Arsenal Comes Through

Arsenal won the key game today beating Roma 1-0 at home. They were the only team of eight playing today in Champions League match ups to win. The fact that they scored only 1 goal will put pressure on them in Roma, but they only need to play for a 0-0 draw. This is one of the unfortunate things about how the games go. Now if they could only move up past Aston into fourth place in the Premiership.

They Don't Make Protests Like They Used To

Some NYU students were occupying a cafeteria to protest Israel's attack on the Gaza Strip. Today the administration finally said enough is enough. Pretty pathetic if you ask me. Now you see the violence inherent in the system.

Interesting Tax Proposals from The Strata-Sphere

One of the blogs I read regularly is The Strata-Sphere. Today he has some interesting proposals on taxes and sharing the pain of the current economic conditions. They make too much common sense, like cutting the capital gains and business tax, to ever be implemented. They are though worth reading and thinking about. He proposes that nobody under 18, or 25 if in college, pay medicare or social security taxes. These people if they get a better education will make up the few years of non-payment and their extra income will help pay for school as well as put money in the economy. He also proposes that all people pay some sort of income tax, even if it is a moderate amount. We have a constant fight about that in Alabama as basically the system has been updated so that the highest tax bracket starts at about 18K. I never have been a fan of the Earned Income Tax Credit, and this would probably be one way to end it. Anyway, read his post here and see what you think.

Raiders Do the Right Thing

The Raiders signed Nnamdi Asomugha to a three year contract. This is the best thing they have done in a long time. They avoided franchising him for a second year and will keep him until 2011. For the last two years he has been their best player. Now if they could get some lineman and receivers.

Intellectual Humor

I only claim to be an intellectual (I am really a snob). I love this quote though from Professor Paul Gottfried: "Cultural illiteracy, like the French Left in 1919, constitutes a consistent whole."

This Sounds Like A Bad Monty Python Skit -

This has to be made up as there is no way this is true? Local Muslim leader who founded cable channel to build trust between Muslims and mainstream America arrested for decapitating his wife. See Newsbusters.org for the story.

Altavista Lives

Altavista was an early search engine and like many of them has been subsumed by google. I didn't even know it was still around but when I was checking the traffic for defenseprocurementnew.com my website on defense contracting I found two hits from it there. Pretty neat!!

Newsweek Pulls A Spinal Tap

Spinal Tap on their tour in the movie moved to smaller venues over the big arenas because their manager said they had become more exclusive. Newsweek is using the same excuse. I guess the same old liberal claptrap is more exclusive now.

The Growing Divide Between the State and the Public

The San Jose Mercury News has an interesting article about how regular Californians are reacting to the furlough twice a month of state employees. Let's just say that most people would prefer to have a job even though you miss two days a month without pay. The interesting thing it does is compare the average salary of a state worker, $63 K a year, with the average resident, $56 K. It also points out that the state pays $25 K a year in benefits for the average state worker. These are just averages as there are plenty of people in both groups who make a lot more then this. It does highlight though that if the downturn continues there might be more schisms between those without jobs and those with "gummermint" ones.

My Teams Move Forward

Arsenal after the longest time and breaking Wenger's habits of no January signings get Arshevin in the fold. He better propel them past Villa or it will be a long off season. He is only getting about $160,000 a week to do this.

Raiders kept Cable which makes sense as they were off hiring coordinators and such before the head coach. He was decent filling in for Kiffin, who I still say shouldn't have been fired. If they can get a stud wide receiver and work on the lines then they might see 8-8 next year.

Someone in the UK Gets It - The Government Has Decided What You Want for Too Long

This article at The Daily Telegraph describes the different responses of EU countries to the world's economic downturn. The point is that due to EU rules on labor movement there is little a country can do to protect native jobs from being undercut by the importation of cheaper labor. One of the arguments of the conservative side in the U.S. at least is that if you let Government take responsibility for everything they will then end up deciding everything for you. You want cheeseburger? Not good for you, sorry, have a carrot instead. A commentator to this article, geoffthereff, writes:

"Has the day finally arrived when the politicians discover that what they thought the people needed is not what they actually want." (sic).

Unfortunately, I doubt it in the U.K. or in the U.S. The ruling, political elite thinks they know what is best in the U.S. but then doesn't live by the rules they want to force on the people. See Al Gore, Tom Daschle, President Obama, and so on for recent examples.

This Used to Be A Good Thing..

For as long as I can remember the media and politicians have complained about the low savings rate of Americans. Now that the economy has collapsed and requires spending to save it the more we put in our bank accounts hurts the economy. Why doesn't the Federal government spend $800 billion by giving everyone a credit card with $2500 on it and let them by useless electronics items.