Mostly Last Week's News
The federal government is back on as of last Thursday. A proposed Senate compromise was approved by large majorities in both houses. In the end, the only thing that surprised me was how many Republican representatives backed the compromise, once the were given the chance to vote (the count was 285-144 in the House, 81-18 in the Senate, all nay votes were Republicans). Hopefully Obama holding his ground this time will discourage the hugely irresponsible tactic of threatening default (probably not on treasury bond payments, but loans are not the only kind of financial obligation that matters, defaulting on bills or wages is just as irresponsible) as part of legislative negotiations. And those that are concerned about the national debt would be wise to avoid tactics that cause plenty of misery without actually saving any money.
In related (?) news, it seems Ohio is taking the medicaid expansion after all. A strange story, since the Republican governor and the Republican-controlled legislature don't see eye-to-eye on this issue. Wonder if more governors will follow. "I've stopped the federal government from paying for your health insurance" might not be so great a point to campaign on.
Bitcoin is over $200 per on increased demand from China. Chinese internet search giant Baidu has started accepting it for payment.
In my life, this week has been quite busy. I made some significant progress catching up on chores, and managed to find time to get this year's flu shot.
At work, my current bug is annoyingly hydra-like. Migration to Google infrastructure has wonderful aspects and annoying bumps.
Oh, I haven't mentioned tabletop gaming here for a while. Xave ran a brief Nobilis game, which was interesting, and now Andrew's running a game of "Dragons in the Vineyard" (Dogs in the Vineyard mechanics, Exalted setting). Very interesting so far. Dogs has a set of rules that make for fascinating storytelling, and places the players in a very different sort of role than many such games.
In related (?) news, it seems Ohio is taking the medicaid expansion after all. A strange story, since the Republican governor and the Republican-controlled legislature don't see eye-to-eye on this issue. Wonder if more governors will follow. "I've stopped the federal government from paying for your health insurance" might not be so great a point to campaign on.
Bitcoin is over $200 per on increased demand from China. Chinese internet search giant Baidu has started accepting it for payment.
In my life, this week has been quite busy. I made some significant progress catching up on chores, and managed to find time to get this year's flu shot.
At work, my current bug is annoyingly hydra-like. Migration to Google infrastructure has wonderful aspects and annoying bumps.
Oh, I haven't mentioned tabletop gaming here for a while. Xave ran a brief Nobilis game, which was interesting, and now Andrew's running a game of "Dragons in the Vineyard" (Dogs in the Vineyard mechanics, Exalted setting). Very interesting so far. Dogs has a set of rules that make for fascinating storytelling, and places the players in a very different sort of role than many such games.