Not a puppy or a kitten, rather a Merlin XU870 HSDPA Express Card for a Dell Laptop. 3G speed on AT&T is yours for the asking, everywhere except my new home, which it turns out is a cell desert.
I now have dreaded Comcast Internet service, which is turning out to be not too bad. It would be nice to keep wireless Internet for when I’m traveling, but not $60 a month nice.
First come, first served. dave@ratherthanworking.com
Keep in mind that the plan was related to me at the neighborhood bar. Though in the plan’s defense, it was posited just after we sat down.
Here’s the deal. All these bad debts are the cause of all of these failures. So when the debt goes into default, the Feds buy it. It’s now off the books of whatever irresponsible company owned it. The Feds own it at the current payoff price. They foreclose, or develop some sort of bailout for the individual owners of the debt. The money flows slowly and at the same time this confidence garbage is assuaged.
Maybe some people lose their houses, they probably shouldn’t have bought in the first place. So they rent from the Feds, or the Feds sell the property at a market rate and the new owners are the landlords.
The banks return to a balance sheet that makes business sense. The Feds can (we can) afford to stretch out the payments, in some instances maybe profiting, in other instances losing money. But, there’s no huge influx of money that isn’t there, other by borrowing. And the equity in the properties is still there, at whatever value it has over the coming years.
Go ahead and tell Big Tony he’s wrong.
I read and heard that Obama wasn’t good at it; and, that McCain was. I read and heard that McCain was pithy and to the point; and, that Obama wandered around a subject sounding pretty.
I saw and heard the opposite. McCain hearkened back to his trips to various regions and experience in various areas of governance, never tying his visits or experience to a point, throwing in various prepared lines and talking points at inappropriate times.
Obama, other than early on in response to bailout issues (as did McCain) not directly responding to questions (that probably didn’t have an answer) ticked off his points in respose to the questions.
Interestingly, other than in defending his stance on Iraq, McCain came off as a bit of a dove, to Obama’s baby hawkish stances.
No knockout, Obama on points.
From a NYTimes.com article on the $6 billion plus in earmarks in the current budget bill, here's my favorite defense of an earmark, $800K for research on skin bumps caused by shaving:
"Senator Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri, obtained $800,000 for the Pentagon to spend on a drug treatment for a skin condition, pseudofolliculitis barbae, popularly known as shaving bumps or razor bumps. The drug is made by a small pharmaceutical company in the St. Louis area.
'The Defense Department has long recognized pseudofolliculitis barbae as a serious dermatological condition that disproportionately affects African-American and Hispanic men, and up to 33 percent of active-duty military men,' said Shana Marchio, a spokeswoman for Mr. Bond. This condition not only causes painful lesions but also 'affects combat readiness and personal safety,' by making it more difficult for men to use gas masks and oxygen masks, Ms. Marchio said."
Two minorities, military men and national defense. Hard to attack that pork.
Governor Palin, while not campaigning per the Boss’s orders, was interviewed by Katie Couric. Tell me W was not answering the question asked here. A (suspended) campaign official had to interpret her answer to provide marginal sense:
The Press Dissed Me
She also took four questions (not campaigning) at “Ground Zero,” answering one of them. Sorry, I can’t find the link again.
Seems to me she is well prepared to be a Republican Vice President.
The previous post talked in part about restoration of confidence. Here's a real life example of the level of confidence people have in our financial system.
"I'm thinking of closing a checking account and keeping the money in the gun safe, the account's only paying three quarters of a percent anyway."
John McCain has suspended his campaign until the bailout crisis is resolved. From what I've read, our esteemed Washington leaders, Dems and GOP, Administration and Congress, seem to think they can solve the crisis over the weekend.
Really?
I still haven't heard or read an explanation that makes any sense of just what is going to happen if action isn't taken immediately.
Various pols have intoned that we must act immediately to "restore confidence" in the financial markets. Whose confidence? If it's mine, borrowing another $700 billion to give to Wall Street isn't going to get it. Spending the money after less than a week of thought, based on marathon bargaining sessions between Barney Frank and Secretary Paulson, will make me even less confident.
Who's going to administer this gravy train? Some government bureaucrats? The Wall Street people that screwed it up in the first place? Maybe we can bring in the Chinese to run it, it's their money we're going to use.
