Did everyone forget we are in a recession?

I find it amazing at the disconnect between the "facts on the ground" and Repub policies. We are in a recession, right? Doesn't that imply we should stimulate the economy? It is consensus economics that this is true. But Repub policies go in the opposite direction. They are pursuing policies that will increase the severity of the recession, which means more job losses for a longer period of time. Didn't they run on increasing jobs? Everything they have done so far will have the effect of job loss. This is simply bizarre. What is worse is the American people losing sight of how we got here: Repub ideology.

"Elementary, my dear Watson"

One of the most important things that happened in the last week was not even political. Watson's defeat of the Jeopardy champs is very significant. The key development was getting past what AI researchers call the "frame problem," which is basically the ability to understand context, knowing when people mean "bat" as in baseball or "bat" as in flying rat. I remember some philosopher's near certainty that this was an insoluble problem. I'd be interested to see how they did it.

Double Posting to My Blog

My wonderful wife, Lyn, showed me how to cross post between my blog and Facebook, so all my posts will be in both places.

Censorship

Testing to see if I can post

Is Boehner nuts?

Boehner just said the U.S. has the best health system in the world. What has he been smoking? Oh yeah, he does smoke. Has he missed the whole health care discussion? 40 million uncovered? No pre-existing conditions covered? Most expensive system in the world, and the most red tape. That is the best in the world? I think not! He is just  a shill for the insurance companies. Disgusting. This is what people voted for? Maybe they don't like some of the details of the bill, but they were certainly not happy with what we had.

Good Morning Viet Nam!

Well, I'm in Viet Nam. Unfortunately they block Facebook. So people will have to come here for my blatherings. They are idiots for blocking it. This country is locked down. They have nothing to worry about. It is interesting that the south still regards itself as more free. They call the northerners communists. VN is much more modern than Cambodia. Cambodia is still recovering from Pol Pot and the civil war. But they are building like crazy. Some investors are going to make a killing--probably not the best choice of words for Cambodia :), but oh well. But returning to VN, my hotel is rather elegant. Dinner cost me $55! No more dinners here! But I get the impression that VN is more expensive that the rest of SE Asia. Tomorrow is the Cu Chi tunnels. I'm a bit claustrophobic, so it could get a but hairy.

Stuxnet

Did the U.S. just put the world on notice that we have some pretty clever geeks that can do some heavy damage to your system if you oppose us? Or did the Chinese do this in order to implicate the U.S.? Hard to say.