Friday, February 25, 2011

'Nuff said.


You did WHAT on your hands?!?

Interesting article in the Wall Street Journal today about the former future of the New York Mets, Fernando Martinez. One thing I wish they didn't mention is something I recall applying to both Moises Alou and Yankee catcher Jorge Posada:

"In 2009, while playing in the Dominican winter league, Martinez missed several games because of blisters on his hands. Former Met Moises Alou, the general manager of Martinez's winter ball team, told him to urinate on his hands to make the skin more resilient. 'It worked,' Martinez said."

Unfortunately he says it worked, which means we'll be hearing more about this in the future.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

If a picture is worth a thousand words, what are eight pictures worth?

Excellent post on MotherJones.com about not just income inequality in the United States but the misguided perceptions about that inequality. The chart that really stood out was this one:








I'm guessing the answer is not linear but exponential to the question posed in the title of this post. Many a political career have been made on attempting to address these issues. Will anyone make a career of actually solving the issue one day?

Avoiding the wool being pulled over their eyes...

And you thought bipartisanship was dead, right? Jennifer Steinhauer of The New York Times profiles the interesting friendship between New York Democrat Anthony Weiner and Utah Republican Jason Chaffetz that started with their mutual dislike of mohair. Weiner is known for his raucous TV appearances:



Meanwhile Chaffetz is known as the Congressman that lives in his D.C. office instead of renting an apartment and as the guy that famously leg-wrestled Stephen Colbert on "The Colbert Report":



In spite of their political differences, one thing they do have in common is neither seems to take himself too seriously, much like another Utah Republican, Orrin Hatch, and his description of his relationship with Ted Kennedy.

"Disagreements over policy, however, were never personal with Ted. I recall a debate over increasing the minimum wage. Ted had launched into one of his patented histrionic speeches, the kind where he flailed his arms and got red in the face, spewing all sorts of red meat liberal rhetoric. When he finished, he stepped over to the minority side of the Senate chamber, put his arm around my shoulder, and said with a laugh and a grin, “How was that, Orrin?”"

If laughter is the best medicine, perhaps levity is the best route to bipartisanship?

Monday, February 14, 2011

The Obudget

The White House announced its 2012 budget today. The New York Times has a great interactive visual representation of it.

Think you can do a better job? Knock yourself out.

Boston to Southern Virginia in three hours? Well, not in the US anyway.

An article in yesterday's New York Times about China's high-speed rail construction also gave some background information on why China is so insistent on building it:

"China’s lavish new rail system is a response to a failure of central planning six years ago.

After China joined the World Trade Organization in November 2001, exports and manufacturing soared. Electricity generation failed to keep up because the railway ministry had not built enough rail lines or purchased enough locomotives to haul the coal needed to run new power plants.

By 2004, the government was turning off the power to some factories up to three days a week to prevent blackouts in residential areas.

Officials drafted a plan to move much of the nation’s passenger traffic onto high-speed routes by 2020, freeing existing tracks for more freight. Then the global financial crisis hit in late 2008. Faced with mass layoffs at export factories, China ordered that the new rail system be completed by 2012 instead of 2020, throwing more than $100 billion in stimulus at the projects.
"

One other passage that stood out:

"In a little more than three hours, [the Guangzhou-to-Wuhan line] travels 664 miles, comparable to the distance from Boston to southern Virginia. That is less time than Amtrak’s fastest train, the Acela, takes to go from Boston just to New York."

One can only hope...

Friday, February 11, 2011

Hmm, I wonder if this is 'Step 1'?

From today's Washington Post:

"These include reducing the size of mortgages Fannie and Freddie can purchase, from $729,750 now to $625,500 by this fall. It also includes phasing a 10 percent down payment requirement for the companies. Finally, it includes raising fees the companies charge to insure loans.

The administration also suggested scaling back FHA, which caters to first-time homebuyers with low down-payment options. It said it wants to reduce the size of loans that FHA can provide, increase fees by a quarter percentage point, and potentially raise the down payment requirement from 3.5 percent now to 5 percent in the future.

The report also emphasized the importance of rental housing for low and moderate-income communities.
"

This got me thinking. One of the recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles Commission was to eliminate the mortgage interest deduction, which was somewhat scaled down yet still retained in Ronald Reagan's Tax Reform Act of 1986. The question is how do you get rid of a sacred cow unless you convince people it is no longer sacred? Could this be the first step to making that happen?

Super Mario

Why do I feel like former Gov. Cuomo is Super Mario except that he's mediating between two Donkey Kongs?

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Social Security is indispensable to our seniors' economic well-being and also a program whose autopilot increases should be trimmed to leave room for

Another great Matt Miller column titled "Andrew Cuomo and the liberal case for Social Security cuts". Yes, sometimes that baby is just ugly...

High-speed rail: the elegant way to travel...

The White House recently had Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood make a trip to Philadelphia's 30th Street station to announce the President's plan to have 80% of Americans access to high-speed rail within 25 years. (So we can be in 25 years what Japan is like today? At least I hope our streets will be that clean by then.)

Great pieces by the New York Times and Washington Post to report the facts of the announcement. The Wall Street Journal made sure to imply some foreign conspiracy about "Japanese-style bullet trains" and the socialist idea of how Amtrak is the "federally subsidized national railroad operator", which it may be but seems somewhat worse when you describe it in such a utilitarian way. (Of course, that probably was their intent.)

Debunking the "Lie of the Year"

Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius wrote an informative op-ed piece in today's Washington Post about how the Affordable Care Act is anything but a government takeover of healthcare. Many excellent points raised, although I'm sure many people will still continue believing PolitiFact's 2010 Lie of the Year.

Hobin Rood: Stealing from the poor and giving to the rich...

Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post explains how credit card companies can give all those great rewards to the high-end card holders:

"Because while everyone pays the higher retail prices necessary to cover the "swipe fees," only those with rich rewards cards actually get the kickback. In effect, they are subsidized by those who pay those higher retail prices with cash, debit cards or standard-issue credit cards."

So if you were wondering who pays for all those great rewards for Platinum card members, the correct answer is YOU.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Ex-owner Wilpon? One can only hope...

CNBC with a brief but on-the-point piece on how just selling a minority stake in the New York Mets won't be enough to entice another billionaire or group of millionaires to bail out the Wilpon family from their Madoff mess.