Quote of the Day...

For the American public, AIG now stands for “arrogance, incompetence and greed,”
Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H.

At Least We're Not Iceland...

You thought America has it rough? Check out the situation in Iceland.

Global financial ambition turned out to have a downside. When their three brand-new global-size banks collapsed, last October, Iceland’s 300,000 citizens found that they bore some kind of responsibility for $100 billion of banking losses—which works out to roughly $330,000 for every Icelandic man, woman, and child. On top of that they had tens of billions of dollars in personal losses from their own bizarre private foreign-currency speculations, and even more from the 85 percent collapse in the Icelandic stock market. The exact dollar amount of Iceland’s financial hole was essentially unknowable, as it depended on the value of the generally stable Icelandic krona, which had also crashed and was removed from the market by the Icelandic government. But it was a lot.

Political Name Calling...

Paul Krugman lays the smack down on Jindal's response (and I use that term loosely) to Obama's non-State of the Union address to Congress.

And leaving aside the chutzpah of casting the failure of his own party’s governance as proof that government can’t work, does he really think that the response to natural disasters like Katrina is best undertaken by uncoordinated private action? Hey, why bother having an army? Let’s just rely on self-defense by armed citizens.

The intellectual incoherence is stunning. Basically, the political philosophy of the GOP right now seems to consist of snickering at stuff that they think sounds funny. The party of ideas has become the party of Beavis and Butthead.

Banking on the Brink...

Why on Earth didn't we get Paul Krugman somewhere in this new change and hope administration? The more I hear coming out of the Department of the Treasury, the more it sounds like the same crap I heard when Bush was in office, a.k.a. government hand outs to corporations with nothing in return for the tax payers. If that's the way it's going to be, I'd rather they just fail. I might not agree with everything Krugman says but at least he says it in a clear manner that people can understand. We can't fix this problem by doing the same things we've been doing or by being polite. These are drastic times, they require drastic measures. Stop hesitating and rip the bandaid off already.

Stimulus...

Wonder where the latest 800 billion in tax payer money is going? Check it out. Here are the highlights:

AID TO POOR AND UNEMPLOYED

_ $40 billion to provide extended unemployment benefits through Dec. 31, and increase them by $25 a week; $20 billion to increase food stamp benefits by 14 percent; $3 billion in temporary welfare payments.

DIRECT CASH PAYMENTS

_ $14 billion to give one-time $250 payments to Social Security recipients, poor people on Supplemental Security Income, and veterans receiving disability and pensions.

INFRASTRUCTURE

_ $46 billion for transportation projects, including $27 billion for highway and bridge construction and repair; $8.4 billion for mass transit; $8 billion for construction of high-speed railways and $1.3 billion for Amtrak; $4.6 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers; $4 billion for public housing improvements; $6.4 billion for clean and drinking water projects; $7 billion to bring broadband Internet service to underserved areas.

HEALTH CARE

_ $21 billion to provide a 60 percent subsidy of health care insurance premiums for the unemployed under the COBRA program; $87 billion to help states with Medicaid; $19 billion to modernize health information technology systems; $10 billion for health research and construction of National Institutes of Health facilities.

STATE BLOCK GRANTS

_ $8 billion in aid to states to defray budget cuts.

ENERGY

_ About $50 billion for energy programs, focused chiefly on efficiency and renewable energy, including $5 billion to weatherize modest-income homes; $6.4 billion to clean up nuclear weapons production sites; $11 billion toward a so-called "smart electricity grid" to reduce waste; $13.9 billion to subsidize loans for renewable energy projects; $6.3 billion in state energy efficiency and clean energy grants; and $4.5 billion make federal buildings more energy efficient.

EDUCATION

_ $47 billion in state fiscal relief to prevent cuts in state aid to school districts, with great flexibility to use the funds for school modernization and repair; $26 billion to school districts to fund special education and the No Child Left Behind law for students in K-12; $17 billion to boost the maximum Pell Grant by $500 to $5,350; $2 billion for Head Start.

HOMELAND SECURITY

_ $2.8 billion for homeland security programs, including $1 billion for airport screening equipment.

