Posts Made By: Russ Carroll

We had a 3-way tie for first place in the football pool. Eric, Herb, and I had an identical 11-5 record this week. As the commissioner, I have declared myself the winner. I also had the tie-breaker go my way, so the computer declared me the winner as well.

Sign up for next weeks pool. You will not be sorry.

is not George Bush or Sarah Palin, or even Michael Crichton. It may well be environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg. Ironically, Dr. Lomborg, a former greenpeace activist, does not deny the existence of man-made environmental warming of the globe, but insists that the impact that it is having and probably will have are being greatly exaggerated by fear-mongers with agenda's.

Further, he claims that the hysteria surrounding the debate has pushed nearly all useful funding to address the problem off to the side, with incredibly expensive and basically useless initiatives, like the Kyoto accord and Cap and Trade, undermining worldwide efforts to improve living conditions around the globe.

I just watched his 2010 documentary called "Cool It" and was pretty surprised at not only his assertions, but the consensus assessment of scientists as to the actual impact of climate change as viewed by the IPCC.

A scientist at Princeton's IAS summed up my personal frustration with this issue - that science has been hijacked by alarmists and catastrophizers surrounding the issue and bad policy is the result.

I encourage anyone here to seek out this film and watch it for yourself. It seems persuasive and is at a minimum thought-provoking.

My wife and I went to a dinner party at a friends home tonight with James Bullard, who is the current President of the St. Louis Federal Reserve. He noted that there was no press there with some emphasis, so I don't feel comfortable quoting him, but I want to assure you of something - this guy is an honest to goodness CAPITALIST and a defender and supporter of it. I know he was aware of who he was talking to, but Milton Friedman and Adam Smith would have been shouting AMEN after virtually every answer to questions that we asked of him, many quite tough and I was surprised he answered them all, and candidly.

I know the Federal Reserve is only a piece of the solution, but I am so pumped up to see such thinking in one of the primary architects of monetary policy. I'll be frank, I was ready to hang it up as an entrepreneur about 6 months into the current administration, and was really depressed by seeing such an all-out assault and rejection of capitalism, otherwise known as the golden goose. I stuck it out and have been rewarded for it. But to hear Dr. Bullard speak, I am 100% confident that America will be on the mend, hopefully soon, and become better than it has ever been within my lifetime. I didn't believe I would ever think that way again.

Congrats to me. I went 12-4 and came in first for the week.

Eric came in second with a respectable 11-5 on another bad week for the Vikes.

Herb pulled up limping and only mustered an 8-8. What cometh before a fall?

I'll try a new tactic this week; DON'T JOIN the football pool. It's too late. I won't return your e-mails. Your pleas will go unanswered. You are wasting your time if you want me to get you in....

http://www.youtube.com/embed/NA-ST8nXl4U?rel=0

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/11/michael-lewis-201111#gotopage1

This is a pretty enlightening article about the roots of the financial troubles of local and state government. The article singles out California as the Chernobyl of states and to get read for its impending collapse.

The first part of the article is an overview of municipal governments and their financial health. The second part is an interview and overview of the failed Governators term in office in California. The article ends with a pathetic assessment of labor costs and retiree benefits destroying what is left of local government and the collapse of Vallejo, CA. It also has an excellent interview with the Democratic mayor of San Jose, CA.

Early in the article, it talks about States being splintered into winners and losers, something we are seeing played out as we speak as businesses flee California and other disastrous states for business-friendly and fiscally responsible states like Texas and Florida.

I don't agree with all of the authors views, but it is an excellent article.

and goes 6-7 in this weeks football pool. Can't make it all up in one week, bud. However, he did redeem himself by being the only person I know, and I mean the ONLY one, that picked the Seahawks to beat the Giants. Believe, man!

E-Dog got a nice win from his Vikes and went 9-4 to come in second. You can't lose 'em all.

It took Al Davis dying for me to pick the Rayda's, but it did put me in first with a 10-3 week. RIP Al.

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(Told you!)

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

http://techcrunch.com/2011/10/13/father-of-c-and-unix-dennis-ritchie-passes-away-at-age-70/

He is the technology counterpart to Steve Jobs. A very tough week for the computer industry.

I briefly worked with Dennis at Bell Labs on a supercomputer project back in the late 80's. He was a very nice guy.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204002304576628673446417268.html?mod=WSJ_hp_mostpop_emailed

Real-estate and newspaper mogul Mortimer Zuckerman voted for Obama but began seeing trouble as soon as the stimulus went into the pockets of municipal unions.


" It may seem odd that most of the targeted rich people had nothing to do with creating the financial crisis. But as Mr. Zuckerman ponders the Occupy Wall Street movement, he concludes that "the door to it was opened by the Obama administration, going after the 'millionaires and billionaires' as if everybody is a millionaire and a billionaire and they didn't earn it. . . . To fan that flame of populist anger I think is very divisive and very dangerous for this country."

...

"At that time he supported Mr. Obama's call for heavy spending on infrastructure. "But if you look at the make-up of the stimulus program," says Mr. Zuckerman, "roughly half of it went to state and local municipalities, which is in effect to the municipal unions which are at the core of the Democratic Party." He adds that "the Republicans understood this" and it diminished the chances for bipartisan legislating."

...

""Even if you want to do this to revive your support in the base, to revive your credibility on the issues of the economy and jobs, which has fallen off the table, this isn't going to accomplish it. Another speech from this guy? The country knows this is just another speech. They understand it almost instantaneously, and his numbers have continued to go down for that reason. What the country wanted was some way of coming up with a solution.""