Cars: us and them

Barack Obama - Ford Escape hybrid (30 mpg)
Joe Biden - takes train (Amtrak) from D.C. to his home in Delaware.

John McCain - Cadillac CTS sedan (19 mpg).
Sarah Palin - Chevrolet Suburban (16 mpg), private plane, assorted snowmobiles, rocket-powered sno cats and such.

Headlines

“News analysis items” and reactions to the VP choice made by the presumed Republican presidential candidate, as seen in on-line editions on Saturday, August 30 2008 around 8 AM Eastern:

Washington Post
With Pick, McCain Reclaims His Maverick Image

New York Times
Choice of Palin Is Bold Move by McCain, With Risks

Los Angeles Times
McCain's choice of Palin is a risk

Denver Post
McCain picks Alaska governor as running mateMcCain courts women and surprises his party with his VP selection.
On his 72nd birthday, Sen. John McCain chose Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his running mate, rattling the dynamics of the presidential race

Miami Herald
McCain VP choice has Florida rewards, risks

Chicago Tribune
McCain's pick: Sarah Palin
John McCain has chosen a tough-talking social conservative with credentials

The Boston Globe
McCain surprises with VP pick.
Selection is a bold, but risky, political gamble.

The New York Post
Alaskan lass is Mac’s wild card. Veep pick a bid to woo Hillary fans.

The Arizona Republic
Selection of Palin as VP stirs up race.
With the final piece of the presidential puzzle in place, the picture now seems even less clear.

International Herald Tribune
McCain picks Alaska governor as running mate.
Sarah Palin, a Christian conservative and a foe of abortion, is a surprise choice for second spot on Republican ticket.

The Guardian (UK)
McCain shocks party with VP choice McCain moves to steal Obama's thunder by choosing woman running mate

Gazeta Wyborcza (Warsaw, Poland)
Najseksowniejsza polska olimpijka wybrana! (Sexiest Polish Olympian selected!)

Rising and steady...

Crude oil is up, but the pump prices are still lower than a few weks ago. All grades (sans diesel) were below $4/gallon at the Shell in Waldorf, Maryland on Saturday, August 23 2008

Evil trio

Two most "not wanted" democratic (or so they say...) politicos at the DNC? John Edwards (cheating on a gravely ill wife...) and Joe Lieberman (turncoat poster boy.) The Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is running close third... (Allegations of marital infidelity, conspiracy, perjury, and murder. The only sitting mayor of a major city in the history of this United States to be charged with a felony!)

Most welcome person, other than Mr. Obama himself? Well, the "Obama girl" (Amber Lee Ettinger) of course!

Gustav again...And Hanna...

Since passing over Haiti yesterday (sadly claiming at least 22 lives) hurricane Gustav has been downgraded to a tropical storm. Today it appers to be strengthening again heading for Jamaica and the western tip of Cuba, and then straight for the "third coast."

3 years ago (August 29 2005) hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans: another direct hit would be catastrophic for The Big Easy...

Tropical storm Hanna - the 8th named storm of the season - has formed today north of the northeren Leeward Islands and is likely to develop into a hurricane later this week. Seems like the "Atlantic conveyor belt" has started serving one storm after another...

Obscurantism vulgaris

Memo to the big honchos at The Washington Post:

Yeah, I know, the content ain’t free, running a website costs real money and selling ads is a good way of earning some moola, so I don't mind tasteful, well-placed, attractive ads on web pages, but the things that scroll, pop, slide, drip, follow the cursor, obscure large patches of text, talk or play tunes to me without my express permission are another matter altogether... Oh, boy, I despise those with vengeance!

No, I'm not going to buy a Dell or anything at Radio Shack because of these “advertising messages”– au contraire, I'm going to deliberately avoid these places because their sliding ads that open unexpectedly and obliterate everything on the page piss me off!

Yes, everybody wants to make a buck but if the drive to make one literally obscures your main goal (i.e. providing information/content) then what's the point..? Show me tasteful ads in a way that doesn't insult my intelligence and doesn't tax my patience.

Please, Washington Post: leave the scrolling/dripping ads to the yellow press and 14-year old morons!

Hurricane Gustav

The 7th named storm - Gustav, which formed yesterday after a rather rapid developement, has today become the third hurricane of the Atlantic season. Due to its rapid development and predicted track (bypassing major landmasses) it may become a major hurricane very rapidly.

