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updated: 2019-01-09
 

"Jefferson wanted to make an advance by fitting a government to a people which he believed to be in a peculiarly happy situation.   Hamilton wanted to fit a people to a preconceived form of government." --- James Truslow Adams 1936 _The Living Jefferson_ pg7

 
 

2012 Feb

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19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29

 

"But there is no certain way that exists permanently.   There is no way set up for us.   Moment after moment we have to find our own way.   Some idea of perfection, or some perfect way which is set up by someone else, is not the true way for us.   Each one of us must make his own true way, & when we do, that way will express the universal way.   This is the mystery.   When you understand one thing through & through, you understand everything.   When you try to understand everything, you will not understand anything.   The best way is to understand yourself, & then you will understand everything.   So when you try hard to make your own way, you will help others, & you will be helped by others.   Before you make your own way you cannot help anyone, & no one can help you." --- Shunryu Suzuki 1970, 1991 _Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind_ pg 111

 
 
 

captain William Scott's flag for the Republic of Texas.

2012-02-01

2012-02-01 09:09PST (12:09EST) (17:09GMT) (19:09Jerusalem)
Nick Heath _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
those trying to pursue roles in software development are struggling to get work in the UK
"Last year employers told tech skills body e-Skills UK that IT graduates didn’t have the mix of technical skills and business knowledge they are looking for.   An e-skills UK report found this lack of the right skills had resulted in a steady drop-off in the proportion of IT professionals aged under 30 -- falling from 33% in 2001 to only 19% in 2010 -- as employers favoured experienced workers from other sectors over young recruits...   'Many employers believe that what people learn about IT at university and at school is basically useless.', said Holway...   required are in things like app development, network design, social media skills and how they operate in the cloud...   n.gurr responded: 'As I work providing IT services to, among others, Computer Science students in an old (1994 group) university I can say that Holway speaks out of where he sits.   There is a specific focus on both app development and network design at the moment during our courses...   All in all his comments about Comp-sci are ill judged and even more ill informed -- he is obviously chasing a sensationalist title.   Perhaps a tax on out-sourced [off-shored] products would be better...'"

2012-02-01 07:32PST (10:32EST) (15:32GMT) (17:32Jerusalem)
Mike Pare _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
Whirlpool begins shifting workers to new plant in Cleveland, TN: Cattle-call for new job applicants for an additional 130 jobs will be held on Saturday
Chattanooga TN Times Free Press
"Whirlpool hiring for the 1M-square-foot factory on Benton Pike."

2012-02-01
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Why I love adding southern Unionist content to the web
"because people are starting to learn that the story isn't as they may have heard...or the story that they have come to believe...   it's because I get to hear feed-back from others who have discovered Southern Unionist ties in their own families...and they enjoy the fact that the history of the South is really much more rich than so commonly told.   Good stuff..."

2012-02-01
Thomas E. Brewton & Paul Greenberg
Obummer blocking economic improvement, pushing uneconomic boondoggles

2012-02-01 13:37PST (16:37EST) (21:37GMT) (23:37Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_/_IDG_
US firms should disclose off-shore hiring: US House bill filed today would require that firms report employment data country-by-country
"A newly filed US House bill would require that US public companies disclose the number of workers they employ in the U.S.A., and the number that work over-seas.   The intent of this legislation is to discourage offshoring, said US representative Gary Peters (D-MI), who introduced it on Wednesday.   Publicly traded companies are currently required to disclose total employment in annual reports filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.   Peters' bill would require that companies break out the employment figures by country and state in the reports.   'We need to do everything in our power to fight the [off-shore] out-sourcing of American jobs and this bill gives consumers and investors the information they need to make an informed choice.', said Peters in a statement.   The bill is co-sponsored by Peters, representative Tim Bishop (D-NY), and representative Jerry McNerney (R-CA)...   In its annual report filed 2011 June 30, MSFT said it employed approximately 90K people on a full-time basis -- 54K in the US and 36K internationally [but not how many foreign workers they have brought to the USA].   MSFT's US employment was unchanged from the year-ago period, but overseas employment increased by about 1L workers.   Hewlett-Packard, IBM and most other large tech companies only report worldwide numbers.   IBM, which has been hiring over-seas while it shrinks its US work-force [a combination of US citizens, green card holders, and guest-workers], stopped providing a break-out last year...   R&D employment abroad by US multi-national firms nearly doubled between 2004 and 2009, while domestic employment by these firms increased by less than 5% during the same period."

2012-02-01
Robert Curry
the Scottish Enlightenment and America's founding: The drama of the constitutional convention
"Remarkably, the actual course of events during the Constitutional Convention, as if by dramatic intent, seems designed to draw our attention to the enormous importance of the Scottish Enlightenment in America's Founding...   As Gary Wills observed, 'At age 16 Jefferson and Madison and Hamilton were all being [educated] by Scots who had come to America as adults.'   Madison's tutor, Donald Robertson, was a product of the Scottish Enlightenment at its peak, but the great intellectual influence on Madison was John Witherspoon, also a Scot.   When Madison entered Princeton in 1769, under the leadership of Witherspoon it had become the American university where the great thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment -- Hume, Smith, Hutcheson, Reid, Ferguson and Kames -- were studied most intensely."

2012-02-01
Heide B. Malhotra _Epoch Times_
Attempting to define "true" unemployment numbers

2012-02-01
Ellen Gray
What we don't know about snow

2012-02-01
Willis Eschenbach
Cites and signs of the times

2012-02-01 16:17:47PST (2012-02-01 19:17:47EST) (2012-02-02 00:17:47GMT) (2012-02-02 02:17:47Jerusalem)
Patrick May _San Jose CA Mercury News_
What will be on sale at FB IPO is you

2012-02-01 18:46PST (2012-02-01 21:46EST) (2012-02-02 02:46GMT) (2012-02-02 04:46Jerusalem)
Susan Postlewaite _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
new Martin county FL jobs tending toward the low end of the pay scale
"Fruth's research firm has analyzed wages and other economic data in hundreds of local economies around the country including Martin County.   The firm says its data shows Martin County's average wages slipped dramatically over the last 20 years when ranked against 366 metropolitan communities."

2012-02-01 20:05PST (2012-02-01 23:05EST) (2012-02-02 04:05GMT) (2012-02-02 06:05Jerusalem)
Jason D. O'Grady _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple released Mac OSX 10.7.3 with Safari 5.1.3

2012-02-01
Peter Ferrara _American Spectator_
Obummer's calculated deception
"Calculated deception as a central public manipulation strategy practiced by president Obama involves the president taking advantage of what he thinks the average person doesn't know and won't be told by a compliant media.   Such calculated deception was central to last week's State of the Union Address.   That address is useful only as an outline of the president's re-election strategy.   A powerful practical answer will come at the end of March in the form of House Budget committee chairman Paul Ryan's 2013 budget proposal, which will be passed by the Republican-controlled House.   That budget, which all the Republicans will run on, and the President's State of the Union Address will frame the 2012 election debate.   The Obama SOTU exhibited again Obama's core [leftist] conviction that the average American is hopelessly stupid."

2012-02-01
Daniel J. Flynn _American Spectator_
eugenics remains in Massachusett court

2012-02-01
John Zappe _TLNT_
employee referrals are effective
"He and his partner, Mark Mehler, surveyed their clients and others about employee referral programs and found that most of the 50 respondents have a referral program, most pay a bonus of some kind, and on average 28% of their external hires are referrals."

2012-02-01
Steve Southerand ii
honest federal government budget act

2012-02-01
Claudius Gros, G. Kaczor & D. Markovic _PhysOrg_
Brain capacity may limit exponential on-line data increase

2012-02-01
Mark J. Perry
Shale oil revolution reaches Eagle Ford, TX

2012-02-01
Mark J. Perry
Indiana is first rust-belt state to convert from forced-union to right-to-work

2012-02-01
Mark J. Perry
US natural gas production 1981 January to 2011 November

2012-02-01
Mark J. Perry
light vehicle sales

2012-02-01
Jeff Lukens
America after Obummer: recovering prosperity, government fiscal sanity, consitutionality, and liberty

2012-02-01
Beryl Lieff Benderly _AAAS Science_
president Obummer encounters high-tech unemployment

2012-02-01
_Dice_
Dice Report: 83,272 job ads

2012-02-01
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
more on the Wedel case
 
Several articles have come out in the press in the aftermath of Mrs. Wedel's on-line challenging President Obama over his claim that we have an engineer shortage and need a liberalized H-1B program to remedy it.   An important piece of new information in them is that Mr. Wedel had been laid off from Texas Instruments (TI) -- a company that has been in the forefront in lobbying Congress to expand the H-1B and green card programs for many years.   Let's start with that point.
 
Back in 1998, when Congress was considering its first big H-1B increase, I cited the example of a new grad, with a bachelor's in physics from Princeton, and a Master's in EE from Cornell, top grades in top schools, who was rejected not just once but twice by TI.   There is always the possibility that there are unknown factors in cases like this, but it certainly didn't jibe with TI's claim to have a desperate shortage of engineers.
 
The next year, Roger Coker, TI's director of staffing for the United States, actually told US News and World Report in a rare moment of candor that H-1B was a key component in TI's quest to hold down engineer salaries.   I suppose there might be a charitable interpretation of that too, but it surely seems to be part of a pattern of lack of sincerity by TI on the H-1B issue.
 
Then in 2009 Vivek Wadhwa cited an example of a foreign hire TI had made earlier -- as a test engineer.   This worker had a master's degree but was working as...a test engineer!   This is mundane work, nothing innovative.   Surely TI could have found a U.S. citizen or permanent resident for that job.   (Though not necessarily a young one, which was probably what TI wasn't telling you.   More on this below.)   A test engineer -- come ON, TI, these are the foreign geniuses you say you're hiring?
 
Then last October, TI testified to Congress that it couldn't find engineers at the graduate-degree level.   Surprisingly, TI volunteered the information that they had NO shortage at the bachelor's level; the only shortage, the TI rep said, was at the graduate level.   The American kids stop at a bachelor's degree, she said, because they want to go out in the world and make money.
 
That of course is not what Obama has been told.   He thinks we have a shortage of electrical engineers, that firms like TI just doesn't have any applicants, and that thus Mr. Wedel should be able to get a new job "right away".   Obama recently called for adding 10K more engineers to our work-force.
 
The TI rep's statement is also at odds with her later statement in the same hearing that TI has various programs at the K-12 level to get more kids interested in engineering!   Why do that if there is no shortage?
 
And what about the TI claim that they do have a shortage at the grad level?   First of all, if that's true, then why is TI conducting programs at the K-12 level?   Shouldn't they start programs at the university level, to coax those American engineering students to continue on to a master's?   (Not PhD.   As I've written before, although the industry lobbyists say they need more H-1Bs because not enough Americans pursure doctorates, most tech firms do NOT hire many PhDs.)   Why aren't they doing this?
 
And TI's claim to need people with grad degrees seems bogus too, in light of their hiring the above-mentioned worker with a master's in the position of test engineer.
 
Now, what about age?   As most of you know, the central point I've been hammering away at for years regarding H-1B is AGE.   The H-1B program is fundamentally about AGE.   When the industry runs out of young Americans to hire, they hire young H-1Bs, and thus avoid hiring the older Americans.   Younger workers are cheaper than older ones, hence H-1B brings cost savings to the employers.
 
On that topic, consider the Wedel piece in abc News.
 
It features the following quote of Vivek:
 
"The #1 issue in the tech world is as people get older, they generally become more expensive.", said Vivek Wadhwa, an adviser to start-ups and an entrepreneurship scholar affiliated with Duke University.   "So if you're an employer who can hire a worker fresh out of college who is making $60K versus an older worker who's making $150K, and the younger worker has skills that are fresher, who would you hire?"
 
So Vivek said what I've been saying, and what he has said before: The issue is AGE.   He and I do differ on the skills issue, which I regard as a pretext.   See my various writings for details, but that's not the point I want to make now.   Instead, let's modify Vivek's statement, in a way I don't think he'd disagree with, to the following:
 
So if you're an employer who can hire a worker fresh out of college who is making $60K versus an older worker who's making $150K, and BOTH the older and younger worker have the freshest skills, who would you hire?
 
This exposes the REAL problem, doesn't it?   The real problem is that older workers are too expensive.   The skills issue is secondary, if not an outright pretext (which I say it often is).   And this is why I said in my last posting that retraining programs (a topic sure to arise if Obama really were to figure out that Wedel is typical, not an exception) are NOT the solution.   A retrained expensive old guy is STILL an expensive old guy.
 
The bottom line is that Mr. Wedel, in his mid-30s (right at the point where I've said "old age" sets in in the tech field), is a victim of this revolving-door ruse that the H-1B program has devolved to over the years.   Its predecessor, H-1, started as a means of hiring "the best and the brightest", outstanding talents from around the world.   Now, H-1B is a program for, in many cases, hiring ordinary people to do ordinary work -- but YOUNG ordinary people doing ordinary work.
 
And Obama is a victim too, in his own way.   The Democratic Party (as with the Republicans too) has been pushing this theme for years, saving our economy through tech innovation.   Obama came into this, and apparently drank the Kool-aid.
 
Norm
video
Beryl Lieff Benderly: AAAS Science
Jennifer Epstein: Politico
Steve Camarota & Roy Beck: Center for Immigration Studies
nearly 2M US engineers unemployed or under-employed
"101K U.S. engineers looking for a job who can't find any work at all; 244K U.S. engineers who have dropped completely out of the labor market; 1.47M U.S. engineers who are working but no longer as engineers; 1.8M total U.S.-born individuals under the age of 66 who have engineering degrees but don't have an engineering job."
2012-01-31: White House briefing (video)
Joe Guzzardi: Californians for Population Stabilization
Anna M. Tinsley: Fort Worth TX Star-Telegram
Patrick Thibodeau: ComputerWorld/IDG
SlashDot discussion of EE Darin Wedel
Mark Karlin: BuzzFlash
"there is generally no actual shortage of US citizens with high-tech skills for the work done by H-1B visa holders...   Of course, the high-tech [executives and PR flacks] are telling the White House and Congress that they can't find US citizens for the H-1B jobs, but many critics argue that many high-tech companies hire H-1B workers without even offering the positions to Americans.   On top of that, after the H-1B workers are sent back to their native nations, there are reports that they are rehired by US companies abroad to start off-shore high-tech offices that move more US jobs over-seas.   In short, the H-1B visa could be seen as an [off-shore] out-sourcing training program at the expense of highly skilled US professionals."
Wedel video

2012-02-01 (5772 Shebet 08)
Nara Schoenberg _Jewish World Review_
What to do when you've been "dissed"

2012-02-01 (5772 Shebet 08)
Michelle Malkin _Jewish World Review_
First, they came for the Catholics
Andrew Klavan: PJMedia
"This weekend, Catholic bishops informed parishioners of the recent White House edict forcing religious hospitals, schools, charities and other health and social service providers to provide 'free' abortifacient pills, sterilizations and contraception on demand in their insurance plans -- even if it violates their moral consciences and the teachings of their churches...   As always, tolerance is a one-way street in the Age of Obama.   'Choice' is in the eye (and iron fist) of the First Amendment usurper.   Like the rising number of states who have revolted against the individual health care mandate at the ballot box and in the courts, targeted Catholics have risen up against the Obamacare regime.   Arlington (VA) bishop Paul Loverde didn't mince words, calling the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [HHS] order 'a direct attack against religious liberty.   This ill-considered policy comprises a truly radical break with the liberties that have under-pinned our nation since its founding.'   Several bishops vowed publicly to fight the mandate."

2012-02-01 (5772 Shebet 08)
Brian Bennett _Jewish World Review_
US government officials see increasing threat of attack on USA from Iran
"leaders in Tehran are increasingly likely to support bombings on U.S. soil, especially if they feel that their hold on power is threatened."

2012-02-01 (5772 Shebet 08)
Lisa M. Krieger _Jewish World Review_
theory that mental effort may prevent Alzheimer's gets more support
"researchers used brain scans to examine the amount of beta amyloid deposits in the brains of healthy seniors with no signs of dementia.   Beta amyloid -- the protein fibers folded into tangled plaques that accumulate in the brain -- is the top suspect in the pathology of Alzheimer's disease.   But the build-up of amyloid can also be influenced by genes and aging.   People who reported doing daily brainy activities from age 6 onward had very low levels of amyloid plaque..."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-02

2012-02-02 05:30PST (08:30EST) (13:30GMT) (15:30 Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 415,094 in the week ending January 28, a decrease of 1,786 from the previous week.   There were 464,775 initial claims in the comparable week in 2011.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.2% during the week ending January 21, unchanged from the prior week's unrevised rate.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 4,042,107, a decrease of 27,544 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.7% and the volume was 4,632,950.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending January 14 was 7,670,452, an increase of 345 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, WV, and WI during the week ending January 14.   States reported 3,022,925 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending January 14, an increase of 100,392 from the prior week.   There were 3,656,624 claimants in the comparable week in 2011.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" (the divisor) changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02;
to 125,807,389 beginning 2011-07-02;
to 126,188,733 beginning 2011-10-01;
to 126,579,970 beginning 2012-01-01.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2012-02-02
James O'Toole _CNN_
CGC: announced job cut plans reached 53,486 in January
Leah Schnurr: WIUM/National Socialist Radio/Reuters
KTUU/AP
XE/Reuters
Challenger at Work
retail 12,426
financial 7,611
"Historically, January is the heaviest job-cut month, averaging 101,084 announced lay-offs between 1993 and 2011.   October, the next heaviest job-cut month, averaged 82,036 cuts over the same period."

