While Congress wastes time and effort on the so-called Foley scandal, the North Korean’s have followed through on their stated plan to test a nuclear device. I guess we need to welcome yet another state to the nuclear fraternity. Great.
So let’s take score:
We’re spending more money than ever before, at last check $1 BILLION dollars more a day than revenue. Every man, woman, and child’s share of the national debt in the US? ~$27,000.
We’re mired in Iraq with no clear plan to win the peace (Despite the $20M allocated by Congress to celebrate the victory…) 4,000 Iraqi police have been killed, another 8,000 injured. Sounds like progress to me.
Afghanistan is reverting to Taliban control (as claimed by the UN Commander)
Iran is following North Korea’s lead in developing nuclear capability (it’s clear we only have military reprisals for those unable or unwilling to protect themselves)
We’ve significantly limited American’s rights in America via the PATRIOT act (Hint Congress, expiration would have been a very GOOD THING.)
We’ve got secret prisons, detention without end, suspension of habeas corpus, and TORTURE
We’re spying on our citizens without probable cause (is it any wonder large companies like HP are following the Executive Branch’s lead on this stuff?)
This is a partial list, I’m just typing the things that are immediately coming to my head without deep thought. It’s an appalling list. Yet, we’re spending our time and effort on finding out who some 2nd rate Congressman wanted to screw? Near as I can tell, to be an intern or paige, one needs to be older than 16 years old, the age of sexual freedom in Washington D.C. Is it great to have a Congressman hitting on interns or paiges? Nope. Is what he did illegal? Nope. Is this an important issue? In the grand scheme of things, nope. I am condemning the entire political apparatus, in this particular instance, Congress, for HAVING THE WRONG PRIORITIES AT THE WRONG TIME. AGAIN!
When you go into the booth (or fill out your absentee ballot,) do us all a favor and simply vote against the incumbent. That’s perhaps the simplest and least harmful thing we can (provided our votes are counted….) I’d like to start an anti-incubent movement before the election. I don’t care if they’re Red or Blue, if they’re in office, they’re a target because they’ve been asleep at the switch. If you agree, send the link to this blog around. Let’s show MoveOn what grass roots really means. Let’s vote and throw the bums out. Let’s take our country back and make history with a new congress, really new. Not a retread. Steal this entry and share it. Please.
10.08.06 |Permalink|Comments Off on Falcons grounded, 35-7
In what amounted to a scrimmage, the Bucks handled Bowling Green. The only surprise to me was that Pittman didn’t get his 100 yards (65) and that we didn’t see a play in special teams or defense put points on the board. Figures that this is the first game in ages the Bucks didn’t cover the spread simply because it was referenced all over the place. The injuries were also concerning with David Patterson, Kirk Barton, and Troy Smith all leaving the game at one time or another. Information from the team leads us to believe that none of the injuries are serious.
Next up, a “cornered dog” game with the Michigan State Spartans. It’s on the road, I always worry more about road games than home games against a team with talent who’s season has gone from promising to disaster in 3 weeks. If the team doesn’t go up there with the right focus and attitude, it will be more difficult than it should be to pull out the W. Sparty is a “cornered dog” in that it needs a win in the worst way and has absolutely nothing to lose. And who could forget 1998 when they upset OSU 28-24 costing a shot at the national championship. Hate to see a replay of that next Saturday…..
On the national scene yesterday, it was a busy and unpredictable slate. Georgia, Oregon, Wake Forest, and Auburn all fell from the ranks of the unbeaten. Wake Forest at least made a game of it into the 4th quarter. The others were blowouts. Makes me wonder about all that “SEC is the toughest conference” talk heard every year (Georgia, Auburn, and LSU’s performances that is.) Love to see Cal get a crack at Tennessee now……USC looks very ordinary and came within a mismanaged clock sequence of getting beaten at home, by Washington. If I had to guess about the national championship game today, I’d say the winners of the WVU/Louisville and OSU/Michigan game will be playing.
Back to non-sports topics for the next few entries.
10.06.06 |Permalink|Comments Off on OSU/BGSU Preview
Well, the BGSU Falcons are sure to have their hands full this weekend. In what has become a transition year for their program, they have to make a trip to the Horseshoe to face the #1 team in the land. Vegas doesn’t give them much of a chance having installed the Falcons as a 35 point underdog in the contest. (It’s worth noting that Ohio State has covered the last 11 games…..)
That said, I don’t see Tressel’s style as one to run up scores, so that’s a pretty big expected point differential.
BGSU’s Defense is giving up an average of 30 points per game
BGSU’s Offense is putting up an average of 23.8 points per game
OSU’s Defense is giving up an average of 9.8 points per game
OSU’s Offense is putting up an average of 32.4 points per game
OSU’s offense is outscoring opponent’s defensive average by 13.7 points
OSU’s defense is holding opponent’s offense to -18.5 points of their average
It never works out this way, but for arguments sake, let’s say the teams play “average” using the trends above. We’d expect a 45-7 (43.7-5.3) type score in this game. Well, we’ll see what happens when they actually play. The weather, turnovers, mental preparations, let downs after a big game, can all play into the performance on Saturday. Not to mention new turf that neither team has ever played on (The Shoe got a face lift after the poor field conditions experienced with Penn State.)
Do you think, over the next 10 years, that US electricity consumption will increase or decrease?
An interesting question, there are constant conservation programs and there is ever improving technology (like Sun’s Ultra T1 processor,) but do you think that’s enough to offset any increase in demand?
Sometimes a historical look can be illuminating when attempting to answer these sorts of questions. The chart below shows in Petawatt hours (a petawatt is 1,000,000,000,000,000 watts) how electricity production has grown since 1992 in the US. For our international readers, I apologize, I’m not taking a global position on this, only a US-centric position. Well, frankly, because I live here and it’s big enough to be undigestable with the US alone. Notice that there is an aggregate increase of nearly a petawatt hour in the amount of electricity consumed over the past 13 years.
A percentage view of electricity consumption over time shows the growth is assuredly not linear. From 1992 to 2005 the aggregate growth in electricity consumption is 32.4%. There does seem to be a correlation between electricity consumption and the overall health of the economy. Note the relatively high growth rate in 1999 (Dotcom bubble) and the negative growth rate in 2001 (post bubble, 9/11) – both of these years vary considerably from the average annual growth rate of 2.2%. It is also interesting to note that the growth rate in 2005 is 3.1%, the fourth highest percentage in the measurement period. Which begs the question, are we in the midst of another bubble?
Returning to the questions above, will demand for electricity increase or decrease and what, if any impact with conservation and technology have on the trend? I believe we’ll continue to see an increase in demand. Even a fraction of a % of growth in demand spurs the need for more energy generation. And that’s interesting.
