December 2009 Archives

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

How to Compose Clear and Effective Reports, Letters, Email, and Memos

Do you need to improve your writing skills? This intensive one-day course helps students understand the three dimensions of professional writing: organization, format and style. In addition to reviewing and teaching specific writing techniques, our faculty show you how to:
Apply critical thinking to the writing process
Use the four keys to effective writing
Understand the five-step writing process
Develop an effective writing style
Communication skills are the key to efficient and effective operations in business and government. New employees should brush-up on their basic written communication and plain English skills, while experienced professionals, burdened by the additional workload caused by downsizing and budget cuts, can also benefit from this refresher course.

January 28, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm.

Approved for 0.6 CEU credits from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WordWorkshop.com

December 29, 2009 06:37 PM Link Training Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/27/09

Silent Monks Singing Halleluia

Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing , January 28, 2010
Update on The 111th Congress, 2010, January 29, 2010
Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, February 10, 2010
Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, February 11, 2010
Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, February 18, 2010
The President's Budget, February 23, 2010
The Defense Budget, February 26, 2010
Capitol Hill Workshop, March 3-5, 2010
Snowstorm Makes Flying A White Hell - "Airlines canceled more than 3,000 flights over the weekend, and Amtrak and commuter trains gave up all hope of running on anything resembling a schedule. Some airports saw their traffic cut by as much as two-thirds, leaving tens of thousands of people stranded. Travel had resumed this morning and the FAA said there were no major delays, but it will be awhile before things are back to normal.

'Full recovery may take well into Tuesday,' Air Transport Association spokesman David Castelveter told USA Today. 'We haven’t seen anything like this since 1996. The sad news here is that’s happening on the weekend before Christmas, when so many people are traveling.'"
Lest We Forget: Moral Hazard and the Subprime Crisis - "There are two preliminary moral hazard problems. First, obviously the sales force does not have the incentive to screen out 'bad loans' given the incentive contract offered. Second, as mortgages can be bundled and traded, the managers do not have the incentive to give the sales force the incentive to screen our bad loans. They want to maximize raw volume rather than quality-adjusted sales.

This leaves 'the market' as the potential monitor. A large group of owners of securities faces a free-rider problem in monitoring so no-one monitors. The price of the bundled security reflects the mix of good and bad loans in the market. An individual issuer of mortgages has the incentive to screen out bad loans if this is reflected in the price of the security they sell. But if no-one is monitoring, no-one will notice the extra benefits from screening, the price will not improve and there is no incentive to invest in making just good loans.

Finally when everything does tank, if banks sell mortgages and the banks are too big to fail, they get bailed out by taxpayers. One final bit of moral hazard to make sure there is no incentive to monitor the monitor to monitor the mortgage sale."
Boom Time on K Street - "Lay out a picnic, you get ants. Hand out more wealth through government, you get lobbyists. As Craig Holman of the Ralph Nader-founded Public Citizen says: 'the amount spent on lobbying . . . is related entirely to how much the federal government intervenes in the private economy.'

More on the lobbying bonanza in President Obama’s Washington here. Back in 2001 David Laband and George McClintock tried to estimate the total costs to society of efforts to effect forced transfers of wealth in their book The Transfer Society."
Bah Humbug - "Hopefully 2010 will be the end of the road for the crooks and deadbeats!"
BAIC Got Saab Technology On The Cheap - "GM netted a paltry $200m for the Saab technology it sold to China’s BAIC. So said BAIC to Reuters today, while desperately trying to keep a straight face. The money bought BAIC the rights to three vehicle platforms, two engine technologies and two transmission systems. A pittance, given the fact that developing a new car typically costs from $1b on upwards these days.

Granted, the IP for the 9-5 and 9-3, and the tooling to make them are not the newest, but you can trust BAIC to make the most of it. Interestingly, BAIC got what they desperately needed"
A Small but Telling Example of Government Waste - "Some commenters claim that auctioning off the gifts would offend foreign governments by making it seem that their gifts weren’t valued. Of course, storing them in some warehouse never to be seen again doesn’t exactly indicate that the US government places any real value on the gifts either. Still, it’s possible that the gifts should only be auctioned off some years after they are given, by which time foreign officials are less likely to keep track of them. Alternatively, the gifts can be donated to charities that can then use the proceeds to help the poor; it would be difficult for foreign opinion to take offense at that."
Christmas Bonuses for Fannie and Freddie - "The Obama administration tried to sneak this one under the radar by making it official on Christmas Eve. The Washington Post did a good job catching the story:"
Explain the Difference - "Is there any difference between Hugo Chavez and Barack Obama in terms of how they approach the auto industry? 'Make the kind of cars I thing you should, or the government will take you over.'"
Blank-Check Bailout for Fannie and Freddie Means Taxpayers Get a Lump of Coal from Obama - "Even though politicians already have flushed $400 billion down the rathole, the Obama Administration has announced that it will now give unlimited amounts of our money to prop up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two government-created mortgage companies. While President Obama should be castigated for this decision, let’s not forget that this latest boondoggle is only possible because President Bush did not do the right thing and liquidate Fannie and Freddie when they collapsed last year. And, to add insult to injury, Obama’s pay czar played Santa Claus and announced that that a dozen top 'executives' could divvy up $42 million of bonuses financed by you and me. Not a bad deal for a group of people that more properly should be classified as government bureaucrats."
Does New Jersey like being ranked last? - "Each measure accomplishes the exact reverse of stimulating jobs, economic recovery, or fiscal solvency. With measures like these one wonders if legislators think being ranked the worst place to do business in the country is a good thing."
How to Ensure Your LinkedIn Profile Is Effective - "Is your LinkedIn profile as effective as it could be? While you can see your “profile completeness” score on your profile page, it doesn’t measure profile effectiveness -- how good your profile is at attracting contacts, generating leads and showing off your skills. Use this checklist to ensure your profile is thorough, effective and updated."
Al Qaeda Failed. What About Us? Ten Questions. - "Early reports about the failed Christmas bombing of NW 253 raise questions that need answers. Because, frankly, if the reports are true, al Qaeda never should have gotten this close to a successful attack."
Beating The Low Signature Enemy - "When the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) battled Hezbollah to basically a draw in southern Lebanon in summer 2006, one thing that really stymied the IDF was what Israeli Brig. Gen. Itai Brun called Hezbollah’s 'strategy of disappearance': Hezbollah fighters set up command posts and arms stores in civilian buildings; launched rockets from near mosques and schools; used 'low signature' weapons, such as mortars, anti-tank missiles and shoulder launched surface-to-air missiles; and spent years building extensive below ground fortifications including a maze of tunnels and bunkers.

The IDF, which had prepped for high-intensity battle against Syrian tank armies, was unprepared for an asymmetric, low-signature enemy that refused to stand in the open and smile for the electronic eyes on overhead drones and aircraft and thermal sights on Merkava main battle tanks. The IDF took fairly heavy casualties trying to root out dug-in Hezbollah combat cells and never did stop the rain of rockets fired from southern Lebanon into Israeli towns.

The challenge is how to compel the low-signature enemy to emit a detectable signal, to raise his signature level. According to a draft paper passed along to DOD Buzz, the Israelis, and certain parts of the U.S. military, are exploring a concept called “distributed maneuver,” a potentially promising approach that could force the “hybrid” enemy to breach the detection threshold so that he can be targeted and dispatched. The paper, a joint Israeli-U.S. effort, was authored by strategist Frank Hoffman, who now works in the Office of the Naval Secretary."
What Would Always-On-The-Record Government Look Like? - "Recently, I wrote a post about Government 2.0 predictions for 2010-12, and one of them was that government would 'always be on-the-record.'

By that I meant that the combination of (1) the proliferation of tech-savvy citizens with mobile camera/video devices, (2) the prevalence of wi-fi or other Web connections, (3) the massive number of people using social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter, and (4) the great interest that people have right now in a number of controversial issues like our current wars, health care, and climate change that people could and probably would start documenting everything that government officials do and say, where they go, who they meet with, for how long, what their staffers eat for lunch and with whom, and so on."
More Engineers in Jihad - "Gambetta and Hertog find that 'the share of radical Islamic engineers is no less than nine times greater than the share we could expect if the proneness of engineers to radicalize was the same as that of the male adult population.'"
Doubling Your Money while Earning 0.01 Percent - "'What the average citizen doesn’t explicitly understand is that a significant part of the government’s plan to repair the financial system and the economy is to pay savers nothing and allow damaged financial institutions to earn a nice, guaranteed spread,' said [Bill Gross of PIMCO]"
Beginners' Guide to Liberty - "Adam Smith Institute publishes a very nice edited "volume" on the we"
Security Theater: A New Show Opens In Detroit - "what sort of magical thinking is behind the rumored TSA rule about keeping passengers seated during the last hour of flight? Do we really think the terrorist won't think of blowing up their improvised explosive devices during the first hour of flight?"
Open Thread: TSA To Keep Us Safe From Nigerian Terrorists, Bankers' Sons, 419 Scammers - "Is there an inverse relationship between the retardation of the terrorist and the federal overreaction? The 9/11 attackers (who whatever you want to say about them were clearly competent and effective) inspired many new restrictions, but it took the stupid nincompoop Richard Reid to make us lose our shoes. What will we be required to doff thanks to the apparently dirt-dumb Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab?"
The Unorganized Militia Once Again is Needed - "According to press reports, a passenger helped subdue the terrorist who was attempting to bring down Northwest #253. This again highlights the importance of the unorganized militia in asymetric warfare."

The Healthcare Jokers: Holiday Celebration

Which are the "safest" cuisines? - "The most dangerous cuisine to try, in the United States at least, is Chinese. Your best working assumption is that the restaurant simply isn't any good. Even in a Chinatown, such as in New York or DC, most of the restaurants aren't very good. Inverting the two principles mentioned above puts you on a path toward figuring out why. Still, even in Paris or most of Europe for that matter, most of the Chinese restaurants aren't very good.

I find also that (in the U.S.) Mexican restaurants are risky, Vietnamese establishments are relatively safe, and Thai places were traditionally safe but they are becoming riskier. I've never been to a bad Nepalese restaurant."
4-year-old survives being hit by train - "Perhaps the most urgent question raised by this Atlanta Journal-Constitution story is not: how did Elijah Anderson manage to emerge from such a collision sufficiently unscathed to resume life as a normal kid, aside from a scar? Nor is it: why is his mother, represented by attorney Fred Lerner, planning to sue railroad CSX despite an investigative report exonerating the railroad and the general principle that right of ways are not for trespassing? No, the real question is: whose idea was it to take that camera shot of him on the tracks?"
What Is Seen, What Is Unseen. - "Emory's Mark Bauerlein contemplates higher education's supposed boy problem. ... Suppose beer 'n circus isn't an aberration, it's the mission?"
Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
The Book of Genesis Illustrated - "As literature, the biblical book of Genesis has it all: sex, violence, angels, war, murder, heroes, incest, world-wide disasters, spooky mystery, and a timeless story. All it needed was illustrations by the comic genius R. Crumb and you'd have a underground manga hit. And that's what this book is."
WePay’s Group Payments Get Some Big-Name Backers, Including Max Levchin - "WePay is a startup that looks to streamline group payments.

