Category: News

Complacency is the one word that concerns the commander of U.S. Northern Command
…

PhoneArena has weighed in with their review of the HTC HD2 and came to this conclusion:

There is no way a cell phone equipped with such a huge screen and powerful components would fail to appeal to eager high-tech buffs. The truth is, we see no reason not to recommend the HTC HD2 to anyone who feels overwhelmingly compelled to get a device with such a spectacular hardware. In terms of software and interactivity, it delivers everything that any self-respecting Windows Mobile smartphone offers and then some, adding capacitive screen and a lot of preinstalled applications, which make it not just head and shoulders, but light years away from its WM rivals today. The only WM smartphone that has a fighting chance against it is the Samsung Omnia II I8000. Personally, we´d go for the HD2 for its capacitive screen and better performance, but if we were predominantly focused on video playback, we would gladly sacrifice the extra 0.6 inches for the perfect video codec support of the Omnia II and its brilliant AMOLED screen – even if a bit smaller, its image quality is incomparably superior to any LCD display.

Ultimately, we say “yes” to the HTC HD2. This is a great handset that offers a lot with any respect. What´s more, considering the presence of the Sense interface, the HD2 escapes the fate of being qualified as just “another high-tech toy”, because it comes with functions in the forefront of today´s social networking, something that will certainly appeal to a good part of the now numerous people using various social networking services.

They do complain about in call sound quality and camera only gets a 7/10 but they still award an overall excellent 9 out of 10.

Read their full review here.

On Friday, oil refiner Valero (VLO) announced the completely shutdown of a plant in Delaware City, resulting in the loss of over 500 high-paying jobs.

Edward Harrison of CreditWritedowns.com argues that the fact that Valero had to shutdown this plant — which was losing about $1 million per day — indicates that the real economy, where consumers actually buy gasoline at the pump (as opposed to the financial economy, where barrels of crude trade at elevated levels), remains quite weak.

The new CEO Bill Klesse came to Valero via Ultramar Diamond Shamrock (UDS), which Valero acquired at the top of the market in 2001. So, company ethos may be different than under Bill Greehey who was very committed to community. And Delaware City is an old Getty/Shell-Motiva oil refinery and a legacy asset of Blackstone-controlled Premcor, the company run by former Tosco head and Salomon Brothers commodities trader Tom O’Malley. So, it was not core to Valero’s operations. Valero already cut staff there in September. And the Shell-Motiva JV had serious operating difficulties with the asset before offloading it to Premcor.

Nevertheless, this was a refinery which has been upgraded significantly to process less expensive heavy, sour crude oil. The fact that Valero is laying off workers and shuttering the entire site tells you that the situation is bad. They are saying in effect “we cannot continue to operate at a loss through this business cycle.” If Valero can’t make money, no oil refiner can.

I see this in a macro context as a sign of cyclically weak end-user demand.  I do think peak oil is for real but the world is awash in oil and oil products right now. Read the whole thing >

He points to this FT Alphaville piece as a backup for the last part that the world is “awash” in oil products.

We feel it’s Olivier Jakob at Petromatrix who really expressed the matter best on Friday. As he wrote (emphasis FT Alphaville’s):

As per our Tuesday ad hoc note on floating stocks; on a crude equivalent basis all of the OPEC and half of the IEA estimated oil demand growth for 2010 is already parked at anchor in floating stocks and these idled cargoes filled with oil are getting more and more attention.

By the end of the winter there is likely to be as much distillates afloat as in the total US at the end of winter 2007 and we expect that it will be more and more difficult for some of the Wall Street commodity banks to avoid mentioning the subject and to continue to hide the floating storage fill-up as “demand from emerging economies”.

The ICE Gasoil contango is currently widening and this will not work towards the reduction of these floating stocks. In an environment of spare refining capacity the only solver to the growing floating stocks of Distillates is a sharp reduction in OPEC supplies [ahem…Daily Mail], but only lower prices would trigger that.

The only answer that we see to GOD (Glut of Distillate) is a flat price correction sharp enough to force more OPEC supply cuts.

Indeed, the realization that end-user demand is not all its cracked up to be has been emerging all week.

