Tom Faranda's Folly

Predictions for Florida primary

UPDATE: Wow, a "landslide" to quote Drudge. Romney with close to half the vote in a four man race.

This is pretty easy, with the polls closing in three hours.

1. Romney
2. Gingrich
3. Santorum
4. Ron Paul

No housing price rebound

Your Dreams Of A Housing Rebound Just Got Smashed

Hit the link above fro the chart

...the Case-Shiller Home Price Index, came out this morning, and it will dash the hopes of people who think we're on the cusp of a rebound.

After a little blip upwards, prices resumed their downward slide in November.

 

Washington Post: The most polarizing President - ever - & a response

UPDATE: Democrats jump swiftly to the President's defense; go here - It's all the Republicans fault

You know who. But as the article below says, it isn't just Obama's fault.

Obama: The most polarizing president. Ever.

For 2011, Obama’s third year in office, an average of 80 percent of Democrats approved of the job he was doing in Gallup tracking polls, as compared to 12 percent of Republicans who felt the same way. That’s a 68-point partisan gap, the highest for any president’s third year in office — ever. (The previous high was George W. Bush in 2007, when he had a 59 percent difference in job approval ratings.)

In 2010, the partisan gap between how Obama was viewed by Democrats versus Republicans stood at 68 percent; in 2009, it was 65 percent. Both were the highest marks ever for a president’s second and first years in office, respectively.

What do those numbers tell us? Put simply: that the country is hardening along more and more strict partisan lines.

******

“Obama’s ratings have been consistently among the most polarized for a president in the last 60 years,” concludes Gallup’s Jeffrey Jones in a memo summing up the results. “That may not be a reflection on Obama himself as much as on the current political environment in the United States, because Obama’s immediate predecessor, Bush, had similarly polarized ratings, particularly in the latter stages of his presidency after the rally in support from the 9/11 terror attacks faded.”

Our guess is that Jones’ latter hypothesis is the right one — that we are simply living in an era in which Democrats dislike a Republican president (and Republicans dislike a Democratic one) even before the commander in chief has taken a single official action.

Of course I disapprove of Obama - but not because he's a Democrat. I disagree on policy. on virtually every social issue, and economic issue, he's simply wrong. On foreign policy he's turned out to be better then I expected - I expected him to be disaster, and he hasn't been.

 

Tim Tebow's Role Model

From the Wall Street Journal House's of Worship column a couple of weeks ago. Hit the link for the whole article.

In Danny Wuerffel, the star quarterback had an example of both religious and athletic devotion.

Have you heard about the quarterback who won the Heisman trophy and led his University of Florida Gators to a national championship? The multisport athlete, Florida's USA Today Football Player of the Year as a high-schooler? The son of a pastor who always put his faith before football, even while playing in the National Football League?

Of course we're talking about Danny Wuerffel, who has served as a powerful role model for a certain Denver Broncos quarterback currently making news.

Mr. Wuerffel and Tim Tebow didn't know each other well growing up 13 years apart, but Mr. Tebow's parents made it a point to introduce the two more than a decade ago, while Mr. Wuerffel was still playing at Florida. Both players' families understood that football provided a platform that could be used to talk about the most important thing in their life—their faith.

******

After his tenure with the Saints, Mr. Wuerffel played for the Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears and Washington Redskins. When the Redskins looked to re-sign him in 2003, he walked away. He and his wife, Jessica, found God calling them back to the Ninth Ward and into full-time ministry with Desire Street.

They say they were inspired by a passage from the book of Isaiah: "Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings." The Wuerffels felt this would be better accomplished through full-time ministry with underprivileged youth in New Orleans than by signing a million-dollar contract to play football.

One minute video: Doorbell rings - "Hi, I'm from the government..."

Very amusing; sent to me by my friend Bob W., who writes, "this puts it all in perspective"

 

Blackberry: Trying to avoid the Hall of Fallen Gadgets

An interesting article in the NY Times yesterday, as RIM (maker of the Blackberry line) tries to recover. They are down to 10% market share for smartphones.

The list of fallen gadgets includes, Walkman, Palm, Atari, etc.

FULL DISCLOSURE: I still use a Palm Z22 personal planner, since it can be backed up on my microsoft oulook program, including the notes. (Very inportant to me, I want the notes as well as calendar and contacts backed up.) But, android phones allow for an app that will do the same, so the Z22 will soon be retired to the back of a desk drawer.

