Saturday, September 11, 2004

Recommended Reading

Frank Rich on refighting the Vietnam War.

• Posted at 10:56 PM · LINK

Powerless

The electricity was out for seven hours yesterday here. Today, I reset all my clocks and timers (I have a lot of things with timers on them) and then I threw out much of what was in my refrigerator, went to the market and restocked. I finished this around 2:00 in the afternoon and an hour later, the power went out here again...and stayed out until just before 9:30. Could it be more fun?

But you know what I kept thinking about through it all, while I was sitting and reading books by flashlight? I kept thinking this was a microscopic fraction of what some folks in Florida have been through lately...and may be about to experience again. It also dawned on me that compared to what happened to some other people not that long ago on this day, two long power outages is like luxury.

• Posted at 10:07 PM · LINK

Is the Economy Growing?

Let's find out. Last November, I posted this simple message on this site...

Is the economy really on a rebound? I'll believe that when more people start using Paypal to donate money to this site.

As I admitted here then, it brought in an awful lot of money. Alas, lately, things have changed. I've only received one Paypal donation here in the last six weeks...which suggests to me that the American economy is slowing down. So I am hereby soliciting contributions from those who enjoy this site and want to prove to me that the Bush tax cuts and other moves have improved the financial situaiton in this country. I'll report in a few days. This is at least as accurate as anything Alan Greenspan ever said.

• Posted at 2:23 AM · LINK