Our Vincent Fernando noted on Tuesday:

Last week was particularly worrisome for oil, since U.S. fuel inventories (distillate stocks) rose during a time of year when analysts expected a drop. The American fuel glut continues due to weak demand, and as shown below, is far worse than anything seen in recent years.

Even if U.S. fuel demand picks up with the economy, the U.S. will first have to work down its massive distillate stocks before needing more oil. This process will keep a lid on America’s contribution to world oil demand.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• America’s Growing Fuel Glut Could Torpedo Oil Prices (USO)
• Fitch: European Refiners Facing Worrisome Cash Flow Crunch
• Energy-Hungry America Drilling For Oil In Beverly Hills And Hollywood

Filed under: Motorsports, Motorcycle

Knee-draggers take heart: following the disappointing news that Harley-Davidson has killed the Buell brand, comes the announcement of its rebirth. Don’t go looking for any new street bikes, though; the Buell name will carry on strictly through racing.

According to the announcement, company founder and chairman Erik Buell will leave the Motor Company to head up the newly formed Erik Buell Racing. This spin-off will be supported by HDMC and based at the Buell factory in East Troy, Wisconsin. The racing outfit will likely retain part of the workforce that, until last week, was responsible for assembling the roadgoing sportbikes. Rather than building bikes for public consumption, however, the team at Erik Buell Racing will supply the Buell 1125R to racing teams for as long as the bike complies with current competition regs.

So, while existing Buell retailers will sell off the remaining stock of street bikes, the name will live on (for a while, at least) on the racing circuit. Check out the fresh mega gallery of 1125R images (on and off the track) and the details in the press release after the jump.

[Source: Harley-Davidson]

Continue reading Salvation! Buell sportbikes reborn as Erik Buell Racing

Salvation! Buell sportbikes reborn as Erik Buell Racing originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 22 Nov 2009 10:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Jimmy Moore is a low-carb super star. The man pushes harder than most to crack conventional wisdom on his blog, and he just released a new book, 21 Life Lessons From Living Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb: How the Heatlhy Low-Carb Lifestyle Changed Everything I Thought I Knew.

I’ve posted the piano thing before, but The Fun Theory is just too inspiring not to spread.

Want to strengthen your bones? Buy a jump rope. Want to weaken them? Become a cardioholic, drive your cortisol levels crazy, and prevent your bones’ uptake of calcium. Read more about a fascinating new bone study at the NY Times.

Sugar kills….worms!

Mummies are old, but not as old as Grok. Why is this important? Because scientists just discovered mummies with heart disease. These same scientists have not been able to confirm whether vampires and werewolves have heart disease, but it’s looking likely.

How Primal are business cards made of meat?

Recipe Corner

• Another great one from Free the Animal this week: Primal Chicken Pot Pie with Cauliflower Crust
• Just discovered The Recipe Zaar, a hub for posting and creating collections of recipes. ThatSouthernBelle has created a collection called Chez Grok’s Primal Recipes which includes 100!

Time Capsule

One Year Ago (November 15 – 21, 2008)

• Grain Pain – My battle with IBS and my personal story of giving up grains.
• Banish Bake Sales? – An age old tradition of local fund raising. I’m all for charity and community, but there has to be a healthier way to raise money.

Get Free Health Tips, Recipes and Workouts Delivered to Your Inbox

Related posts:

1. Weekend Link Love
2. Weekend Link Love
3. Weekend Link Love

Huge week for the PS3. For starters, firmware 3.10 is now live, spamming Facebook news feeds everywhere with Trophy information and a few PSN “purchas…

Filed under: Spy Photos, Sedan, BMW

BMW’s official unveiling ceremony isn’t until Monday, but a few authentic shots of the all-new “F10” BMW 5 Series are floating around cyberspace. These three low resolution images only give us a frontal glimpse of the upcoming 5 Series sedan, apparently as it does a dress rehearsal for its big show at the beginning of the week.

Our first sans-camouflage observation says it looks much like the 5 Series GT, its close sibling (nobody was expecting any radical styling departure anyway). Thanks to its “sport sedan” role, the new 5 Series four-door sports a slightly more aggressive flair to its front facade and side styling. In case you were wondering, the little black buttons just ahead of the front wheels are side view cameras, just like those found on the 7 Series. We’ll reserve further judgment until Monday, when they pull the rest of the tarp off. Thanks for the tip, Brandon!

