Oil at an All Time Historical and Inflationary Adjusted High

Thank you environmentalist, leftist, democratic, socialist whackos.

Hat tip to WTRG Economics. Some outright amazing data on energy.

They Weren't Kidding About Those Wait Times

So when Obama gets elected on the backs of ignorant youth who think it cool to wear a Che Guevera t-shirt (and I don't care if I spelled his name wrong), he no doubt will start embarking on nationalized health care.

And one of those common mantra arguments you hear from the right is "do you know how long the wait times are for these countries with universal health care???" And although hypocritical, I'm more inclined to believe these arguments without confirming them as over the years of my life, the "right wing" arguments tend to prove true and leftist arguments tend to prove false. It's why I will take a capitalist or libertarian at their word and confirm what they claim at my leisure, and will listen to a socialist with an eyebrow raised, believing nothing they say until I can confirm it.

Regardless, thanks to a friendly Canadian, he pointed me in the direction of the Fraser Institute where they conducted a study on wait times in Canada. And it seems not only were they not joking about wait times being horribly long in Canada and other countries, but they're getting worse. Here are just two charts from the report (but the report is just full of charty goodness);






Now only if the OECD or some outfit had "wait times" as a measure we could compare different countries against.

But You Can't Incorporate Economic Growth

Here's a fun game to play;

Budget Hero.

Shows you, you can't just "spend a little bit more on health, education and children."

But it doesn't account for economic growth from lower taxes.

Canada About to Become More Capitalist Than the United States

I have had the honor of being invited to blog on Small Dead Animals, the premier Canadian web site for independent thought, conservative, free-market thinking, liberty and other sins. Thusly, since it is a Canadian web site, I decided I should make a post about Canada and thought as a kind of token "economics lesson of the day" I would describe the concept of "government spending as a percent of GDP."

The reason I like this measure is that it is "the" measure to gauge how "capitalistic" or "communistic" your economy is. If you take the government budget and divided it by GDP this shows you, more or less, what percent of the economy the government is taking. Now, a lot of people will point out that it should be government revenues, not expenditures that should be divided by GDP to see how much a country is "taxed." The problem is ultimately, whether it is debt spending today or actually taxes collected, taxes is what will inevitably pay for that spending. Thus I prefer to measure what the government spends, not what it takes in.

But imagine my surprise when I, Captain Capitalism, presumed knower-of-all-things-economic, pulled the figures for Canada and realized Canadians have the same tax level as the US. 37%.


It was shocking because Canada is supposed to be the socialist of North America and we're supposed to be the capitalists. Canada is the one with socialized medicine. Canada is the flag cowardly Americans put on their backpacks as they go to Europe. We're the evil capitalist jerks, Canada is the socialists everybody loves. And given the trend it looks like Canada is going to usurp this role.

If McCain Was Smart

He'd pay attention to an NBC poll (yes, MSM, not known for its bias to the right) and realize the silent majority is providing him is one way ticket to the presidency.




81% of Americans want to expand drilling for oil.

If that isn't a platform that runs against the Democrats, I don't know what is.

The Left is to Blame for High Gas Prices

Yeah, but those acres aren't where the oil is.

Seriously, this is the consequence of "going green" and brainwashing my generation with "Captain Planet" and the current generation with dying polar bears/global warming.

You leftists pushed for ethanol. You leftists voted in the democrats who have been against ANWAR and drilling WHERE THE OIL IS and shale drilling. You've been against building nuclear power plants. You've been against building refineries. You have effectively cut off the supply of energy (and don't tell me about wind or solar power). YOU are to blame, so don't bitch about the high price of gas or revert to your inane conspiracy theory argument and blame it on "big oil."

This is (as Rush Limbaugh says) the egregious price of your ignorance.

The question is whether you're going to get sick of $5 gallon gasoline and come around, or continue to force a low standard of living on the country to adhere to your psycho-pathological infatuation with environmentalism.

Sunspots Analysis

Great post and a good review if you want to basically have some handy ammo to shoot a big gapping hole in this global warming BS.

ht to Ian.

No, Seriously, Will We Blame China?

I opted to focus in on one particular aspect of the previous chart I posted before and I want to ask the left a serious question;

When China inevitably starts producing more carbon emissions than the US, will you go after them vehemently as you do the US? Because it's going to happen next year, 2009. Seriously, I want to know. Are there going to be protests? Are you going to contact the Chinese embassies? No doubt you are well researched enough on this that you already have plans to divert your efforts towards China? Right? Because you're so well researched? RIGHT? And we can expect mainstream media outlets to highlight China being the world's biggest carbon emitter hence forth, and not just independent publications The Economist, right????



No, wait, let me answer for you. You're not going to even expend one calorie of energy attacking China because the underlying, unspoken goal of this global warming farce is to stop capitalism. It's to stop progress. It's to weaken the United States. And it's to employ a bunch of otherwise unemployable scientists and activists and make people who've never contributed a cent of GDP to this economy feel good about themselves.

That's what it's all about.

Sunspots and Global Warming

Wow, who would have guessed. Sun spots increase along with global warming.


