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These guys got a taste of $100 per barrel oil, and they’re finding it hard to get the taste out of their mouths, apparently, regardless of how the world economy is doing or whether or not demand for oil has slumped.

The following article says it the way it really is. These guys could care less about anything other than their own coffers. Which is exactly why the U.S. should put together a strategic plan for getting off foreign oil

A “severe” cut may be needed to halt the decline in prices

“Obama has reversed pledges to immediately repeal tax cuts for the wealthy and take on Big Oil. He’s hedged his call for a quick drawdown in Iraq. And he’s stocking his White House with anything but stalwarts of the left.”

The following article is pretty interesting. A lot of people months before the election said that Obama was not a liberal democrat but more conservative, something akin to the new democrat policies of Bill Clinton.  If you consider the fact that Obama referenced Ronald Reagan with praise and has selected HRC as his secretary of state, there may be something to this.

Liberals voice concerns about Obama

Where will President Obama stand on gun laws. This article answers a few questions, and muddies a few others.  This statement is particularly interesting: “I believe in common-sense gun safety laws, and I believe in the second amendment”. But so is his record in Illinois.

I own a couple of rifles and a handgun myself, not for hunting but for occasionally going to the range and doing shooting practice. Individuals I’ve spoken to at my local ranges had all predicted that a democrat victory in the Presidential race would mean a rush on guns and ammunition. Not surprising since the fear is that the old ban that limited clips to ten rounds may rear its head again.

What’s most interesting to me, however, is that Obama even addressed the topic, and did so as if to assuage fears. That wouldn’t seem to be for the benefit of his own constituents. Perhaps he won’t be as hard on gun laws as people think. Though, who really knows until his administration is up and running.

Obama says nothing to fear for Gun owners

Here are a few pages that were written and placed on Gather. Gather seems, to my mind, to be one of the best social media sites on the web. It’s easy to use, practical in design, and does what a social media site really should do (not all do) which is to encourage and facilitate conversation and the interchange of ideas. I’ve found it quite easy to find people on Gather who share similar interests and I like the fact that its so easy to read what other people write and to comment on it.

Social Security Disability Eligibility

What does social security consider in a disability case?

Can you get social security disability if your doctor writes a letter for you?

Being considered for social security disability

Having a social security disability attorney when you file 

Railroad disability claims seem to be approved at a substantially higher rate than any other form of disability benefit that I’m aware of. With regard to social security disability and SSI, about 1/3 of all claims are approved at the application level, while about half of all claims that are appealed to the hearing level are approved.

However, according to this article, when it comes to railroad disability claims filed at Long Island Rail Road, 97 percent of claims are approved. That is incredible. So incredible that “The FBI and New York attorney general have launched their own probes.”

Railroad disability approvals beat social security disability approvals by a mile

It seems to happen every year no matter how much I tell myself in advance that it won’t, that I will have the willpower to defy tempation, that I will stand firm against the onslaught of holiday feast odors and glorious visuals of meat dishes, side dishes, and various cakes, pies, and pastries.

I vowed, yet again, to resist the call. And I have failed again. I have gorged myself on food of the worst kind (nutritionally speaking, though from a childlike-need-for-basic-satisfaction perspective, this may be the best food).

What am I talking about? Chocolate cake, apple pie, chocolate silk pie, lemon meringue pie, and tons of mashed potatoes. And none of this is counting, of course, the day after thanksgiving which beget the infamous breakfast gathering of relatives and associated inlaws which, by definition beget pancakes and more pie.

Is there any way to mentally defeat these kinds of temptations? Am I too old for Jedi training?

A long time ago, I opted to use capchas on my blogs in order to make sure that the comments I would occasionally get were from actual people, versus automated programs. But you know what, even though the comment spam I get these days is from actual people instead of machines, I can’t tell that it’s any smarter. Usually, the posts are so imbelicic that it befuddles me that they would even think for a second that I would allow the comment.

The funny part is, they think they’ve gotten craftier by saying a things about my post before they launch into their pitch —

Ex: “That was a great post. I one hundred percent agree with your position. Have you ever had back pain? I know of one good site that offers reliable information on how to cure back pain. www.sleazy-scam-artist-site-posing-as-a-medical-information-site.com. You might want to try it out”

Where do these guys come from? Bizarro world?

There’s a phrase out there that applies to efforts designed around trying to get one’s website “seen” or “noticed” on the web, both by web users and by the search engines themselves. The phrase is SEO and it stands for search engine optimization.

SEO work can be done by a blogger, by an individual who owns a small website, or even by a company that performs services for other website owners, the goal being, of course, to achieve greater search visibility for sites owned by clients.

SEO in recent years has been a term synonymous with black hat, a phrase that is itself synonymous with tactics and methods that are generally frowned upon by search engines, mainly because they involve duplicity and generally do not work in the best interests of claimants.

And because this is the case, I was very fascinated today to find a blog that is written by an attorney who operates websites in one legal field that have the goal of attracting potential clients. This particular blog had nothing to do with his legal specialty, but, rather, was a blog that offered commentary on SEO.

I was amazed for a couple of reasons. First of all, it told me clearly that this attorney, who operates in the area of social security disability, does his own SEO work, versus farming everything out to SEO companies, many of whom are either not legit, or will engage in practices (often unbeknownst to clients) that are not-ok with search engines and run an unacceptably high risk of later bringing sanctions down upon site owners. Second, it told me that this social security disability attorney has an intrinsic interest in optimizing for the web.

That, my friends, is fairly amazing and very rare. And I would think the attorney in question stands heads and shoulders above his peers in the social security disability web niche. Because in that arena, very few attorneys are astute enough to do their own web work. Instead, they typically send everything “out”.

In fact, I know of at least a couple of disability attorneys who don’t even know how to blog themselves. They simply write their posts, email them to their “web guys” and wait on them to put the posts online.

…The U.S. government’s latest bailout package totals $800 billion dollars. $500 billion will go to buy mortgage backed securities, $200 billion will go to holders of investments backed by consumer loans, and $100 billion will take over debt currently held by fannie mae and freddie mac.

…the rate of cancer has begun to delcine for the first time ever since these rates were first recorded. However, researchers say the downturn in incidence may be related to the economy as fewer people feel comfortable with paying for screening tests.

…researchers at Harvard have stated that 365,000 lives could have been saved if the south african government had provided AIDS medications to patients, including pregnant women.

…the McDonald’s cheeseburger, in a sign of rising costs…will now cost $1.19 instead of $1.00

Before I begin this post, I have one question: is friendster alway this freaking slow? I mean, come on, this is pretty damn slow.

Ok, back on target. I just read an article (Sovereign wealth funds switch from Western investments), the point of which seems to be that a lot of that massive credit that we’ve been leaning on may be to the point where it’s no more. I’m talking about the middle east, and more specifially sovereign wealth funds.

Articles like this make me wonder all sorts of unpleasant thoughts, like what would happen if the U.S. government found that the market for treasuries suddenly dried up, i.e. no foreign governments willing to buy our bonds anymore. We simply couldn’t run our system anymore. The nation would come to a screeching halt.

Which begs the question for a non-economics major (history degree) such as myself—why the $%* are we in this position? We the #$*&% does our system run on perpetual debt? Why is it that we can’t, as a nation, pay our freakin’ bills? Why does our government have so many obligations that it can’t operate without massive borrowing from abroad each and every year?