What happened to capitalism? You know, let the markets do their job, in the end they will lift all boats. (Shush - we aren't going to admit it didn't work. So, don't tell anyone, but we are going to administer some more supply side socialism here. As put by several pundits, we'll monetize the losses and privatize the gains. We just won't call it that.)
Dave, wealth envy? So unbecoming of you after reading your blog these past two years. Sorry, as a peon I just lost my head there for a minute. Senator McCain - Godspeed on your quest. Spend more money like a drunken sailor (sorry about the military reference, but McCain does it all the time), if it works we're all the better for it. In the meantime, I wish they hadn't prohibited naked short selling. I'd be looking into it - if I did it in a big enough way, and failed, they'd just roll me into the bailout.
Kvatch has been doing a blog for a while now. He is not a fan of the right, in its many forms. He’s a bit more left. He’s also a good writer. Here’s what he thinks about the $700 billion we are about to spend. I find the comments about Democratic Party complicity very interesting. They all seem to be on board for the bail out.
The Crisis du Jour
Reading Doc Sardonicus at Pole Hill Sanitarium on Monday, about it being the second anniversary of his blog, got me to investigating. Turns out that Rather Than Working turned two yesterday. Here's the first post in its entirety:
"Should anyone happen upon this blog, you may safely move on. I created it about five minutes ago and I am playing with it to learn how to do this. Come back in a month or so. It will either be gone due to lack of interest or ability on my part; or, there might be something here to interest you."
My interest has flagged a few times. Some of the posts don't show the full ability I'd like. Some of what I've written hasn't been fully captivating. Other times just the opposites are true. As an aside, I find it interesting that I will really be happy with a post, and it draws no comments from readers. Other times, I throw out what I think of as a throw away, and it strikes a chord with ya'll.
As of midnight last night I'd had 21,303 visitors (that registered with Sitemeter). Big Rick says there are twenty people that read it and have nothing better to do than come back a couple of times a day. That is probably closer to the truth than I like to think about. Thanks to all twenty of you.
And, thanks for your comments and own postings. They bring pleasure to me each and every day.
So, now that I'm a toddler, we'll see if the phrase terrible twos has any meaning. Come along to find out.
I heard a news report today that says the $700 billion bailout bill presented to Congress by the Administration has a provision that makes decisions under it by the Secretary of the Treasury not reviewible by a court or an administrative tribunal. In other words, what the Secretary says, goes.
W was sick the day checks and balances in the Constitution was taught.
Why is there a rush to spend this money? Wouldn’t it make sense for either McCain or Obama to be in office as the result is going to be dealt with by one of them? Just what is going to happen if the bill isn’t passed in the next four months?
I'm ignoring the need to:
- get a four prong receptacle for the four prong dryer cord.
- start unpacking eight boxes that are covering every inch of counter in the kitchen.
- find a box that has stuff in it that I need.
- hook up the TV and home theater.
- mount the speakers on the walls.
- sign up for the dreaded Comcast.
Instead, I'm drinking coffee, listening to Weekend Edition on NPR and reading newspapers online.
The new one, that’s where I’m at. It’s been an interesting and long day.
I was up at six. Movers were scheduled for nine. Twenty after, I get a call from the dispatcher telling me that my third mover had an emergency and they were getting another guy, they’d be there “shortly.” It gets worse much worse, I’ll cut it short with, they got there at eleven, minus the third guy.
The two guys worked their asses off and did a great job.
The new furniture came at the exact time promised and looks pretty good.
DirecTV – I’ll not be enjoying it, as I can only get standard definition on the satellite I have a clear sight line to. I have to go with the dreaded Comcast.
So, cell reception here is bad, bad, bad. One or two bars on the cell phone. Edge on the wireless internet rather than 3G. I suspect this is purposeful, as I just spent thirty bucks for a month of high speed wireless though the “community” system. I may have to get the dreaded Comcast internet, though it is fast.
There’s no reception on broadcast TV, though that may be my fault, I’m not real good at hooking up electronics. So I’m listening to steaming internet, KZPS in Dallas, pretty good classic rock and Texas stuff. I won’t tell you how long it took to hook up the two little bookend speakers to the laptop so the sound is OK.
Finally, anyone know what goes in the “low humidity” and “high humidity” boxes at the bottom of a fridge? My old one had vegetable and meat bins.
Assuming you read the last post, you know I’m moving.
I’ve had cable (Comcast and its predecessors), DirecTV and Dish Network.
