Yet another problem with wind power

Since wind does blow at a continuous rate, one big problem has been that one has to build double the capacity. Not just the wind farm, but also some other alternative power supply to cover periods when the wind isn't blowing. Now there are some other costs. Apparently sometimes there is too much power, I guess when the wind blows unusually hard. In those cases, now the power companies are having to get consumers to increase use of electricity when they get these sudden surges of electricity. The NY Times views this as a big positive story. I think that it just points to yet another cost.

For decades, electric companies have swung into emergency mode when demand soars on blistering hot days, appealing to households to use less power. But with the rise of wind energy, utilities in the Pacific Northwest are sometimes dealing with the opposite: moments when there is too much electricity for the grid to soak up.

So in a novel pilot project, they have recruited consumers to draw in excess electricity when that happens, storing it in a basement water heater or a space heater outfitted by the utility. The effort is rooted in some brushes with danger.

In June 2010, for example, a violent storm in the Northwest caused a simultaneous surge in wind power and in traditional hydropower, creating an oversupply that threatened to overwhelm the grid and cause a blackout.

As a result, the Bonneville Power Administration, the wholesale supplier to a broad swath of the region, turned this year to a strategy common to regions with hot summers: adjusting volunteers’ home appliances by remote control to balance supply and demand.

When excess supply threatens Bonneville’s grid, an operator in a control room hundreds of miles away will now dial up a volunteer’s water heater, raising the thermostat by 60 more degrees. Ceramic bricks in a nearby electric space heater can be warmed to hundreds of degrees. . . .

Obama actually claims that the job numbers are "positive"?

So Obama thinks that 80,000 jobs in a month is "positive" news? Is this serious? This is half the growth in jobs that would be necessary just to KEEP EVEN with the growth in the population. From the Politico:

In economic news on Friday that President Barack Obama called “positive” but said shows the economy is still growing much too slowly, the unemployment rate ticked down to 9 percent in October, while the country added a less-than-expected 80,000 jobs last month.

The job growth was the most anemic its been in past four months and the U.S. created only about half of the number of jobs that were added in September. Private sector employment increased by 104,000 in October, while government jobs continued a downward trend, reporting a loss of 24,000 positions, according to the Labor Department.

Speaking from the G20 summit in Cannes, France, Obama said the October jobs numbers “were positive, but indicate once against that the economy’s growing way too slowly.” . . .

Economists had forecast that 100,000 to 125,000 jobs would be created last month and that the jobless rate would remain at 9.1 percent - where it had been stuck for the past three months. But the less-than expected addition of 80,000 still resulted in a dip in the unemployment rate as nonfarm payroll for August was revised upward from 57,000 additional jobs to 104,000, while jobs added for September was tweaked from 103,000 to 158,000. . . .

Virginia state Supreme Court rules that spit wads are "weapons" and using them is "criminal"

From WND:

The state Supreme Court in Virginia has let stand a ruling that spit wads are "weapons" and using them is "criminal."

But a public-interest law firm fighting the case says it has asked for a rehearing because of alleged violations of due process of law that occurred in the case.

The case has been argued by the Rutherford Institute, which said a tiny plastic pellet shot out of a plastic tube doesn't meet the definition of a "weapon" and a long-term suspension for a 14-year-old honor student is inappropriate.

The argument came in the case of Andrew Mikel II, who was a freshman last school year when he was kicked out of Spotsylvania High School for the remainder of the session under a claim by school officials that the "spit wad" was "violent criminal conduct."

Rita Dunaway, a staff attorney with the Rutherford Institute, argued before the state's high court that the penalty should be reversed and that the school determination that Mikel "possessed" a "weapon" reached too far. . . .