Though I'm sure, momentarily, I will be told by a socialist internet troll somewhere, some warped, illogical line of logic by which I should ignore my eyes, ignore what I see and believe in global warming anyway.

Oh, and I'm pre-emptively striking the "well, they couldn't measure sun spots back then as frequently as they do now." Though no doubt true, I'm going to assume the data above has been adjusted for that in some manner or another.

Many thanks to Marc!

Energy Hogs

Here's a Jim dandy chart to have in your arsenal whenst arguing against the socialists about global warming


(though, I seriously wonder whether you should even argue with them, and rather instead just accuse them of being disingenuous and hiding behind such a ruse as "global warming" to rationalize a wealth transfer. no, seriously, anybody even thing about that? Instead of trying to argue whether or not there is global warming, wouldn't it just be easier to go straight to the jugular and question their belief in it? To accuse them of being nothing more than desperate socialists willing to resort to the most outlandish conspiracy theories and methods to parasite off the producers of society? Ah, forget it, never mind, the amount of brainwashing kids get nowadays in school if they'll vote for somebody who promises "hope" and "change" and no means by which to deliver it, they'll fight to the death for something as a fear-mongering religion as global warming.)

Outstanding Picture from The Economist

Was from this article.



Yes, let us embrace diversity. Even if it results in a theocracy that destroys freedom.

This will be the consequence if we put diversity above freedom.

Achievements in Bachelortudeosity

In line with refusing to make my bed (as most of the time I sleep on my couch), I embarked on spring cleaning last week.

And one of the more annoying aspects of cleaning or keeping an abode clean is that if you technically want to keep your carpets clean, you should really take off your shoes.

This poses a problem for me in that I am always coming or going, and in Minnesota, particularly during winter, there is snow or slush, thus necessitating you take off your shoes before you traipse around the house, no matter how little time you must spend at home.

Thus, I employed an ingenious technique.

I would take all the junk mail I had and throw it on the floor. Any paper or print offs I had that I did not need, I would throw on the floor. This in essence made all the junk mail and paper my "area rug" and so if I needed to just make a call, grab some gear and head out once again, I would not be encumbered with taking off my shoes, but instead could just walk on the papers that had been laid down on the floor, conduct my business as needed, and then leave. Oh, sure, initially it was like a game of hopscotch where I would only have bits and pieces of paper leading to the fax, or leading to the computer, by which I would have to play a game of human frogger jumping from one piece of paper to the next to avoid touching the carpet, but after a couple weeks the floor was amply covered and I could gallivant about my house as I pleased without going through the torture of taking off my shoes.

Now, many of my friends critiqued me for this. They said my bachelor pad looked like I was trying to potty train a dog with all the papers on the ground. And "what happens if you have a date." To which I responded, "there's either her place or I'd much rather get a hotel room for $50 than spend the hours needed to clean." Which begat eyes rolling and some commentary about how I'll never find a girl and how hopeless I was, and girls don't like X-Box or a half polished off bottle of Jim Bean on the counter, why don't you conform and become a communist like the rest of us and do what society tells you and make your bed and go to church even though deep down inside women like the renegade bad ass, Tony Stark, Captain Jack Sparrow type blah blah blah...

But oh, how wrong they were.

For when I started my spring cleaning and pulled all the papers off the floor, the carpets were spotless. Beautiful. And not once this past year did I have to take off my shoes, thereby avoiding horrible psychological reminiscings of visiting grandma where they forced me to take off my shoes.

Oh, mock me if you must, but these economic bachelor like ways will certainly serve us bachelors well in the future. Besides, quite literally, girls will always prefer the guy who comes up with Captain Jack Sparrow-level-of-cleverness ideas like using junk mail as an area rug than some schmutz who always insists you take off your shoes before you walk on his precious little downtown condo's carpet.

World GDP v. World Oil Production

I was originally attempting a means by which to compare commodity prices like oil to a measure of production by which to determine whether a commodity is over or undervalued. Instead I just came up with another chart that explains (yet ONCE AGAIN) why it isn't Exxon or BP or "Big Oil" jacking up prices, as much as it is the fact the world economy is growing faster than oil production and therefore (revisiting the basics of economics 101 which most people don't get during their education) since demand is exceeding supply, prices have gone up.



They didn't have 2008 figures which I'd be curious to see with this last spike, but yeah, my apologies to all you freshmen and sophomores in college out there, apparently it isn't Dick Cheney and Haliburton just trying to piss you off. It's just simple economics.

Of course we could allow for drilling offshore or in ANWAR which would increase supply and thereby lower...oh heck, never mind. I'm foolishly assuming people care about lowering the price of oil when in reality these people want nothing more than to destroy the US economy.

There's Nothing Wrong With To Do Lists

The same girl that criticized me about ripping tags out of my shirt has now mocked me for my to do list.

Thus warranting the economic lesson about the merits of to do lists.

See, previous to "to do lists" people didn't know what to do. They were just standing around. Doing nothing. A lot like France. And then, an ingenious human came up with the idea to do things and thus composed the first to do list in the history of man.

