states spend every penny, and that growth multiplies the pain when the downturn arrives. The reason Kansas has such a relatively small problem is because it has a relatively small government in the first place.  It does not pain me that it's getting smaller.

* for what Madame DeFarge once described as, "Beggars begging from beggars"
** Irony: - noun. The head of a state employees union complaining that state employees are underpaid. I know that's what they're supposed to say, but if it's true, maybe state employees need to get a better union.

State of the Union

Abusing the law of the excluded middle

But in a really dramatic fashion:

Authorities are worried a recent wave of police officer shootings may not be a coincidence.

In just 24 hours, at least 11 cops were shot around the country...

"It's not a fluke," Richard Roberts, a spokesman for the International Union of Police Associations, told MSNBC.com.

Really? That is odd. But what's the evidence that the relationship of these shootings in Idianapolis, Oregon, Washington, Florida, and Detroit may not be a coincidence?

"There's nothing in this that makes sense at all," Police Chief Ralph Godbee told reporters during a briefing on the case.

While all the shootings don’t appear to be connected...

I see. The shootings don't appear to be connected, but they are not a coincidence, either. But what manner of mastermind would be able to (not) mastermind a series of shootings that are not coincidental and yet not connected?

While all the shootings don’t appear to be connected, Roberts says they have one thing in common.

"We don't have any data, but there seems to be a type of criminal out there looking to thwart authority," he told the station.

Indeed. Well, that certainly explains a few things.

Finally, a helpful review

It would have been better to shut up

Unless he's a closet birther:

HONOLULU – A privacy law that shields birth certificates has prompted Democratic Gov. Neil Abercrombie to abandon efforts to dispel claims that President Barack Obama was born outside Hawaii, his office says.

Uh-huh. See, here's the funny thing: I already knew Hawaii law forbad the governor releasing the birth certificate, and I don't even live there. The governor and his staff had to know it, because in all the time Governor Dufus has spent talking about it he has been consistently asked about that fact. And yet they had to go making all this noise* which in the end just feeds into the suspicions and evidence** of those whom Abercrombie was trying to silence.

There are really only a few possible (non-exclusive) conclusions one can draw from this whole mess:

• Abercrombie knew what he would find and found it, but Obama doesn't want it released
• Abercrombie found something other than what he expected to find, and Obama doesn't want it released.
• Abercrombie mouthed off without thinking and now has to slink off humiliated
• Abercrombie is an idiot.

But there are two conclusions one must draw from it: Obama has not released all there is to release, and Obama does not want it released.

Anything beyond that is mere speculation, but of the very kind Abercrombie tried to quash yet instead has actually done yeoman's work to perpetuate.

* First it was "Yes, we're going to release it and shut these birthers up." Then it was "Yes, the document is here; well, there's a notation here, I can tell you that much." Now it's "Hawaii law forbids me from releasing the info without the permission of my BFF Obama, who for some undisclosed reason won't give it to me."
** Yes, I know, lack of evidence is not evidence. But the persistent failure to find evidence can become evidence that such evidence does not exist. For example, the fact that I have never found a buffalo nickel in my car is not proof that one does not exist there, but its non-existence is the best explanation for my continued failure to find one.

Sinking of the USS Milton Bradley

Words mean things

Governor Sammy joins a fundamentalist cult:

It has now been established that Sam Brownback, R-Kan is a member of the Family or C Street. It is a religious cult that many member of the US congress belong to...

As the Republican Party implodes the public is becoming aware of a secretive Christian society known as the Family or the Fellowship. The group was founded in 1935 in opposition to FDR's New Deal and its adherents subscribe to a far right Christian fundamentalist and free market ideology.

I very much enjoy the moonbat's lack of respect for the integrity of words.

