But the art and mystery of banks is a wonderful improvement on that. It is established on the principle that “private debts are a public blessing”; that the evidences of those private debts, called bank notes, become active capital, and aliment the whole commerce, manufactures, and agriculture of the United States. Here are a set of people, for instance, who have bestowed on us the great blessing of running in our debt about two hundred millions of dollars, without our knowing who they are, where they are, or want property they have to pay this debt when called on; nay, who have made us so sensible of the blessings of letting them run in our debt, that we have exempted them by law from the repayment of these debts beyond a given proportion (generally estimated at one-third).
Into the Void
FTC – Annual Credit Report
FTC Consumer Information – Your Rights: Credit Reporting It’s a good idea to check your credit report every year. Please ignore TV commercials telling you about free credit reporting sites. Go to the Federal Trade Commission site and use only the web pages they recommend.
Death and Taxes
Well, unless I die sometime today, I’m going to e~file my 2007 Federal Return tonight. I use TurboTax because my brokerage recommends it. It’s not so bad, really. TurboTax has a scoreboard at the top of the screen that shows your progress. It’s kind of like a text adventure game where you’re trying to get […]
No hope…
No hope for help… | Oddly Enough | Reuters “I have a message for every homeowner worried about rising mortgage payments: The best you can do for your family is to call 1-800-995-HOPE,” … Bush said after a White House meeting with administration officials and lenders on a new plan to help. Unfortunately he was […]
You Too Can Make Gas Prices Higher
<rant> Email to someone I don’t even know who has been spamming me with chain letters. Date: Sun, 13 May 2007 09:57:50 -0400 To: ————- From: Leslie Subject: I’m blogging this. Thanks. Re: Gas War Did you write this in crayon? Or worse, did someone else write it in crayon and you merely forwarded it […]
Why didn’t I think of this?
And in the “Why didn’t I think of this?” category: UPS CIO: Driving cost savings by eliminating left-hand turns | CNET News.com
Extrapolated Salary
I graphed my salary from the Social Security Statement this morning. After diagnosis and meds, my salary increase faltered and I began to have steep drops in salary, usually corresponding to a period of unemployment, every three years. Just for giggles I’ve uploaded a gif of the graph. I let Excel do a logarithmic extrapolation […]
Kick ‘Em While They’re Down
In the grand American tradition of kicking them while they’re down, President Bush made a Proclamation last week that suspends the minimum wage laws for workers in the areas affected by Hurricane Katrina. Hell of a thing to do to people who have lost everything and want to rebuild. Here it is, right from the […]
Blood from a Stone
If there’s no global oil shortage, why is it necessary to go to extremes like extracting oil from shale? For years now they’ve been using water to flush out the dregs from near-depleted oil wells. It seems pretty obvious. There was a gas crisis in the mid-70’s where they went to even-odd day gas rationing. […]
The American Dream
The American Dream requires that you spend spend spend the future and hope that future earnings pay the debt.
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