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Monthly Archives: March 2008

Overreacting

Monday, March 24, 2008

Things are getting a bit fevered out there: You know, it strikes me that the best way to really restore sanity and a measure of stability to the mortgage industry is to ensure that the people most harmed by predatory lending practices, who were on the receiving end of extraordinary dubious financial advice which has, […]

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In which I beat several dead horses

Monday, March 24, 2008

From this Morning’s Times: “The news business is something worse than horrible. If that’s the future, we don’t have much of a future,” Sam Zell, who bought the Tribune Company last year, said recently in The Baltimore Sun. The Tribune Company, and therefore Sam Zell, owns the Hartford Courant. Years ago I heard a story […]

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“Moving paper fantasy” hits real wall

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Last month I mentioned an article I read about “credit default swaps”, another off the books sort of financial chicanery that might be lurking in the background ready to cause financial havoc. These are, as best as a I understand, freely tradable credit “insurance policies”, which, for the holders, amount to bets that insured loans […]

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Friday night Music-Woody Guthrie

Friday, March 21, 2008

I’ve made it a rule to avoid this type of video, in which there’s actually no video, but most rules are made to be broken. It being Good Friday, this song seemed to be appropriate. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDS00Pnhkqk[/youtube]

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It’s time for her to go

Friday, March 21, 2008

Josh Marshall links to this article at the Politico that argues that the press has been complicit in pushing a narrative that Hillary Clinton still has a chances to win the nomination. In this morning’s Times, even that narrative appears to be crumbling. Bill Richardson’s endorsement is likely the first in a cascade of endorsements […]

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Today’s Comic

Friday, March 21, 2008
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Happy Good Friday

Friday, March 21, 2008

Today we observe Good Friday, on which the believable events of the Easter myth took place. It takes no stretch of the imagination to believe that a person with a revolutionary message like Jesus’ would be executed. As for the rest, well return from the dead is a bit hard to swallow, Richard Nixon’s political […]

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The news, 21st Century style

Thursday, March 20, 2008

This morning’s Day (I couldn’t find the article on-line), on page A-3 (not the Entertainment section), contains a short AP article reporting the latest developments in American Idol. The doings on the TV show are reported as straight news. We are informed that a contestant that one of the judge’s didn’t like has been voted […]

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Vidal gets in the last word

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Old enmities die hard. Gore Vidal takes a swipe at Newsweek for sullying his reputation in the course of burnishing that of the loathsome William F. Buckley. It’s worth reading, if just for the prose stylings, though it appears to suffer from a lack of editing. I’m old enough to dimly remember the debate to […]

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Thirty and counting

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Today my wife and I celebrated our thirtieth anniversary. I’m none the worse for wear. At least I don’t feel the worse for wear. That’s not really so surprising since I’ve spent those years married to her. What’s amazing is that she’s also held up remarkably well, despite spending thirty years married to me.

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