He, along with other humans, started doing the things that were listed on the to do list. And thus production and GDP ensued and soon they were driving cars, brewing beer, programming video games and raising dachshunds. Yes, all the great things in life emanating from that first to do list.

Therefore, (on a more serious note) I am a big believer in to do lists. Much more gets done, more efficiency ensues, life gets easier and in general you are typically wealthier. I often opine what the economic consequences would be if society in general got into the good habits of putting together to do lists...heck I often opine what would happen to GDP production if women started dressing like Sophia Loren did back in the 40's. But, regardless, I would not be surprised if it resulted in a full 1-1.5% additional boost in economic growth. That translates into $140 -$210 billion in extra production.

Ahhh, but what a stupid idea. Like something as simple as to do lists would have any real economic consequence. Kind of like a "point and click interface" that would get rid of the need to know DOS.

Sub Prime Slime

Oft we think of "sub prime" as the bottom of the barrel types abusing the equity in their home as they lollygag between the bar and the trailer court.

Not so.

Suburbia is the primary culprit and abuser of the sub prime loans. This chart from the Federal Reserve (those of you not familiar with the Twin Cities area will need to know the "inner city" is barely on the map here and it is the suburbs marked in red) shows the prevalence of sub prime mortgages and they're all in the fancier zip codes.



City or burbs, the desire to avoid work, yet still consume what you want runs rampant.

Herman the Bunny

I was pouring a new concrete footing for one of the support pillars for my deck. It had to be about 3 feet deep and a foot across otherwise it would shift and fail to act as an anchor. So I dug a sizable hole, figured it was enough work for the day and retired.

Next day it rains cats and dogs and thinking the hole has now filled up a little bit, I returned to the hole to see how much re-digging I would have to do, only to see an baby bunny shivering in the hole. Figured the poor thing was there all night, doused in rain and scared to death.

Not wanting to get rabies, I got a shovel and returned to scoop the little critter out, but he wanted none of it. Additionally I didn't want to accidentally break any of his little rabbit legs by shoving the shovel underneath him to scoop him up. So I risked the chance of rabies and just picked the little guy up with my hands.

Poor thing was cold and shivering and so I put him in the sun, went inside the house and grabbed a carrot. I return and he's still there, shivering. I put the carrot next to him (which was almost bigger than he was) and he didn't do anything. All of the sudden he darts away from me, and slips back into the hole which was all of 4 feet away.

Now feeling like he was being dishonest with me (not to mention a pretty dumb bunny), I grabbed him out of the hole and put him near some shrubbery in my back yard and left the carrot there. A month goes by and I'm smoking my cigar and I see him eating my grass near the shrubs I dropped him off at. Grabbed a picture of him, and I'm now calling him "Herman the Bunny" and he is a fixture of the Captain's Bachelor Pad and is about the closest thing I want to a child (this one lives in the back yard and costs me nothing).



I mention Herman the Bunny because the people over at Snarkolepsy have one. You should check out some of the pictures.

Foreclosure Rates in Your Neighborhood

I found this chart pretty and informative.


Kind of like how I like my women...ahhh...Maria Bartiromo.

HOV's for SUV's

So I get a motorcycle.

Which means I can drive on the HOV lanes on the highway.

Which means during this last rush hour I was whizzing by practically a parking lot of cars.

But I found this odd in that, if you are to be a believer in global warming and so forth, then in all intellectual honesty the HOV lanes or "share lanes" should be open only to SUV's, trucks and other gas guzzlers. Reason being is the amount of carbon dioxide they emit just sitting there inching along at 1 mile per hour is more than if they were allowed to zip along in the HOV lanes, certainly more than what I would expend sitting there in my motorcycle or all the sensitive 90's men driving their hybrids.

So if we really do care about global warming and can admit that HOV's are pretty much a failed attempt at moving traffic along faster, then we should open them up only to SUV's, trucks and other vehicles consuming the most gas. This would lessen the amount of carbon emissions emanating from the interstate and we would do our part in fighting global warming.

I know it may sound outlandish, but it's true.

Tornadoes Determine Economic Growth

So it's tornado chasing season and I usually try to get out to chase some storms down because this is what really cool, hip economist type guys do to impress the girls. And while dabbling on the internet I found this chart that showed where tornadoes occur and it occurred to me it is a nearly identical match to which countries enjoy 1st world status. ie-where there is the most tornadic activity there is also the most economic growth. Heck, even South Korea is plagued with tornadoes, but it's evil communist twin to the north is not.


This can only mean one things. CAPITALISTS ARE CONTROLLING THE GLOBAL WARMING TO BRING MORE TORNADOES TO THEIR COUNTRIES AND THUS MORE ECONOMIC GROWTH!!!! Those greedy bastards! Hogging all the tornadic activity to themselves!

Of course, this is not much more outlandish than most theories tendered by leftists.

They Didn't Call it the Volcker Recession for Nothing

Wow, imagine that, the head of the Fed during the worst recession since the Great Depression endorses Obama. (I will immediately concede Paul Volcker was not responsible for the Volcker recession, I'm just taking a cheap shot...like most of the left does...except I'm not trying to pass it off as truth and maintain some level of intellectual honesty).