According CAGW:
$250,000 by Senate appropriator Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) for the Entrepreneurial Center for Horticulture at Minot State University-Bottineau. According to its website, the center is “committed to furthering greenhouse production of organic and specialty vegetables in North Dakota.” North Dakota is not among the leading states in horticulture sales .
Now, I gotta admit, I had never heard of Minot State University-Bottineau. It’s located in Bottineau, North Dakota. That told me a lot. So, I checked out their website for better info. Minot State University-Bottineau has an enrollment of about 600 according to their website. That’s kinda small. So, I figured they must have one hell of a horticulture program going in order to merit $250,000 for 600 students. This is their current curriculum:
| Minot State University-Bottineau Fall 2009 Class Sc |
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| § Information Management – Accounting Technician (AAS) § Infor |
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| § Information Management – Medical Secretary (AAS) § Advertisin |
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| § Medical Assistant (AAS) (Diploma) § Reception Services (Diplo |
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| Office: Admin. 2nd Floor Telephone: (701) 858-4339 |
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| CRS # | COURSE TITLE |
INSTRUCTOR | |
| ACCT 200 | Elements of Accounting I | W. Johnson |
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| Lab | W. Johnson |
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| ACCT 215 | Legal Env of Business | Benson | |
| ACCT 294 | Independent Study | W. Johnson |
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| ACCT 297 | Co-op Ed Accounting | Gagnon | |
| AH 136 | Clinical Procedures | Staff | |
| AH 138 | Medical Coding I CPT | Boucher | |
| AH 171 | Medical Terminology | Staff | |
| AH 297 | Co-op Ed Medical Assistant | Gagnon | |
| ASC 075 | College Study Skills | Weber | |
| ASC 092 | Beginning Algebra | Nahinurk | |
| BADM 105 | Leadership Techniques | Keith | |
| BADM 201 | Principles of Marketing | Keith | |
| BADM 205 | Leadership Techniques | Keith | |
| BADM 210 | Advertising I |
Keith | |
| BADM 214 | Entertainment Marketing | Keith | |
| BADM 240 | Sales | Keith | |
| BADM 260 | Principles of Retailing | Keith | |
| BADM 297 | Co-op Ed Advertising/Mktg | Keith | |
| BIOL 115 | Human Structure & Function ($15.00 Lab fee) |
Brooks | |
| Staff | |||
| BOTE 108 | Business Math |
S. Johnson |
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| BOTE 209 | Office Management | Gagnon | |
| BOTE 217 | Records Management | Gagnon | |
| BOTE 297 | Co-op Ed Admin Assistant | Gagnon | |
| BOTE 297 | Co-op Ed Medical Secretary | Gagnon | |
| CSCI 101 | Introduction to Computers | Gagnon | |
| NUTR 240 | Principles of Nutrition | Kveum | |
| PSYC 100 | Human Relations in Org | Gagnon | |
I suppose promoting greenhouse vegetables is part of their Sales program. Their online program does include some things to do with plants and dirt. Not sure exactly how that would work. I guess you email pics of what you’re growing. But, to be honest, they do have a 100 level horticulture class online. That one 100 level class ( for clarification, 100 level courses are those classes freshmen take in order to move on to more important things like, 200 level courses. ) For that one ONLINE class, Minot State University-Bottineau either has or will have an “Entrepreneurial Center”. Not sure how big this entreprenurial center for students who never come to campus will be. But, for $250,000, it’s probablty not that big.
For that matter, I wonder if it exists at all, or ever will exist.
But, I gotta hand it to whoever made this request that Byron Dorgan and Kent Conrad could not say no to. I mean, the beauty of it impresses me. ”furthering greenhouse production of organic and specialty vegetables in North Dakota”. I am completely in awe of someone who can get $250,000 to grow vegetables in North Dakota. I mean, it’s not like vegetables can grow in North Dakota all by themselves.
Yes, I want that job. I don’t want to live in North Dakota tho. Too cold. As with the students of the horticulture program, I’ll just live where I do now and teach them online. I can do that for $250,000, easy.
