micah holmquist's irregular thoughts and links

"Two standards" is my latest contribution to Dead Horse. Since it was posted, Helen Thomas has resigned.

Three things the Deepwater Horizon oil spill has taught us

1) Now that golf balls have proven bootless at stopping top killing, killing the top or stopping the spill in some other way, we can safely say that golf is worthless, as is everything else associated with it. Also, George Carlin was right about everything.

2) People who aren't scientists should stop saying oil and water don’t mix. It may not be desirable, but they clearly will fraternize.

3) We need to do much more offshore oil drilling throughout the world. If oil spills like this happened every week or so, the oil companies would probably know how to take care of them by now.

This is in bad taste, but I can remain silent no longer

The flooding in Tennessee has caused even more homes to go underwater.

I guess I am going to have to sell those Canadian hockey jerseys in some other state

Arizona has passed a law requiring police to check the citizenship status of anybody they suspect is in the country illegally (Randal C. Archibold, The New York Times, April 23).

I want to attend a Tea Party protest with a sign that reads, “I believe taxes are slightly too high.”

Scott Brown's victory is great news for Democrats

Now they have an excuse for not doing anything.

Predictions for 2010

-The United States Mint will announce a new series of quarters featuring U.S. military bases from around the world such as the Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Okinawa, Japan and the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in sunny Cuba.

That will be followed a series featuring federal prisons.

Despite my misgivings, I will collect both.

-Oprah will end her show early. Tiger Woods will be the guest on the second to last edition.

-Jimmy Hoffa’s remains are conclusively determined to be located in marked grave in a suburban Detroit cemetery. Nobody had previously thought to look there.

-There will be a major riot in the U.S. Uncle Sam is due for one.

-Gen X revolts against Generation Y. They lose badly.

-Every person who reads this and sends me $100 will have a good year. Send me $1,000 and your year will be great. Actually, you don’t have to read this. Sending me the money will be sufficient.

Are the NRA and the Gangster Disciples about to team up?

Bloomberg news columnist Alice Schroeder writes today that a friend of hers told her that she heard from a friend that a Goldman Sachs employed friends of hers –a friend of a friend- has said that Goldman Sachs executives are buying guns to protect against a populist uprising.

I am skeptical of this story because of the sourcing, but also because I don’t believe Goldman Sachs execs are so stupid that they believe a political uprising is coming and that their owning of guns could actually make any difference in the event of an attack from the combined forces of all of the gang members and hunters in this country.

But maybe I am wrong. Some seem to be buying the story.

Educational reform

Obama said yesterday that he wants to put more emphasis on math and science education because apparently America needs these skills to compete in this still somewhat new century.

Maybe I am wrong about this, but emphasizing math and science seems to have been official U.S. policy for my entire life, and yet we apparently never get it right. Therefore, I say stop throwing bad money after good and put the emphasis on social studies.

(For the record, once I am elected governor of Michigan, my plan is to turn over all the entire public school system to the educational arm of Blackwater.)

The problem with the world today is just about everybody lacks common sense.