LIBERTY: I like the idea of eliminating 12 sets of gubamint.

Monday, July 31, 2006

http://www.tjc.com/38states/

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The map reducing the U.S. to 38 States is the creation of C. Etzel Pearcy, geography professor at California State University, Los Angeles. The new boundaries totally erase the 104 lines currently separating the 50 States. Each State’s new name, chosen with the help of a poll of geography students, represents a physical or cultural aspect of the new territory. For example, Cascade (named after a major mountain range in Washington and Oregon), Cochise (named after the Apache Indian chief of Arizona), and Alamo (named after the mission in San Antonio, Tex.).

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But, I still think the Free State Project http://www.freestateproject.org is a better idea. A plague on all the politicians, bureaucrats, and the parasites.

1 Comment | LIBERTY | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj

RANT: Greedy state government defrauds the taxpayers with an unneeded sales tax hike!

Monday, July 31, 2006

Note that 101.5 today is reporting that only one sixth of the tax increase is going to close the “budget gap”; the rest is for pork! Doesn’t anyone else find that amusing? The politicians pulled another fast one. AND, as I believe I mentioned, back on Wall Street, old Jon would have closed that budget gap with some good old fashioned cost cutting. But he wasn’t spending his money! Vote ’em all out. And, send them to jail for fraud.

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Posted by reinkefj

FUNY: Tuskgee Airman … wonder how much of the movie is true?

Monday, July 31, 2006

Chose to watch the movie Tuskgee Airmen last night. Given Hollywood’s liberal bias, I suspect everything that comes out of there. But if in fact that group never lost a bomber and if in fact the losses were a third prior to that, that’s some accomplishment. Strip away all the fluff and stuff, you have to wonder about racist assumptions. Very powerful paradigm shifter.

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Posted by reinkefj

MONEY: The world is fraught with risks!

Sunday, July 30, 2006

http://www.moneyweek.com/file/15985/the-five-major-trends-reshaping-the-world-economy.html

energy costs, the world’s reserve currency, business cycle, west 2 east, end of the American empire

All things that should be considered in financial planning.

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Posted by reinkefj

FUN: Capturing your family history

Sunday, July 30, 2006

http://familyoralhistory.us/news/view/open_discussion_thread_have_you_tried_it/

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but when a person dies, it’s like burning down a library.  All their stories are gone.

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I think that the interesting thing about today’s technology is its capability of creating the equivalent of the Library of Congress for the individual, family, groups, or society.

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Posted by reinkefj

ALUM: Interesting that search engines present different results … …

Sunday, July 30, 2006

… … in of itself that’s not so surprising. What is interesting is that the same search input string yields different results. Not all search engines support rss, surprising. Search engines are “contaminated” by phony results (i.e., “manhattan college” is on the page but as an ad or other filler). Search engines have no way to just pull people out. So when I do my query, I get sports stories, sales sites, travel agencies, and liberally sprinkled thru the results are real alumni. Hmmm!

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Posted by reinkefj

LIBERTY: Republican leaders know the impact of a minimum wage increase but pander!

Saturday, July 29, 2006

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_07/009254.php

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RAGS TO RICHES….The latest from the GOP:

Republican leaders are willing to allow the first minimum wage increase in a decade but only if it’s coupled with a cut in inheritance taxes on multimillion-dollar estates, congressional aides said Friday.

Clearly, the Republican Party is the party of common sense. After all, if you give a few hundred dollars a month to the poorest of the working poor, it’s only fair that you also give several million dollars to the richest of the idle rich.

Right?

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Wrong, wrong, wrong.

(1) Raising the minimum wage is a joke. All it does is put poor people out of work and give raises to the politicians and the politically connected unions. If 7$/hour is good, why not 10$/hour? Why not a 100$/hour? Argh.

(2) Estate taxes are theft. And the graves being robbed don’t vote.

How stupid are we?

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Posted by reinkefj

MONEY: There’s a moral lesson in this story!

Saturday, July 29, 2006

http://money.cnn.com/2006/07/27/news/funny/monopoly/index.htm?section=money_latest

Monopoly ditches cash for Visa
New British version of classic board game will replace traditional paper dollars with a debit card to reflect modern lifestyles.
July 27 2006: 2:01 PM EDT

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NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The days of spending cash are over, if a British version of Monopoly has anything to say about it.
Parker Brothers said a new edition of the board game released this week in the United Kingdom and Australia switches to a Visa debit card and electronic transaction calculator from its traditional paper money.

***End Quote***

I recently heard that the average consumer has 19.5 credit cards. The average credit card debt sounds like a minimum wage job’s annual earnings.

Maybe it was my depression era grandparents and their children, my aunt and uncles, particular love of zero debt, a full savings account, and a “never spend more money than is in your pocket” ethic. I learned those lessons later in life. But I marvel at people’s thinking.

Unfortunately, Parker Brothers is not living in the real world.

(1) It doesn’t charge 21% interest for loans. While it may eliminate cheating by the Banker player, it doesn’t reflect the real world where the  politicians, non-regulating insider regulators, the fat cat insiders, and the Federal Reserve (a private corporation that is no more “federal” than I am) ARE cheating us. They are robbing us blind!

(2) It doesn’t take 35% of your $200 when you pass go to waste. There should be one player representing the gubamint that just takes from everyone.

(3) It doesn’t, if one circuit around the board is a year, take an inflation tax of all you cash. That’s real life.

(4) It doesn’t take the opportunity to teach us that cash is better than credit and cash ain’t a store of value.

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Posted by reinkefj

RANT: The automatic greeting at the McDonald’s drive up

Saturday, July 29, 2006

Nothing dumber. It is obviously trigger ed by a motion sensor. “Welcome to McDonalds. May I take your order?” Don’t start ordering then because you will just have to repeat it when the clerk’s ready. Dumb!

1 Comment | Ranting | Permalink
Posted by reinkefj

TECH: PLAXO syncs email address books for you

Saturday, July 29, 2006

You may wish to consider Plaxo. It is a free internet service that sync address books between different people who “know” each other. In exchange for the information you share with them, which I am sure they have various ways of making a profit on, you not only get up-to-date info on fellow Plaxo “members”, but you get a usable web-based address book which is a backup of the address book on your computer. It will even sync multiple machines. I have found it a great tool. Some call it “Faustian”, but:

(1) They are upfront about they reuse data. Everyone does it but are not honest enough to admit it.

(2) I seeded my address books with fake people (i.e., my non-computer literate elderly uncle complete with an isp email address). If spam was to show up in the email boxes for my “fake people”, then it could have only come from them. And, I’d rat them out to the inet community. If it sounds like “trust but verify”, it is. I did a few tours in security, so I am very skeptical of stuff on the net. Wanna see my tin foil hat?
FWIW

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Posted by reinkefj

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