Dish for its own reasons will not allow me to access the satellite that I have a direct view of at the new place because I’m a current rather than new customer – the “eastern arc” satellite is only for new customers. I don’t have a clear sight to the “western arc” satellite. Stupid.
So, I’m back to DirecTV, that I liked. (I left it because when I got LCD/HD TV, it wanted to charge me for a new dish and receiver and Dish gave them to me free.)
I just now realized that I have 32 hours of saved HD programming that is going to go poof tomorrow morning. Should I stay up all night watching it?
Nope. I’m listening to Margaritaville on Sirius. Tomorrow night I’ll listen to a similar station on XM, provided by DirecTV.
Sorry Bill (a friend and an employee of one of the above named companies). No prize if you guess which.
This is untitled as it is just a quick update on a couple of things that have been happening and have been discussed in previous posts and comments.
As I type this, I’m surrounded by boxes and debris. I am absolutely amazed at how much stuff was in the cabinets in my kitchen. They are now all in eight boxes, plus the microwave, the Foreman grill, a big pot that doesn’t fit and a bunch of cleaning supplies that I will use soon.
That said, you may surmise, I’m in the process of moving. I could do a post about moving; but, you’ve all been there. All of the negatives are currently working. The movers will be here “at about nine” in the morning. The alarm is set for six at which time I will breakdown the seven miles of wire and cable that connect the electronics that, now that I am moving things around, seem, well, unseemly.
Tomorrow’s schedule starts with the movers. All of us should be in the new place about noon. The new living and dining room furniture are scheduled to be delivered after one – if any of you guys are reading this, don’t get there sooner. DirecTv will be there between four and eight.
The worst part of the move will be coming back and cleaning all of the detritus.
As to middle men, yesterday was interesting. I left home at 5:30 a.m. and got home at a bit before ten last night. Six hours of driving and nine hours of listening to a language that I didn’t understand.
I learned that most of the non-verbal things we do to make contact with each other work absent words. I learned that translators spend more time saying what I said than I did. They spend much less time saying what my foreign friends spend talking to tell me what was said by my foreign friends.
I also engaged in a cliché, giving an admired tie to the admirer (after making sure the translator said that it wouldn’t screw the deal, wouldn’t be offensive, and most importantly, after the Chairman of the new partner watched and listen to me and the new tie owner, walked over, and through the interpreter asked if I really wanted to give my tie. I said yes. Quick language, and my tie was gratefully received.
I was then invited to a foreign country to consummate the deal. I countered with a signing in Vegas, accepted with a lot of laughter. My suggestion that the first annual meeting be in Macau, met with more laughter (not by the president of my client).
Now we’ll see if we can actually paper the deal and make some money.
There's not much of a point to this post. But, I have a meeting tomorrow to negotiate a potential joint venture between my US client and a foreign company. For the first time in my career I have to have a translator. I'm wondering how that will affect the dynamics. Should be interesting.
You will be thankful that this is the last installment of the travelogue.
The jazz brunch yesterday was pretty good. Not great music, but pleasant.
I then played a couple of hours of Pai Gow. I had discovered the pleasures of playing in the high limits room on Saturday night. Up until then, I'd played on the main floor betting $20.00 a hand with a $5.00 bonus bet (do a word search for Pai Gow on the blog if you want to know what that is). The minimum bet in the high limits area was $25.00, so it wasn't much of a jump in risk. In return, though all of the dealers I ran into at Harrah's were competent and friendly, the dealers in the high limits room were more so. In contrast to the crowded and noisy main casino, it was spacious and relatively quiet. Instead of the casino's 60's and 70's music theme (think Build Me Up Buttercup at high volume over a bad sound system) the piped in music was blues and jazz at a reasonable volume). Throw in the complimentary shoulder massage and it was a very pleasant place to lose money, though I actually came out ahead there.
At about 12:30 p.m. yesterday, I came to realize that I was "gambled out." My plane didn't leave till 4:45 p.m,. but I'd had enough. I caught a cab to the airport and got lucky, getting a standby seat (first class!) on an earlier flight. Home and asleep, on the couch at 9:00 p.m.
Now, back to putting out small fires.
Yesterday, I got caught up in Pai Gow and the only thing I did in a touristy way was dinner at August, owned by the Iron Chef wannabe discussed in the last post. I know, there were better options; but, it was really good.
I am in love with the Windsor Court, if I could work out of NO, I’d move in.
I’m typing this on my balcony, sipping coffee after having read the Times Picayune, not a bad paper.
