Lost a friend today

Roy Ulrich was a family friend who lost his battle with cancer this morning.

Roy has known me most of my life and knew me when I had particularly long hair (longer than lately) and he admitted to me more than once that he hated it.

His wife Delores called me very early this morning and told me that Roy had passed away just a little bit earlier. I told her I was sorry to hear that and laid down in my bed thinking about my last conversation I had with Roy just a few days ago.

He asked me for a special favor for which I'm truly honored to do. He then said to me, "I don't know why I ever cared about your hair...after all...it's just hair."

This morning I had my hair cut off. Alot of it. Shaved my beard too...well mostly.

Roy gave me two gifts. A complete set of classical music CD's and a recording of the old radio show Have Gun Will Travel.

I asked Roy how he wanted to be remembered. This is what he told me:

I want to be remembered for being a simple man who worked hard, loved his family and loved God. I want to be a person who never acted more important than I really was.

Good bye Roy. You were a good friend to me and my family.

An Argument for NOT Auditing the Fed

The Federal Reserve relies on a great deal of misinformation, overstating and smoke and mirrors to obtain assets to put up against Treasury Bills. If the entire world were to know how full of sh*t they are...getting loans in the future would be downright impossible...and would make holding an annual public debt very difficult.

...oh wait...I accidently argued for it again. Dang. Nevermind.

More Federal Reserve Lunacy

Before you watch this video I'd like to explain why I'm showing it. This Democrat congressman is pursuing a more popular theme running through congress these days. What legal right does the Federal Reserve have to send dollars overseas in the form of credit? Does it require any Congressional scrutiny at all?

Bernanke is correct in his answer though. He's offsetting volatility in dollar markets globally. Why? Because congress insists on spending more than what it has. The treasury is broke so the Federal Reserve is in the business of procuring wealth, credit, and assets so that we can insanely finance wars and payoffs. The Federal Reserve doesn't make our insane policy, it reacts to our insane policy. Congress should look inward before it points at the bank for needing to take extreme measures to keep our monetary policy alive.

I'm not a fan of the central bank at all, but they're only part of the problem.

Hot here

Not like Midwest hot or Southwest hot...like Northwest hot. Not all that hot but we don't have many warm weather clothes. At least we're not wearing socks with our sandals.

Cool updates coming soon.

Seattle’s love for boondoggles

Welcome to Seattle. 

Seattle is a city that will vote repeatedly for a mass transit solution they want and never get it…while its leaders put together another system that was in debt 1 billion dollars before a single foot of track had been laid. 

Below is video from the Seattle Times that shows an invitation only Sounder Light rail ride for area reporters.  The video shows the mayor of Seattle beaming over the accomplishment of 2.3 billion dollars being spent on 14 miles of rail line that doesn’t YET go anywhere useful.

Even though it’s a waste of money, I hope to ride on it some day for fun.  As soon as it goes some place different than Tukwila.

The Dangly Bits Show

I'm co-hosting a half hour podcast every Thursday night called The Dangly Bits show which is a spill-over of the The Dave and Steve Show. We do on occasion talk about politics and current events. You can find the show every Friday posted on The Dave and Steve Show website.

Dave (of the show) has really given me the forum to shape a midweek show out of the loosely FM talkradio style format. It's light so don't expect some of the heaviness of this blog or my two attempts at podcasts from last year. Please give it a listen...you can stream to it from the website or look it up in the iTunes store.

Change?

Seven soldiers died in Afghanistan this week.

The longer we are in that country, the easier it will be for the Taliban and different militias to resent our presence and mobilize forces against us. Sadly, I'm afraid more will die there for no good reason.

If this bugs you then just close your eyes and repeat the following to yourself until you begin to feel better:

They hate us because of our freedoms.
They hate us because of our freedoms.
They hate us because of our freedoms.
They hate us because of our freedoms.
They hate us because of our freedoms.

All you Obama supporters that emailed me and told me he was the peace candidate have some splainin' to do.

Independence Day

I haven’t shared my artwork on this blog since my own attempt at making the world’s most offensive cartoon (from an earlier post) but I’ll give it another shot.  Below is a sidewalk chalk representation of Old Glory.

Some key differences I took artistic liberty with:

• 10 Stripes instead of 13.  If forced to justify this I’ll just consolidate the Carolinas and merge New York and New Jersey…oh and boot Georgia completely.
• There are pink stripes.  No this isn’t a gay rights protest nor is it promoting breast cancer awareness…I just didn’t have red chalk. 
• Only 25 Stars.  Again…if the secession movement takes off this may not be a big issue.

Hope you all enjoyed Independence Day.  Mine was pretty good like always.

Hooray Canada!

Happy Canada Day!

I asked someone recently if they knew what Canada Day was celebrating. They replied, "I think it's Canada's Independence day." Don't we take being independent so much for granted that we assume everyone has fought for it?

Not Canada though. They pretend to be free but as we saw this last year, the Queen can shut down their government if she so chooses. That's not all bad though as I wish she could shut ours down for a few months.

It's not unusual to see Canadian flags fly beneath or along side the US Flag in the Seattle area. It's been like that all my life. The cultural differences between the state of Washington and the province of British Columbia are negligible. We probably have less in common with Oregon frankly.

Have a great day Canadians! Enjoy whatever it is you're celebrating today but remember that the banks and liquor stores are closed.

Viva la Canada!