Anyway, here's the article -

The BlackBerry, Trying to Avoid the Hall of Fallen Giants

Nice WSJ editorial on the SEAL hostage rescue

Saving Jessica Buchanan

Talking after Church with my friend Ceil about working out ...

Ceil was saying how one of her friends who is a trainer, thinks Ceil should get off using machines and more into bodyweight (like pushups) workouts. Ceil is VERY fit, but this is NOT her - and it certainly isn't me either.

 

Two teenagers on $400 budget space launch a lego man (see the pix!) 14 miles

Ha! Neat.

Lego Man launched 14 miles into sky by Toronto boys, capturing amazing images of Earth and space

 

Almost funny: the President mentions an energy company in his SOTU speech and it immediately files for bankruptcy

Almost, but not quite funny. The Midas touch?

President Obama Mentions An Energy Company In His Big Speech And It Goes Bankrupt Instantly

Andrew Restuccia of The Hill is reporting that Ener1, a battery company that President Obama referenced in his State of The Union Speech on Tuesday as an example of successful energy investments, has just filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. 

That's just two days after the speech.

“In three years, our partnership with the private sector has already positioned America to be the world’s leading manufacturer of high-tech batteries,” Obama said in his speech. 

According to Phil Milford and Dawn McCarty at Businessweek, Ener1 had received a $118 million U.S. Energy Department grant to make electric-car batteries. And the grant received bi-partisan support, so it is not entirely on Obama's shoulders.

Global Warming update: WSJ op ed signed by 16 scientists

More and more, the BS balloon is being deflated -

Why is there so much passion about global warming, and why has the issue become so vexing that the American Physical Society, from which Dr. Giaever resigned a few months ago, refused the seemingly reasonable request by many of its members to remove the word "incontrovertible" from its description of a scientific issue? There are several reasons, but a good place to start is the old question "cui bono?" Or the modern update, "Follow the money."

Alarmism over climate is of great benefit to many, providing government funding for academic research and a reason for government bureaucracies to grow. Alarmism also offers an excuse for governments to raise taxes, taxpayer-funded subsidies for businesses that understand how to work the political system, and a lure for big donations to charitable foundations promising to save the planet. Lysenko and his team lived very well, and they fiercely defended their dogma and the privileges it brought them.

Speaking for many scientists and engineers who have looked carefully and independently at the science of climate, we have a message to any candidate for public office: There is no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to "decarbonize" the world's economy. Even if one accepts the inflated climate forecasts of the IPCC, aggressive greenhouse-gas control policies are not justified economically.

A pretty comprehensive article, if you hit the link. The 16 signors are at the end of the article.

2011 growth in GDP was less then 2010 growth. Obamanomics.

2010: 3%. Not very good coming out of a recession.

2011: 1.7% Pitiful

From Business Insider

1.7%

 

Pentagon to send a "mothership"? to the Middle East

Special forces base.

Navy wants commando ‘mothership’ in Middle East

The Pentagon is rushing to send a large floating base for commando teams to the Middle East as tensions rise with Iran, al-Qaeda in Yemen and Somali pirates, among other threats.

In response to requests from the U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, the Navy is converting an aging warship it had planned to decommission into a makeshift staging base for the commandos. Unofficially dubbed a “mothership,” the floating base could accommodate smaller high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEALs, procurement documents show.

******

With a large naval base in Bahrain, and one or two aircraft carrier groups usually assigned to the region, the Navy already has a substantial presence in the Persian Gulf and surrounding waters. Adding the mothership ship would do relatively little to bolster U.S. maritime power overall, but it could play an instrumental role in secretive commando missions offshore.

The ship is the Ponce, and it's 41 years old.

 

Jeopardy: Who is Rachel Maddow

The MSNBC evening host of "The Rachel Maddow Show". And she has the network's best ratings!

Participants on the game show Jeopardy were shown a picture of MSNBC host Rachel Maddow and asked to identify her. All three contestants sat in silence until the buzzer.

Great video: "Touched by a wild mountain gorilla" - been viewed almost 2 million times

Cool (didn't need the music) and fascinating. Gets better and better as it goes along

Sent to us by an Aussie connection, Brigid's niece June.