Student at Purdue pushes to end gun-free zone at his school

From the Purdue student paper:

A student government senator from Krannert will propose legislation for concealed carrying on campus at the student government meeting tonight.
Zach Briggs, senator and junior in the Krannert School of Management, wrote in an email that this piece of legislation could protect students and possibly, one day, his younger sister.
“The biggest reason (behind this legislation is) the safety of every individual on campus,” Briggs wrote. “Additionally, I think of my little sister and how someday she could be walking on this campus. If anyone ever tried to hurt her I would want her to at least have the option of defending herself.”
Briggs wrote in the email that although he expects some disagreement from the senate and the campus, he still has a lot of support on this issue. . . . .
“An Indiana resident with the proper licensing can carry on Purdue’s campus with no fear of repercussions since he or she could only be punished through University Regulations,” Briggs wrote, “which obviously don’t apply to him or her if this person is not a student, a member of faculty, or staff. This means IU students have the right to carry here without enforceable punitive actions being taken while Purdue students can’t.” . . .

Oakland developer protects his property with a shotgun

From the SF Chronicle.

Oakland developer Phil Tagami is used to working behind the scenes to broker some of the biggest deals in town. Late Wednesday, he was using different persuasive skills - holding a loaded shotgun to scare away rioters trying to get into a downtown building.

"We had people who attempted to break into our building," the landmark Rotunda Building on Frank Ogawa Plaza outside City Hall, Tagami said Thursday. He grabbed a shotgun that he usually keeps at home, went down to the ground floor and "discouraged them," he said.

"I was standing there and they saw me there, and I lifted it - I didn't point it - I just held it in my hands," Tagami said. "And I just racked it, and they ran."

Although they didn't get inside the building - Tagami, 46, oversaw its $50 million renovation and has an office there - vandals did scrawl graffiti on the outside walls during the post-midnight riot that broke out after Occupy Oakland's daylong general strike. . . .

Thanks to Dave O'Brien for the link.

Solyndra executives were rewarding themselves with bonuses before the company went bankrupt

This wouldn't be an issue to me if the government hadn't given Solyndra a half a billion dollars. From Fox News:

Solyndra executives were awarded quarterly bonuses worth up to $60,000 apiece earlier this year as the California solar-panel company headed for bankruptcy, court documents show.
Documents filed by the company in U.S. bankruptcy court in Delaware show the well-paid executives at the firm were given bonuses in April and in July, just months before the company filed for bankruptcy in September and laid off 1,100 workers.
The details add to the narrative of what was happening behind the scenes in the year leading up to the company's financial collapse, though congressional Republicans investigating the matter are looking for more details. After the Obama administration turned over 20,000 pages of documents earlier this week pertaining to Solyndra, House Republicans on Thursday night served the White House and vice president's office with a subpoena for more Solyndra documents. . . .

Democratic Representative accuses Republicans of not being patriotic

Dem Rep says GOP "not patriotic," "They Don't Love This Country"
The youtube video is available here.

Grad Students wrote the IPCC report

From Fox News:

A scathing new expose on the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change -- which sets the world's agenda when it comes to the current state of the climate -- claims that its reports have often been written by graduate students with little or no experience in their field of study and whose efforts normally might be barely enough to satisfy grad school requirements.
Grad students often co-author scientific papers to help with the laborious task of writing. Such papers are rarely the cornerstone for trillions of dollars worth of government climate funding, however -- nor do they win Nobel Peace prizes.
“We’ve been told for the past two decades that 'the Climate Bible' was written by the world’s foremost experts,” Canadian journalist Donna Laframboise told FoxNews.com. “But the fact is, you are just not qualified without a doctorate. In academia you aren't even on the radar at that point.”
The IPCC insists that the lead authors of individual sections of its climate report are indeed the pre-eminent experts in their field.
"These authors are nominated by governments and selected based on expertise,” a spokesman told FoxNews.com. “Author teams on IPCC chapters are a mix of individuals who have excelled in their fields of specialism." . . .

Senate moves to prevent the Obama administration from "putting any limits on serving potatoes or other vegetables in school lunches"

The Federal government is regulating the vegetables that local public schools can include in lunches? From the Deseret News:

Agriculture Department rules proposed earlier this year aimed to reduce the amount of french fries in schools, limiting lunchrooms to two servings a week of potatoes and other starchy vegetables. That angered the potato industry and members of Congress from potato-growing states, who say USDA should focus on the preparation instead and that potatoes can be a good source of fiber and potassium.