[Source: 5post.com]

First official shots of new BMW 5 Series leaked online originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 22 Nov 2009 08:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Will the Fed actually stop snapping up mortgage-backed securities (MBS)?

Maybe, but they better be on guard if they do, in terms of what will happen to the housing market.

Calculated Risk offers this interesting analysis.

Earlier this year, Political Calculations introduced a tool to estimate mortgage rates based on the Ten Year Treasury yield (based on an earlier post of mine): Predicting Mortgage Rates and Treasury Yields. Using their tool, with the Ten Year yield at 3.356%, this suggests a 30 year mortgage rates of 5.33% based on the historical relationship between the Ten Year yield and mortgage rates.

Freddie Mac released their weekly survey Thursday:

Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE) today released the results of its Primary Mortgage Market Survey® (PMMS®) in which the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 4.83 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending November 19, 2009, down from last week when it averaged 4.91 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.04 percent.

This suggests morgage rates are about 50 bps below the expect level …

Read the whole thing >>

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Yow! One In Seven Homeowners With Mortgages Are In Trouble
• Mortgage Applications Plunge To 12-Year Low
• Rosenberg: No Chance Of A Rate Hike Before 2011

The Wii might be in unfamiliar territory, facing decline for the first time and all, but that doesn’t mean that the console is down for the count. A …

Perhaps this week you heard news reports about Venezuela bombing a couple of bridges that connected it with Colombia, and have been wondering what all the tension is about.

If so you should run to read this report in UK’s The Independent about America’s role (surprise!) in fomenting tension. (via Forexlive)

As it turns out, Colombia is basically our last surrogate state in Latin and South America.

In the old days, sure, we had our various friendly puppet goverments, and we certainly wouldn’t mind having a few more (see: the brief 2002 Venezuelan coup). But for the most part, that’s over, and for Latin America that’s a much better state of things.

But Colombia — due to the drug war and thorough corruption — remains, and so the US is putting more and more chips on that spot. After all, the US gets about half of its oil from Latin America. We can’t just let the region go on its way.

The Independent: Indications of US willingness to envisage the stationing of nuclear weapons in Colombia are seen as an additional threat to the spirit of nuclear disarmament. After the establishment of the Tlatelolco Treaty in 1967, four more nuclear-weapon-free zones were set up in Africa, the South Pacific, South-east Asia and Central Asia. Between them, the five treaties cover nearly two-thirds of the countries of the world and almost all the southern hemisphere.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the world’s leading think-tank about disarmament issues, has now expressed its worries about the US-Colombian arrangements.

With or without nuclear weapons, the bilateral agreement on the seven Colombian bases, signed on 30 October in Bogota, risks a costly new arms race in a region. SIPRI, which is funded by the Swedish government, said it was concerned about rising arms expenditure in Latin America draining resources from social programmes that the poor of the region need.

Much of the new US strategy was clearly set out in May in an enthusiastic US Air Force (USAF) proposal for its military construction programme for the fiscal year 2010. One Colombian air base, Palanquero, was, the proposal said, unique “in a critical sub-region of our hemisphere where security and stability is under constant threat from… anti-US governments”.

The proposal sets out a scheme to develop Palanquero which, the USAF says, offers an opportunity for conducting “full-spectrum operations throughout South America…. It also supports mobility missions by providing access to the entire continent, except the Cape Horn region, if fuel is available, and over half the continent if un-refuelled”. (“Full-spectrum operations” is the Pentagon’s jargon for its long-established goal of securing crushing military superiority with atomic and conventional weapons across the globe and in space.)

So you can understand why Colombia’s neighbors are nervous. Following the US plans, Venezuela warned Colombia it might prompt war, and indeed that’s already started to some extent. Even without war, it does, as noted by the think tank above, require other countries to beef up their military spending in kind.