O tempora..!

Amtrak train No. 592 from Los Angeles to San Diego ran out of fuel late Sunday night (August 24, 2008) and proceeded to sit in Sorrento Valley (just north of San Diego) for about two hours waiting for another engine to push it to its final destination.

Fay revisited

Fay has never become a hurricane, but...
It has dumped as much as 20 inches of rain in many places and gave a good soaking to many other. Unfortunately there have been as many as 12 Fay-related deaths in the US. Fay has gone over Cuba, Florida Keys, South Florida, Daytona Beach, a few days just off shore over the Atlantic, back across Florida to the Gulf, over the Panhandle, then Alabama Louisiana, Mississippi and who knows where next. What a pest of a storm!

Final medal count

First eleven:
1. USA 110 (36/38/36)
2. China 100 (51/21/28)
3. Russia 72 (23/21/28)
4. Great Britain 47 (19/13/15)
5. Australia 46 (14/15/17)
6. Germany 41 (16/10/15)
7. France 40 (7/16/17)
8. South Korea 31 (13/10/8)
9. Italy 28 (8/10/10)
10.Ukraine 27 (7/5/15)
11. Japan 25 (9/6/10)
... and some of the rest
Cuba 22 (2/9/11)
Jamaica 11 (6/3/2)
Poland 10 (3/6/1)

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Saturday, August 23 2008)

Shocker of the day - South Korea wins the gold medal in baseball beating the Cubans 3:2!!!

Medal count - first eleven (with apologies to Spinal Tap):
1. USA 107 (34/37/36)
2. China 96 (49/19/28)
3. Russia 69 (21/21/27)
4. Great Britain 47 (19/13/15)
5. Australia 46 (14/15/17)
6. Germany 41 (16/10/15)
7. France 38 (6/15/17)
8. South Korea 31 (13/10/8)
9. Italy 27 (7/10/10)
Ukraine 27 (7/5/15)
10. Japan 25 (9/6/10)
11. Cuba 22 (2/9/11)
... and some of the rest
Jamaica 11 (6/3/2)
Poland 10 (3/6/1)
silver - cycling, mountain bike, women's cross country; silver- canoe/kayak flatwater, women's double kayak (K2) 500 m

No baton left behind

That's the name of the new US Government program instituted after both men's and women's Olympic 4x100m relays dropped the baton and were eliminated. Even a single baton left behind is not acceptable!

Rising...And falling...

Yesterday:
Oil has jumped by over $5/barrel - the aftermath of the invasion of Georgia by the Russian military (Georgia, the country; if any Russians were to invide the state of Georgia it would be the Russian mafia...) Pump prices remain lower than a few weeks ago.
Today:
Back to $115/barrel. Apparently the importance of the "Russian affair" pales in comparison to slowing demand...

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Friday, August 22 2008)
Shocker of the day - IOC will investigate the allegations that some Chinese gymnasts are underage (i.e. younger, sometimes way younger, than 16...) Wow! I admire the speed of your reaction, IOC dudes!!! You'd be the fastest correspondence chess players in the history...

Medal count - first 10 countries:
USA 102 (31/36/35)
China 89 (47/17/25)
Russia 57 (17/18/22)
Great Britain 44 (18/13/13)
Australia 42 (12/14/16)
Germany 36 (14/9/13)
France 34 (5/13/16)
South Korea 28 (11/10/7)
Italy 25 (7/8/9)
Japan 25 (9/6/10)
Ukraine 21 (5/4/12)
...
Poland 8 (3/4/1)
...
Jamaica 10 (6/3/1)
Third world record and third gold medal for Mr. Bolt (in 4x100m relay, he ran the third leg.) Beyond awesome!!!

iDiocy

Apparently some cell phone companies in Poland (Orange..?) have hired actors to form (fake...) lines to their stores and generate a (fake...) feeding frenzy the day before the release of iPhone in Poland...

Wojciech Jabczyński of Orange Poland admitted in an interview with Zycie Warszawy (A Warsaw, Poland daily) that fake clientes were supposed to advise real clients and were part of a marketing ploy. Phooooey! You see, Steve Jobs is not the biggest snake oil salesman in the world (he is very, very close, tho...)

Medal count (and other tidbits)

End of day in Beijing (Thursday, August 21 2008)

Shocker of the day - USA ladies softball tem loses to Japan...