So what exactly does WePay do that PayPal can’t? The difference stems from the way payment accounts are set up. With PayPal, your account is tied to your name, without any way to separate the payments associated with your soccer team from those of your fraternity or your own personal transactions. On WePay, you can create a unique, FDIC insured account for each of these. The account is still associated with your name, but you can keep each group account totally separate."
Your Comments on the Quadruplets Admitted to Yale - "trying to out-think the admissions office of a highly selective college is a fool’s errand. There is no set formula for admission. And, I would argue, there is no fair (or fairer) way to assemble a freshman class. There are simply too many obviously qualified applicants, and too many metrics for what constitutes merit."
Last-Minute Bargain! - "I purchased one of those new Magellen GPS’s with Scottish turn by turn from Ampersand. 'Ye think ye can drive? Great turn, Columbus, but it was wrong!! Why not pull off now for a wee dram?'. Best electronic device I’ve ever bought. 'Ach, ya great bollocks….WRONG turn AGAIN!!!'"
NSFW: The Physical Impossibility of The Future in the Mind of Someone Trapped In Chicago - "Chicago is, after all, the only place in the world capable of making Washington DC look like a step up."
24 Days Of Local Sunlight -- Day 23 - "Today I want to give a shout out Bacon’s Rebellion.

The blog is dedicated to covering Virginia; especially infastructure, transportation and taxes. Bacon’s Rebellion has a few contributors but the person I have highlighted the most is James Bacon."
Yegor T. Gaidar: R.I.P. - "So many people on this blog are free market advocates. At times, they get into the nit-picky about what they sometimes see as a creeping turn to socialism and big government.

Think of Gaidar and see the approach turned on its head. Consider that you are a member of the Communist Party of what was then a super power. You even edit an academic tome titled 'Kommunist.' Yet during the excitement of Mikhail S. Gorbachev's 'perestroika,' you get free market religion and, in increments, you turn into a capitalist that Milton Friedman would envy.

At the same time, you are thrust into a decision making position of a country undergoing a huge, lightning-fast transition from police and military industrial state to what Russians call 'dicki capitalism,' or 'wild' capitalism. You have to keep things in check, fight off mossbacks in the government, avoid civil war (with nuclear weapons no less) and somehow build an enduring structure of a free market economy."

Boeing 787 Dreamliner makes first flight

The Innovative 787 Carries Boeing, And Aviation, Ahead - "Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner looks like any other airliner, so it might be hard for anyone but an airplane geek to get so excited about its inaugural flight. But the energy-efficient airliner is a bold step forward for Boeing, and for aviation.

As much as the 787 Dreamliner looks like the jet that carried you on that cramped, uncomfortable flight last month, almost everything about it is new. From the extensive use of composite materials and advanced aerodynamics to its fuel-efficient Rolls Royce engines and all-electric systems, Boeing is betting the 787 will be the plane to usher in a cleaner, greener future for the airline business.

Boeing claims the 787 is 20 percent more fuel-efficient than comparably sized jets."
Animated Christmas Tree Cable Cars Are Yet Another Thing For Your Guests To Trip Over - "So while these animated cable cars are a clever twist on the traditional train under the tree decoration, I don’t think they’d survive for very long in a household with either kids, pets or festive revelers. $49 from Walmart, if they ever get it back in stock."
20 Powerful Beliefs That Will Push You Toward Success - "Success, first of all, is not a set of achievements or a combination of external factors; it is a mindset. Success is an attitude that comes from a framework of powerful beliefs and empowering thoughts. There have been many books written about this, probably some of which you have read. In the ones I have read, there always seemed to be a certain partiality-- an incomplete picture -- perhaps biased towards financial success or some other area but not another.

In the following list of beliefs and empowering thoughts, I would like to present a rounder view of success. One that I hope will give you a wider angle towards the meaning of success ranging from the material to the spiritual."
Verizon Wireless Denies It's Charging People Phantom $1.99 Fee, Despite Tons Of Complaints - "For a little while now, Broadband Reports has been doing a good job highlighting how Verizon Wireless has been charging a phantom $1.99 fee for "accessing the internet" even when users claim they did no such thing. Despite a growing amount of press coverage, Verizon Wireless had been silent on the issue. However, once David Pogue at the NY Times reported on it, finally the FCC got involved and asked Verizon Wireless to explain. The company apparently delayed for a while and then sent a reply (pdf). While much of the press coverage focused on a separate question (about why Verizon Wireless had doubled its early termination fees), what may be more interesting is the company's non-response to the phantom $1.99. It basically said it doesn't do what lots and lots of people are saying it does." Yes, Verizon does this, and it is a hassle to get the charge removed.
Books of note - "4. Scott Berkun, Confessions of a Public Speaker. If you get only one good tip from this book, it's worth it."
Sun and moon 'set off deep tremors on San Andreas fault' - "Scientists have discovered that the faint gravitational tug of the sun and moon can set off tremors deep underground in one of the world's most dangerous earthquake zones."
A Letter to the Middle-Aged Guy in the BMW Z4 - "Now when I see that blue shape ahead, stopped at a traffic light or waiting to pull in front of me at the grocery store exit, I know I'm in for a long drive home. I'm stuck behind the one little blue pill that can't get it up. "
Speed Dial Combination Lock - "Rather than spinning a dial with numbers, Master Lock’s Speed Dial combination lock uses up/down/left/right movements. In addition to the new code entry system they use an anti-shim technology and a hardened steel shackle to prevent circumventing the combination. The result is a lock that they claim is faster to open, easier to use, and more secure then a standard combination lock."
Former Musician Now Lawyer Comes To Terms With What's Happening To His Music Online - "He begins to reason through the arguments, recognizing that he and his (one surviving) bandmate haven't actually put their own music online for sale, and they probably would have put some of it up for free anyway, so maybe having some free music out there isn't that bad. But more importantly, he realizes that this means there's actually both interest and demand in his old band (he even discovers that old copies of the band's single are selling for £35), and he might as well do something about it, rather than worry about what others are doing"
10 obsolete technologies to kill in 2010 - "2. ‘Cigar lighter receptacle’ plugs in cars.
The idea of building cigar/cigarette lighters into car dashboards originated in the 1920s. The technology was perfected in the 1950s. Decades later, the automobile industry is still building these weird sockets into cars, but now usually without the actual lighter.

As electrical outlets, dashboard lighter ports are dangerous, unreliable, underpowered, inconvenient, unsightly and expensive. They require that you purchase a special plug and/or adapters, which add clutter to your car.

All cars should have standard household electrical outlets, with the converter built in. Or USB ports that can charge gadgets. Or both."
Christmas Game Theory - "The lovely wife says the jewelry I bought her for Christmas has to be returned because 'it's just too expensive!'

Do not try this at home. Without extensive knowledge of game theory and your spouse this strategy can be very dangerous to your finances"
To track small LDL, track blood sugar - "To gain better control over small LDL, follow blood sugars (blood glucose).

When you think about it, all the foods that trigger increases in blood sugar also trigger small LDL. Carbohydrates, in general, are the most potent triggers of small LDL. The most offensive among the carbohydrates: foods made with wheat. After wheat, there's foods made with cornstarch, sucrose (table sugar), and the broad categories of "other" carbohydrates, such as oats, barley, quinoa, sorghum, bulghur, etc."

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December 27, 2009 11:47 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

Update on The 111th Congress, 2010

Update on The 111th Congress, 2010 , half-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Update on the 111th Congress, 2010

Our expert faculty look at the second session of the 111th Congress in terms of leadership, membership, the 2010 elections, and the anticipated legislative agenda. They will also review and analyze the major legislative initiatives and accomplishments of the first session of the 111th Congress. Held in January of every even-numbered year.

January 29, 2010, 9 am - 1 pm

Approved for 0.4 CEU credits from George Mason University.

Where: Washington, DC

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see UpdateOnCongress.com

December 26, 2009 01:27 PM Link Training Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Reprogram"

Reprogram: Shifting funds from one program to another in the same appropriation account.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook.

Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms.

Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

December 25, 2009 11:37 AM Link Tips and Terms Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Adjourn to a Day or Time Certain"

Adjourn to a Day or Time Certain: Adjournment that fixes the next day and time of meeting for one or both chambers.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook.

Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms.

Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

December 23, 2009 09:27 AM Link Tips and Terms Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/18/09

So Sweet I can't stand it....

Regulation Vacation Celebration - "I have cholera!"

Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing , January 28, 2010
Update on The 111th Congress, 2010, January 29, 2010
Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, February 10, 2010
Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, February 11, 2010
Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, February 18, 2010
The President's Budget, February 23, 2010
The Defense Budget, February 26, 2010
Capitol Hill Workshop, March 3-5, 2010
The Minnesota Case---An Institutional Diagnosis - "Why, then, would a high-ranking administrator in a high-profile university reveal to the public such a transparent whitewash of the whole enterprise? More than that, why would a committee of professors at 'the premier public research institution in the state' (Quam's words) produce such a hot-headed, resentment-ridden, identity-politics report that would wither under the slightest public scrutiny?

I think it has to do with the institutional conditions in which this report was produced, conditions that are largely opaque to people who have never served on an academic committee or attended a close academic meeting.

The 'Race, Class, Culture, Gender' report is an in-your-face, up-front determination about U.S. history and society. Beneath its relentless framework of 'privilege' and 'oppression' lies a firm adversarial posture. 'Lots of Americans out there don't recognize these things,' the authors declare, 'but here you will.'

But alongside the contentious, adversarial attitude is a remarkable circumstance: there are no adversaries and contenders in the room. Nobody on this committee stood up and said, 'I don't think we should emphasize racial identity so much in our review.' The committee didn't ask a believer in the old-fashioned American idea that you can become anything in the United States if you work hard and live wisely to come into the room and state the case. Everybody agreed on the priority of cultural, racial, sexual, and gender variables to all others (moral, psychological, etc.).

We don't know what went on behind closed doors, of course, but the report doesn't contain a whisper of skepticism or caution. It proceeds with all the confidence of collective wisdom. This is the fatal ingredient of all-too-many academic enterprises. They emerge out of a habitat of the like-minded, a gathering of 100% right-thinking personnel. That outsiders would recoil from their assertions probably didn't occur to the report's authors. Or rather, they expected conservatives, reactionaries, and various unenlightened ones to take umbrage, but they believed that the patent goodness of their motives and aims would prevail.