Where I really think they slid a fast one on Dorgan and Conrad is by sticking the word “greenouse” in it. Whenver someone simply mentions the word “greenhouse” in academia it is immediately assumed to be 100% legit and 100% politically correct. Nevermind the fact that this particular money has nothing to do with limiting greenhouse gases and all to do with spending $10,000 on a bunch of plastic to grow vegetables. They said “greenhouse”. Write the check.
$400,000 by Senate Financial Services Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) for Western Illinois University for the Small Business Development Center. The University’s website lists only one faculty person for the Center.
I could do that for $400,000 easy. Actually, I’ve done it for a lot less in the past. Don’t tell Durbin that tho. I’ve always said one man’s pork is another man’s career. In this case however, I imagine about $350,000 of that request is purely pork. The one development foundation I am familiar with receives most of its money from rents and such from the industries, ie small businesses, they recruit. They are almost stand-alone, but not quite. Therefore they are subsidized by the local occupational tax. In other words, they don’t cost the feds one single penny. So, why Dick Durbin feels the Western Illinois University Small Business Development Center is so inept they need $400,000 is so beyond me to the point it does look contemptable.
“An ethical cloud hangs over the Capitol, … This culture of corruption must stop. … The American people deserve better.” – Nancy Pelosi.
New Jersey’s having all kinds of fun over the last week or so. Here’s some of their local headlines:
And from the New York Post:
CNN ran it as a headline:
No party affiliations mentioned.
Wolf Blitzer?
“Dozens of public figures, including mayors, are caught in a stunning corruption sweep. They belong to both major parties.”
Deborah Feyerick?
“nearly 30 politicians and public officials, Democrats and Republicans, were rounded up in what prosecutors called the largest sweep of its kind.”
ABC, CBS, and NBC all ran stories during their evening broadcasts, not one mention of party affiliation. So, sounds like a bipartisan affair doesn’t it? By my best guess, this bipartisan affair now includes 42 Democrats and 4 Republicans including people working for the Democrat governor. Among the usual charges of taking bribes and the like, a rabbi is charged along with one of them as well as one pandering human organs.
“An ethical cloud hangs over the Capitol, … This culture of corruption must stop. … The American people deserve better.” – Nancy Pelosi. Maybe it will stop when media starts reporting ethically.
While running for President, Obama promised pretty much everything to everyone. In Ohio, he promised to support loan guarantees for uranium enrichment. A cornerstone for the US to ween itself from oil and coal. The promise was convincing, it made logic. It would not only assist in the pursuit of cleaner energy, it would create jobs in a state that had been hammered by job losses. McCain didn’t make any such promises. In the end, Ohio bucked their Republican trend and went for Obama. Barely. 2,940,000 to 2,670,000. The argument can easily be made that the 6% officially unemployed won the state for Obama. Ohio set the stage for the rest of the country. Obama, with the huge momentum from Ohio, pulled away and won the election.
Six months later, things have only gotten worse in Ohio. Unemployment has gone from 6% to over 11%. The company Obama promised to guarantee a loan for to develope the uranium enrichment plant was a big hope for turning the economy around in Ohio. Obama had made a big deal about it during the race. So, it was pretty much accepted this very routine process would work itself out even more quickly as Obama pushed hard to turn around the faltering economy.
Then a rather strange thing happened. The Department of Energy denied USEC’s loan guarantee. They will still have to purchase uranium. But, that uranium will be processed either by Areva or Urenco. Neither of which is based in the US. USEC has announced that layoffs will begin in August. This is truly pathetic.
Now, the crux of the biscuit here is that from what I can tell, the DOE does not want to guarantee the loan USEC would have to secure in order to meet the terms of this contract. As such, they are not qualified via the financial guidelines of the award. My take on this is a little different than the DOE’s. My take is that there is no better situation for any US federal agency to secure a loan. None. They will be creating jobs and allowing a US based company to pay taxes in the US rather than allowing another company to take US money out of the US to be taxed in another country. How did Areva or Urenco get to the point they are now financially? Was it totally through the private sector, as USEC is having to do. Or, were they subsidized by their countries? If USEC were to bid against Areva or Urenco in Brittain or France, would they be allowed to compete with the local companies?