Time to pack up, attend the hotel’s Jazz Brunch, play a little more Pai Gow and head for the airport.
So, I got in late afternoon yesterday. Bumpy last few thousand feet, not too bad.
First the hotel, the Windsor Court, is very nice. Harrah’s is paying for the “room,” which turns out to be a good sized one bedroom apartment, with foyer, dressing room, kitchen, and two balconies looking towards the French Quarter. Most of the buildings are three to five stories with little apartments and gardens on top. Very swank, as Big Rick would say.
The Casino is big, predictably noisy and has 7,328 one, two and five cent slot machines or maybe 500, one or the other. I never got to play Pai Gow poker as there was only one table and it was always full. I was left with roulette.
I had dinner at John Besh Steak, adjacent to the Casino. I’m told Besh was a challenger on Iron Chef America. I assume he lost. The space is very nice, as is the service. The food, not so much. I started with corn and crab bisque. Corn was present in abundance, no crab or crab flavor to be found, the base was a soup, not a bisque. Next up was flash fried soft shell crab on a cauliflower emulsion. My first flash fried food with an emulsion, and my last. Whatever flash frying is, is does too good a job. To my knowledge soft shell crab is not tough or chewy and it usually tastes like crab. This was more like an upscale Howard Johnson’s crab plate, nicely presented.
Gambling losses are minimal and I would be ahead had I not played “Rapid Roulette.” $200 in twenty minutes.
More as the trip warrants.
As I type, I SHOULD be getting in a taxi at the NO airport to my hotel. Rather, I'm sitting in my office as just as I boarded the plane this morning the pilot announced that the NO airport had no electricity.
Interestingly, all of the other airlines show as "on time," only AirTran has cancelled two flights, mine and another one at noon. I suspect, since there weren't many people on the flight that they are putting them all on a flight late this afternoon. Much more cost effective for AirTran ;and, much more inconvenient for the passengers.
On the bright side, I have six less hours during which to lose money.
this morning, I didn’t remember what happened about 8:30 a.m. a few years back at that time. I was late getting out of the house and didn’t think about it till about ten minutes to nine, about the time I was landing at the Newark airport that Tuesday.
If you want to read about what I saw and did that week, you can go to these links:
Part 1
Part 2 -- The Sheraton Prison
Part 3 -- Other Orphans
Part 4 -- Joe's Odyssey
Part 5 -- Coming Home.
If you just want to listen to a nice song, you can go here.
And though he doesn’t read the blog regularly, Happy Birthday middle brother!
It looks like I get to lose some money and eat some good food. From Nola.com a little while ago:
"In New Orleans, there's a 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms on Thursday and Friday, accompanied by east winds between 25 and 30 mph, with gusts as high as 40."
Time to get my roulette and Pai Gow poker "skills" honed.
For the next two months victory will be a preoccupation with the candidates and a lot of us voters; though, the word has been around, been mis-used and is still being mis-used, for a few years now.
McCain is attacking Obama in ads for being willing to “lose” in Iraq to “win” in Afghanistan.
I’ve been writing this blog for, toward the end of this month, two years. I’ve done probably too many posts on the subject of the idiocy of our involvement in Iraq. Do a word search if you don’t believe me.
I’m still looking for someone, anyone, to tell me what winning, victory in Iraq, you choose the noun, means.
I am convinced that whomever is elected President, and whenever we “leave” (and that word is open to interpretation), we will lose in Iraq by any rational definition of the word.
The Kurds hate the Sunnis who hate the Shiites who hate the Sunnis who hate the Kurds who hate the Shiites. And the Sunnis don’t like the Kurds, almost missed that one.
Whether we “leave” next year, in 2010, you pick the year, the Iraqs will almost immediately go back to fighting with each other. The only difference would be that depending on what we mean by leaving, fewer of us would die.
Whenever we leave, Iraq and Iran will go back to the adversarial relationship they had back in the Eighties.
Al Qaeda? It will do what it’s been doing. The Saudis will pay off all of the players. The billions of dollars we spent and the lives we’ve lost in the last five years will have done nothing to change that.
So how do we define what we will leave, when we leave the Mideast, as victory when it will be the exact same place it’s been for the past forty or fifty years, with billions of dollars spent and tens of thousand of lives ended, with the notable exception that Sadaam is now taking a dirt nap? It's an expensive, botched hanging, nothing more.
I bitch and complain about a lot of things here. It's only right to praise when the occasional company does something well.
