Do we...uh...PAY actuaries??

The American Academy of Actuaries issued a policy statement Monday suggesting that "holding the retirement age constant is a certain prescription for future financial problems."

Extra Extra: Economists Issue Statement Saying Increasing Supply Leads to Lower Prices!

The changing user interface of life

I never fully grokked why my friend is *so* passionate about his iphone and, well, all things Apple in general. Sure, they're brilliant at product development and execution. Yes, Steve Jobs is a marketing genius with an unparalleled ability to create an upswell of consumer demand.

But to bring the latest SDK specs with you on a vacation to Thailand? :0)

Now, however, I get it. I at last have the latest-greatest elite toy and for starters, all the pent-up demand for music that my ipod-less experience to date (Shuffle doesn't really count folks) is alone transforming my reality into an immersive, escapist delight.

And I KNOW I haven't even scratched the surface when it comes to appreciating the elegance of the device's integrated design and to leveraging the Brave New World of AppleStore applications being promulgated as I type.

The horror of it all is that now that I can access Facebook 24X7, the reactionary makers of the beloved Mr. Potatohead I referenced in an earlier post have pulled an RIAA and decided to use the courts rather than customers to decide what products we have available to us. What will I now do with my insane amount of discretionary time??

Let the market decide!!!

Outrage - cntd.-

"WMD" seems so passe...right?

For example, a key assertion of the news release issued by the military on the day of the killings was that “a weapon was recovered from the wreckage.” But the military said Sunday that no one claimed to have found a weapon in the car or had seen a weapon taken from it.

Outrage defined

Maybe it's not "news" but I still can't help being outraged.....is it me, or is it completely ironic that the cause for ongoing incarceration was a need to define due process???

Judge Refuses to Postpone Trial of Bin Laden’s Driver....The ruling clears the way for the start of the first trial of a detainee at the prison complex in Cuba, opened in 2002 to hold prisoners captured in the campaign against terrorism. The trials have been delayed for years, in part by courts that found legal fault with the commissions created to try people designated by the government as “unlawful enemy combatants.”

The beauty of globalization

How many exotic locales can you pick out in the first 3 sentences of this NYT story?? Just relieved that Miami Beach is appropriately represented. No wonder I love Get Shorty so much.

homage to George Carlin

In a post earlier this year I mentioned how I derived my inspiration from brilliant comic George Carlin. What a shock to read of his passing today - at the age of 71.

Carlin's career and legacy are compelling not only for the pure talent that powered his wit (which, while offensive to some, certainly had intrinsic merit for its astute cultural observation), but also for the missial nature of his career. He risked his early successes to reinvent himself because, in his own words, “I was a traitor...I was living a lie.” His challenge to many presumptions grew starker as the years went by and sometimes regressed into a cynicism that surpassed the entertainment value one would hold a purported comedian to; but his vision and desire to hold fast to his ideals are to be commemorated along with the gifts and insights he brought to his diverse audiences.

I don't know Chris Blumhofer but I already like him

THANK YOU THANK YOU Mr. B b/c you detest the pop culturization of Our Lord as much as me! It may sell a lot of books to distill the creator of the earth, the Alpha and Omega, the maker of all things (of course this descriptive list is by definition incomplete owing to our inability to grasp the infinite) to a business principle...but er, can the Created really appropriate the Creator for its own ends? When exegesis is inversed into starting first with a principle for our own sake, we become impoverished, losing all sense of our proper relationship to Him. The logical outcome of that trend is what CS Lewis termed "God in the Dock."