Read the whole thing at The Independent>

(Picture via Flickr user Cosmowidgets)

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Brazil Is Reeling From Weakness In The Dollar (EWZ)
• Swine Flu Explodes In Latin America
• Sadly, CERA’s Optimism Over Oil Production Is Total Nonsense

By James

The HP Pavilion dv6-2020sa (VJ342EAABU) is a brand new notebook from the one of the leading manufacturers of laptop computers, Hewlett Packard (HP). It comes in an Espresso Imprint design and the glossy black finish with a discreet circular pattern is the most amazing highlight of the notebook. The energy-efficient, mercury-free backlight LED display gives a clear and detailed while watching any kind of movie. The HD ready display screen (1366 x 768) of the Windows 7 laptop has a size of about 15.6 inches. The highly efficient AMD Turion II M500 processor included in the HP Pavilion dv6-2020sa (VJ342EAABU) provides sufficient power to run any kind of application with the 64 bit Windows 7 Home Premium operating system. Pace and smoothness is added to these applications with the 3072 MB DDR3 RAM memory which can be extended up to 8 GB. The total hard disk capacity of 320 GB is enough to save all your favourite music tracks and images.

The communication features of the HP pavilion notebook include an integrated 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet LAN and the 802.11 b/g WLAN 1 ExpressCard/54 Slot (also supports ExpressCard/34). While for mobile entertainment there is theHP Pavilion Webcam with integrated Digital microphone. Additionally, there is a VGA low-light HP mobile remote control provided with HP Pavilion dv6-2020sa (VJ342EAABU). Some other features include an ATI Mobility Radeon HD3200 graphics card, DVD writer and a 5-in-1 Digital Media Reader. The connection ports included inthe notebook are 4 x USB 2.0, IEEE 1394 Firewire (i.Link), ExpressCard/54 and ExpressCard.

Source

Recent third quarter data from the World Gold Council showed that while gold supply fell 5%, demand (inclusive of investors) fell a much larger 34%.

Yet despite this negative disparity between supply and demand change, gold prices rose during the period.

Hard Assets Investor: Year-over-year demand has dropped in each of gold’s three market segments: for investments, off 46 percent; for jewelry, down 30 percent; and for industrial use, off 11 percent.

Gold prices, however, have risen universally. In key markets such as India and Turkey, gold prices spiked 15 percent and 33 percent, respectively. In dollar terms, gold rose 12 percent year-over-year, while euro prices rose 11 percent.

The bull market may have put gold out of reach for many consumers. That may account for some of the renewed interest in “the poor man’s gold”—silver.

Read more here.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Schiff: Roubini Doesn’t Get Why Gold Is Soaring
• CHART OF THE DAY: How The Old Gold Bugs Lost Control Of Gold (GLD)
• Gold Tanking (GLD)

Howard Chui from Howard Forums have published this brief video overview of the Samsung Omnia 2, currently available on Bell’s HSDPA network, and which will soon arrive on Verizon.

While the device appears to be very functional Howard does have a point regarding confusing navigation on the device, and it is slower than the 800 Mhz processor would suggest (for reference the HD2 loads the speed test page in 15 seconds).

Like all Samsung devices however the Samsung Omnia 2 is loaded with great included software and hardware which for many will more than make up for a little bit of lag here and there.

Do any of our readers have an Omnia 2?  Let us know your impressions in the comments below.

With our recent poll showing there is a significant proportion of our readers who have become a bit sick of every second article being about the HTC HD2 our readers may have noticed a reduction in the number of articles showing up on the front page about this amazing smartphone.

This does not mean however we have cut back on our coverage of the most interesting Windows Mobile smartphone this year.  We have merely moved most of our news items to our dedicated section, which can be found here or by typing in WMPoweruser.com/htcleo.  Our coverage also still shows up in our RSS and Twitter feed, so if you do not want to miss a thing follow us using these links here.

Of course if there is any news on any other topic you wish us to cover, don’t forget to contact us on our tips page here.

I hope we have struck a reasonable balance which will keep all our readers happy.  Let us know in the comments below.

Edit: In response to requests, we now also have a dedicated HTC HD2 RSS feed, for the real fanatics

Check out this heatmap of the infamous credit default swap (CDS) market, courtesy of Zero Hedge. Obviously November 19th (the date of this heatmap) was a pretty bad day given all the red, which indicates weakness.

Yet also notice the massive size of AIG as a proportion of the map. AIG credit default swaps make up a huge chunk of the upper left hand corner.