I ordered some wall mount speaker brackets from Crutchfield.com on Saturday at 6:45 p.m.. The site said they'd ship in two to three days. They arrived in my office today at 1:15 p.m.
Not bad at all.
Ike seems to be cooperating with my weekend plans. All of the computer projections (except one) are now heading due West towards the US - Mexico border - more than six hundred miles from New Orleans. Maybe I'll be able to lose the money I planned to lose.
Here's some "Men's Fashion" from the New York Times. The guy on the left got some of the same fabric that was used for some drapes when I was a little kid.
Ike appears to be determined to mess up my plan to lose money in New Orleans next weekend. The NOAA projection puts its eye about 150 miles SW of New Orleans next Friday at 2:00 p.m., when I’d planned to be finishing lunch at either Antoine’s or Acme Oyster.
A friend who works in disaster relief, sent me an Email saying I might be wise to change my plans. We’ll see what it looks like as the week progresses. I suppose I better make a “provisional” tee time for next weekend.
Here’s a piece today in the AJC about Bill O’Reilly sending a crew to ambush Cynthia Tucker, an editorial writer to try to embarrass her about an editorial she did about his disparate views on the fault of liberal and conservative parents when their daughters become pregnant:
O'Reilly Ambush
Here’s what Cynthia Tucker said:
Tucker Take
Here’s Jon Stewart on the same issue:
Stewart Take
I am really looking forward to O’Reilly trying to ambush Stewart, playing both ambushes, and then trying to give a no spin version of his idiocy. Maybe he can get Karl Rove on the show for his take on the issue.
It isn’t the five kids; she’d have the use of the Vice President’s mansion down the street from the White House. I’m figuring they have nannies, maids, tutors, etc. as needed. We’ll see if she fires the chef, as she said she did in the Alaska governor’s mansion, or tries to sell the daily limo on EBay.
It isn’t the daughter’s unfortunate condition and impending marriage. Let’s assume the kids are really dumb. That would just be a new second family fully in line with the tradition of other first families that embarrassed their famous parents. Various Kennedy kids. Billy Carter. The Reagan brother whose name I’ve forgotten. Reagan’s kids that he was embarrassed about, though for no good reason. The current Bush kids that did some of the stupid things that kids do. The list can go on.
It isn’t her insignificant “executive experience.” If you compare the four candidates, she has the most, as minimal as it is.
It isn’t even that she was for “earmarks” before she was against them. I don’t like earmarks; but I understand that they are a reality in politics.
It isn’t because she didn’t write the speech that she delivered last night. (The guy that wrote most of it has been writing Republican speeches for quite awhile now.)
I won’t be voting for Senator McCain and Governor Palin because the great majority of what they want to do is not good, from my point of view.
Governor Palin made a joke in her speech last night about Obama wanting “terrorists” to have their rights read to them. She apparently doesn’t think the pesky first ten amendments to the Constitution mean much. My view is that no one accused of something is ”it” until a real court says they are. In my view, our government should treat people the way I would want to be treated, which doesn’t include being put on ice for years without the ability to get to a court. Governor Palin seems to have a lot in common with the current VP, Dick Cheney. Former Attorney General Gonzales. W. I find it interesting that other than Senator McCain’s insistence that we need to hang out in Iraq until we “win,” whatever that means, he actually, probably, isn’t Bush incarnate. From what she said last night, she wants us to think that she is.
Then there’s the pro-life or anti-choice stance, whichever version you prefer. If I were in a position having to consider whether to undergo an abortion, I probably would choose to preserve the life or potential life within me. But, I cannot understand someone that wants to, indeed, demands the right, to make that choice for someone else.
Guns. Great photo ops those dead beasts and drawing a bead with soldiers standing around are. If it were up to me, I’d restrict them as much as the current Supreme Court will allow. I know, if you ban guns, only the criminals will have guns. How about if you change what the real economic price of a gun is? Absolute liability for the manufacturer of a gun used to injure or kill someone. How many S&W’s, Glocks, etc., and at what price, will be sold? Over time, the current supply dwindles. Fewer accidental and intentional deaths. Not rocket science, not constitutional law, just, to my mind, common sense. (Read some economic law stuff from Judge Posner from Chicago, a conservative federal appellate judge. He might well be a Republican.)