2012-02-02 06:04:01PST (09:04:01EST) (14:04:01GMT) (16:04:01Jerusalem)
George Avalos _San Jose CA Mercury News_/_Oakland CA Tribune_
Dell could employ 850 in Sili Valley (with map)

2012-02-02
Phyllis Chesler _PJ Media_
Muslim family members convicted of first degree murder in "honor killings" in Canada

2012-02-02
Herbert London _American Spectator_
some of the fraud in the US government's entitlement system

2012-02-02
David Klinghoffer _American Spectator_
politics, science and religion

2012-02-02
Peter Hannaford _American Spectator_
Some want to throw the Republic of China/Taiwan, under the bus

2012-02-02
Roy Spencer
U of Alabama at Huntsville global temperature anomaly has gone negative
UAH global temperature report

2012-02-02
J. Christian Adams _PJ Media_
Criminal rot spreads through federal "justice" department

2012-02-02
Willis Eschenbach
Algore effect continues

2012-02-02
"Zombie"
warming or cooling the prescription is the same: punitive taxes, lower standards of living, draining the first world to subsidize the third

2012-02-02
Thomas Mucha _Global Post_
state by state look at unemployment and under-employment
Wall Street Journal: interactive map

2012-02-02
Sid Perkins _AAAS Science_
Stars built by black-holes?
Mark Crockett: Phys Org

2012-02-02
Elizabeth Norton _AAAS Science_
Are some genetically primed for addiction?
"In both drug abusers and their non-addicted siblings, some brain areas involved in addiction are larger or smaller, or function less efficiently than in healthy, drug-free controls.   A child of drug-addicted parents is eight times more likely to become an addict than a child growing up in a drug-free home.   But genes aren't everything.   Even in families whose very brains seem primed for addiction, some children still go on to lead productive lives free of drugs, according to new research.   Behavioral neuro-scientist Karen Ersche of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom and colleagues had set out to examine whether drug abusers begin life with miswired brain circuitry or merely end up that way.   Imaging studies of addicts show dramatic differences in brain areas involved in motivation, reward, and self-control, to name just a few.   But it's less clear whether these differences are the cause or the effect of drug abuse.   Because both addiction and brain structure are likely to be inherited traits, many researchers suspect that drug abusers have faulty brain circuitry based in their genes.   To explore the chicken-versus-egg question, Ersche and colleagues worked with 50 pairs of biological siblings; one in each pair was addicted to cocaine or amphetamines while the other had no history of drug abuse.   Also included were 50 healthy, drug-free, unrelated volunteers.   The researchers first tested the subjects' self-control...   even in children as young as 4 to 12, traits such as self-control and flexibility can be improved by targeted interventions, including exercise training, martial arts, yoga, and computer games designed to enhance working memory (the ability to hold complex information in mind).   These approaches, she says, could be used to help prevent addiction in those at risk for drug abuse."

2012-02-02
William L. Anderson
government spending vs. investment

2012-02-02
Mark J. Perry
PA consumers switching to natural gas as prices drop
"UGI estimates that the average family of four will save $1K to $1.5K a year at current prices by switching from oil to gas."

2012-02-02
"Cherish the Scientist" _Engineer web logs_
engineers: not just for engineering

2012-02-02 (5772 Shebet 09)
R' Yaakov Rosenblatt _Jewish World Review_
Welcome home, governor Rick Perry
"unambiguity and resolve are qualities that all Americans should employ...   slow talk can be straight talk, that truth is simple, that reality is easily explained.   No, you can't add regulation and jobs at the same time.   No, you ought not borrow money if you don't have the means to pay it back.   And you reminded us that religion is as much a part of who you are as the family in whose home you were born.   Our Godly connection is the foundation of our humanity.   And we should wear it with pride...   It is human to stumble.   It is OK to step back.   It is spiritual to fight again and we know that you will.   Your impact on American society was far greater than your adversaries will concede.   You shook the dust off its Judeo-Christian foundation and let it be seen once again.   Americans now know your story.   You are the son of tenant-farmers who grew to maturity in a town where there was nothing but Boy Scouts and religion, and used that moral foundation to lead Texan prosperity for over a decade.   The lesson is now part of American consciousness...   Please keep pushing forward, rolling the log ahead.   As Jewish tradition teaches, 'It is not incumbent upon you to complete the work, but neither are you at liberty to desist from it.' (Pirkei Avos/Pirqi Abot 2:21)"

2012-02-02 (5772 Shebet 09)
Jim Carney _Jewish World Review_
Wrong number call may have saved her life

2012-02-02 (5772 Shebet 09)
Reza Kalili _Jewish World Review_
What Obummer does not grasp about striking deals with the current Iranian regime
"he failed to see the realities of the regime's fanaticism...   the very ideology of Iran's Islamic leaders was the sole reason for no progress in a negotiated settlement.   They simply would not close an honest deal with 'infidels'."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-03

2012-02-02 19:40PST (2012-02-02 22:40EST) (2012-02-03 03:40GMT) (2012-02-03 05:50Jerusalem)
Tolu Taiwo _Daily Illini_
Employers should not treat interns as "free labor"
"The Ohio State University filed a law-suit to fashion magazine Harper's Bazaar, saying that they violated 'federal and state wage and hour laws by not paying her even though she often worked there full time', according to a New York Times article."
Steven Greenhouse: NYTimes: Former Intern Sues Hearst Over Unpaid Work
"The law-suit against Hearst states, 'Employers' failure to compensate interns for their work, and the prevalence of the practice nationwide, curtails opportunities for employment, fosters class divisions between those who can afford to work for no wage and those who cannot, and indirectly contributes to rising unemployment.'...   unpaid internships are only lawful in the context of an educational training program, when the interns do not displace regular employees and the employer derives no immediate advantage from the intern's work.   The guidelines also state another criterion for internships to be unpaid: 'the internship experience is for the benefit of the intern'."

2012-02-03 Tom Blumer _PJ Media_
state GOP establishments attack their base
"You would think that the targets of these efforts are president Barack Obama and Democratic Party office-holders who are hell-bent on turning America into a financially broken, post-constitutional, Washington-controlled playground safe only for crony [leftists] and regulators gone wild.   You would be wrong.   In Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Utah, to name just 4, state GOP establishments are laboring mightily to marginalize the millions of constitutional conservatives whose activist energy (but not their outlook) dates back to the beginnings of the Tea Party movement 3 years ago.   By their behavior, it's clear that those who run many state parties and quite a few incumbent 'moderate' Republican law-makers are more threatened than pleased at the results of the 2010 elections, when the GOP took back the U.S. House and significantly improved its representation in statehouses and state legislatures.   Oh, they're happy with the majorities they have, and want to pick up control of the U.S. Senate this time around.   They just don't like many of the people who won the races which gave them those majorities, would rather not see any more interlopers come in and try to upset the status quo, and are targeting several newbies for political extinction."

2012-02-03 03:45PST (06:45EST) (11:45GMT) (13:45Jerusalem)
Benjamin Pimentel _MarketWatch_
Micron CEO, Steve Appleton died in plane crash
"Micron Technology Chief Executive Steve Appleton, who worked his way up from a 22-year-old factory worker to eventually lead the company, died Friday morning in a plane crash in Boise, ID.   Appleton was 51.   He joined Micron in 1983.   He had served as head of the memory chip company since 1994 September, when he became CEO at age 34."

2012-02-03 03:47PST (06:47EST) (11:47GMT) (13:47Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_/_IDG_
Public Policy Institute of California asserts hat H-1B workers are paid 10% more, are 10 years younger, and more educated
Australia
"The study found that average age of H-1B workers are 30.6-years-old versus 40.6 for U.S. born IT workers...   The researchers got individual level data from USCIS that included occupation, industry, education, age and annual earnings collected off the I-129 form.   They assembled data about U.S. workers from the U.S. Census American Community Survey, which is based on a sample of 1% of the U.S. population.   Among the things that this study found was that less than one fourth of the U.S.A.-born workers in IT have graduate degrees while close to one half of the H-1B workers have advanced degrees...   One limitation in the data is lack of information about the geographic location of the H-1B workers.   The concern is that H-1B workers are more likely to work in high-earning areas, such as Silicon Valley, than U.S.A. born workers...   The report shows (table 4) mean annual earnings in IT for H-1B workers at $76,698, and the U.S.A. born workers, $79,118.   The H-1B workers are paid less in that chart, but Lofstrom argues that you have to adjust for the differences in age and education to make a valid comparison.   Miano, however, said the law requires H-1B workers to be paid the higher of the wage paid to similar worker or the prevailing wage for the occupation and location.   'If we take the report at face value, the authors have shown that employers are unlawfully paying low wages to H-1B workers by not paying young workers the overall prevailing wage.', he said."
2012-01-13: Matloff: new research claims H-1Bs not under-paid
alternate link
2012-01-23: Matloff: more on PPIC article
alternate link

2012-02-03
Erin Conway-Smith _Global Post_
New estimate doubles malaria deaths
"The study of malaria deaths worldwide between 1980 and 2010, using new data and computer modeling, was led by Dr. Christopher Murray at the University of Washington in Seattle, with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.   An estimated 1.24M people died from the mosquito-borne disease in 2010, with more than 90% of those deaths occurring in Africa, researchers found.   This is around twice the figure of 655K malaria deaths estimated by World Health Organization for the same year.   Malaria deaths rose from 995K in 1980 to a peak of 1.82M in 2004, but since then have been steadily decreasing, the Lancet study said."

2012-02-03 08:18PST (11:18EST) (16:18GMT) (18:18Jerusalem)
_Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_Memphis TN Commercial Appeal_
ServiceMaster seeks to hire 6,700... at least temporarily
"Most seasonal positions will be in field operations and customer call centers for its leading brands of Terminix, TruGreen, and American Home Shield...   In 2011, almost 400K individuals (about 7692 per week) applied for employment with ServiceMaster through its corporate branch locations...   'With household brands like TruGreen, Terminix, American Home Shield, ServiceMaster Clean, Merry Maids, Furniture Medic and AmeriSpec...'"

2012-02-03 09:14PST (12:14EST) (17:14GMT) (19:14Jerusalem)
Holly Ramer _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
Yale produced new map of lyme disease risk

2012-02-03
Tim Hartman & Ralf Wehlitz _Phys Org_
molecule size affects likelihood of radiation damage

2012-02-03
Deborah Counce _Phys Org_
ORNL scientists studying quantum super-solidity and super-fluidity
"quantum states are exquisitely fragile, easily crushed by the comparatively huge forces in what physicists call the macro world.   In fact, only 2 'super-states' resulting from quantum mechanics have been conclusively observed at the macro level: super-conductivity, in which electrons pair up and flow without resistance through a material, and super-fluidity, in which liquid helium loses all viscosity and can flow through the finest pores in any material.   And both of these states so far are seen only at very low temperatures at which there is little energy to disrupt them.   The super-solid state would be even more elusive, existing only in helium-4 cooled to barely above absolute zero (0 kelvin, the temperature at which atoms lose all their energy) and subjected to extreme pressure...   'super' in this case means beyond solid rather than more solid...   Many experiments are needed to resolve whether neutron scattering will provide evidence of a supersolid quantum state, or only superfluid layers inside a solid, Lauter says, but only roughly one can be done per year.   'Just creating the sample is an effort.   There are lots of difficulties in doing the experiment, but it's the challenge that makes it fun.'"

2012-02-03
Michael Shedlock
1.177M not in labor force
graphs
"In the last year, the civilian population rose by 3.565M.   Yet the labor force only rose by 1.145M.   Those not in the labor force rose by 2.42M.   In January, the Civilian Labor Force rose by 508K.   In January, those 'Not in Labor Force' rose by an amazing 1.177M.   If you are not in the labor force, you are not counted as unemployed.   Participation Rate fell 0.3 to 63.7%, taking out a 1984 low."

2012-02-03
Mark J. Perry
Bodies shopped vs. manufacturing over-time hours
"Temporary employment reached a 3.5-year high in January of 2.4M jobs, the highest level since 2008 May."

2012-02-03
Joe Guzzardi _Californians for Population Stabilization_
yet another study shows USA has a surplus of engineers: Why import more?
"Indeed, the Center for Immigration Studies, a non-partisan Washington, DC-based research organization that favors less immigration, found that 1.8M Americans under age 66 have engineering degrees but not an engineering job."

2012-02-03 (5772 Shebet 10)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Fool me twice
"The useful idiot who pre-election promised American Jewish leaders that Obama was Israel's best friend and only hope, was back shilling in the Holy Land.   This time, though, he was pushing more territorial compromises in the name of peace.   A reminder of the damage former US congressman Robert Wexler has done -- and a warning of what he intends to do."

2012-02-03 (5772 Shebet 10)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
letting Jewish people participate in Nevada caucus

2012-02-03 (5772 Shebet 10)
Edmund Sanders _Jewish World Review_
Iran is developing a missile that could reach the East coast of the USA

2012-02-03 (5772 Shebet 10)
Edmund Sanders _Jewish World Review_
coyotes used black drivers
"In the calculus of cross-border human smuggling, Maria Lopez-Diaz allegedly concluded that black instead of brown equals green.   The 60-year-old Compton, CA, woman, prosecutors say, tried to cash in on racial profiling by operating a human smuggling ring that hired mostly African-American drivers who didn't speak a word of Spanish to ferry small groups of immigrants from Mexico to Los Angeles.   In the end, the venture failed.   Authorities announced charges Thursday against Lopez-Diaz and 4 others, including conspiracy and transporting and harboring illegal immigrants.   Lopez-Diaz, 2 family members and a driver were arrested by agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement [USICE] and Border Patrol.   A second driver facing a conspiracy charge, 32-year-old Yvette 'Hazel' Binford, remains at large."

2012-02-03 (5772 Shebet 10)
Jethro Nededog _Hollywood Reporter_
"Who Do You Think You Are?" executive producer Lisa Kudrow revealed her "dream stars" for the series
"Lisa Kudrow serves as the series' executive producer with Dan Bucatinsky through their production company, Is or Isn't It Entertainment (along with Shed Media).   And no one can say that Kudrow is asking celebrities to do anything she hasn't done.   She appeared in her own episode during the show's first season and says she learned a lot about herself in the process...   'it made me realize I don't like confronting things that are difficult or emotionally difficult things either -- at all.   So, it made me think, Hm, you've gotten worse at that, too, as you've gotten older.'...   Martin Sheen, Reba McEntire, Rob Lowe among season 3 cast...   How much of the journey actually makes it on-screen? Lisa Kudrow: 'Most of it does.   They're getting to answer questions of experts in certain areas in which their ancestors are involved with.   We want them to have some time to make sure they're satisfying their curiosity.   But we can't put all of that in the show, because it's only 40 minutes long.   Most of it does.'..."
 
Proposed Bills 2012

2012-02-03

DJIA	12,862.23
S&P 500(SPX)	1,344.90
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,905.66
Nikkei	8,831.93
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	1.95
crude oil(CL2H)	$97.84/barrel
natgas(NG12H)	$2.53/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RB2H)	$2.91/gal
heatingoil(HO2H)	$3.11/gal
gold(GC2J)	$1,740.30/ounce
silver(S12H)	$33.75/ounce
platinum(PL2J)	$1,631.90/ounce
palladium(PA2H)	$708.85/ounce
copper(HG2H)	$0.24375/ounce
soybeans	$12.325/bushel
maize	$6.445/bushel
wheat	$6.6075/bushel
dollarindex (DXY)	78.969
yenperdollar (USDYEN)	76.555
dollarspereuro (EURUSD)	$1.3147
dollarsperpound (GBPUSD)	$1.5814
swissfrancsperdollar (USDCHF)	0.9174
indianrupeesperdollar (USDINR)	48.575
mexicanpesosperdollar (USDMXN)	12.6603
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	671.09

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2012-02-07
Ralph Vartabedian _Los Angeles CA Times_
Roger Boisjoly, one of the engineers who warned of problem of space shuttle O-rings in cold weather, died January 6
Salt Lake UT Tribune

2012-02-07
Kelly Field _Chronicle of Higher Education_
$60M in federal pork went to universities that employ relatives of corrupt congress-critters
Russ Roberts

2012-02-07
_Rasmussen_
59% of US citizen likely voters say election rules seem to be rigged to help congressional incumbents

2012-02-07
Mark J. Perry
Apple's iPhone has higher sales than all of MSFT's defective products and services put together

2012-02-07
Mark J. Perry
December job openings (JOLTS) highest in last 2 waves of recession as Bush-Clinton-Shrub-Obummer economic depression continues

2012-02-07
Mark J. Perry
Jaw-bone created using "3-D printing"

2012-02-07
Mark J. Perry
Mandel/lobbying group for tech executives say "app economy" has created 466K jobs in USA
"while California tops the list of App Economy states, states such as Georgia, Florida, and Illinois get their share as well. In fact, more than two-thirds of App Economy employment is outside of California and New York."
Mandel (pdf)

2012-02-07
Mark J. Perry
Low interest rates often help borrowers and hurt savers

2012-02-07
Don Boudreaux
brand proliferation and market share concentration

2012-02-07
Russ Roberts
If what is legal becomes the norm rather than what is moral, we are all going to be very poor

2012-02-07
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
Obama still insists we have a tech labor shortage
 
Superb letter from senator Grassley to president Obama:
 
Note in particular that in spite of the Wedel case, the president recently went ahead with USCIS plans to take executive action to liberalize regs on tech immigration.   (As with past such actions, many of us view these changes as actually being end runs around Congress, rather than simply adjustments to regulations.)
 
In the same vein, when a question about Wedel was asked during a recent White House press conference, Obama's spokesperson Jay Carney did not back down at all, insisting that we need the foreign tech workers.   (See from White House on press briefing and Breitbart coverage.)
 
Nevertheless, Carney hemmed and hawed through that statement (clear in the video, not in the transcript), clearly nervous that he was, in effect, denying Wedel's claims (even though he did deny denying it).
 
I must say that I'm even more concerned about the young reporter, David (surname not given), who suggested that Mrs. Wedel's points about H-1B in her exchange with Obama were "xenophobic".   The reporter looked pretty young, possibly Asian-American, and there is an ethos common in younger educated professionals today, especially among minorities, that any concern of any kind that even some aspects of immigration might be too liberal is xenophobic, if not downright racist.   The reporter's phrasing, "xenophobia going on when the economy is tight", is right out of standard Asian-American Studies courses, Jennifer Wedel portrayed as the new Dennis Kearney.
 
(For the record: I strongly support the notion of ethnic studies curricula, but as academic disciplines, not as ideology masquerading as scholarship.)
 
Gimme a break, David!   The poor woman's husband has not had steady employment for 3 years now.   It's a safe bet that David hasn't ever gone 3 years without a job, so what does he know?   Given that many H-1Bs in fact ARE engineers, and given that many American engineers ARE being laid off, is Mrs. Wedel's reasoning so preposterous, David?   In fact, there's plenty of evidence of various kinds to support her.
 
Presumably the White House press corps is the elite among journalists.   If so, how can this reporter be so simplistic, indeed so dogmatic, in his reasoning?
 
Recently Beryl Benderly, a writer for the prestigious AAAS Science magazine web-site, published a fine piece in the Columbia Journalism Review, taking the press to task for blindly swallowing the "tech labor shortage" claims put out by the industry's PR machine.
 
Excellent account, but unfortunately Benderly did not address a fundamental question: WHY is the press so ignorant?   There are exceptions of course (see a link to a nice USAToday article in the reader comments section in the above link), but generally the level of sophistication has been disappointing.   Is it due to bias?   Laziness?   "Physics envy" (thus making them view the industry as heroic)?
 
Back to the USCIS: I don't think I've ever seen an administration, under either party, in which USCIS/INS has been so openly political.   They recently ran a short piece on the Lofstrom study, (which I've reviewed
here and and here), portraying H-1B in a positive light.   To my knowledge, they've never highlighted research on the other side.   And the USCIS web-site has the phrase, "our broken immigration policy", standard among those who wish to liberalize policy, on various pages.
 