It can't happen, not in an open society. The fact that the dean of the program has to defend the initiative with thin mendacities signals the corruption at its heart. One hopes, as KC says, that the legislature in Minnesota will take heed of how state employees are meeting their duties."
I live in a van down by Duke University - "The idea of 'thrift,' once an American ideal, now seems almost quaint to many college students, particularly those at elite schools. The typical student today is not so frugal. Few know where the money they're spending is coming from and even fewer know how deep they're in debt. They're detached from the source of their money. That's because there is no source. They're getting paid by their future selves.

My 'radical living' experiment convinced me that the things plunging students further into debt -- the iPhones, designer clothes, and even 'needs' like heat and air conditioning, for instance -- were by no means 'necessary.' And I found it easier to 'do without' than I ever thought it would be. Easier by far than the jobs I'd been forced to take in order to pay off my loans.

Most undergrads imagine they'll effortlessly pay off their loans when they start getting paid the big bucks; they're living in a state of denial, disregarding the implications of a tough job market and how many extra years of work their spending sprees have sentenced them to. But 'facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored,' as Aldous Huxley famously said.

I have sympathy for my fellow students. I did many of the same things when I was an undergrad. Plus, escaping student debt -- no matter how frugal they try to be -- is nearly impossible. Even if they do resort to purchasing a large creepy van, most will still have to go tens of thousands of dollars into debt to pay for tuition.

While I found a way to afford graduate school, I by no means had the same financial responsibilities as the average student. I was so poor when I applied that my department took pity on me and significantly reduced the cost of my tuition. I even found a well-paying part-time job working for a government-sponsored program, tutoring inner-city kids."
A bad day to be in Copenhagen - "Consummate statesmen Robert Mugabe and Hugo Chavez addressed the climate change conference.

YIKES!!
. . .
Now that things have devolved to a circus, why not go all the way and have Ahmadinejad say a few words?

What's that? He's on the schedule for tomorrow?"
Time's Man of the Year: In Ben We Trust - "It was thoughtful of Time to give this award to Ben on the day before his confirmation hearings."
New version of an old e-mail scam prompts Oklahoma Bar to schedule free webcast - "The latest version of the e-mail/forged bank check scam targeting lawyers involves scammers posing as potential clients seeking to collect back child support or alimony. Some of these say they have already worked out an agreement, but want the lawyer to process the check for a healthy share of the proceeds. Of course, any time someone wants to pay you five figures to serve as a check-cashing service, your internal "too good to be true" alarm should go off.

Many lawyers are not aware of how long it takes the banking system to recognize and notify depositors of the forged checks. The scammer just hopes they can convince the lawyer-victim to wire out the money before getting the news that the check is worthless (or maybe now much worst than worthless.)"

5 Fabulous New Features Google Unveiled Today

Pirates Amok. Yo Ho Ho And A Sultanate Of Rum - "Of all the scourges of history we never thought we'd see again, who would've guessed pirates would be making a comeback? I'm not talking about the stereotyped, Disneyfied, Caribbean ones who get their swag from SAG -- nope, the Somali pirates are the real deal and business, as they say, is booming.
. . .
It also seems these so-called pirates really aren't that piratical at all... they sure don't conform to Stephen Colbert's description: eyepatch-wearing, rum-guzzling, shipmate-buggering peg-leggers with parrot poop layered thick on their shoulders. No plank-walking, no tying scurvy dogs to the yardarm... neither scurvy nor yardarms, if truth be told. No sinister yet romantic Black Pearl brigantines flying the Jolly Roger. Not even the occasional "ARRRR!" growled in anger. What gives? We were brought up to despise pirates and these dudes aren't following the script. No wonder the combined navies of a half-dozen nations have got their spinnakers in a collective knot over how to handle them... and they've been doing a splendid job so far, haven't they?

Methinks there be -- sorry, couldn't help it -- I think there may be an opportunity here to exploit the pirate mystique for mutual benefit. They've already got colorful characters: head of the Suleiman pirate clan Mohamed Abdi Hassan's nickname is "Big Mouth", for instance. Hey Hollywood, how about this: Pay one of the pirate gangs a few doubloons to embed a reporter and a cameraman as they go about their merry ship-seizing ways. It'll be the ultimate reality show! Call it Surviv-ARRR!, or Pirates of the Somali-ish Main, or even Biggest Loser Shipping Magnates."
Picks for the Best Gadgets of the Past Decade - "Here are my picks for the best gadgets of the last decade:"
China fact of the day - "A Chinese policeman who died after drinking too much at a banquet he was made to attend has been deemed a martyr who died in the line of duty, in an apparent attempt to meet his family's demands for compensation, a state-run newspaper said."
Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
Vice President Biden wants you to know . . . - ". . . that he's really, really smart. A laugh-out-loud takedown of Mr. Biden's tacit claim. It should be noted, though, that his is a reasonably common condition. Many of our elected officials think they are really, really smart.

A big problem for our country is that they are often wrong."
The Answer Factory: Demand Media and the Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell Media Model - "Online content is not worth very much. This may be a truism, but Rosenblatt has the hard, mathematical proof. It’s right there in black and white, in the Demand Media database -- the lifetime value of every story, algorithmically derived, and very, very small. Most media companies are trying hard to increase those numbers, to boost the value of their online content until it matches the amount of money it costs to produce. But Rosenblatt thinks they have it exactly backward. Instead of trying to raise the market value of online content to match the cost of producing it -- perhaps an impossible proposition -- the secret is to cut costs until they match the market value." ht Radar

Between the Folds

Is Facebook a Brand that You Can Trust? - "Isn't it about time that we started holding our online brands to the same standards that we hold our offline ones?

Case in point, consider Facebook. In Facebook's relatively short life, there has been the Beacon Debacle (a 'social' advertising model that only Big Brother could love), the Scamville Furor (lead gen scams around social gaming) and now, the Privacy Putsch.

By Privacy Putsch, I am referring to Facebook's new 'Privacy' Settings, which unilaterally invoked upon all Facebook users a radically different set of privacy setting defaults than had been in place during the company's build-up to its current 350 million strong user base.

To put a bow around this one, the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), not exactly a bastion of radicalism, concluded after comparing Facebook's new privacy settings with the privacy settings that they replaced:

"Our conclusion? These new 'privacy' changes are clearly intended to push Facebook users to publicly share even more information than before."

Ruminate on what that means for a moment. You are a parent, and you regularly upload photos of your kids to Facebook, blithely assuming that they are free from the roaming eyes of some sexual predator. While previously, these photos were only viewable to the Friends and Networks that you explicitly connected with, now, without consulting you, Facebook has made your son or daughter's pictures readily accessible to friend or felon."
Merge Duplicate Gmail Contacts With a Single Button Press - "One of the main reasons I’ve dealt with Gmail’s Contacts, even without it having advanced features is the cross-platform support. Since Gmail is a web service, I can access my contacts from any browser on any device. And because those contacts can be synchronized on nearly every major smartphone platform through Google Sync, those contacts never have to be manually entered on a handheld. Plus, any contact updates made on any of the devices are automatically sent back to the cloud and other devices. It’s simple, and it works."

. . . . . . . . .

December 18, 2009 09:07 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 8 (Eighth Amendment)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 8 (Amendments 1-10 are known as the Bill Of Rights) (8th Amendment)

Amendment VIII.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Eighth Amendment - Wikipedia
Eighth Amendment - Findlaw

The Supreme Court rules death by lethal injection to be Constitutional.

Justice Scalia discussing torture and if it can be defined as "cruel and unusual punishment."

A free download of our Pocket Constitution is available on Scribd.

. . . . . . . . .

December 17, 2009 10:37 PM Link U.S. Constitution Comments (0)

New Facebook Privacy Settings - How to Adjust (December 2009)

Facebook recently changed its default privacy settings, with little advance notice to the majority of its users.

Isn't it about time that we started holding our online brands to the same standards that we hold our offline ones?
Case in point, consider Facebook. In Facebook's relatively short life, there has been the Beacon Debacle (a 'social' advertising model that only Big Brother could love), the Scamville Furor (lead gen scams around social gaming) and now, the Privacy Putsch.

By Privacy Putsch, I am referring to Facebook's new 'Privacy' Settings, which unilaterally invoked upon all Facebook users a radically different set of privacy setting defaults than had been in place during the company's build-up to its current 350 million strong user base.

To put a bow around this one, the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), not exactly a bastion of radicalism, concluded after comparing Facebook's new privacy settings with the privacy settings that they replaced:

"Our conclusion? These new 'privacy' changes are clearly intended to push Facebook users to publicly share even more information than before. Even worse, the changes will actually reduce the amount of control that users have over some of their personal data."

"Is Facebook a Brand that You Can Trust?," by Mark Sigal, Radar, December 2009

Here are a few articles and videos that address how to adjust your Facebook privacy settings.

Facebook privacy settings: What you need to know

Clayton Morris walks you through Facebook's new privacy settings

How to : Facebook privacy settings explained step by step

. . . . . . . . .

December 16, 2009 08:37 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/15/09

WARNING - THIS IS A GRAPHIC VIDEO
VIDEO: Australian Transport Accident Commission celebrates 20 years of disturbing commercials
Slow down. Don't drink and drive. Stay at least 2 seconds behind the vehicle in front of you. Do not stop on the side of a busy road, get off before getting out of your car.

William Shatner and Sarah Palin
"Good to finally see those two together." Conan O'Brien

Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing , January 28, 2010
Update on The 111th Congress, 2010, January 29, 2010
Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, February 10, 2010
Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, February 11, 2010
Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, February 18, 2010
The President's Budget, February 23, 2010
The Defense Budget, February 26, 2010
Capitol Hill Workshop, March 3-5, 2010
Government Losses from the Bailout - "And who didn't see this coming?"
Study Sheds Light on Students Leaving College Early - "In the popular image of college, there’s dorm life, full-time classes, football games, parties, maybe a part-time job -- and then, four years later, a degree.

But for most students, it doesn’t work out that way. About 2.8 million students enroll in some form of higher education each year. But finishing what they start is a different matter: Only one in five of the students who enroll in two-year institutions graduate within three years. And even at four-year colleges, only two in five complete their degrees within six years. "
The New Bubble in the Barbarous Relic that Is Gold - "An analysis of the facts suggests that a good part of this rise in gold prices is driven by a bubble."
The Enemy Within - "No, it’s not the latest crewe of knuckleheads crossing the seas to wage war on their countrymen. They are a blip lost in the noise band of extremism, and at least they were romantic and foolish enough to eschew domestic terror to fight in the field. If they hadn’t gotten swept up by the Pakistani authorities before they could wage jihad, they would very probably have been treated more or less respectfully by the graves registration detail before being shipped home in caskets."
Are Democrats Sunk? - "I was talking to a libertarian friend yesterday who is a professor in the midwest, and we were marvelling at just how delusional many Obama voters seem to have been about what he was going to accomplish. Don't get me wrong--I certainly don't approve of everything Obama has done. But the guy got elected to be president of the United States, not Prime Minister of Sweden. Anyone who seriously entertained the notion that the procedural obstacles to enacting legislation in the United States would suddenly fall away--along with the essentially center-right politics of the American voter--is probably not mature enough to be driving."
Bill 'Reforms' Constitution - "The Democrats' health-care overhaul asserts for Congress a power that the framers of the Constitution never envisioned: the power to force Americans to purchase unwanted goods or services.

With all the hype, one might think the "public option" is the linchpin of the Democratic health plan. Yet Congress has created entitlements in the past, and enrollment in a public option would not be mandatory (at least not initially).

The legislation's centerpiece is really the "individual mandate" - an unprecedented legal requirement that Americans purchase health insurance under penalty of law. The mandate is nearly universal, and without it, as President Obama admitted to a joint session of Congress, the legislation would fall apart.
. . .
The individual mandate would extend the dominion of the federal government to virtually all manner of human conduct - including the non-conduct of not buying health insurance - by establishing a federal police power that is authorized nowhere in the Constitution. Democrats will have legislated a new quasi-crime, and perhaps the sole offense in our history that can be committed only by people of a certain income, since those below the poverty line would be exempt from the mandate.

Congress' attempt to punish a non-act that harms no one is an intolerable affront to the Constitution, liberty, and personal autonomy. That shameful fact cannot be altered by calling it health-care reform"
Beyond Pleasantville - "Permissiveness is not the same thing as liberty. Permissiveness suggests a master loosening a leash, not an individual charting his own course."
"Don't send a man to the grocery store!" - Jeanne Robertson
Ask The Best And Brightest: Can Minivans Make A Comeback? - "And few automotive examples prove the inconstancy of market trends like the minivan. On paper they just plain make sense, creating a huge amount of flexible interior room out of high-volume sedan platforms, making them relatively cheap, capable and efficient. But if consumer decisions were made based on such rational considerations, turtlenecks would be long overdue for a huge comeback. In short, the 'image thing' killed minivans, with more than a little help from the marketing efforts of the very companies that profited off their (relatively) brief time in the sun. "
Yes, Obama is Getting Serious About Banks. He is Now Calling Them Bad Names! - "Today, the Wall Street Journal is promoting the curious fiction that a few harsh words from Obama to the banksters has any significance aside from its hopeful PR value.

Recall that Timothy Geithner once ventured early on to actually use 'currency manipulator' and “China” in the same sentence. China threw its usual temper tantrum and the US backed down pronto. Here, Obama’s popularity ratings are falling, so the president has stepped up the rhetoric.

But who does he think he is fooling? The UK is imposing a 50% bonus supertax to encourage banks to retain earnings rather than pay them out. Financial services is a larger percentage of GDP in the UK than the US, so it is even more important for them not to mess up banking than it is for us, and they clearly believe that curbing banker pay is a positive and necessary move, and in lieu of having a worked out policy, a stopgap measure is a good place to start. Do we see anything approaching the same resolve here? Of course not, 'resolve' is an empty word as far as Obama is concerned."

Christmas Music: I Saw Three Ships, Sting

Wireless Brain-to-Computer Connection Synthesizes Speech - "A system that turns brain waves into FM radio signals and decodes them as sound is the first totally wireless brain-computer interface.

For now, 26-year-old Erik Ramsey, left almost entirely paralyzed by a horrific car accident 10 years ago, can only express vowel sounds with the system. That’s less than can be accomplished with wired brain-computer interfaces. But it’s still a promising step.
. . .
In the last decade, brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, have made the jump from speculation to preliminary medical reality. Since Wired reported on quadriplegic BCI pioneer Matthew Nagle four years ago ('He’s playing Pong with his thoughts alone'), the interfaces have been used to steer wheelchairs, send text messages and even to Tweet. They’re so advanced that some researchers now worry about BCI ethics -- what happens when healthy people get them? And they’re concerned about the threat posed by hackers." ht MedGadget
Top 10 Homemade Versions of Things We Love - "9. Pizza Ovens. There's an entire realm of new restaurants opening on the premise that pizza baked in wood-fired ovens tastes great, and is worth the extra time and money over your favorite napkin-soaking corner joint. We're of the mind that you shouldn't have to drop a C-note to feed a family with great pizza. We started our obsession with a temporary bricks-in-oven setup, then moved on to a small but efficient backyard model. We hit our apex with stomachs growling by glimpsing at a backyard, concrete-seated pompeii oven, and then brought it all back home with an oven you can build in one afternoon."
Open source hardware 2009 - The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009 - "Welcome to definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009. First up - What is open source hardware? These are projects in which the creators have decided to completely publish all the source, schematics, firmware, software, bill of materials, parts list, drawings and "board" files to recreate the hardware - they also allow any use, including commercial. Similar to open source software like Linux, but this hardware centric.

Each year we do a guide to all open source hardware and this year there are over 125 unique projects/kits in 19 categories, up from about 60 in 2008, more than doubling the projects out there! - it's incredible! Many are familiar with Arduino (shipping over 100,000 units, estimated) but there are many other projects just as exciting and filled with amazing communities - we think we've captured nearly all of them in this list. Some of these projects and kits are available from MAKE others from the makers themselves or other hardware manufacturers - but since it's open source hardware you can make any of these yourself, start a business, everything is available, that's the point."
Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
Manolo the Columnist - "Dear Manolo,
My dear husband fancies himself an outdoorsman, and although he did plenty of hiking and hunting when he was younger, these days he mostly confines his outdoor activities to raking the leaves and long walks in the park. What can you recommend as a Christmas gift that will flatter his self-image without seeming ridiculously woodsy?
Claire"
Don’t Fence Me In - "Empires are normally associated with great cities, monumental buildings and vast tramping armies. Less well known, but perhaps as important is the phenomenon of the nomadic empire: the largest of all. By many measures the Mongol Empire utterly dwarfed Rome.
. . .
The fundamental requirement of nomadic governance was to manage problems asynchronously. To do that, the nomads created a kind of federal structure that every American would instantly recognize. Susan Alock, in her book Empires: perspectives from archaeology and history, argues that the need to manage tribal collisions, disputes over livestock and manage relationships with the settled empires, the nomads created a three tier system. At the top of the pyramid was an imperial leadership, which arbitrated tribal disputes and handled common strategy and foreign affairs; one level down were the governorships, which performed the same tribal management and strategic function at regional levels. Lastly, there were the tribes themselves: maintained with the traditional leadership and customs intact. Intuitively recognizing the principle of subsidiarity the nomads had assigned to central authority only those functions which could not be performed locally. In some ways the nomadic empires operated under the aegis of a “distributed program” in which autonomous nodes interact with each other to pursue a common goal."
Lucas wanted David Lynch to direct Return of the Jedi - "So, he took me upstairs and he showed me these things called Wookiees. And now this headache is getting stronger."
Why Southern Universities Are Not World Class - "I like the South, and American universities in the south have improved relative to national norms a lot over the decades. So the heading on this blog is a bit unfair, a gross generalization. But it is true that the very best top flight institutions of higher learning are underrepresented in the South, although I think Virginia, along with California, has the best quality public universities in the United States.
. . .
Meanwhile, at my university, which had a reasonably decent football team (9 and 4), the grown ups (trustees, alums, etc.) are all excited that we made some third rate bowl in that garden spot of America, Detroit, playing the second best school in West Virginia. We will receive a few hundred thousand dollars in revenue, and spend far more than that in bribing students and others to attend the game so attendance is not embarrassingly low. We spend roughly $15 million a year subsidizing intercollegiate athletics, probably more than we spend on some of our academic colleges. This is not unique."
NYT suggests AT&T is taking the heat for iPhone’s shortcomings - from the comments: "EVERY ATT customer I know in Chicago, DC, NYC and SF (and I know a lot, using a variety of Blackberries, iPhones and dumbphones) has HORRID reception (voice and data). I dropped over 10 calls a call some days (client calls, to boot… that was fun…)."

Senator Hatch & Stuart Taylor on the Constitutionality of an Individual Health Insurance Mandate

"If you're not prepared to be wrong, you will never come up with anything original."
"Have you ever thought of Shakespeare being 7? He was 7 at some point. He was in somebody's English class wasn't he? How annoying would that be."
-- Ken Robinson, TED, February 2006

Samak Sundaravej, celebrity chef and prime minister of Thailand, died on November 24th, aged 74 - "He was forced from power last September, by a court judgment, on the constitutional technicality that he had continued to host his cookery programme. Mr Samak hit back, of course, especially pointing out that he had been paid a mere 80,000 baht ($2,400) for doing four shows. His protests were dismissed. Much of his career had been built on hell-raising, wounding remarks. But he was deposed for saying 'Add coconut milk,' and 'Simmer for at least three hours.'"
MSI Wind U123 now shipping with Windows 7 - "MSI has released its first netbook with Windows 7, and it’s the Wind U123. In other words, it’s the exact same netbook that MSI has been pushing for the last few months, except it now comes with Windows 7 Starter Edition instead of Windows XP."
'Nexus One' Is Google's Android Phone For Consumers - "The device will be available directly from Google online, and buyers will have to provide their own cellular service. It will be sold unlocked, so that users can choose the network on which to use it. Whether those will be CDMA-based (Sprint, Verizon) or GSM-based (AT&T, T-Mobile) is unclear, though it is more likely that the device will be GSM-based to give it a wider base of possible users."

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December 15, 2009 10:17 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

January - February 2010 Legislative, Communication, and Media Training from TheCapitol.Net

Our latest email update:
http://www.thecapitol.net/PublicPrograms/email2009/email_2009_December15.html

If you don't have time to attend our live training, see our Capitol Learning Audio Courses.

TheCapitol.Net, Inc.
>> We help you understand Washington and Congress TM
>> Non-partisan training and publications that show how Washington works. TM

December 15, 2009 09:47 AM Link Training Comments (0)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 7 (Seventh Amendment)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 7 (Amendments 1-10 are known as the Bill Of Rights) (7th Amendment)

Amendment VII.

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Seventh Amendment - Wikipedia
Seventh Amendment - Findlaw

"When First My Old, Old Love I Knew," from Gilbert & Sullivan's - Trial By Jury

A free download of our Pocket Constitution is available on Scribd.

. . . . . . . . .

