We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
I'm looking forward to visiting there this Spring.
Sicily has had its native tribes, then the Greeks, the Phoenecians/Carthaginians, the Romans, the Muslims, the Normans, and is currently occupied by European powers. What next?
The message here will be what it was in 2008 and to a lesser extent in 2012 — a chance to make history, this time by electing the first female US president. In fact, that’s all Hillary has. She has no track record of significant accomplishment in her eight years as a US Senator, and nothing at all to recommend her from her four years as Secretary of State. Even a Clinton ally like Lanny Davis couldn’t come up with a single data point in a tenure bookended by the “reset button” embarrassment and the debacle in Benghazi. Despite her outsize power in the Democratic Party, Hillary Clinton is simply a weak candidate and a mediocre-at-best campaigner — and that’s why Democrats should be hitting the panic button.
... if the poor pay attention, they can learn from the rich and become better off themselves by investing in education, getting and staying married, and working full-time.
Do most Americans energetically pursue wealth? I don't think they do. People have other desires besides wealth, fortunately. Of course, few would refuse a windfall. Even Bill Ayers lives high on the hog, on his family fortune.
Not that there is any reason to assume the CBO is 'impartial'. It likely is not. It's probably not any more impartial than a host of other predictive organizations out there. However, the CBO does have a larger veneer of impartiality than, say, the president's Council of Economic Advisers.
But today's release, by the CBO, about how Obamacare will impact the workforce is possibly the most insightful look into the potential damage this legislation will wreak on workers in the United States.
But wait! There's more! Spin, that is. After all, what good is an administration if it can't get the gullible masses to believe the CBO didn't say what it did say? I'm curious to see how this plays out (or doesn't, as is more likely) in the media over the next few days.
Football
Is Top Sport in U.S.: 1,088,158 High School Players - See more at:
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/football-top-sport-us-1088158-high-school-players#sthash.hjKC0UA2.dpuf
Charter
High Schools Increase Earnings and Educational Achievement - See more
at:
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/02/charter-high-schools-increase-earnings-and-educational-achievement.html#sthash.shWRN1wD.dpuf
Panelist
at Podesta's Think Tank on Common Core: 'The Children Belong to All of
Us' - See more at:
http://cnsnews.com/video/cnsnews/panelist-podestas-think-tank-common-core-children-belong-all-us#sthash.LUCyJ9E4.dpuf
ABC’s Slime-Time News- Did flashy reporting go too far when it stirred up hysteria over a common beef product?
Michael Barone: How ObamaCare Misreads America - The Washington elites who designed the law must be bewildered: Why doesn't everyone behave as they do?
Science changed dramatically in the 1970s, when the reward structure in the profession began to revolve around the acquisition of massive amounts of taxpayer funding that was external to the normal budgets of the universities and federal laboratories. In climate science, this meant portraying the issue in dire terms, often in alliance with environmental advocacy organizations. Predictably, scientists (and their institutions) became addicted to the wealth, fame, and travel in the front of the airplane...
Just this morning we were thinking about the former Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation. He’s written books, has a heck of a CV, and has received oodles of honors from very prestigious institutions. And yet there’s something missing from the résumé of the Job Czar: he’s never had a job in the private sector. It’s a remarkable thing, and atypical of US history, though quite typical of today’s utopians.
New York’s failed expedition into governmental nannying is symptomatic of its class structure. Rich people’s scolding is really a form of snobbery masquerading as concern for poor people’s well-being. Rather than admit that the underclass repulses them, wealthy New Yorkers try to strip away their repulsive behavior by force of law. Expect the trend to continue through the de Blasio years.
Pizza requires government rules: I want a hard, thin, half-burnt crust and hate the soft soggy crap, and I demand government action now. It should be free, too. The People need good pizza.
Count me in with those who believe Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. After all, many Ponzis start with a surplus and garner interest, but over time the payouts exceed incoming revenues. All Ponzis are based on paying dividends to "investors" out of active money incoming from new "investors". But even Ponzis don't pay out additional money to people who petition for someone else's funds. If they did, I presume they would lower one person's payout to cover the person making the petition.
I'm not sure how long Social Security can last. A friend of mine who is dyed-in-the-wool liberal/progressive believes the upper range limit for SocSec payments should be eliminated and it should be handled the same way as an income tax. That is probably the first step that will be taken. Soak the Rich. This will extend the scheme for a few more years. Then they will undoubtedly implement means-testing, which will extend it a bit longer. At some point, all the financial engineering will fail. Until then, keep kicking the can down the road.
Religion is a map. A map provides orientation and direction, but one is under no compulsion to go anywhere with it. It lets you know YOU ARE HERE and GOD IS THERE. The rest is between you and him.
"What I like to do is to start businesses. It can be any kind of business, I've done everything from restaurants to specialty wire manufacturers. Most fail, some struggle along, some do OK, and occasionally there is a home run. It's great fun, all of it."
Why does it matter? It's a business, and makes money for the school. This is not news. Universities have become businesses, and, often, big ones. They serve their consumers.
Homeland
Security Secretary: Illegals Have ‘Earned Right to be Citizens’ - See
more at:
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/penny-starr/homeland-security-secretary-illegals-have-earned-right-be-citizens#sthash.yxvC3JIs.dpuf
Jaywalking is as much a part of New York as salty pretzels and the carriage horses of Central Park. While Bill de Blasio claimed to be inspired by Mayor La Guardia, the latter had an entirely different view of the relationship between the people and the city government.
“I prefer the happiness of our unorganized imperfection to the organized perfection of other countries,” La Guardia said after vetoing a jaywalking bill, and added, referencing the growing fascism in Germany that was then admired by many progressives, “Broadway is not Unter den Linden.”
Remarkably, more than a quarter of retirees will un-retire at some point, not due to financial necessity, but because they find work more rewarding and enjoyable than retirement.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio emphatically backed New Governor Andrew Cuomo’s controversial remarks that “extreme” conservatives – which he defined as being pro-life, second amendment advocates, or supporters of traditional marriage – “have no place in the state of New York.” “I stand by that 100 percent,” de Blasio told reporters at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C. on Thursday.
Thanks to a reader for that pic of Massachusetts this weekend.
Will Nicotine 
The Lowdown on Low-Cut: Salary's Dress Code Survey - Find Out the 
Kid-Rearing (This is like, so Un-PC… But is it useful?)