Norm
Wedel video

2012-02-07
_Cohen & Grigsby_
Pittsburgh organizations conspire on strategies for hiring foreign students and grads over US citizens
"During the 2-hour work-shop, university administrators will discover strategies for facilitating connections with local employers and organizations representing diverse communities in the region, as well as pre- and post-graduate options and strategies for international students.   Students will learn about U.S. immigration rules and how to successfully transition to the work-force, including information about changing from F-1 to H-1B or other visa statuses, as well as related tax issues.   Vibrant Pittsburgh is an organization dedicated to developing a diverse workforce through collaboration with human resource departments, corporate recruiters, professional organizations and non-profits.   GlobalPittsburgh...   Students in the Immigration Law Clinic of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law represent immigrants...facing removal from the United States..."

2012-02-07
Buck Sexton _The Blaze_
5th column in America?: former border agent details national security threats spilling into the USA
"'The main problem is that the American press is working in conjunction with the administration to keep the facts about what is happening in Mexico and Central America a secret.   They are hiding it in plain sight, deception I would call it...   the 4th estate has been corrupted.   It is a tool of disinformation...   A psychological warfare operation being waged against the American people using things to deflect their attention.'...   The Sinaloa, the Zetas, and others narco-insurgents are engaged in beheadings, mutilations, sexual assaults, as well as video-taped torture campaigns similar to what most people associate with Al Qaeda...   groups from around the world have become involved.   In this case, that means the Shia militant group Hezbollah...   the Department of Homeland Security did away with CAS (Close Air Support) helicopters in 2011 December even though with a FLIR-mounted surveillance system, the choppers 'almost guarantee you will catch your quarry'.   Taylor doesn't mince words about this.   He believes the removal of the choppers is an attempt to intentionally hamper the effectiveness of border operations.   The federal government is 'killing the operation through policy and how they deploy assets...   it's about spending money and making the show, not about effectiveness'."

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Kathleen Hennessey & Christi Parsons _Jewish World Review_
Obummer not worried that abortion/birth-control mandate will hurt election odds with Catholics and other religious people

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Obummer's rhetorical storms

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Frank J. Gaffney ii _Jewish World Review_
Obummer gives more good reasons not to vote for him
"Anyone with an IQ above room temperature has noticed lately plenty of evidence of both hostile Iranian intentions and the capabilities to act on them."

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Suzanne Bohan _Jewish World Review_
Tiny leaping lizards are helping to advance design of robots
"This latest research from the lab of Robert Full, a UC Berkeley integrative biologist, for the first time shows how engineers could copy nature's design to create mobile machines that actually jump from floors to walls... Full and his students added a gyroscopically controlled tail to a lizard-sized vehicle they dubbed 'Tailbot'. When graduate student Thomas Libby dropped Tailbot face down, it righted itself in mid-air."

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Emma Christensen _Jewish World Review_
home-made energy bars are far better than commercial ones

2012-02-07 (5772 Shebet 14)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
A defining moment
"Romney's statement about not worrying about the poor -- because they 'have a very ample safety net' -- was followed by a statement that was not just a slip of the tongue, and should be a defining moment in telling us about this man's qualifications as a conservative and, more important, as a potential President of the United States.   Mitt Romney has come out in support of indexing the minimum wage law, to have it rise automatically to keep pace with inflation.   To many people, that would seem like a small thing that can be left for economists or statisticians to deal with.   But to people who call themselves conservatives, and aspire to public office, there is no excuse for not being aware of what a major social disaster the minimum wage law has been for the young, the poor and especially for young and poor blacks.   It is not written in the stars that young black males must have astronomical rates of unemployment.   It is written implicitly in the minimum wage laws.   We have gotten so used to seeing unemployment rates of 30% or 40% for black teenage males that it might come as a shock to many people to learn that the unemployment rate for 16- and 17-year-old black males was just under 10% back in 1948.   Moreover, it was slightly lower than the unemployment rate for white males of the same age.   How could this be? The economic reason is quite plain.   The inflation of the 1940s had pushed money wages for even unskilled, entry-level labor above the level specified in the minimum wage law passed ten years earlier.   In other words, there was in practical effect no national minimum wage law in the late 1940s.   My first full-time job, as a black teenage high-school dropout in 1946, was as a lowly messenger delivering telegrams.   But my starting pay was more than 50% above the level specified in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938...   It was in the wake of these [leftist] escalations [of the minimum wage] that black teenage unemployment rose to levels that were 3 or 4 times the level in 1948.   Even in the most prosperous years of later times, the unemployment rate for black teenage males was some multiple of what it was even in the recession year of 1949.   And now it was often double the unemployment rate for white males of the same ages.   This was not the first or the last time that [leftists] did something that made them feel good about themselves, while leaving havoc in their wake, especially among the poor whom they were supposedly helping...   For those who want to check out the statistics -- and I hope that would include Mitt Romney -- they can be found detailed on pages 42 to 45 of Race and Economics by Walter E. Williams...   The economic reason is not complicated.   When you set minimum wage levels higher than many inexperienced young people are worth, they don't get hired."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-08

2012-02-08 06:09:40PST (09:09:40EST) (14:09:40GMT) (16:09:40Jerusalem)
George Avalos _San Jose CA Mercury News_/_Oakland Tribune_
Sili Valley job growth improved in 2011, but latest report also contains warnings
Christopher S. Rugaber: AP: more job openings than at the depth of last wave of recession
graphs

2012-02-08
Tom Blumer _PJ Media_
One less-bad jobs report doesn't "fix things"

2012-02-08
Anthony Watts
solar activity and climate

2012-02-08 09:03:41PST (12:03:41EST) (17:03:41GMT) (19:03:41Jerusalem)
Matti Huuhtanen _San Jose CA Mercury News_/_AP_
Nokia to move phone manufacturing from Finland, Mexico and Hungary to Red China: All the bad boys are doing it
"in line with what other cell-phone makers had been doing for years, such as Apple, Samsung Electronics, Motorola Mobility, and Sony Ericsson, which had large assembly plants in Europe."

2012-02-08 13:51PST (16:51EST) (21:51GMT) (23:51Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_
Obummer's statement regarding STEM job markets may haunt him

2012-02-08 14:48:43PST (17:48:43EST) (22:48:43GMT) (2012-02-09 00:48:43Jerusalem)
George Avalos _San Jose CA Mercury News_/_Contra Costa CA Times_
Apple has leased office buildings in Sunnyvale for the first few hundred in planned expansion of 2K employees

2012-02-08
Don Bauder _San Diego CA Reader_
scrutiny of applicants and sponsors of H-1B visas may help unemployed and under-employed American STEM workers
"Government regulators are cracking down on alleged fraud in worker visa programs.   But some heavy-weight companies, such as San Diego's Qualcomm, are lobbying hard to bring in even more foreign engineers.   Smaller local software companies want more off-shore techies, too.   On January 25, India-based Infosys, a so-called body shop, or placement firm that sends talent to American companies, revealed that it and some of its employees are targets of a Texas criminal investigation into fraud and abuse of United States visa laws.   The State Department, Homeland Security, Department of Justice, and Internal Revenue Service are investigating Infosys practices...   Critics complain that the H-1B engineers (heavily from India and greatly under age 30) are paid less than their United States counterparts, thus depriving Americans of jobs and depressing the general technology wage level...   Donna Conroy, director of Chicago-based Bright Future Jobs, which represents American workers pushing for out-sourcing reform...   Professor Norm Matloff of the University of California Davis, who has written extensively on the H-1B program, points out that the original [touted] purpose was to bring in 'the best and the brightest from around the world', but that is not happening.   'The vast majority are ordinary people doing ordinary work.'   It's all about low-priced labor, he says.   'The use of foreign workers for cheap labor pervades the entire tech industry, including the large, main-stream U.S. firms, and including the foreign workers hired from U.S. universities.'   The victims are really the best and brightest American engineers 'being squeezed out of the market once they accumulate 10 years or so of experience', Matloff says on his website.   And H-1B discourages United States college students from pursuing tech. 'H-1B is causing an internal [waste] of American talents.'"

2012-02-08
Tom Borelli
Obummer's war on coal (and oil pipe-line) undermining manufacturing jobs

2012-02-08
Jason D. O'Grady _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple doesn't enforce its own Address Book privacy policy; makes it easy for app developers to grab, transfer, accumulate contact info
"Apple makes a standard practice of approving apps that upload the entire contents of your iOS address book (including names, address, phone numbers, [e-mail addresses] -- everything!) to developers' servers...   13 of the 15 iOS developers he informally polled admitted that they copy their user's Address Books and have data-bases of 'millions' of contacts...   'Apple provides extremely easy access to address book data.'   This is patently absurd and actually boggles my mind.   Apple will refuse an app for any number of insane reasons, let it routinely approves apps that up-load your Address Book wholesale ['without obtaining the user's prior permission']? Something's wrong here.   Very wrong."

2012-02-08 13:22:01PST (16:22:01EST) (21:22:01GMT) (23:22:01Jerusalem)
Andrew Harris _Bloomberg_
Former Motorola employee found guilty of stealing trade secrets and taking them to Red China
2010 June: abc/WLS
2009-03-04: abc/WLS
Knoxville TN News Sentinel
Global Post
"She faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison on each of the 3 counts for which the judge found her guilty...   Jin was indicted in 2008 on the trade-secret theft counts for which she was convicted and 3 counts of economic espionage, each punishable by as long as 15 years in prison.   She was accused of simultaneously working for Motorola and for a Beijing-based company, Kai Sun News (Beijing) Technology Company, also known as SunKaisens, which was affiliated with [Red China's] military.   U.S. Customs agents stopped her as she was about to board a plane at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport on 2007 Feb. 28.   In her possession were more than 1K Motorola documents, $30K in cash and a one-way ticket to [Red China]...   The judge ordered Jin confined to her home, with electronic monitoring.   He scheduled her sentencing for April 18...   Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Dollear said that while the U.S. [government] never expressly said Jin was a spy, 'She was better than James Bond.'"
National Security Implications of Investments and Products from the Red Chinese in the Telecommunications Sector (pdf)

2012-02-08
Mark J. Perry
Energy boom happening despite US government energy policies which have tried to hamper it

2012-02-08
Mark J. Perry
ND oil production continues setting records in December

2012-02-08
Mark J. Perry
Boomtown Girls

2012-02-08
Don Boudreaux
Tit for Tat, Quid Pro Quo, TurnAbout Is Fair Play

2012-02-08
Lee Moran _London Daily Mail_
insider trading by politicians

2012-02-08
Donald J. Boudreaux _Pittsburgh PA Tribune-Review_
An economist's lament

2012-02-08
David Fulghum, Bill Sweetman & Amy Butler _Aviation Week_
Red China's role in F-35 Joint Strike Fighter's spiraling costs
"Before the intrusions were discovered nearly 3 years ago, [Red Chinese] hackers actually sat in on what were supposed to have been secure, on-line program-progress conferences..."

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Rivy Poupko Kletenik _Jewish World Review_
Tree hostility and Tu Be Shebet

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Steven Emerson _Jewish World Review_
Planting trees is racist?!?
"An international campaign wants to stop a non-profit environmental organization that has been functioning for more than 100 years by purporting fallacies and anti-Israel propaganda.   The Jewish National Fund (JNF) was established with the hope to help the birth of the State of Israel.   JNF plants trees for forest development in Israel, creates parks, battles forest fires, is responsible for soil conservation, pioneers innovative solutions to help Israel's water supply, among other notable work."

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Warren Richey _Jewish World Review_
Prop. 8 ruling by 9th Circus still not enough for gay exremists

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Anne Applebaum _Jewish World Review_
Russia's Potemkin "democracy" vs. respect for individual rights

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Menachem Wecker _Jewish World Review_
LL.M.s can lead to specialized legal jobs
"some of his colleagues discourage job applicants from mentioning an LL.M. -- or master of laws degree [rather than JD, juris doctor] -- on their resumes.   Other people have also questioned the value of the degree, which tends to attract either J.D.'s seeking more specialized legal training or international students hoping to better understand the U.S. legal system.   In a post on the web log Above the Law, Elie Mystal wrote that he felt sorry for aspiring lawyers who pursue an LL.M. after failing to land a job.   'They've spent 3 years and who knows how much money pursuing a career in law, and now they can't get a job.   They're hoping that somewhere there is some magic bullet that can turn everything around.   There is not.', he wrote.   'Watching a kid get an LL.M. degree is like watching a recovering drug addict fall off the wagon after a personal set-back.'"

2012-02-08 (5772 Shebet 15)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Economic chaos will continue and worsen
"Federal 2010 Medicare and Medicaid expenditures totaled $800G.   The projected annual growth of both programs is about 7%.   [Socialst Insecurity] expenditures are more than $700G a year.   According to the 2009 [Socialst Insecurity] and Medicare trustees reports, by 2030, 49% of federal revenues will go for [Socialst Insecurity] and Medicare payments.   The unfunded liability of both programs is already $106T.   But not to worry.   The Congressional Budget Office estimates that it's possible to sustain today's level of federal spending and even achieve a balanced budget.   All that Congress would have to do is raise the lowest income tax bracket of 10% to 25% and the middle tax bracket of 25% to 66% and raise the 35% tax bracket to 92%.   That's a static vision that assumes that people will have no response and they'll work just as hard and send more money to Washington.   If Congress did legislate such tax increases, it would be the economic equivalent of committing national hara-kiri...   My translation of the symposium's conclusions is that it is by no means preordained that our nation must suffer the same decline as have other great nations of the past -- England, France, Spain, Portugal and the Ottoman and Roman empires.   All evidence suggests that we will suffer a similar decline because, as professor Cowen says, 'the American electorate has dug in against both major tax increases and major spending cuts'."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-09

2012-02-09 Shoshana Bryen _PJ Media_
Iranian ruling thugs make threats and the USA gets blamed for "sabre-rattling"
"Israel is often in this position.   Its enemies threaten it in unacceptable ways or commit acts of violence just under some unspoken-but-very-real threshold of tolerance (not Israel's threshold, mind you, but that of the U.S.A., the UN or the EU).   Corresponding Israeli action to protect its people is called 'aggression' and Israel is blamed for any resulting damage.   In 2002, Israel's choice was to suffer suicide bombers or to enter [cities on the Palestinian-occupied West Bank].   In 2005, it was to accept terrorist infiltration or to build the security fence.   In 2008 and 2009, it was to permit Hamas to rain rockets and missiles on the south, or to enter Gaza to restore its deterrence.   In 2010, the choice was to intercept the Mavi Marmara in international waters or to risk having it blow up on Israel's shores [or smuggled weaponry to target Jerusalem]...   Iran wants nuclear weapons -- or at least wants to pursue whatever nuclear capability it wants to pursue without full disclosure and without penalty [while declaring that it wants to abuse that capability to wipe out the USA and Israel]."

2012-02-09
Jaime Daremblum _PJ Media_
Obummer appeasing enemies in South America instead of stengthening friendships

2012-02-08 23:06PST (2012-02-09 02:06EST) (2012-02-09 07:06GMT) (2012-02-09 09:06Jerusalem)
_NBC Dallas-Fort Worth TX_
Wedel limited in relocation due to child custody issues from previous marriage
"Darin Wedel [had to turn] down the offer from Intel as well as 3 other out-of-state jobs and 1 in Austin because his custody agreement does not allow him to move away from his daughter's mother, who lives in the area...   His wife, an insurance agent at State Farm, said she has found herself as a sort of spokeswoman working to make it so Americans have the first chance to get a job before foreign workers.   She said people from all over the country have reached out to her and told her stories similar to her husband's.   'I have clients who are struggling to pay their insurance bills because they have gotten laid off, and a number of those have been in the same industry that my husband is in.', she said.   U.S. senator Chuck Grassley, R-IA, e-mailed her Wednesday morning and told her that he is going to try to breathe new life into a proposal to modify the H-1B visa program.   Grassley said he and senator Dick Durbin, D-IL, tried to pass a measure in 2009 that would require employers to make a reasonable effort to recruit Americans for jobs before they could hire H-1B workers.   Jennifer Wedel said she and her husband are humbled that their experience is bringing attention to the issue.   'I think it is fulfilling.', she said.   'I think it will be more fulfilling when we see change [for the better].'"
Wedel video

2012-02-09 05:30PST (08:30EST) (13:30GMT) (15:30 Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 397,810 in the week ending February 4, a decrease of 24,477 from the previous week.   There were 440,706 initial claims in the comparable week in 2011.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.2% during the week ending January 28, unchanged from the prior week's unrevised rate.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 4,084,606, an increase of 26,370 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.7% and the volume was 4,605,543.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending January 21 was 7,663,205, an increase of 7,982 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MD, MA, MI, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, WV, and WI during the week ending January 21.   States reported 2,985,907 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending January 21, a decrease of 21,789 from the prior week.   There were 3,756,990 claimants in the comparable week in 2011.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" (the divisor) changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02;
to 125,807,389 beginning 2011-07-02;
to 126,188,733 beginning 2011-10-01;
to 126,579,970 beginning 2012-01-01.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs
Mark J. Perry

2012-02-09
Mark J. Perry
Michigan has a state government budget surplus and lower unemployment rate than DC

2012-02-09
Mark J. Perry
What dollar store locations reveal about the USA: There are suckers everywhere?

2012-02-09
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
St. Paul's Episcopal church in Alexandria, VA

2012-02-09 (5772 Shebet 16)
Jeff Strickler _Jewish World Review_
An argument a day keeps the divorce away
"44% of married couples believe that fighting more than once a week helps keep the lines of communication open.   While that survey was done in India, it reinforces similar studies that have been done in the United States, said William Doherty, a professor in the University of Minnesota's Department of Family Social Science.   The studies come with a couple of caveats, he added: For starters, nobody is recommending that you put down the newspaper and pick a fight with your spouse.   It's also important to remember that there's a difference between 'good fighting' and 'bad fighting', and the latter can be as destructive as the former is beneficial.   'What the studies have shown is that it's not so much whether couples get angry but how they handle it.', he said...   Doherty said that arguing 'helps couples recalibrate by addressing the things that are important to them.   I see a lot of couples bury these things under the rug -- and that rug ends up getting really lumpy.'   All things being equal, marriage counselor Bernie Slutsky would rather have the couples who come into his Therapy for Relationships offices in St. Louis Park and Maple Grove, MN, yell at each other than ignore each other...   You don't want let children see you waging a war, but having them witness what Doherty calls 'low-level skirmishes' is healthier for everyone...   'if it's a small irritation that is addressed respectfully and the kids see that 15 minutes later you've gotten over it and everything is fine again, that's helpful.'...   'Don't attack; argue.   And don't blame.   It has to be done in a way that you're not trying to hurt the other person.   You're just expressing your point of view.'...   Focus only on the topic at hand.   Dredging up a bunch of old issues -- called 'kitchen sinking' by therapists -- fuels anger.   Don't bring in third parties.   Saying, 'My Mom agrees with me' isn't going to help win the argument.   In the same vein, don't make comparisons between your mate and someone else.   Avoid using 'you always' and 'you never'.   Exaggerations hurt feelings and open the door for your spouse to focus on the misstatement and ignore the point you're trying to make.   Treat your partner with respect.   When you're speaking, don't yell, belittle or taunt.   When you're listening, don't roll your eyes, grimace or smirk.   If you owe your spouse an apology, make it.   It shows that you consider the relationship more important than what you're fighting about."