Following a bipartisan agreement on the issue, the Senate by voice vote accepted an amendment by Republican Sen. Susan Collins that would block USDA from putting any limits on serving potatoes or other vegetables in school lunches.

Collins, who is from Maine, a potato-growing state, says the vegetables are a cheaper and nutritious way to feed children when school budgets are strapped.

"This proposed rule would have imposed significant and needless costs on our nation's school districts at a time when they can least afford it," she said. . . . .

The Fed projections on the economy are getting worse

How will Obama explain having an unemployment higher than when he became president? From Reuters:

In fresh quarterly projections, the Fed lowered its forecasts for growth and raised its forecasts for unemployment for this year, 2012 and 2013. Policymakers did not see the jobless rate, now at 9.1 percent, falling to a level they consider consistent with full employment even at the outer edge of their forecasting horizon, the final quarter of 2014.

Officials now expect the world's largest economy to grow by a tepid 2.5 percent to 2.9 percent next year, down from the rosier 3.3 percent to 3.7 percent they were expecting in June.

They saw the unemployment rate going no lower than 8.5 percent to 8.7 percent by the end of 2012, up from the more sanguine 7.8 percent to 8.2 percent range envisioned in June.

Fed officials believe the economy will have reached full employment when the jobless rate drops to between 5.2 percent and 6 percent. In their forecast, the unemployment rate would still be at 6.8 percent to 7.7 percent at the end of 2014. . . .

Republican House is passing a lot of legislation, not the Democratically controlled Senate

From The Hill newspaper:

How are House deregulation bills piling up in the Senate? According to House Republicans, increasingly like cord wood.

"We've been doing a whole lot over the last 10 months," Rep. Tim Griffin (R-Ark.) said Tuesday night. "Passed a lot of legislation, I think we've had about 800 votes. Unfortunately, a lot of those good ideas are stacking up like cord wood over in the U.S. Senate."

For the last several weeks, the Republican message has been focused on the "forgotten 15" — the nickname for various House-approved bills that would ease federal regulations and are awaiting Senate action. Republicans seem to have developed the "cord wood" metaphor in September, but took it fully on board in October.

"Mr. President, jobs have been job number one for House Republicans since the beginning of this year," Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) said October 13 in response to President Obama's call for Republican jobs bills. "In fact, major portions of the House Republican Plan for America's Job Creators have been stacking up like cord wood on Senator Harry Reid's doorstep for months."

Obama's criticism that Republicans have done nothing to help the unemployment situation is the clear impetus for the oft-repeated phrase, and has prompted the GOP to point out that Senate Democrats have failed to even look at the forgotten 15. . . .

New National Review piece: Goolsbee’s Gaffes

My piece at National Review Online starts this way:

The Obama administration is having a difficult time explaining the unemployment rate, which has been above 9 percent for 27 consecutive months and is today 1.3 percentage points higher than it was when Obama took office. The October numbers, due to be released on Friday, are unlikely to look any better. So, his administration goes to great lengths to spin its own unique set of facts.

Just look at Austan Goolsbee’s Friday interview on Sean Hannity’s radio show. Despite having stepped down as Obama’s chief economic advisor in August, Goolsbee continues to do media shows supporting Obama’s economic policies. Goolsbee declared: “I deal only in facts, Sean.” Here is a simple fact check of Mr. Goolsbee’s claims.

Hannity: We heard that unemployment wasn’t going to go above 8 percent.

Goolsbee: When they made that 8 percent prediction, that was the same prediction being made by everyone. But you forget the other half of the thing, which is if you did nothing, the rate would go to 8.9 percent, and it was already above that before the first part of the stimulus even went out.

Mr. Goolsbee is just plain wrong. When the Obama administration got into office, they made optimistic promises about their stimulus program, claiming that during 2009, unemployment would stop rising and then fall. The unemployment rate in January was 7.8 percent. In late February, the administration claimed that it would average just 8.1 percent for the year if the Stimulus was enacted. . . .

Legislation to end Canada's long gun registration passes two crucial votes

From CBC:

The government fended off accusations from the opposition Tuesday that it is making it easier for criminals to access dangerous guns by abolishing the long-gun registry.