Bottom line here, the promise has been made repeatedly by Obama both as a candidate and a president that the path to future economic prosperity is by going green. Sending all our money and higher level jobs to other countries will have the exact opposite impact. It will make us as beholden to European, and Iranian, processed uranium as we are to oil now.
Appeals have been made to Obama to intervene in the DOE’s decision. He needs to do it now. What I personally will be watching is how receptive to an obviously horrible situation that is easily corrected Obama is when it’s on behalf of a Republican Congresswoman.
OK, so Obama’s nominee for surgeon general, take two, isn’t exactly what most people would think the top health icon on the country should be. I got a problem with this. Now, first of all, let’s look at what has been the icon of health in the United States over recent history. Currently it’s a guy named Steven Galson:
Steven looks pretty fit. He sorta has to, the military tends to make you fit whether you really want to be or not. Before that he tried to get Dr. Sanjay Gupta:
OK, so Sanjay looks really fit too. Oh yeah, well before that we had Kenneth Moritsugu:
OK, so he looks healthy too. Well, how about Richard Carmona?
Yeah, ok, he looks healthy too. And, apparently he likes hanging out with healthy looking babes too. David Satcher?
OK, so he looks fit too.
This line of reasoning isn’t going anywhere. Apparently past presidents Clinton and Bush II did like healthy looking people to push health initiatives. The concept that “Do as I say, not as I do” just isn’t appropriate on a national level totally sponsored by the tax paying public.
So, let’s use another logic shall we? According to the American Heart Association, this is their ideal weight chart:
| Height | Small Frame | Medium Frame | Large Frame |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4’09″ | 90-97 | 94-106 | 102-118 |
| 4’10″ | 92-100 | 97-109 | 105-121 |
| 4’11″ | 95-103 | 100-112 | 108-124 |
| 5’00″ | 98-106 | 103-115 | 111-127 |
| 5’01″ | 101-109 | 106-118 | 114-130 |
| 5’02″ | 104-112 | 109-122 | 117-134 |
| 5’03″ | 107-115 | 112-126 | 121-138 |
| 5’04″ | 110-119 | 116-131 | 125-142 |
| 5’05″ | 114-123 | 120-135 | 129-146 |
| 5’06″ | 118-127 | 124-139 | 133-150 |
| 5’07″ | 122-131 | 128-143 | 137-154 |
| 5’08″ | 126-136 | 132-147 | 141-159 |
| 5’09″ | 130-140 | 136-151 | 145-164 |
| 5’10″ | 133-144 | 140-155 | 149-169 |
Oh well, that’s for 1959 when people were accepted even if they were of larger girth. In 1989 it was modified to look more like this:
| Height | 18-24 Yrs. | 25-34 Yrs. | 35-44 Yrs. | 45-54 Yrs. | 55-64 Yrs. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4’10″ | 114 | 123 | 133 | 132 | 135 |
| 4’11″ | 118 | 126 | 136 | 136 | 138 |
| 5’00″ | 121 | 130 | 139 | 139 | 142 |
| 5’01″ | 124 | 133 | 141 | 143 | 145 |
| 5’02″ | 128 | 136 | 144 | 146 | 148 |
| 5’03″ | 131 | 139 | 146 | 150 | 151 |
| 5’04″ | 134 | 142 | 149 | 153 | 154 |
| 5’05″ | 137 | 146 | 151 | 157 | 157 |
| 5’06″ | 141 | 149 | 154 | 160 | 161 |
| 5’07″ | 144 | 152 | 156 | 164 | 164 |
| 5’08″ | 147 | 155 | 159 | 168 | 167 |
Well, I’m going to guess Dr. Benjamin is 5’6″ or so. That means at her age, she should weigh about about 157. Let’s look:
Just from looking, and not being a person normally terribly concerned about girth, I’d just have to guess that she’s not exactly 157 pounds or so. Now, I can see problems with this chart. I mean, how many women 45-54 are exactly 157 pounds? Flawed logic if you ask me. Flawed to the American Heart Association as well. So, they once again modified their logic to come up with an ideal weight that is so complicated you have to use java script to figure it out. First you have a chart:
| Body Type | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| Athlete | <17% | <10% |
| Lean | 17-22% | 10-15% |
| Normal | 22-25% | 15-18% |
| Above Average | 25-29% | 18-20% |
| Overfat | 29-35% | 20-25% |
| Obese | 35+% | 25+% |
Now, you have to know you body fat index to use this thing. According to my guessing, just from experience with knowing some women with similar builds, and using the body fat index java script calculator, I’m guessing Dr. Benjamin comes in at 45.2. OK, so that’s about 20% over the obese standard. I’m getting nowhere with this so far.
