Obama Stoops to New Lows, Republican Job Plans and life at 100

Workout notes Yoga, then 6 miles (plus) of running. I warmed up for 20 minutes (felt better than expected), did 9 goose loop laps (3.24 miles) via 4 x .5 harder, .22 easier, then .36 harder: 4:26, 4:16, 4:12, 4:10, then 2:59. 29:06 was the total. Then I walked about .25 miles and then jogged 1.2 miles back to the car. I felt ok, though I had some knee ache just about when I stopped. Funny, but when the knee starts to hurt I have to SPEED UP; what brings on the pain is when my legs get stiff and my legs get a bit too straight.

When I got home, I did some one legged squats, step ups and Achilles tendon exercises.

Thought
Yes, this 100 year old guy, Fauja Singh, finished a marathon. It took him 8 hours (though he did 5:40 as a 90 year old!). Well, I remembered that back in 2005, it took me about 8 hours to finish the last 26 miles of the Leanhorse 100 (29:34 was my total). The surface was a groomed crushed rock bike path. I was exhausted, sleep deprived and my feet were a sea of blisters due to the rocks that had gotten into my shoes and an improperly trimmed orthotic pad. I felt as if I were barely moving at all.

In other words, how I felt in the last 26 miles of a 100 miler is the way that a 100 year old feels all of the time! Oh my…

Today: a picture is worth 1000 words day!

How do we “know” stuff? Well, there you have it. Yes, these guys (in this New York Times article) are well intentioned, but the moment you start accepting “facts” without evidence you are on the road to trouble. These guys don’t seem to understand that the “unreasonable” evangelicals are the logical extension of what they are.

Republicans: PROOF THAT OBAMA STOOPS TO NEW LOWS!!!

Yes, the Republicans have a jobs plan.

Perspective. Ok, I am not even close to being in the 1 percent; statistically speaking my wife and I together are about the upper 15 percent. But while both of us have worked for our modest amount of success, both of us have had some lucky breaks along the way and have had some opportunities that are being denied to others.

Really, this shirt says “I am a hot woman and therefore can make a man act like an idiot anytime I want; hence I can get what I want”. Yes, there is evidence of that:

It seems all it takes for 75 percent of hackers and IT security professionals to hand over their personal online information is the seductive ways of a woman.

One would hope that IT workers on the frontlines of cybersecurity, as well as the technically adept hackers they battle, would know not to disclose personal information to a stranger they meet online. But that’s not the case, according to a new study by the security firm Bitdefender, which found that both groups are likely to hand over their personal details to the right online “friend,” especially if that friend is a woman.

Bitdefender researcher Sabina Datcu used a sample pool of 100 people, half from the IT security industry and the other half online criminals she found on underground cybercrime forums. To test how susceptible both groups were to scammers trolling for their online credentials such as passwords and phone numbers, Datcu created a fake profile of a 25-year-old woman, and then tailored it to each target group.

So while the fake woman’s photos and information remained the same, for the IT experts, the woman’s interests included security, psychology and literature, PCWorld reported. For the hackers, the woman was interested in psychology, reading news, “trying new things” and, of course, hacking.

After engaging the IT professionals and the hackers in an ongoing conversation online, Datcu’s test subjects began to trust the “woman” they were chatting with, and, eventually, the woman duped 75 percent of the survey subjects into handing over personal information such as addresses, phone numbers, details about their children and their parents’ names. Thirteen percent of the IT experts even sent the fake online woman various passwords to their online accounts.

Of course, Fox News uses this to their advantage:

Off to yoga class. Got back from yoga and a run; It wasn’t quite like this though these are poses that we do…of course this is a park district class and features mostly older parents and grannies and grandpas (myself included). But there are a few MILF’s and GILF’s there.

Best part: 3 minutes into it an onward, IMHO. Here is a screen shot from that period:

OWS: start of the needed conversation (though smaller than the Tea Party) and other topics

Science and Technology
Yes, Reiki works…as does “fake Reiki”…and the latter works equally well. The study was done on cancer patients. But the upshot: non-placebo treatments like massage provide benefits beyond placebo, though the Reiki study shows that perhaps people doing massage might learn and incorporate some of the “soothing” skills in their practice.

You might have heard of “sourcing”: this is when a company puts out a reward for someone out there to come up with an innovative solution to a problem. Unfortunately, criminals are adopting this technique as well.