For example, a cult (latin:cultus) is generally a group which is separated from the main by a particular devotion, practice, or doctrine.  For example, among Catholics you might have the cult of Saint Oswald or of Saint Dagobert - and these tiny groups would be offset from the whole body by their particular devotion. Within protestantism, cults are similarly divided from the whole. Mormons are considered a cult while the New England Evangelical Baptist Fellowship, composed of but 10 churches and 600 people, is not. What makes the difference? Cults operate outside the "acceptable" limits of Protestant doctrine.

Secondly, fundamentalist is not a synonym for "bad." Fundamentalism in Christian theology was a turn-of-the-20th century Protestant reaction to liberal theology or the Social Gospel, which attempted to dress Progressive do-goodism in religious garb. Fundamentalism promoted the historical "fundamentals" of Protestantism (e.g. inerrancy of scripture, bodily resurrection, vicarious atonement). In short, fundamentalism represents the doctrinal 'core' of Protestantism.

It is very difficult to posit that one could have a fundamentalist cult, or a cult that follows 'fundamentalist ideology' - they are a contradiction in terms.  Making a practicing Roman Catholic a member of such a Protestant oxymoron just compounds the confusion. Whatever "The Family" is, besides a small ministry that provides fellowship for politicians and operates the annual National Prayer Breakfast, it's probably not one of those.

Careful what you ask for

So anyway, I got a really nice letter from the Historical Society this morning thanking me for breaking the encryption on some of John Brown Jr.'s war correspondence. But it turns out that the letters thus decrypted are "rather salacious," and so the Historical Society can't put the key online lest middle schoolers get ahold of it and decode the lustful musings of one of Kansas' first heroes for themselves. Oops.

They will, however, be creating a paper reference copy of the key and translations which will be kept under armed guard at the Topeka reference room.  But you will need your parents' permission to see it.

UPDATE: Here is the key, just in case it disappears from the KSHS site*:

The code is a simple letter-replacement system based on descending even and ascending odd numbers. So you start with A=24, B=22, C=20, and continue to L=2. Then M=1, N=3 ... Y=25. There appear to be no Zs, but they would most likely be number 26. 00 is a space-filler to hide the existence of one-letter words, like "I" or "a." 00 08  and 00 24 appear quite often, which was a big hint when it came to breaking it.

The writing is columnar. Each page begins in the bottom right-hand corner and goes up, then begins again at the bottom of the next column to the left. There is occasionally obvious junk at the top of a column, and especially in the upper left of a page. This appears to be a scheme to fill up columns and pages evenly and perhaps to make it harder to break the code since our natural impulse is to start at the top left of any page.

Each word begins at the bottom and goes right-letter, left-letter, like this:

FE
DC
BA

If you apply this to Letter 92, for example, beginning at the lowest right corner you'll read, "I do love to reead (sic) your dear letters in figures."

* Everyone here is over age, right? Right?

Way to get right on that...

After piling on more for two years:

President Barack Obama Tuesday ordered a government-wide review of regulations with the goal of eliminating those that hurt job creation and make the U.S. economy less competitive...

It was not immediately clear, however, how far-reaching Obama's new regulatory strategy would be in changing the way the federal government operates.

On the contrary, it is perfectly clear: it will have no effect whatsoever. None. Nada. Zilch. Those regulations that are based in law cannot be changed on the fly, and those created on the fly exist because someone, somewhere, in government thinks they are or were a good idea or that they are based on law. Sure, there may be repeals here and there of a few so 'progress' can be shown, but if anyone thinks an op-ed in the WSJ is going to change how the federal government actually operates, I would suggest that person has no idea how the federal government actually operates.

Regulations don't exist to make companies more efficient and competitive, and they don't exist to help companies hire more people. They are primarily written by those who work for established companies* to structure markets in such a way that those already in a given market don't have to compete with small companies and startups, which, not coincidentally, are the kinds of companies that hire more people. That is certainly not going to change by giving the same people who wrote those rules permission to double-check their work.

* Or expect to work for those companies once they leave the government.

And point 001 percent

... spent the entire day cleaning up side quests on Dungeon Siege II before realizing that, with only two boss fights left, it hardly seems worthwhile to finish.