Non-shocker of the day - apparently Beijing is full of official Chinese hit squads, that constantly roam (pardon me, "patrol") the city, rip out or paint over any “unwelcome” graffiti or signs (including the logos of companies who are not olympic sponsors), squash all visible (and many invisible...) forms of dissent and protest within nanoseconds by snatching and detaining the protesters, journalists and bystanders… All that after forcing a few million “undesirables” to leave the city for the Olympics… Long live Chinese democracy!

China 83 (46/15/22)
USA 93 (28/34/31)
Great Britain 40 (17/12/11)
Russia 50 (16/16/19)
Australia 38 (11/13/14)
Germany 31 (11/8/12)
South Korea 26 (10/10/6)
Japan 24 (9/6/9)
Italy 21 (6/7/8)
Netherlands 15 (6/5/4)
...
France 30 (4/12/14)
...
Poland 8 (3/4/1)
Sad note, a Polish sports official (rowing) Andrzej Baczewski died in Beijing on Tuesday of apparent heart attack while entering the Olympic Stadium.
Not so sad note from the land of the truly stupid, another Polish sports official Jerzy Sudoł got kicked out from the Olympic Village for (what else..!) public drunkenness. What a moron!!!

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Wednesday, August 20 2008)
Shocker of the day - 200 m men's sprint, world record by the Jamaican Bolt.  Awesome!!!

China 79 (45/14/20)
USA 82 (26/28/28)
Great Britain 37 (16/10/11)
Russia 45 (13/14/18)
Australia 36 (11/12/13)
Germany 28 (11/8/9)
South Korea 25 (9/10/6)
...
Poland 8 (3/4/1)

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Tuesday, August 19, 2008.)
Shocker of the day: Argentina 3, Brazil 0 and Nigeria 4, Belgium 1 in men’s soccer semifinal (!)

China 76 (43/14/19)
USA 79 (26/26/27)
Great Britain 33 (16/9/8)
Australia 35 (11/12/12)
Germany 28 (11/8/9)
Russia 42 (10/14/18)
South Korea 24 (8/10/6)
...
Poland 8 (3/4/1)
silver - men's discus throw

Fay

The 6th named tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season hit South Florida today as a strong, slow moving tropical storm, not a hurricane. Lots of flooding and wind damage, deaths in Dominicana and Haiti (at least 30 after an overloaded bus tried to cross a storm-swollen river), small tornadoes in Florida.

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Monday, August 18, 2008.)
China 67 (39/14/14)
USA 72 (22/24/26)
Great Britain 27 (12/7/8)
Australia 33 (11/10/12)
Germany 23 (9/7/7)
Russia 36 (8/13/15)
South Korea 23 (8/9/6)
...
Poland 7 (3/3/1)
gold - artistic gymnastics, men's vault.

Blue sky

Yep, blue sky over Beijing!!! For the first time in over two weeks one could seee a clear blue sky, no smog, no fog, no haze, no smoke, just blue sky. Wow!!!

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Sunday, August 17, 2008.)
China 61 (35/13/13)
USA 65 (19/21/25)
Great Britain 25 (11/6/8)
Germany 21 (9/6/6)
Australia 29 (8/10/11)
South Korea 22 (8/9/5)
...
Poland 6 (2/3/1)
gold - men's rowing (quadruple sculls); silver-men's weightlifting (94kg); silver-men's rowing (lightweight four); bronze-women's freestyle wrestling (72 kg)
...
Jamaica 4 (2/2/0)
gold medal in men's 100 dash yesterday and gold and two silver medals (Jamaican sweep!) in women's 100m dash today. Jamaica has never won the gold in 100m dash. Outstanding!!!

Falling...

Amazing - the price of crude oil hovers around $110-113 and even pump prices are slowly inching down in the US. Even super unleaded is at three dollars ninety-nine and 9/10 cents (Annapolis, Maryland.) I never thought I'd see all 3 grades of gas for less than $4/gallon before the Labor Day weekend. And diesel is practically in nosedive: $4.40, down from $4.85 a month ago!

All these decreases are of course relative: a year ago gallon of unleaded sold for $2.70 and diesel was selling for $2.86...Not to mention that on August 17, 2004 (measly four years ago!) the barrel of crude oild cost $46...

