Fwd: Stuff to Know on 19 September

1.  Obama has a problem with Solyndra, a campaign donor in a risky Green project making solar panels, that has gone bankrupt.  But, as this Washington Post Editorial points out, there is egg on faces all around.  Crap is an equal opportunity experience:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/capitalizing-on-venture-socialism/2011/09/16/gIQAQ7sYdK_print.html

2.  The issue of activities related to the 2nd Amendment always pop up.  Now, it comes up as allowing people to "pack heat" anywhere.  Okay, guns are fine - they help start revolutions, and stop revolts, usually by killing.  Everyone except law enforcement officers should not be allowed to pack heat.  Okay, hunters can carry a rifle, but there ought to be a law that says that there needs to be a wild game animal at least within 5 miles (or so).  Guns are just a dumb mechanical device.  People are complicated animals, and the difference between a law-abiding citizen and a felon is the nano-second pull of a trigger that launches a bullet:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/opinion/packing-heat-everywhere.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

3.  Bill Keller, the former Editor of the NY Times, is now a weekly contributor to the op-ed page.  His piece today is reflective of what he sees at the political landscape of today, and what to make of it, with his opinion on how it is to be seen and a bit as to how it should be received and where it should go:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/opinion/filling-in-the-blanks.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

4.  Paul Krugman.  Continuing to just pass on the NY Times Opinion page to you....well, why not?:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/opinion/economic-bleeding-cure.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

5.  Paul Volker - a man who has been there before - cautions against making policy by doing something stupid.  Stupid is no good public policy:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/19/opinion/a-little-inflation-can-be-a-dangerous-thing.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

6.  Cruel and Unusual?   Not quite punishment, but moving one's residence from Kona, Hawaii to the Tehachapi Mountains of California, is not punishment, but a chance to survive the creep of development.  Trading the landscape and climate of the Kona coast for Tehachapi is inhumane, but if you are a donkey in search of a place where no one is going to bother you, it's fine.   In the realm of politics, you don't see any Republicans being airlifted to California, but the Transpacific migration of Donkeys has started:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-donkey-airlift-20110918,0,7616199,print.story

7.  A Business Section writer for the LA Times opens up and out on Rick Perry's Social Security platform:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hiltzik-20110918,0,6371998,print.column

8.  Closing out today, we have a request to check into the conduct of the Supreme Court's Mr. Happy:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-thomas-20110916,0,1831761,print.story

--
Juan Matute

"The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work."
       -- Robert Frost

"An economist is a surgeon with an excellent scalpel and a rough-edged lancet, who operates beautifully on the dead and tortures the living."
       -- Nicholas Chamfort

"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
       -- Henry J. Tillman

"A motion to adjourn is always in order."
       -- Robert Heinlein