robot wisdom weblog
Jorn's back! And without the slightest acknowledgment that he has been gone for almost 18 months. Just picked up where he left off. Cool.

THE BATTLE OVER SAME-SEX MARRIAGE / Mayor argues cause at Harvard / Nuptial ban called a civil rights issue: "'I can't stand my party right now. They offend me,' he said. 'I have no interest in the majority of the Democratic Party that becomes Republican Lite.'"

I totally agree, Gavin. Keep it up!

President Participates in Class-Action Lawsuit Reform Conversation: "Some in our country think that Social Security is a trust fund -- in other words, there's a pile of money being accumulated. That's just simply not true. The money -- payroll taxes going into the Social Security are spent. They're spent on benefits and they're spent on government programs. There is no trust. We're on the ultimate pay-as-you-go system -- what goes in comes out. And so, starting in 2018, what's going in -- what's coming out is greater than what's going in. It says we've got a problem. And we'd better start dealing with it now. The longer we wait, the harder it is to fix the problem."

Either The President is a moron, or he is a liar and a thief. Take your pick. This statement violates a number of ethical and moral principles not to mention constitutional requirements he has sworn to uphold, namely that the public debt of the United States shall not be questioned. The working taxpayers of the United States have been overpaying their payroll taxes at the direction of Congress based on the Greenspan committee's plan enacted into law in 1983 to build up reserves in the social security fund to provide for the retirement of the 'baby boomers', who are the bulk of the ones paying into the system. To deny that this is the case is thievery. It is the same thing done by companies like Enron. It is raiding the pension fund. He is right though, that there is a looming crisis in the general fund to repay the staggering debt that has been accumulating since he took office. And it appears he is proposing that we simply ignore it away and refuse to pay it. Mind boggling.

New York Daily News - Home - Reid's Eagles bird-brained"Well, you know, I'm trying to remember back on that. I put that away a little bit," Reid said a few hours before the Eagles checked out of their hotel. "But we did try to get it going. I can't remember. I can't detail the circumstances why it didn't work as well as it should have."...The drive he can't remember, incidentally, doesn't represent Reid's only bizarre decision. He mismanaged the clock at the end of the first half, too, when the Eagles had three timeouts and the ball with 1:10 remaining. Reid didn't use a timeout until there were 10 seconds left. Asked about that after the game, Reid said, "I don't remember that at all, to be honest with you."

Mike Martz made similar comments after a few games this year and was eviscerated in the press. It will be interesting to see if Reid gets the same treatment. The other thought I had is that this appears to be a problem with coaches that tend to get very involved with play calling like Reid, Martz, Holmgren, Gruden. But if you notice Bill Belicheck, he doesn't even carry a piece of paper around with him on the sidelines! He delegates the play calling to his coordinators, then focuses on the game itself. I bet he can remember EVERY drive his team had AND the Eagles' too! Now I don't believe this is THE reason why he is so successful, but it is a part of it. The Patriots might not be the most talented team in the league, but they are a team that makes very few mistakes which usually translates into a lot of wins. Not having to deal with the particulars of play calling helps the head coach to focus on the game, know the situation and make the right call when needed.