LAW ENFORCEMENT

_ $4 billion in grants to state and local law enforcement to hire officers and purchase equipment.

___

Taxes

NEW TAX CREDIT

_ Approximately $115 billion for a $400 per-worker, $800 per-couple tax credits in 2009 and 2010. For the last half of 2009, workers could expect to see perhaps $13 a week less withheld from their paychecks starting around June. Millions of Americans who don't make enough money to pay federal income taxes could file returns next year and receive checks. Individuals making more than $75,000 and couples making more than $150,000 would receive reduced amounts.

ALTERNATIVE MINIMUM TAX

_ About $70 billion to spare about 24 million taxpayers from being hit with the alternative minimum tax in 2009. The change would save a family of four an average of $2,300. The tax was designed to make sure wealthy taxpayers can't use credits and deductions to avoid paying any taxes. But it was never indexed to inflation, so families making as little as $45,000 could get significant increases without the change. Congress addresses it each year, usually in the fall.

EXPANDED COLLEGE CREDIT

_ About $13 billion to provide a $2,500 expanded tax credit for college tuition and related expenses for 2009 and 2010. The credit is phased out for couples making more than $160,000.

HOMEBUYER CREDIT

_ $3.7 billion to repeal a requirement that a $8,000 first-time home buyer tax credit be paid back over time for homes purchased from Jan. 1 to August 31, unless the home is sold within three years.

BONUS DEPRECIATION

_ $5 billion to extend a provision allowing businesses buying equipment such as computers to speed up its depreciation through 2009.

AUTO SALES

_ $2.5 billion to makes sales tax on paid on new car purchases tax deductible.

File This Under: Badass...

If you think dinosaurs are cool (which all nerds are required to), then this prehistoric snake is definitely badass.

Fossils from northeastern Colombia reveal the biggest snake ever discovered: a behemoth that stretched 42 to 45 feet long, reaching more than 2,500 pounds.

"This thing weighs more than a bison and is longer than a city bus," enthused snake expert Jack Conrad of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, who was familiar with the find.

Just Go Away Already...

We don't have to put up with this crap after they leave office. They failed, miserably. Their opinions are worthless as far as I am concerned.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney warned that there is a “high probability” that terrorists will attempt a catastrophic nuclear or biological attack in coming years, and said he fears the Obama administration’s policies will make it more likely the attempt will succeed.

In an interview Tuesday with Politico, Cheney unyieldingly defended the Bush administration’s support for the Guantanamo Bay prison and coercive interrogation of terrorism suspects.

Bailout Failure...

Like I didn't see this coming. Definitely doesn't inspire confidence in our government. I knew it would have been better to just let those greedy wallstreet banks fail. We don't need them. We gave them a ton of our hard earned money and instead of fixing the economy, they just spread it out amongst themselves as a reward for failure. These people live on a different planet.

Why Rush Sucks...

He says he hopes Obama fails. He knows that if Obama fails, this nightmare economic situation we're in will get even worse for everyday Americans and he just doesn't care as long as his side gets back into power. Don't believe me? Hear it for yourself. God he sucks.

China Goes Universal...

If a country like China with 1.3 billion, with a B, people launches a plan to have universal healthcare by 2011, it just shows how truly behind the times we are as a country compared to the rest of the world.

The Things We Do...

To each other sometimes defy belief. I mean seriously.

Finally...

President Obama's Inaugural Address:

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Trust Issues...

Like many I use customer reviews to help me make an informed purchase. Turns out, those reviews aren't always so trustworthy. Seems Belkin has been paying people to write 5 star reviews for them on Amazon and they got caught doing so. Ouch.

Best Blogs of 2008

The 2008 Weblog Award Winners. Nice to see a few of the blogs I frequent, some on a daily basis, made the cut.

Edit: If the best travel blog doesn't make you want to quit your job, travel the world and indulge in the cuisine and culture of other countries, something is wrong with you.

Bye Gones...

Paul Krugman doesn't think the incoming administration should just forgive and forget all the past indiscretions of the outgoing one. If no one is above the law, then those who break it must be prosecuted. There's no room for ambiguity.