2012-02-09 (5772 Shebet 16)
Clifford D. May _Jewish World Review_
CAIR's crusade against movie "The Third Jihad"
Clarion Project: Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
anti-CAIR
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2012-02-09 (5772 Shebet 16)
Melissa Healy _Jewish World Review_
micro-electrical stimulation of entorhinal cortex boosts memory

2012-02-09 (5772 Shebet 16)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
GOP voters are still saying "We don't really want Romney!" and "We don't really want Gingrich!"
"Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado happened.   Rick Santorum beat him in all 3 states on the same day -- and beat him by huge margins in 2 of those states, as well as upsetting him in Colorado, where the Mormon vote was expected to give Romney a victory.   The Republican establishment, which has lined up heavily behind Romney, has tried to depict him as the 'electable', if not invincible, candidate this November...   a far more serious issue is [ObummerDoesn'tCare], perhaps the most unpopular act of the Obama administration, its totalitarian implications highlighted by its recent attempt to force Catholic institutions to violate their own principles and bend the knee to the dictates of [DC] bureaucrats."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-10

2012-02-10
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
Texas Instruments is not an Indian firm
 
Contrary to all established principles of journalism [the inverted pyramid model of putting the most important details first], I will not get to the topic described by my mail title above until later in this posting.   Please be patient.
 
First, though, let's discuss Pat Thibodeau's Computerworld February 8 web log posting, ["Obummer's statement regarding STEM job markets may haunt him"] which will eventually lead to my title above, but also cover important points along the way.
 
The issue is this: Jennifer Wedel's direct challenge to president Obama in the Google "town hall meeting" regarding his support of the H-1B program caught Obama off balance.   Already the Republicans have prepared to attack Obama on this point, something along the lines of Obama's not producing enough tech jobs, and senator Grassley (a Republican) has sent Obama a letter supporting Mrs. Wedel on the H-1B issue [and been joined, again by Democrat senator Durbin in composing yet another ineffective, off-target "reform" bill which may or may not be better than nothing].   I reported on that letter.
 
In his blog posting, Thibodeau asks whether the Wedel incident will cost Obama come election time in November.   But that's hard to see happening, I think.
 
When I first reported on the Wedel case, I said it was the most remarkable incident I've seen in all the years I've been criticizing H-1B.   But I also expressed doubts that it would have much effect.
 
My doubts grew when I reviewed the White House press conference in which Obama's spokes-person [despite the huge amount of evidence to the contrary] STILL insisted that we have a tech labor shortage and that we need to import foreign workers.   And of course, as Mark Krikorian pointed out in his recent web log post, the Republicans can hardly throw stones in the H-1B glass house.
 
If in a presidential election debate the president is asked about the Wedel case, he may get off the hook by saying that Wedel is a tough case, as he must stay in the Dallas area, due to child custody issues.   Too bad, the president might say, because Intel in New York wanted to hire Wedel.   We're already seeing some "spins" on the Wedel case, such as the Osgood File radio program implying that Wedel just didn't know how to look for a job [balanced by the observation that "executives and HR people have gotten lazy and are using defective tools, and are getting advice from immigration lawyers in means to declare all US applicants to be 'unqualified' despite those candidates' intelligence, talent, creativity, knowledge, skill and track-records"].
 
I do think it's plausible that the Wedel case will at least discourage Congress from enacting legislation this year that expands the H-1B and/or green card programs, which would make the Wedels' bold speak-out worthwhile.   But as to it inspiring actual reform legislation, well, that would be wonderful, and one can hope.   OTOH, as I've pointed out before, "reform" could be worse than nothing.   I'll return to this point later.
 
One important point in the blog posting is that Grassley told the president that he was glad to hear Obama tell Mrs. Wedel that "the H1-B should be reserved only for those companies who say they cannot find somebody in that particular field".   Key word here is "should"; other than a minuscule exception category, H-1B employers are NOT required to give hiring priority to qualifed Americans.   Among things, such a requirement would be imposed on employers under the Durbin/Grassley bill, which I've endorsed.
 
There is widespread ignorance in Congress on this point.   Engineers and programmers who try to let their concerns known to their senators and representatives often receive a letter in response that states that employers do have to hire Americans first -- a false claim, of course.   Maybe it is genuine ignorance.   But when it's pointed out that there is no such requirement, the politicians who had proudly pointed to this claimed-but-non-existent protection for U.S. workers, suddenly have no interest in adding such a requirement.   The politicians may not know all the ins and outs of H-1B law, but they certainly know that the industry doesn't want any new protections.
 
Pat Thibodeau's coverage of the H-1B case has been fantastic, but I must say I'm concerned that in this posting he ties Grassley's letter and his bill to the offshoring issue.   Grassley didn't mention offshoring in his letter, and this bill covers many different aspects of H-1B and L-1.   Thibodeau says that the off-shoring companies don't like the Durbin/Grassley bill, but sadly, the bill is disliked by the entire industry.   They would oppose (and have opposed) giving Americans hiring priority, and would in particular dislike the measure I consider central in the bill, reforming the legal definition of prevailing wage.   Indeed, when a couple of years ago there was some effort to incorporate Durbin/Grassely into the comprehensive immigration reform bill, the lobbyists were already pushing to weaken D/G's prevailing wage measure.
 
As many of you know, the issue of the Indian firms -- ones that off-shore, and the rent-a-programmer firms -- is a touchy one for me.   Many in DC, e.g. senator Schumer and representative Lofgren, have tried to portray the H-1B issue as a "Good Guys" (U.S. main-stream firms) versus "Bad Guys" (Indian firms) issue.   The American firms are portrayed as using H-1B responsibly, while the Indians are portrayed as the villains.   And it's not just the politicians; at least one academic has testified to Congress speaking in such terms.
 
In other words, the message from Schumer, Lofgren et al is that Darin Wedel is out of work because of the Indian firms.   Yet the firm that laid him off 3 years ago is a main-stream American firm, Texas Instruments.   And this is the same TI that testified to Congress last October that they need more H-1Bs.
 
I just checked TI's Careers web page, specifying the Dallas area (note this point), and found positions for IC Test Engineer, Test and Characterization Engineer, Test Engineer, Product/Test Engineer, Product Engineer and so on.   Based on what I know about Wedel's background, I believe he could do many of these jobs.   But I also believe it's likely some of these are being filled by H-1Bs (young ones, naturally).
 
TI, of course, would say that Wedel is "over-qualified" for those jobs (read, "too old/expensive"), while he is "UNDERqualified" for all the other jobs.   Doesn't leave much, does it?
 
Why am I so irritated by this blame-the-Indians business?   First, of course, it's unfair and inaccurate [even though a huge proportion of the H-1B visas are granted to people in/from India], just plain scape-goating.   But much more importantly, it leads to bad legislation, such as Lofgren's IDEA Act.   Lofgren's "reforms" are targeted at the Indian firms, in all but name, while she would give automatic green cards to foreign STEM students, hired by the "Good Guys" -- which again, I must point out includes that very same Texas Instruments that laid Darin Wedel off.
 
Norm
Wedel video

2012-02-09 18:46PST (2012-02-09 21:46EST) (2012-02-10 02:46GMT) (2012-02-10 04:46Jerusalem)
Nicole Rodriguez _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
Students honored for St. Lucie county science and engineering fair projects
Florida Foundation for Future Scientists
Maryland Science Fair

2012-02-10
Donald J. Boudreaux
the twistocracy

2012-02-10
_InformationWeek_
NASSCOM: India's off-shore out-sourcing boom
NASSCOM: off-shore out-sourcing growth will drop to 11% to 14% from 19% in the previous year
"Despite calls from Washington to keep jobs on-shore, U.S. [executives] seem to be sending more tech work to the sub-continent, as off-shoring sales spike 19%.   Indian out-sourcers saw strong gains last year in spite of calls by some U.S. law-makers to penalize businesses that send tech work over-seas.   India's export of IT products, mostly in the form of out-sourcing services to the United States and other Western countries, increased 16.3% in 2011, compared to the previous year, to reach $69G in total.   The country's IT and business process out-sourcing sector, including exports and domestic sales, topped $100G in total revenue for the first time.   IT off-shoring services alone grew 19%, to $40G, while sales of business process out-sourcing (BPO) services, such as call center operations, grew 15% to $13G.   Officials at NASSCOM, a trade group which represents [executives of India off-shore out-sourcing firms], said part of the gains were due in part to concerted efforts by India's tech industry to move beyond commodity services like infrastructure management and application maintenance into higher margin areas, such as consulting and targeted services for industries like finance and health-care [privacy violation].   'Indian IT-BPO firms have matured from being service providers to strategic partners to their customers -- highlighting their importance in enabling growth of customer businesses.', said NASSCOM president Som Mittal, during a press conference to announce the numbers.   Also, experts say the weak U.S. economy is continuing to drive companies to cut costs, a trend that helps outsourcers in low-cost countries like India.   'That's one of the primary drivers.', said John Caucis, who follows the IT services [bodyshopping] sector for Technology Business Research.   Caucis added that Indian out-sourcers are also getting their fair share of discretionary IT spending.   'We're starting to see some new investments in IT, though the outlook for 2012 remains cautious.', he said.   India's out-sourcing industry is continuing to thrive even as political rhetoric against the practice heats up in the White House and in Congress.   President Obama in January held an in-sourcing summit in DC, at which he encouraged companies to keep jobs in the United States.   And congressman Tim Bishop (D-NY) earlier this month introduced a bill, the U.S. Call Center Worker and Consumer Protection Act, that would make businesses that out-source ineligible for federal loans and grants.   It would also force them to disclose the number of jobs off-shored.   Market watchers, however, say such efforts aren't likely to gain much traction, given the extent to which off-shoring is already ingrained in most large companies' business practices and the tight supply of IT workers in the United States.   'You're not going to see much political impact.', said Joe Walent, also of Technology Business Research.   'Getting the right people for the jobs right now domestically is too hard and in a lot of cases it's easier done over-seas.'   NASSCOM said it expects India's out-sourcing industry to grow at between 11 and 14% in the current fiscal year."

2012-02-10 12:58PST (15:58EST) (20:58GMT) (22:58Jerusalem)
_Numbers USA_
senator Grassley's H-1B reform proposal may narrow one of the loop-holes that have been hurting US workers
"Senator Grassley (R-IA) and senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) sponsored legislation that would prohibit businesses with more 50 employees from having more than 50% of their workers hold either H-1B or L-1 visas, and would require employers to first try to fill jobs with U.S. workers."

2012-02-10
Anthony Watts
Scafetta vs. IPCC pages

2012-02-10
Willis Eschenbach
Argo notes part2

2012-02-10
Joe Guzzardi _Californians for Population Stabilization_
American students face tough competition from over-seas students willing to shell out full out-of-state tuition

2012-02-10
Isaac Sweeney _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Tell more people about the academic bodyshopping scam

2012-02-10
Mark J. Perry
US trade sets record

2012-02-10
Mark J. Perry
manufacturing industry's secret success story

2012-02-10
Mark J. Perry
California's best export year was 2011

2012-02-10
Mark J. Perry
truck/rail freight shipments hit record in December

2012-02-10
"FrauTech" _Engineer web logs_
How good we engineers have it

2012-02-10 (5772 Shebet 17)
Lisa M. Krieger _Jewish World Review_
man with defibrillator demands access to his own medical data
"HC has a small computer buried in his chest to help keep him alive.   But he has no idea what it says about his faulty heart.   All the raw data it collects, especially any erratic rhythms it controls with shocks, goes directly to the manufacturer.   And some of it later gets sent to his doctor...   'It's mine.   I paid for it.   It's in my body.', asserts the tech-savvy [man who] has devoted himself to studying cardiology text-books, attending device symposiums and scheming how to access the electronics of his tiny defibrillator.   'I have a right to my own damn data [and the feral federal government, state government, and the protection rackets do not].', he said...   Already he discovered that caffeine and Scotch trigger irregular heartbeats...   Federal law entitles patients to easy access to their health records, including X-rays and pathology reports...   Much of the collected data -- such as average heart rate, fluid accumulation, atrial arrhythmias -- is diagnostic.   But these devices also collect huge amounts of proprietary information, such as wiring break-downs, battery voltage and the time it takes to release a shock.   Calls and e-mails deluged him after an on-line video of last November's TEDxCambridge speech went viral...   he earned a certificate from the Arrhythmia Technologies Institute...   a kidney cancer survivor...launched a right-to-information campaign after discovering that his hospital had exported a Google personal health record riddled with inaccuracies and omissions...   The former cardiac electrophysiologist founded DLS Healthcare Consulting...   the data is very technical, even for physicians, and often irrelevant...   The Palo Alto, CA, startup Glooko, for instance, sells diabetics a $40 cable that connects glucose meters to iPhones.   Meter readings are automatically down-loaded, so patients can constantly monitor their blood-sugar levels...   rejecting his remote monitor.   'I will not be monitored remotely unless I'm part of the loop.', he asserts.   But new allies have rallied to him: hackers.   More than a dozen engineers have volunteered to help him tap into the wireless system and unlock the data."

2012-02-10 (5772 Shebet 17)
David G. Savage _Jewish World Review_
many activists may not be in a hurry to have supremes rule on gay "marriage"

2012-02-10 (5772 Shebet 17)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
The Middle East "peace process" is over... finally
"When PA Chairman and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas signed a deal with Hamas terror-master Khaled Mashaal in Doha, Qatar, the notion that there is a significant segment of Palestinian society that is not committed to the destruction of Israel was finally and truly sunk."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-11

2012-02-11 09:19PST (12:19EST) (17:19GMT) (19:19Jerusalem)
James MacPherson _Seattle WA Times_/_AP_
ND's Dickinson State U awarded hundreds of degrees to foreign students who did not earn them
FAIR US
"Jon Brudvig, Dickinson State's vice president for academic affairs, will continue to work at the university in a yet-to-be determined role while he looks for another job, chancellor William Goetz...   apparent suicide of university administrator Doug LaPlante...   only 10 of the 410 foreign students who earned joint degrees from Dickinson State and the students' home universities since 2003 had completed all their requirements.   Most were Chinese, it said. The rest were Russian."

2012-02-11
David Archibald
Quantifying the solar cycle 24 temperature decline

2012-02-11
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Dog-gone web log post done gone and got ahead of me!
"Aquilla (a very cool name, BTW...which also happens to be the given name of yet another ancestor, though unrelated to this ancestor) and Susannah Simpson Emerson resided in Alexandria, where Aquilla operated a tavern, opposite Market House..."

2012-02-11
Anthony Watts
Fogageddon near Panama City FL

2012-02-11
Charles Grassley
H-1B reform (video)

2012-02-11
Mark J. Perry
Do med school acceptance rates reflect minority group preferences?
"For those students applying to medical school with average GPAs (3.40 to 3.59) and average MCAT scores (27-29), black applicants were almost three times more likely to be admitted than their Asian counterparts (85.9% vs. 30%), and 2.4 times more likely than their white counterparts (85.9% vs. 35.9%).   Likewise, Hispanic students with average GPAs and average MCAT scores were about twice as likely to be accepted as white applicants (68.7% vs. 35.9%), and more than twice as likely as Asian applicants (68.7% vs. 30%).   For students applying to medical school with slightly below average GPAs of 3.20-3.39 and slightly below average MCAT scores of 24-26 (first column in the table), black applicants were more than 8 times as likely to be admitted as Asians (67.3% vs. 7.7%), and more than 5 times as likely as whites."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-12

2012-02-12
Jan Falstad _Billings MT Gazette_
Bakken boom helps push up demand for commercial property in Billings

2012-02-12
Willis Eschenbach
Argo and the ocean temperature maximum

2012-02-12
Robert Moore
Lincoln connections
"I've written recently about Lincoln's ties to Virginia, and even mentioned that I know some who are related to Lincoln (via the Herring family) who are here in the Shenandoah Valley.   Indeed...I have first cousins who, through their mother, are descended from 2 of Bathsheba Herring Lincoln's siblings (Bethuel and William).   Cool stuff...though that doesn't give me [common ancestor] connections to President Lincoln."

2012-02-12
Reza Kahlili _PJ Media_
Iran's 'Furdow" nuclear plant now fully operational

2012-02-12
Victor Davis Hanson _PJ Media_
Europe in the rear-view mirror: the dream and the nightmare

2012-02-12
Jim Powell _Forbes_
Obummer's leftist power-madness

2012-02-12
John Miano _Center for Immigration Studies_
Why Obummer doesn't have a clue
"The president could have gone to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.   The December unemployment rate was 4.0% for Professional and Related Occupations and 6.3% for Architecture and Engineering Occupations.   The unemployment rate for engineers is 58% higher than for professional workers in general.   The president is quite removed from reality here...   In engineering, there is a term for this: GIGO, Garbage In/Garbage Out.   Clearly, the president is getting the word from the wrong kind of people -- industry leaders in search of cheap foreign labor, armed with large campaign contributions.   President Obama is clearly lacking a voice of the average working American.   No advocate of American workers has his ear.   President Obama clearly sees the need for an advocate.   Last week he created a [tax-victim] funded position of advocate for illegal aliens.   The problem working Americans have with their government is clear: They are less important than illegal aliens in the eyes of the president."

2012-02-12
Mark J. Perry
gender pay gap app
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

2012-02-13

2012-02-12 16:40PST (2012-02-12 19:40EST) (2012-02-13 00:40GMT) (2012-02-13 02:40Jerusalem)
Ed Bott _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Privacy is widely violated on the net

2012-02-13
Anthony Watts
Was the NE Passage navigated in 1660? (with several interesting old maps)

2012-02-13
Robert Moore
And you thought electronically delivered history was all about the content...

2012-02-13
Anthony Watts
pollution from electric cars may be worse than gasoline

2012-02-13 Scott Ott _PJ Media_
It's not personal: Why we resist cousin Obummer's power grabs

2012-02-13 06:13PST (09:13EST) (14:13GMT) (16:13Jerusalem)
Larry Dignan _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple's third-party inspections of Foxconn factories are a good first step

2012-02-13 07:00PST (10:00EST) (15:00GMT) (17:00Jerusalem)
Jason Perlow & David Gewirtz _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Do happier workers in Red China spell the end of affordable tech gadgets?: Obviously not

2012-02-13 10:21PST (13:21EST) (18:21GMT) (20:21Jerusalem)
Eric Pfahler _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
American Energy Innovations returning incentive money, dumping some employees, rethinking products
"AEI, an affiliate of Stuart-based American Custom Yachts, builds seamless, single-piece blades and other components for wind and submerged turbo engines...   The company has returned all financial incentives and will not be collecting future incentives from the state and county.County: $435K, including $75K already paid; State: $3.9M, including $750K already paid; Obligations: 600 jobs by 2015 at an average annual wage of $43,350."