Props where due

That's one small step for a country:

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – President Barack Obama plans to loosen Cuban travel policy to allow students and church groups to go to the communist country, the administration announced Friday...

Of course, Republicans are going nuts on this, saying things like "Loosening these regulations will not help ... the Cuban people free themselves from the tyranny that engulfs them."

It might be easy to say, "wrong, wrong, wrongwrongwrong," but it's probably easier to point out that the current policy, if it has not done exactly that in half a freaking century, is obviously not going to do it.  And if it has not done so in half a freaking century, then quite possibly helping the Cuban people free themselves from tyranny is simply not something the American government can do.  Like the Athenian philosopher Tom Petrarchy once wrote, "It don't make no difference to me, baby, everybody's had to fight to be free."* If the Cuban people want freedom, it's up to them to take it. If they don't take it, it's their loss.

But it is certainly proper to note that economic sanctions are worse than war, especially war on the small scale that it would take to forcibly remove Mr. Castro. And the reason they are worse is that they affect the little people more than the government, which takes what it wants from them at gunpoint anyway.  As I have said before, "Embargoes impoverish people. Regular people. Powerless people. They are leverage applied by strong states on weaker ones to make life so miserable in the latter that the people rise up and overthrow the government. But little people starve in the meantime**."

I am not arguing that we as individuals have a moral obligation to trade with anyone, just like I don't argue that moonbat has a moral obligation to shop at WalMart. But when we make it a national policy to impoverish another nation, we must accept some responsibility for the suffering that our policy, enforced by gunboats, inflicts.

Obama needs to go one step further: it's time to unilaterally lift the embargo on Cuba. It would be a testament to human stubbornness and stupidity if it outlived Mr. Castro, as it has outlived 10 US presidents who hoped that it might accomplish something worthwhile.

* See? You don't have to live like a refugee.
** and I suffer from an acute lack of Cuban cigars.

Unfair but reasonable

Dean Obeidallah asks a tough question:

Shortly afterward, the media reported that a 22-year-old male had been arrested in the shooting. His name had not yet been released. I believe your reaction to that piece of news depended greatly on your status in American society -- namely, whether you're a Muslim.

If you are a typical white person, I would imagine your initial response was relief the suspect was caught, and an attempt to make sense of why he committed this horrible crime.

But if you are Muslim or of Arab heritage, your reaction to the news of the arrest was likely: "Please don't let him be Arab ... please don't let him be Muslim." Believe me, that was my reaction...

But let's be brutally honest. If the suspect's name wasn't Jared but was Jamil or Mahmud instead, America's reaction might have been different. What if a Muslim-American had made anti-government statements and shot a U.S. congresswoman at a political event?

I'm going to agree with Mr. Obeidallah that it's probably unfair that America's reaction might have been different*. But it's not because America has something against Muslims just because they're different or new or shiny. To illustrate, let's dial the clock back a couple decades to a time when the lily white Irish Republican Army was blowing up a lot of Brits.  If some Irish-born American had shot a politician while screaming Irish Nationalist slogans, would it not be reasonable to tentatively conclude that he was a terrorist?

In other words, it's not the color of his skin but what's happening in the rest of the world that first guesses are based on. Organized white people are not right now blowing up markets and assassinating politicians for political purposes**.  They have in the past, and it was called terrorism then.  They will again, and it will be called terrorism again.

There's a reason that "Christian Terrorism" never really stuck with Eric Rudolph except among those with a political axe to grind: it was obvious that the world was not in the midst of a lot of Christians who thought that blowing people up was the best way to advance their political or religious goals.

With all due respect to Mr. Obeidallah, that is not the case today with Muslims.

* Well, some of America's reaction. The NY Times would still have tried to blame Sarah Palin.
** outside of governments, that is.