Let’s talk about foreign policy. Governor Palin jabs at Senator Obama for being willing to talk to heads of state that oppose us without setting pre-conditions. We’ve had seven and a half years of a cowboy president that threatens and doesn’t talk, to no avail. The cold hard fact is that this is not 1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990 or 2000. America is the lone “super-power” in a military sense, in the world. Use of that status, without the necessary concomitant of economic and moral super-power status in unavailing. Here, Governor Palin joins Senator McCain in playing big dog. “Victory in Iraq is in sight!” Bush has spent two terms redefining victory with McCain at his side. Palin makes three. Please tell me what a win means.
There’s more; but, you might see it’s clear that Governor Palin and I don’t agree on a lot of things. She seems to be Senator McCain with some charisma. Bad views, well spoken, do not a Vice President make.
I invite you, my conservative readers, you know who you are, to tell me I’m wrong in my views. Humor and glibness are welcome, accompanied by reasoned analysis.
You aren’t. I just switched, for now at least, to Firefox as a browser. I also thought I’d “subscribe” to some of your blogs. I’ll be damned if I can figure out how to do it. I did subscribe to a few sometime back and have now added them to my homepage; but, other than cutting and pasting each of your urls into the “subscribe” pop up, which I’m not going to do, I can’t figure it out (I haven’t tried really hard). So, how can I select the blogs from my blog folder in Bookmarks and send them en masse to Google Reader?
And, the Firefox experiment may be ending as when I tried to upload this post to Blogger, I got a bunch of garbage in the typing box and a big red ERROR above it. I'm entering this from IE7.
I will be eternally grateful for your advice, or at least for a week or two.
I hate light or bright blue ties, be they worn by Republicans or Democrats.
I've been watching the GOP convention for a couple of hours. There have been three black people that I've seen. No Asians. Some big hair, male and female.
I saw President Bush speak.
I'm not a Republican.
As you know, I'm not a member of a political party. Were I to join one, it would probably be the Democrats.
I just watched a video played at the Republican convention that was a tribute to a Navy Seal who dropped himself on a grenade, killing himself and saving two of his team members. Gripping. He is a hero. The video said nothing about Michael Monsour's politics. Some guy named Swindle just thanked him for his sacrifice, a member of his family is apparently a Republican and was there to receive the thanks.
What does this have to do with who should be the next President?
I'm watching FoxNews (sorry Fermi) and just saw George H.W. Bush walk into the arena. He's gotten old and infirm. Don't like his son and didn't have much use for H.W. politically; but, I never disliked him personally. I just realized that if W and I get to the point where I see him walking stiffly and infirmly, I just said I'd be happy. No I wouldn't.
Maybe there's a point that we can all just get along.
This morning, I remembered that I had a Netflix DVD in the home theater. It was in slot one of five. The other four opened easily, just not number one.
I won't bore you with how I got it out; but, as of about ten minutes ago, I think I broke it. I'm listening to TV sound as the ht box won't run the speakers.
So, I'm not going to spend what a BluRay costs. Any ideas on what to buy to play CD's and DVD's and run the speakers?
The title of the post may, or may not be appropriate, we’ll see.
This morning, rather than going to a parade, I went to the golf course. Probably more in tune with today’s country than I would like.
Then, I watched Hurricane Gustave thankfully fizzle it seems.
Now I’m watching what is passing for the Republican convention. I think the GOP did the right thing to downplay the politics; but, as the storm doesn’t seem to be a real threat, their appeal that they are “Americans” seems a bit flat. They played what seemed to be a good bet and lost.
Four Republican Governors who stayed in their states did video speeches, all acceptable, except for Rick Perry of Texas who inferred that only Republicans could have dealt with what turned out to be a Category 1 storm. Brownie, Chertoff (the first time around), George W and a few others would belie that view.
Then there was just Laura Bush and Cindy McCain. They spoke for a minute or two each and asked us to send money to the Gulf Coast states.
Just now, Senator McCain’s campaign said that he knew that Governor Palin’s daughter was pregnant when he selected his nominee. My thought is that Senator McCain showed quite poor judgment, not for choosing Governor Palin (though I think it was a bad choice for a number of reasons), rather that he knew of the bombshell and didn’t put it out in the open from the start. Lots of drama for no good reason.
To end on the title, we have labor and we have ownership. I don’t think it’s a good idea to focus on either. Each of us brings something to the table. The minute we focus on adversity, be we on the leveraged side or the downside, we miss a bet.
Enjoy your labors and your leisure. It won’t be long till Columbus Day is here.