2012-02-13
Thomas E. Brewton
Obummer's latest election campaign pandering: $25G deal mocks responsible home-owners and mortgage payers

2012-02-13 Andrew Klavan _PJ Media_
Celebrate black history month: spank a leftist!
"Of all the sins of leftism -- its assault on our Constitution, its undermining of our inalienable rights, its hobbling of the economy -- none is quite so wicked as its virtual enslavement of the black underclass.   It was increases in welfare and the institutionalization of leftist attitudes that, beginning around 1964, brought a century of improvements in black life to a crashing halt."

2012-02-13
Claudia Rosett _PJ Media_
the UN is planning your future -- all of it
"the UN has been planning its grand summit-level Rio+20 Conference, scheduled for June 20-22 in Brazil.   This will mark the 20th anniversary of the Rio Earth Summit, which helped spade the ground for climate hysteria, the Kyoto treaty, and the quack vilification of the world’s most productive economies.   This round, the UN plans to make even more 'sustainable' the things the UN-ocracy would like to see sustained -- paramount among them, the UN itself.   As is the way of such UN confabs, the Rio+20 Conference already has a 'Dedicated Secretariat', headed by [Red China's] Sha Zukang, the UN Under-Secretary-General who made news in 2010 for his drunken rant during a UN retreat at an Austrian ski resort -- in which Sha declared he had never liked UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, and he didn't like Americans either.   Also in 2010, Sha served as ceremonial presenter of a 'World Harmony Award' to the former [Red Chinese] military chief who was operational commander during the 1989 crushing of the Tiananmen Square uprising."

2012-02-13
Rand Simberg _PJ Media_
Our malevolent Marxist would-be masters

2012-02-13
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
under-reported murder spree: arrested twice after deportation order... released

2012-02-13 David Roberts & Mary Brandenberger _DoL OPA_
US DoL budget request

2012-02-13
_FAIR US_
Obummer appointed former VP of La Racists as domestic policy chief

2012-02-13
Mark J. Perry
personal interest income

2012-02-13
Mark J. Perry
emerging world energy map

2012-02-13
William L. Anderson
Why not an $85/hour or $850/hour minimum wage?
"The first [NYT fallacy] is the fallacy of Appeal to Authority...   The second argument -- that Republicans oppose it, so it must be bad -- is another version of the Appeal to Authority...   Is mentioning the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics 'stale', or referring to the Law of Gravity? Of course not, but then why is the Law of Opportunity Cost a 'stale' argument?...   In the next paragraph, the editors commit the Fallacy of Composition...   What is the definition of poor?   Furthermore, is Silver saying that work causes poverty?   Would a lot of these people be better off not working at all?   One would like to see all occupations being productive enough to where anyone who worked could live comfortably off that pay, but that never has been the case in all of human history, and I doubt seriously that the State of New York by fiat can change economic history, at least for the better.   Again, we see the fantasy world that exists at the NYT.   It really is the perfect home for Paul Krugman."
Mark J. Perry

2012-02-13 (5772 Shebet 20)
Paul Greenberg _Jewish World Review_
The All-Mighty meets the media

2012-02-13 (5772 Shebet 20)
Binyamin Rose _Jewish World Review_
Back to the bunker: How a life-risking act by Christians during the holocaust saved a family and built a thriving community a world away

2012-02-13 (5772 Shebet 20)
Danielle Kurtzleben _Jewish World Review_
the myth of economic inequality

2012-02-13 (5772 Shebet 20)
Michael D. Tanner _Cato Policy Analysis_
still a better deal: private investment vs. Socialist Insecurity
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

 
 

2012-02-14

2012-02-14
Barbara Phillips Long _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
Lou Barletta visits new constituents of his altered district

2012-02-14
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
sheep/lamb business never better

2012-02-14
David Deming
modern environmentalism rooted in erroneous "noble savage" meme

2012-02-14
Tom Foremski _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Dan Lyons points out corruption in Sili Valley media

2012-02-14
Anthony Watts
DHS taking note of solar storms and their geo-electro-magnetic effects

2012-02-14
David North _Center for Immigration Studies_
response to USCIS RFC on draft "Request for Evidence" templates
"We have, according to professor Ron Hira of the Rochester Institute of Technology, about 350K people on L-1 visas in the U.S.A. at any given time, all of these are working, and many at jobs that might otherwise be held by citizen or green card workers.   To that number I would add about 300K L-2s (dependents) many of whom are working as well, for a total of about 650K.   These numbers are increasing, apparently despite the recent downturn in the economy.   Using admissions (a different concept than that of the total population) there were 702,460 L-1 and L-2 admissions in FY2010, according to the 2010 Year-book of Immigration Statistics (Table 25) as compared to 493,992 the prior year.   This upward trend was reflected in another set of statistics, the issuance of visas (by the State Department) of 64,696 L-1s in FY2009 and 74,719 in FY2010...   Deciding to add several scores of thousands of workers a year to the American work force at a time of wide-spread unemployment among resident and green card workers is [seriously insane]...   One wonders whether or not these same corporations are moving U.S. citizens and green cards into and out of executive and managerial positions in their home country...   I would suggest the following questions be asked at the start of each of the RFEs under consideration: How many US citizens or Permanent Resident Aliens do you have on your corporate payroll at this time?   How many in the U.S.A.?   How many in the country where the firm is incorporated?   How many in [other] countries?   How many people, of all nationalities, do you have on the world-wide pay-roll?"

2012-02-14 13:02PST (16:02EST) (21:02GMT) (23:02Jerusalem)
Larry Dignan _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple's Tim Cook bets on transparency

2012-02-14
Anthony Watts
sea level still not cooperating with predictions

2012-02-14
Anthony Watts
impact of microbes on climate

2012-02-14
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
mild winter means sugar refining continues
"The refineries in Billings and Lovell normally finish up Feb. 10, but a mild, dry winter has kept Western's beet piles, spread across the rural countryside, from spoiling.   Farmers truck their beets to the piles in October, where they're stored for months and hauled to town by commercial truck as the factory needs them...   Montana yields were about 26.5 tons of beets per acre, slightly lower than in recent years when beets genetically engineered to resist the powerful herbicide Roundup drove yields to record highs.   However, the yield was still better than the 10-year average, which is somewhat lowered by a half-decade of beets that weren't Roundup Ready.   Together, the two refineries will process more than 650K tons of beets."

2012-02-14
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
Obummer wants to cut funding to jail illegal alien criminals

2012-02-14
J. Cristian Adams _PJ Media_
Millions of dead people voting thanks to Eric Holder
"The Pew Center on the States estimates nearly 2M dead voters are on the rolls, and 2.8M people are registered in more than one state.   This is precisely the mess that the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) was designed to prevent."

2012-02-14
Emily Schrader _PJ Media_
A time for choosing in the great RINO hunt

2012-02-14
Paul McDougall _Information Week_
H-1B victim electronic engineer still unemployed
MSFT NBC
"The White House's involvement landed Wedel a number of offers, including one from Intel, but he said he was unable to accept because none of the positions was in north Texas, where Wedel needs to remain because of a child custody arrangement...   'Thousands of qualified Americans remain out of work while companies are incentivized to import foreign workers.', Grassley wrote."
Wedel video

2012-02-14
Mark J. Perry
natural gas boom is energizing chemical industry

2012-02-14
Mark J. Perry
wholesale sugar prices

2012-02-14
Daniel Luzer _Washington Monthly_
we really have a STEM talent glut

2012-02-14 (5772 Shebet 21)
Dennis Prager _Jewish World Review_
Chris Christie on Israel and what it means to be a leader

2012-02-14 (5772 Shebet 21)
Frank J. Gaffney ii _Jewish World Review_
Interpol serving as shariah police?
"A Saudi newspaper columnist named Hamza Kashgari was detained in Malaysia, reportedly on the basis of an alert by Interpol...   The alert apparently was mounted in response to a 'red notice' (or request for help apprehending an individual) issued by Saudi Arabia.   Mr. Kashgari was then sent back to Saudi Arabia, where he faces almost certain death.   Mr. Kashgari's crime? He criticized the founder of Islam, Muhammad, on his Twitter account.   According to press reports, he addressed the man Muslims call the Prophet directly, writing: 'I have loved things about you and I have hated things about you.   There is a lot I don't understand about you...   I will not pray for you.'...   Jago Russell, chief executive of the British nongovernmental organization Fair Trials International told the Guardian that Interpol is an international coordination mechanism for national police authorities that is supposed 'to respect human rights and free speech' and steer clear of 'religious or political cases'...   in a 2009 December executive order unveiled on a Friday afternoon in the run-up to the Christmas holidays, President Obama issued Executive Order 13524.   It amended an earlier order by President Reagan that conferred on Interpol some -- but not all -- of the privileges of a foreign diplomatic mission.   Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor and one of the finest legal minds and essayists of our time, wrote that Mr. Obama's amendments would have the effect of establishing here 'an international police force immune from the restraints of American law'.   He added that, thanks to the Obama executive order, 'This international police force (whose U.S. head-quarters is in the Justice Department in Washington) will be unrestrained by the U.S. Constitution and American law while it operates in the United States and affects both Americans and American interests outside the United States.'   There has been a lot of anxiety across the country lately about the possibility that provisions of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act could be used to have the military arrest American citizens and detain them indefinitely without due process."

2012-02-14 (5772 Shebet 21)
Steven Thomma & David Lightman _Jewish World Review_
Obummer's "budget" highlights election choices, continues horrendousl over-spending

2012-02-14 (5772 Shebet 21)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
the regressive legacy part 1 of 3
"Many of the trends, problems and disasters of our time are a legacy of that [regressive] era.   We can only imagine how many future generations will be paying the price -- and not just in money -- for the bright ideas and clever rhetoric of our current administration.   The 2 giants of the [Regressive] era -- Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson -- clashed a century ago, in the 3-way election of 1912.   With the Republican vote split between William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt's newly created [Regressive] Party, Woodrow Wilson was elected president, so that the Democrats' version of [Regressivism] became dominant for 8 years...   a vision of an expanded role of the federal government in the economy and a reduced role for the Constitution of the United States...   Like other [Regressives], Theodore Roosevelt was a critic and foe of big business.   In this he was not inhibited by any knowledge of economics, and his own business ventures lost money...   Like other [Regressives], TR wanted an income tax to siphon off some of the earnings of the rich.   Since the Constitution of the United States forbad such a tax, to the [Regressives] that simply meant that the Constitution should be changed.   After the 16th Amendment was passed, a very low income-tax rate was levied, as an entering wedge for rates that rapidly escalated up to 73% on the highest incomes during the Woodrow Wilson administration...   Judicial activism is one of the enduring legacies of the [Regressive] era.   In reality, the Constitution was amended 4 times in 8 years during the [Regressive] era.   But facts carried no more weight with crusading [Regressives] then than they do today...   Whatever the vision or rhetoric of the [Regressive] era, its practice was a never-ending expansion of the arbitrary powers of the federal government.   The problems they created so discredited [Regressives] that they started calling themselves 'liberals' -- and after they discredited themselves again, they went back to calling themselves 'Progressives', now that people no longer remembered how [Regressives] had discredited themselves before.   Barack Obama's rhetoric of 'change' is in fact a restoration of discredited ideas that originated a hundred years ago."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"[O]nly through gov't restrictions & special privileges can output be permanently reduced & prices artificially raised.   The free market -- if it is truly free & without fraud -- provides for maximum social efficiency, optimum output, & the lowest prices while fulfilling consumer demand...   there is no persistent misallocation of resources in the free market; costs are minimized & output is maximized whether the demand for a good is elastic or inelastic." --- Mark Skousen 1991 _Economics on Trial_ pg 251

 
 

2012-02-15

2012-02-14 18:35PST (2012-02-14 21:35EST) (2012-02-15 02:35GMT) (2012-02-15 04:35Jerusalem)
Lamar Smith _Politico_
Obummer's lax visa policy imperils the USA
"The immigration subcommittee is holding a visa fraud hearing Wednesday to investigate the alleged abuses by the administration contained in the IG report...   USCIS is supposed to be a first line of defense for national security -- not a customer service agency for foreign nationals...   In light of these facts, it's outrageous that Obama administration officials would compromise national security for their own political agenda.   Their 'get to yes' motto has got to go...   Work site enforcement has plummeted 70% under this administration, allowing illegal immigrants to hold scarce jobs when millions of Americans are unemployed or can't find full-time work.   The administration also has granted backdoor amnesty to potentially millions of illegal immigrants by abusing administrative powers."

2012-02-15
Anthony Watts
Do under-water volcanoes have an effect on ENSO

2012-02-15
Anthony Watts
Some notes on the sad state of journalism and the leak of info about Heartland Institute
"Some of these documents were stolen from Heartland, at least one is a fake, and some may have been altered...   the authenticity of those documents has not been confirmed."

2012-02-15
Anthony Watts
notes on the faked Heartland Institute doc

2012-02-15
Tom Blumer _PJ Media_
Obummer's farcical budget proposal betrays crisis-creation strategy

2012-02-15
_Sacramento CA Bee_
State governments taking the lead in efforts to cut/discourage illegal immigration
"states do have the right to deal with illegal aliens if states can show they are being invaded.   Although it is the federal government's duty to protect the states against invasion [Art. IV, Sec. 4], the Constitution also says a state may act if it is 'actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay'. [Art. 1, Sec. 10, cl. 3]."

2012-02-15 11:45PST (14:45EST) (19:45GMT) (21:45Jerusalem)
_Tampa Bay FL Business Journal_
Ravinder Reddy Allala sentenced to 40 months in prison for bogus IT bodyshop Laconia Associates
Miami FL Herald
"submitted fake H-1B visa applications for Indian nationals between 2006 and 2010...   Allala submitted the bogus visa applications under a fake name and in many instances, also listed a fake work-place for the aliens, the statement said."

2012-02-15
Mark J. Perry
record US exports via Los Angeles

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Liz Bowie _Jewish World Review_
cursive writing

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Jason Koebler _Jewish World Review_
plants could be made to produce pharmaceuticals, electricity
"Research published last week in Trends in Plant Science suggests the complex chemical reactions involved in photosynthesis could be re-routed to automatically produce mass quantities of rare, valuable medicines and complex chemicals that are artificially produced in chemical labs today...   In 2010, French scientists announced that they had transformed the chemical energy produced by photosynthesis into electrical energy.   Photosynthesis is one of the most efficient energy-creating processes scientists have discovered, so, theoretically, great amounts of chemicals or electricity could be created with very little waste."

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Susan Johnston _Jewish World Review_
ways to fend off unwanted calls

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Eilene Zimmerman _Jewish World Review_
Love (?) American style

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
John Stossel _Jewish World Review_
Never trust government budget numbers
"'We have a budget of, what, almost $4T? So if we're doing $2T of cuts.', Mitchell said, 'we're cutting government in half.   That sounds wonderful.'   But what the president was talking about is not even a cut.   The politicians just agreed that over the next 10 years, instead of increasing spending by $9.48T, they'd increase it by 'just' $7.3T.   Calling that a 'cut' is nonsense...   President Bush said the war in Iraq would cost $50G to $60G. It cost $800G.   When Medicare Part A was created, the government said it would cost $9G in 1990. It cost $67G.   They said the hiring of TSA airport security screeners would cost $100M. Then they spent $700M.   Yet the media report the estimates as if they are realistic.   Again and again, politicians get away with under-estimating the cost of their programs."

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Rising black social pathology
"The Philadelphia Inquirer's big story Feb. 4 was about how a budget crunch at the Philadelphia School District had caused the district to lay off 91 school police officers.   Over the years, there's been no discussion of what has happened to our youth that makes a school police force necessary in the first place.   The Inquirer's series 'Assault on Learning' (2011 March) reported that in the 2010 school year, '690 teachers were assaulted; in the last 5 years, 4K were'.   The newspaper reported that in Philadelphia's 268 schools, 'on an average day 25 students, teachers, or other staff members were beaten, robbed, sexually assaulted, or victims of other violent crimes.   That doesn't even include thousands more who are extorted, threatened, or bullied in a school year.'   I graduated from Philadelphia's Benjamin Franklin High School in 1954.   Franklin's students were from the poorest North Philadelphia neighborhoods -- such as the Richard Allen housing project, where I lived -- but there were no policemen patrolling the hallways.   There were occasional after-school fights -- rumbles, we called them -- but within the school, there was order.   Students didn't use foul language to teachers, much less assault them...   Over the past couple of decades, I've attended neighborhood reunions.   I've asked whether any of us recall classmates who couldn't read, write or perform simple calculations, and none of us does.   Back in those days, most Philadelphia school principals, teachers and counselors were white.   At Stoddart-Fleisher junior high school, where I attended, I recall that only one teacher was black, and at Benjamin Franklin, there might have been two.   What does that say about the role model theory? By the way, Asian-Americans are at the top of the academic ladder, and, at least historically, they rarely experience an Asian-American teacher during their K-through-12 schooling.   Many black students are alien and hostile to the education process.   They are permitted to make education impossible for other students.   Their misbehavior and violence require schools to divert resources away from education and spend them on security, such as hiring school police and purchasing metal detectors, all of which does little for school safety.   The violent school climate discourages the highest-skilled teachers from teaching at schools where they risk assaults, intimidation and theft.   At a bare minimum, part of the solution to school violence and poor academic performance should be the expulsion of students who engage in assaults and disrespectful behavior.   You say, 'What's to be done for these students?'   Even if we don't know what to do with them, how compassionate and intelligent is it to permit them to make education impossible for other students?"