I’m sorry, but if we don’t have an inquest into what happened during the Bush years — and nearly everyone has taken Mr. Obama’s remarks to mean that we won’t — this means that those who hold power are indeed above the law because they don’t face any consequences if they abuse their power.

Water Landing...

In case you've been living under a rock, a jetliner blew one of its engines yesterday and had to make an insane water landing on the Hudson River. I guess those safety guides actually are worth something. Who'd a thunk it? I'll inform Tyler Durden.

The End of Print Media?

At least one newspaper of note, isn't going down without a fight.

... something hopeful has been going on: a kind of evolution. Each day, peculiar wings and gills poke up on the Times’ website—video, audio, “drillable” graphics. Beneath Nicholas Kristof’s op-ed column, there’s a link to his blog, Twitter feed, Facebook page, and YouTube videos. Coverage of Gaza features a time line linking to earlier reporting, video coverage, and an encyclopedic entry on Hamas. Throughout the election, glittering interactive maps let readers plumb voting results. There were 360-degree panoramas of the Democratic convention; audio “back story” with reporters like Adam Nagourney; searchable video of the debates. It was a radical reinvention of the Times voice, shattering the omniscient God-tones in which the paper had always grounded its coverage; the new features tugged the reader closer through comments and interactivity, rendering the relationship between reporter and audience more intimate, immediate, exposed.

Working As Intended...

For all my cynicism towards government and politics, a case in which the more you know the more depressing it becomes, there are moments of optimism and amazement that it sometimes actually works as intended. Our new 111th Congress is pushing forward this week with an expansion of SCHIP, the health insurance bill for families with children that Bush famously vetoed twice bending to special interests in the insurance lobby over bipartisan support in Congress. While the vote may happen while Bush is still president, the bill wouldn't actually get to the White House until after Obama takes office. Times they are a changing.

Audience Atomization Overcome...

Recently I've been watching a lot of future technology shows on the Science Channel centered around either eco-technology or human enhancement technology. It's scary and exciting to think how our world and even ourselves will change in the next ten or twenty years. As someone who was around for the birth of things like the answering machine, the ATM, the web, the cellphone, and the laptop, things that are so prevalent in our lives today they have become indispensable and and at the same time invisible, I know that technology is expanding at an exponential rate. Its ability to affect our lives and our society is almost immeasurable. Given that, it's easy to forget that it is affecting other things besides adding more convenience to our lives.

Technology has been for quite some time, also changing how we connect and relate to each other. Most people are familiar with social networking sites like Myspace, Facebook, and even Blogger, the site driving this website. But it also shaking the foundation of other more unconscious relationships such as the one between us (the audience) and mass media. Jay Rosen over at PressThink explains it in detail. An interesting read for those who are interested in such things (like me).

Now we can see why blogging and the Net matter so greatly in political journalism. In the age of mass media, the press was able to define the sphere of legitimate debate with relative ease because the people on the receiving end were atomized— meaning they were connected “up” to Big Media but not across to each other. But today one of the biggest factors changing our world is the falling cost for like-minded people to locate each other, share information, trade impressions and realize their number. Among the first things they may do is establish that the “sphere of legitimate debate” as defined by journalists doesn’t match up with their own definition.

Best Job in the World...

The Australians, in a move to promote tourism, might have just created the one of the best jobs in the world. Check it out and know envy, or better yet, apply!

Government Isn't the Problem

For the full video, check out MSBNC.

Public Transportation, Public Execution?

Gordon sent me this. Turns out there was a fatal shooting of a civilian by a BART officer in Oakland on New Years Eve. The problem was the victim was at the time of the shooting, laying prone on the ground with his hands behind his back with the cop standing over him. To compound issue the entire incident was video taped from numerous angles by bystanders standing on the platform as the confrontation unfolded. That video has since propagated through cyberspace and taken on a life of it's own. The officer in question has since resigned rather than to talk to the press about the incident. And now we have riots. Great way to start off the new year bay area.

People's Choice? Not Quite...

The news isn't that the People's Choice Awards is a corporate-sponsored, focus-group marketed sham, but that someone actually wrote about it.

