John McCain & 100 Years in Iraq

Hendrik Hertzberg, of the NewYorker puts it elegantly:

McCain's wants to stay in Iraq until no more Americans are getting killed, no matter how long it takes and how many Americans get killed achieving that goal—that is, the goal of not getting any more Americans killed. And once that goal is achieved, we'll stay.

The key word here is "stay"....stay no matter what and then stay longer.

Money Laundering by Clinton and McCain

Tom Friedman points out the obvious in todays NYT.

This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. What a way to build our country.

When the summer is over, we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit.

. Actually, this is just John McCain and Hillary Clinton pandering for votes by offering a bad idea, a gas tax holiday, that people unthinkingly accept as good for them.

Here is the problem as Friedman points out. The USA has no energy strategy. We haven't had a realistic energy strategy for almost thirty years.

Here is something I didn't know.

While all the presidential candidates were railing about lost manufacturing jobs in Ohio, no one noticed that America’s premier solar company, First Solar, from Toledo, Ohio, was opening its newest factory in the former East Germany — 540 high-paying engineering jobs — because Germany has created a booming solar market and America has not.

Isn't this strange? It's an instance where we can increase home grown energy supplies and increase numbers of high paying jobs at the same time. But we don't do it. Is there more sun in East Germany than in the USA?

True, you can't run a car on the sun. But you can run a car on energy produced from the sun when it is used to dissociate hydrogen from water.

Conservatives and liberals alike believe a gas tax holiday is a bad idea and is not a solution to high gasoline prices. Do you think the media will pick up on the pandering by Clinton and McCain or stick with the Wright/Obama relationship story?

Snow and 34 degrees

Weather at my house is back to winter.

Federal Gas Tax Holiday

How about that Federal Gas Tax holiday that Clinton and McCain are recommending for this summer? My conservative friends keep reminding me that the price of gasoline is dependent on supply and demand. The capitalist system is working just fine. Decreased supply of a product leads to increased price. So what happens if gasoline is made cheaper by a Federal Gas Tax holiday. People will buy more gasoline and the price will continue to go up. Oil companies make even more profit and badly needed Federal tax revenues go down. Or am I missing something?

Democrats in the Ring

Want to beat the crap out of Hillary (or Obama)? Just go here and have at it.

A Few Questions

My free 60 day subscription to Norton Anti-Virus runs out in 9 days. Should I chuck out $40 to renew it or go with a free version of Avast Anti-Virus? I really like using free software when possible. I use OpenOffice for all my word processing and "powerpoint" needs and I've had zero problems with it.

Speaking of free software, I've been using Firefox instead of Internet Explorer. Really, I have nothing against Microsoft but it seems all the real cool, "in-the-know" people use Firefox. It is supposed to be more secure. But Blogger doesn't work well with Firefox. Why is that? I haven't had a problem with any other websites when using Firefox.

Aren't you glad it's raining in the Adirondacks right now? Maybe we won't burn down after all and my well will continue to pump water.

Lastly, why do bunny rabbits love having their head and nose rubbed so much?

North Country Credit Card Breach

Several people who have shopped at http://www.wisebuysstores.com/news.phpWisebuys in Northern NY have had their credit cards breached. This according to the Credit Union Journal:

The victims are believed to have shopped at WiseBuys department store in December, according to Scott Wilson, president of SeaComm FCU, which has had 19 members complain of unauthorized transactions.

The credit union, located on the Canadian border, has notified 250 members who shopped at WiseBuys of the possibility that their accounts have been breached, said Wilson .

SeaComm was alerted to the situation by the New York City Police Department, which notified them they had a counterfeit credit card with the credit union’s identification on it. To date, approximately $9,200 has been charged on the credit union’s cards in greater New York . “We started investigating these disputed transactions on our own and filed a complaint with the local police,” Wilson told The Credit Union Journal Friday.

As much as $100,000 of goods have been charged on area institutions, he was told by police. “It’s much bigger than we thought,” he said. “Other financial institutions have been impacted.”

This post is not meant to hurt Wisebuys, a local department store. I've never shopped at Wisebuys but I love their new owners Hackett's. Hackett's is at least 100 years old and they are everything a department store should be. They are not the cheapest (nor the most expensive) but they only sell quality.

Learn About the World

It's 20 minutes long, but here is an opportunity to learn a bit about the World. Really nice graphics.