Thanks June!

 

Illinois raised state income taxes in 2011; Illinois had the biggest increase in unemployment in the Country in 2011

The worst unemployment record in the country last year.

Almost a year after Illinois’ record income tax increase, the state’s unemployment woes contrast starkly with the slow but positive national economic recovery. Unemployment rates in 46 states dropped since January 2011, and some dramatically. Illinois’ unemployment rate, on the other hand, was 9.8 percent in December, up from 9 percent in January 2011. Simply put, Illinois placed more people on the unemployment rolls than any other state in the country.

Warren Buffett's secretary (poor thing) makes between $200,000 & $500,000 a year

Here's an ABC puff piece about Buffett and his secretary, as they interview them together. ABC doesn't allow embedding of their videos

Warren Buffett, Secretary Debbie Bosanek Discuss Tax Rate Inequality in Interview

Here's an analysis in Forbes magazine about how much $$$ Bosanek makes -

Bosanek’s prominent role in Obama’s “fairness” campaign piqued my curiosity, and I imagine the curiosity of others. How much does her boss pay this downtrodden woman?

The IRS publishes detailed tax tables by income level. The latest results are for 2009. They show that taxpayers earning an adjusted gross income between $100,000 and $200,000 pay an average rate of twelve percent. This is below Buffet’s rate; so she must earn more than that. Taxpayers earning adjusted gross incomes of $200,000 to $500,000, pay an average tax rate of nineteen percent. Therefore Buffet must pay Debbie Bosanke a salary above two hundred thousand.

There's another factor - Bosanek has worked for Buffett for 19 years. How many shares of Berkshire Hathaway stock and stock options does she have? She's almost certainly a multi-millionaire.

WSJ editorial on the President: "The State of His Policies"

In the Journal opinion section, so the entire excellent piece (my opnion - Wall Street journal is hands down the best-written newspaper in the Country) is available to anyon hitting the link.

President Obama delivered a State of the Union address Tuesday night that by the account of his own advisers is more campaign document than a plan for governing. He's running against Republicans in Congress, Reaganomics, wealthy bankers and inequality.  

Perhaps this will work if Republicans nominate a standard-bearer who is damaged, or too cautious or guilty to challenge this politics of envy.

******

Meantime, as Mr. Obama begins his fourth year in power it's a good moment to recount the economic record that he'd rather not talk about.

******

As he runs for re-election, Mr. Obama is trying to campaign as an incumbent who is striving to help the economy but has been stymied at every turn by Congress. Not even MSNBC can believe this. For two years he had the largest Democratic majorities in Congress since the 1970s and achieved nearly everything he wanted.

The New Yorker magazine this week has posted on its website a 57-page memo that economic adviser Larry Summers wrote to Mr. Obama in December 2008. It lays out nearly his entire agenda for the "stimulus," reviving housing, the auto bailout and saving the financial industry. If anything, the memo overstates what would be needed to stabilize the financial panic, but nearly all of the stimulus spending priorities that the memo deemed "feasible" made it into law. They simply didn't work as promised.

******

Mr. Obama clearly has a spring in his step these days, figuring that the public hates Congress and thinks Republicans run it, that the GOP will field a weak presidential candidate, and that he can fool the public into believing only Mitt Romney's taxes will rise if Mr. Obama wins a second term. He has only one big obstacle: his record.

His record? Indeed.

The biggest BS line of the President's State of the Union Speech

Pointed out by Ann Althouse -

"I'm a Democrat, but I believe what Republican Abraham Lincoln believed: The government should do for people only what they cannot do better by themselves and no more."

Why watching "State of the Union" speeches is a waste

After a while, the speeches write themselves-

Haven't We Heard this Before?

 

Archbishop Dolan op ed in today's WSJ: "ObamaCare and Religious Freedom"

Sub-titled: "How about some respect for Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease?"

Hit the link for all 11 paragraphs - the last two are below -

The Catholic Church defends religious liberty, including freedom of conscience, for everyone. The Amish do not carry health insurance. The government respects their principles. Christian Scientists want to heal by prayer alone, and the new health-care reform law respects that. Quakers and others object to killing even in wartime, and the government respects that principle for conscientious objectors. By its decision, the Obama administration has failed to show the same respect for the consciences of Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease.