The Conservatives introduced legislation on Oct. 25 that would remove the requirement to register non-prohibited long guns in the RCMP's database. The requirement to register prohibited and restricted firearms would remain intact and no changes to the licensing regime are proposed.

The bill passed second reading in the House by a vote of 156 to 123. The legislation will now go to a committee of MPs to hear from witnesses. NDP MPs Bruce Hyer and John Rafferty, both from northern Ontario, voted with the Conservatives to pass the bill.

The NDP said in question period that easing the registration requirements will mean certain firearms, including the one used in the Montreal massacre in 1989 and the mass shooting in Norway this past summer, are exempt from registration and shouldn't be. . . .

"Mitt Romney's Top 5 Contradicting Comments"?

I don't know how ABC News determines what the top 5 contradicting comments are, but they have picked: The Flat Tax, Massachusetts Health Care, Abortion, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and Constitutional Amendment Defining Life. Their discussion is available here.

More conflicts of interest in Obama giving out money to "green energy" firms

Yet another problem. From Fox News:

A clean-energy firm led by a member of President Obama's jobs council has a stake in projects that have reaped nearly $2 billion in loan guarantees from Washington, a case that has raised conflict-of-interest concerns as the same jobs council pushes for more "government-backed" investment in renewable energy.
The company, NextEra Energy, secured a loan guarantee in August for a solar project in California. An affiliate has taken over another California project that won a separate guarantee in September. The firm is no lightweight -- NextEra Energy Resources, the subsidiary working on both solar projects, is the biggest producer of wind and solar energy on the continent.
But the company also enjoys a connection to the Obama administration -- company Chairman and CEO Lewis Hay sits on the president's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, which last month issued a report calling, among other things, for a new federal financing program to attract private investment for clean energy projects via loan guarantees and other tools. . . .

Just how hard is it to start a business in India

The entire piece is pretty scary. From the WSJ:

It's tough to be an entrepreneur anywhere, but India presents special obstacles—byzantine bureaucracy, moldering roads and power grids, cultural pressures that penalize risk-taking, and corruption. Mr. Alva says the thugs demanded bribes to go away. He wouldn't pay.

Entrepreneurship is vital to India as the nation of 1.2 billion tries to reduce poverty through economic growth. Small and medium businesses are the largest nonfarm employers and account for 45% of manufacturing output, according to government data and a study last month by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Confederation of Indian Industry. Those small firms are adding some 3.3 million jobs per year—not nearly enough to accommodate the roughly 13 million people entering India's job market.

India ranks among the world's worst countries at encouraging entrepreneurs. For ease of starting a business, India is 166th out of 183 countries, just ahead of Angola, according to World Bank figures released recently. Only one country, Timor-Leste, is worse at enforcing contracts. . . .

Europe defines recessions the way that we used to define them

GDP declining seems like a pretty broad measure to me. It also seems like a lot more objective measure that can't be played around with for political gain. From the WSJ:

. . . . A rule of thumb, particularly in Europe, defines recession as two straight quarters of declines in gross domestic product. It usually takes a few more weeks for Europe's statistics agency to compile GDP figures than its U.S. counterparts. Third-quarter figures for the euro area won't be released until mid-November; in the U.S., they're already out. Assuming euro-zone GDP contracts in this quarter and the start of 2012, the earliest anyone would know would be when final GDP first-quarter figures are released in late spring.

"Even if it's very clear, it takes three-quarters of a year to confirm there was a broad-based decline in activity," says Harald Uhlig, who heads up the recession-dating committee at the Centre for Economic Policy Research, a London-based think tank that is Europe's equivalent of the U.S.'s unofficial recession arbiter, the National Bureau of Economic Research.GDP isn't the last word on recession. The NBER looks at other indicators such as employment and industrial production to gauge whether a broad-based drop in U.S. activity has occurred, as does Mr. Uhlig's committee of eight economists. . . . .

25 biggest US newspapers by daily circulation

A list of the newspaper by sales is available here.