I guess I’ll have to toss all logic aside and just make a claim based on the fact no woman, or man for that matter, should ever look like this:
And that’s why Dr. Benjamin should be our next Surgeon General.
Apparently that’s what Obama did as well.
24
Jul
In my world, the ultimate definition of a pacifist is to enter a war and not be terribly concerned with winning. You do this by not acknowledging it’s actually a war, then equivocating what the ultimate outcome must be. In Korea and Vietnam, the United Nations, with an assist from the United States, would not call either a war. They were “police actions”. In other words, you just tried to keep the two sides from killing each other. The immediate result in both cases was the United States sticking soldiers in the middle of a firing squad shooting at them from all directions. The end result in both cases is nothing was accomplished. We’re still in Korea fifty years later. And, the Communists over-ran South Vietnam leading to a mass exodus of Vietnamese as well as the deaths of millions of people due to the destabilization caused by “the other side” having an interest in countering the US’s interests supported by the United Nations. What started as minor skirmish turned into the crux of the Cold War. When the US pulled out of South Vietnam, the North Vietnamese were heavily armed against a completely defenseless society. Not only did the South Vietnamese suffer greatly, the Laotians and Cambodians died by the millions. Which was pretty incredible considering the mighty military power of the United States was supposedly dealing with a third world country fighting with nothing much more than rifles. The embarassing exit from South Vietnam was a thorn in the side of the United States until the Soviet empire collapsed. Then it was simply forgotten. An entire generation of soldiers were trashed mostly because it was an unpopular “war” that resulted in defeat. The United States had never lost before and the blame was put directly on the soldiers. That’s what happens when you enter a war and victory is not the goal. It was never the soldiers’ fault. It was the fault of those who did not have the guts to admit we were in a war. A struggle for life and death. The other side was fighting for their very survival. We were just hanging out and giving them something to practice on.
In the case of Korea, the North had nothing to lose by antagonizing the South. When they entered the South, the last thing anyone expected was the United States to jump into another “war” so shortly after wrapping up WWII. What the rest of the world really did not expect was China to be so willing to jump into it as well. What started as a small rebellion the French couldn’t handle turned into a serious Cold War stand-off. Eventually the Americans and Chinese tired of killing each by the tens of thousands and drew a line. North Korea was immediately catapaulted militarily from a backwards third world military to state of the art as the Chinese armed them to protect themselves from the US rather than directly confronting the US directly. Today, we’re still sitting there watching each other. North Korea has taken the ball the Chinese handed them and run amok with it. Today the world is concerned with North Korea as they are now firing missiles perfectly capable of carrying nuclear weapons. The intent of the Koreans is to reach the United States mainland. They’ve made it to Hawaii already. That’s what happens when you enter a war and victory is not the goal.
In 2001 an Afghan citizen sponsored an attack on the United States. He did it rather unconventionally. Nearly 3,000 innocent people were killed in this attack. The intent of the attack was to cripple the United States economy. It didn’t work quite as planned, but it did cause an economic issue as the markets world-wide collapsed. The ruling entity of Afghanistan was The Taliban. President Bush almost immediately attacked Kabul and ousted The Taliban. The Taliban since then has been at war with the United States trying to regain control of Afghanistan with an assist from several other Taliban supporters in Pakistan and Iran.