This latest erosion of our first freedom should make all Americans pause. When the government tampers with a freedom so fundamental to the life of our nation, one shudders to think what lies ahead.

Charitable donation update: Romney, 15% of income, Obama 1%, Gingrich, 2.6%, Biden $369.

The figures are here -

Obama Gave 1% to Charity, Romney Gave 15%

and here, from the UK paper the Daily Mail -

Mitt Romney gave millions to charity. Joe Biden gave $369.

OK, so Mormons are supposed to tithe 10 percent of their income. But it's to Romney's immense credit that he promised to do this in his youth and followed through with that - to the tune of scores of millions (maybe hundreds of millions) of dollars throughout his life.

In fact, in those two years, he paid 16 percent of his income to charity, compared to, er, 2.6 percent by Newt Gingrich.

And what about President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the run-up to their 2008 campaign?

USA Today broke it down here. In 2007, the Obamas gave more than $240,000 to charity, about 5.7 percent of their income. The Bidens gave an average of $369 to charity a year for the decade before he moved to the Naval Observatory - about 0.3 percent of their income. Back in 1997, then veep Al Gore and his then wife Tipper gave $353.

Since becoming veep, Biden hasn't become much more generous. In 2010, he gave $5,350, about 1.4 percent of income. That same year, Romney gave some $3 million. The national average is about three percent.

The Giants overtime field goal, from the snapper and holder points of view.

Here's an interesting short piece on two-thirds of the unit needed to kick a field goal (the third part - the kicker, of course).

If you saw the end of the game (Giants-Niners) you know the snap of the wet ball on the wet field was not perfect. And in 2003, the Giants lost to the 49ers in the NFC championship game because of a bad snap.

“I don’t think we handled a dry ball all week,” Weatherford said Monday, explaining that he and DeOssie used several techniques in an attempt to simulate what they would face in a potential game-winning sequence. Although the Giants practiced indoors at their practice center in the days leading to the game, Weatherford said he and DeOssie had a large bucket of water with them that they used as a “holding tank” for their practice balls.

 

Nice article on Giants coach Tom Coughlin

IN the NYT -

Coughlin Goes by the Book, and Wins

Myth or reality: Shoveling snow raises the risk of a heart attack

Now that we've had our first fairly substantial snowfall, this is timely. Luckily for me, Brigid does most of the shovelling...

From the NYT's "Really?" health section -

Yes!

A statistically significant study, and the relationship between shovelling and heart attacks is probably under-reported.

 

The "preppers"; if you think things are falling apart, you're not alone

From Reuters -

I know a couple of people in this genre -

Subculture of Americans prepares for civilization's collapse

"Modern preppers are much different from the survivalists of the old days," he said. "You could be living next door to a prepper and never even know it. Many suburbanites are turning spare rooms into food pantries and are going for survival training on the weekends."

Like other preppers, Snider is worried about the end of a functioning U.S. economy. He points out that tens of millions of Americans are on food stamps and that many U.S. children are living in poverty.

"Most people have a gut feeling that something has gone terribly wrong, but that doesn't mean that they understand what is happening," he said. "A lot of Americans sense that a massive economic storm is coming and they want to be prepared for it."

Where would the Giants be without Eli Manning?

Good piece in the NY Times sports section today, as the Giants are headed to the Super Bowl and a re-match with New England.

Sunday’s rally was Manning’s seventh fourth-quarter comeback of the season and his eighth game-winning drive — staggering numbers that are emblematic of the Giants’ penchant for playing close games. Earlier in the year, especially, it seemed the Giants went down to the final series every week; several players even joked about the “cardiac” nature of the team’s play.

NY Daily News sides with Catholic Church against Administration forced mandates

 

No comments from other newspapers that I've seen; of course they're likely blind to the gravity of the Obama edict.

Obama administration is taking a wrong-headed line with the church

 

Church leaders, including New York’s Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, had lobbied vigorously to persuade Sebelius to grant an exemption from Obamacare’s uniform-care-for-all standard.

She went only so far as to grant nonprofit groups that do not provide contraceptive coverage because of religious views an additional year “to adapt to this new rule.” She is sadly mistaken to think a transition period compares in any significant way with timeless belief.

