Did the nation invest a hundred billion dollars in Colorado Springs? What will the effect be on foreign policy if it burns? Shouldn’t safety be the highest priority for our firefighters? Don’t their lives have infinite value? Why are we risking their lives in fighting this fire?
Finally, which would you rather do, and feel it more worth the fight in terms of your risk of life? Fight this fire, or ride a Dragon to the space station without a launch abort system?
Just asking.
Obama doesn’t know what it means:
Because the Obama campaign knows that one of its most important constituencies is economically illiterate yokels — a demographic to which the president himself apparently belongs — it is on the airwaves claiming “Romney’s never stood up to China — all he’s ever done is send them our jobs.’’ (Whose?) The Obama campaign cites a Washington Post story on the subject, and the Romney campaign has noted that the folks over at WaPo did not distinguish between outsourcing and offshoring (and, indeed, the story is not a very smart one — do read it and see). Obama responded thus: “Yesterday, his advisers tried to clear this up by telling us that there was a difference between ‘outsourcing’ and ‘offshoring.’ Seriously. You can’t make that up.” And indeed you wouldn’t have to make it up, because it is a real thing: different words with different meanings. (Seriously, can we get this guy a library card?)
To be fair, he’s ignorant about business and economics in general. And it shows in his policies.
…is nowhere in sight.
That’s what I’m playing for people who can’t successfully prosecute idiotic and immoral anti-prostitution laws. Glenn has the right idea:
…why not just legalize prostitution. Legal prostitution is safer and healthier, and it’ll provide employment opportunities for some of those unemployed college grads.
It’s not like it goes away if you make it illegal.
Yeah, I know. I’m just being a crazy “right winger,” as usual.
…cannot hold together. With France joining the rest of the PIIGs, it’s hard to see survival of the Euro, except perhaps in Germany and the Netherlands. They may reach a point at which it just makes sense to go back to the guilder and deutschemark.
…cuts carbon more than cap and trade. Don’t tell the watermelons.
Political art. Politically incorrect art. That is apparently doing very well for the artist.
In reading this article about whether or not there’s money to be made on the moon, I came across this link, with an estimate from about three years ago of the cost of a lunar base.
The numbers seem way high to me, but of course, they’re based on Constellation. But I can never get over the cost estimate for Altair. Twelve billion dollars to develop a lander? How can that possibly be? The only way I can think that they came up with that is to look at the LEM costs in the sixties, and scale them up in both size and current-year dollars. Which is a completely useless way to do it.
A lawsuit has been filed on the basis that Dodd-Frank is unconstitutional.
[Friday morning update]
…and the worship of “change”:
“A man like me is born only once every five hundred years,” Ceausescu used to proclaim, over and over. The Romanian media did its part, nicknaming Ceausescu the “Most Beloved Son of the People,” the “Guarantor of the Nation’s Progress and Independence,” and the “Visionary Architect of the Nation’s Future.” In 1989, Ceausescu functioned as the head of state, leader of the Communist Party, commander of the armed forces, chairman of the Supreme Council for Economic and Social Development, president of the National Council of Working People, and chairman of the Socialist Democracy and Unity Front. By that time, the personality cult was extended to Ceausescu’s wife as well. Elena Ceausescu became the country’s first deputy prime minister, chair of the National Council on Science and Technology, and head of the National Council for Science and Education. Elena Ceausescu’s national prominence had grown to the point that her birthday was celebrated as a national holiday, as was her husband’s.
The U.S. Democratic Party also began constructing its own god. “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for,” proclaimed Senator Barack Obama during his electoral campaign as the 2008 nominee for the White House. The leaders of the Democratic Party jumped in, calling him an “American Messiah.”
“This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal,” the senator assured the country in his acceptance speech.
After winning the 2008 elections, the Democratic Party’s agenda for “change” began changing the U.S. into a monument to its leader as well. Below is a partial list of projects and places already named after President Obama:
California: President Barack Obama Parkway, Orlando; Obama Way, Seaside; Barack Obama Charter School, Compton; Barack Obama Global Preparation Academy, Los Angeles; Barack Obama Academy, Oakland. Florida: Barack Obama Avenue, Opa-loka; Barack Obama Boulevard, West Park. Maryland: Barack Obama Elementary School, Upper Marlboro. Missouri: Barack Obama Elementary School, Pine Lawn. Minnesota: Barack and Michelle Obama Service Learning Elementary, Saint Paul. New Jersey: Barack Obama Academy, Plainfield; Barack Obama Green Charter High School, Plainfield. New York: Barack Obama Elementary School, Hempstead. Pennsylvania: Obama High School, Pittsburgh. Texas: Barack Obama Male Leadership Academy, Dallas.
Change is still the Democratic Party’s theme for the 2012 elections. The current target for change is American capitalism, and this new crusade for change started with the article “Why isn’t capitalism working?” by Lawrence Summers, former head of President Obama’s National Economic Council. According to Summers’ essays, Americans are disillusioned with market capitalism: Only “50% of people had a positive opinion of capitalism, while 40 percent did not.” The reasoning:
[Capitalism produces] inequality and declining social mobility…The problem is real and profound and seems unlikely to correct itself untended. Unlike cyclical concerns, there is no obvious solution at hand.
Those who do not know history…