It's still six months away but I think the election results in November are already set in stone.

Obama is going to be the Democrat nominee--unless Hillary finally loses control and decapitates him prior to the convention.  Look for Obama to pick a VP candidate that is an elected politician and has Washington experience.  He's smart enough to know he needs that to counter the inexperience argument against him.  He can blow the whole thing with his choice though.  Hillary would be an albatross that would sink him.  Any other woman or minority will do the same.

Of course John McCain will be the Republican nominee.   He'll need the opposite VP candidate from what Obama needs.  He needs a young comer from the Republican party to counter the argument against his age.  I don't know of any such young comers in the GOP but somebody will dig up one.  He can blow this pick too by picking another McCain type established politician with some age on him.  But look for McCain to play up his experience, military experience and POW experience against Obama's lack of all that.  And well he should.

Obama will win the majority of the debates against McCain.  Maybe all of them.  He's a polished speaker and doesn't melt under pressure.  Unlike Al Gore who was stage managed into phoniness, Obama will overcome that same type management and pull off looking as what you see is what you get.  I'm in charge and in control.  Follow my lead.

Having said all of that the vote will be close but not that close.  Unless the economy turns around and I think that's very unlikely, it's going to be Obama.  He'll even take some Southern states.  The country has just had enough of high gas prices, foreclosures, high food prices, war, budget deficits, various scandals, energy issues and Cheneys and Rumsfelds.  So many issues in so little time.  Bush and Cheney have set the Reagan revolution way back and it won't return for a very long time.

President Barack Obama. 

A year from now that isn't going to sound as strange as it does now.

Here's an interesting column about the current state of our economy. 

I'm one of those in the 75% bracket of the public that think the economy is in bad shape.  It wouldn't be a stretch for me to say it's in very bad shape.  Apparently that would put me in the same opinion league with none other than Alan Greenspan. 

The author of this article acknowledges the current state of the economy but says that compared to the last hundred years of economic history it really isn't that bad.  I find that very interesting because to me it's at least comparable to the oil shortage economies of the seventies, etc. 

Anyway, he says something else is going on; namely a pessimism about both our economy and our political system that isn't in relation to the depth of the problem.  And that pessimism is eroding our confidence in ourselves and creating a negative viewpoint of us globally.  Essentially he pleads for us to keep our perspective.

I think he's got a point.  I believe we've become a nation of pessimists about ourselves and the American economic and political system.  But I think it's at least partially due to the constant pounding of negative news by the media, especially the television media.  In many ways Ted Turner's innovation with twenty four hour news is starting to blow back in our faces and it's smacking us pretty good. 

I'm glad I read his column.  We are Americans and we need to remember we can do anything that we decide we want to do.  That's the American spirit.  No other country possesses it.  We need to remember that.

It didn't get much coverage in the U.S. but last Friday Russia revived their Cold War and pre-Soviet breakup tradition of a Victory Day military parade in Red Square.   Tanks and missiles rolling past St. Basil's cathedral...how Russian is that?

When I was a kid in the fifties and sixties those parades were a staple of Russian culture and military posturing.  I can remember watching them on the old black and white Admiral television and having a vague feeling of unease about it.  Even at that young age I knew it was an ominous display of military might and that it was especially intended for American viewing.  Of course that was a long time ago and the Soviet Union is no more.  At least not in the form it was then.  I don't think we can even call the current Russia our clear number one enemy as we certainly could when I was growing up.  Our enemies these day tend toward religous zealots and economic barons of essential goods.

So it was interesting as I watched the revival of the parade last week.  One big difference was this time I watched in color.  An even greater difference was that I was actually in Red Square only nine months ago.  And coincidentally while I was there Putin's Air Force resumed long-range bomber patrols with much ado about that in the local news. 

As I watched the news clips of the parade last week I found it to be a bit disconcerting to know those tanks, missiles and other hardware were rolling through the very area where I stood not that long ago.  In some ways I found it incongruous with the country I visited, bombers flying over the very cathedrals that I walked through (and was totally awed by their beauty and history).

Clearly there was a message being sent last week.  Or at least Russia's leaders were attempting to do so:  Russia is once again a military power to be feared. I don't know if that is totally accurate but I'm not too anxious to find out. 

It was clear to me while I was there that the Russian people adored Putin for the most part.  It reminded me somewhat of the Reagan Presidency in our country.  Now he's no longer President but then again he really is--another throwback to the old Russia.  Who knows...maybe the new President will turn up banging his shoe on the desk in the UN.  Now wouldn't that be a hoot.  Truthfully?  No.

Oh, yeah, like I really needed to read this.

