I must really be behind the times. I came across a link to the web site congressmanwithguts.com. This in turn led me to the old video above. I had no idea that Rep. Grayson was making such a splash.

After you look at the cartoons below, remember to come back here and visit the link to the story Photos Show Palin To Be a Serial Teleprompter User

Follow this link to the article on Yahoo! news.

I recently received the following email. It has links to the Health Care Action Center. It is really easy to use those links to send a message to your Congress people letting them know how you feel about moving the process along.

Steven — A few days ago, President Obama told a story about an OFA supporter in St. Louis who had volunteered during the campaign and organized her community for health reform, but recently succumbed to breast cancer. She didn’t have quality insurance, so she put off crucial exams and didn’t catch it early enough. And while she fought cancer, she also spent her final months fighting for a chance at health reform so others wouldn’t go through the same thing. The President told this story to remind Congress, the nation, and us: We can’t tell her family we’re giving up on reform because it’s too hard, or too risky. Congress is weighing options and hearing plenty of special interest voices telling them to give up. They need to understand that their constituents want them to keep fighting. So today, we’re relaunching our Health Care Action Center to give you all the tools and information you need to fight for reform. At the Action Center, you can make calls, write letters, speak out in your community, and weigh in directly with Congress. There’s information about what the President stands for, and personal stories that show why reform is so important. So check it out today: http://my.barackobama.com/Action Many of our senators and representatives are working overtime to gather support for a final bill and pass reform, and they should know we’re standing with them. And the rest need to understand their constituents still demand action. We’re so close to real reform — we can’t stop now. Thanks for making it possible, Mitch Mitch Stewart Director Organizing for America

Paid for by Organizing for America, a project of the Democratic National Committee — 430 South Capitol Street SE, Washington, D.C. 20003. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee. This email was sent to: steve@ssgreenberg.name

Follow this link to the story on the Wall Street Journal. Let me know if this link should break.

China heralded a major bust of computer hackers to underscore its pledge to help enhance global online security, with state media saying officials had shut what they called the country’s largest distributor of tools used in malicious Internet attacks.

I am beginning to wonder if my suspicion mentioned in the comment of the post More On Chinese Computer Hacking may have been true, that the recent stories of Chinese government hacking have been propaganda put out by the west.

Follow this link to the article on The Boston Globe’s web page.

How cognitive fluency shapes what we believe, how we invest, and who will become a supermodel.

This little teaser is more realistic than the phony one with which they start the article:

Imagine that your stockbroker – or the friend who’s always giving you stock tips – called and told you he had come up with a new investment strategy. Price-to-earnings ratios, debt levels, management, competition, what the company makes, and how well it makes it, all those considerations go out the window. The new strategy is this: Invest in companies with names that are very easy to pronounce.

This would probably not strike you as a great idea. But, if recent research is to be believed, it might just be brilliant.

I do not know, yet, how this will influence the way this blog is written.

As Nicholas Taleb said in his book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, people are on much firmer ground when they describe an observation than when they try to explain the reason for it.  The explanations in this article about  why certain behavior might occur look more like confabulation to me than the actual reasons.  So read the article for the description of the phenomena themselves and file the explanations of the reasons for the phenomena in the little round file.

The discussion of picking stocks might be better worded as follows:

If you were going to pick a few stocks for your portfolio by random selection instead of by traditional measures of quality, you would be better off if you at least chose the stocks that were easier to pronounce.  Of course you would be a fool to pick stocks this way.

Follow this link to the article that explains Senator Richard Shelby (R. Ala.) has put a hold on  nominees to be the top Intelligence officers at the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security as well as the number three civilian at the Pentagon.

The reason for the hold amounts to extortion on Shelby’s part.  There is a $35 billion defense contract that he wants in his state and he doesn’t seem to care what he has to do to extort it.

I imagine I am not the only one who is starting to wonder why the Senate has to give in to this crap.

The harm that these rules produce probably far out weighs the harm that they prevent.

Follow this link to see what the White house has to say about this.

Follow this link to the facebook page about Melanie Shouse.

Melanie was a tireless activist who fought until losing her battle with cancer on Jan. 30. She was fighting…because she understood that there were others coming behind her. President Obama

The article By Michael Sorkin St. Louis Post-Dispatch clarifies further the significance of Melanie Shouse.

On Thursday night, President Obama cited her case in promising to continue working for health care legislation.

In a speech, Obama spoke of Shouse’s death and her obituary in the Post-Dispatch.

How can I say to her … ‘We’re giving up’? Obama said.

I believe the Obama speech to which the article refers is the one in my post A Conversation With The President