December 13, 2009 01:17 PM Link U.S. Constitution Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/12/09

A scene from Mr. Hulot's Holiday

Fun Biz Markie commercial for TuneUp

Research Tools and Techniques: Refining Your Online and Offline Searches, with WiFi Classroom, December 15, 2009
Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing , January 28, 2010
Update on The 111th Congress, 2010, January 29, 2010
Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, February 10, 2010
Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, February 11, 2010
Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, February 18, 2010
The President's Budget, February 23, 2010
The Defense Budget, February 26, 2010
Capitol Hill Workshop, March 3-5, 2010
Online Education and the Market for Superstar Teachers - "I have argued that universities will move to a superstar market for teachers in which the very best teachers use on-line instruction and TAs to teach thousands of students at many different universities. The full online model is not here yet but I see an increasing amount of evidence for the superstar model of teaching. At GMU some of our best teachers are being recruited by other universities with very attractive offers and some of our most highly placed students have earned their positions through excellence in teaching rather than through the more traditional route of research."
The implausible Quantity Theory - "Suppose the gold industry was a government monopoly, and also suppose the demand for gold was unit elastic. Now suppose the government monopoly suddenly doubled the supply of gold. What would happen to the relative price of gold in terms of other goods? It would fall in half, wouldn’t it? And that is true regardless of whether or not gold has any role as money. We would get a sort of “gold inflation.” Stuff would cost more in gold terms. But not in dollar terms.

Now suppose that at some point gold was no longer used for anything other than (full-bodied) gold coins. No more gold teeth and no more gold jewelry. Now what happens if the government doubles the amount of gold, say from $100 per capita, to $200? Again the value of gold would fall in half in terms of all other goods. But this time prices wouldn’t just rise in terms of gold, prices would double in nominal terms, as gold is now money. And this is true no matter how small a fraction of our wealth is held in the form of gold. "
Thoughts, from Victor Niederhoffer - "Who is the naive party in the Uncle Remus story and the market story that believes all these stories, and pays 100 cents on the dollar to forestall these terrible outcomes? "
Big Out-of-Control Government Has Had Better Days at the Supreme Court - "Two curious notes from the argument: 1. Petitioners’ counsel Michael Carvin referenced Cato’s brief in discussing PCAOB’s overreach internationally -- seeking to regulate even foreign accounting standards -- without oversight from the State Department or the SEC, let alone the president; 2. PCAOB brought its own lawyer to argue alongside the solicitor general, begging the question: if PCAOB is subservient to the SEC and/or the president, why does it need its own counsel to represent its own views?"
Zombie Buildings - "Although Corfman is discussing commercial office buildings, the same idea applies to residential real estate and loan modifications. Homeowners with significant negative equity own zombie houses - the 'owners' are really renters and will defer maintenance as long as possible."
Nothing Down Flamed the California Real Estate Bonfire: 40 Percent of First Time Buyers in 2006 and 2007 went with Zero Down in California. 4 out of 10 Purchases in California now Backed by Almost Nothing Down FHA Insured Loans. - "The no money down idea was shifted from the seedy late night infomercial crowd and became common place. We are hearing many ideas being thrown around on Wall Street and D.C. but no one will dare touch the notion that we should increase the down payment option.

I believe a big part of the housing bubble fuel was the ability for people to purchase homes with little to no money. In California, this was the accelerant that created the biggest housing bubble we have ever witnessed.
. . .
What is even more perplexing is the number of repeat buyers that went with zero down in California. In other words, people were selling their homes into the bubble and buying other bubble homes with no money. It was a Ponzi scheme that would make Bernard Madoff proud. Nothing down was a large culprit of the housing bubble. Don’t be fooled by those in the industry talking about how nothing down was somehow standard in the industry. It wasn’t. Not even close. It started in 2001 with the Federal Reserve dropping rates to historical lows:
. . .
Nothing down is such a horrible idea. First, it takes away the actual punch of a home price. If you even needed 10 percent down, buying a $500,000 home would require $50,000 saved up. That would take time and show some financial discipline. The way things stand today, you would only need $17,500 to get leverage up to $500,000. Didn’t we learn with Lehman Brothers that maximum leverage can be devastating?
. . .
The nothing down addiction is a reason FHA has now become the first time buyer choice in California."
Whacky, or Wacky? - "'It goes to show you how whacky the median price is for an indicator,' [Real estate agent Jim Klinge] said. The median, which is the point at which half the sales prices were higher and half were lower, can be skewed when buying activity shifts to varying sectors of the market."
Federal Salaries Explode - "That’s the subject of a USA Today analysis, which reveals an outrageous increase in salaries at the top levels of the federal workforce. I’ve been complaining about excessive federal pay for some time based on one set of data, and now Dennis Cauchon provides strong support for my thesis using a different set of data.

Cauchon finds that since the economy fell into recession, the number of federal workers earning more than $150,000 has more than doubled. The federal government has become extremely bloated and top heavy, even as families and businesses across the nation have had to tighten their belts. With 383,000 workers earning six-figure salaries, the government has become an elite island of overcompensated administrators immune from the competitive job realities of average families.

There are a remarkable 22,000 federal civilians earning salaries of over $170,000, illustrating that Big Government works for the benefit of well-off insiders, not average Americans. And Cauchon only looks at salaries and wages. Average annual federal benefits are more than $41,000, which pushes total federal compensation even further ahead of the private sector average."
High public sector salaries and fake pointsettias in New Jersey - "What is truly depressing is the difficulty of reining in public sector salaries. According to the Asbury Park Press the median public sector salary for New Jersey’s 398,000 state and local employees (excluding police officers) is $49,164. That’s less than the median salary for New York City’s (251,000 public employees) of $48,076. New York City has a population of 8.3 million, slightly less than the entire population of New Jersey. The highest paid public servant in New Jersey earns over $290,000 as head of the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission.

If municipalities really want to save money, take a cue from holiday cutbacks and reduce the public sector’s footprint on the local economy. It’s likely many currently public jobs can be provided by the private sector or non-profits. Lower property taxes will more than make up for missing tinsel."
Because taxpayers and creditors haven’t given enough - "'The House approved legislation on Thursday that would grant Chrysler and General Motors dealerships the right to challenge the companies’ decisions to close them in third-party arbitration.' The measure apparently has the support not only of Democratic leaders but of House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio)."
Inflationary Fears Creep Back into the Market - "Despite gold's recent plunge, yesterday's auction tells you that the bond market remains extremely worried about inflation.
. . .
It's pretty simple folks:

The bond market is scared to death of inflation. I mean who wants to hold a 30 year bond at 4.5% when inflation could rise 10% a year as we power up the printing presses?

You must also assume that the bond market presumably expects the US to continue to spend themselves into oblivion. In my opinion, it becomes increasingly obvious that we cannot eliminate all of our debt without printing out of it.

Thursday's auction was very ominous: If we cannot sell our debt, the jig is up. In my eyes, this was a warning shot across the bow from the bond market."
Politicians Investigating Leaks Sites... Not Leaks - "It was rumored recently that some politicians were going to investigate Wikileaks for some leaked documents that were posted there. The details weren't clear, and I was hoping something was lost in the translation, and they meant that the politicians would be investigating the leaks not the site Wikileaks for posting it. No such luck apparently. Three Congressional Reps have apparently asked Homeland Security what can be done about sites that post leaked documents, including not just Wikileaks, but Cryptome as well."
Stuff Journalists Like: #92 fedoras - "Like journalists themselves, nowadays fedoras are slowly fading from the newsroom, instead turning up on effeminate pop stars. However, journalists still wear fedoras, you just have to know which empty desk covered in dusty boxes to look behind.

There will sit an old curmudgeon cursing at the computer while punching the keyboard with two fingers, fedora slightly askew and whiskey seeping from the pores. This journalist may not know a blog from a RSS feed, but he makes that fedora look damn good."
The Ten Best Days of the Year to Buy a Car - "The car pricing people at TrueCar ran the stats and discovered December is the best month of the year for buying a car. Six of the ten best days fall in the last month on the calendar, with December 24th being the best of all. Walk into a showroom on the day before Christmas, says TrueCar, you can expect to get a 7.25 percent discount on the cost of the car.

The best day for scoring a deal is Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. But the December discounts run anywhere from 6.90 percent to 7.25 percent."
Season's Greetings from William & Mary - "Annual Yule Log Ceremony: Festivities will include music by the Gentlemen of the College and the William and Mary Choir and seasonal readings from different faith and cultural traditions. There is a rumor that Saint Nick will join us for the annual reading of Dr. Seuss’ "How the Grinch Stole Christmas." As in years past, everyone will receive a holly sprig to toss on the Yule log. Refreshments will be served. Those attending will be asked to contribute $1 to a campus charity drive."
The Tiger Crash - "Much like a Fed-induced credit bubble, the mainstream press has inflated a Tiger bubble. Built mostly on a foundation of tabloid-level reporting, the higher-paid 'journalists' and pundits on the food chain perform two basic functions: (1) repeat the tabloid reports, and (2) continually insist this is a major story and that everyone must pay attention.

It's easy to condemn the ethics of, say, ESPN for relying on tabloid reports, but there's clearly consumer demand for tabloid gossip about well-known celebrities. The economic question here is, Why should ESPN pay expensive writers like Rick Reilly ($2 million per year) and Bill Simmons ($1 million per year) to pontificate about a subject where the cheap tabloid reporters are at least three steps ahead of the actual story? Where's the value in paying a premium for writers who do little original reporting and contribute primarily to self-sustaining hype?

Reilly, Simmons, and their top-columnist brethren are the $3 gourmet cupcakes of modern media. Sure, they might have fancy resumes and ingredients, but they're still just cupcakes. In the long run, more consumers will get the same sugar rush from 50-cent cupcakes from the grocery store."

Cool Video: Suzuki Motorcycle Assembles Itself

1970 History and Events - "US males who turned 18 in 1970 were subject to the draft lottery.

The President of the United States was Richard Nixon."
Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
Small LDL: Perfect index of carbohydrate intake - "Measuring the number of small LDL particles is the best index of carbohydrate intake I know of, better than even blood sugar and triglycerides.

In other words, increase carbohydrate intake and small LDL particles increase. Decrease carbohydrates and small LDL particles decrease.

Why?

Carbohydrates increase small LDL via a multistep process:"
The new html edition of Tyler Cowen's Ethnic Dining Guide - "Currently my two favorite places are Sichuan Pavilion and Abay Market (you now can and indeed have to order vegetables in advance), with Thai X-ing a perennial. Komi is the 'finest' dining and Bourbon Steak is the place most likely to be better than you think."
Foodzie Lands The Man Who Invented Google Gadgets As Its VP Engineering - "Foodzie helps speciality food vendors get exposure by giving them a central online marketplace to sell their goods. Foodzie takes a cut of each sale, but the vendors are still left with more than they’d get if they sold their goods through traditional speciality food sites."
Shopping styles of men and women all down to evolution, claim scientists - "The two approaches to how we used to obtain food mirrors how we shop in modern times, the study believes.

