Well that's awesome. I know that the 'Skins need a backup but usually what you look for as your #2 is someone reliable who can manage a game and not lose it by themselves.
The numbers on Grossman are:
7 Seasons, 37 Games, 524/971 Comp% 54, 6197 Yards, TD/INT 33/36, QB Rating 69.5
The numbers on Campbell are:
4 Seasons, 52 Games, 1002/1637 Comp% 61, 10860 Yards, TD/INT 55/38, QB Rating 82.3
These guys are almost the opposite of each other. Grossman is an absolute loose cannon slinging the football around with all of Favre's enthusiasm but with none of the accuracy. Campbell is all about safe passes and taking few risks.
The only bright side of the signing is that maybe it's an indication that the Redskins have no intention of drafting a quarterback with the 4th pick of the draft. Maybe, just maybe, they will do something smart and start working on rebuilding that offensive line that is crumbling apart before Campbell's very eyes. I'm not overly enthusiastic that this is the case considering that over at ESPN there's a question of if the 'skins should draft QB Jimmy Clausen in the first round. If that happens I will most likely throw up. I don't know how it isn't apparent to the guys in control but it should be obvious that, no matter who the QB is, no one will succeed if they have defensive linemen breathing down their neck every single down.
I probably shouldn't be getting worked up about this as it makes no sense to get upset about something that hasn't even come to pass, but I've just seen how the Redskins operate for a decade now to understand what they will do. We're talking about a team where that just signed Rex Grossman and Larry Johnson; two guys who have little to offer at this point. The best take on the Johnson signing is the fantasy article titled "Larry Johnson to make Portis look spry". Ain't it the truth.
So I suppose that I should simply be happy at this point that the Redskins haven't gone ahead and ran up a bill on free agents that will haunt them for years. You can bet, however, that I will be watching the draft to decide whether or not the new coaching staff will bring in a new era (hope and change if you will) or just more of the same.
Showing posts with label Gettin paid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gettin paid. Show all posts
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tear the roof off
We here in Syracuse have a problem. One of our main highways, Route 81, is currently cut in half with a detour due to a disintigrating building ready to fall on it. This drama has been unfolding for weeks now and yet 81 remains closed, and the building remains standing. The owner has been letting this structure fall in to disrepair for years now, and claims that rt 81 caused it to fall apart in the manner that it is now. I'm no insider on this story but it sounds like this guy is full of crap.
In the meantime, the city has taped off the property and given it the old "condemned" treatment while the owner has not allowed the city access. So right now there's a stalemate and a pissing contest rolling in to one. While nothing is being done, traffic is being diverted to the streets where it has become an ugly logjam.
Although this is the dominant news in Syracuse right now with around the clock updates, it is not what bothers me. The thing that baffles me are the quotes by the state on what it will take to knock it down. Initially the figure stood at $500,000, which sounds like a lot to destroy a building. Perhaps it's vicinity to the highway was the reason or special permits were required, whatever. Lets say that's a reasonable figure. Fine.
Next thing you know, the figure jumps to $2 million. How the hell does the price to knock down a building quadruple to that astronomical kind number? There was a letter to the edior recently saying that if the city supplied him with 50 men and a bunch of kegs, he would take care of it for free. Then the rumors started the price would now by $3 million. And that is just plain disgusting.
I highly doubt that it would even take $3 million to even build that structure. I can only guess that the state is giving these figures because they are in a hole right now and trying to get some revenue. I could be completely off base here but there just seems to be no justification for the price of a demolition to increase by six times over the course of two weeks. It would benefit the city if some enterprising individual should throw some dynamite in the place in the middle of the night. At least that way I could stop hearing about it.
In the meantime, the city has taped off the property and given it the old "condemned" treatment while the owner has not allowed the city access. So right now there's a stalemate and a pissing contest rolling in to one. While nothing is being done, traffic is being diverted to the streets where it has become an ugly logjam.
Although this is the dominant news in Syracuse right now with around the clock updates, it is not what bothers me. The thing that baffles me are the quotes by the state on what it will take to knock it down. Initially the figure stood at $500,000, which sounds like a lot to destroy a building. Perhaps it's vicinity to the highway was the reason or special permits were required, whatever. Lets say that's a reasonable figure. Fine.
Next thing you know, the figure jumps to $2 million. How the hell does the price to knock down a building quadruple to that astronomical kind number? There was a letter to the edior recently saying that if the city supplied him with 50 men and a bunch of kegs, he would take care of it for free. Then the rumors started the price would now by $3 million. And that is just plain disgusting.
I highly doubt that it would even take $3 million to even build that structure. I can only guess that the state is giving these figures because they are in a hole right now and trying to get some revenue. I could be completely off base here but there just seems to be no justification for the price of a demolition to increase by six times over the course of two weeks. It would benefit the city if some enterprising individual should throw some dynamite in the place in the middle of the night. At least that way I could stop hearing about it.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Milk-a-what?
