Take out the speculators.

Make it a requirement that only those who actually are hedging their use and sale of oil and gas are able to buy and sell oil and gas futures.

Its that simple. There is plenty of liquidity in place, the market wont miss the speculators and prices will go down.

It amazes me that while watching all the talk about oil prices on the QVC for stocks channels, that no one I have heard has talked about the role of speculators. They think its a problem for housing, even though 70 pct or more of new housing purchases are homes for the buyers. For some reason the “pundits” seem to think that price movements are driven purely by supply and demand for the commodity. What nonsense.

Thats like saying no one ever speculates on stocks. That speculators had nothing to do with the internet stock bubble.

[via Blog Maverick]

From one angle, "reality" often seems like a place marked by scarcity -- a place where there isn't enough to go around, where there isn't always room. But from another angle, the reality is this: Whether there is "enough" for everyone depends on how we define "enough." Whether there is room for others depends on whether we will make room.

There's always room.

[via slacktivist]

Double the Fun?

We are so used to the vicarious compassion and anxiety and outrage we feel for universally shared news stories. It's not quite right to say that those are feelings meant for consumption in the safety of one's living room, because they can prompt people to real actions -- to collect supplies for donation to hurricane victims, to jump on a plane and fly into a war zone. But imagine how it turns things inside out to be feeling that distanced, packaged emotion for yourself and your fellow passengers, weirdly layered over your immediate fear. The plane is inside the screen, and you, watching the screen, are inside the plane.

[via Ambivablog]

Floating Icons

In the first flood of photos documenting the effects of Hurricane Katrina, I hadn't noticed how many struck a religious theme. Looking more closely, however, there were any number of floating icons, windswept priests, home made signs appealing for mercy, and churches with roofs blown off and spires folded over.

As humble as these images were, it made me think they might represent a different presence for religion. After years of being preached to by this government and threatened with hell fire, perhaps a new order had arrived. Maybe the Almighty him- (or her-) self had decided to step down from the Bush team.

Whatever it was, the failure of the government to respond effectively to human suffering couldn't have done more to erode the far right's claim to the moral high ground. At the same time, just the perception that racial and economic demographics was a variable in the application of "compassionate conservatism" couldn't have been more damning.

Looking back at Katrina, it's possible one of the profound effects will be the neutralizing of God as a right wing asset.[via BAGnewsNotes, HT: Street Prophets]

Real Wedge Issues

I cannot stand the smugness of liberals. I cannot stand the sanctimony of conservatives. I like the sweetness and basic kindness of liberals, even when they are hopeless ninnies. I like the strength and conviction of conservatives, but not when it turns them mean....

Ideology is brain death. Ideology is cement poured in the ears.

What unites us in the Mighty Middle is not lock-step agreement, but a willingness to keep our minds open, to eschew ideology, to look at the facts, to re-evaluate from time to time, to fight like hell when we think we're right but also to listen to the "other" side because you know, it's just possible the other side is more right. I happen to be a Democrat, but there are plenty of Republicans out here in the middle, too.

Odds are you think I'm wrong about at least one issue. And I don't want to shock you, but I probably am wrong about at least one issue. Unlike the ideologues of Left and Right, I don't claim to have The One and Only Truth.... You're entitled to your opinion, but you're not entitled to an unchallenged opinion.

There's really only one requirement for membership in the Mighty Middle: you have to love truth more than certainty. Start there and you'll find you can't squeeze into either the Left or the Right wings.

[via , HT: CommonSenseDesk]

Silence Instead

There is an ever-increasing crowd around, of the people who try to protect my interests. In fact, the people who claim to protect the interests of others could, apparently, outnumber them. Every person you meet talks like an activist, and tries to make you one. Some of them have come from far away countries, as if fewer people have been left in their own countries with unprotected interests. They all claim to be fighting here on my behalf: And not by words alone, at that, at times....

Sometimes it gladdens me to find that - unlike I often assumed - I am not alone to protect my interests.

But it can not remain so strident for ever, as I may loose my sanity. Sooner or later, this fact will be recognized. And I hope a few of the people, protecting my interests, will see the futility of the whole matter, and give up. Also, that, the remaining few, tenacious enough to not give up, will agree on something that will be in the best interest of mine.

That day possibly the things will become quieter, if not silent. It is the silence that I seek as an answer to my silence. But I only get more words that I am not supposed to answer.

[via humour]

Entrenched

Slavery is anything that makes anyone feel less than human.

I say our guilt remains.

[via Unedited Ravings]

Meanwhile, in the comments...

You've defined a problem but offered no solution. Not very helpful. I trust you do better in business....Congratulations, you are now no better than those who judge an entire ethnic group to be lazy or dishonest.

by Ad eundum quo nemo ante iit...

Middle Grounding...

I find this kind of labelling is rather narcissistic. When labelling others "liberal" or "conservative" it is always relative to our own position. I become the mean point, so to speak, on the liberal/conservative scale; everyone is right or left of me.

[via The Eagle & Child]

Percieved Truth = Fact + Perspective

There are a few minor caveats/hypotheses to/about this phenomena.

I believe that the set of people whose Perspective = 0 in this equation is null.

That is, everyone has a perspective.

Most folks perspective scores are similar. That's not to say that they're the same, it's just that their perspectives are approxomately equally errant from fact--albiet some are errant in entirely opposite directions.

As the number of equal participants in a community increases, the truth equation of the community (that is, the average of all members' Perceived Truth scores approaches fact).

In communities where there is not equal participation (i.e. the relative weight of individual participant's truth scores are not equally represented in the cumulative Percieved Truth score of the group) will find that their Percieved Truth scores will, rather than regressing toward the mean, toward actual fact, gravitate toward the more extreme individual's scores.

This gravitation toward extreme scores happens in part because of the alienation and osteracism of some members (whose perspective the community would've otherwise needed in order to approach facts.)

If I'm right about this, it's the very act of strict adherence to ABSOLUTE truth that may drive communities farther from actual fact.

Of course, little if any of this is empirically verifiable.

[via a badchristian blog]

Bring Out The Big Guns...

The Wittenburg Door:

Featuring interviews of Ginger Geyer, Christopher Moore (author of The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal) and Diana Butler Bass (part of Projects on Congregations of Intentional Practice).

Also includes stuff on Christianity Yesterday, why Hermie from Max Lucado is more than a cute nickname, Official U.S. Government Sin Pyramids, and The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Abyss, amongst other things.

The Last Word: Rendering unto Caesar by Ole Anthony