2012-02-15 (5772 Shebet 22)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
the regressive legacy part 2 of 3
"'Often wrong but never in doubt' is a phrase that summarizes much of what was done by Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, the 2 giants of the [Regressive] era, a century ago.   Their legacy is very much alive today, both in their mind-set -- including government picking winners and losers in the economy and interventionism in foreign countries -- as well as specific institutions created during the [Regressive] era, such as the income tax and the Federal Reserve System.   Like so many [Regressives] today, Theodore Roosevelt felt no need to study economics before intervening in the economy...   the actual thrust of anti-trust activity has more often been against businesses that charged lower prices than their competitors...   The rhetorical transformation of government into 'society' is a verbal sleight-of-hand trick that endures to this day.   So is the notion that money earned in the form of profits requires politicians' benediction to be legitimate, while money earned under other names apparently does not...   IOW, the government -- politicians, bureaucrats and judges -- are to intervene, second-guess and pick winners and losers, in a complex economic process of which they are often uninformed, if not misinformed, and a process in which they pay no price for being wrong, regardless of how high a price will be paid by the economy.   If this head-strong, busybody approach seems familiar because it is similar to what is happening today, that is because it is based on fundamentally the same vision, the same presumptions of superior wisdom, and the same kind of lofty rhetoric we hear today about 'fairness'.   Wilson even used the phrase 'social justice'.   Woodrow Wilson also won a Nobel Prize for peace, like the current president — and it was just as undeserved.   Wilson's 'war to end wars' in fact set the stage for an even bigger, bloodier and more devastating Second World War.   But, then as now, those with noble-sounding rhetoric are seldom judged by what consequences actually follow."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"By a faction, I understand a number of citizens who are united & actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of the other citizens, or to the permanent & aggregate interests of the community." --- James Madison 1787 _Federalist #10_ (quoted in Philip K. Howard 1994 _The Death of Common Sense_ pg 166)

 
 

2012-02-16

2012-02-16 05:30PST (08:30EST) (13:30GMT) (15:30 Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 361,928 in the week ending February 11, a decrease of 39,328 from the previous week.   There were 424,400 initial claims in the comparable week in 2011.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.1% during the week ending February 4, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week's unrevised rate.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,964,007, a decrease of 133,493 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.6% and the volume was 4,575,640.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending January 28 was 7,681,911, an increase of 18,304 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MD, MA, MI, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, WV, and WI during the week ending January 28.   States reported 3,002,475 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending January 28, an increase of 16,568 from the prior week.   There were 3,629,604 claimants in the comparable week in 2011.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" (the divisor) changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02;
to 125,807,389 beginning 2011-07-02;
to 126,188,733 beginning 2011-10-01;
to 126,579,970 beginning 2012-01-01.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2012-02-16
Alan Caruba
anatomy of a warmist smear

2012-02-16
Roger Morse _PJ Media_
Obummer "budget" drowning in red ink

2012-02-16
Victor Davis Hanson _Town Hall_
Please, a little honesty about illegal immigration

2012-02-16
Julie Wernau _Chicago Tribune_
Wind power tax credits pulled in Illinois

2012-02-16 12:28PST (15:28EST) (20:28GMT) (22:28Jerusalem)
Jason Perlow _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Abuse of Chinese suggests loss of ethics in 1st world
"As much as I would like to believe that costs are going to increase due to the possibility of human rights conditions improving in [Red China], the reality is that from a systemic perspective, that nation is such a long way off from improving the lives of its people to the level of a Westernized nation that it will likely take decades before we will ever see an economic impact on the supply chain."

2012-02-16
Dan Burrows _CBS_
World's 10 most expensive cities

2012-02-16
Stewart M. Powell & Regina Garcia Cano _San Antonio TX Express-News_
Janet Napolitano questioned about lackadaisical approach to stopping illegal aliens at borders and internally, and laxity in granting visas

2012-02-16
_News Max_/_Washington Times_
illegal immigration is increasing again under Obummer

2012-02-16
Mark J. Perry
great moments in socialism

2012-02-16
Mark J. Perry
rent control is unconstitutional... and stupid

2012-02-16 (5772 Shebet 23)
Clifford D. May _Jewish World Review_
Listening to the Syrian rebels
"A revolution is under way.   On one side is the dictator Bashar al-Assad, backed by Iran's rulers, Hezbollah, and Vladimir Putin's Russia.   On the other side are ordinary Syrians, facing bombs and bullets with the kind of courage exhibited in Tiananmen Square.   Meanwhile, those who should be their allies dither."

2012-02-16 (5772 Shebet 23)
Jason Koebler _Jewish World Review_
Wash U study suggests anti-biotics are ineffective against sinus infections
"JAMA...   Sinusitis is one of the most common infections in the United States.   Its 24M annual cases account for nearly one fifth of all antibiotic prescriptions.   Because sinusitis can be caused by either a virus or bacteria, by definition, anti-biotics won't have any effect on the viral infections.   And, according to the AMA report, it doesn't have any effect on the bacterial infection either.   Amoxicillin, the most commonly prescribed anti-biotic prescribed to treat sinus infections, doesn't work any better than a placebo, according to Jay Piccirillo of Washington University School of Medicine, one of the authors of the study."

2012-02-16 (5772 Shebet 23)
Jason Koebler _Jewish World Review_
We're doomed: B-school bozo MBA defense executives are being churned out of industry-focused graduate programs

2012-02-16 (5772 Shebet 23)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
the regressive legacy part 3 of 3
"[Woodrow Wilson] saw the indigenous peoples brought under American control as beneficiaries of progress.   He said, 'they are children and we are men in these deep matters of government and justice'.   If that sounds racist, it is perfectly consistent with President Wilson's policies at home.   The Wilson administration introduced racial segregation in Washington government agencies where it did not exist when Wilson took office.   Woodrow Wilson also invited various dignitaries to the White House to watch a showing of the film 'The Birth of a Nation', which glorified the Ku Klux Klan -- and which Wilson praised...   Woodrow Wilson was also a precursor of later [Regressives] in assuming that the overthrow of an autocratic and despotic government means an advance toward democracy.   In 1917, president Wilson spoke of 'heartening things that have been happening within the last few weeks in Russia'."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"Tutankhamen, the youthful monarch who ruled Egypt from 1352 to 1343BCE...   However, what interested me most of all about the treasures that he had unearthed was that they included dozens of Ark-like chests or boxes, some with carrying poles, some without, but all of them conceptually similar to the Ark of the Covenant.   By far the most striking of these objects were the 4 shrines that had been built to contain the sarcophagus of Tutankhamen.   These shrines... took the form of large rectangular caskets that had originally been positioned one inside the other but that were now installed in separate display cases.   Since each casket was made of wood, & since each, moreover, was plated 'inside & out with pure gold', it was difficult to resist the conclusion that the mind that had conceived the Ark of the Covenant must have been familiar with objects like these.   Further support for this inference was provided by the presence on the doors & rear walls of each of the shrines of 2 mythical figures: tall & terrible winged women, fierce & imperious in stature & visage -- like stern angels of vengeance.   These powerful & commanding creatures, placed so as to provide ritual protection for the precious contents of the tomb, were thought to be representations of the goddesses Isis & Nephthys.   While that identification in itself held no special significance for me, I could not help but note that the deities had their 'wings spread upwards' just like the cherubim referred to in the biblical description of the Ark.   They also faced each other just as the biblical cherubim had done.   And although they were shaped in high relief on the flat planes of the doors (rather than being distinct pieces of statuary) they were never the less fashioned 'of beaten gold' -- again very much like the cherubim described in the Bible...   the formidable winged guardians of Tutankhamen's inter-nested shrines were the closest models that I was ever likely to find for the 2 cherubim of the Ark, which indeed had been conceived as standing sentinel over it & which had also frequently served as channels for its immense & deadly power..." --- Graham Hancock 1992 _The Sign & the Seal_ pp 288-291 (citing Richard Elliott Friedman 1988 _Who Wrote the bible?_ pg 156; Exodus 12:40, Exodus 25:11, Exodus 25:18, 1 Chronicles 15:15; _Jerusalem Bible_ Chronological Table pg 343; Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt 1989 _Tutankhamen: Life & Death of a Pharoah_ pp 15, 20, 105, 131, 185; Nicholas Reeves 1990 _The Complete Tutankhamen_ pp 102, 104, 105; John Anthony West 1989 _Ancient Egypt_ pg 268; Jill Kamil 1989 _Luxor_ pg 28; Alan Moorhead 1984 _The Blue Nile_ pg 17; Edward Ullendorf 1956 "Hebraic-Jewish Elements in Abyssinian (Monophysite) Christianity" _Journal of Semitic Studies_ vol 1 #3 pg 223 footnote 6; E.A. Wallis Budge 1932 _The Queen of Sheba & Her Only Son Menelik: being the 'Book of the Glory of Kings' (Kebra Nagast)_ pp 14-15; Kenneth Kitchen 1960 April "Some Egyptian Background to the Old Testament" _Tyndale House Bulletin_ #5-6 pp 10-11; E.A. Wallis Budge 1934 _From Fetish to God in Ancient Egypt_ pg 40; A.H. Sayce 1884 _Fresh Light from the Ancient Monuments_ pg 67, 68; Shalom M. Paul & William G. Dever 1973 _Biblical Archaeology_ part 3 pg 252)

 
 

2012-02-17

2012-02-16 20:54PST (2012-02-16 23:54EST) (2012-02-17 04:54GMT) (2012-02-17 06:54Jerusalem)
Chase Purdy _Lakeland FL Ledger_
bill that would have given illegal aliens in-state tuition and fees rejected in Florida senate

2012-02-17 03:34PST (06:34EST) (11:34GMT) (13:34Jerusalem)
Zack Whittaker _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Did Google trick Apple's Safari into tracking users?

2012-02-17
David Steinberg _PJ Media_
The first tea partied nomination is a grand success so far

2012-02-17
Soeren Kern _PJ Media_
The rise and fall of Baltasar Garzon

2012-02-17
Paul Bedard _Washington DC Examiner_
19 reporters and media execs join Team Obummer

2012-02-17
Doug Jones
AAAS turns to the anti-science political dark side
Science is not enough: AAAS panel on political influence to be web-cast from Vancouver, BC, Canada

2012-02-17
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
Montana wheat values hit $1G for 2nd year
"Analysts have put Montana's 2011 crop values at $1.3G.   The numbers released late Thursday by the state bureau of the National Agricultural Statistics Service are buoyed by strong, lasting wheat prices, which kept values afloat despite a weather-plagued crop year...   The average 2011 market price for all wheat was $7.75 a bushel, up $1.47 from 2010.   Still, crop values were down from 2010's record $1.4G.   The difference is partly due to rough 2011 weather.   Record rainfall last spring kept farmers from planting much of anything in May.   Crops that farmers usually finish planting by Memorial Day were still 70% unplanted heading into June. The delay left many farmers short of growing days for the crop to mature before harvest."

2012-02-17
Charles S. Johnson _Billings MT Gazette_
US supremes put temporary block on Montana's century-old ban on independent election spending in name of corporations
"The Montana Supreme Court majority said Montana voters passed, by initiative, the Corrupt Practices Act in 1912 to combat the widespread political corruption in the state by the owners of copper mining companies, known as the Copper Kings.   The court majority said they had carved out a legal exception to Citizens United ruling."

2012-02-17
Alan Gomez _USA Today_/_Gannett_
Obummer is in the process of shutting down the 287(g) program of local co-operation in immigation law enforcement

2012-02-17
Mark J. Perry
Conference Board's leading economic indicators

2012-02-17
Mark J. Perry
documentary: FrackNation

2012-02-17
William L. Anderson
Stereotypes and inter-personal utliity comparisons
"he really has abandoned economics while claiming that he is analyzing things from an economic point of view...   at one time the man did real economic analysis.   Unfortunately, once he found that he could make a lot more money being a political operative, Krugman abandoned the fundamentals of economics such as the Law of Scarcity and the Law of Opportunity Cost and decided to push the view that governments via the printing press can do magic things and create wealth from green paper."

2012-02-17 (5772 Shebet 24)
Franco Ordonez _Jewish World Review_
Christian & Jewish clergy converged on Capitol Hill to testify that the Obummer admin is attempting to violate their religious freedoms
"Leaders from the Catholic, Jewish, Baptist and Lutheran faiths joined in opposition to a proposed federal mandate that would require church-affiliated employers to cover birth control in their health plans."

2012-02-17 (5772 Shebet 24)
Kristen Chick _Jewish World Review_
After surviving sectarian mob, Egyptian Christians have been expelled from village

2012-02-17 (5772 Shebet 24)
Eryn Brown _Jewish World Review_
Scary remote-controlled micro-chip may control release of medications
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"Facient solitudinem, et pacem appellant.   [They make an emptiness/desolation/wasteland & call it peace.]" --- Calgacus (quoted by Tacitus, quoted in William B. Williams 1995 _Future Perfect_ pg 119)

 
 

2012-02-18

2012-02-18
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
private real estate developer denies acess to cemetery near Staunton VA at former state hospital/ prison/ nursing home site
"this cemetery was, after all, a state maintained cemetery up until the time the state turned the property over to the Staunton Industrial Authority, thereby turning public property into private property...to include the head-stones and corpses in the ground, I suppose.   The property is now part of the Villages at Staunton...a mixed-use neighborhood; the first building being renovated is known as 'The Bindery', which holds residential condos."

2012-02-18
David Archibald
climate cycles will continue

2012-02-18
Anthony Watts & John R. Christy
Sierra snow-fall over last 130 years shows no trend or effect from CO₂

2012-02-18
_Fox_
illegal alien Saul Chavez arrested in 2008, killed while DUI in 2011, never reported to ICE

2012-02-18
Victor Davis Hanson _PJ Media_
leftists' new commandments

2012-02-18
Barry Rubin _PJ Media_
Manufacturing heresy: how the mildest Muslim liberalism is turned into a capital offense
Phillip Smyth: Sharia's global reach

2012-02-18
Walid Shoebat & Ben Barrack _PJ Media_
Sunni doctrine of Muruna takes taqiyya a step further

2012-02-18
Mark J. Perry
drill, drill, drill == jobs, jobs, jobs (graph)

2012-02-18
Mark J. Perry
inflation-adjusted manufacturing product per worker

2012-02-18
Rob Sanchez _Federal Observer_
pres. Obummer unpopular, but immigration issue has not yet begun to have its full impact
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"We can all tolerate a certain amount of discomfort on the way to something we really want, & that's fortunate, since the road to any goal will always have some rough stretches on it.   But don't allow things you dislike any permanent place in your goal...   While it can be a good stretch to occasionally try out activities you don't like, your strongest talents will only show themselves when you're doing what you want to do.   Far from being self-indulgent, putting your best efforts behind activities you enjoy is as smart as planting your crops in rich rathe than stony soil...   make a list of the 20 things you hate most -- then cut this list until it hurts." --- Barbara Sher & Barbara Smith 1994 _I Could Do Anything If I Only Knew What It Was_ pg 205

 
 

2012-02-19: National Engineering Week begins

2012-02-19
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Defining "Southern Unionists"... one part of what might end up a multi-part examination

2012-02-19
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
A photo of a Shenandoah valley Virginian in blue: Henry "Hiram" Meadows & Ardista D. Breeden

2012-02-19
David P. Goldman _PJ Media_
After they get the Catholic church they will come for the Jews

2012-02-19
Frank Crimi _Right Side News_
Obummer's new czar for illegal alien amnesty

2012-02-19
Josh Fischman _Chronicle of Higher Education_
re-engineering STEM education to turn out more unemployed grads

2012-02-19
Victor Davis Hanson _Fresno CA Bee_
In most regards, illegal immigration has proven as immoral as it is unlawful

2012-02-19
Tom Tancredo _Gulag Bound_
Why is John Boehner blocking immigration reform bill?

2012-02-19
Scott Pelley _CBS_
millions are trapped in long-term unemployment

2012-02-19
Mark J. Perry
renegade Aspen cabbie back in business... sort of

2012-02-19
Mark J. Perry
economics of kidney transplants

2012-02-19
Mark J. Perry
employee compensation in Red China sloowly moving toward parity with the 1st world

2012-02-19
_Freedom Fighter USA_
the pay-roll tax (FICA) reduction does no go far enough; repeal the Socialist Insecurity Abomination
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"[N]o permanent impact has ever been accomplished in quality control without [the] understanding & nurture of top management." --- W. Edwards Deming 1972-07-?? "Report to Management" _Quality Progress_ pg 2 (quoted in Marshall Sishkin & Kenneth J. Kiser 1992 _Total Quality Management_ pg 22)

 
 

2012-02-20

2012-02-20
Anthony Watts
Warmist confessed
statement from Heartland Institute
dishonest warmist's resignation from National Center for Science Education accepted
Chris Horner: Fake, it's what warmists do
Atlantic's McArdle acknowledges web loggers who recognized warmist as source of fake and stolen docs
Willis Eschenbach: open letter to Linda Gundersen and the American GeoPhysical Union "scientific integrity" task-force
Rand Simberg: PJ Media: Can't hide this decline
investigating memo authorship
Christopher Monckton: why the perps should be prosecuted for fraud
warmist may also have violated CA's anti-cyber-impersonation statute
e-mail messages warmist used for phishing have been released
guilty warmist has asked for a leave from Pacific Institute
American Geophysical Union: warmist's transgressions cannot be condoned

2012-02-20
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
Jennifer Wedel has started a web page
 
See the article/TV news report, and her web page, The Real Unemployed.   Good for her!
 
I would add a couple of points: At least for people in the tech area, the real issue is UNDERemployment, not UNemployment.   As Gene Nelson put it so succinctly many years ago (I'll modify it a little), the former computer security engineer now working as a security guard counts in government data as employment [a fully employed security guard], but clearly the issue is under-employment -- working in a job unrelated to one's training -- not unemployment.   Due to the age aspect of the engineer and programmer job market, many former techies are squeezed out of the field, as early as their mid-30s.
 
In addition, there are the independent contractors, who are quite numerous in the software field.   They often find that contracts are harder to come by, and pay less, than in the past.
 
Norm
Wedel video

2012-02-20
Bryan Preston _PJ Media_
rising food prices (graphs)

2012-02-20
Matt Cover _Cybercast News Service_
Gallup poll pegs unemployment at 9% for February

2012-02-20
David Wheeler _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Sidney Fells and associates developed system to turn hand-gestures (and pedal) into song

2012-02-20
_WKRC_
Butler county Ohio and other locales being dumped from 287(g) program by Obummer admin

2012-02-20
William L. Anderson
spend and pretend
"The eternal down-turn continues and no real recovery is in sight, yet the advice from Paul Krugman always is the same: borrow, spend, pretend.   Pretend what? Pretend that borrowing and essentially printing new dollars is the same thing as actually having a productive, prosperous economy.   Print money and get rich!   The Keynesian view of the economy is pretty simple.   Factors of production are homogeneous, production and consumption are not related except to say that the purpose of consumption is to clear the shelves so that producers can make new goods to put on the shelves.   The sole purpose of a 'job' is to put income in the hands of workers so that they can spend and in order to make way for new production.   IOW, it is a model-driven, mechanistic view of economics in which human action is not purposeful, but rather robotic."

