1/05/2014

Thoughts On A Sunday

The post-Storm Of Doom cleanup continues. Part of it includes clearing the slope of the driveway of ice and snow with the judicious use of ice-melt now that the temperatures are out of the single digits.

Why the hurry to remove the ice? It's simple really: propane.

We have a propane delivery some time this week and the propane truck won't be able to navigate the slope if it's ice covered. The delivery was postponed last week because of the ice, the driver and I agreeing that he might get his truck down the driveway but no way he would be able to get it back up to the road. (The Manse's driveway has a 22% grade, pretty steep under the best conditions.)

We aren't short on propane, having a little more than half a tank left, so if we can't pull of a delivery this coming week it won't leave us in dire straights as we heat The Manse with the woodstove most of the time. (It can't keep up when the temps are at 0ºF or lower, but it does a pretty good job the rest of the time.)

There's still snow to be removed from two of the three decks, something I'll have to get to because we have rain in the way later tonight and through tomorrow morning.

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By way of Glenn Reynolds come these disturbing unemployment numbers:

34% - The unemployment rate for Americans ages 16-17. The unemployment rate for teenage Hispanic Americans is 48%, and the rate for teenage Black Americans is 60%.

As the minimum wage has gone up so has the unemployment rate among teens as they are priced out of the job market. Should congressional Democrats get their way and get the minimum wage increased again, the unemployment numbers will only get worse, particularly for unskilled workers which includes the aforementioned teens.

When will they get it into their heads that minimum wage was never designed to allow a worker to support a family of four? It was to cover entry-level jobs, primarily those taken by teens. As the cost of labor goes up, particularly unskilled labor/entry-level positions, more employers will replace humans with machines as the machines are cheaper than people under those circumstances.

As I've said more than once, better a job at $7.25/hr than no job at $15/hr.

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But it's part of their culture, and therefore perfectly OK!

If these reports are true, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un had his uncle executed by stripping him naked and throwing him into a cage with 120 ravenous dogs to be eaten alive.

Nice folks, those Norks....

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You know it's bad in Detroit when the city's police chief is saying that citizens should arm themselves.

[Detroit Police Chief] Craig said he started believing that legal gun owners can deter crime when he became police chief in Portland, Maine, in 2009.

“Coming from California (Craig was on the Los Angeles police force for 28 years), where it takes an act of Congress to get a concealed weapon permit, I got to Maine, where they give out lots of CCWs (carrying concealed weapon permits), and I had a stack of CCW permits I was denying; that was my orientation.

“I changed my orientation real quick. Maine is one of the safest places in America. Clearly, suspects knew that good Americans were armed.”

The same is true of neighboring New Hampshire, which is a Shall Issue and open carry state, and Vermont, which requires no permit to carry concealed. Crime rates in all three states is low because criminals know citizens are armed. It's also likely the citizens are much better shots than criminals because they practice more often.

(H/T Maggie's Farm)

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The WSJ has an essay adapted from Glenn Reynolds' new book about the higher education bubble and how economics are forcing institutions of higher learning to adapt or die.

The higher education bubble is as insidious as the housing bubble was, leaving students in debt for an education that isn't worth what they spent on it. With some student debt in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, it's like paying a mortgage on a house you can't live in and can't sell. What's worse is that many of these indebted students ended up with degrees that won't find them jobs or with jobs that don't require college degrees, but the debt is still there.

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The New England Patriots had a bye week, giving them an extra week to heal up and practice before their playoff game next weekend.

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the lingering effects of the Storm Of Doom are still being felt, freezing rain is expected over night, and where once again Monday has returned too soon.