Temperatures - December 2009 vs. January 2010

As long as I was recording high and low temperatures, I decided I might as well blog some comparison charts.

I'll include the daily averages if I think it will add to or clarify the images.

We have an interesting visitor in our backyard today. A warbler. Specifically a Yellow-rumped Warbler. They commonly winter here in New Jersey but we don't usually see them in the backyard this time of the year. A single individual would go unnoticed in the crowd of sparrows, finches, dee-dees, tufties, etc.

Maybe it's Our Drinking Water?

When did a corporation morph into a person? When was a corporation granted the same rights of an individual citizen?

Thomas Jefferson saw it coming.

"In this respect England exhibits the most remarkable phenomenon in the universe in the contrast between the profligacy of it's government and the probity of it's citizens. And accordingly it is now exhibiting an example of the truth of the maxim that virtue & interest are inseparable. It ends, as might have been expected, in the ruin of it's people, but this ruin will fall heaviest, as it ought to fall on that hereditary aristocracy which has for generations been preparing the catastrophe. I hope we shall take warning from the example and crush in it's birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

Sidebar
After 34 Years, a Plainspoken Justice Gets Louder
By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: January 26, 2010
The New York Times

Justice John Paul Stevens, in what might be his final term, has crafted opinions that suggest the Supreme Court has lost touch with its sense of fair play.

Get the Mega-Money Out of Politics

Congress is a broken, dysfunctional, living on a different planet, worse than useless, institution. I have long ago concluded that there is only one bottom-line goal for our representatives in congress and that is to get re-elected. Nothing else matters anymore.

I have stopped believing that there is a practical solution for this mess. Sure, in theory, all that has to be done is separate the mega-money from campaigns. It would be far less expensive for the American taxpayer to set a limit to what can be spent on a congressional campaign and then write a check for every viable candidate for that amount. Campaigns don't have to cost hundreds of millions. TV and radio frequencies used to belong to the American public. Congress gave them away. Congress could take them back. Write a check for $10 million and put every S.O.B. in jail who violates it. Everyone. Every banker, wall-street tycoon, movie star, corporate sleaze-ball who has a congressman in their pocket.



Well you can see why this is going nowhere. When you sell your soul to the devil, there's no "do-overs". There's no "I-didn't-mean-like-forever."








After the Massachusetts Massacre
BY:
New York Times
OP-ED Columnist
Frank Rich
Published January 24, 2010

January is Cold and Frosty

My Sister's Warped Sense of Humor - 2

She forwards these great silly emails a few times every week. Among the groaners are some real gems...like this one:

The economy is so bad that:

I got a pre-declined credit card in the mail.

When I ordered a burger at McDonald's the kid behind the counter asked, "Can you afford fries with that?"

CEO's are now playing miniature golf.

If the bank returns your check marked "Insufficient Funds," you call them and ask if they meant you or them.

Hot Wheels and Matchbox stocks are trading higher than GM.

McDonald's is now selling the 1/4 ouncer.

Parents in Beverly Hills fired their nannies and learned their
children's names.

A truckload of Americans was caught sneaking into Mexico .

Dick Cheney took his stockbroker hunting.

Motel Six won't leave the light on anymore.

The Mafia is laying off judges and Exxon-Mobil laid off 25 Congressmen.

Congress says they are looking into this Bernard Madoff scandal.

Oh Great!! The guy who made $50 Billion disappear is being investigated by the people who made $1.5 Trillion disappear!

And, finally...

I was so depressed last night thinking about the economy, wars, jobs, my savings, Social Security, retirement funds, etc., I called the Suicide Lifeline. I got a call center in Pakistan, and when I told them I was suicidal, they got all excited, and asked if I could drive a truck.

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