I officially hate this version of WordPress.
Anyways, on to the Shorties! My main browser window is bursting with tabs, so pull up a diet soda and enjoy.
Follow up on Student Loans: Remember when I talked about how the student loan program was federally guaranteed because it needed to be, and that the current “crisis” started right about the time they shifted the program into the public sector and spun off Sallie Mae? Well we’ve got yet more fallout. “Apparently, Citibank, JP Morgan Chase, and several other major lenders have stopped providing student loans to students at many community colleges and some less-tony four year schools.” Here’s more via AMERICAblog. From a servicing standpoint, it does make more sense to lend more money to fewer students — they save money on paperwork, reporting, even mailing bills! From a risk standpoint, it makes less sense because it’s far, far less diverse and ignores the fact that these schools often have niche majors where the students are hired before graduation (I believe that DeanDad mentioned nursing; at my undergrad institution we had a tradition of producing music education majors and backstage theatre types). And from a society standpoint, just what we don’t need is to make it harder to get an education at the very schools whose mission often is to provide education to people who can’t afford the Big Uni experience.
The LA Times reports on Reality: Specifically, they point out His Name is Henry Paulson went to the Middle East not to beg for more oil production, but to beg for investment within the United States by the Sovereign Wealth Fund run by the government of Abu Dhabi. Next thing you know, they will talk about how much of the United States’ debt is owned by foreign nations like China (click on the link at the end of the first paragraph for a pie chart. mmPie).
What do you mean, you lost it? Well, apparently an entire lighthouse was misplaced back in the 1920s. Most people thought it was taken down, but it turns out to have been moved across the country, where it is still in use. I guess I still have a soft spot for lighthouses.
Sex and the Nation: The federal government still says that if our schools want money to teach adolescents about sex, they have to teach little more than Just Say No. Compared to the rest of the modern world, this makes us some kind of ostrich puritans. Even historically Catholic nation Mexico has embraced comprehensive sexual education, and so should we. I mean, unless we like having double the teen pregnancy rate of Canada.
I’ll drink to that: Yet more research that says red wine — and specifically the resveratrol it contains — is good for you and appears to help you live longer. Not news to me, but still good to know more research is confirming it.
John Bolton’s ideas are looking more quaint every day: Remember John Bolton? The guy we tried to send to the UN who said things like “There is no United Nations. There is an international community that occasionally can be led by the only real power left in the world, and that’s the United States, when it suits our interests, and when we can get others to go along”? Well, in today’s news “The Reverend Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, an outspoken leftist critic of the United States and a former foreign minister in Nicaragua’s Sandinista government, was elected president of the UN General Assembly. D’Escoto, 75, an American-born Roman Catholic priest, said he would not use his new position as a platform to disparage the United States, but he wasted no time in taking a few oblique swipes at Washington.”
Down on the Farm: I’ll leave it to Expert Ezra to talk about the Farm Bill.
A short film on video game violence: See commentary and a link to the video at GamePolitics.
I’ve got good news and bad news: It would seem that initial unemployment claims unexpectedly fell last week! Bloomberg concedes that might just be because the unemployment office was closed on Memorial Day.
What is hopefully the last Hillary round-up: I got the news in my email early this morning, and the New York times confirms that she will endorse Senator Obama on Saturday. As for her being the Vice Presidential candidate, Jimmy Carter and Robert Reich both say “don’t do that!” For some other reasons, well, I’ll let JurassicPork take that one. Don’t forget to scroll to reason #1.
The continuing adventures of Failboat: Fail Blog has had some great Failboats before, but this one is one of the best. How long until they add this one?
The First Computer Programmer: It turns out she — yes, she — was the daughter of Lord Byron. Meet Countess Lovelace, Ada Byron King, without whom Babbage’s machine would have been a complicated bit of scrap. Even though the machine was less powerful than many pocket calculators, “Ada predicted that a computing machine could compose music, draw graphics and find application, so to speak, in business and science.” You can read more about her at these links.
Treason: The Independent reports that “A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November.” This is against the will and the long term security of both the United States and Iraq. Permanent troops will not only limit our ability to respond to real threats to American security, they make it more difficult to recruit new military personnel, and they cost a lot of money. Furthermore, they act as a flashpoint worldwide, breathing evidence of an “occupation” that is resented by the overwhelming majority of Iraqis. This must not be allowed to come to pass.
And finally: War on Photography. You didn’t really want a picture of yourself in front of [insert monument here], did you? Because in the movies, terrorists take pictures….