30 percent of employers may soon drop health insurance for their employees

Boy, this is a big surprise. NOT. The fee for going through the government insurance is very small compared to what the insurance actually costs, so why not let the taxpayers pick up the tab. So much for the government estimates on how many people would stay on private insurance. Remember these additional costs will blow the budget apart. From Fox News:

Three years before the new health care law takes full effect, a survey of employers has found 30 percent of them are thinking about dropping coverage, in part because most employees will have an alternative -- government-subsidized insurance exchanges.
McKinsey & Company commissioned a survey of 1,329 private sector employers in February and found that three out of 10 respondents who said their companies offered employer-sponsored health insurance said they would "definitely" or "probably" drop coverage in the years following 2014, the year the Affordable Care Act takes full effect.
"The employer knows there's no reason to provide private, expensive coverage if there's free options available from the government," said John Goodman, of the conservative National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas.
Workers in the exchanges making all the way up to more than $90,000 in income would get generous federal subsidies. For lower-wage workers, the government would pay almost the entire cost of insurance.
"For a $12,000-dollar health insurance plan, if you make about $30,000 a year, the government pays about $11,000 of the premium," Goodman said. . . .

Finally, after all these months, a political appointee in the Obama Justice Department admits that he knew about the Gunwalker program

The Obama administration is trying to do what it can to obscure the "Gunwalker" or "Fast & Furious" cases with the "Wide Receiver" case. The “Wider Receiver” program gave direct notice to the Mexican authorities so that they could try to track the guns when they went to the Mexican side of the boarder. "Fast and Furious" made no such attempt to notify the Mexican authorities in anyway. "Fast and Furious" made no serious attempt to actually trace the guns and what is worse they knew that the guns weren't being traced. The Bush officials might have learned that Mexican police weren't up to tracing the guns, but at least they had a plan to try to have the guns followed. "Fast and Furious" gave out the guns, but agents and middle level people complained that the guns weren't being traced. From Fox News:

Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer became the first high-ranking official Tuesday to admit that he knew U.S. agents were letting thousands of guns sold in the U.S. fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels.
But Breuer says the controversial “gun walking” tactics he learned about in April 2010 weren't part of “Operation Fast and Furious,” but rather a previous investigation during the Bush administration called “Wider Receiver.” . . .
Some lawmakers find Breuer’s story implausible because he learned about Wider Receiver at the same time as Fast and Furious, run by the same agents and the same U.S. attorney’s office.
“He was asking questions about Wide Receiver at the very same time Fast and Furious was going on and it was going on in the same division within the Justice Department, so why wouldn’t they be asking questions about Fast and Furious the same way as they were about Wide Receiver?” Grassley told Fox News. . . .
As the Fast and Furious investigation enters its 10th month, the blame game grows more intense. . . .
“Lanny Breuer’s statement said he told the attorney general in January or February so that doesn’t jive,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. “So we’ve just got some massive contradictions here.” . . .

Comparing the drop in employment during the past recession to previous ones

A couple of points:
1) The total employment drop falls below the drop during the 1980s recession in the 16th month, which is April 2009.
2) It fell below the 1948 recession in June 2009.
3) It hit bottom in February 2010.

Another company given government money goes bankrupt

Let's see, the government puts up $43 million of the $69 million needed and despite that the company can't raise all the remaining $26 million? Fox News reports:

An energy company that received a $43 million loan guarantee through the same federal program that backed Solyndra has followed the path of the failed solar firm and filed for bankruptcy.
Beacon Power Corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Sunday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. The company, which develops energy storage systems based on what are known as "flywheels," had received the federal guarantee for a 20-megawatt energy storage plant in Stephentown, N.Y., back in August 2010.
The loan was expected to cover the lion's share of the $69 million project, one of several that Beacon was developing across the country.
But the company's CEO said in a statement to the court that all those projects are "capital intensive," and the firm is struggling to attract the additional investment needed to keep everything running. The fact that the company faced being de-listed from the NASDAQ didn't help, he said. . . .

Obama knew that there would be serious legal problems with an insurance mandate

It would be nice to think that the Supreme Court was told about Obama's own doubts about the legality of the insurance mandate. Note that Obama never publicly stated his doubts about the legality of his center piece legislation.

