Fun riding the bus

I don’t know why I love this video so much:

I wish this soda pop store were in D.C.

Cash for Clunkers: Is the Obama Administration less economically literate than the Bush Administration?

This post by John Stossel nails the problem with presidencies and economics:

I enjoyed this from Brad Smith at Division of Labour:

Thanks to the glories of YouTube, we can watch as the government mandates the destruction of perfectly good automobiles to "help the economy." Here is a very nice 1990s Dodge Dakota 4X4 being destroyed . It is a much better vehicle than my pick up truck.

This is a Corvette that looks to be in pretty good condition. Black, pretty sharp car. I’m sure there are a lot of young men crammed into 2001 Malibus who would have liked this car.

In this video, a ‘98 Cadillac DeVille with less than 80,000 miles meets its end. Just 68,000 miles on this Chevy Caprice wagon.

A nice looking 2001 Mazda light truck with 75,000 miles bites the dust here.

Here’s a good looking Volvo prematurely destroyed.

This SUV would look at home in any tony U.S. suburb.

… Are these "clunkers?" Can it really help the economy to destroy perfectly good assets?

Of course, destroying assets does not help an economy.  The politicians who defend Cash for Clunkers remind me of the silly people who said that the rebuilding that would come after the destruction of Hurricane Katrina  would “stimulate” the economy.  What they forget is that the money for rebuilding —and the cash-for-clunker money—is forcibly taken from people who would have used that money to create other things.  

Brad Smith asks:
Are the people running the government the most economically illiterate bunch since FDR ruled the roost?

I doubt that.  Most power-hungry lawyers and others who run for office to rule over others—not to mention the media who cheer them on—are economically illiterate.   I don’t think that this bunch is better or worse than their predecessors.

Actually it’s worse than that. Presidents frequently set aside sound economic advice for short term political game. It doesn’t matter who the President is—Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter…

The WSJ profiles the current state of Nomar Garciaparra’s career

The WSJ has an interesting profile of Nomar. It’s too bad his body has broken down because once upon a time he was a great, great hitter.

Really? Every person who voted for Obama wants Obamacare?

This op-ed in the LA Times is awfully silly:

I am afraid there has been a misunderstanding since that election in 2008, during which 66,882,230 Americans cast their votes for you. Perhaps one of your trusted advisors has given you bum information. Maybe they told you that we voted for you — walked, marched, prayed, fund-raised and knocked on doors for you — because we hoped you would try to reunite the country. Of the total votes cast that long-ago November day, I’m guessing that about 1,575 people wanted you to try to reconcile the toxic bipartisanship that culminated in those Sarah Palin rallies.

The other 66,880,655 of us wanted universal healthcare.

So nearly everyone that voted for Obama wants Obamacare? That is a lame, lame argument. There were many reasons people voted for Obama—he was charismatic, he wasn’t George Bush, he didn’t choose Sarah Palin as his running mate, he promised an open and transparent government, he promised to close Gitmo, he wasn’t George Bush, he promised to get the soldiers out of Iraq, etc. It is the height of silliness to write that every singe (except for 1,575 people) who voted for Obama actually want whatever plan comes out of Congress.

Things change and many people who supported Obama’s health care reform efforts will not support the actual plan. It’s one thing to support “doing something” about healthcare. It’s another when people get to see what is actually involved in the real plan. 

Some leftists aren’t happy that Obama lied to them

This video a pretty enlightening video. I love this Obama lie. Speaking of health care reform negotiations he said, “we are going to have all of these negotiations on C-SPAN.” Right.

And this comment from the Air America radio host is priceless, “He’s such a charming liar.” Well yeah. All of the good ones are.

Pics from Sri Lanka

A couple of my friends are in Sri Lanka for the next couple year. Here are some pictures from Sri Lanka:

Wind Rivers “Drawing”

Here’s a “drawing” I made using a program called FotoSketcher from a photo I shot here:

10 Months after Obama’s election…

While researching the previous post, I ran across this picture on Flickr:

Ten months ago, when Obama was elected, who would have thought that the conservatives would be the ones believing in personal power. Just look at the health care debate. It’s an example of how quickly political winds can change.

And who knows, maybe the political winds will be blowing for Obama soon. 

Censorship from Flickr

 As reported by the LA Times, the picture of the left was created by a 20-year-old college student from Chicago named Firas Alkhateeb. Flickr decided to pull the picture from Alkhateeb’s photostream because of “copyright-infringement concerns.” Flickr didn’t have the same reservations when it came to President Bush (here, here, and here).

So why the double standard?

Photog Thomas Hawk has more.