Another for Bethie

Dust in the wind

Nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky:

Three Republican cardinals on the House Appropriations Committee say they view the ban on earmarks as temporary and that lawmakers should retain the right to direct spending to their districts.

None of the three spending-subcommittee chairmen have a specific timeframe or plan in mind to resume earmarks, but they said earmarking should be restored once the public has more confidence in the process.

Yes, as soon as the public has confidence in the new process, change it back to the old crooked one and hope they don't notice. Combine this with the fact that the non-tea party wing of the GOP has knitted a loophole into the House rules that makes it easy for money that is 'saved' in one place to merely be shifted elsewhere - most likely to an Appropriation Committee member's district - and it is becoming inarguable that the new more conservative house GOP is a whole lot like the old more conservative house GOP.

UPDATE: That said, I have officially retired the Brownback Weasel(tm). It seems only fair, given that our new Republican governor is cutting $750 million from the state budget next year and eliminating 2,000 state jobs. Granted, the jobs are already empty and the $750 million is from budgeted and not actual amounts - meaning that state spending will be less than last year, but not $750m less. And I'm not a big fan of his 'public/private partnerships' or state investments in 6th Century Persian energy technology*. But still, 10% off the state budget is a really, really good start. And in Kansas, new more conservative house GOP really is more conservative than the old more conservative house GOP, which ought to keep that from crawling back up in the Appropriations Committee. I hope**.

UPDATE the SECOND: and tossing phasing out the Kansas Arts Commission.  I gotta say it was a good day. 

* known today as 'windmills.'
** P.T. Barnum would have a field day with me, I suspect.

A voice of uncommon sense

It's not often I agree with something I read on CNN, but James Fox hits the mark:

Over the past three decades, on average, about 20 mass shootings -- with at least four slain victims -- have occurred annually in the United States, claiming nearly 100 lives each year.

Without minimizing the pain and suffering of these victims and their families, the risk of this type of crime is significantly less than a wide array of other catastrophes that we confront every day.

That's 100 victims a year in a nation of 300 million people, and about one-seventh of the number of bicyclists who are killed by motorists every year. Now obviously, nothing can minimize the pain of the families involved - whether your mom or daughter is killed by a car or a gun or a fall on the ice, she is just as dead and it hurts just as bad. When a family member or a friend bemoans the loss of a loved one, you listen respectfully, offer what you can to help, and say a little prayer that somehow their pain might be eased.

But it does neither them nor America any good to sensationalize mass shootings, and it shows an incredible lack of perspective to run continuous news 'specials' where people who are not involved and have no facts talk about how we must restructure the nation to meet a threat that kills less than half the of the number of toddlers who drown annually. This is why no one should take seriously those who are so loudly decrying the existence of guns or Sarah Palin after the Arizona shooting unless they are twice as loud about decrying the existence of plastic buckets*. Within an hour of the shooting a whole army of gleeful ghouls were pinning the blame, based on nothing but their own private fantasies, and by some strange coincidence that blame belonged to exactly the same people that they blame for everything else.

The National Tragedy of the Week(™) is to many just a chance to preen in front of the cameras and their friends and to say how their political opponents are the kind of people who kill children. And if there is one thing sicker than a little girl's brains all over the sidewalk, it's a sanctimonious liberal dancing in them.

* Nor should they engage in ritual denunciations, for aforementioned reasons.

Questioning their own patriotism

I've mentioned before that if someone is complaining that their patriotism is being questioned, that person is guaranteed to be a Democrat, and most likely, a liberal*. Mike Dukakis complained about it incessantly, John Kerry complained about it, and what is of interest is that both pointed to their record of service in uniform to prove that the patriotism in question actually existed.

As John Kerry noted: "I fought under that flag and I saw that flag draped over the coffins of friends... I'm tired of Karl Rove and Dick Cheney and a bunch of people who went out of their way to avoid the chance to serve when they had the chance," he said. Don't question John Kerry's patriotism, he's got the medals to back it up.