Handy for travelers and stay-at-homes both:  Weather Forecaster.

I'm flying to Boston next week.  Why do I always find stuff like  this right before I'm traveling?

I find this a little hard to believe.  I figure the only way somebody in Uganda can be that rich is drugs or corruption.  And BTW, put a military hat on that dude and he looks exactly like a young Idi Amin.

News of the Weird:  Kerosene-soaked man dies after lighting up in Japanese police station.

More NOTW:  From Nickelodeon merchandising has come a Spongebob Squarepants Musical Rectal Thermometer (which plays the Spongebob theme that the designer apparently imagines makes the temperature-taking process less unpleasant). [CartoonBrew.com, 2-19-08] 

Mother Nature was a bitch this weekend in Tennessee. 

Yesterday we got hit with winds up to sixty miles per hour.  Those winds then drove rain sideways.  The power got knocked out at our little country church and we dismissed early because of no lights.  Then on the way home I had to dodge fallen limbs in the road.  When I got home the wind had blown off one of the shutters on the Medlock mansion.  A number of the Bradford Pear trees and pine trees in the neighborhood lost large limbs.

Later I made a visit to our local home center to pick up some tall hibiscus for spring planting.  They were in five gallon buckets and stood about three feet tall.  As I was wheeling them on the little platform dolly to my truck the wind picked them up and blew them right off the dolly and sent them rolling down the parking lot.  These were not lightweight plants.  I'd guess maybe twenty to twenty-five pounds each.  That's how strong the wind was.

Whatever front came through yesterday left us with cold weather this morning.  It was in the forties, very cool for this time of year, and today it's only gotten to fifty-two degrees.  It's darn chilly.  Tomorrow  the high is supposed to be seventy-eight.  Go figure.

I'm not normally too nervous about bad weather but yesterday I was nervous.  Things just didn't feel right.  Even the air smelled funky and the air seemed unnaturally warm.  I was thinking tornado and kept looking out the window.  Sure enough I found out this morning there was a tornado on the ground yesterday about fifty miles away.  Luckily it was brief and no one was hurt.

I think Mother Nature has calmed down now.  She wasn't happy about something yesterday.  And it showed.

1.  Hillary Clinton at this point is like that friend you have or the person you work with that you don't want to talk to.  You and everyone else know that they're wrong in what they're doing or not doing but the person just keeps doing the same thing like everything is fine.  So you avoid them and when they bring up the issue you change the subject because you know nothing you can say will convince them that what they are doing is wrong.  Someone at the highest level of the Democratic party needs to tell her it's time to go home.  Besides Bill is looking awfully red-faced lately.  Having said that the person that tells her should accept the fact that they'll never be able to have children from that point on.  Yeah, she'll cut them right off.

2.  One of the reported big movers behind the scenes for the start of the Iraq War was Douglas Feith.  He's got a new book out called War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism.  Supposedly he tells all about the decisions prior to and during the war.  I've got the book on reserve at my local library because I think those decisions are some of the prime causes of W's failing as a President.  Reportedly Feith was a Rumsfeld man so it's going to be interesting to see how he sees the principal players.  I think Rumsfeld was the worst Secretary of Defense in my lifetime.  That's saying something because I can remember when Robert McNamara was SOD.

3.  I think the current record oil prices ($126 barrel as I write this) have gone beyond the law of supply and demand.  I believe that speculators trying to make a buck (more likely, many bucks) are behind much of this year's run-up in prices.  No, I don't have proof.  Most sources attribute the rise to demand increases from China and other countries.  I think that's part of it but I believe most of it is due to speculators.  I don't know how anyone can stop it but I do believe that eventually the prices are going to come down to a level more consistent with the real supply and demand.  And if and when they do I hope those speculators lose their ass.  In the meantime we need to do everything we can as consumers to reduce our dependence on oil and oil-related products.  That means major, major change for all of us.  We can do that or continue in the current status of being held hostage to the whim of every sheik, Mid East whacko leader or speculator. 

4.  And while I'm on the subject of energy isn't it time we start the long process of building nuclear power plants again?  The hysteria of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl is long gone.  Sure there are risks.  But they're like any risks.  They have to be managed and managed well.  Hell, the French get eighty percent of their power from nuclear plants and they're usually back asswards wrong on any issue.  But not this time.  It's time to start building nuclear plants in this country again.  And yeah, you can build one in my backyard.

5.  I know I'm sometimes naive but it's startling to me that in this modern world we still have governments who are so secretive and so afraid of losing control that they make their people suffer to an extreme.  I'm referring to the Myanmar or Burma as I know it.  As much as I think the U.S. government screwed the pooch after Katrina and it surely did I don't think you can compare the two situations.  We're talking a government who simply put their continued existence over survival of their citizens.   There's not a word that can describe this atrocity.

