Category: aminals

03/06/09 04:51 - 54ºF - ID#47970

Red Panda

The Buffalo Zoo should get one of these:

(source:

)

Actually, I should get one of those.

Permalink: Red_Panda.html
Words: 22
Location: Buffalo, NY

02/25/09 11:20 - 33ºF - ID#47884

SAVE THEM

Source:

Permalink: SAVE_THEM.html
Words: 9
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: economics

02/21/09 02:31 - 31ºF - ID#47850

Credit Crisis Visualized

Excellent visual summary of the credit crisis / current economic woes.

Part 1:

Part 2:

Best watched in HD (.mov download) at source:

tinypliny writes at 03:44:21 02/21/09 - Comment #45776: You know, the more I learn about this crisis, some things become increasingly clear to me.

1. Everyone wants someone to blame. No one wants to look at how they themselves are contributing to the mess. (eg. Look at my two comments below. I was so very quick to blame the investment bankers. Then I pulled down the govt. after a few minutes)

2. People were created equal. However the greed in their minds were completely cultivated and honed over centuries.

3. Some people who realized the evil that is greed, tried to balance this out by donating, becoming charities, establishing socialist movements and communities etc.

4. But that didn't change the greed. In fact, all the good schemes suffered from the greed coming in from various quarters.

5. Some really powerful greedy people went right ahead and built an empire and economic framework called capitalism. The basic tenet behind it was to make the wealthy even wealthier and take psychological as well as literal advantage of the greed in the minds of similarly oriented people - only the people at the bottom rung of the capitalism totem pole who were being taken advantage of were sucked into the whole scheme because had they been powerful, they could easily have been the leeches at the top.

6. The socialist societies didn't do so well - mainly because the greed still existed and rotted it from within. But it also didn't implode and continued to limp on - sick and starved but alive all the same.

7. The capitalist camp imploded - bringing the majority of the world down along with it - because really, greediness is a universal human trait. There aren't so many people out there who would resist the opportunity to:
a) Own a home when they can't afford one
b) Live flagrantly beyond means
c) Laugh at the concept of family planning and continue reproducing with wild abandon
d) Appropriate and embezzle as much money as they possibly can.
e) Try and think of making money in the easiest most dishonest greedy way possible.

8. Reasons 1-7 are the reasons I would blame for this crisis. There are no good people. There are plenty of greedy self-centred irresponsible people. On an average, we deserved this meltdown. We asked for it.

9. By trying to find whom to blame we are only ignoring our own greed that has lead to this outcome. How many of us can step forward and declare that they have never had a greedy thought, never hoarded (anything, really) more than they needed, spent more than they needed to, wished for more money even though they really didn't need it?

I can't. Can you?

jim writes at 03:20:10 02/21/09 - Comment #45775: Tinypliny, the CRA: there is no shred of proof tying this relatively small program to the giant trillion dollar mess that we're in. If the CRA was behind the issuance of the any significant chunk of sub-prime mortgages I've yet to see the proof. There's no actual evidence that I can find that the CRA resulted in even a tenth of the sub-prime activity as the CDO's allowed.

The rise in sub-prime mortgages was only made possible via pooling them up and then slicing them into tranches. That's fairly well proven and documented - that's what the CDO's are. Why do have a 2 trillion dollar problem with fantastically worthless CDO's if the CRA was actually at fault?

The CDO story is much more credible and backed up with evidence and reason. Faulting the CRA just blames poor people without any evidence.

tinypliny writes at 03:04:27 02/21/09 - Comment #45774: Okie - this video = not entirely responsible.

:::link:::

tinypliny writes at 03:01:53 02/21/09 - Comment #45773: Here is part 2: :::link:::

tinypliny writes at 03:00:46 02/21/09 - Comment #45772: One of the commentator on youtube said:

"Lenders didn't make the decision to abandon lending standards. That decision came from the Clinton adminstration in the 90s. They wanted everyone to own a house, so they FORCED private institutions to lower their standards."

Is that true? Then - the government is to blame for poor governance!

tinypliny writes at 02:57:25 02/21/09 - Comment #45771: Wow - that was awesome. Good find!

So the irresponsibility and greed of the investment bankers caused this meltdown.

But there they are laughing from mansions on their islands and thinking up new ways to get a chunk of the new handouts. Maybe some of them are politicians themselves. We (as in people who have always worked hard to maintain a good credit and never carried a balance forward) are doomed. UGH.

Permalink: Credit_Crisis_Visualized.html
Words: 40
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: internets

02/18/09 12:58 - 34ºF - ID#47798

How Many Times Are You Going to Kill Me?

Permalink: How_Many_Times_Are_You_Going_to_Kill_Me_.html
Words: 7
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: politics

02/18/09 09:51 - 35ºF - ID#47793

Politician's Syllogism

As explained by wikipedia:

We must do something

This is something

Therefore, we must do this.

Which is ultimately why I am distrustful of trillion dollar bills rammed through Congress, even though I think we do need something.

Permalink: Politician_s_Syllogism.html
Words: 48
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: internets

01/31/09 10:52 - 13ºF - ID#47578

Google Marks Whole Internet Malware

Seems to be fixed now. ~~stopbadware.org was down this morning (which Google partners with to warn of bad sites), and Google defaulted to marking everything as malware, even itself.~~

UPDATE

Unfortunately (and here's the human error), the URL of '/' was mistakenly checked in as a value to the file and '/' expands to all URLs. -- Google Blog

Permalink: Google_Marks_Whole_Internet_Malware.html
Words: 70
Location: Buffalo, NY

01/29/09 01:13 - 21ºF - ID#47557

Milestone

It's taken less time for David Paterson to choose a successor to Hillary Clinton then for James to hear back about whether or not he's got a job he interviewed for 2 months ago.

Your tax dollars at work, grinding away slowly.

Permalink: Milestone.html
Words: 41
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: internets

01/28/09 03:03 - 26ºF - ID#47546

Have You Seen This Cat?

source:

Permalink: Have_You_Seen_This_Cat_.html
Words: 14
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: undead

01/27/09 09:10 - 13ºF - ID#47534

Pride & Prejudice & Zombies

This one is for (e:james)

On Amazon:

As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton-and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers-and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield as Elizabeth wages war against hordes of flesh-eating undead.