He said women would spend hours trying to find the right outfit, present or object, because they had in the past spent ages trying to find the best quality and health giving foods.

Men on the other hand, decided in advance what animal they wanted to kill and then went looking for it. Once it was found - and killed - they returned home. " ht ALD
99 10 Red Balloons - "Earlier this week DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, moored ten, 8 ft red, weather balloons in undisclosed locations across the United States.

The DARPA Network Challenge offered a prize of $40,000 to the person or group who first identified all the locations.

The MIT Group which won the challenge used a clever pyramid incentive scheme."

Replace battery in Nike+ sensor for under $5
Or just take it back to an Apple store for replacement....

I WISH IT COULD BE THAT EASY - "The Huskies might be the Chicago area football team with the largest following, trailed by Notre Dame, Wisconsin, and Northwestern (in that order) but turnout at those Soldier Field games doesn't persuade me there's any advantage in holding games there. That student journalists and DeKalb residents are questioning the university's continued participation in the positional arms race called college football suggests to me that, pace Ms Shaw, the use of tax funds to crowd out private universities by way of big time football isn't a sensible public policy."
2009 TechnoLawyer Holiday Gift Guide: GPS PND, Earphones, and iPod/iPhone Speaker System - "The Ultimate Ears 700 do not sound as good as the triple.fi 10 vi, but they sound very good and they're also a fraction of the size. In fact, they're the smallest dual driver earphones in the world (last time I checked). As a result, they virtually disappear in your ear canal. You can lay sideways on a pillow while wearing them.

My advice? Buy the Ultimate Ears 700 for music lovers, especially those who don't want to sacrifice quality while exercising, travel frequently, enjoy listening to music while laying down, or don't want to look like a nerd."
Composer reinvents the piano - "For a non-pianist, the idea of a microtonally fluid piano might seem either no big deal or baffling. But this weekend a composer will reveal the result of a 10-year mission -- nothing less than the reinvention of one of the most important instruments in western music.

Geoff Smith believes he has come up with the first multicultural acoustic piano -- what he has trademarked as a fluid piano -- which allows players to alter the tuning of notes either before or during a performance. Instead of a pianist having a fixed sound, 88 notes from 88 keys, Smith's piano has sliders allowing them access to the different scales that you get in, for example, Indian and Iranian music. For good measure, Smith has included a horizontal harp."
Wedding Police - "News flash: Catholics are allowed to go to other churches and denominations and sit in attendance at whatever is going on there short of genuine evil and Satanic rituals. Once they avoid anything involving Ouija Boards, Catholics can trot on over and celebrate the weddings of their Separated Brethren, be they Baptist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian or Mennonites.
. . .
You've missed your window of opportunity for scolding. All that is left is to try love."

. . . . . . . . .

December 12, 2009 11:27 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

Research Tools and Techniques: Refining Your Online and Offline Searches, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Research Tools and Techniques: Refining Your Online and Offline Searches

What to do when you're told, "Find out about this!"

This course helps anyone responsible for research at any Washington-area organization, whether an agency, association, business, elected official or nonprofit. It is designed for anyone who wants to improve their online and offline searches.
Are you among the 80 percent who haven’t received research skills training? Our faculty offer a minimum of 10 years' experience in performing research in Washington.

You'll gain:

An overview of online searching, telephone and email research

A review of legislative, judicial, regulatory, factual and international research

A review of public and private information sources

Portable Wi-Fi Classroom TM You will have a "hands-on" opportunity to follow our faculty and navigate the Internet with one of our laptop computers (first 20 registrants to sign in at program). Or, bring your own Wi-Fi equipped laptop and take advantage of our Portable Wi-Fi Classroom^TM to enhance your learning.

December 15, 2009, 9 am - 4 pm

Approved for 0.6 CEU credits from George Mason University.

Where: Goethe-Institut, 812 Seventh Street NW, Washington, DC (Gallery Place / Chinatown Metro stop)

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WashingtonResearchSkills.com

December 11, 2009 08:57 AM Link Training Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Precedence"

Precedence: Order in which amendments or motions may be offered and acted upon.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook.

Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms.

Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

December 10, 2009 12:37 PM Link Tips and Terms Comments (0)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 6 (Sixth Amendment)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 6 (Amendments 1-10 are known as the Bill Of Rights) (6th Amendment)

Amendment VI.

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Sixth Amendment - Wikipedia
Sixth Amendment - Findlaw

Discussion of whether Casey Anthony, whose case was covered by the national media, could have a fair and impartial jury in any county

Discussion of whether there are any exceptions if a witness cannot be confronted.

6th Amendment, Bill of Rights, Michael Badnarik

6th Amendment Right to Counsel in Wisconsin, Jeff Murrell

A free download of our Pocket Constitution is available on Scribd.

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December 9, 2009 09:37 AM Link U.S. Constitution Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/8/09

Larry's High Silk Hat

Funiculi, funiculà sung by Beniamino Gigli

Advanced Legislative Strategies, December 9-11, 2009
Research Tools and Techniques: Refining Your Online and Offline Searches, with WiFi Classroom, December 15, 2009
Never a Recession in Washington - "For those of you worried about starving bureaucrats, politicians, and consultants clogging the streets of Washington, D.C., don’t be. Everything is fine here! In fact, there’s more money than ever to spend."
Simpson’s Paradox, from Phil McDonnell - "There is a very timely article in the Wall Street Journal that discusses Simpson's Paradox (a form of aggregation fallacy) and other statistical myths. A brief snippet:"
Vengeance - "Vengeance must be the most stupid of all the motives. It is self-destructive, devoid of insight, alarmingly lacking in compassion.
. . .
The maudlin lack of pretense, the absence of any attempt to cover up the emotions, the failure to employ self-reflection -- all this was fascinating in a depressing way."
Charitable Giving - "Like many of you, I am sure, I was impressed when I heard Goldman was going to donate $500 million to a myriad of small businesses, which are widely perceived to be the primary engines of job creation in our economy. Oh goody, I thought: half a billion bucks mainlined into the veins of those businesses best able to kick start the economy back into rude health. What a coup.
. . .
Oh great, Lloyd, that's just what every small businessman needs: an education. After all, everybody knows what the owner of a chain of dry cleaners or a machine tool factory really needs is "scholarships," greater "educational capacity," and mentoring by some half-assed social worker out of an abandoned storefront. Why stop there, though? Why not endow a hundred spots at Harvard Business School in perpetuity so Hmong immigrants can learn to apply CAPM and discounted cash flow analysis to their corner delicatessens?

Either that, or you could pull your head out of your ass and actually lend some money to these guys instead. Heck, set up a small business lender with half a billion in capital, lever it up ten to one, and loan five billion dollars out to struggling small businesses. You might actually spur some real economic growth, rather than employing an army of aspiring bureaucrats to fill out scholarship applications in triplicate. Plus, you might finally earn some respect from a country which suspects you and your peers are constitutionally incapable of taking a crap without consulting the Harvard Business Review or the McKinsey Handbook of Corporate Obfuscation for instructions." (footnotes omitted)
Resolve to Fire Better - "In yesterday's resolution I encouraged you to understand what makes your bad clients bad, and avoid taking any more like them. But what do you do with the terrible clients that are already on your books? Fire them!

Sounds easy, but the reason so many lawyers continue to serve clients they shouldn't is that it is uncomfortable/awkward/difficult/etc. to let those bad clients go -- especially early in the relationship when we know the client is a difficult one, but promise ourselves they'll improve. Sound familiar?"
LETTER TO THE EDITOR. - "I take pen in hand to protest the bill currently before the city council, no. 4241984 if I recall correctly, which would ban the use of electric carving knives while operating a motor vehicle. No doubt the members of city council all come from the leisure classes, but many of us work for a living.
. . .
The half-hour I spend commuting is the only time I have alone to carve the roast for my family. Is my family to starve because a few ill-educated drivers are not responsible enough to handle a carving knife while navigating the Boulevard of the Allies? Surely the answer lies in proper education for those who require it, rather than in depriving responsible carving-knife users of their constitutional rights."
Baucus Scandal - "Some commenters think I’m being too harsh on Baucus, given that Senatorial appointments are full of conflicts of interest, personal favors, favoritism to friends, relatives, political allies, donors, friends and relatives of donors, etc. Perhaps. But I suspect that if I knew more of what went on behind closed doors in the Senate, my reaction would not be that this absolves Baucus, but that more Senators should resign, not that Baucus should be off the hook."
Some very good (security) reasons to stay out of Facebook applications - "The problem with many of them is that they offer direct access to your personal information to the people and companies creating the apps. Facebook counts on people to give away their valuable personal information -- and they're getting what they've been hoping for. And what's unfortunate is that all of this is being figured out as the company makes decisions on the fly -- like killing off regional networks and changing the way that people have to establish their personal privacy settings."
[hack] No, I Don’t Want to Join Your Mafia - "On the list of worst ideas of the past 100 years, Facebook applications falls between filling the Hindenburg with hydrogen and Pauly Shore’s acting career. While some apps enhance the user experience, most are just fall into dumb and/or annoying categories.
. . .
Apart from the annoyance factor, Facebook applications present a security risk. Unless you specifically tell it not to, Facebook will share all of the information you put on your profile with outside affiliate websites and applications. It’s all to better target marketing efforts, but it’s an invasion of privacy. So here are a few ways to reclaim your Facebook sanity and security.

First, disable Beacon and Facebook Connect. Beacon allows third party websites to send stories about your actions to Facebook. And Connect sends your profile information from Facebook to outside applications. Without sounding too paranoid, both are essentially information-harvesting tools. By going to Settings > Privacy Settings > Applications > Settings > Select 'Don’t allow friends to view my memberships on other websites through Facebook Connect' and 'Don’t allow Beacon websites to post stories to my profile.' This minimizes the security risk associated with applications."
Requiem for the Dollar - "As it is today, dollars are piled higher and higher in the vaults of America's Asian creditors. There's no adjustment mechanism, only recriminations and the first suggestion that, from the creditors' point of view, enough is enough.
. . .
Anyway, starting in the early 1970s, American monetary policy came to resemble a game of tennis without the net. Relieved of the irksome inhibition of gold convertibility, the Fed could stop worrying about the French. To be sure, it still had Congress to answer to, and the financial markets, as well. But no more could foreigners come calling for the collateral behind the dollar, because there was none. The nets came down on Wall Street, too. As the idea took hold that the Fed could meet any serious crisis by carpeting the nation with dollar bills, bankers and brokers took more risks. New forms of business organization encouraged more borrowing. New inflationary vistas opened.
. . .
In no phase of American monetary history was every banker so courageous and farsighted as Isaias W. Hellman, a progenitor of an institution called Farmers & Merchants Bank and of another called Wells Fargo. Operating in southern California in the late 1880s, Hellman arrived at the conclusion that the Los Angeles real-estate market was a bubble. So deciding--the prices of L.A. business lots had climbed to $5,000 from $500 in one short year--he stopped lending. The bubble burst, and his bank prospered. Safety and soundness was Hellman's motto. He and his depositors risked their money side-by-side. The taxpayers didn't subsidize that transaction, not being a party to it.

