MaxRedline

Oregon Health Authority

What economic crisis? They're hiring, with generous benefits!

Salary:	$95,628.00 - $140,964.00 Annually

 

Feds Raid Top Guitar Maker

Barry's DOJ is at it again; armed agents have raided the world's premiere guitar manufacturer, Gibson, for a second time.

God Bless The EPA

Image by Matt Ortega via Flickr

That seems to be the prevailing sentiment among the entrenched bureaucrats there, anyway. They're busily enacting rules and regulations geared toward crippling the energy industries while driving consumer prices for energy through the roof. Why? While campaigning for the Presidency, then-Senator Barack Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle that he would “bankrupt” the coal industry. The EPA's just working to fulfill the dream.

Barry also promised to create 5 million high-paying "Green" jobs.

 Last week, the Massachusetts-based Evergreen Solar filed for bankruptcy, after laying off 800 workers in March.   Now, they are slated to dump another 65 workers by closing a plant in Michigan.  This, after receiving an undisclosed amount of stimulus cash, in addition to $58 million in state aid.

And as noted here just yesterday, SpectraWatt's going the same route.

Dr. Walter Block, economics professor at Loyola University, claims that customers should have a choice between traditional and renewable energy sources.

“Nuclear, coal, oil and gas are far cheaper than wind, water, solar and geothermal. The only reason the latter are used at all is because of heavy subsidies, and taxes on the former.

The E.P.A.’s power grab is only the most extreme example of a larger malady: regulation without representation. 

Most people strongly support sound environmental practices. But they're also in favor of keeping the lights on. The EPA is an agency desperately in need of defunding.

 

Related articles

• Texas AG Sues EPA over Obama's War on Energy - John Ransom - Townhall Finance (gds44.wordpress.com)
• Obama's New EPA Rules Would Destroy Our Energy Sector (chicagonow.com)
• Memo to coal industry: Replace your 'Steve Miller' (junkscience.com)
• The Energy Disaster Continues (powerlineblog.com)

On The International Stage

Image via Wikipedia

Not that she gives a rip, but MO's profligate spending on her many vacations is drawing attention: “$10 million of US taxpayers’ money on vacations alone in the past year.” This figure is actually low, as it fails to consider that the Obamas generally take separate planes (as demonstrated yet again in the case of their current sojurn to Martha's Vineyard), nor does it take into account the USAF C-17 cargo aircraft that transported the Presidential limos, helicopters and other support equipment. Why don't they just unwind at Camp David? Her sense of entitlement knows no bounds.

Waterworld

The Silicon Valley billionaire has funnelled $1.25million to the Seasteading Institute, an organisation that aspires to launch a floating colony into international waters, freeing them and like-minded thinkers to live by libertarian ideals.

Mr Thiel recently told Details magazine: 'The United States Constitution had things you could do at the beginning that you couldn't do later. So the question is, can you go back to the beginning of things? How do you start over?'

His answer: build island cities in international waters - and possibly connect them, building nations. 

Mr Thiel and his colleagues say their ocean state would have no welfare, looser building codes, no minimum wage, and few restrictions on weapons.

Naturally, the concept has its detractors - mostly from the "planner" set: Margaret Crawford, an expert on urban planning and a professor of architecture at Berkeley, told Details: 'it's a silly idea without any urban-planning implications whatsoever.' 

They never like to think outside the condo tower and train combination. They are, after all, experts. Anybody who is comfortable with having such a term applied to them is not to be trusted - with anything.

Mr Thiel told an audience at the Seasteading Institute Conference in 2009 that: 'There are quite a lot of people who think it's not possible. 

'That's a good thing. We don't need to really worry about those people very much, because since they don't think it's possible they won't take us very seriously. And they will not actually try to stop us until it's too late.'

He may well be correct in that assessment. The technology required just to provide drinking water and sanitation services alone is daunting. On the other hand, Spacelab and the ISS have provided some crude blueprints.

Related articles

• Billionaire to build new countries at sea (thesun.co.uk)
• Coming soon: City-state communities afloat on ocean platforms (news.bioscholar.com)
• Paypal founder invests in floating island utopia (telegraph.co.uk)

Another One Bites The Dust

Image via CrunchBase

Say goodbye to SpectraWatt, the second solar company to file for bankruptcy this month. The Intel spinoff went all Chapter 11, blaming operational problems and difficult market conditions. They got nothing; they can't even find buyers for their production equipment.

"Green jobs" are going to save Oregon and the rest of the USA. If you can afford the subsidies.

Related articles

• Solar shakeout will bring more failures, few deals (news.cnet.com)
• Another Solar Firm touted by Obama has a premature sunset (ironmill.wordpress.com)

Vegetation

Image by j_mills via Flickr

It comes as no surprise to many, but a new report from AEI documents pervasive grade inflation for "Education" majors and low standards for public school teachers. Among the major points:

• Grades awarded in university education departments are consistently higher than grades in other disciplines.
• Similarly, teachers in K-12 schools receive overwhelmingly positive evaluations.
• Grade inflation in education departments should be addressed through administrative directives or external accountability in K-12 schools.

Universities are training uneducated educators. In fact, education majors score considerably lower than students in other academic departments on college entrance exams. In other words, they start off with less on the ball than other students, and they "train" for entry into a union-dominated, non-competitive field.

Our schools are designed to grow vegetables.

Related articles

• The wellspring of grade inflation (scienceblogs.com)

Switcheroo

Image via Wikipedia

Remember when you used to be charged for placing long-distance telephone calls? Now, AT&T levies an added charge whether you place such calls or not. 

AT&T has added a new $2-a-month "minimum use" fee to the phone bills of landline customers who don't have long-distance calling plans.

In other words, customers who rarely, if ever, make long-distance calls are the ones most likely to pay the fee.

Those customers can avoid the fee, a company spokeswoman said, as long as they make at least $2 worth of long-distance calls a month.

"So if we make the call we pay; if we don't make the call, we pay," said an incredulous Ruth Hord, who discovered the charge on her July phone bill. "What is wrong with this picture?"

They'll find a way to make you pay, no matter what you think or say.

More East Coast Quake

Disturbing images have emerged in the aftermath of the 5.9 earthquake that disrupted Barry's round of golf. Washington, D.C. was especially hard-hit:

Some may not grasp the fact that Joe Biden's place at the next beer summit has been rendered unusable.

Others question the significance of the loss, given that Joe tends to hog all the beer-nuts anyway.

But other areas on the east coast were shaken:

New Regs For Goat-Herders

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

The Obama Labor Department has come out with new workplace regulations that apply to ranchers who - you can't make this kind of stuff up - hire people to herd sheep or goats. Published in the Federal Register, the new regulations describe strict rules for sleeping quarters, lighting, food storage, bathing, laundry, cooking and new rules for the counters where food is prepared.

“Who knew we needed all of this federal help for herding goats?”