2012-03-20
Mark J. Perry
sex differences in AP subject exams

2012-03-20
Mark J. Perry
comparing Carter and Obama approval/disapproval ratings at this point in campaign season
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"While long term potentiation (LTP) was named for a version that lasted many days in the hippocampus, the process in the neo-cortex seems to last only for about 5 minutes (see Atsushi Iriki, Constantine Pavlides, Asaf Keller & Hiroshi Asanuma 1991 "Long-Term Potentiation of Thalamic Input to the Motor Cortex..." _Journal of NeuroPhysiology_ vol 65 pp 1435-1441), placing LTP squarely in the camp of short term memory process.   It may, of course, have lingering components that provide the scaffolding for a more permanent change in synaptic strengths via anatomical changes in the number & contact area of boutons." --- William H. Calvin 1996 _How Brains Think_ pg 175 note to pg 109

 
 

2012-02-21

2012-02-21
_PJ Media_
Obummer's injustice department's leftist hiring

2012-02-21
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
predators and weath killed about 22,900 sheep and lambs in 2011
"In 2011, sheep ranchers lost 22,900 animals to bad weather and coyotes, according the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service.   NASS released the numbers late last week.   Total deaths were 48K, a $7M loss, which includes deaths by other predators and nonpredator-related deaths from illness and infection.   The number of animals was the same as the previous year's, but the cash loss was 38 percent higher, reflecting the record high prices for lambs and wool in 2011.   Weather killed 13,100 animals...   Last year's winter was still full strength in March...   Coyotes were the other big killer.   The predators claimed 9,800 animals, a cash loss of $1.4M.   The number of sheep and lambs coyotes killed actually decreased by 1,900 from the previous year, according to NASS.   Sheep are easy targets for predators.   Even eagles kill lambs.   Losses to all predators totaled 13,600."

2012-02-21
Richard Fernandez _PJ Media_
Leftists are striving to bring down the American Dream

2012-02-21
Cain Nunns _Global Post_
Hollywood is bending to the will of Red Chinese ruling thugs

2012-02-21
David North _Center for Immigration Studies_
bursts of dubious creativity in immigant investor (EB-5) visa program

2012-02-21
Mark J. Perry
natural gas prices

2012-02-21
Mark J. Perry
BMW in the USA

2012-02-21 (5772 Shebet 28)
Fred Weir _Jewish World Review_
Fearing the West, Putin pledges biggest military build-up since 1991

2012-02-21 (5772 Shebet 28)
Menachem Wecker _Jewish World Review_
How to go to medical school "for free"
"[Out of state] students at public schools -- the subset with the highest tuition costs, according to the report -- will pay about $188K over a 4-year period, on average, not including room and board...   Primary care doctors earn an average annual salary of $186,582, according to a a study in Health Affairs...   EP, a third-year medical student at UVA, has her tuition and fees waived as part of the National Institutes of Health's Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP), which also pays stipends to 933 budding researchers in joint M.D.-Ph.D. programs at 45 institutions.   EP, who had been torn between pursuing a research career and an M.D., says she was 'ecstatic' to learn of the combined program.   But she stresses that the 7- or 8-year program isn't really a free M.D., and students who treat it that way might be getting free classes but, for the doctoral half of the program, are 'essentially losing 4 years of doctor's salary'."

2012-02-21 (5772 Shebet 28)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Academic hypocrisy
"If any business operated this way, selling customers something that was very costly in time and money, and which the sellers knew in advance was almost certain to disappoint their expectations, academics would be bursting with indignation -- and demanding full disclosure to the customers, if not criminal prosecutions.   But the Chronicle of Higher Education reports 'faculty resistance' to collecting and publishing information on what happens to a university's... Ph.D.s after they leave the ivy-covered walls with high hopes and low prospects...   For people not familiar with academia, a tenure-track appointment does not mean that the appointee has tenure, but only that the job is one where a tenure decision will have to be made at some point under the 'up or out system'.   At leading universities, far more are put out than move up.   There are also faculty appointments that are strictly for the time being -- lecturers, adjunct professors or visiting professors.   Half the 2010 Ph.D.s from Duke University and the University of Pennsylvania have these kinds of appointments, which essentially lead nowhere.   They are sometimes called 'gypsy faculty'.   Finally, there are Ph.D.s who are on post-doctoral fellowships, often at the expense of the [tax-victims].   They are paid to continue on campus, essentially as students, after getting their doctorates.   More than one-fourth of the 2010 Ph.D.s from Rutgers, Johns Hopkins and Harvard are in this category...   But apparently many academics are too busy pursuing moral crusades in society at large to look into such things on their own ivy-covered campuses."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"When our hands are empty, what will decide the fight is what's inside our minds." --- Chuck Norris 1996 _The Secret Power Within_ pg 17

 
 

2012-02-22

2012-02-22
jgo
17% rejection rate for H-1B applications is extremely low
If sponsors want to claim H-1B recipients are "best" or "brightest", or that they have knowledge or skills not otherwise available in the USA, then they'd better be restricted to those with intelligence, knowledge and skills not widely available in the USA.   But, of course, the immigration lawyers and executives who use and abuse these visas (and their lobbyists) actually want them for cheap, pliant foreign labor with flexible/questionable ethics, so they want no limits and no minimal standards.

2012-02-22
Alec Rawls
omitted variable fraud: vast evidence for solar activity driving climate rates one oblique sentence in AR5

2012-02-22
Jason Kuruvilla & Joshua Lamont _DoL ETA_
US DoL has wasted about $183M on ill-conceived "technical skills training" while hundreds of thousands of bright, knowledgeable, industrious, creative US STEM workers remain unemployed and under-employed
Coloradoan

2012-02-22
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Abraham Lincoln is hunting vampires, and a Virginia Confederate goes to Mars

2012-02-22
Anthony Watts
the electric "brick"
"If the battery is ever totally discharged, the owner is left with what Tesla describes as a 'brick': a completely immobile vehicle that cannot be started or even pushed down the street."

2012-02-22
Carly Harrington _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
Junk-bots work-shop
"Founded by Eric Johnson, Mike Neel and Byron Williamson... Participants will have opportunities to learn about different technologies from building robots and web-sites to developing video games and mobile apps..."

2012-02-22
Robert M. Goldberg _American Spectator_
Obummer and Israel: The silence of "friends"
"Obummer has decided to cut funding for the Jewish state's missile defense system at the same time he wants to restore funding to UNESCO.   (Israel's best friends will remember that the President was forced to cut support to the traditional anti-Israel agency by federal law because the organization recognized the Palestinian Authority as a state.)"

2012-02-22
Laura Diamond _Atlanta GA Journal Constitution_
GA senate committee approves bill barring admission of some illegal aliens to state colleges and univesities

2012-02-22
William L. Anderson
Higgs vs. Krugman

2012-02-22
Mark J. Perry
architect billings and builder new project queries indices recovering

2012-02-22
Phyllis Schlafly _Eagle Forum_
Obummer's war on religious liberty
Town Hall

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Paul Richter & Edmund Sanders _Jewish World Review_
USA and Israel are sending mixed messages regarding Iran's threats

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Warren Richey _Jewish World Review_
Supremes to rule again on affirmative action in university admissions

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
George Friedman _Jewish World Review_
The state of the world: a frame-work
"On 1991 Dec. 25, an epoch ended...   for the first time in almost 500 years no European power was a global power, meaning no European state integrated economic, military and political power on a global scale.   What began in 1492 with Europe smashing its way into the world and creating a global imperial system had ended.   For 5 centuries, one European power or another had dominated the world, whether Portugal, Spain, France, England or the Soviet Union.   Even the lesser European powers at the time had some degree of global influence."

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Victoria Shanta Retelny _Jewish World Review_
moderate ethanol consumption has benefits
"While there are positive health effects documented with moderate alcohol intake, drinking too much clearly wipes away any potential benefits.   Consider alcohol a double-edged sword with the shiny side holding the promise of improved health and the lackluster side leading to health risks."

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Philip Moeller _Jewish World Review_
saving, investment, charity...
US News & World Report
Bidness Insider

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Menachem Wecker _Jewish World Review_
In today's tough job market, law school grads (like STEM workers) are under-employed
"Among the alumni ranks of the University of Texas -- Austin's School of Law are cartoonists, service dog trainers, and wind farm employees, which might explain why it has a Non-Practicing Advisory Council within its alumni association."

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Math matters
"If one manages to graduate from high school without the rudiments of algebra, geometry and trigonometry, there are certain relatively high-paying careers probably off-limits for life -- such as careers in architecture, chemistry, computer programming, engineering, medicine and certain technical fields.   For example, one might meet all of the physical requirements to be a fighter pilot, but he's grounded if he doesn't have enough math to understand physics, aerodynamics and navigation.   Mathematical ability helps provide the disciplined structure that helps people to think, speak and write more clearly.   In general, mathematics is an excellent foundation and pre-requisite for study in all areas of science and engineering...   only 7% of U.S. students perform at the advanced level in math.   45% of the students in Shanghai are advanced in math, compared with 20% in South Korea and Switzerland and 15% of students in Japan, Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Canada.   Hanushek and Peterson find one bright spot among our young people.   That's Asian-American students, 52% of whom perform at the proficient level or higher.   Among white students, only 42% perform math at a proficient level.   The math performance of black and Hispanic students is a disaster, with only 11% and 15%, respectively, performing math at the proficient level or higher.   The National Center for Education Statistics revealed some of the results of American innumeracy.   Among advanced degrees in engineering awarded at U.S. universities during the 2007-08 academic year, 28% went to whites; 2% went to blacks; 2% went to Hispanics; and 61% went to foreigners.   Of the advanced degrees in mathematics, 40% went to whites; 2% went to blacks; 5% went to Hispanics; and 50% went to foreigners...   The same message of hard work and discipline applies to all students, but someone must demand it."

2012-02-22 (5772 Shebet 29)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
The "fairness" fraud
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"[A] region of the brain tucked behind the temporal lobes, the hippocampus, is critical for long-term memory storage in humans & other mammals...   Memories... are often classified by psychologists into 2 types, declarative & procedural.   The former are memories of facts or events, whereas the latter are retained motor skills or reoutines.   Declarative memories cannot be permanently stored in patients with hippocampal lesions.   Procedural memories, by contrast, can be retained in such patients, & there is evidence that the cerebellum participates in the learning & retention of procedural motor skills... normal individuals are often unaware of the details of a learned skill." --- John E. Dowling 1998 _Creating Mind_ pp 151-152

 
 

2012-02-23

2012-02-23 05:30PST (08:30EST) (13:30GMT) (15:30 Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 345,216 in the week ending February 18, a decrease of 19,888 from the previous week.   There were 380,985 initial claims in the comparable week in 2011.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.2% during the week ending February 11, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week's unrevised rate.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,996,051, an increase of 11,166 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.7% and the volume was 4,587,740.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending February 4 was 7,502,791, a decrease of 178,619 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MD, MA, MI, MO, NV, NJ, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, WV, and WI during the week ending February4.   States reported 2,919,330 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending February 4, a decrease of 83,145 from the prior week.   There were 3,685,361 claimants in the comparable week in 2011.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" (the divisor) changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02;
to 125,807,389 beginning 2011-07-02;
to 126,188,733 beginning 2011-10-01;
to 126,579,970 beginning 2012-01-01.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2012-02-23
Benny Peiser
economic sanctions against "carbon tax"

2012-02-23
Luke S. Browne _Global Post_
over 50 killed, 15 injured today in terrorist attacks in Iraq

2012-02-23
Christopher Orlet _American Spectator_
Girls can practice any profession these days, but what about boys?

2012-02-23
Ross Kaminsky _American Spectator_
Obummer's anti-investment tax hike

2012-02-23
Heather M. Whitney _Chronicle of Higher Education_
peer review goes public with PaperCritic

2012-02-23
Lincoln Mullen _Chronicle of Higher Education_
philosophy professor, John MacFarlane, developed PanDoc for moving among apps
John MacFarlane diagram of conversions

2012-02-23
Lorna Thackeray _Billings MT Gazette_
homeless count increased
"Billings' homeless population continues to grow, at least according to preliminary results of the Jan. 26 Point-In-Time survey of the city's most vulnerable population.   This year, 618 people without a permanent address were counted.   In January 2011, the number was 468.   These initial figures include only people likely to fall under the [unconstitutional] U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Affairs definition of homeless, said Lynda Woods, homeless liaison for the city of Billings.   The Billings results were sent to the state Department of Public Health and Human Services for inclusion in its annual Montana Housing Status survey.   That survey is used to allocate millions of dollars in HUD assistance."

2012-02-23
Rebecca Cusey _PJ Media_
Runaway Slave: are blacks enslaved by the left?
"Around 200 people gathered in a DC theater last night to watch the Washington premiere of 'Runaway Slave', a documentary by African-American Tea Party activist, reverend C.L. Bryant, that encourages the black community to rethink its 95$ voting rate for the Democratic Party.   Drawing on the history and language of slavery, the film argues that the Democratic party and the welfare state are the new version of the slave-holding plantation, keeping black people mentally enslaved.   In the opening of the documentary, Bryant visits dueling Washington, DC, rallies.   At the Lincoln Memorial, Glenn Beck leads the 'Restoring Honor' rally while the reverend Al Sharpton leads the 'Reclaim the Dream' rally in an African-American section of the city. 'Why aren't these Americans with the others?', Bryant asks. 'Why are we divided along racial lines?'   He then sets out to talk to black conservative leaders and everyday African-Americans on the street.   He interviews high-profile black conservatives such as Hoover Institute scholar Thomas Sowell, one-time presidential candidate Herman Cain, U.S. representative Allen West (R-FL) and pundit Star Parker."

2012-02-23
Jack Dunphy _PJ Media_
LAPD twisted impound policy to favor illegal aliens

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
socialism illustrated

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
months after the government attack on Gibson Guitars, no evidence of wrong-doing has surfaced

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
What ND knows that CA does not: the energy boom

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
crude oil vs. retail gasoline prices

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
world trade and industrial output

2012-02-23
Mark J. Perry
UK learns Laffer curve lesson

2012-02-23 (5772 Shebet 30)
Eric Sliva _Jewish World Review_
Putin says installing tens of thousands of surveillance cameras at over 90K polling sites will "guarantee democracy". Yah, sure

2012-02-23 (5772 Shebet 30)
Amina Khan _Jewish World Review_
How humans communicate: nature vs. nurture
"About 7K languages are spoken today, each with a unique blend of sounds, words and structure.   Some languages place the verb near the beginning of a sentence, while others stick it at the end.   Some have genitives (like the possessive in 'Mary's dog'); others do not.   For decades, linguists have studied the diverse structures of languages with the idea that there are underlying principles all languages follow -- principles that many presumed were programmed into our brains...   Gray's team built 4 family trees.   One was based on 82 Indo-European languages (including Spanish, English and Hindi), another was based on 400 Austronesian (including Indonesian and Hawaiian), a third analyzed 34 Uto-Aztecan (including Hopi and Yaqui) and a fourth included 73 Bantu (as well as two Bantoid) languages."

2012-02-23 (5772 Shebet 30)
Menachem Wecker _Jewish World Review_
Still can't get a job with that MBA? Try journalism
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"In 1881 Austria-Hungary concluded an alliance with prince Milan of Serbia that made her the protector of the principality.   Since 1879 she had also occupied Bosnia & Herzegovina.   At the same time Russian officers organized the gov't & administration of Bulgaria.   Bismarck tried in vain to induce Russia & Austria-Hungary to come to a permanent agreement on a division of the Balkans into spheres of interest...   In 1883 Germany acceded to a friendship & alliance treaty of Austria-Hungary & Rumania.   This treaty committed the 2 great powers to come to the assistance of Rumania if she were attacked by Russia, while Rumania was to come to the assistance of Austria-Hungary if Russian aggression were directed against neighboring provinces of the Habsburg empire." --- Hajo Holborn 1969 _An History of Modern Germany 1840-1945_ pp 242-243

 
 

2012-02-24

2012-02-24
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
an age-old problem (pun intended)
 
Nice guest piece at IEEE but what is really important is the reader comments.   Almost all of them agree with the author, as do I, that the employer-claimed "engineer shortage" is phony, and that the only "shortage" is one of cheap labor, which is provided by the H-1Bs.
 
HOWEVER: Though many of the reader comments note that cheap = young, many other readers do not.   They don't realize that the biggest salary savings comes from the fact that the H-1Bs are usually young.
 
Furthermore, one of the few dissenters, a current H-1B himself, writes:
 
Guest
 
I have not read all of the posts, but I would like to offer a slightly different perspective on the issue.   What companies are looking for are passionate, committed workers who are unmatched experts in their field and very big contributors to the company's success.   I do apologize if I sound a bit harsh.   I am a foreigner working in the US on an H1b as a scientist in a biotech company.   I graduated with a phd in ece 2.5 yr ago from uiuc.   I am really knowledgeable and passionate about the field I work in and read about new technologies for about an hour every day.   I work about 10-12 hr days and sometimes on saturdays.   In the past 2.5 years I have been promoted three times with ~15% salary increase each time.   This may sound anecdotal, but basically all of my colleagues from graduate school are in a similar situation.
 
He's a recent graduate, 2.5 years ago!   Yes, he probably is paid well relative to recent grads, but he still is cheaper than the older engineers.   He doesn't understand that.
 
Unfortunately, a lot of the critics of the H-1B program don't understand that either.   I've been saying this for ages (pun intended again), and yet still I have to keep reminding the critics: H-1B is fundamentally about AGE.   Even though some readers may tire of hearing it, it's such a little-known fact even among critics that I have no choice but to keep bringing it up.
 
Another H-1B writes:
 
I am in the US on an H1-B (I'm Canadian).   I was hired by a large US company at a good salary because they couldn't find anybody who had my combination of skills (power systems plus another skill set).   US universities turn out very few power systems engineers because it's not a sexy area in EE.   At least in the company I work for, I'm payed well, treated well so I don't see any merit to the comments about H1-Bs being poorly payed 'indentured servants'.
 
Since I joined the company I've moved into a management position and in the last 2 years I had to go out looking for candidates with similar skills.   Out of the 50+ resumes I received while looking in 2010-2011, I think only 2 were US citizens.   If we could have found a decent American applicant we would have hired them because it's a pain and very expensive dealing with H1-Bs and green cards (10-15K and lots of time and paperwork).
 
[N.B. Seymour Cray started as a power system engineer.]
 
What this guy doesn't understand is that HR filters out the CVs for the older workers, so he, as a manager, never sees them, and mistakenly concludes that there just aren't any Americans available.   In other words, he wrongly concludes there is a shortAGE (sorry, last pun).
 