Upper left hand corner, zoomed-in — This is what too big to fail looks like:

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• The AIG Bailout Is Still A Mystery Shrouded In Lies
• Hank Greenberg: I’m Not A Billionaire Anymore (AIG)
• TARP Inspector Barofsky Slams The AIG Counterparty Ripoff (AIG, GS, UBS)

We’ve highlighted before why recent negative treasury bill yields aren’t sustainable, aren’t reason to panic, and are just due to end of the year window dressing by financial companies.

The excellent fixed income blog Across the Curve takes it further, highlighting commentary from CRT Research that basically supports this view. They interestingly add that the negative yields we’re seeing might be partially caused by the fact that we have less investment banks and more ‘plain vanilla’ financial companies with December 31st year-ends.

It’s a great example of how markets can be distorted by the absence of business variety.

Across the Curve: “We instead take our cue from activity in the financing markets, where year end is playing its hand – Jan bills are trading negative. The story here is not a new one as we saw bills negative at the end of the last quarter, but exacerbated by a more intense year end. We say that because 1) it’s clearly the talking point on funding desks, 2) EVERYONE has a Dec 31 year end as we have no investment banks any longer, [emphasis added] and 3) as bank holding companies there’s a likelihood that former IBs, too, need to show cash in something other than a mattress.

analyst whom I read suggested that an exacerbating factor was the maturity of some cash management bills which were not replaced.

Whatever the case, I am certain that the present circumstance is not an indicator of financial stress as plunging bill rates have been in the past.

Check out more from Across the Curve here.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Post-Lehman Deja Vu As T-Bill Yields Turn Negative
• Swedish Central Bank Tries Negative Interest Rates To Force Banks To Lend
• Why T-Bill Yields Just Returned To Crisis Levels

As anyone who regularly reads this blog can tell, I’ve been a bit hit and miss in posting lately.  The bride and I have been swamped with work on the Sous Vide Supreme project.  MD has been working with chefs to develop recipes along with creating a bunch herself; she has been editing a book on sous vide for the home cook written by yet another sous vide expert; she’s been posting on the Sous Vide Supreme blog (eggs the sous vide way); and, as you can see at the left, she’s been talking sous vide to anyone who will listen.  All this while she prepares for performing the Messiah in about two weeks.  I’ve been heavily involved in the business end of things, which is a never-ending task.  Plus, I’m the taster-in-chief.  Neither of us dreamed that this would turn into such a time-gobbling project after the development of the machine.  But it has.  It seems that we are spending twice as much time now working in some capacity on  Sous Vide Supreme than we ever did before – even when we were at our busiest.  I’m going to have to work harder on my time management if I expect to keep up with all the other projects – including this blog – that I have going.

Twitter

The sous vide time commitments have put a real hickey on my reading.  I’ve probably read less over the past four months than in any four month period of my life.  Instead of five or six books per week, I’m down to about two or three max.  I hate it.  I’m trying to keep up with my daily medical/scientific journal trawl, but that has even slacked off a bit.  When I do find something of interest, instead of blogging on it as I used to, I stick it up on my Twitter page.  I probably post 10-15 times per day on Twitter, so if you want to keep up on a moment-by-moment basis, follow me on Twitter.  If you have a problem thinking of yourself as a Twitter person, give it a try.  I dipped my toes in the Twitter waters with great hesitation, and now I love it.  I’ve found it extremely valuable because I find all kinds of new stuff daily.  You’ve got to be careful who you follow, however, or you can waste a ton of time.  If you get started, start following people who provide you with information you can use.  I avoid following people who do nothing but tell me what they ate for breakfast that day or what movie they’re going to see that night.  Sign up an give it a go. You don’t have to write anything (or tweet, as it’s called) if you don’t want to.  You can simply lurk and be the beneficiary of a ton of good info.   The Twitter people take you by the hand and get you squared away.  It takes all of about two minutes – if even that.  Literally.

Comments

I have fallen way, way behind on dealing with comments.  As I wrote a while back, I had to stop answering individual comments, and I’ve pretty much stuck to my guns on that.  Problem is, I had about three hundred comments stacked up before I started doing that.

When comments come in and I post them, they go up in by date.  So back when I was spending half my day dealing with them, I would often come across a comment that required some thought and a detailed answer.  If I didn’t have time to deal with it right then, I put it off until later.  Often when later came, I had 20 or 30 more that came in after the one requiring the time.  I didn’t want to answer those and put them up ahead of the one I hadn’t answered, so I simply didn’t deal with any of them.  Now I’ve got about 340 of them stacked up and it gives me heartburn whenever I even get on my blog administration screen.  The sad thing is that some of these comments go back months and months.

