Obviously, Sports Logos mean more to us Fans than to the Owners

It’s not that I’m against change, but I don’t like changing stuff just for the sake of changing it.

And it’s official: the Miami Dolphins have changed their logo, which for my money was one of the most enduring, and endearing, left in sports today. They went from this:

…to THIS:

When The Fed Has To Print Money, Just To Print Money

I’m not an economist, I don’t play one on TV, and staying at a Holiday Inn Express wouldn’t help me one iota. But these days, anytime I hear the words ‘Federal Reserve‘ and ‘print money‘ in the same sentence, I start paying reeeeaaal close attention.

I carved out as much of the economics minutiae in the article below as possible, to make it easier for everyone to follow, …including me.

—–

From ZeroHedge.com: 

“…we once again refer readers to the paper released yesterday by Morgan Stanley’s Greenlaw and Deutsche Bank’s Hooper, which discusses not only the parabolic chart that US debt yield will certainly follow over the next several decades, but the trickier concept known as the Fed’s technical insolvency, or that moment when the Fed’s tiny capital buffer goes negative [***which the ZeroHedge guys refer to as the "D-Rate" ]. 

In short what would happen is that the Fed will be then forced to print money, just so it can continue to print money.“

Hey, THAT doesn’t sound very good! And this sounds worse:

TAXMAGEDDON (Be afraid; be very afraid…)

I abhor repeating myself, but some things bear repeating.

Therefore, I’m once again linking a brief description from Heritage.com on the imminent threat of Taxmageddon, which is the half-trillion-dollar tax tsunami slated to hit our shores in January, 2013. Also included is a new, bold, easy-to-understand graphic.

If you like paying more of your income in taxes, you’re simply gonna love this.

There is only one way for us to avoid this, boys & girls….and giving Obama 4 more years ain’t it.

Please share.

—-

Taxmageddon Is Huge - 

• Unprecedented Tax Hike For 2013: Starting January 1, 2013, Americans will face a $494 billion tax increase, the highest ever in one year. Obamacare’s tax increase over 10 years barely edges ahead of Taxmageddon at $502 billion. The average American household would see its taxes rise by $3,800 in 2013 alone. And this is just for one year. Taxpayers would see even higher tax hikes in succeeding years.
• Expiring Tax Cuts and Obamacare’s New Taxes: Almost 34% of the tax increases from Taxmageddon come from the expiration of the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts. Another 25% comes from the expiration of the payroll tax cut. Most of the remaining increases come from Obamacare, notably from the start of the hospital insurance 3.8% surtax on all forms of income over $250,000.
• Taxmageddon Hits the Middle Class: Taxmageddon falls primarily on middle- and low-income Americans. That’s because 60 percent of the Bush tax cuts went to middle and low-income taxpayers. The expiration of the patch on the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) will cause these taxpayers to pay a tax they were never supposed to be hit with, and the expiration of the payroll tax cut is a tax hike almost exclusively on middle- and low-income families. That’s just the direct impact. Americans at all income levels will feel the pain of Taxmageddon because it will slow job creation and wage growth.

—–

 

 

—–

UPDATE: Please see a friend of ours’ post on this, as well.

BLACK METTLE:  100 DAYS UNTIL TAXMAGEDDON

 

Up In Smoke

From the Sacramento Bee online:

With California voters poised to vote next week on a tobacco tax hike, a new federal study concludes that the state has used relatively little of the billions of dollars in tobacco money it already takes in to prevent kids from smoking or to help smokers quit.

Between 1998 and 2010, just 6 percent of the money collected from a massive lawsuit settlement and from cigarette taxes went to tobacco interdiction and education programs, the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last week, far below federal spending guidelines for effectively curbing tobacco use.

And before anyone dismisses this as small potatoes, let’s look at the actual money that was squandered, shall we?

From 1998 through 2010, California collected nearly $22 billion from a lawsuit settlement with tobacco companies and from cigarette taxes, according to the federal report.

It appropriated $1.3 billion, including state funding and federal grants, for tobacco prevention and cessation programs during that period.

In 2010, California spent about $79 million on anti-tobacco efforts, about 18 percent of what federal guidelines recommend spending to have a significant impact on public behavior.

California’s experience reflects a national trend that shows states and local governments have used tobacco-related revenues for just about everything but curbing tobacco use.

You mean that most of the shakedown money that Big Tobacco has been paying for years, plus most of the tax revenue from the sales of tobacco, doesn’t actually go to programs to reduce tobacco use? Who’Da thunk that?

Now, contrary to some folks, I do not think that this is just an indictment of  government greed or inefficiency, although those are both undoubtedly true. No, I think this has more to do with the fact that the State of California is not in the best financial shape. The angle that I see missing in all of these reports is the same issue that we first looked at in ‘Soda is NOT the Enemy‘.