Norm
---30---

2012-02-23 19:20PST (2012-02-23 22:20EST) (2012-02-24 03:20GMT) (2012-02-24 05:20Jerusalem)
_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
gallery of beautiful 3D CAD/CAE images and photos behind a few of USA's engineering feats

2012-02-24 00:55PST (03:55EST) (08:55GMT) (10:55Jerusalem)
Kenric Ward _SunShine State News_
state representative Will Snyder says Obummer has signalled surrender on illegal immigration

2012-02-24 04:10PST (07:10EST) (12:10GMT) (14:10Jerusalem)
_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
gallery: Smithsonian using 3D scanners and prototypers to copy sculptures, beginning with one of Thomas Jefferson

2012-02-24
Phyllis Chesler _PJ Media_
"Act of Valor" a chance for some excellent vicarious heroism

2012-02-24 07:57PST (10:57EST) (15:57GMT) (17:57Jerusalem)
Ruth Mantell _MarketWatch_
UMich consumer sentiment index rose from 75 in late January to 75.3 in late February
St. Louis Fed

2012-02-24 09:43PST (12:43EST) (17:43GMT) (19:43Jerusalem)
Jack Wallen _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
10 signs you aren't cut out for STEM work

2012-02-24 09:56PST (12:56EST) (17:56GMT) (19:56Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
40 and 50 and 60 and 70 year olds don't want to retire
"57% plan to keep working after retiring from their current job...   43% of the employers surveyed said they plan to hire workers age 50 or older this year, up slightly from the 41% who said they hired workers 50 or older in 2011."
contact Roger Harris

2012-02-24
Beryl Lieff Benderly _AAAS Science_
Obummer earned Pinocchio for comments to Mrs. Wedel
Wedel video

2012-02-24
Howard Fischer _East Valley AZ Tribune_
governor Jan Brewer turned down Charles Schumer's invitation to testify to senate immigration sub-committee
"'This looks like a publicity stunt for senator Schumer.', he said.   'Congressional inaction by the likes of senator Schumer is exactly the reason SB1070 and other laws like it were necessary in the first place.', Benson said.   'They've had years to deal with this issue.   They haven't.'...   In_God_We_Trust posted: 'There is no more reason to talk with a congress or president that refuses to protect our borders or enforce our immigration laws.'"

2012-02-24
Mark J. Perry
illustration of how electric cars work

2012-02-24
William L. Anderson
more economic illiteracy from the NYT

2012-02-24
Jack Sullivan
Frank Hume: Rebel Spy and Federal City Success
 
Proposed Bills 2012

2012-02-24

DJIA	12,982.95
S&P 500(SPX)	1,365.74
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,963.75
Nikkei	9,647.38
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	1.98
crude oil(CLJ2)	$109.77/barrel
natgas(NGH12)	$2.55/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RBH2)	$3.15/gal
heatingoil(HOH2)	$3.32/gal
gold(GCJ2)	$1,776.40/ounce
silver(S1H2)	$35.34/ounce
platinum(PLJ2)	$1,715.10/ounce
palladium(PAH2)	$710.75/ounce
copper(HGH2)	0.24125/ounce
soybeans	$12.8675/bushel
maize	$6.44/bushel
wheat	$6.4125/bushel
dollarindex (DXY)	78.341
yenperdollar (USDYEN)	109.06
dollarspereuro (EURUSD)	$1.3483
dollarsperpound (GBPUSD)	$1.5875
swissfrancsperdollar (USDCHF)	0.8943
indianrupeesperdollar (USDINR)	49.0155
mexicanpesosperdollar (USDMXN)	12.9015
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	692.52

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

"Yet anti-Semitism was only part of his racism...   The use of terror against enemies of the party & the regime was another means of barbarization, but even terror & violence were not merely instruments for acquiring power.   Hitler believed in their permanent value.   People do not have a natural herd instinct, he said, if left alone, they would rather fight among themselves.   Only the fear of an authority commanding & using force can create a community.   About the forms in which terror should be used, he probably had not thought too much in Vienna.   He learned much about terror from the bolshevik revolution." --- Hajo Holborn 1969 _An History of Modern Germany 1840-1945_ pp 715-716

 
 

2012-02-25

2012-02-25
Anthony Watts
warmists have declared war against science and liberty
Deceitful tactics

2012-02-25
Alan Caruba
Obummer's energy lies at U of Miami

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
manufacturing renaissance

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
debt and delinquency: government vs. private

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
Asia is largest consumer of petroleum

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
inflation-adjusted price of gasoline from 1919 to 2013

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
Are petroleum exports good or bad for the USA?

2012-02-25
Mark J. Perry
crude oil prices rising while natural gas prices are returning to 2001 levels
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"Veterans of VietNam's high-intensity warfare were found to have permanently elevated brain levels of adrenalin...   The neuro-chemical change correlated with their PTSD symptoms of hyper-vigilance & hair-trigger emotional responses.   Other vets showed elevated levels of endorphins, the newly discovered brain messenger that mimics the narcotic effects of morphine.   That change was believed by some neuro-scientists to explain the persistent emotional numbing many American soldiers experienced..." --- Flo Conway & Jim Siegelman 1995 _Snapping_ pg 207

 
 

2012-02-26

2012-02-26
David M.W. Evans
Who are you going to believe -- the government climate "scientists" or the data?

2012-02-26
Willis Eschenbach
Rio+20 meets Agenda 21

2012-02-26
Candice M. Giove _NY Post_
in 1 hour and for $260 people can get phony green cards, socialist insecurity numbers, and driver licenses

2012-02-26
Tom Blumer _PJ Media_
Bush-Clinton-Shrub-Obummer economic depression contines with dire consequences
Obummervilles sprouting up across the USA

2012-02-26
Goldie Blumenstyk _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Robert W. Mendenhall, president of on-line university, focuses on knowledge rather than class-hours

2012-02-26
Mark J. Perry
spending on energy

2012-02-26
Mark J. Perry
commercial debt delinquency and write-off rates

2012-02-26
Mark J. Perry
government extortion rates on businesses are higher in USA than OECD
Economist

2012-02-26
Mark J. Perry
inflation-adjusted newspaper ad revenues at 60-year low
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"In 1226, the year after they were expelled from Hungary, Conrad of Mazovia in northern Poland begged the knights to enter his domain for a brief spell to help him subdue his pagans, & in gratitude for their assistance, he wrote some unfortunate letters that could be interpreted as an invitation to stay permanently & also as a grant of land on which they could build a head-quarters from which to Christianize territories that he, Conrad, did not own. Hermann von Salza had brought his 1st German knights to Poland in 1226, with the presumed intention of staying a year or 2.   Nearly 200 years later they owned most of the Baltic coast, including the lands of the Latvians & Estonians, & showed every intention of soon controlling Lithuania, Poland & much of Russia.   Superior in military might, managerial ability & commerce, they excelled in diplomatic relations with the rest of Europe -- especially with the papacy -- & seemed destined to rule eastern Europe." --- James A. Michener 1983 _Poland_ pp 66-67

 
 

2012-02-27

2012-02-27
Liz Klimas _The Blaze_
wipe your google history... frequently; Google is evil

2012-02-27 00:51PST (03:51EST) (08:51GMT) (10:51Jerusalem)
Meena Krishnamsetty _MarketWatch_
Evil George Soros owns $168M of stock in evil Google, dumps oil and gas exploration stocks in efforts to harm USA and decrease liberty in the world

2012-02-27 04:52PST (07:52EST) (12:52GMT) (14:52Jerusalem)
Gina Smith _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
in a case of judge shopping, federal court in SF rules you can't be forced to decrypt without a warrant
"Last week in San Francisco, a federal court for the first time ruled that the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution -- the right to not self-incriminate -- protects against 'forced decryption'.   The judge, from the 11th Circuit in San Francisco, ruled that a Florida court violated a defendant's rights when its Grand Jury gave him the choice to either reveal his TrueCrypt password or go to jail.   The privacy watchdog group Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called this 'a major victory for constitutional rights in the digital age'.   You can read the full ruling on the case -- called United States v. Doe."

2012-02-27
Anthony Watts
increased supply, lower prices drove shift to natural gas

2012-02-27
Wiley-Blackwell
9th to 16th century Arabic meteorologists

2012-02-27
_Chronicle of Higher Education_
National Association of College Stores and Amazon.com have settled a price/advertising dispute

2012-02-27
Bridget Johnson _PJ Media_
approve Keystone XL

2012-02-27
_Agence France-Presse_
Chinese find hole in censorship, post on Obummer's google+ site about government abuses
"'We are not barbaric people, we are just suppressed', one netizen wrote, while others called on the US president to 'come and liberate China'."

2012-02-27
David Catron _American Spectator_
Santorum and the silence of the shams regarding Obummercare

2012-02-27
Reyes Mata iii _Las Cruces NM Sun-News_/_El Paso TX Times_
Horses deployed to deter illegal immigration along the borders
"'Before it was a lot of families, a lot of women, lots of children.   Now it's more young men, anywhere from 18 to 30 or 35 years of age usually coming through now.', he said.   'With family groups, they knew they were caught, they did everything they were told.   There were no problems at all.   Now there is a lot more risk.   They do tend to fight you, resist your apprehending them.'"

2012-02-27
William L. Anderson
inflation will not save the European economy

2012-02-27
Mark J. Perry
what if other transactions, like housing, were forbidden as organ donations are?

2012-02-27
Mark J. Perry
petroleum and natural gas firms respond to price signals

2012-02-27 (5772 Adar 04)
Lisa M. Krieger _Jewish World Review_
blood-test for genetic defects may be abused
"4.5M U.S. births a year, of which an estimated 750K are 'high risk', due to age or family history.   The current crop of tests only seeks major abnormalities on 3 chromosomes: 13, 18 and 21.   They can also tell whether a fetus is a boy or girl...   For women with insurance coverage, Verinata said it would provide documentation to support a claim.   But in cases where the claim is denied, or if a woman is uninsured, it will negotiate a discount, it said.   It accurately detected all 89 cases of Down syndrome in 532 maternal blood samples.   It also detected 35 of 36 cases of Edwards syndrome and 11 of 14 cases of Patau syndrome -- 2 far more devastating chromosomal abnormalities."

2012-02-27 (5772 Adar 04)
Dan Hinkel _Jewish World Review_
Louis Farrakhan remains over the edge

2012-02-27 (5772 Adar 04)
Rick Newman _Jewish World Review_
3 up-sides to lousy government
"The growing disconnect between Capitol Hill and Main Street may even signal the start of a turnaround in Americans' over-dependence on the federal bureaucracy."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"Neither National Socialism nor Bolshevism has ever proclaimed a new form of gov't or asserted that its goals were reached with the seizure of power & the control of the state machinery.   Their idea of domination was something that no state & no mere apparatus of violence can ever achieve, but only a movement that is constantly kept in motion: namely, the permanent domination of each single individual in each & every sphere of life.   The seizure of power through the means of violence is never an end in itself but only the means to an end, & the seizure of power in any given country is only a welcome transitory stage but never the end of the movement.   the practical goal of the movement is to organize as many people as possible within its frame-work & to set & keep them in motion; a political goal that would constitute the end of the movement simply does not exist." --- Hannah Arendt 1950 Summer & 1966 June _The Origins of Totalitarianism_ pg 326

 
 

2012-02-28

2012-02-28
Donna Healy _Billings MT Gazette_
Chicks in Science robotics team
"The team, made up of high school students from the Billings Career Center's Engineering Club, already captured the most prestigious prize at the Montana robotics tournament in Bozeman in early February."

2012-02-28
Rob Taylor _PJ Media_
Importing violence: immigration, crime and why we need assimilation

2012-02-28 07:30PST (10:30EST) (15:30GMT) (17:30Jerusalem)
Anne d'Innocenzio _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_Scripps_/_AP_
Conference Board's consumer confidence index up for February
Ruth Mantell: MarketWatch
"Those stating jobs are 'plentiful' increased from 6.2% to 6.6%, while those saying jobs are 'hard to get' decreased from 43.3% to 38.7%."

2012-02-28 10:30PST (13:30EST) (18:30GMT) (20:30Jerusalem)
John Williams _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Off-shoring and bringing the jobs back
"Since Y2K, in fact, there has been a virtual torrent of IT jobs flowing out of the U.S.A. to over-seas locations, most notably India and [Red China].   While the numbers vary, it's estimated that nearly one million formerly U.S. IT jobs have moved or will soon move over seas, with an estimated 3.3M service sector jobs at risk by 2015.   The primary drivers were...cost...   Back in the early 2000s, for example, you could hire an India-based IT contractor for under $20/hr., compared to $100/hr. or more in the U.S.A."

2012-02-28
Myra Adams _PJ Media_
representative Allen West

2012-02-28
Bridget Johnson _PJ Media_
Obummer's double back flip on Keystone XL pipe-line

2012-02-28
N.M. Guariglia _PJ Media_
What American exceptionalism means: rights, privileges, and the US constitution vs. oath-breakers

2012-02-28
William L. Anderson
North Korean government counterfeiting of US currency is right in line with what Keynesians want

2012-02-28
Mark J. Perry
bank average returns on assets back to 2006 levels

2012-02-28
Mark J. Perry
housing prices in ND vs. USA

2012-02-28
Mark J. Perry
SC is #1 state for auto exports

2012-02-28 (5772 Adar 05)
Elliot B. Gertel _Jewish World Review_
Move over intact Christian families, TV has decided that Orthodox Jews are ripe for mockery

2012-02-28 (5772 Adar 05)
Frank J. Gaffney ii _Jewish World Review_
Shariah's threat to civil rights

2012-02-28 (5772 Adar 05)
Pete Spotts _Jewish World Review_
Could free-floating nomad planets carry seeds of life through the universe?

2012-02-28 (5772 Adar 05)
Pete Spotts _Jewish World Review_
pettiness and mud-slinging in politics
"What could they possibly have been thinking about, in the first place, when they agreed to a format based on short sound bites for dealing with major complex issues, and with media journalists -- 90% of them Democrats -- picking the topics?...   Taking advantage of the public's lack of knowledge is something that Barack Obama already does very effectively in his political propaganda.   But is that something the Republicans want to imitate?...   Discussions of particular issues, one by one, often miss the larger point that goes beyond the issue at hand -- namely, this administration's steady movement toward arbitrary government that circumvents the restrictions of the Constitution."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"On the best teams, different individuals provide occasional leadership, taking charge in areas where they have particular strengths.   No one is the permanent leader, because that person would then cease to be a peer & the team interaction would begin to break down.   The structure of a team is a network, not a hierarchy." --- Tom de Marco & Timothy Lister 1999 _Peopleware_ pg 155

 
 

2012-02-29

2012-02-29
Kathy Kristof _CBS_
Inflation is higher than the government index claims
"Everyday prices are up some 8% over the past year, according to the American Institute for Economic Research...   AIER focuses on Americans' typical daily purchases, such as food, gasoline, child care, prescription drugs, phone and television service, and other household products...   Over the past year, the EPI is up just over 8%, according to the economics group.   The biggest factor: Motor fuel and transportation costs are up 21.06% from year-ago levels.   The cost of food, prescription drugs, and tobacco also have increased faster than the government's inflation measure, rising 3.56%, 4.21%, and 3.4%, respectively.   On the bright side, prices of household fuel (natural gas and electricity) and supplies have increased only 2.74%; recreation and personal care products are up less than 1%; and telephone or Internet services are down 0.66%.   Admittedly, the purchases that the EPI tracks make up slightly less than 40% of the average household budget.   But Steven Cunningham, research and education director at AIER, says these items are what contribute to the 'sticker shock at the gasoline pump and the supermarket check-out line'."

2012-02-29
Anthony Watts
GISS concedes significant role of sun in climate

2012-02-29
Aaron Goldstein _American Spectator_
A new leaf for North Korea?

2012-02-29
Peter Ferrara _American Spectator_
Obummer lost his first debate of 2012 regarding energy

2012-02-29 07:39PST (10:39EST) (15:39GMT) (17:39Jerusalem)
Toni Bowers _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Extroverts and introverts working together

2012-02-29
Willis Eschenbach
Argo part 3

2012-02-29
Jim Goodridge
The gas of life

2012-02-29
Paul Walter _News with Views_
Will America survive?

2012-02-29
Edwin Mora _Cybercast News Service_
77% of illegal aliens caught near borders were not prosecuted
"About 77% of the 327,577 illegal aliens caught along the Mexican border by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) during fiscal 2011 were not prosecuted, according to government data analyzed by the office of representative John Culberson (R-TX)...   The busiest sector for illegal crossings in FY2011 was Tucson in Arizona.   Of the 123,385 illegals apprehended there last year, only 32,703 (26.5%) were prosecuted...   Under existing law an individual caught trying to illegally cross the border can be incarcerated for up to 6 months, although that is not always the case, according to Fisher.   At the busiest Border Patrol sector along the southwest border, he said, the average time served for an individual who is prosecuted by DoJ is 'generally 2 to 3 days'."

2012-02-29
Mark J. Perry
sex gap in college degrees: do we need a White House Council on Boys and Men?

2012-02-29
Mark J. Perry
how expensive "green" energy has been destroying jobs while cheap shale gas has been creating them

2012-02-29
Mark J. Perry
restaurant business indices

2012-02-29
Mark J. Perry
excessive regulation and mal-regulation are choking Greece's economy

2012-02-29 (5772 Adar 06)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
"Peace Now" shocked to discover "Arab League" does not want peace

2012-02-29 (5772 Adar 06)
George Friedman _Jewish World Review_
Explaining US government strategy

2012-02-29 (5772 Adar 06)
Carol Rosenberg _Jewish World Review_
Club Gitmo's $744K soccer field
"all designed as a quality of life improvement for cooperative captives.   The goals were missing but the military had erected 2 guard towers, lights and surveillance cameras at the site outside a penitentiary-style building called Camp 6 where the Pentagon imprisons about 120 of the 171 captives here...   The showcase soccer field -- half the size of an American football field -- is being built by Burns and Roe Services Corp...   The Obama administration estimates that it spends $800K a year per captive on basic operating costs for the detention center, whose staff numbers 1,850 government employees from contractors to guards."

2012-02-29 (5772 Adar 06)
Tara Malone _Jewish World Review_
The term paper is disappearing
"The high school research paper, that academic rite of passage riddled with foot-notes and anchored by a bibliography, has faded from many class-rooms, a consequence of larger class sizes that leave teachers with more students and less time.   Several Chicago-area high schools have dialed back the paper's length requirements and instead emphasize the research process and weighing of sources, a critical skill in the digital era, teachers say."

2012-02-29 (5772 Adar 06)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Equality or inequality
"Equality before the general rules of law is the only kind of equality conducive to liberty that can be secured without destroying liberty."
 
Proposed Bills 2012
 
 

"Aggregation relationships tend to be fewer & more permanent than acquaintance.   Acquaintances, in contrast, are made & remade more frequently, sometimes existing only for the duration of an operation.   Acquaintances are more dynamic as well, making them more difficult to discern in the source code." --- Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson & John Vlissides 1995 _Design Patterns_ pg 23

 
 

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Proposed Bills 2012

Congressional candidate fund-raising, expenditures, and debt
 

USA Over-Population Clock
World + USA Over-Population Clocks
Jimbo Wales's WikiPedia on World Over-Population
 

"Tradition: 375 mercies (ChSDIM) are contained in the mercy (ChSD) of the Ancient of Days, & they are all called 'first mercies (ChSDI QDMAI)'.   For it is written: (Psalms 89:49) 'Where are thy former mercies (AIH ChSDIK HRQAShVNIM)?' And they are all contained in the mercy of the Ancient of Days, most concealed of all.   And the mercy of the Small-faced One is called permanent mercy (ChSD OVLM)." --- Moshe de Leon, George T. Sassoon & Rodney A.M. Dale 1978 "The Greater Holy Assembly" _The Kabbalah Decoded_ pp 94-95 folio #869-871

Movies Coming Soon
 

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