But while still searching desperately for a way to pin the Arizona shooting on Sarah Palin, a bunch of liberals were forced to admit:

[Loughner's] political beliefs are also uncertain. One woman who claimed she knew Loughner as a teenager described him as a liberal, but Loughner more recently attempted to join the military, and was rejected for undisclosed reasons.

Someone described Loughner as a liberal, but he tried to join the military - that fact is apparently now sufficient proof to liberals that you are not a liberal**. But John Kerry says that it is military service which is the final proof of patriotism.

So who is questioning the liberals' patriotism now?

* conservatives don't care if liberals question their patriotism, because no one pays any more attention to what liberals say about patriotism than they do to what liberals say about religion.
** Or as a Scotsman might say, "No true liberal would serve in uniform."

A bizarro accusation

The Socialist Workers Party has a little problem with reform:

In what education historian Diane Ravitch calls the "dominant narrative" of education reform today, buzzwords like "accountability" and "choice" are used as window dressing for a concerted effort to impose corporate management techniques and market-style competition on the education system. Teachers unions and anyone else who dares to disagree with this agenda are invariably accused of being "against reform" and "for the status quo."

Let that sink in a bit. The dominant narrative in education reform is a change from the present central command techniques to corporate management techniques. The Socialist Workers Party has a problem with those who are against this reform being called "against reform," and with those are opposed to these proposed changes being called "for the status quo." What are you supposed to call it? A chocolate mocha? Seriously, that's what the words mean*.

But the funny thing is that the SWP is not going after Bill Gates or John Boehner or even el presidente pasado, they are going after Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is not exactly a right-wing fanatic, if you get my drift.  In fact, he used to work for the same teacher's union the SWP is criticizing him for criticizing. Rather than the attack being, in their words, allegations "straight from Bizarro World," it might just be that at least in this case, the mayor knows whereof he speaks.

* Of course, they have their own ideas for reform: more tax money, more finger-painting, and fewer tests. I'm all for the last two, so long as we agree to call the resulting 12 years of kindergarten, "12 years of kindergarten."

An old one for the Professor

(language warning*)

* I mean, it's Chris Rock after all.

Well, that's a relief

Experts find a cause for dead birds all over the ground*:

The Corps of Engineers office at Lake O' the Pines says they are not exactly sure why [dead birds on the road] happens, but it appears likely the birds are walking or roosting or flying on and around the bridge and many of them probably get hit and killed by motor vehicles.

Yes, I know it's only "probably," but I feel better anyway.

* I mean, besides the fact that dead birds can't fly**
** well, not for very long.

Blatantly stolen from Drudge

Quote of the Day

“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies. … Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.”
-- Barack Obama, while voting against raising the debt limit, March 20, 2006.

Give the President a Harumph!

We've got to protect our phony-baloney jobs, gentlemen:

Austan Goolsbee, chairman of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers, said if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, the “impact on the economy would be catastrophic.”

“I don’t see why anybody’s playing chicken with the debt ceiling,” Goolsbee said today on ABC’s “This Week” program. “If we get to the point where we damage the full faith and credit of the United States, that would be the first default in history caused purely by insanity.”

Actually, a failure to up the credit limit would not be a default at all: refusing to borrow more money does not in any sense mean that what you borrowed in the past will not be paid back. Nor do you damage your own "full faith and credit" by refusing to go deeper in debt*. As is often the case when government officials make scary announcements, their claims are not just incorrect, they are exactly backward.

But like the last dozen times, it will get done, probably at the last minute and certainly with a new ceiling low enough that we'll have the same fight** next year. Promises will be made that next year we're going to do better, politicians of both parties will wring their hands and tut-tut each other for being big spenders, but in the end we'll all give the President a harumph and send him off with a bigger credit card.

Because the alternative is doing what everyone says they want to do. They just don't want to do it yet.

* In fact, it could be argued that not borrowing more money is the first step toward fiscal responsibility
** in the Pro Wrestling sense