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Yearly Archives: 2012

Solar Weather

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It’s not just that it’s hot.  It’s the stifling stillness that has settled in over the center of the continent that slowly suffocates, like a python wrapping around its prey.  A year that started out promising, with plenty of warmth and rain early on, has turned deadly for crops throughout the grain belt of the US.

The price of corn has shot up 40% in the last month as a terrible harvest falls ahead of brown, dead stalks grimly standing in the fields.  As much as a third of the grain belt states is in “severe drought” conditions, and it’s likely to only worsen.  This is the kind of shock our economic system simply cannot handle right now, already weakened by bumbling in financial centers far from where people do actual work.

What has caused such awful weather?  It’s always hard to say exactly, but we can be sure this will last a while longer – and it is too late for most of the crops.

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Catch a Break

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It’s been the kind of week you swim through.  The thick languid air drags back as if yesterday was a long time ago and tomorrow might never come.  It’s not a day to get much work done, but we all slog through.

Daze like this I admit I go back through the Barataria archives to see if there’s anything that needs updating.  Starting from July of 2011, however, it’s positively depressing.  Employment is still lagging and the economy has not done anything new.  At least funding is being secured to restore the old Rathskeller at the Schmidt Brewery on West Seventh – we locals are moving forward with heart and arm and brain.  But at the big level, things are simply languishing as if summer never ended.

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Taxing Returns

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Why hasn’t Mitt Romney released more than one year of tax returns? “The cost of not releasing the returns are clear,” said conservative columnist George Will, on ABC’s “This Week.” “Therefore, he must have calculated that there are higher costs in releasing them.”  Will has a reputation for being particularly honest when his side is screwing up, but he’s far from alone in his assessment.  It’s far more damning when Bill Kristol weighs in – “He should release the tax returns tomorrow. It’s crazy,” Kristol said on “Fox News Sunday.” “You gotta release six, eight, 10 years of back tax returns. Take the hit for a day or two.”

Why are the conservative pundits hitting this so hard?  What’s at stake here is not just Romney’s candidacy or even the whole Republican ticket that wants to keep the US House.  There is a core myth that has driven Republican rhetoric for decades based on a concept of “fairness” that could come crashing down if this plays out badly – and the pundits know it.

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Fight with Funny?

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If I learned anything from teevee sitcoms, it’s that summer is a time for re-runs.  Actually, I learned everything I know from sitcoms, which is why I’m never going to get off this damned island.  I hope you like this piece from last year.

What makes something funny?  It turns out that there are many different Humor Theories and none of them are funny.  That may seem like a problem right there, but the irony that you expect it to be funny and it isn’t could be funny if you … Hey!  Wait!

OK, so this duck walks into a bar and asks the bartender, “Why is it so often a duck?” and the bartender says, “Look, if you want to analyze stereotypes you could ask why it’s always a bar.”  The duck shrugs his wings, sits down, and gets so hammered he doesn’t even remember pecking the priest, the rabbi, and the lawyer to death.

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Scurry from the Light?

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When the lights are flipped on, tradition has it that the cockroaches that feast on the night quickly scurry for the darkness.  Those of us from more Caribbean climates know that the really big Palmetto bugs often keep going on about their roachy business as if light and dark mean nothing to them.  But you have to expect that in languid, humid air better suited for piracy and general disregard for “authority”.

Exactly what climate does the financial world operate in?  We may soon find out.  But there are many reasons to believe JP Morgan, the investment bank, already operates more like Captain Morgan, the pirate.  And they are apparently far from alone.

Just as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is working to flip the switch, a survey has come out suggesting that it may well not make much immediate difference.  Then again, it does help to know that what you have are, in fact, roaches.

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