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Saturday, August 16, 2008.)
China 47 (27/13/7)
USA 54 (16/16/22)
Germany 18 (8/5/5)
South Korea 20 (7/9/4)
Australia 25 (7/8/10)
...
Poland 2 (1/1/0)

Airborne $30 000 000 lighter

Airborne, over the counter nutritional supplement (read on...) pushed as a miracle preparation to boost your immune system and thus cure and shorten the duration of colds, and make you less susceptible to catch one, turned out to be less than the sum of its parts (i.e. no workee as advertised) and the FDA (US Food and Drug Administration) has fined the company 30 million dollars for making unsubstantiated claims. That number includes refunds to the purchasers, so if you got swindled into buying Airborne, apply early and apply often, as they say in Chicago…

Boys and girls, there is no conclusive scientific evidence whatsoever that the preparation can indeed prevent or cure colds. Besides, remember that if anybody pushes a miracle cure for cold, flu, Japanese encephalitis or a certain stubborn antibiotic-resistant strain of syphilis you are likely to catch only in a few places in Harbin, it is most likely fraud and snake oil. If this stuff really worked, the big boys of the pharmaceutical industry would be all over it for gads sake!!!

By the way, Airborne is considered a nutritional supplement, not a medication and thus is not regulated by the FDA (but the FDA can still go after the makers for fraudulent claims.)

There is more “good” news - the formula of Airborne may even be hazardous: two tablets of Airborne contain 10,000 IU of vitamin A, considered the maximum safe daily level, and the company dose instructions advise not exceeding three tablets a day.

So, IMO if you feel a flu or cold coming, save your pennies: if you have a balanced diet substituting a spoonful of dirt for two pills of Airborne may be as effective, perhaps even safer, not to mention much tastier...

Think and don’t be naïve!!!

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Friday, August 15, 2008.)
China 41 (26/9/6)
USA 46 (14/13/19)
Germany 14 (8/2/4)
South Korea 18 (6/9/3)
...
Poland 2 (1/1/0) Silver in men's team epee; Gold in men's shot put!

No brains between the ears

Deaths on motorcycles…a very sad statistics released by NTSB.

1997 2,116 deaths. (5% of all motor vehicle crash fatalities – all time low.)
2007 5154 deaths. (13% of all motor vehicle crash fatalities.) That's a 128 percent increase comparing to 1997!

Consider this:
· There are only 75% more motorcycles registered today than in 1997.
· That's 10 straight year of the number of motorcycle-related deaths climbing.
· Overall number of motor-vehicle fatalities fell by 2.9% between 2006 and 2007.

The victims of motorcycle crashes are 3 times more likely than all other fatalities in motor vehicle related accidents not to have the proper license and 2.6 times more likely to be DUI/DWI in the time of accident. And - of course – many victims are helmetless riders.

I'm lifting my hand in the middle finger salute to all thirty states which allow helmetless riding: you are idiots!!!

Medal count

End of day in Beijing (Thursday, August 14, 2008.)
China 35 (22/8/5)
USA 34 (10/9/15)
Germany 12 (7/2/3)
South Korea 16 (6/7/3)
...
Poland 0

I'm following the official Chinese website and the good Chinese people count gold medals first and the total medals second (you know, "one gold medal is worth 1000 silver medals...")

Medal count

As of end of Wednesday August 13 (Beijing time.)
China 27 (17/5/5)
USA 29 (10/8/11)
South Korea 13 (6/6/1)
Poland 0

Falling...

Oil at $113/barrel. Not much drop at the pump, though.

(The rumors that the CEO of Exxon/Mobil was seen panhandling in Kabul are not true: he was lobbying in Washington, D.C. for more tax breaks.)

Medal count

End of day (Tuesday, August 12 2008) in Peking:
China 20 (13/3/4)
USA 22 (7/7/8)
South Korea 12 (5/6/1)
...
Togo 1 (first Olympic medal ever!!!) (0/0/1)
Poland 0

Nuke your cookies, Luke…

According to a story in the Washington Post (Some Web Firms Say They Track Behavior Without Explicit Consent, August 12, 2008) several internet service and broadband providers have admitted using very precise tracking of users’ on-line activities, including so called “deep-packet inspection” (reading your email and other info send/received over the ‘net to gather information about you) without informing the users. That data is of course used to bombard the users (including underage children) with all kinds of ads, and sold to other companies for cold cash who in turn assail the users with enlarge your penis/breasts/abs/pecs with a herbal remedy spam messages, viruses, Trojans and other niceties. Of course, no company (or a single Republican in Congress) wants any regulation other than "self-policing" (surprise, surprise…)

Kudos to the House Energy and Commerce Committee member Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) for trying to do something about it.