Even as mindless distraction, this awards show was a failure. There was no suspense; every category could be easily predicted by remembering who you'd already spotted in the audience. Would the "Favorite Rock Song" be "All Summer Long" by Kid Rock, or those other two thingies performed by people who were not currently located inside the Shrine Auditorium? To quote "winner" Rock: What a surprise. Chris Brown accepted his "Favorite Combined Forces" award (for "No Air" with Jordin Sparks) "live via satellite" from Dublin, Ireland -- where by my calculations it would have been approximately 3:30 in the morning.

Burn? LOL.

Cooking the Books...

It's good to know that America doesn't have a monopoly on financial fraud. Way to go India!

Sign of the Times...

You know things are rough when the rich start killing themselves. I mean this guy was the 94th richest guy on the planet.

"The desperate situation of his companies caused by the financial crisis, the uncertainties of the last few weeks and his powerlessness to act, have broken the passionate family entrepreneur and he took his own life," a family statement said.

Russian Prof. Predicts End of U.S.

I'm not kidding. Check it out.

Mr. Panarin posits, in brief, that mass immigration, economic decline, and moral degradation will trigger a civil war next fall and the collapse of the dollar. Around the end of June 2010, or early July, he says, the U.S. will break into six pieces -- with Alaska reverting to Russian control.

And... you lost me. The Russians are seriously still that hung up over Alaska. Suck it up, you lost it fair and square.

In case you're interested, here's a map:

Three-Ring Circus...

There are many who find politics boring. I just don't get that. Every time I go to the grocery story and stand in line at the check out, I see racks of magazines about celebrities and their personal lives. I guess I just don't care if some actress is dating some other actor that much. I mean I guess it's good to know as a conversation piece but it doesn't really register with me as vital. But politics is probably crazier than any Hollywood love triangle and unlike the stories in the tabloids, usually has a direct impact on our lives.

Take this whole crazy situation in Illinois, you know, the home state of our new president-elect. The governor there is under investigation by the FBI for trying to sell Barack Obama's senate seat. He denies it of course but they have him on tape basically saying it. I can't wait to see how his lawyers spin that in court. So the Illinois state legislature threatens to impeach Gov. Blagojevich, and he calls their bluff and just goes ahead and appoints Ronald Burris to fill Obama's vacant seat, which until he's impeach is within his power to do so. But since he's being charged with corruption directly pretaining to said seat, well things get a little sticky.

Which brings us to today, the day where Burris just showed up in D.C. trying to get sworn in and was promptly rejected by the leadership in his own party. Now personally I don't like Burris that much. He's obviously an opportunist, who at one point in this crazy fiasco called for the governor's impeachment and argued against any appointment, that is until he himself became that appointment. Now he think's its God's will. *rolls eyes* All this is a stupid distraction during a time we should be focused on the economy, not on a single senate seat. But if Americans are anything these days, we are easily distracted.

A Return to Science...

With T-minus 15 days until President-elect Obama is scheduled to take office, there has been a flood of how things are going to be different now articles. One addresses a problem near and dear to me, namely the frightening trend of American anti-intellectualism over the last decade or what Thomas Friedman calls the dumb as we want to be mentality, where ignorance and apathy are not only tolerated but indeed celebrated over knowledge and curiosity.

... under the Bush administration, the scientific community has been through some dark days, to say the least. And it hasn't been a simple case of diminishing funding, as is so often the issue in the realm of governmental research. No, Teich says, Obama's remarks at Chu's appointment spoke directly to the problem.

Not many people realize that this attitude has become so pervasive that a literal war on science has been raging in this country, where politics have overridden science for the last 8 years. Hopefully Chu's appointment is just the first in what will become many of counter-offensives in this battle.

Reading Profile...

One good thing about coming back into work is I'm reading the columns again. For some reason I can't find the motivation to read, or blog much for that matter, at home. I've always preferred to do it on the go, in the moment as it were, or from work where I do the majority of my current events reading (and thinking I suppose).