In this crisis, of course, with latter-day Hellmans all too scarce in the banking population, the taxpayers have born an unconscionable part of the risk. Wells Fargo itself passed the hat for $25 billion. Hellmans are scarce because the federal government has taken away their franchise. There's no business value in financial safety when the government bails out the unsafe. And by bailing out a scandalously large number of unsafe institutions, the government necessarily puts the dollar at risk. In money, too, the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone. Debased banks mean a debased currency (perhaps causation works in the other direction, too).

Many contended for the hubris prize in the years leading up to the sorrows of 2008, but the Fed beat all comers. Under Mr. Bernanke, as under his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, our central bank preached the doctrine of stability. The Fed would iron out the business cycle, promote full employment, pour oil on the waters of any and every major financial crisis and assure stable prices. In particular, under the intellectual leadership of Mr. Bernanke, the Fed would tolerate no sagging of the price level. It would insist on a decent minimum of inflation. It staked out this position in the face of the economic opening of China and India and the spread of digital technology. To the common-sense observation that these hundreds of millions of willing new hands, and gadgets, might bring down prices at Wal-Mart, the Fed turned a deaf ear. It would save us from 'deflation' by generating a sweet taste of inflation (not too much, just enough). And it would perform these feats of macroeconomic management by pushing a single interest rate up or down.

It was implausible enough in the telling and has turned out no better in the doing. Nor is there any mystery why. The Fed's M.O. is price control. It fixes the basic money market interest rate, known as the federal funds rate. To arrive at the proper rate, the monetary mandarins conduct their research, prepare their forecast--and take a wild guess, just like the rest of us. Since December 2008, the Fed has imposed a funds rate of 0% to 0.25%. Since March of 2009, it has bought just over $1 trillion of mortgage-backed securities and $300 billion of Treasurys. It has acquired these assets in the customary central-bank manner, i.e., by conjuring into existence the money to pay for them. Yet--a measure of the nation's lingering problems--the broadly defined money supply isn't growing but dwindling.
. . .
On the matter of comparative monetary policies, the most expressive market is the one that the Fed isn't overtly manipulating. Though Treasury yields might as well be frozen, the gold price is soaring (it lost altitude on Friday). Why has it taken flight? Not on account of an inflation problem. Gold is appreciating in terms of all paper currencies--or, alternatively, paper currencies are depreciating in terms of gold--because the world is losing faith in the tenets of modern central banking. Correctly, the dollar's vast non-American constituency understands that it counts for nothing in the councils of the Fed and the Treasury. If 0% interest rates suit the U.S. economy, 0% will be the rate imposed. Then, too, gold is hard to find and costly to produce. You can materialize dollars with the tap of a computer key.

Let me interrupt myself to say that I am not now making a bullish investment case for gold (I happen to be bullish, but it's only an opinion). The trouble with 0% interest rates is that they instigate speculation in almost every asset that moves (and when such an immense market as that in Treasury securities isn't allowed to move, the suppressed volatility finds different outlets). By practicing price, or interest-rate, control, the Bank of Bernanke fosters a kind of alternative financial reality. Let the buyer beware--of just about everything.
. . .
Collateralize the dollar--make it exchangeable into something of genuine value. Get the Fed out of the price-fixing business. Replace Ben Bernanke with a latter-day Thomson Hankey. Find--cultivate--battalions of latter-day Hellmans and set them to running free-market banks. There's one more thing: Return to the statute books Section 19 of the 1792 Coinage Act, but substitute life behind bars for the death penalty. It's the 21st century, you know."
*What Works in Development?* - "Usually essay collections are of low value but this is the single best introduction (I know of) to where development economics is at today. Contributors include Dani Rodrik, Simon Johnson, Michael Kremer, Lant Pritchett, Ricardo Haussmann, and Abhijit Banerjee, among others. Even better, there are two published (short) comments on each essay, a practice which should be universal in every collection, if only to establish context."
Anchovy Fishing! - "Note the classic, 'the visionary failed because others lacked idealism' story. Meanwhile the visionary is off on an anchovy-fishing expedition."
A True Tale of Canadian Health Care--Why some patients need to go to the U.S. for surgery - "Proponents of Canadian-style health care should meet Cheryl Baxter, a Canadian citizen who waited years for hip-replacement surgery, only to be told that her operation would not happen any time soon. Instead of waiting, Baxter did what an increasing number of Canadians are doing: She flew to a clinic in the United States, paid out of pocket, and had a life-altering surgery in a matter of weeks rather than years."

The Big Discombobulation

Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector, by Benjamin Moser. - "I loved this book. She's an interesting writer with a fascinating biography, plus the book doubles as a history of Brazil and a history of Judaism in 20th century South America. This is one of the sleeper books of the year. "
The First Step Towards Getting Out of Debt - "If you’re not willing to completely stop using debt and to spend less than you earn every single month, no debt repayment plan of any kind will help you."
The Value of Ayn Rand to the Freedom Movement - "I have a favorite Nathaniel Branden quote I like to drag out every time I'm in the middle of the Ayn Rand war zone, which can be found on page 542 of my book. Branden was noting that Rand's detractors rarely deign "publicly to name the essential ideas of Atlas Shrugged and to attempt to refute them. No one has been willing to declare: 'Ayn Rand holds that man must choose his values and actions exclusively by reason, that man has the right to exist for his own sake, that no one has the right to seek values from others by physical force--and I consider such ideas wrong, evil and socially dangerous." "
What to do about an ungrateful adult child? - "If he's an adult, you're not obligated to do anything for him, he needs to do things on his own now.
. . .
You don't owe your adult child your life."
Ungrateful (Adult) Kids - "Does an adult child blame you for how their life may have turned out? Were you divorced? Too kind? Tried to be a friend vs. a strict parent? Does their attitude continually push you away? If you are a victim of an adult-child's animosity then let's talk about it to problem-solve the issue."
Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice - Video "Featuring the author, Tom G. Palmer, General Director, Atlas Global Initiative for Free Trade, Peace, and Prosperity, and Senior Fellow, Cato Institute; with comments by Tyler Cowen, Professor of Economics, George Mason University, and General Director, Mercatus Center."
Palmer and Cowen on Libertarianism - "On Tuesday I hosted a Book Forum for Tom Palmer’s new book, Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice. You can see the video here. I thought Tyler Cowen’s comments were very astute, so I reproduce an abridged version here:"
Our Present Anxieties - "But what is different from past Presidents is the serial, incessant whine of 'poor me', 'Bush did it', 'we have to hit the reset the button' with the Russians, the Arabs, the Iranians, the Europeans, etc. I thought all this would have the usual shelf-life of 6 months. But here it is nearly a year and we are getting more, not less of it. We are back to the lamentations of Jimmy Carter, who, 30 years after his disastrous leadership in 1979-80 on the Iranian hostage crisis, is still talking about how others would have done worse, and how he had saved thousands of lives.
. . .
Obama’s legacy is to reduce the word 'trillion'--which used to be a mind-boggling concept--to the equivalent of 'billion', as in a 'trillion here, a trillion there.'

There are solutions, of course. Don’t laugh: the ridiculous can become the real when the money runs out. We can furlough federal employees 1 -5 days a month. We can inflate our way out by expanding the money supply. (I started farming with 12% inflation, and 19% interest rates and 10% unemployment, and watched the price of raisins go from $1,350 a ton to $480 in a single year: ergo, anything, I learned, is possible. [There is really no 'they' who will step in and save us.])

E.g., we can default on Social Security and Medicare--as in saying 'those who make over $150,000 will not be eligible for Medicare' or have 50% of their Social Security withheld as tax. Don’t laugh, worse may be in store.
. . .
How odd that amid all the reset slurs, no one has mentioned just one thing that went well from 2001-9--not one?

What is so hard about winning wars you begin, paying debts as you go, and keeping taxes and government small? (Is the antithesis really that appealing: quit conflicts you begin, borrow every year, raise all sorts of new taxes for new questionable government expenditures?) One is a Roman republican, the other a late imperial, ethos."
Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
Who Wins Today's Godwin Award? - " Is it ... Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, talking on Capitol Hill today about health care obstructionistas?
You think you've heard these same excuses before, you're right. When this country belatedly recognized the wrongs of slavery, there were those who dug in their heels and said, slow down, it's too early. Let's wait. Things aren't bad enough.
Nope! It's old-timey media futurist Douglas Rushkoff, recipient of the Neil Postman award for Career Achievement in Intellectual Activity (no, really!) talking about--shudder--free journalistic content online:"

Safe Routes to School

Are You Thankful?

Of Course Defense Analysts Are Biased - "Funds and access aren’t the only things that encourage defense analysts to support hawkish foreign policy decisions. I would add social pressure and jobs. The hawkish consensus in DC is reinforced by social convention. Put a guy from Berkeley in Washington, and I bet his social milieu alone would drive his stated views right. Political ambition is even more important. High-level foreign policy jobs in both parties go to those within the establishment consensus. Smart, ambitious people know that. It affects their stated views early.

What irritates me about this situation is not that analysts aren’t truly independent, it is that so many insist that they are. No politics here, they say, just us technocrats. Why not just admit it? Think tanks are political, especially when they take government money. That limits what you can say."

Don Draper's Guide to Being a Better Lawyer - "One of the hottest shows the past few years has been Mad Men, a show about a 1960s Madison Avenue advertising agency. Despite the show being on the air for a few years, I only recently got around to watching. I crammed three seasons into my nightly tv viewing. Not surprisingly, I have developed a strange craving to smoke Lucky Strikes, drink whiskey at breakfast and call every woman I see 'doll face'. I find it difficult to resist the overwhelmingly urge to slick back my hair with pomeade. Though I do not recommend cheating on your spouse, getting drunk during a three martini lunch, sexually harassing everyone you see or smoking yourself into oblivion, I think the show can offer some tips you can apply to your own law practice."

21st Century Innovation: Disaster Ready Baby Carriage - "Earlier this year Samsonite invited designers to develop products that would make it easier for people to travel with their babies. One submission came from Iranian designer Pouyan Mokhtarani who suggested a pod that can be used for casual travel or even during disaster scenarios."

. . . . . . . . .

December 8, 2009 08:27 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

Advanced Legislative Strategies, 3-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Advanced Legislative Strategies

This advanced three-day course builds on the skills for those who have already learned the legislative process and basic congressional operations. In this course, participants learn how to develop high-level strategies and tactics to help educate Congress and influence legislation.

