So, for weeks or maybe months now, you’ve been listening to people spout off about the U.S. economy, and give their opinions (born of varying degrees of expertise and nuttiness) about the government’s response so far.

Do yourself a favor and spend <10 minutes listening to the woman in charge of the TARP oversight committee, who has probably the ( Read more... )

Preamble:  I maintain, personally and professionally, that there is no good logical reason to ever be pessimistic. (Pessimism is different from considering all the options; it’s specifically expecting the negative or unpleasant ones.)  Optimism is free and has its own benefits.  Conversely,  pessimism is unpleasant and can be costly.  There’s just ( Read more... )

As said in the previously-quoted bit on theology and philosophy, to have faith is to have faith in something.  And as the ol’ Bible itself says, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1…a beautiful line perhaps worth more as poetry than explication, but it illuminates the nature of faith as a sort ( Read more... )

I bet you didn’t see this coming:
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America the Banana Republic: Politics & Power: vanityfair.com
Now ask yourself another question. Has anybody resigned, from either the public or the private sectors (overlapping so lavishly as they now do)? Has anybody even offered to resign? Have you heard anybody in authority apologize, as in: “So very sorry about your savings and pensions and ( Read more... )

According to the Global Mammal Assessment, one in four mammal species on Earth faces extinction.

Anybody else thinking there’s a huuuuuuge “oops” in our future?

Originally published at *Transcendental *Logic. You can comment here or there.

Real vs. Speculative:

“The real economy need not suffer in the downfall of the speculative
economy. If anything, the real economy has been repressed by the
speculative economy. Real farmers have been crushed by Big Agra, real
druggists have been crushed by Wal-Mart and real transportation
alternatives have been crushed by Big Oil and Big Auto.

The ( Read more... )

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Here’s the best of what’s accumulated in my browser over the last few days. It’s been a powerful week for links!

If you’re like me, overt expressions of authority make you ill. Authority itself is pre-committed to an idea that human beings are separate, that one can be hurt without hurting the others, and that it’s somehow efficacious or correct ( Read more... )