The secretary also contended that she had nicely threaded a needle by giving a pass to groups that have the primary purpose of inculcating religious values, primarily employ individuals who share those values and primarily serve people who share them as well.

That essentially covers the parish rectory. It leaves out Catholic schools, hospitals and social service organizations — the vast sweep of Catholic Charities — because they serve all comers who need help, regardless of faith.

Dolan, who serves as president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, was unstinting in saying the Obama administration had “drawn an unprecedented line in the sand” with the decision. An epic confrontation is in the offing.

Here's the last paragraph of the editorial.

While Obama’s one-year grace period will put off the day of reckoning until after the presidential election, it is already clear how events will play out. The Catholic Church will never submit to such an order and will move Earth and heaven to hold to beliefs that happen to be out of favor with a President of the United States.

 

Funny - the new Air Force One cloaking device

Air Force One of course, the president's plane.

From my friend Joe.

Look carefully. ...

Representative Giffords statement she's stepping down to work on her rehabilitation

My So. Carolina primary call; mostly right but lost my 100% record

If you go here My call on So. Carolina Primary today as I try and maintain 100% prediction record you'll see I had it Newt, then Romney, with Paul third, and Santorum finishing last.

Here are the actual results - slipped up on Ron Paul and Santorum finishes.

Results for South Carolina Republican Primary (U.S. Presidential Primary)

Jan 21, 2012 (100% of precincts reporting)

Newt Gingrich	243,398	40.4%
Mitt Romney	167,957	27.9%
Rick Santorum	102,213	17%
Ron Paul	78,093	13%
Rick Perry	2,549	0.4%
Other	8,223	1.4%

Washington Post's own Ombudsman says the Post too soft in it's Obama coverage

And of course he's right (HIs name is  Patrick B. Pexton). Could you imagine the NY Times Reader Editor (or whatever they call their ombudsman these days) writing this? The next day he'd be re-writing his resume.

The fact is, the Washington Post has much higher standards then the NYT.

Scrutinize President Obama’s record

Deborah Howell, Post ombudsman from 2005 through 2008, said at the end of her tenure that “some of the conservatives’ complaints about a liberal tilt [at The Post] are valid.”

I won’t quibble with her conclusion. I think she was right.

Hit the link for the whole piece.

My call on So. Carolina Primary today as I try and maintain 100% prediction record

As I bragged mentioned here on January 11th My 100% election predictions record still intact. I'm batting 1,000 on calling first, second and third place in Iowa and NH.

This is a more difficult call but here goes:

1) Newt

2) Romney

3) Ron Paul

Gingrich ekes out a victory and Paul just nips Santorum for third. Both those could easily be reversed when the dust settles.

The President's Administration launches a direct attack on Catholic - and other - Churches and conscience protection

I lifted this entire posting from here. Some of my friends will have to decide if they're Catholics, or Democratic Party loyalists.

UPDATE: Even the normally Democratic Party lap dog National Catholic Reporter (NCR) is outraged. NCR - UPDATED: White House refuses to expand conscience exemption

Mandates that contraceptives and abortifacients must be provided in employer health plans with no opt out for conscientious objection.

This is from the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops (USCCB)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                             JANUARY 20, 2012

 

U.S. BISHOPS VOW TO FIGHT HHS EDICT

 

Unconscionable to force citizens to buy contraceptives against their will

No change in limited exemption, only delay in enforcement

Matter of freedom of conscience, freedom of religion

 

WASHINGTON—The Catholic bishops of the United States called “literally unconscionable” a decision by the Obama Administration to continue to demand that sterilization, abortifacients  and contraception be included in virtually all health plans. Today's announcement means that this mandate and its very narrow exemption will not change at all; instead there will only be a delay in enforcement against some employers.

            “In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences,” said Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

            The cardinal-designate continued, “To force American citizens to choose between violating their consciences and forgoing their healthcare is literally unconscionable.  It is as much an attack on access to health care as on religious freedom. Historically this represents a challenge and a compromise of our religious liberty."

            The HHS rule requires that sterilization and contraception – including controversial abortifacients – be included among “preventive services” coverage in almost every healthcare plan available to Americans. “The government should not force Americans to act as if pregnancy is a disease to be prevented at all costs,” added Cardinal-designate Dolan.