Anyway, on to the point of this post, it turns out that Karl Rove wrote a WSJ column about how many books Bush, who famously doesn't read newspapers (or security briefings warning about impending attacks), has read during the course of his presidency. However, Richard Cohen of the Washington Post isn't impressed.

As might be expected, most of Bush's books have been biographies and histories. Biographies are usually about great men who often did the unpopular thing and were later vindicated. As for histories, they are replete with cautionary tales. That might explain how the 1961 classic, Hugh Thomas's "The Spanish Civil War," made it onto this year's presidential reading list. Had Hitler (and Mussolini) been stopped in Spain, much misery would have been avoided. Substitute Iraq for Spain and you have, for the president, some reassuring bedtime reading.

Burn? I think so. I read anywhere on the order of 20-25 books a year. In my hay days I read a book a week. I can read a "classic" in a sitting. And a 400 page book is like a teaser. A real book starts after 600 pages. I wonder if our reading lists give an insightful view into our personalities. Considering I read nothing but political commentary, historical fiction, and science-fiction/fantasy, I wonder what mine says about me.

Blow to the Ego...

So a 9-year old Indian girl is now Microsoft Certified. Feel bad about your self if you don't even understand Windows.

Below the Fold...

Tom Friedman cries about how much America's infrastructure sucks and how instead of investing in invention and engineering new technologies and products, we invested in creating more and more creative financial schemes. And we all know how that story ended.

My fellow Americans, we can’t continue in this mode of “Dumb as we wanna be.” We’ve indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can’t afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating and immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world’s best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.

To top it off, we’ve fallen into a trend of diverting and rewarding the best of our collective I.Q. to people doing financial engineering rather than real engineering. These rocket scientists and engineers were designing complex financial instruments to make money out of money — rather than designing cars, phones, computers, teaching tools, Internet programs and medical equipment that could improve the lives and productivity of millions.

I think though the problem is not only where we emphasized our efforts, and one could make some pretty effective arguments against the amount of IQ actually on Wall Street considering our current financial woes, it's that intelligence and discourse have actually become things to be reviled in America. If you're too smart, you're an elitist. Heard that before? Yes, we should feel bad about actually be curious about the outside world and taking the time to actually learn a thing or two about it, like say where other countries are on a map. Here's to hoping the country takes a drastic course correction on Jan. 20th.

I, Nanny...

Yesterday I wrote about Ergo Proxy, an anime I had recently finished watching. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic world where humans live in bio-domes, are cloned in artificial wombs, and depend on artificial intelligent machines (androids) for many basic, day-to-day functions. Well it turns out that at least one part of that story might not be so sci-fi after all. In a Wired article, I just discovered that robot nannies are now available.

Models now on the market range from the Hello Kitty robot — "perfect ... for whoever does not have a lot time to stay with child," proclaims a vendor — to NEC's PaPeRo, which tells jokes, gives quizzes and uses radio-frequency identification chips to track kids. In another generation, these sophisticated machines will likely seem quaint.

Personal service robots are more common than industrial robots — an estimated 5.8 million are now in use, five times more than in industry — and people are happy to use them for tasks once fulfilled by people. One survey of public attitude towards robots found that many people were willing to to use them as babysitters — more people, in fact, than would use robots as priests or massage therapists.

Of course, while the technology is definitely cool, it does raise a lot of interesting ethical questions we'll eventually have to tackle as robots get more advanced and more prevalent in our daily lives. Man, these are crazy times we live in.

How We Got Here...

A long read but an interesting one for those interested in at least one view point on how we, as a country, got to where we are. No surprise really who the NYT chooses to blame for our current economic woes:

For much of the Bush presidency, the White House was preoccupied by terrorism and war; on the economic front, its pressing concerns were cutting taxes and privatizing Social Security. The housing market was a bright spot: ever-rising home values kept the economy humming, as owners drew down on their equity to buy consumer goods and pack their children off to college.

Lawrence B. Lindsey, Mr. Bush’s first chief economics adviser, said there was little impetus to raise alarms about the proliferation of easy credit that was helping Mr. Bush meet housing goals.

“No one wanted to stop that bubble,” Mr. Lindsey said. “It would have conflicted with the president’s own policies.”