EppsNet

The most fitting eulogy I’ve read for Senator Kennedy . . .

A Senator from Massachusetts has left office in the only manner possible for an incumbent Democrat, i.e., in a coffin. The New York Times leads off their story on Ted Kennedy’s death with “his sometimes-stormy personal life.” When I think of Ted Kennedy, though, my first thought is always sadness at the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, a promising young woman killed by Kennedy, who waited more than eight hours before seeking help for her rescue. One expects politicians to impoverish constituents with reckless spending; one does not expect them to kill constituents. . . .

[Some friends asked today how I would have summarized Ted Kennedy's biography, if not the way the New York Times did. I observed that he had spent his entire life either as the child of a wealthy family or as a government employee. Never having held a job in the private sector and never having been exposed to the risk of losing a job or a paycheck (either as a child or an adult), he created many new laws and regulations on private businesses (most of the laws that apply to private employers do not apply to Senators themselves in their relations with staff). In his personal life, rather than donating to charity (source) or working directly with the unfortunate, he enjoyed drinking and partying. He drove a car off a bridge, trapping a young woman inside, managed to save his own skin, left her to die, and did not attempt to summon help that could have saved her.]

Update: I just noticed that Barack Obama gave a televised speech from Martha’s Vineyard in praise of Ted Kennedy. Though he was speaking just a few miles from where Mary Jo Kopechne died, President Obama did not mention her. Barack Obama did note that there was nobody in the Senate who had earned more “respect” and that he was one of “the most accomplished Americans ever to serve our democracy.” I guess if all of our government workers were similarly accomplished we would no longer have to worry about overpopulation.

— Philip Greenspun

The Moreno Valley is now the poster child for American housing gone wrong, and the New York Times weighed in with one of their stock magisterial pieces, the kinds that read purty but don’t say jack shit about reality. The Orange County connection is that two of the homeowners profiled in the piece moved to the MV because they couldn’t afford apartments in OC, which should clue the rest of the nation into how stupid they were to buy into Moreno Valley. Reporter Jennifer Steinhauer doesn’t note that even people in Colton ridicule Moreno Valley residents for living there. It’s not an area “filled with people priced out of Los Angeles and Orange Counties, or looking to escape louder, less-safe cities,” as the Times notes; it’s a place for fools who weren’t smart enough to buy a house in Calimesa. Shit, even Beaumont is better than Moreno Valley, and Beamount is sketchy.

— Gustavo Arellano, OC Weekly

[The New York Times piece is here.]

My fellow Americans –

Happy Independence Day to all of you!

Please take a few minutes on this day to look at a wonderful history lesson — about me! — by Maira Kalman, in which you’ll learn, among other things, that I actually wrote the Declaration of Independence!

Thanks,

Tom

Iranian envoys hoping to get a piece of American pie, or at least a hot dog, will have to wait. The invitations extended last month to Iranian officials to attend Fourth of July celebrations at American embassies have been rescinded, reports The Times’s Mark Landler.

— NYTimes.com

Credit: misscharo

I hope that’s because they continue to murder their own citizens in the streets and not just because they failed to RSVP in a timely manner.

I stand side by side with President Obama in my support for human rights and opposition to totalitarian autocracy!

NO IRANIAN DIPLOMATS WILL BE ALLOWED AT MY HOUSE FOR JULY 4 FESTIVITIES!

Oh yeah, we’re playing hardball now . . .

Phoenix has achieved the unwelcome distinction of becoming the first major American city where home prices have fallen in half since the market peaked in the middle of the decade, according to data released Tuesday.

— Home Prices Continued Their Decline in February – NYTimes.com

Money quote from Greg Swann, a Phoenix real estate agent: “We were living during the boom like there was no tomorrow. And guess what? Now it’s tomorrow.”

• RT @presentationzen: NYTimes on learning how to think. http://snipurl.com/enerw [Are you a "hedgehog" or a "fox"?] #
• RT @KathySierra: RT @magdaZINE “math without numbers” http://www.morenewmath.com/all/ #
• Speak always and only when you believe it will improve the general results/effort ratio: http://tinyurl.com/5z2rg6 #

We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times … and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK.

That’s not leadership. That’s not going to happen.

— Barack Obama, May 16, 2008

Mr. Obama, who hates the cold, had cranked up the thermostat.

“He’s from Hawaii, O.K.?” said Mr. Obama’s senior adviser, David Axelrod, who occupies the small but strategically located office next door to his boss. “He likes it warm. You could grow orchids in there.”

— The New York Times, January 28, 2009

The rising cost of college — even before the recession — threatens to put higher education out of reach for most Americans, according to the biennial report from the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

— NYTimes.com

Good! Long overdue!

There are way, way, way too many unqualified people getting college degrees. Higher education has been devalued to the point that you can’t swing a cat without knocking down some idiot with a graduate degree.

A NY Times business editor took an apparently intentional header off the 15th floor of the Times building.

Too bad he wasn’t the crossword editor, it would have made a better headline. You’d want to work the phrase “15 Down” into it . . .