Medal count

As of the end of Monday (August 11, 2008) Beijing time for selected (by me...) countries:
China 14 (9/3/2)
South Korea 8 (4/4/0)
USA 12 (3/4/5)
Russia 6 (0/4/2)
Cuba 2 (0/1/1)
Colombia 1 (0/1/0)
Poland 0

The irony of Mamona

Newest trend at the Beijing Olympics? Sunglasses with no glass. Apparently glass fogs up in the humidity of Beijing but some sponsorship agreements (padded with lots of $$$) call for glasses being worn in competition so beach volleyball players don glassless frames with the sponsor’s logo prominently visible…

Apparently swimming with no trunks on (trunks' manufacturer’s label glued to the swimmer’s ass) ain’t catching on, but who knows.

Gold, Silver, Bronze, Nada...

Medal count (as of evening EDT Sunday, August 10 2008 )
China 10 (8/2/0)
USA 10 (2/2/4)
Russia 4 (0/3/1)
Poland 0 (0/0/0)

Sir Isaac Hayes

Soul singer Isaac Hayes, who rapped before there was rap and boogied before there was disco, died yesterday (August 10, 2008) in Memphis, Tennessee. His "Theme From Shaft" won both the Oscar and a Grammy. He was 65.

9 million missing bicycles

Where did all the bicycles, so common in Beijing, go? In a word – banned. Some bicyclists were simply deported from the city and the others "actively discouraged…" Ah, there is also an “exclusion zone” around the Olympic venues where nothing (a-b-s-o-l-u-t-e-l-y nothing!) can take place without the explicit permission of the Chinese government. There are no bicycles allowed in that zone (of course! bicycles are so passé and low class, only the poor ride bicycles…) and the cops asked where have all the bicyclists gone answer either “what bicyclists?” or “look, there are everywhere!” (thus creating make-believe bicyclists in a make-believe democracy…Or maybe the smog was just too thick to see the bicyclists...)

Wall Arch collapse

Wall Arch located on the Devils Garden Trail in Arches National Park in Utah collapsed sometime on August 4 or 5 2008. It wasn't the largest stone arch ( 33 feet tall and 71 feet across) in the park, but one of the most photographed. There are over 2000 stone arches in Arches National Park.

Wind between the ears...

In the eternal struggle between bad and worse, six members of Set Free Soldiers, a Christian motorcycle gang who describe themselves as "a group of men who love Jesus and love to ride hard" have been arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit murder after stabbing two members of another (rival, perhaps..?) motorcycle gang, the Hells Angels, during a brawl at the Newport Beach bar Blackie's by the Sea on July 27.

The police also arrested three Hells Angels who "allegedly struck one of the Set Free Soldiers in the head with a pool ball" and committed other forms of assault, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Somehow I think that this is not the end of the Set Free Soldiers versus the Hells Angels saga ...

Pork and how to make a gerund out of it

Mr. John Edwards (yeah, THAT Edwards, former US Senator and one-time presidential candidate who just loves $200 haircuts) was apparently porking his personal female videographer while Mrs. Edwards, his legally-married wife, was (and still is) battling cancer. Don’t know whether this is as bad as, or worse than, Newt Gingrich (a Republican hypocrite extraordinaire and a famous serial wife-dumper) serving his wife Jackie with divorce papers in a hospital, where she was also battling cancer but, hey, who am I to judge such distinguished figures!

Too bad that Mr. Edwards wasn’t caught with a hooker - we could call him John-John and the world would be so much funnier (even funnier than the fact that Mr. Edwards’ affair was first revealed by the National Enquirer, the paragon of American journalism…)

JetBlue and common sense

JetBlue Airlines started charging $7 for a blanket/pillow combo on their flights. The blankie is yours to keep, by the way.

The same JetBlue has asked 1000 volunteers (“frequent fliers”, whatever that means…) to come and test their check-in, baggage handling and security process at their new terminal at JFK on August 23. So, you can trek to JFK from the City; stand in multiple lines to embark on an imaginary flight to nowhere; get free parking, lunch and (unspecified) “giveaways” (a blankie..?)