Yesterday, the intent of our interest in Afghanistan changed dramatically:
“I’m always worried about using the word ‘victory,’ because, you know, it invokes this notion of Emperor Hirohito coming down and signing a surrender to MacArthur,” Obama told ABC News.
“We’re not dealing with nation states at this point. We’re concerned with Al Qaeda and the Taliban, Al Qaeda’s allies,” he said. “So when you have a non-state actor, a shadowy operation like Al Qaeda, our goal is to make sure they can’t attack the United States.”
“We are confident that if we are assisting the Afghan people and improving their security situation, stabilizing their government, providing help on economic development … those things will continue to contract the ability of Al Qaeda to operate. And that is absolutely critical,” Obama told ABC News.
OK, so once again we’re in a life and death struggle and a leader is afraid to call it what it is. Without getting too technical, I’ll give Obama an assist by referring to a source of information I rely on a lot but the Obama administration seems to fear, the dictionary:
- a conflict carried on by force of arms, as between nations or between parties within a nation; warfare, as by land, sea, or air.
-
a state or period of armed hostility or active military operations: The two nations were at war with each other.
-
a contest carried on by force of arms, as in a series of battles or campaigns: the War of 1812.
- active hostility or contention; conflict; contest: a war of words.
- aggressive business conflict, as through severe price cutting in the same industry or any other means of undermining competitors: a fare war among airlines; a trade war between nations.
- a struggle: a war for men’s minds; a war against poverty.
- armed fighting, as a science, profession, activity, or art; methods or principles of waging armed conflict: War is the soldier’s business.
Not one single definition says war is reserved for governments only. Not one. I’ll toss another definition out the for Obama as well:
- a success or triumph over an enemy in battle or war.
- an engagement ending in such triumph: American victories in the Pacific were won at great cost.
- the ultimate and decisive superiority in any battle or contest: The new vaccine effected a victory over poliomyelitis.
- a success or superior position achieved against any opponent, opposition, difficulty, etc.: a moral victory.
In all conflicts, the definition of victory contains the word success. I do hope a reader here knows what the lack of success is.
If we’re afraid of success, we will fail. Unless we’re willing to understand that this is a life and death struggle, our soldiers will die. Unless Obama understands that if The Taliban, ie Al Qaeda, understands that all they have to do is wait us out until we say we’ve acheived some other goal besides victory, we’ll eventually fail to win the war. And, the bottom line is we’re not helping anyone in Afghanistan if we fail. All the economic development Obama thinks will make the Afghans happier will be lost. The Taliban is totalitarian, it will be all theirs.
And, anyone want to guess how hard it is for The Taliban, Al Qaeda, North Korea, Iraq, or any other agressor to figure out that Obama doesn’t have the guts to call it a war and go for the victory? I mean, it couldn’t get any clearer if he just blurted it out on international news.
Hillary Clinton gave a 35:44 speech you can watch in its entirity at MSNBC:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Only thing about this speech is it was actually over an hour long. MSNBC cut off the last 34 minutes. That’s kind of understandable, it’s a very windy speech with very little actual content. I didn’t watch it all. Here it is if you want to:
I doubt too many people will. But, for some inexpicable reason, just watch the first minute of the second version and about ten secounds of the MSNBC version and you’ll see what everyone’s scratching their head over. MSNBC crops off the first minute of the video. That actually had the most meat of the entire speech. Here’s a transcript of what MSNBC felt wasn’t worth airing:
What’s THAT supposed to mean? I would have thought she went to The White House to be told what she should be doing and how she should think about the future. Sure, the conspiracy theorists will run wild with that statement. But, I still think it’s more telling that MSNBC felt like they should edit her speech. Then again, I haven’t trusted anything on MSNBC for several years. Not sure too many people do:
| Foxnews | 1,248,000 | 48% |
| CNN | 554,000 | 21% |
| MSNBC | 319,000 | 12% |
| CNBC | 202,000 | 8% |
| Headline News | 287,000 | 11% |
| 2,610,000 |
Now, although MSNBC obviously felt they needed to give Hillary an assist, maybe that’s why only 1 in 8 people will admit to watching their channel.
