The silence is deafening.
Forecast: Take a raincoat, wear galoshes and carry a big stick.
Home Stretch: Sales of existing houses increased 7% in April (m/m) as realtors rushed hapless buyers into houses as the deadline neared for the 8% tax credit. The inventory of unsold houses increased by 2.7% y/y – the first such increase in two years. So while sales were up, supply was up even more. The percentage of mortgage delinquencies declined, possibly suggesting that the supply of folks in over their heads is dwindling. Gotta be a bottom to the barrel somewhere.
Quoted: Yes, Big Oil owns the US government, but why are all the other governments in the world simply standing by while a private corporation destroys a major ecosystem in the name of free market capitalism?
Fat of the Land: It's not only access to healthy foods that is an important factor in obesity, it's the cost. Research shows that the determining factor is not proximity, but cost, with 6 out of 7 shopping for food outside their immediate neighborhood and driving three times as far to save money on groceries. Thus it is the groceries chosen (and their cost) and not just the proximity, as had been previously believed.
Headline Only: “Arizona Cracking Down on Teachers with Heavy Accents.” They are especially wary of Sveedisch und Jerhmin. Meanwhile, The governor used a frog puppet to explain the immigration laws. The frog did not have an accent.
Pick-up Line: Topi antelopes will lie to females in heat, claiming there are predators in the area in order to keep the ladies around long enough for a roll in the hay. Not all the liars work on Wall Street.
Crime Pays: For the non-violent misdemeanor crimes of trespass, obstructing an officer, conspiracy to trespass, and littering, two environmental activists who were arrested while protesting mountain-top removal coal mining have been ordered to pay $100,000 each. It was the littering that was the last straw.
Spukhafte Fernwirkung: Even though “spooky action at a distance" bothered Einstein, quantum entanglement is here to stay. Chinese researchers have demonstrated 'teleporting' information between two photons some 16 km distant – with no apparent mediator for the interaction.
Photo Finished: Police in Maryland are arresting folks who videotape them making arrests and beating suspects and such. It is illegal, in Maryland, to record private conversations without consent of both parties involved. The MD AG says that means you can't film the cops, even though they can film you.
Bedtime Story: About 13,000 years ago, our ancestors populated the New World and helped depopulate it of mammoths and other megafauna. The atmosphere noticed the absence of the methane the herbivores spewed from both ends – and that absence probably helped bring on the prolonged freeze known as the Younger Dryas.
1 comment:
With regard to the environmental activism bail story, you are, I presuming, being sarcastic about "littering" being the last straw. The truly dreadful crime in the list is "obstructing an officer".
I was reminded of Arlo Guthrie's autobiographical account of his draft physical, in his song "Alice's Restaurant":
And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W's where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And they was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean 'n' ugly 'n' nasty 'n' horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me and said, "Kid, whad'ya get?"
I said, "I didn't get nothing, I had to pay $50 and pick up the garbage."
He said, "What were you arrested for, kid?" And I said, "Littering." And they all moved away from me on the bench there, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I said, "And creating a nuisance."
And they all came back, shook my hand, and we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing, father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the bench.
Post a Comment