The issue is addiction: addiction to spending.

Think about it: an addict, a TRUE addict, will do or say ANYthing to get their next fix, their next drink, their next bet. When things are in control, there’s no problem. But when times are tough, they will make any promise, any claim, for more. What then is the difference between that addiction and this one?

With ‘Soda is NOT the Enemy‘, the addicted parties were the schools and their over-bloated budgets. This time it’s California’s State government, and they’re in the same bind: they actively campaign against the product which is funding a tremendous amount of their very own bottom line.  It’s almost the textbook definition of ‘Conflict of Interest’. It also shows that they’re addicted to the money just like a junkie is to heroin.

The ultimate lesson that I can see is that giving them more money (“…just this time, we promise. Swearsies!“) won’t make it all better, no matter how desperately the addict pleads for it. They can’t be trusted.

The addict needs what ALL addicts need.

So how, exactly, does one enroll an entire government in Spenders Anonymous?

Problem? Inconvenience? (Or Just Dog Puke?)

Problem?  Or inconvenience?  My husband growled that the dog had puked on the rug (again).  I mildly pointed out that this was not a “problem” in the grand scheme of things…only an inconvenience.  He didn’t take that very well.  But he and the baby went for a walk.

And I started thinking: the “problem vs. inconvenience” dichotomy is not my original idea.  Some of you will recognize it as belonging to a wise little story from Robert Fulghum (All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten).

And there is truth in it.

But today it seems as if the inconveniences proliferate to the point where we are overwhelmed, and we have no time and energy left to think about–much less deal with–the big PROBLEMS out there, like the escalating national debt and the taming of the welfare state.

Soda is NOT the enemy

Courtesy of FOX13NOW.com:

KAYSVILLE — Davis High School has been fined $15,000 after they were caught selling soda pop during lunch hour, which is a violation of federal law.

The federally mandated law prohibits the sale of carbonated beverages after lunch is served. The program is an effort to help fight childhood obesity and to have young students make better food choices. 

Had no idea this was a federal law now, but, hey… at least this makes it impossible for the kids to buy soda at the school, which was the intent all along, right?

Sucker….

“Before lunch you can come and buy a carbonated beverage. You can take it into the cafeteria and eat your lunch, but you can’t first go buy school lunch then come out in the hallway and buy a drink,” said Davis High Principal Dee Burton.

Principal Burton said he does not understand the law with rules that seem to be contradictory.

“We can sell a Snickers bar, but can’t sell licorice. We can’t sell Swedish Fish, we can’t sell Starburst, we can’t sell Skittles, but we can sell ice cream, we can sell the Snickers bar, Milky Ways, all that stuff,” said Burton.

Sooooo, the machines are still there, but you just have to reconfigure in which order you buy your lunch and your soda?  They sell some candy, but not other kinds of candy? And this made sense…to WHOM, exactly? How does this law help anything?

———————-

Personally, I was never a fan of the soda machines in schools. Kids are there to learn, and they really don’t need Zingers and a Mountain Dew to do so. If kids want snacks, and are being asked to pay for them anyway, they can bring them to school themselves. Personal responsibility and all that….

And if you’re wondering why the schools DON’T just get rid of the machines, the answer is simple. As Joe Biden might say, it’s a four-letter word: M-O-N-E-Y.

Schools sign big, multi-year contracts with snack vendors and drink companies, which can bring in thousands, tens of thousands or even millions of dollars to a school and/or school district. Thus, the conflict between the incessantly droning ”snacks are bad” rhetoric and the hypocrisy in keeping the machines on site. It results in the liberal illogic of making the kids alter their route in order to get their sodas, and yet the food police in the schools will still be able to perform their public hand-wringing about the evils of sodas & snacks, ……..all the while continuing to receive $$$$$ from their machines which sell sodas and snacks.

So, what to do? Do we ban the sodas from schools? Do we basically do to Coke and Pepsi what we’ve already  done to Joe Camel?

———————-

Honestly, I don’t think that’s the problem. The problem is that schools feel the need to pimp themselves out to whatever will bring in more cash, so they can afford to do all the programs that need funding: sports, band, etc.,…

Much as our federal spending has ballooned out of control, so too has our spending on education. We now spend about 5x more per child for public school education than we did back in the early 1960s, and I dare someone to tell me that we are putting out a better educated student. We’re spending over $10,000/child, but how much of it is football, and baseball, and band, or even the 14th edition English book, when the 13th edition was just dandy, thank you? Lord knows that I loved music and sports, and the newest books, and everything else. But when you end up having to try to contort your logic to simultaneously vilify & allow sodas on campus, all because the schools need the money so badly to pay for all these promises that you couldn’t otherwise afford, perhaps you’ve lost sight of your priorities just a wee bit.