Free Tibet!

Memo to the Chinese: you have broken your promise of unconditionally respecting human rights made when the world gave you the privilege of organizing the 2008 Olympics. Shame on you!

Falling...

Crude oil at $116/barrel today! Pump prices fell another 1/10 of a cent. Alleluia!

The Chinese torture

Apparently the Chinese want to use the 2008 Olympic Games in Peking to establish supremacy over the sport world in general and the US sport in particular. The Games will be successful in the eyes of the Chinese only if the Chinese win the most medals AND beat the US in the number of gold medals. One gold [medal] equals one thousand silver [medals] is the mantra repeated everyday by the Chinese officials including the Minister of Sport Liu Peng. So, badminton, table tennis, gymnastics and diving are the main battlegrounds but rumor has it that they also count on the disciplines requiring more brawn than brains so let's see if the Chinese can really win in women's weightlifting or man’s heavyweight boxing…

I can sense a striking similarity with the German approach: Hitler just couldn't stand that his "racially superior Aryans" were beaten by one Jesse Owens, and the DDR government had exactly the same mantra… win…win…here’s steroids…win…here’s hormones…win…at all costs..win…or…

I wonder what the “or” part will be for the Chinese who lose…

Pea soup air

AQI 95 in Beijing today. In the US it would fall into the "unhealthy for everyone" category, but in Beijing anything below 101 is a clear day...

Here's what International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge had to say on the subject: The fog you see is based on the basis of humidity and heat. It does not mean to say that this fog is the same as pollution. It can be pollution, but the fog doesn’t mean necessarily that it is pollution. Of course, we prefer clean skies, but the most important thing is the health of the athletes being protected.

I would like to praise the IOC for employing handicapped people: obviously Mr. Rogge is legally blind.

Here is a picture of a clear day in Beijing:

Photo Greg Baker/AP

Note: If AP has a problem with using of the photo here, please let me know and I'll remove it. For now I consider it "fair use" (this is a non-commercial blog.)

Scotty, Where The Hell Are You???

Falcon 1, a privately-funded space rocket, with some, ahem, “interesting” cargo aboard, blew up over South Pacific just 2 minutes after launch from the Marshall Islands late last Saturday (August 2, 2008) local time. The flight, dubbed the “Explorer's Flight” (read on…) carried 3 satellites and the remains, ashes, of 208 people, among them Gordon Cooper (US Mercury astronaut) and actor James Doohan (Scotty of the “Beam Me Up” fame on the original Star Trek TV series.) Apparently a “space burial” company called “Celestis, Inc.”, a subsidiary of another outfit - Space Services Incorporated, does a brisk business putting the remains of your loved ones in outer space (at least that's the plan…) Unfortunately, judging from their after-launch statement, Celestis, Inc. appears also to be full of it: "the Explorer's Flight mission appears not to have reached orbit tonight." Yeah, right, Einsteins!

Apparently neither Gordon Cooper nor “Scotty” can quite make it to the outer space: their remains were already blasted by the same outfit once before, on April 28 2007, on a suborbital flight and later recovered.

The Celestis, Inc. absurdity aside, the Falcon 1 disaster seems to be a norm for the rocket company (Space X) – they have not had a successful launch yet.

Pininfarina

Andrea Pininfarina, 51, of the Pininfarina SpA (the designers of Ferraris among other cars) died Thursday (August 7, 2008) morning near the Italian city of Turin in an accident while riding his Vespa scooter. He was the grandson of the founder of Pininfarina SpA, Battista "Pinin" Farina.

Made in U.S.A redux

The upside of high fuel prices? High transportation costs which may lead to some jobs returning back to the good ol’ USA… It just may be cheaper to make a T-shirt - or a computer - in the US than to shuffle raw materials and the finished product back and forth between continents.

It may be the kiss of death to over-globalization and the “Wal-Mart model of world domination.” For that, I’ll gladly pay $4/gallon…

More (with a slightly different angle) in the New York Times (Sunday, August 3, 2008, Shipping Costs Start to Crimp Globalization) and on NPR (Monday, August 4 2008.)

Bulgaria buys General Motors

Well, after posting a 15 billion (yep, that's billion with the "b") quarterly loss, the prospect of GM going away (or being bought out by Bulgarrenault, a now-defunct Bulgarian car manufacturer) is not that remote.