December 9-11, 2009, 9 am - 4 pm all three days.

Approved for 1.6 CEU credits from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see AdvancedLegislativeStrategies.com

December 7, 2009 08:07 AM Link Training Comments (0)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 5 (Fifth Amendment)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 5 (Amendments 1-10 are known as the Bill Of Rights) (5th Amendment)

Amendment V.

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Prof. James Duane, Regent University School of Law

Officer George Bruch, Virginia Beach Police Department

5th Amendment (pt.1) - Michael Badnarik Bill of Rights Class

5th Amendment (pt.2) - Michael Badnarik Bill of Rights Class

Fifth Amendment - Wikipedia
Fifth Amendment - Findlaw

A free download of our Pocket Constitution is available on Scribd.

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December 6, 2009 10:17 AM Link U.S. Constitution Comments (0)

Assorted Links 12/5/09

The Bohr-Einstein Debates, With Puppets from Chad Orzel.

Advanced Federal Budget Process, December 7-8, 2009
Advanced Legislative Strategies, December 9-11, 2009
Research Tools and Techniques: Refining Your Online and Offline Searches, with WiFi Classroom, December 15, 2009
Who says there's a credit crunch? - "Somali pirates are raising money through a local equity offering:"
Panel Discussion - "[Alan Nevin] mentioned that “we don’t learn” from our mistakes, and that California is a cyclical state. Traditionally there have been around 10,000 houses per year built in SD County, but this year there will only be about 2,000, and almost all of them north of the I-8 freeway.
. . .
The most powerful data of the evening was [Bruce Norris's] chart that showed that there were projections of 549,383 foreclosures to happen in California by now, but only 238,054 have happened. The shortage of 306,329 is what is haunting the market -- when will the shadow inventory hit the open market?"
A Real Fiscal Conservative - "In Washington, the term "fiscal conservative" often gets applied very loosely to people who complain about debt and deficits a lot but never, ever put any real deficit reduction proposals on the table--Evan Bayh, I'm thinking of you. Such people always say we need yet another commission to study the issue, the time isn't right, we need to wait until after the next election or better weather or whatever. So I'm pleased to call attention to a real fiscal conservative--economist Jeff Frankel of Harvard, who has put together a 10-point plan of serious, honest-to-God deficit reduction proposals. Half involve higher revenues and half reduced spending; they include entitlements as well as discretionary programs."
Guarding Obama: Photos of the president-elect's Secret Service detail. - "Obviously, over of the course of the campaign, I got to know many of the agents quite well. In fact, it sometimes felt like traveling with the 40 or so older brothers and sisters I had never wanted: They were nosy and overprotective and fun to be around. Best of all, they almost never wanted to talk politics, a quality so rare on the campaign trail that it immediately elevates those who possess it to most-favored-interlocutor status. The only thing worse than hearing the same speech over and over is hearing people talk about it endlessly at bars afterward."
Fed Chairmen Never Learn - "No matter if people agree or disagree with Bernanke, to maintain independence the Fed Chairman should not be commenting on the deficit and entitlements.
. . .
A very poor performance today from the Fed Chairman."
Gasbaggery at the White House - "Indeed, in the age of Obama, the summit has replaced the vaunted bipartisan commission as the ultimate empty gesture. Where a president once kicked a nettlesome political problem down the road by assembling a panel of bipartisan worthies to produce a report on entitlement reform, say, or how we made the mistake of thinking Saddam had WMDs, Obama now holds a confab to jawbone the problem to death."
Terrorists Within our Borders - "My ears perked up at this line last night in the president’s speech about Afghanistan. It’s one sentence that has potentially huge implications:

This is no idle danger; no hypothetical threat. In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror.

Has anyone heard about these apprehensions? Who are the perpetrators and what were they planning? This is explosive news. Am I just missing something?"
Sprint Provides U.S. Law Enforcement with Cell Phone Customer Location Data - "The odds of us ever learning the truth are probably very low."
Yes, We Can Write Our Opinions Without Contacting The Company We're Writing About First - "This happens all too frequently. I recently wrote a short post about something that was apparently happening with YouTube and soon after received an angry email from a PR person at the company first scolding me for not contacting Google PR first and then demanding that I insert some PR babble paragraph that said nothing that addressed the key questions raised in the post in 'response.' This made no sense to me. If I got something factually wrong, I have no problem having someone point out what was in error, but demanding that I first contact them and then include a meaningless statement is ridiculous. If the PR folks have something to say, they're free to take it up in our comments."
The Future of Western War - "My point here is that all of the usual checks on the tradition of Western warfare are magnified in our time. And I will end with this disturbing thought: We who created the Western way of war are very reluctant to resort to it due to post-modern cynicism, while those who didn't create it are very eager to apply it due to pre-modern zealotry. And that's a very lethal combination."
Former RNC Finance Chair pleads guilty to $1 million bribery - "Elliott Broidy, the former Finance Chairman of the Republican National Committee, plead guilty yesterday to offering $1 million bribes to officials with New York state's pension funds. In return, Broidy got a $250 million investement in the Wall Street firm he worked for:
. . .
However, Pro-Publica -- which has been doggedly covering the story -- notes that nothing has been done to prevent future corruption:"
Will Medicare cost reductions stick? - "My view is this: the aggregate data show that Medicare expenditures, as a percentage of gdp, have expanded at a healthy clip for every medium-run period you can find since 1973. I don't doubt that the future -- like the past -- may well show some shorter periods which look better than others but cost control has never worked in the past on anything but a temporary basis. Citing a bunch of short periods of time doesn't convince me; they didn't stick!"

The Continuing Drama of the Document-Swiping Deputy
What the hell?

Blackmail - "You can trust me to pay you for the information but now the problem is that I can’t trust you. You will show me only half of what you found and blackmail me to keep that a secret. Once you have your money you will show me the other half and blackmail me again. Forseeing this I won’t pay you the first time."
Light’s Out--Norwegian Cruise Descends Into Chaos! - "What an excellent case study it would have been to be aboard the Norwegian Cruise Line’s Norwegian Dawn, which lost power last weekend---leaving the ship's 2,400 passengers on board without running water or air conditioning for two days.
. . .
If we’re to believe the anecdotal evidence from agitated cruisers, I’d have to rate the level of civilization to which the Norwegian Dawn backslid over the course of five hours to be somewhere in neighborhood of the pre-Enlightenment era."
Google Now Personalizes Everyone’s Search Results - "The short story is this. By watching what you click on in search results, Google can learn that you favor particular sites. For example, if you often search and click on links from Amazon that appear in Google’s results, over time, Google learns that you really like Amazon. In reaction, it gives Amazon a ranking boost. That means you start seeing more Amazon listings, perhaps for searches where Amazon wasn’t showing up before." hat tip Midas Oracle.org
Chicago Cannibalization: Mayor Daley's Budget Eats 75% of a 75 Year rainy Day fund in One Year - "That is the sad state of affairs in Chicago. Unfortunately, Chicago is likely to respond the way it always does - raise taxes to make up for the lost revenue that stems from the city raising taxes.

Some will suggest this argues against privatization, but the reality is that it argues against a no-bid process rammed through by one person. It also argues against using very long-term funding for short-term needs."
"The 10 weirdest physics facts, from relativity to quantum physics" - "People who think science is dull are wrong. Here are 10 reasons why."
Lenticular UFO clouds and other spectacular cloud formations - "Lenticular clouds are often shaped like flying saucers, leading to people reporting UFO sightings"

What is Sarah Palin?

Follow The Bunny: Even in its heyday, Hef's magazine was a yokel's idea of sophistication. - "There has always been something faintly ridiculous about Hugh Hefner—lounging in those silky pajamas with his interchangeable twin sets of blond honeys and that erect pipe jutting from his jaw, like Popeye.
. . .
In fact, even in its heyday, Playboy was a yokel's idea of sophistication. There was, for example, the Bunny Watchers' Society, a bunch of guys in special black blazers with the Playboy logo who would sip free drinks at a Playmate Bar each afternoon while ogling cottontail cocktail waitresses and guessing their measurements.

Beneath the swagger ran a deeply unattractive misogyny. Mr. Hefner constantly proclaimed his adoration of women, but the magazine went berserk over the 'womanization' of American society, especially the dire threat of women competing with men at work. From the archives, Prof. Fraterrigo unearths a memo from editor A.C. Spectorsky, Mr. Hefner's éminence grise, to the author Philip Wylie ordering up a hatchet job on career women--'these chromium-plated, castrating, driven, vicious, unhappy, destructive, asexual or anti-sexual devouring, insatiable' menaces. Later, Mr. Hefner tried to ally himself with the feminists."
Facebook profile captures your true personality not some virtual ideal, claims psychologist - "In fact, our findings suggest that online social networking profiles convey rather accurate images of the profile owners, either because people aren't trying to look good or because they are trying and failing to pull it off."
Google Gets Into The DNS Business. Here’s What That Means - "Google just announced Google Public DNS, a new service that lets consumers use Google as their DNS service provider. The benefits to users are a theoretically faster and more stable browsing experience, and some additional security against malware type sites. The benefit to Google – tons more data, and some potential revenue.

Here are the basic instructions on how to use it (and Google has even provided phone support)."
Markets in everything: Stepford Wife edition - "Mrs. Angus and I had been debating whether Tiger's wife would leave him or stand by her man. Turns out she is planning to lease herself to him:
. . .
YIKES!"
Deposition Videos You Have To See To Believe - "You may have seen some of them before, but probably not all six unless you hang out on YouTube a lot."

. . . . . . . . .

December 5, 2009 10:57 AM Link Caught Our Eye Comments (0)

Advanced Federal Budget Process, 2-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Advanced Federal Budget Process

In this 2-day course, learn how the federal budget process really works from faculty members with years of subject-matter expertise. Study important terminology and get tips to protect your budgetary interests.
We provide a comprehensive overview of current budget politics and the federal budgeting process. So you gain the awareness and guidance necessary to increase your chance of boosting funds and minimizing cuts. Understand the budget resolution process as well as the differences between authorizations and appropriations.

Learn how to recognize various budget documents so you can use them most effectively. We will also review and discuss transparency and accountability in the budget process and OMB's tools for program performance assessment. Finally, we explore professional online budget research resources.

December 7-8, 2009, 8:30 am - 4:00 pm both days.

Approved for 1.2 CEU credits from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see BudgetProcess.com

December 4, 2009 04:27 PM Link Training Comments (0)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 4 (Fourth Amendment)

The Constitution of the United States: Amendment 4 (Amendments 1-10 are known as the Bill Of Rights) (4th Amendment)

Amendment IV.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

4th Amendment - Michael Badnarik Bill of Rights Class

U.S. Constitution 4th Amendment is Dead in America

December 2009 Archives

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net