I receive several newsletters in regards to what I do at work. This is one I received this morning.
Kentucky lawmakers discuss possible effects of federal energy bill
FRANKFORT – State lawmakers shared comments and concerns about a federal bill that proposes, among other changes, a three percent cut in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2012 and a 17 percent cut in emissions by 2020 during a meeting of the state legislative Special Subcommittee on Energy today.
The comments followed testimony by Kentucky Public Service Commission officials on the bill, named the Waxman-Markey Climate Bill after sponsors Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Ed Markey, D-Mass. PSC Executive Director Jeff Derouen said that the bill, which passed the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee on May 21, could mean significant increases in utility rates over time.
Derouen said possible rate increases under the climate and energy bill could range from 15 percent to 60 percent, although most experts estimate that rate increases would fall in the 20 to 35 percent range.
“They (rate changes) wouldn’t all come at once, and there’s still a moving target even among utilities about what it would mean in real dollars,” Derouen said.
Sen. Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, said he is concerned about the impact such increases would have on Kentucky industry and jobs. Per Stivers’ request, the subcommittee asked for more detail on the bill’s potential impact on large employers who rely on Kentucky’s historically low electricity rates.
“What bothers me…especially in this economy, is what there will be in terms of impact to the A.K. Steels of the world, the Ford plant in Louisville, the Toyota plant in Georgetown, the GM plant in Bowling Green—these high-end users that have come to the state because of low energy costs for production,” Stivers said.
What emissions are taxed will ultimately affect how much Kentuckians are taxed, Derouen said. He explained that Kentucky’s average utility rates are currently ranked 48th nationally while emissions from utility plants are ranked 7th. That ranking falls to 13th if all emissions, including vehicle emissions, are considered.
“So if the federal government chooses to tax all emissions including vehicles, the impact on us would be less than if they just taxed carbon emissions from utility plants,” he said.
Rep. Harry Moberly, D-Richmond, said the climate crisis gives Kentucky opportunities to be an energy leader—something it has been working toward for several years in the General Assembly and the research field.
“I truly think there are bits and pieces of this puzzle being worked on all over the country and nobody has pulled that together, but that can be done and we can do that in Kentucky,” he said. “We can be the lead state in carbon management.”
In response, Subcommittee Co-Chair Sen. Brandon Smith, R-Hazard, said that while there are some concerns by some members, “…we are looking forward to playing whatever role we can in moving forward.”
On a motion by Sen. David Boswell, D-Owensboro, the subcommittee passed a resolution to recommend to the 2010 General Assembly that Kentucky’s resources be combined with available federal and other states’ resources to move forward on the use of carbon dioxide outside of the realm of carbon capture and storage.
“We’ve talked about coal conversion. We’ve talked about utilization of Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, we’ve talked about all these things. We’ve not only talked, we’ve spent hundreds of millions of state and federal dollars in the process. And we’ve come to the conclusion that we can do all these things if we just figure out what to do with carbon dioxide,” Boswell said. “What’s been said here today I think exemplifies the desire of this Legislature to move forward and kind of quit talking about it and let’s pull all these resources together.”
Carbon capture and storage involves removing carbon dioxide—a greenhouse gas that has been attributed to global warming–from fossil fuels and storing it hundreds of meters below ground indefinitely, potentially for millions of years.
This just reinforces the opinion I expressed May 18th. This is California’s payback for losing their industry due to their making their energy costs too expensive. They’re putting the screws to the rest of the country rather than just fessing up that what they did neither helped the climate or their economy. Need the pudding? Henry Waxman, the primary sponsor of this disaster, is from California.
I got news for Harry Moberly, Kentucky can not lead in carbon management. We don’t have the means for generating alternative energy. We also don’t have the financial resources to convert to other means of energy. Our state government is broke, as are most. They are cutting back on essential services much less funding extremely expensive conversions. And, it the cost estimates above are correct, energy costs will both sap state funds by means of energy subsidies to the poor, as well as deplete the state’s abilities to attact new industry to generate additional revenues. I would like to hear Moberly’s explanation of how he thinks a bankrupt state government will lead the way in something most people don’t think we need in the first place while they watch their utilility bills explode. I might even make it a point to go to a public function just to hear Moberly’s explanation.