            At issue, the U.S. bishops and other religious leaders insist, is the survival of a cornerstone constitutionally protected freedom that ensures respect for the conscience of Catholics and all other Americans.

            “This is nothing less than a direct attack on religion and First Amendment rights,” said Franciscan Sister Jane Marie Klein, chairperson of the board at Franciscan Alliance, Inc., a system of 13 Catholic hospitals. “I have hundreds of employees who will be upset and confused by this edict. I cannot understand it at all.”

            Daughter of Charity Sister Carol Keehan, president and chief executive officer of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, voiced disappointment with the decision. Catholic hospitals serve one out of six people who seek hospital care annually.

            “This was a missed opportunity to be clear on appropriate conscience protection,” Sister Keehan said.

            Cardinal-designate Dolan urged that the HHS mandate be overturned.

            “The Obama administration has now drawn an unprecedented line in the sand,” he said. “The Catholic bishops are committed to working with our fellow Americans to reform the law and change this unjust regulation. We will continue to study all the implications of this troubling decision.”

---

First Amendment, heath care, Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Freedom of Conscience, U.S. bishops, United States Conference of Catholic bishops, President Obama, Sister Carol Keehan

# # # # #

GM, in partnership with the American taxpayer, once again #1 top-selling carmaker in the world

And the fact that there was a Tsunami in Japan - that didn't help Toyota.

General Motors and its partners sold 9 million vehicles around the globe in 2011, the company announced Thursday, allowing it to reclaim the title of world’s top-selling automaker.

Even with GM’s sales success, however, the United States has still not been fully repaid the $50 billion it invested directly into the company to rescue it.

So far, GM has returned $23 billion, and the government still owns about one-third of the company’s common stock. For the government to recover its full $50 billion investment, its General Motors stock would have to rise to about $54 per share. It is currently selling for about $25.

This year’s GM sales results also underscore the growing importance of the Chinese market.

Of its 9 million in global sales, GM and its joint ventures sold a record 2,547,171 vehicles in China in 2011.

Even the Washington Post thinks cancelling the Keystone pipeline is dumb (but not the NYT!)

Here's the editorial - they hedge but finally say so ...

Obama’s Keystone pipeline rejection is hard to accept

Of course, the NY Times, faithful to the end, agrees with the President.

Insane. A Good Call on the Pipeline

Limbaugh on ABC's planned interview with Gingrich's ex

Here's a transcript from his radio show which was linked on the Drudge Report - Rush Limbaugh with his dry and sliiigghtly sarcastice sense of humor.

Drudge Screwed Up ABC's Plans for the Marianne Gingrich Interview

Well, follow me on this.  Newt Gingrich, aside from the budget deal in '95 and being made to ride in the back of Air Force One, Newt got along with Clinton pretty well, if you recall, and Newt treated Hillary with respect, even sat on the couch with Nancy Pelosi.  Now, there's an accusation out there that Newt wanted an open marriage, just like Bill and Hillary.  And, in fact, Newt even had the politeness to ask permission for it.  Do you think Bill ever did that?

Now, if Newt can hold onto enough of the Republican base, he might take 20% of the Democrat vote with this.  You know how this stuff is a resume enhancement in the Democrat Party.  I wouldn't make too many snap judgments here.  I don't understand why the media's pretending to be so upset about these charges coming from Marianne.  I mean, it's all about sex and how many times are we told that somebody's sex life, even if they're president, doesn't matter. It's nobody's business as long as it doesn't affect the job.

And Rush goes on ... you get the gist - hit the link for the whole thing.

Italy v. Europe - a cartoon!

Sent to me by my very Italian friend Antoinette.

Evidently nothing has changed in Italy since Brigid and I were there for over two weeks in 1981 - especially regarding traffic and bus stops!

 

Low I.Q. as a predictor of heart disease

A study from Britain, and they are very smart in Britain ...

In a new study, a low I.Q. score was a stronger predictor of heart disease than most traditional risk factors, second only to smoking. The study tracked 1,145 men and women in Scotland over 20 years, documenting I.Q., weight, education and income as well as traditional heart risk factors like obesity, high blood pressure and smoking.

Low physical activity doubled the risk for heart attack, whereas risk was about three times higher for people with high blood pressure or low income.

