Sleeping in the dark
My hours have switched again, this time in a more human direction. Two huge benefits to getting off work at 4 (a.m.) instead of 8: 1) no longer driving home during the morning rush hour; 2) getting to sleep while it's still dark. I can't tell you how giddily happy this last point makes me. With what I'll be saving on Red Bull, this almost counts as a raise.
Nocturnal living is still a bit unnatural, but not to worry — I plan to cut my sleep deficit in half within five years.
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And speaking of deficits that may never be paid …
As Lord Alan Greenspan retires, it's good to see some re-evaluation of his legacy:
… millions of Americans … have prospered during Alan Greenspan's 18 years as chairman of the Federal Reserve. They lived through nearly two decades of generally stable economic growth with low inflation, low unemployment and modest interest rates. Under Greenspan's watch, the economy thrived despite stock market crashes, international financial crises, terrorist attacks, wars and other shocks. No wonder, as Greenspan prepares to retire next week, economists have lauded him as the greatest central banker ever.
Still, his legacy will be judged not just by his record at the Fed, but also by the economy he bequeaths. And when he leaves office Tuesday, Greenspan leaves a nation awash in debt — record household debt and a record trade gap.
Yeah, thanks again Alan for signing off on Bush's tax cuts. …
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Corporate sell-outs at TIME magazine.
No, I don't mean Andy Sullivan — I mean to two dogs in that caricature. Isn't that Satchmo and Beckham? Does TBogg know about this?
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Can the president eat a baby?
In time of war, if he must do so to keep us safe from terra, then yes, our omnipotent president can eat a baby.
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Since we no longer have Spy magazine and the annual Spy 100, the next best thing is The Beast's annual list of "The Beast 50 Most Loathesome People in America."
You're on the list and so am I. We're at No. 4 — just above Tom Delay and just below George W. Bush.
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While you're at The Beast, be sure also to check out their "Torture All-Stars Trading Cards" featuring the nine U.S. senators who voted in favor of torture.
They did, too. They voted in favor of torture. And with no apparent detrimental affects for their political futures.
Freaking torture. Jeebus.
The terrorists may not have already won, but Wayne Allard, Kit Bond, Tom Coburn, Thad Cochran, John Cornyn, James Inhofe, Pat Roberts, Jeff Sessios and Ted Stevens are desperately trying to surrender. Or to switch sides.
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100 Best First Lines from Novels according to Litline.
That link is via Julia, who notes that her favorite is No. 47, which I remembered from the last time we had this arbitrary fun conversation, at Michael Berube's place.
(And that, by the way, is the Narnia movie I'm really looking forward to.)
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I might be less skeptical of the Bush administration's claim to be planning to cut the federal deficit in half over the next five (now four) years if they produced even the hint of something resembling a plan or an explanation of how they intend to do this.
It doesn't help their credibility on this point that they're also playing "Mom, I'm pregnant" every year with their deficit projections.
My friend Michelle got a tattoo, a modest, but conspicuous little dolphin on her ankle. This was bound to freak out her mom. So before showing her mom the ink, she told her she was pregnant. After letting her really freak out over that for a bit, she said, "Relax, mom, I'm not pregnant. I just got a tattoo and I didn't want you to blow this out of proportion."
No offense to Michelle, but this is a pretty dishonest trick. In her defense, she only did it once. The Bush administration has done this same thing year after year.
They project record-shattering deficits of half a trillion dollars or so, so that later, when the merely record-breaking figure of around $400 billion comes out they can claim that they've actually reduced the deficit from their previous, Mom-I'm-pregnant projection.
Honest people don't do things like that.
Under normal circumstances, that deficit would be the flashing red alarm — Exhibit A for why George W. Bush is an awful, incompetent president. But these aren't normal circumstances, what with the disastrous war, the offhand disregard for the rule of law, the nonchalant response to the disappearance of a major city and, again, the freaking torture. With all that going on as well, the inflicting of fiscal calamity on our children and grandchildren becomes almost a second-tier piece of evidence for why George W. Bush is an awful, incompetent president.
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