Falling... (Really..?)

Crude oil at $118/barrel this morning (20% less than the recent peak.)

Regular unleaded $3.88/gallon, national average (5% less than the recent high...)

Delta Airlines starts charging the exorbitant fee for checked luggage today because of rising fuel prices.

US Air started charging $2 for water in economy on domestic flights today because of rising fuel prices.

All the above companies (and, of course, Exxon/Mobil) will tell ya that it takes time (like months or years...) for the retail to follow any decrease in crude oil prices because of the "future" nature of oil contracts. Takes time..? Really??? The pump prices rise almost instantly after crude oil moves up even by a cent on a barrel! I wonder why...

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Famously imprisoned in the vast soviet empire of “gulags” – forced labor and penal camps, then kicked out of his own country for anti-communist writings, settled in the US where for years lingered as a more and more eccentric figure, a strange mix of a strong anti-Soviet stance and a fully-fledged hatred for the capitalist system. For him, we here were not up to his standards in terms of education, religion, “morals” and consumption. We were cowards who “hastily capitulated” in Vietnam, mired in “vulgar materialism” and “spiritual weakness.” And even the free press (yep, he apparently considered unfettered press dangerous, especially – it seems - when it criticized Mr. Solzhenitsyn…) wasn’t up to snuff for him.

After moving back to Russia, Solzhenitsyn started turning into a truly bizarre individual, detesting the Russian reformers (Gorbachev) but friends with his former oppressors (Putin, a KGB man…)

A great and brave writer, but at the end, after stripping him of the “anti” veneer, he appears to be just another Russian imperialist at heart, frustrated with the passing of the Great Russian Empire and grateful to those who are trying to resurect it. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn died on Sunday (August 3, 2008.) He was 89.

Turtle No. 72, Where Are You?

According to The Washington Post (Slow and Steady Gets the Bust As Turtle's Trail Leads to Drugs, 8/1/2008) some Eastern box turtles in Rock Creek Park (spanning the D.C. and Maryland border) are fitted with tiny radio transmitters so their movements can be monitored by the National Park Service scientists. Said scientists sometimes rendezvous with their charges and apparently one such tête-à-tête took place in the middle of a tiny, well-cultivated marijuana plot deep in the woods of the Park. (Well, whatdoyawant? The turtle apparently went where the grass was - turtles have needs, too, you anti-turtle bigot!!!)
The end of the story is predictable: police stake-out, arrest and charges of possession with intent for the enterprising gardener.

Now, if only the combined police forces of D.C. and Maryland were equally swift catching murderers, rapists, thieves and drunk drivers…

Exxon Mobil buys Bulgaria

Exxon Mobil reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion, the biggest quarterly profit ever by any U.S. corporation. Ever!!! Hey, the goons of Wall Street are disappointed because they expected even larger profits..!

The CEO of Exxon/Mobil has been complaining bitterly about the huge after-tax charge for the Exxon Valdez polluting a big chunk of Alaska. Yeah, champion, that 290 million dollars is indeed a huge sum when you are on the way to a $40 billion yearly profit. $40 billion is a GDP of Bulgaria to put things into perspective...

Wal-Mart: red, white, but not blue (not a friggin' chance!)

It seems that in addition to peddling lots of cheesy crap of dubious origin to the American public, Wal-Mart has also become a peddler of dubious political causes... Read this Reuters wire, quoted here in extenso:


Wal - Mart Mobilizes Against Democrats: Report
By REUTERS
Published: August 1, 2008
Filed at 7:17 a.m. ET

(Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc is mobilizing U.S. store managers to lobby against Democrats in November's presidential election, fearing they will make it easier for workers to unionize, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

In recent weeks, thousands of Wal-Mart managers and department heads have been summoned to mandatory meetings at which the retailer stresses the downside for workers if store workers unionize, the paper said.

About a dozen employees who attended meetings in seven states said executives stressed employees would have to pay hefty union dues and get nothing in return, and might have to go on strike without compensation, and warned that unionization could force the company to cut jobs as labor costs rise, the Journal reported.

The Wal-Mart human-resources managers who have run the meetings didn't tell those attending how to vote in the November elections, but made it clear that voting for the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, would be tantamount to inviting unions in, the Journals said.

Wal-Mart could not be reached immediately for a comment.