1. Republicans and Democrats were arguing about less than 1% of the budget. What if they were serious about reduce the deficit?

2. I was hoping the government should shut down for at least a week. I was hoping to go ride my bike on Skyline Drive through Shenandoah National Park without any cars on the road.

3. The Washington Post liberal blogger, Ezra Klein, thinks the U.S. should go deeper in debt (read the last paragraph).

4. The Fed’s weak dollar policy is working to make the dollar toxic. Central Banks do not want to hold dollar reserves.

5. Rising oil prices are beginning to hurt the U.S. economy.

6. Ezra Klein is arguing for more of the vicious cycle we have seen—more spending, which leads to an even weaker dollar, which leads to things like rising oil prices, which hurt the economy.

7. I advocate a different fiscal policy and monetary policy—just stop it. The Federal government needs to stop spending beyond its means and the Federal Reserve needs to stop its weak dollar policy (what it calls Quantitative Easing). Will there be some pain? Yes of course. But thing will recover more quickly and with less pain that the continuing fiddling through profligate spending and weak dollar, pro-inflationary policy.

8. Some Keynesians are starting to see “cracks in their paradigms.” Thank goodness.

9. Here’s a health care plan I can support.

10. The Hell of the North, otherwise known as Paris Roubaix, start at 7am (I think 7am) on Versus.  

I like Stephen Bainbridge’s take on GRRM’s possibly finishing his next book:

The long delayed next installment of George RR Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series, A Dance with Dragons, has been announced as July 12, 2011. Right. I’ll believe it when I hold the book in my hands.This book has been the fantasy equivalent of vaporware.

As of this date, the book’s not even finished by Martin’s own admission. Also by his own admission, he’s blown past numerous publication dates in the past. He says this one is real, but why should we believe him? Maybe the HBO people are holding a gun to his head?

If it does finally appear, because it’s been six years since the last edition, I hope there’s one hell of a detailed synopsis. I’ve forgotten virtually all the characters and subplots.

So what’s the over and under on when the next book appears? I’d say 8 years, assuming Martin lives that long.

I doubt the book will come with a synopsis, but that doesn’t matter because of the website The Tower of the Hand.

1. The weakness of Microsoft Office for the Mac makes it tough to use OS X as my primary office operating system (maybe it’s just because I’ve used Office for Windows for the last 12 years as much primary office programs). But even after having a MacBook Pro as my office computer for more than 2 years, when I comes to writing, I still boot up Windows instead of using OS X because Offices for Windows is superior.
2. For it to makes economic sense in California to save money by driving a Chevy Volt, oil prices need to be twice as expensive as they are today (between $171 and $254 a barrel).
3. Martha Stewart apparently has a skull in her kitchen.
4. Palin’s Not Complicit in Loughner Shooting, but She Sure Ain’t Presidential, Either.
5. Ann Althouse: It makes more sense to teach children creationism than to teach them that politicians are pure of heart motivated only by the desire to serve the common good.
6. Why you should never, ever use two spaces after a period according to one self-important writer.
7. I don’t recommend The Dragon Keeper by Robin Hobb. It is just way too slow. It’s 500 pages and it feels like a it is just the setup.
8. Chernobyl: Environmental dead zone or eco heaven?
9. To reduce CO2 emissions to what some science climate scientists believe we should, it will only require building a nuclear power plant every day for the next 40 years.
10. A brief history of computing from Life.

1. 40% of all California state workers had work-provided cell phones
2. Sony is shutting down a plant that used to make 18,000,000 CDs a month
3. Professor Bainbridge understands that George R.R. Martin “is not his bitch” but Bainbridge wants Martin to write faster anyway
4. When George R.R. Martin finished his last book, A Feast of Crows in 2005, he was over 1/3 finished with A Dance With Dragons and yet Martin has yet to finish A Dance with Dragons.
5. I don’t think Neil Gaiman had actually read George R.R. Martin’s books when he wrote this blog post nearly two years ago arguing that reader’s shouldn’t care when Martin finishes his next book
6. If you listen to Jenny McCarthy, you are qualifying for a Darwin Award. Sadly, you are only punishing your children.
7. Jenny McCarthy’s body count.
8. Dead Red Redemption deserves the kudos it is receiving
9. Jeffrey Walls: “outside of the Chris Nolan realm, the comic-book superhero genre is a plague and a pox upon our cinematic house.”
10. How dare Sarah Palin defend herself after being accused of inciting mass murder?

This article from the BBC is amusing: 

Since Saturday’s tragic shootings in Arizona, America’s cable news channels have been flooded with analysts speculating about why.

They have bemoaned the state of America’s political discourse, called for leadership in toning down heated rhetoric, speculated over whether this is a turning point for Barack Obama or Sarah Palin and puzzled over the shooter’s mental state.

But one thing that has scarcely been raised is gun control.

In Australia, a 1996 gun massacre in Tasmania promoted a deeply conservative federal government to push for restrictive gun laws.

But here in the US, the only regulatory response so far has been to call for a ban on the sale of high capacity magazines like the sort that Jared Loughner allegedly used in Arizona, enabling him to shoot 31 bullets from a semi-automatic handgun without having to reload.

Two possible bills proposing such changes are unlikely to pass the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.

Many in the US believe the situation would have been safer if more people on the scene had had guns. At least two congressmen have said they will start carrying a gun at all times.

The Arizona Citizen’s Defense League is calling for members of Congress and their staff to receive firearms training.

Such responses leave many in other developed democracies scratching their heads, asking the same question: what is it with America and guns?

Well, you see, we have this thing called the Constitute and there’s a part called the Second Amendment. It states, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

What it is with America and guns? First, we are Constitutionally guaranteed to be able to own them and second, we realize that draconian gun controls laws are like closing the barn door after the horse has bolted.

Somehow the BBC fails to mention the Second Amendment other than to note that “The NRA has a large, extremely well-funded political lobbying operation – deeply supported by weapons manufacturers – that will not brook any infringement on the constitutional right to bear arms.” Yes, you know, kind of like the New York Times supports the First Amendment.

Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, North Carolina, and South Dakota all have more pigs than people and other facts from the census.

This is nothing more than random Soviet-inspired space art:

More here.

As someone who spends too much of my life driving to and from work, I would love to see the adoption of driverless cars. The barriers to adoption of driverless cars is not the technology (as Google previously demonstrated and the video below show) but the problem is the legal liability. Hopefully the trial lawyers will quickly lose this battle and I can spend my commute time doing productive things. 

Today she flew to London: