That the two notable figures (who ably served their respective Imperia) that would pass away on the same day would be Margaret Thatcher and Annette Funicello? Sometimes, stuff just happens.

Ordinarily the 1st of April is a high note here at the talking dog; but events of 2013 have taken a lot of wind out of a lot of sails… even ours. Speaking of sailing, Candace at least has a happy thought for the day…

I’m pleased to report that the simple expedient of downloading Google Chrome has addressed my home blogging woes. For those of you who are still there. The post title does not refer to, say, Harvard, the university with the largest endowment in the universe, finally spending enough money to get a basketball team capable of winning an NCAA tournament game. But it’s close to that. For our link today, we’ll go with this LATimes piece that could be called “the rich are different– they have more money.” Its theme, unsurprisingly, is that people of means (defined as say 8 digits...

Still having “technical problems” with the home server… but one of these days… as the Governator said… I’ll be back. We’ll comment further on “the sequester,” the new Dow Jones high, the elevation of torture mavens to CIA director and Tea Party Senators (literally) standing up for the Constitution, and the rest of the topsy turvy alignment of our political universe, and its economic overlords, and my standard ongoing advice (stock up on food and water, learn edible gardening, lower your expectations)… remains in effect. Cheers.

I promise… more blogging soon… More than, say… none at all!

Yes, it’s 2013. We’ve survived December 21st, when various perversely optimistic hucksters were telling us we would all be “saved” from our humdrum, unsatisfying existences by the ultimately grand cosmic gesture of an Apocaplypse as predicted by some incorrectly deciphered Mayan calendar. Most of us survived “Superstorm” Hurricane Sandy, which, as predicted by so many for so long, demonstrated what the effect of raising the world’s sea-levels and ocean temperatures by willy-nilly burning everything that would burn as fast as possible in the name of… what, again?… would do to storm intensity and resulting damage, when a storm finally hit...

I have nothing to say, nothing to add, nothing… NOTHING. What can you say after a tragedy like the shooting up of six and seven year old kids, leaving twenty of them dead along with six adult members of their school staff in Newtown, CT yesterday. Well, the White House tells us “this is not the day to talk about gun control.” No. Of course not. Why would it be? After all… this isn’t Britain, where one similar incident at a school in Dunblane, Scotland resulted in the banning of virtually all private hand guns in the country ( country...

Anything that might help anyone, excepting the military [and the other components of the ruling class.] And so, amidst the fake crisis we’re told is a “fiscal cliff,” the Republican House has nonetheless found some money and voted to provide lifetime Secret Service protection to all living Presidents (right now, Democrats outnumber Republicans three [Obama, Clinton and Carter] to two [Bush Pere and Dubya])… but paranoia has bipartisan consensus. [the change, btw, is that current law provides for Secret Service protection for up to ten years after the President leaves office; this will provide such protection for life of the...

Well, the always-opportunistic Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss, who famously questioned the patriotism of his opponent, triple-amputee-as-a-result-of-military-service Max Cleland, in a senate race some years back, now takes… a stand?… and suggests that he may breach his “no new tax” pledge with Grover Norquist. Yawn. [Oh… and my college classmate, the President, forgot to mention the One True God in his Thanksgiving address. The fact that he’s going to use these “Fake Fiscal Cliff[TM]” negotiations to set in motion the eventual handing over of social security to his backers on Wall Street… what did you think this was about?… will be...

First, a happy birthday to TD Sister, and belated happy birthdays to TD Nieces #2 and 5 (ages 14 and now 4 days respectively) and to Mrs. TD. And now… on with the all too tragic soap opera that is the Middle East. Israel’s Haaretz reports that a cease-fire deal is in the works between Israel and Hamas. The deal being brokered in Cairo with the assistance of Egypt would, hopefully, shut down the ongoing rocket barrage into Israel coming from Gaza and the Israeli air-strikes in retaliation (as well as the possible Israeli ground invasion of Gaza). Some things...