DeParle, in her memo, stressed that Obama should embrace a plan much like that in Massachusetts, driven by the teeth of a mandate, where individuals would be fined for not having health insurance. Obama, never much for the mandate, was concerned about legal challenges to it but was impressed by DeParle’s coverage numbers. . . . . But the mandate, with its various features, was expensive, adding an estimated $287 billion across ten years to the total cost. . . .

Suskind, Ron (2011-09-20). Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President (Kindle Locations 5796-5801). Harper. Kindle Edition.

Crime against college students versus others of the same age

There are several interesting points here. Serious violent crime against non-college students is 50 percent higher than for college students, and the relative relationship is true across the board -- all violent crimes against non-college students are higher than for college students. College males students are raped at a much higher rate relative to female students compared to the same ratio of non-college students (a 1 to 4 ratio for college students versus a 1 to 16 ratio for non-college students). If it is relatlvely more embarrassing for men to report rapes, the rapes against men might be significantly underreported. Other and Hispanic non-students have a much lower violent crime rate committed against them then other non-students.

Chicago Purchasing Managers Index falls

The media headlines have managed to put a generally positive spin on this news about slower growth.

The U.S. economy expanded at a slower pace in October, while revealing low inflation and an improvement in the employment sector, a survey of Chicago area purchasing managers showed Monday.
The Chicago Business Barometer fell to 58.4 in October, the lowest reading since May, the Institute for Supply Management-Chicago reported Monday.
The barometer, also known as the Chicago Purchasing Managers Index or PMI, had been at 60.4 in September.
The latest figure was below analysts' forecasts. The consensus estimate of economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires projected the business barometer would slip to 59.8 in October. . . .

Is housing heading down again?

From CNN:

The besieged housing market has even further to fall before home prices really hit rock bottom.
According to Fiserv (FISV), a financial analytics company, home values are expected to fall another 3.6% by next June, pushing them to a new low of 35% below the peak reached in early 2006 and marking a triple dip in prices.
Several factors will be working against the housing market in the upcoming months, including an increase in foreclosure activity and sustained high unemployment, explained David Stiff, Fiserv's chief economist.
Should home values meet Fiserv's expectations, it would make it the third (and lowest) trough for home prices since the housing bubble burst. . . .

The most "open administration in history" wants to weaken the Freedom of Information Act

Will the media pounce on this?

. . . Obama's Justice Department has proposed a regulatory change that would weaken the Freedom of Information Act. Under the new rules, the government could falsely respond to those who file FOIA requests that a document does not exist if it pertains to an ongoing criminal investigation, concerns a terrorist organization, or a counterintelligence operation involving a foreign nation.
There are two problems with the Obama proposal to allow federal officials to affirmatively assert that a requested document doesn't exist when it does. First, by not citing a specific exemption allowed under the FOIA as grounds for denying a request, the proposal would cut off a requestor from appealing to the courts. By thus creating an area of federal activity that is completely exempt from judicial review, the proposal undercuts due process and other constitutional protections. . . .

"Sheriff: Time For Citizens To Arm Themselves"

A South Carolina Sheriff knows his officers have an important job, but he also knows that they can't be everywhere.

The Spartanburg County Sheriff is known for speaking his mind, and at a news conference on Monday, he didn't hold back his anger and frustration after a woman was attacked in a park over the weekend.
Investigators said 46-year-old Walter Lance grabbed a woman who was walking her dog in Milliken Park on Sunday afternoon. They said Lance choked the woman, made her take off her clothing and tried to rape her. (Full Story)
Lance is in custody and was denied bond on Monday.
Sheriff Chuck Wright opened his news conference by saying, "Our form of justice is not making it," and he said, "I'm really aggravated."
He said, "Carry a concealed weapon. That'll fix it."
Wright said Lance had been charged numerous times with crimes again women, and other crimes such as resisting arrest and escape. Wright said Lance had been on probation for a federal gun charge.
He referred to Lance repeatedly as an "animal," and expressed his disgust about Lance's long record and the attack.
He said Lance "doesn't fight police or men folk -- he just goes after women." He said Lance is not married because, "No woman can stay married to him because he beats them down too much."
Wright said, "This is a horrific crime … her life was threatened so many times." . . .

