Or “doing math for the MSM”.

Today is a story in the Washington Post about how the recent sales numbers of men’s underwear indicates something good in the economy.

Apparently there has been an uptick in sales in men’s underwear.
Apparently in hard times men will delay buying underwear.

Question. When did these recent hard times start?
So then when would men really get into the “have too” times of buying new underwear?

With that in mind does this make sense?

Mintel predicts that next year, men’s underwear sales will fall by 0.5 percent, [which is less than the current decline] and as with many economic indicators, a slowing of a decline can be welcomed as a step in the right direction

Right now men need underwear that they didn’t buy during the last 12 months.
Next year men will need underwear that they aren’t buying now.

Someone get these reporters a book of sense please. Or at least give their editors some real news to report.

Karl Rove

and

Nicholas Kristof

I – a normal nonwonky person with common sense, decent health insurance and my health yet with friends in differing situations – still think that cutting the chord between insurance and work, allowing people to pick and choose between policies across state lines, and allowing people to pick and choose amongst coverages including just opting for catastrophic care and disallowing the “rescission” Kristoff is talking about should do the trick.

1 – you’d solve a lot of the “youth” problem. Youth don’t want to pay a ton for insurance nor should they. But they do want coverage for cancer…….
2 – you’d solve the employee problem and losing your job and starting a new one or starting a business and unfair tax policies that come with this current situation
3 – I don’t need maternity coverage and I don’t want to pay for mental health coverage, so why do I have to pay for it? (lower prices)
4 – no – I should not be kicked off my policy because suddenly I need to use it. This could magically disappear if there were real competition by the way.

Ed Morrissey has the wrap up.

1. – foreign cars benefited the most while
2. – govt owned companies benefited not so well -why?
3. – with bankruptcy and govt ownership GM and Chrysler had less inventory due to their normal ramp up time in the fall for 2010 models.
4 – with 700,000 fewer American made cars on the road – how do you suppose the parts places are doing now?
5 – [me] this program stimulated alright. It stimulated people into remembering how well the government runs things.

Ok – I’ll delve because this administration is ticking me off.

Five years ago the CIA interrogation stuff was investigated. Repercussions ensued. Congress was asked for guidance. Congress said to follow the geneva conventions on these nonsignatory detainees. Ok said George. Should we go back and investigate further. No. Let’s look forward.

So because Health Care reform is dominating the news, we now have a new look backward. “Don’t forget everybody. Bush is the devil! See what he’s done!.” The NYTimes makes clear who they’re after.

As long as all this stuff is out in our papers and photographs of secret agents are being given to members of al-Qaeda, I’m going to suggest that instead of spending time on Health Care reform, that this Congress sit down and list exactly what is allowed and not allowed on differing levels of prisoners of war. Specifically.

Sure, “an elite interrogation unit” is now in charge of interrogations, but they’ll need to know specifics too. Can prisoners be “taunted repeatedly”? Can a woman enter the room? Can they be denied their holy book, whatever that may be? On higher level prisoners who most definitely have information – what exactly can be used to extract it? Reverse psychology? More severe taunting?

If we are going to choose to not have any sort of enhanced interrogation then that’s the decision that we get to live by. I don’t have a strong opinion about what works versus what doesn’t work, but then again I live safely in the middle of the country in a smallish town and probably will never be targeted. We need to make decisions and abide by them. And preferably not share them in the newspapers with the rest of the world.

And in the meantime you don’t get to change the rules of the past.

If you could actually get Congress to make this enumerated list, what happens 15 years from now when loud music is suddenly deemed torture? Do we go back and investigate? I don’t think so. So what the hell are we doing now?

Ignatius is probably right. The CIA is happy to be done with it all. I certainly would be. And just like in any large corporation with a culture of paranoia based on real incidences within, the CIA and now the FBI will become less and less willing to make actual decisions.

Dr. Zero of Hot Air share his anger in a good post on this here.

I feel for the sheepdogs in this world as they try to maneuver around us. We’ve apparently determined that while biting used to be ok, it isn’t anymore, so we’ll have to put you on trial. Or rather we’ve determined that since biting was sort of ok in the past but there were those who bit hard in the neck and were previously punished for doing so, we need to bring it up again in a public way to make certain that we’ve purged ourselves of your violent ways completely.

The big picture from my perspective.

In the past the right has “meddled” in Latin America, supporting rightist dictators that cater to the US no matter how they treat their own civilians. As a person who is about the age of Obama – I too learned this was bad.

If someone says they are “for the people”, then the left will support them no matter how loony they are and they are good. (Chavez)

Zelaya, after 3.4 years in office and 0.6 years to go said he was “for the people” and needed more time in office to “save the people”.

Honduras (their Congress, their Supreme Court, Zelaya’s own party) all said, no. “We’re not going to follow the road to leftist never ending regimes. Instead we’re going to follow the rule of law we set up to avoid this exact situation.”

(Hmmm – complexities. Let’s go with a knee jerk reaction.)
Obama, being a good leftist, supported the guy who said he was “for the people” instead of the laws of a Latin American country.

Now – groups of negotiators are trying to save the face of themselves who clearly backed the wrong side by coming up with an accord that they created out of thin air without actually speaking to Hondurans except maybe Zelaya.

Honduras (their Congress, their Supreme Court, Zelaya’s own party) said no.

Obama, being a good leftist has now stopped issuing visas in Honduras. Why?

The State Department’s decision completely ignores Honduras’s highest court’s specific reasons. [please click through to Fausta's blog with an interpretation and further explanation.] By exerting this kind of pressure on the country, the US basically has told the Honduran Supreme Court that whatever they rule does not count at all.

The US’s State Department insistence that a country contravene its own laws and Constitution makes no sense.

The only sense it makes is that Obama is doing this to “save face” himself for a decision he made to back Zelaya simply because Zelaya was “the leftist” and hence populist and hence anti George Bush side.

This is a piss poor way to be a president.

Do you all remember when $1 Trillion was a lot of money?
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One day we’ll remember when our intelligence agencies say “eff you” when asked to dig deeper.
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Do you remember the last election? And do you remember the insult to the blue collar workers from the left? Today they are getting a bit slapped from the right as we’re told:

the promise of economic help, and of protectionism, carried the day with them.

While I disagree with many particulars of this column, I do believe that Obama is not the man many thought he would be. I’m surprised by that because he’s exactly who I expected and it makes me wonder what other people missed.
I’m also surprised how people on the left can not see how the things they are requesting now would be feared by them if the right were in power.
(ht a loyal reader)
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Do you remember General McChrystal?
This is an article about what he’s working on now in Afghanistan. Good luck to you sir.