I’ve been wracking my brain trying to figure out what to do with them, and I’ve finally come to a decision.  I’m simply going to post them as they are.  I’m going to post about 30 of them per day until they’re all up.  Why not all at once?  Because I know many of you are set up to get comments emailed to you when I post them.  I don’t want to clot email accounts with 340 emailed comments all at once, especially since some of these comments are lengthy.  So, I dole them out over the next 10 days or so while keeping up with the new comments as they come in. I won’t start this process for a few days to get those of you who don’t want even 30 of them a day coming in to unsubscribe.

Since many of these hoarded comments contain very good questions, they are a trove of subjects for future blog posts.  As I post them, I’m going to reread them and clip those that would make for good posts into Evernote or my new favorite plaything DEVONthink that I’m just starting to feel my way along with. (See this great Steven Johnson (whom I follow on Twitter) article about the virtues of DEVONthink.)  After I’ve got these blogworthy comments in a format in which I can find them instantly, I’ll start working through them and posting.

Bloggers and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

I don’t know how closely blog readers attended to the recent announcement by the FTC that they were going to start riding herd on bloggers, but the bloggers went ballistic.

Among its other duties, the FTC patrols the universe of advertising in this country looking for anyone or any company engaging in, as they term it, deceptive practices.  In other words, the FTC is on the prowl seeking out advertisers who make false claims in order to stop them and punish them.  Which all sounds good in the abstract, but in reality is a whole other story.

As I pointed out in an earlier blog, it’s a valuable exercise to read Kevin Trudeau’s first book to see how the FTC operates.  The nutritional and health information he presents is total garbage, but his description of the practices of the FTC is right on the money. (I’ve got to admit that some of the nutritional and health information presented in Trudeau’s first book (the only one I’ve read) is accurate, but I write that off to the law of averages.  He presents so much information that odds are some of it just happens to be true.  So, if you read the book and come across something that is nutritionally accurate, don’t write me about it.  I know a few things are there, but not enough to justify reading the book other than the first part, which is an excellent treatise on the FTC.)

The FTC has the power to absolutely ruin anyone and/or any company it chooses to go after.  If you read the first part of Trudeau’s book, you’ll see how.

So, the FTC opined that they planned on monitoring bloggers to see if they disclosed the fact that they were paid to do reviews on products.  Apparently, many bloggers make money by doing paid reviews on products without disclosing such, and the FTC doesn’t like it.

I’ve never reviewed products for pay, but I have read enough about it to know how it works.  Companies provide bloggers products, then pay these bloggers for reviews of the products.  I guess the fact that bloggers are given the products and possibly paid for the reviews as well might induce them to write positive reviews of products that they thought sucked.  And I assume that’s what the FTC is concerned about.

The FTC’s actions certainly got the blogosphere in an uproar.  So much so, in fact, that the FTC started to crawdad, which I never thought would happen.  Just goes to show that if you turn the spotlight of public awareness on even the most aggressive and powerful of all government agencies, you can get results.

Not that I fear the FTC on this (at least not at this point), I’ll go ahead and disclose where I get dinero from this blog.  Virtually all of the money that comes to me through the blog comes from readers buying products through Amazon.com.  When they buy a book I recommend or go through one of the book thumbnails of Protein Power or the 6-Week Cure up at the top right or any of our other books I have up on the site, I get a little bit of lucre for it.  And I get a little more if they buy anything else after entering Amazon through one of the portals in this blog.  In a good month, it’s enough to cover my hosting and web guy expenses; in a bad month (as this one is turning out to be), it’s about enough to cover the hosting of the site and maybe an hour or so of the web guy time.

Google ads

I get a little income from Google ads, but I’m trying to get them off the site.  I’ve had several web guys working on the site over the years, and I guess code for these Google ads is stuck all over the place.  I get rid of them in once place, it seems they pop up somewhere else.  When I had Google ads everywhere, I made about $150 per month, which, in my opinion, isn’t enough to justify tacky-ing up the site with a zillion ads.  Plus, I don’t have time to go through and spend time trying to figure out which ads to block.  Many people, I’ve learned, don’t realize that these ads aren’t part of the site, and they wonder why, when I’ve just spent 2000 words bashing statins, an ad for a statin pops up.