However, low I.Q. was a much stronger predictor than these traditional risk factors. People with lower I.Q.’s had four times higher risk of heart disease. By comparison, smokers were nearly six times more likely to have heart problems ...

******

Why would low I.Q. predict heart risk? Researchers pose a number of theories. It may be that some of the factors in early life that lead to low I.Q. may also lead to poorer heart health.

Beginning of tonight's debate: Gingrich responds to his ex-wife's allegations

This is posted on AP - CNN sponsored the debate.I haven't watched any of the Repug debates, but I have seen some highlights (like this one) online.

John King (who I generally think is an OK guy on CNN) started the "debate" by asking Gingrich to comment on the allegations that he asked her if they could have an "open" marriage.

It seems to me that Gingrich scored lots of points with this answer.

 

Ann Coulter on Romney and Bain Capital

Coulter, a strong supporter of Romney, offers a VERY spirited defense in her latest column.

Mitt Romney​ has spent more than 20 years in private enterprise, making thousands of business decisions affecting hundreds of companies that led to more than 100,000 new jobs and billions of dollars for employees and investors. So you can see why the left despises him.

It was labor trouble at the Marion plant of a Bain-acquired company, Ampad, that formed the basis of Teddy Kennedy's desperate 11th-hour attack on Romney in their 1994 Senate competition. Plant worker Randy Johnson was featured in Kennedy campaign commercials against Romney and disgruntled workers were lavished with Dickensian lachrymosity in The Boston Globe​.

In the current presidential campaign, Democrats -- and some Republicans -- have returned to Ampad and the Marion plant as their case in chief against Romney.

******

The Democratic National Committee has retained Johnson to go on tour in order to more fulsomely describe the horrors perpetrated by Bain Capital​ on workers at that plant. As salt-of-the-earth Johnson explains, he lost his job at Ampad because Romney "didn't care about the worker."

It is beyond journalistic malpractice for media outlets showcasing the bitter and lying Johnson to neglect to mention that he was the union president who led the strike that forced Ampad to close the plant.

And yet The New York Times​, MSNBC and others who have publicized Johnson's sob story regularly refuse to convey that crucial fact. This would be as if a judge excluded the fact that the defense's principal witness is the defendant's mother.

Hit the link above for teh rest of the story. It's quite eye-opening.

Myth or reality: Can grief cause a heart attack?

From the NYT health "Really?" section -

In a large new study, scientists have confirmed what the medical world has long suspected: The so-called broken-heart syndrome is real. The study, published on Monday in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association, found that a person’s heart attack risk is 21 times higher than normal the day after a loved one dies.

The fifth oldest tree in the world has burned down

3,500 years old. What a pity.

With pictures -

A fire early Monday has destroyed the 125-foot-tall bald cypress tree known as "The Senator," the centerpiece of Longwood's Big Tree Park.

 

Daily aspirin as heart attack preventative not necessarily a good idea

In the NYT health section.

Over all, for every 162 people who took aspirin, the drug prevented one nonfatal heart attack, but caused about two serious bleeding episodes.

So would you rather bleed gastrointestinally, or have a heart attack? hit the link for more info.

Yankees make some BIG trades

I was so caught up with football this past weekend, that it was only yesterday i read about their big trades.

They've now firmed up their starting rotation, including the pick-up of one of the very best young (23!) pitchers in baseball.

The Yankees sent the best of their catching prospects, Jesus Montero, to the Seattle Mariners in a four-player trade that landed Michael Pineda, an All-Star right-hander who turns 23 this week. They also signed Hiroki Kuroda, a veteran right-hander of the Los Angeles Dodgers, for one year and $10 million. The moves are contingent on the players’ passing physical examinations.

And here's the deal with Phil Hughes -

The Yankees avoided arbitration with the right-hander Phil Hughes on Monday by agreeing on a one-year, $3.2 million contract, with performance bonuses, for the 2012 season. But that may not be the final transaction for Hughes this year.

Only $3.2 million? Poor baby ...

 

Dominique Strauss-Kahn (remember him?): Offers original defense "I Have No Idea If I Slept With Prostitutes At Those Orgies Because Everyone Was Naked"

DSK

From the Business Insider website.

DSK's lawyer has countered with perhaps the single most brilliant defense argument in modern history.

He said his client had no way of knowing the women at the swinger parties were prostitutes because they were "all naked at the time".

