Quiznos makes promises they can't keep

Cheapskate Quiznos Corporate gave away a million subs. Except, apparently, they made their franchisees give away a million subs, without reimbursement, and the franchisees decided they didn't want to participate. So yours truly got to make a trip to Quiznos for nothing.

The sign above first blames "Customer Abuses" but later admits that they are not getting reimbursed.

Cheapskate Corporate! Shame on you.

Chimp cartoon critics miss the point in two ways

First off, the "controversial cartoon" which has people up in arms. Imagine the outrage that some one would compare a a chip to our President (who happens to be African-American.) Uhhh... listen up people: it compares a monkey to CONGRESS. President Obama didn't write the stimulus bill, Congress did. Strike one.

And second, if it WAS comparing the chip to Obama, certainly there is plenty of precedent for comparing presidents to chimps and that raised little protest. Comparing chimps to Presidents is the American way!

Strike two.

So, people, all I have to say is "get over it and let's move on, nothing to see here folks."

Al Gore compares himself to Galileo

Al Gore gave a speech to schoolchildren just before the Inauguration of Barak Obama. He compares his claims regarding global warming and it's rejection to why "older people" rejected Galileo's claims.

He compares the certainty of global warming with the certainty of astronomy.

"When I was your age and the civil rights revolution was unfolding, and we kids asked our parents and their generation, 'Explain to me again why it's okay for the law to officially discriminate against people because of their skin color?'

"And when our parents' generation couldn't answer that question, that's when the law started to change. There are some things about our world that you know that older people don't know," he continued. "Why would that be? Well in a period of rapid change, the old assumptions sometimes just don’t work anymore because they're out of date," Gore said.

tranlation: Your parents don't get it. You do. You're smarter than your parents! They think it's OK to dump tons of pollution into the atmosphere. You know better. Global warming is as certain and as sure as the earth rotating around the sun, and anyone who disagrees is as dumb as the people who rejected Galileo.

A very clever speech, given to young people not quite educated enough to dunk it. The indoctrination of our youth continues. Who will call Al Gore to account?

Listen to a recording of the speech here

King 5 - in the tank for Obama

How much is King 5 TV "in the tank" for Obama? Well, it's hard to prove without a way-back machine. Their Web article

Puget Sound residents react to inauguration

had some comments posted -- not outrageous, just two people who were less than totally enthralled with their new president. And now those comments are gone. And the comments button doesn't work. No comments being accepted.

Too bad they couldn't stand to actually have dissenting views publicly posted. At least they're fair. Now NOBODY can comment on the story.

Why getting out of the current economic downturn isn't as easy as saying "spend"

The recent economic problems, their source and interrelation seem to be so obviously connected, yet so far I haven't seen any pundits make the connections.

Fact: over the last few years, house prices have risen, and people have been capitalizing on the increase in value with second mortgages, or refinancing entirely and pulling out some cash. That money was used to purchase all kinds of goods, including cars, vacations, horse-back riding lessons, and, of course, 50" Plasma TVs.

People were also expanding their other lines of credit: VISA, MasterCard, and store lines.

Now that the house price bubble has burst, and the ARM loans have adjusted, people have no more source of ready capital to borrow, and must live within their means. Some people, saddled with debt they cannot re-finance, must live below their means as they attempt to service that debt.

The past economic boom was all financed with debt. And that game is over. Telling people to "spend" is not going to solve the problem, they have no money to spend, and they can't even dip into their "debt reserve" to refill their wallets, because nobody is willing to loan them one more dime. Their cards are maxed out, and as they pay them down, the credit companies are going to lower the limits on those cards to reward them.

Winter babies are dumber because... well we don't really know

USA today features a story regarding why babies born in winter show less education, and earnings and generally are losers. http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-12-22-winter-babies_N.htm

A large body of research suggests that, on average, winter babies grow up to be less educated, less intelligent, less healthy and lower paid than people born in the spring, summer or fall. Scientists have blamed the winter babies' woes on everything from the weather to age cutoffs for school.

And now, a pair of University of Notre Dame economists have come up with an explanation they say could account for half of the discrepancy observed between winter babies and babies born during the rest of the year: Mom.

Then they go on to try to guess why... and guess and guess. Prom babies. Sperm counts. Poor peple don't have air conditioning, that's what it is!

Studies like this give me fits. I guess social researchers have to do something to earn their pay, but I just call bullshit on this. Get your story straight before coming out in public, OK?

Oh, in case you were wondering. I'm a winter baby. And a number of other people I know are winter babies too, and only one of them is really somewhat questionable. The rest are smart, upscale and "normal" people.

Leaning tower of snow

We had lots of snow here recently. And then it snowed again. And then it snowed some more. I made a big pile on the deck and then started adding to it until it was a big snow column. Very boring.
It started leaning over due to some weak snow layers, and I got the idea of making the "Leaning tower of Pisa" in snow. It should be taller or thinner but it's got the lean down pretty well. I don't expect it to last much longer, the lean rate is accelerating.

Click on the picture for a better view.