Framing the Dialogue

Money Speaks

Update 2 – A Rough Pitch

Pirate "ace" Kevin Correia

I know that it’s still spring training for the Pirates, but I nearly veered off of the road yesterday when I heard the stats for Pirates’ starting pitcher and $2 million dollar man, Ross Ohlendorf.  In his last outing Ohlendorf started, pitched a little over four innings, gave up six runs on 9 hits (including three home runs) for an Earned Run Average of 10.05.  No one can doubt his optimism,

“Still not as good as I’d like to be, but I still thought it was better than last time. I’ve been up in the zone too much. I know I’m overthrowing some. That’s a big part of it.”

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Hits About Myths

I love Milton Freidman.  Economics can be rather dry so when I came across a series of videos of Friedman on common economic subjects I first enjoyed them and decided to share them with you.  In one of these videos, Mr. Friedman compares a myth to an air mattress, full of nothing, but comfortable, and jarring when deflated.

The first is one that I posted a couple of years ago during features Friedman in an interview with Phil Donohue:

 

This one is about the myth of The Free Lunch or how taxes on corporations are really taxes on people:

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Barry’s Choice

We were blessed on Valentine’s Day with the release of the Obama Administration’s 2012 budget proposal.  The cover of the document perhaps should have been red, but give him credit Obama is coming out swinging in defense of his vision for our economic future (sound of toilet flushing in the distance).  It is an interesting tactic to produce this and immediately have his lackeys and media dogs go on the attack because the Republicans have not given their proposal for the 2012 budget.  Perhaps that is because they are working to cut from the current budget before taking on the next one.  The 2011 bloated Democrat budget is not a done deal.

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Hip Hop Economics

I am not even sure how to introduce this other than that the YouTube revolution has given voice to subjects that many will find boring.  I would estimate that 99% of Americans would quickly shut this video off (I loved it).  What I found most interesting is that this video had nearly 2 million hits.  Not bad for a couple of “de-funk’t economists.” 

F.A. Hayek is a free-market guy (and right)

John Keynes is a government spending guy (and wrong)

If you are really interested in economics this discussion is both informative and entertaining.

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Update – A Rough Pitch

My last post chronicled how the Pittsburgh Pirates, a team with EIGHTEEN STRAIGHT losing seasons, were forced through arbitration to give pitcher Ross Ohlendorf a nearly 400 percent raise even though he was often hurt and only compiled a 1 win versus 11 loss season.  In Pittsburgh the Steelers’ season is over so football, the city’s favorite sport, until the NFL draft.  The Penguins are limping so badly with injuries that their season is on the brink of collapse.  They still enjoy strong fan support and are exciting to watch in anticipation of Sidney Crosby’s return (hopefully).  Other than college basketball, hoops is not a big sport in the town.

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A Rough Pitch

My career as a newspaper delivery person has been fairly rewarding even though it is a tough job.  In a typical year I probably accurately deliver about half of my papers. So for 2000 deliveries per week I screw up around a thousand.  Last year was a bad one for me and my accuracy as I only delivered 200 correctly. I don’t always deliver to the wrong house, sometimes I am just late or my toss misses and the paper ends up in the gutter or in the neighbor’s yard.  I count those as “misses.”

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Investor-In-Chief

Barack Hussein Obama is perhaps back in full campaign mode.  This is the perfect role for him as he can say whatever he wants depending on the audience and the lame-stream media will, um, cover, ah, his, um, ah, gaffes.  Just last week the President spoke about jobs, innovation, and his new buzz word – investment – at the Orion Energies factory in Wisconsin.  Obama spoke of the glory of the companies meteoric rise as a green energy company; the type of company that we need more of in the United States. 

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For-Proifit College

Start with a headline to catch your attention.

For-profit college debt brings burdens

Follow up with a subhead that nails it and creates the mood.

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When Pigs Fly

It’s an oft repeated story, government’s abuse of power discriminated against a group.  In this case the United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”) denied loans to black farmers based on race.  A group of black farmers (I wonder why they are “black” farmers and not “African-American” farmers) sued and after a while the USDA admitted to the discrimination.   The USDA settled the Pigford vs Glickman case and agreed to pay affected black farmers $50,000 per claim.  Here is my first hiccup.  The USDA, while a bloated bureacracy, is made up of people some of whom discriminated against black farmers.  None of the article that I read mentioned anything about people being fired, going to jail, or being fined because of the offenses.  Yet another case of government screwing up and costing us money.

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I Bequeath To Thee…

We’ve all sat through long, boring speeches by nameless people who are on their way out of office, high school, the working class, etc.  A timeless tradition is to bequeath something to those who will follow in their footsteps.  These “gifts” are sometimes funny and often touching and depending on the closeness of those assembled accompanied by a good dose of tears followed by hugging.

President Clinton’s White House staff has the distinction of perhaps the pettiest actions of an outgoing office holder.  It was widely reported that his staff stole everything that wasn’t nailed down including all of the “W” from the computer keyboards.  His successor, in case you didn’t know, used his middle initial to differentiate himself from his famous father.  You can still see many cars with their “W” stickers.

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