A while back I was having lunch with Mark Sisson of Mark’s Daily Apple when he asked me what kind of a deal I had going with Atkins Nutritionals.  I told him I didn’t have any kind of deal going with them whatsoever.  I asked him why he asked.  He told me that he gets my blog posts by email, and that at the bottom of each one is a banner ad from Atkins.  I was embarrassed to say that I didn’t even know you could get the posts by email and that I didn’t have a clue why the Atkins ads were there.  I went home and pulled up the blog (I usually never look at the actual blog – only the admin page), and sure enough, there was a way I could get the posts by email.  I signed up to get my own posts, wrote one, and sure enough, here it came with an Atkins ad at the bottom of it.  I thought I had it all taken care of, but I just looked moments ago and there is still a banner ad at the bottom of the emailed post.  I’ve added it once more to the list of things to have my guy deal with when I get with him on Monday.

Book recommendation

While on the subject of Amazon.com, books and book recommendations, I might as well recommend one.
I finished a terrific book not long ago called A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers. As the title implies, this is a treatise about the fall of the House of Lehman, one of the country’s oldest investment banks, and is written by one of the vice presidents who names names and points the finger.

Not only is this book chock full of great information about how Lehman Bros, Bear Stearns, Goldman Sachs and others operate, it is extremely well written.  The ‘author’ realized he didn’t have the skills to tell his own story in a readable manner, so he hired a writer.  But he didn’t just go out and hire one of the non-fiction write-for-hire folks that are swarming around out there, he hired Patrick Robinson, a best-selling thriller writer.  As a consequence, the book is absolutely gripping. Not only do you learn a ton about how the financial crisis developed, you learn it in a gripping, racing-through-the-pages fashion.  You’ve heard people say about certain books that they read like a novel.  Well, this one does.  I had real trouble putting it down.

After reading this book, you will know exactly why we’re in the boat we’re in now and will be stupified at the mismanagement at the top.  As I read through and learned about the perfidy of Moody’s, Standard & Poors, and the other financial rating outfits that gave the most worthless financial instruments triple A ratings, I was stunned that these companies hadn’t been prosecuted.  Without their complicity, the whole house of cards couldn’t have been erected because no one would have purchased the products.  I was interested to read in today’s Financial Times that at least  Ohio is going after them.  I suspect Ohio won’t be the last.  According to the author, these companies made billions while failing to do their due diligence before passing out AAA ratings like they were candy at Halloween.

Not long after I read the book, I came upon a piece by Calvin Trillin in the editorial section of the New York Times that summed up the situation nicely.  The problem was the enormity of the amounts of money waiting to be made drew smart people to Wall Street.  A funny but insightful short essay.

After you read the book and Trillin’s piece, take a look at this video I posted about a year ago.  It will make it all that much more funny.  And sad.

The 6-Week Cure blog

All I can say is that it’s about up.  And apologies for not having it up sooner.  I hope we’ll have it operational this week and populated with a few posts.

Another vegetarian myth

I wrote in a bookish post (or maybe in answer to a comment on a bookish post – I can’t remember) a while back that I had read most of the mystery novels out there and was looking for a new series to sink my teeth into.  Someone suggested the DI Charlie Priest mysteries by Stuart Pawson.  I got one and liked it, so I’ve been motoring through those as time allows.

The last one I read was Deadly Friends about a murdered doctor, a serial rapist and a host of other minor villains. At a point about midway through, DI Priest and one of his underlings are walking around scoping out a pharmacy prior to entering to get info about the dead doctor.  All these books – at least the four or five I’ve read so far – are written in the first person, so everything is from Priest’s perspective.  Here’s what he says:

We completed our circuit of the block.  Passing the back of the butcher’s I tried not to inhale and wished I had the willpower to go vegetarian.  Trouble is, I like my steaks.