It is the same trap where we find our nation today with federal entitlement spending. No one wants to cut anything, since it’s all wonderfully important, and so much of what we do is “good”, and people really like it, and …..oh, spare me.     WE. ARE. BROKE. Maybe it’s time to scale things back a bit, eh? And maybe concentrate on getting the economy going again? Hmmm?

Here’s a little something that I would ask the big-brained folks in charge to try to keep in mind when they are spending our tax dollars:

**More government is not Better government, and More spending on education doesn’t mean a Better Education.**

Class dismissed.

President Profligate

I remembered him saying it, but I just wanted to hear it again:

Yeah, those were good times.

Now, of course, our debt is soaring towards the heavens, and to heck with those flowery speeches of yesteryear. That doesn’t seem to faze President Profligate, who just had his third budget voted down unanimously, this time by a tally of 99-0.

For the record, his previous budgets lost in the Senate 97-0 (May, 2011), & in the House 414-0 (March of this year).

Hold on; let me count here. That makes the final total tally for all three Obama budgets about…..hold on….that would …be…

…..610? To NOTHING? No one? Not even a single Democrat vote? Heck, if you’ve proposed something so crazy that even Hank “Tipper” Johnson or Max “Last Call” Baucus wouldn’t vote for it, you’ve really flown the coop.

Of course, some folks complained about the vote itself. Guess who?

Democrats disputed that it was actually the president’s plan, arguing that the slim amendment didn’t actually match Mr. Obama’s budget document, which ran thousands of pages. But Republicans said they used all of the president’s numbers in the proposal, so it faithfully represented his plan.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, Alabama Republican, even challenged Democrats to point out any errors in the numbers and he would correct them — a challenge no Democrat took up.

Senator Mitch McConnell then summed it up well:

“The President wants to be able to take his budget around the country to talk about the parts of it he thinks people will like. And Democrats in Congress want to be able to avoid a vote on it because it’s so damaging for job creation, seniors, and the economy.
“Well, if anybody wants to know what a failure of leadership looks like, this is it.”

I guess the fact that absolutely no one, not a single person, from either party, voted for it won’t matter to the folks at NBC, PBS, or the Boston Globes of the world. The media will either:

• (a) ignore the story completely (“budget vote? WHAT budget vote?”), or
• (b) spin this complete & utter failure by Obama as: Republican Intransigence!

Anyone doubt me?

———————–

Sponsored by: The Obama Campaign 2012

Suit Yourself

We just discussed the need to solve the problem of lawsuit abuse the other day (In Lawsuits We Trust). Please consider this the most recent, and perhaps best, example of just why such reform is needed.

Read through this first, courtesy of Bill Hanstock at sbnation.com:

Really, this could be a primer on how NOT to file a suit.

From Bill:

“What can we learn about the plaintiff from this document? Well, we know first of all that he owns a typewriter, but not a computer. We can further assume that he had only one piece of paper to work with, given the amount of “corrections” made on the fly.

He also appears to be technically filing for “COPRIGHT INFRINGEMENTU” which may not be the same thing as copyright infringement. Hopefully he didn’t accidentally begin a case about something having to do with police rights.”

Even better, Johnnie N. Perry goes so far as refer to his invention as a “three-point stands”. Here’s Mr. Perry’s invention:

Improper pluralization aside, when I think “three points”, I’m generally looking for..three points.

Call me crazy.

—————————

My advice: if you are thinking of filing a “COPRIGHT INFRINGEMENTU” suit, do yourself a favor —  find a computer, make sure it has SpellCheck, or at the very least hire a 4th grader as your proof reader.

Otherwise, you could end up as one very unhappy “PALINTIFF“.

Congratulations! You lost.

This is just confusing.

Courtesy of Yahoo News:

SEARCY, Ark. (AP) — An Arkansas woman who cashed a $1 million lottery ticket may have to give up the winnings to a woman who threw away the ticket after she bought it, according to a judge’s ruling Tuesday.

The judge decided that Sharon Duncan was entitled to the prize money, not Sharon Jones, who claimed the prize money after she took the ticket from a trash can of discarded lottery tickets at a convenience store in Beebe, a city about 40 miles northeast of Little Rock.

Jones’ attorney, James Simpson, said he plans to appeal.

—-

Simpson noted that Duncan testified she threw away the ticket after the read-out on a ticket scanner said, “Sorry. Not a winner.” The attorney argued that people shouldn’t be allowed to throw items away and then say, “‘ooh, I want to un-abandon it.’”

“We’d have garage-sale law all over the place,” he said. “It became trash when someone threw it away.”

So, one the one hand, Duncan DID throw it away. However, she wouldn’t have done so had the ticket shown up as a winner.

I don’t know. I feel for both of the ”Sharons”. Either way, one of these ladies is gonna feel ripped off.

Question: Since this is going to be appealed, does the next judge order the prize money split?