For me, this entire issue was summed up best by David Boswell:
“We’ve talked about coal conversion. We’ve talked about utilization of Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, we’ve talked about all these things. We’ve not only talked, we’ve spent hundreds of millions of state and federal dollars in the process. And we’ve come to the conclusion that we can do all these things if we just figure out what to do with carbon dioxide.
For hundreds of millions less of state and federal dollars, I could have told them that was the problem in the first place. This entire thing is a bad joke. A very, very, bad joke. I would laugh if it wasn’t already causing people problems……
and it hasn’t even started yet.
19
Jul
Someone’s running a poll on Facebook. It’s about how people voted and how they would voted again. It’s fairly interesting so far:
If the 2008 Presidential Election were held today, would you vote the same way?
| I voted for Obama and I stand by that vote.
45,676 (35.2%)
|
Take the next poll »or+ Create your own poll |
| I voted for Obama and regret it. I would change my vote today.
1,290 (1.0%)
|
|
| I did not vote for Obama and I stand by that vote.
77,756 (59.9%)
|
|
| I did not vote for Obama, but now I like him and would vote for him today.
881 (0.7%)
|
|
| I didn’t vote. But given the chance I would support Obama today.
1,535 (1.2%)
|
|
| I didn’t vote and I really should have. I would vote agaisnt Obama today.
2,575 (2.0%)
|
Seems most people would still vote the same way they did originally. You’ve got 1% that voted for him that would not today, and you have .7% that against him that would today. No big swing one way or the other. But, what did catch my eye was that of the 129,713 voters, 81,621 say they would vote against him, with the huge majority saying they never voted for him in the first place. If they election were held today strictly on Facebook, Obama would get creamed 62% to 38%. Now, this is a sample of 129,713. Harris and Rasmussen would kill for samples like this. And, from what I’ve experienced there so far, Republicans do not make up a majority there. So, what gives? I could make some assumptions, but that’s all they’d be at this point. However, toss in the Visible Vote approval ratings of 30% and it looks like a verification that Obama’s hurting badly on Facebook. Now, either Facebook’s a very unique place, or……
16
Jul
Things aren’t looking for the immediate future to me. I’m sure that’s a shocker. But, the way I see it, even with market fluctuations and such, things are looking rough for the rest of the year. Here’s why I feel like I do right now:
Historically, unemployment sort of stays flat using annual averages. Using averages, unemployment rises a little January through June, drops some from July to September, rises slightly in October, drops in November, rises again in December. There are no huge jumps from month to month. Good years simply balance the bad years. But, what happens within a year is fairly predictable:
- In 26 years, if the unemployment got worse January to June, it got worse for the entire year.
- In 18 years, if the unemployment got better from January to June, if got better for the entire year.
- Only four times since 1948 has the unemployment gotten worse January to June, but improved for the year.
- Only four times has it been unchanged January to June, only to get better for the year.
Simple story is if things get better from January to December, it is very likely it will be better for the entire year. If things get worse from January to December, it is very likely it will be worse for the entire year. There are market reasons for this. I just didn’t think it was quite that strong a trend. It seems however, to be quite strong. So, this is what we’re looking at so far this year:
Not good. If history holds out, we’re looking at unemployment not getting any better for the year. Doesn’t necessarily mean it will get worse than it is right now. But it does mean it won’t get any better than about 8.5% for the year. However, there is another tangible to our current situation:
That’s the unemployment picture since the Democrats took over Congress and the federal spending. That’s the trend they’ll have to reverse in a major way in order to break the cycle of down January to Junes forecasting January to Decembers.
Quite frankly, I don’t see it happening. To date Obama has taken the route of most resistance. Most of his spending has been through social programs and federal jobs. It takes forever to get that spending in place. I certainly don’t see it having much impact within six months. Given the numbers for July, I seriously don’t see it happening within five months.
