By semi-popular request!
For Supreme Court: Suzanne Reynolds
For Court of Appeals: Jim Wynn
Kristin Ruth
Cheri Beasley
Linda Stephens
John Arrowood
Your district court judgeships are going to be different from mine, probably, from there on out. But hopefully that helps.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Monday, October 6, 2008
Yikes, the economy
Yesterday I was at Panera trying to get a little work done, and was sitting next to these four women in their forties and fifties that I just instantly disliked. They had a very aging-Valley-Girl way of talking, they laughed at jokes that weren't funny, they all looked like they'd been in their church clothes for the past ten hours because they just preferred to dress that way -- it's hard to explain, they just got on my nerves. One of them started talking about how she had put her house on the market, and she needed to make $400,000 from it -- it really sounded like she was talking about net, not gross, but who knows -- and how she just couldn't believe it, but not one single person had come to see it this weekend! The women first blamed the beautiful weather -- who would want to go outside? Then the woman talking theorized that it was because her neighborhood was full of Obama signs. She just thought that was turning buyers off. She talked about how she wanted to get a McCain sign but all they had were in Spanish (can you believe there wasn't a run on Spanish McCain yard signs?), "so they all said 'Blah blah blah McCain.'" At no point in this entire conversation did the economy, credit crisis, mortgage crunch, buyer fears, or anything else remotely plausible enter this conversation.
It's as if these people were airlifted in directly from crazytown, but I'm proud to say that I disliked them well before they started talking politics.
So anyway, on that, I just wanted to recommend This American Life for a quick and relatively easy layman's explanation of the economy. Back in May they had one on the mortgage problems that was top-notch. Better than anything else out there for explaining the situation. Now you have to pay $.95 to get it, but I think it's worth it. (If you subscribe, you'll get them free. I had it, but listened to it, so iTunes deleted it and now Josh can't listen to it. That's how they getcha.) Recently, as in the last day or two, they had another good one about the immediate causes leading up to Paulson's dramatic announcement. Just start subscribing to This American Life podcasts, is what I'm saying.
And oh yes: Just look at that gorgeous shade of Carolina blue.
It's as if these people were airlifted in directly from crazytown, but I'm proud to say that I disliked them well before they started talking politics.
So anyway, on that, I just wanted to recommend This American Life for a quick and relatively easy layman's explanation of the economy. Back in May they had one on the mortgage problems that was top-notch. Better than anything else out there for explaining the situation. Now you have to pay $.95 to get it, but I think it's worth it. (If you subscribe, you'll get them free. I had it, but listened to it, so iTunes deleted it and now Josh can't listen to it. That's how they getcha.) Recently, as in the last day or two, they had another good one about the immediate causes leading up to Paulson's dramatic announcement. Just start subscribing to This American Life podcasts, is what I'm saying.
And oh yes: Just look at that gorgeous shade of Carolina blue.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Another good point
From the lobbying arm of the Humane Society of the United States. They have never before endorsed a presidential candidate.
Just trying to help
Really, we are.
You've no doubt seen it, but Tina Fey is still bringing the awesome.
An unaffiliated, previously undecided co-worker of mine recently decided to vote for Obama. It wasn't particularly that he loved Obama, and it certainly wasn't anything I said. The reason? He found out about McCain's health care plan. The sheer awfulness of the McCain plan really deserves a lot more attention, and I think it's going to get it. There are a lot of problems with our system of employment-based health insurance, but the only thing about it that does work is that most people who have insurance, have it because of their jobs. Instead of targeting one of the many areas where health care policy fails Americans, he takes aim squarely at where it succeeds: insuring working people. To that end, I think this brochure put out by the Obama campaign is helpful at illustrating exactly what "the worst excesses of state-based regulation" really are.
Coinciding with the Obama campaign's decisions to focus on the economy and health care, McCain has publicly declared that he's going to start talking about Rev. Wright, Tony Rezko, and the Weather Underground. Says he wants to "turn the page." Back some forty-five years, evidently. The fact that there's nothing there, and there's never been anything there, and several 1,200 word articles have been run that do little but conclude that there isn't any there there, isn't going to slow him down. I appreciate the fact that he's running out of options at this point. If Sarah Palin was a Hail Mary, I don't know what this is -- tossing a midget over the defensive line? But I think the only appropriate response to a man trying to change the subject to crazy '60s radicals with no particular relationship to Obama can be nothing but: Why are you trying so hard to change the subject? I mean, if Obama were campaigning on this strategy we'd be looking at Sarah Palin's witchdoctor practicing the laying of hands and her husband joining a political party that advocates secession from the United States, no? It's some wacky stuff, no doubt, but it doesn't get anyone's bills paid. A little more context, and a more informed football metaphor, here.
You've no doubt seen it, but Tina Fey is still bringing the awesome.
An unaffiliated, previously undecided co-worker of mine recently decided to vote for Obama. It wasn't particularly that he loved Obama, and it certainly wasn't anything I said. The reason? He found out about McCain's health care plan. The sheer awfulness of the McCain plan really deserves a lot more attention, and I think it's going to get it. There are a lot of problems with our system of employment-based health insurance, but the only thing about it that does work is that most people who have insurance, have it because of their jobs. Instead of targeting one of the many areas where health care policy fails Americans, he takes aim squarely at where it succeeds: insuring working people. To that end, I think this brochure put out by the Obama campaign is helpful at illustrating exactly what "the worst excesses of state-based regulation" really are.
Coinciding with the Obama campaign's decisions to focus on the economy and health care, McCain has publicly declared that he's going to start talking about Rev. Wright, Tony Rezko, and the Weather Underground. Says he wants to "turn the page." Back some forty-five years, evidently. The fact that there's nothing there, and there's never been anything there, and several 1,200 word articles have been run that do little but conclude that there isn't any there there, isn't going to slow him down. I appreciate the fact that he's running out of options at this point. If Sarah Palin was a Hail Mary, I don't know what this is -- tossing a midget over the defensive line? But I think the only appropriate response to a man trying to change the subject to crazy '60s radicals with no particular relationship to Obama can be nothing but: Why are you trying so hard to change the subject? I mean, if Obama were campaigning on this strategy we'd be looking at Sarah Palin's witchdoctor practicing the laying of hands and her husband joining a political party that advocates secession from the United States, no? It's some wacky stuff, no doubt, but it doesn't get anyone's bills paid. A little more context, and a more informed football metaphor, here.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
The Debate Question I'd Like To Hear Asked
"Senator McCain, in 2001 you opposed Bush's plan to cut taxes on the wealthiest Americans. You opposed it again in 2003, citing the rising deficit. During your campaign, you have reversed course and endorsed the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. Our deficit is now the highest it has been in our history, and Congress is debating this week a bailout proposal that will likely add a trillion dollars to that deficit. If tax cuts for the wealthiest were wrong in 2001 and 2003, when the deficit was lower, why are they right in 2009?"
Monday, September 22, 2008
Bailout deal gets closer
It looks like the CEO pay may not be a deal-killer after all. I particularly like this line: "At the same time, conservative Republicans are beginning to publicly peel off, despite appeals from President Bush." I assume that's a typo, and should read "because of appeals from President Bush." That guy really needs to discover reverse psychology around about now-ish.
I also like how this question required a follow up question:
Pelley: In your judgment, can you see her as President of the United States?
McCain: Absolutely.
Pelley: As President of the United States?
McCain: Absolutely, absolutely.
I also like how this question required a follow up question:
Pelley: In your judgment, can you see her as President of the United States?
McCain: Absolutely.
Pelley: As President of the United States?
McCain: Absolutely, absolutely.
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