Society: Friendly Atheist talks about a school teacher who was dismissed for making anti-gay comments on her own time on her own facebook page. I think that I agree with Friendly Atheist here….but wonder how I feel if what was being talked about was, say, racial equality. Supporting free speech isn’t always easy or comfortable.

Political Humor: Republicans

SNL is merciless to the Republicans and their debates…and to who is watching (yes, I’ll probably watch tomorrow’s as well). Yes, Mr. Santorum whined about this parody.

Occupy Wall Street
:

(click to see in full size at Daily Kos)

Robert Reich says that this starts a conversation that our politicians are NOT having. Reich points out that while President Obama is trying something, it is too small to be adequate and that the Republicans (and some blue dog Democrats) won’t pass it anyway. He goes on to say that people really are watching the Republican debates and being exposed to either “more of the same” or completely crackpot ideas (9-9-9).

Paul Krugman hopes that this ends the immunity that Wall Street has enjoyed among the Very Serious people.

Of course, Nate Silver points out that the OWS protests are no where near as large as the Tea Party rallies and, in terms of proportion of the population protesting, are more popular on the WEST coast of the US than anywhere else.

Republican Delusions
No, the new Nobel Prize winners are NOT anti-Keynesian:

The right was quick to claim this year’s economics Nobel as an anti-Keynesian prize. Chris Sims sets the record straight:

Professor Sims doesn’t want to be pigeonholed. “I’m not ‘non-Keynesian,’ ” he said, adding that he has been an active “promoter of new Keynesian macroeconomic models,” because they “are the place in our profession where theory and data and policy decision-making are coming together.”

“It doesn’t really make much sense to stand on the sidelines and take potshots at them,” he said. “If you don’t like the way they’re working, you should try to do better.”

He and Professor Sargent have been “trying to do empirical macroeconomics using formal tools of statistics,” he said. “Those tools aren’t in themselves ideological.”

Professor Sims spoke favorably of the Obama administration’s fiscal stimulus programs, which are Keynesian in their countercyclical spending. “An expansionary fiscal policy is probably what we need right now,” he said.

So, are the conservatives lying or do they merely don’t know what they are talking about? It is hard to tell at times; read how one of their “intellectuals” doesn’t know his head from his ass about what he is talking about (with regards to the “faster than light neutrino” claim). No, Mr. Krauthammer isn’t spouting nonsense for religious reasons (he isn’t religious and has spoken out against creationism and intelligent design). In this instance, he merely doesn’t know what he is talking about, and pretends that he does.

While we are on ridiculous Republicans: Lenoard Pitts talks about Herman Cain and how he is the type of black that conservatives like: he doesn’t speak out against racism or the inequities in society and the only time that you hear that he is black it is when he lectures other black people. Sure, Mr. Pitts is right when he admits that all too many minorities (including Mexicans) use racism as an excuse to not try one’s best or as an excuse to try to get out of trouble. But that is only one aspect of the situation.

Mitt Romney: Christopher Hitchens says “hell yeah”, Mr. Romney’s religion is a factor, even if its theology is no more nonsensical than other theologies. The problem is that Mormonism has a very recent openly anti-woman and racist history.

President Obama: he has accomplished some things that liberals like; it is tough to get credit for it though:

That same legislative package also contained sweeping changes in student aid policy that aimed to help more people attend college and complete degrees. Yet when Americans were asked how much they had heard about these changes, only 26 percent reported “a lot,” while 40 percent said “a little,” and fully 34 percent said “nothing at all.”

All told, the public seemed largely oblivious to the president’s major policy accomplishments.

Workouts: Centenarian Marathoner

Workout notes Weights plus a swim. Swim: 500 of fist/free (on 100 intervals; 2:10), 500 of back/free (on the 1:10), 500 steady in 9:06 (wanted to lap the lady in the next lane 3 times), then 500 of 25 drill, 25 free (fins); some of the drill was 3g. Then 200 pull to cool down.

The swim came after weights which was routine, except for the fact that I included dumbbell military presses (2 sets of 15 with 40 lb., 1 set of 10 standing with 45) in my first circuit (rotator cuff, pull downs, hammer rows and curls). I then went to the bench press and struggled badly; only 5 reps with 155, and 3 with 165. Doing military press prior to bench always hurts it a bit.

Centenarian Marathon: yes, a 100 year old man finished a marathon. Sure, it took him 8 hours, but so what. 100 years old and being able to MOVE is good. Click on the link to see the AP video. Hey, that is how I am moving at the end of my 100 milers!