No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for July 13th, 2009

Server issues

by @ 22:40. Filed under The Blog.

Sorry about that; something odd happened to the php server. I basically ended up nuking the entire php handling routine.

Made For Media Theatre

by @ 10:13. Filed under International relations.

One of the main headlines through the weekend was that the CIA had held secrets from Congress and that Vice President, Dick Cheney was responsible for the “cover up.”  After 3 or 4 days of hyperventilating about “another Cheney cover up,” we now get information about what was “covered up:

The Central Intelligence Agency had a secret plan to capture or kill Al-Qaeda operatives

Oh my gosh noooooooo!  Tell me it isn’t sooooooooo!  We were actually planning to kill or capture Al-Qaeda and Dick Cheney made sure the CIA didn’t tell anyone?

Leon Panetta was so outraged by the program that he immediately terminated the program.

Leon, have you covered this program with President Obama?

President Obama ‘orders Pakistan drone attacks’

If not, you may want to think about doing so:

US drone attack kills 45 militants in Pakistan, officials say

A suspected US drone killed at least 45 Pakistani Taliban militants on Tuesday when it struck after a funeral of an insurgent commander killed earlier in the day, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

‘Cause someone ain’t getting the message!

Just What Is The Story?

by @ 9:23. Filed under Economy, Taxes.

From the Boston Globe:

Governor Deval Patrick yesterday accused Zoo New England officials of creating a false and inflammatory scare with their warning that state budget cuts may force them to close two Greater Boston zoos and euthanize some animals. 

“As a supporter of the zoo and a parent who has visited often, the governor is disappointed to learn that Zoo New England has responded to this difficult but unavoidable budget cut by spreading inaccurate and incendiary information,’’ Kyle Sullivan, a spokesman for the governor, said in a statement.

emphasis mine

Deval Patrick is concerned about a taxpayer supported entity portraying catastrophic options as solutions that would blackmail additional funding from those same taxpayers.  Really?  This is news?

How many school district funding increase requests have been bow tied with the threat of larger class room sizes if the request is turned down?

How many municipality funding increase requests have been bowtied with the threat of fewer police or fire staff if the request is turned down?

TARP and the Stimulus package were sold with Presidents and politicians telling us that the US economy would melt down without their passage.

“Inaccurate and incendiary information” is not a news story.  When working to get more taxpayers dollars for some beuraucrat to spend, “inaccurate and incendiary information” is not only normal, it’s action item number one!

All Communication All The Time

by @ 5:05. Filed under Economy, Politics - National.

One of the major difficulties of the Bush administration is that it seemed that they wouldn’t talk to anyone.  Oh, I don’t mean the innocuous daily press briefings or the occasional sound bite as President Bush dashed off to a helicopter or another meeting of some sort.  What I’m referring to is that regardless of the topic, the Bush administration never seemed to expound on or explain themselves.  Time after time we would see the Democrats, the press or even the Republican members of Congress question, challenge or press an administration strategy and invariably, the administration would respond with something akin to “no comment” or “trust us.” 

Enter Obama.

There aren’t many things I can give Obama credit for but one thing is undeniable; the man knows how to communicate.  Unlike President Bush, President Obama is talking all the time about all the things he wants to do for America.  Not only that but President Obama has numerous members of his administration out talking all the time about how they are doing.

As an example of the Obama administration “all communication, all the time,” look at these insights:

First, Joe Biden telling us “the economy was much worse than we expected!”

Second, We have Larry Summers telling us “the worse is not over:

Onward, then, to the toughest economic challenge Summers faces today: the recession. Here, Summers turns sombre: “I don’t think the worst is over … It’s very likely that more jobs will be lost. It would not be surprising if GDP has not yet reached its low.

Things don’t sound so good if we listen to Biden and Summers.  If we listen to these spokespeople for the Obama administration we may want to find a comfortable spot to start practicing our economic fetal position.  But wait, let’s listen to President Obama:

“We’re moving in the right direction,” Obama said. “We must let it work the way it’s supposed to, with the understanding that in any recession, unemployment tends to recover more slowly than other measures of economic activity.”

Yes, Obama and his folks are talking all the time about all kinds of things.  However, not only do they have a problem of conflicting with one another they even conflict with themselves:

The administration admitted it has been on a “learning curve” with the stimulus package, but that it has figured out how to spend some of the available billions more quickly.

Many tax cuts have already taken effect. But only $60.4 billion of the remaining $499 billion has been spent. Most of the money was always likely to be spent this summer, at the earliest, as departments wrestled with the increased workload and new requirements imposed by the bill.

The White House said it isn’t changing its goal of spending 70% of the funds by September 2010. But amid unemployment worries, the administration has been pressuring agencies to get some money out the door more quickly.

Huh, working as it should versus we need to spend quicker because unemployment is a problem.  Well, which is it Mr. President?

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