Thanks very much to AJ Troglio for this link.

See also this piece from Fox News.

Something from the liberal Tax Policy Center

Should the Payroll Tax be included in this? Probably not since liberals would argue that this program is tied to specific benefits and especially since the benefits are strongly tilted towards the poor. But the point is that even including these taxes, the tax rate is quite progressive.

Without the payroll tax, the middle quintile has a tax rate of 4.1 percent and the top 0.1 percent a rate of 29.7 percent. Talk about progressively, that is a difference of 7.24 times. Comparing the fourth quintile to the top 0.1 percent is 8.4 to 29.7, a difference 3.54 times.

The original discussion and figure available here.

Discussing Canada's gun registry program on the Sun News Network

A video of the interview can be seen here.

Why does the government think that it can do a better job of advertising job openings?

Who really thinks that the government can do a better job on this? From the WSJ:

The Obama Administration is outputting job-creation proposals at Twitter-speed and ridiculing Republicans for not signing onto the whole package. Which brings us to an already up-and-running federal jobs program called USAJobs.gov. Well, up-and-running is an overstatement.

Americans in search of federal employment can go to a website called USAJobs.gov, which matches openings with applicants. Since 2004, the feds have outsourced the site's operation to Monster.com. Good call by whoever was in charge in 2004. Monster.com is the private company that pioneered employment websites and is today the largest job search engine in the world.

But 18 months ago the "smart" Obama Office of Personnel Management decided the federal government could do a better job of running USAJobs.gov. It spent some $6 million developing a new in-house version of the site, promising to improve the job-search experience. It unveiled its creation two weeks ago. It's a monster all right.

The volume of requests instantly crushed government servers, slowed the system and locked out thousands of applicants. Naturally, the site has a Facebook page. Naturally, the comment queue is boiling over. Examples:

"Why am I having to do the same search 3 times before anything shows up?" "Over one week now and I still haven't received my password reset email!!" "USAJOBS WEB SITE IS A DISASTER!" "I entered Delaware and got Germany jobs and all of the Forest Service." . . .

CNN's John King: "Obama Is Business As Usual Washington Style"

Here is the problem with John King's presentation. Obama demonizes lobbyists, promising not to take money from them and promises changes. Then he clearly breaks his promises. John King views this as the same or not as bad as Republicans, but Republicans never made the promises that Obama made.

Real Clear Politics: Obama uses "Occupy Wall Street" Language in Weekly Address

Real Clear Politics frames it this way: "Obama Uses Occupy Lingo In Weekly Address To Nation"

Pelosi defends 1,800 waivers as primarily being given to "very, very small" firms

From Real Clear Politics (with video):

"They're small. I couldn't speak to all 1,800 of them, but some of the lists that I have seen have been very, very small companies. They will not have a big impact on the economy of our country," Nancy Pelosi said in an interview with CNBC.

McDonalds, one of the nation's largest employers in recent years, has received a waiver.

"Obama Adviser Tied to Firm That Won Loan"

The appearance of corruption used to be a rallying cry for Democrats.

An investment firm whose vice chairman has been an adviser and fundraiser for President Obama saw one of its portfolio companies win approval this year for $50 million in loans from the administration’s clean-energy loan program.

Washington-based Perseus says its affiliation with James A. Johnson, a major fundraiser for Obama’s campaign, played no role in persuading the Energy Department to award the loan to Vehicle Production Group, a Miami start-up that is manufacturing wheelchair-accessible cars and taxis. . . . .

Wacky Democrat Laws: Banning youtube videos of karaoke singing?

I thought that this was a joke the first time that I read this.

Justin Bieber says Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar should be "locked up" and led away in "handcuffs!"

And, we agree with him on this issue.

The senator (pictured, right) is trying to pass the "Bieber Bill," which would ban people from singing other people's songs -- specifically online, in places like YouTube.

"Whomever she is she needs to know that I'm saying she needs to be locked up," he told Clear Channel's Kane of The Kane Show today. "I just think that's ridiculous." . . .