AAARRRGGGHHHH!  Even in mystery novels I’m being reminded of how deep the vegetarian mantra has wormed its way into our collective brains.  How many times have we all heard variations on this theme?  One of the ideas the vegetarian movement has managed to get firmly implanted in the minds of many is that vegetarianism is a more healthful way to eat.  I’ve heard numerous people wistfully say they really would like to be able to follow a vegetarian diet because it’s so much more healthful, but they just like meat too much to do it.

The truth is, as we all know, that vegetarian diets are decidedly less healthful than diets containing animal protein. But the great unwashed masses don’t seem to have figured this out.

But I’ve got to hand it to the vegetarian brigade: they’ve managed to successfully propagandize most of the population.  And they’ve done so without any real science behind them.  The most they can point to is a sheaf of observational studies that don’t prove squat.

The low-carb/Paleo movement, on the other hand, is producing more data almost daily that a lower-carb, higher-fat, higher-protein diet is infinitely better for a majority of the population.  But, we don’t get the message out as well as the other side does, I suppose.  I went to a Borders Books the other day and found an entire collection of free booklets written for children telling of the horrors of factory farming and encouraging them to go vegetarian.

We are starting to make some inroads into this nonsense, however, with the help of some former vegetarians who have seen the error of their ways.  If you haven’t read Lierre Kieth’s book yet, add it to your Christmas list.

I’m girding my loins for all the hostile comments I’m sure to get from angry vegetarians.  These comments will be from vegans telling me how healthy they are and how many miles they can run and how they could kick my butt in any endeavor I might wish to engage them in.  And they’ll reference the idiotic China Study and a host of other meaningless observational junk.  But wait.  I don’t have to gird my loins.  I’m not dealing with these comments any more.  I’m just posting them as they come in.  Give it your best shot.

To see under what conditions our genome developed, read on.

The hunter-gatherer lifestyle

Just to wrap this long, meandering post up, I want to end with a link to a great article in the December 2009 National Geographic.  And to bring this post full circle, I’ve got to let you know that I found this article on Twitter.  I wouldn’t have discovered it otherwise. At least not as quickly as I did.

The long article is about the Hadza who follow a hunter-gatherer lifestyle in remote Tanzania.  The area the Hadza roam is being encroached upon by all kinds of agricultural and tourist businesses, and the author doubts these indigenous people can maintain their lifestyle for much longer.
The men hunt and the women gather.  The Hadza went on a nighttime baboon hunt and took the author along.  His account of the hunt makes for a riveting read.  Once killed, the Hadza haul the baboon back to what serves as a camp and prepare to serve it up.  I’ll leave you with the author’s description of the meal.

Ngaola skins the baboon and stakes out the pelt with sharpened twigs. The skin will be dry in a few days and will make a fine sleeping mat. A couple of men butcher the animal, and cuts of meat are distributed. Onwas, as camp elder, is handed the greatest delicacy: the head.

The Hadza cooking style is simple—the meat is placed directly on the fire. No grill, no pan. Hadza mealtime is not an occasion for politeness. Personal space is generally not recognized; no matter how packed it is around a fire, there’s always room for one more, even if you end up on someone’s lap. Once a cut of meat has finished cooking, anyone can grab a bite.

And I mean grab. When the meat is ready, knives are unsheathed and the frenzy begins. There is grasping and slicing and chewing and pulling. The idea is to tug at a hunk of meat with your teeth, then use your knife to slice away your share. Elbowing and shoving is standard behavior. Bones are smashed with rocks and the marrow sucked out. Grease is rubbed on the skin as a sort of moisturizer. No one speaks a word, but the smacking of lips and gnashing of teeth is almost comically loud.

I’m ravenous, so I dive into the scrum and snatch up some meat. Baboon steak, I have to say, isn’t terrible—a touch gamy, but it’s been a few days since I’ve eaten protein, and I can feel my body perking up with every bite. Pure fat, rather than meat, is what the Hadza crave, though most coveted are the baboon’s paw pads. I snag a bit of one and pop it in my mouth, but it’s like trying to swallow a pencil eraser. When I spit the gob of paw pad out, a young boy instantly picks it up and swallows it.

Onwas, with the baboon’s head, is comfortably above the fray. He sits cross-legged at his fire and eats the cheeks, the eyeballs, the neck meat, and the forehead skin, using the soles of his sandals as a cutting board. He gnaws the skull clean to the bone, then plunges it into the fire and calls me and the hunters over for a smoke.