"I defy you to tell the difference between a naked prostitute and any other naked woman."

The case involves graft and procuring, not actual liasing with a prostitute, which is legal in France.

Democrats ARE allowed to make political speeches from Church pulpits

That's just the way it is ...

And then they held a voter registration drive.

 

"MLK's Philosophical and Theological Legacy"

A good essay (not too long) this morning on the website Public Discourse.

I've read "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" mentioned. It's a great defense and explanation for civil disobedience.

Hit the link for the entire essy.  

A few months after Governor Wallace’s inauguration, a group of civil rights protesters, led by Martin Luther King, Jr., descended on Birmingham in a campaign of deliberate disobedience to the segregation ordinances of one of Alabama’s most racially divided cities. Images of peaceful protesters being sprayed with water hoses and attacked by police dogs soon galvanized the nation, and in April a group of white Alabama clergymen published “A Call for Unity” in a local newspaper, urging civil rights protesters to adopt a court-focused litigation strategy rather than taking to the streets in defiance of local law.

After King was arrested for parading without a permit, he took a moment, from the confines of his jail cell, to pen a response to his fellow clergymen and offer a justification for his resistance to segregation ordinances. Like any civically minded lawbreaker, King faced vexing moral and philosophical questions from the outset: how did he know whether a law was just or unjust, and when, if ever, was it morally permissible to disobey? In his now-celebrated “Letter from Birmingham City Jail,” King’s answer was that “a just law is a manmade code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.” “To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas,” King explained, “an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal and natural law.”

Those who praise the modern civil rights movement, but who also want to keep morality and theology absent from public discourse, seldom mention King’s reliance on natural law in his justly famous letter. Scholars such as the late John Rawls were at great pains to show how their thoroughly secularized theories of justice and public reason could make room for King, but in fact they could do so only at the cost of minimizing the seriousness of King’s argument. The son and grandson of Baptist preachers, King had studied the Western philosophical tradition while completing his doctorate in philosophical theology at Boston University, and his defense of civil disobedience drew from the work of Thomas Aquinas in particular.

Human ordinances, Aquinas argued in his Treatise on Law, can be contrary to the human good—and therefore unjust—by way of their end, author, or form. The first mode of legal injustice, according to this schema, is a law designed to bring about private gain at the expense of other members of the community. Otherwise benign laws can also be terribly unjust if made by someone without legitimate lawmaking authority or enforced in an illegitimate or partial manner. King, of course, had in mind Jim Crow laws when he spoke of legal injustice, but the concrete examples he marshaled in his letter followed the general contours of Aquinas’s natural law theory.

******

Following Augustine and Aquinas, King famously claimed that unjust laws were no laws at all. Rather, they were acts of violence and usurpations of law that damaged the human good and failed to instill a moral responsibility to obey.

******

King is of course the kind of historical figure that practically everyone wants to claim as his own. Reality, however, is often complex, and the truth about King is that his primary motivations, his most fundamental commitments—the very core of his thought—were rooted in a worldview repugnant to many of those who now claim his legacy. Despite his personal failings, many of which have come to light in the years since his assassination, we should remember King for who he was: an imperfect man and a Christian pastor who, in the best tradition of American politics, fought for justice by appealing to a law higher than the state while respectfully and thoughtfully engaging his interlocutors on the principles of a just political order.

Sixth anniversary of my stem cell transplant

Yup. Great health professionals, chemotherapy and prayer.

Here's what I posted last year on the fifth anniversary.

I could never quite figure why having your stem cells returned to you constituted a transplant, but that's what they call it.

Anyway, the idea is to re-build your immune system, after the high dose chemo has (hopefully) killed off the remaining lingering cancer cells. The side effect is that the chemo gives your immune system a drubbing, and hence the need for the stem cells - and they know what to do - isn't nature wonderful! - to rebuild.

Here's five years ago at Sloan Kettering. The precedure is very simple - like receiving a blood transfusion. I dozed off afterwards for a couple of hours, and Brigid said she enjoyed the peace and quiet ... What was she getting at?

Here - http://tomfaranda.typepad.com/folly/2006/01/transplant_went.html#tp

or here - Transplant went well

Muhammad Ali turns 70

This is from ALJazeeraenglish.

Parkinson's Disease!