Over $300,000 for an ill-advised photo op? Are we sure we want the government providing health care?

More American Workers Outsourcing Own Jobs Overseas

Treasury Department Issues Emergency Recall Of All US Dollars

Why doesn't the media call for the heads of drunk drivers like tougher gun laws? One valuable lesson I’ll take from a statistics course here at the Center of Learning was “statistics don’t lie, but statisticians do.” Suicides accounted for 55 percent of the nation's nearly 31,000 firearm deaths in 2005. There was nothing unique about that year -- gun-related suicides have outnumbered firearm homicides and accidents for 20 of the last 25 years. In 2005, homicides accounted for 40 percent of gun deaths. Accidents accounted for 3 percent. The remaining 2 percent included legal killings, such as when police do the shooting, and cases that involve undetermined intent.

Now for the simple arithmetic 31,000 fireman related deaths * 40% fireman homicides + 3% accidents = 13,330

16,885 people who died in alcohol-related crashes, 14,539 (86%) were killed in crashes where at least one driver or nonoccupant had a BAC of .08 or higher.

I’m not calling for the prohibition of the 1920’s, but where is our protection from drunk drivers? Why aren’t drunk drivers treated like those who carry guns with malicious intent? Drunk drivers are not innocent. We need to quit coddling them. They need to take responsibility for their actions.

13,330<16,885
Which is the greater evil?

In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

March 19 (Bloomberg) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s largest retailer, plans to award $2 billion in extra compensation to about 1 million U.S. hourly workers this year after sales jumped in the recession (average of $2,000 per worker). The Arkansas-based retailer is benefiting from record sales in the fourth quarter that boosted annual revenue by 7.2% to $401 billion.

The amount of the bonuses, profit sharing, discounts and 401(k) and stock-plan contributions being given to employees compares with the $1.8 billion Wal-Mart distributed last year. Payments to employees include $933.6 million in bonuses today.

HT: Russ Roberts , who points out that "This is how capitalism once worked. Successful companies rewarded their employees and lousy companies disappeared."

According to the UCA Echo, in a recent meeting of the UCA board of trustees, trustee Rush Harding explained that the money for the buyout of past UCA president Lu Hardin's contract will come from existing, unrestricted monetary gifts to the foundation and other money given specifically for this purpose. There is not enough money yet but Harding was quoted saying, "We're going to have to find some folks in short order who believe in the university and the university's future..."

Really? I guess you're right, what better way to look to the future than pay off the old president another half million dollars after he resigned because he was publicly called out for forging a letter to the board.

In case you haven't heard: Lu Hardin resigned for "health reasons" after it was found that he had forged a letter to the Board of Trustees recommending that the board award him his $300,000 bonus early and without public disclosure.

But considering how much attention would have been lavished on a comparable run of hot weather or on a warming trend that was plainly accelerating, shouldn't the recent cold phenomena and the absence of any global warming during the past 10 years be getting a little more notice? Isn't it possible that the most apocalyptic voices of global-warming alarmism might not be the only ones worth listening to?

There is no shame in conceding that science still has a long way to go before it fully understands the immense complexity of the Earth's ever-changing climate(s). It would be shameful not to concede it. The climate models on which so much global-warming alarmism rests "do not begin to describe the real world that we live in," says Freeman Dyson, the eminent physicist and futurist. "The real world is muddy and messy and full of things that we do not yet understand."

But for many people, the science of climate change is not nearly as important as the religion of climate change. When Al Gore insisted yet again at a conference last Thursday that there can be no debate about global warming, he was speaking not with the authority of a man of science, but with the closed-minded dogmatism of a religious zealot. Dogma and zealotry have their virtues, no doubt. But if we want to understand where global warming has gone, those aren't the tools we need.

From Jeff Jacoby's latest column "Where's Global Warming?"