Finally some sanity about business buyouts.  And in a most unusual place--the dot.com world.  This column from PC World (link from Tom McMahon) advises Microsoft:

I couldn't agree more.  How could Yahoo be worth what GM and Ford is?  They don't have any tangible assets even close to GM and Ford's numbers.  The entire scenario of Microsoft buying Yahoo for the obscene amount of money they offered is just ridiculous.

If I were a Microsoft stockholder I'd be selling my stock right now.  Clearly their management has nothing else to do other than squander billions of Microsoft cash.  On the other hand if I were a stockholder of Yahoo I'd be raising hell with their management for not selling .  Sometimes the leaders of companies, even very successful ones, have entirely too much time and money on their hands. 

Of course Microsoft finally came to their senses and backed down.  I have no doubt they'll try another buyout though.  I give their management the stupid business trick of the year award for their effort.  Of course they have to share it with Yahoo because they're equally stupid for not selling at that price.

Here's some unusual Internet porn. Or maybe it's better to call it real estate porn.

Pacman Jones home south of Nashville is for sale.  That's because he's been traded to America's team.  Assuming he gets reinstated (a big if given Pac's behavior patterns) at some point he'll play for the Cowboys. 

Anyway there's thirty acres and a lake for sale but Southfork it ain't.   Here's an even better look: Pacman's Palace.  Click on the photo gallery and prepare to be amazed.

I'm hardly one to pass judgment on someone's taste but the outside of Pac's crib looks a bit like a small prison complex--something Freudian there for sure.  And the inside looks stark and bare.  I'd call it the neo- bachelor look.  What's up with all the bare hardwood floors?  Check out the brick arch in the living area with the black leather chair sitting inside.  Notice the picture hanging beside the door in that same room.  A little oversized, huh?  Couldn't Pac just make it rain at home one night and then tell the strippers to decorate?  Oh, wait, there's no stripper pole visible.  Maybe that's why he was always getting in trouble away from home.

It's all yours for a cool $1.8 million.  The line forms at any gentleman's club in Dallas.

Graduation was last Saturday and with the exception of a very small summer term group all the students have packed up and gone.  I think there might be one dormitory open and that's only because the baseball team is playing in their regional tournament.  Both the campus deli and the dining hall have closed.  One could find more food in Mogadishu than on this campus. 

The student workers in the administrative offices have left the buildings.  I'm guessing those functions have dramatically slowed.  Coaches, who are always out and about, have taken that term to a new level this week.  Strangely there was a crime reported very near the campus over the weekend.  Someone must have decided to beat themselves up.

I love it.  At least I do right now.  It's because I'm getting a lot more work done in a day than when everyone was here.  After fifteen weeks of dealing with mostly with recruiting (a drag) I'm finally able to start writing policies and procedures and plan my lessons for rules education.  In other words I'm starting to get at the primary work I was hired to do. 

It can be intimidating because there is a lot to do and for the most part I have to find my own way.  But that's also sort of pleasant because I'm blazing my own trail.  No doubt I will step into some manure along the way but it has to beat the turmoil that my buds in my former company are going through.  Today I had exactly one phone call and I missed it so it turned out to be a phone mail.  I think I received  three emails in eight hours.  Hell I used to get three emails a minute at my old employer.

Best of all I'm finally starting to feel better.  I'm not totally over my cold but I'm close.  I'm thinking about  working out in the school's weight room tonight.  It's been ten days so I'll take it easy.  A brisk two mile walk and maybe some time on the elliptical.  I've learned that my age doesn't take kindly to hard exercise after a cold as bad as this one has been.  I'm pretty sure there won't be anyone around because there hasn't been all week. 

Maybe I'll strip off the shirt and admire my bod in the mirror.  Probably not.  I could if I wanted to though.  School's out for summer.

Here's an interesting map of potential wind power locations in the United States.  I hadn't thought much about it but the Smokies appear to have excellent potential for windmills, etc.  Not that I would want to see windmills in those beautiful mountains.  No doubt someone is saying the exact same thing about the windmilll possibilities in the Great Plains.

That same dilemma is why we're so dependent on foreign oil.  Our elected politicians can't face up to these same hard decisions on the national level.  This editorial gets it exactly right:

But there's a difference between the citizenry not willing to make those decisions and our politicians.  The politicians are elected and getting paid to make them.  Of course, they haven't done that in a long time and for that we're paying nearly four dollars a gallon for gasoline.  Dysfunctional Congress?  A definite yes.  Vote the bums out in November.  Please.