I'm more likely to keep it in.

Yeah, I'm not the most internal guy. Sometimes to my own detriment.

Yet oddly so many seem to support Bush, who doesn't have much a track record of shrinking the government.

This is the really mindbending part.

Sometimes to my own detriment.

And my style sometimes works to my detriment. No quarrels here.

Somebody said online "If there are no atheists in foxholes, there are also no libertarians when the levee breaks."

Sadly, this is proving false.

Nah. They just say neither party was able to build an effective levee. The wonderful thing about libertarians is that current events almost never sway their commitment to their ideology.

Mmmmm. Iced lemon cupcakes with lunch.

That was dessert. Lunch was lobster ravioli with wild mushrooms, as well as a shredded carrot-and-almond-and-cumin-and-currant salad.

Free.

I love "the cat's on the roof" joke and tell it quite frequently. If Nilly were here, she'd probably find where I told it on this very board.

Given that we are paying mercenaries a whole lot more than that to patrol New Orleans....argh! I may be overly suspicious, but I think the administration sees this as a way to get the minimum wage lowered. If they suspend it here and now, it's possible that a precedent will be set, and minimum wage will either stay suspended, stay at the new lower levels, or be suspended whenever the Executive feels like it.

It's been a while since I was really into the nitty-gritty of government contracting, but at a glance, I don't think this says what the linked site says it does.

The regulation in question states that the government must pay "prevailing wages" for a task/position. I.e., if the prevailing wage for electrician is $35/hour (numbers pulled out of my ass), then the government can't use it's position of strength to force contracts that pay $15 an hour. This is what's being suspended. And it still sucks. But it doesn't mean they can run around paying $2 an hour; it does mean that they're not tied into paying the $35 that might be in an existing contract.

I'm going back to read it again more carefully, so grain of salt this, but that's my initial take.

yummy, BHP!

I had a burrito that was not free. But it had its own burritoesque charms.

Did y'all catch that in the story about Michael Brown's resume stuffing, he called himself an Assistant City Manager when, in fact, his title was Assistant To The City Manager? Garth Keenan is running FEMA!

Certainly there are some government programs I would consider shrinking. I question the need for all but a minimal education department at the Federal level, I object to the program of using our military to install Islamic governments in the middle east, I'm against subsidising highly profitable industries, I think the overall military spending should be cut drastically to about three times more than any other country, and I think some farm subsidies are questionable.