I hate to delve in to TMZ-ish type material but some days I just get in the blogging mood and just about everything seems like a good topic for me.
Poor Lindsay Lohan must be falling on hard times. She decided that the E-Trade commercial that aired during the superbowl was an attack on her and is now demanding $100 million from them. The reasons are: a) the baby is named "Lindsay" and b) she's a milkaholic. Therefore, they must be basing the character off of Lohan.
It's so absurd it is beyond understanding.
Listen, Lindsay. I know it must be difficult leading your lifestyle of having promiscuous sex with many anonymous partners without protection while at the same time experimenting with mind-expanding drugs in a consequence-free environment on nothing but the income earned from "I Know Who Killed Me" and the occasional obscure magazine shoot with "tasteful nudity", but this is a new low.
We're talking about a ton of cash for the usage of the name "Lindsay".
This is America, people. No lawsuit is too frivilous and your dignity can easily be turned in for cash. God bless the USA.
Poor Lindsay Lohan must be falling on hard times. She decided that the E-Trade commercial that aired during the superbowl was an attack on her and is now demanding $100 million from them. The reasons are: a) the baby is named "Lindsay" and b) she's a milkaholic. Therefore, they must be basing the character off of Lohan.
It's so absurd it is beyond understanding.
Listen, Lindsay. I know it must be difficult leading your lifestyle of having promiscuous sex with many anonymous partners without protection while at the same time experimenting with mind-expanding drugs in a consequence-free environment on nothing but the income earned from "I Know Who Killed Me" and the occasional obscure magazine shoot with "tasteful nudity", but this is a new low.
We're talking about a ton of cash for the usage of the name "Lindsay".
This is America, people. No lawsuit is too frivilous and your dignity can easily be turned in for cash. God bless the USA.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Too damn busy!
Things at work have been nuts, fellow Americans. That has severely cut in to my bloggin' time. Also, I was using the taboo Mozilla Firefox which caught the attention of IT and I was forced to revert to the crappiness that is Internet Explorer. I hate this browser. But hey, wutrugunnado?
Life has also thrown a number of curve balls in my direction lately. In the effort of trying to capitalize on the first time home buyer tax credit and super low interest rates, the Hot Mary and I have decided to double our orphans and go for the wedding/house combo in this 2010. You know, because last year was boring and we needed to spice things up.
Anywho, we found a place we liked and were balls deep in the purchasing process when the sellers decided to go with the "oopsy, we don't really want to sell after all" maneuver for which there is no defense. That little bit of fuckery left us in a situation where we then had to worry about both recovering our losses and finding another place before we ran out of time. If you follow the link you will see "sale pending". We got to that late stage of the game when they pulled the plug. Jerks.
Luckily, we quickly found a nice spot with a nicely finished basement and had our offer accepted just last night. This spot isn't as sweet in the bedroom size dep't but the basement is sweet and our backyard isn't ass-to-ass with any neighbors; just the regal woodlands of Anytown, USA. Hopefully this goes off without any complications. Any other bumps in the road may cause my head to explode.
We're gonna be homeowners. Yee-haawww!
I will now share the general cluster-f' of goings ons as they appear in my brain.
GAMIN'
A couple of games have been keeping me busy. The one I've been playing the most lately is Bioshock. Brother-in-law Chris is letting me borrow that one with high recommendations and I have to say that the game is awesome. I was a big fan of the game F.E.A.R. (which is one of the few games I have actually shelled out money for which says alot) because of the spooky vibe and sweet enemy A.I. Bioshock will also gives you some chills and allows for a lot of variety in how you want to play.
The difficulty isn't too much either, which is nice. First Person Shooters (or, FPS in the biz) are not my forte by any means so I often will get discouraged. I was scared as shit of taking on the Big Daddy's but after a couple of tries where I had to use every single First Aid kit and then still die 2 times after that, I can now take them down without healing at all if I plan right. It's really just a 5 step process:
1) Lay down a couple proximity mines 'twixt you and him,
2) Get on the other side of the mines and unload on him with gun of choice,
3) Zap him with the lightning plasmid and then unload four rounds of shotgun with electric buck,
4) Back up while reloading shotgun,
5) Repeat 3 & 4 until done.
I'm sure there's other ways as well. Each weapon (seven in all) has 3 different types of ammo and there are a bunch of plasmids to mix up as well.
Anyways, the story behind the game is fascinating and the conversations and monologues of the various inhabitants of the mysterious underwater city are creepy as hell. The story is that some rich guy with a vision decided to create an underwater utopia, population gets involved in some pretty heavy genetic engineering, everyone goes crazy, utopia falls apart. Good times.
Other than that, I have a few other games loaded on my PC, although the amount of time I spend playing them varies.
Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War 2
I recently started up Warhammer. It's supposed to be similar to one of the best strategy games I've ever played, Company of Heroes, so I figured what the hell. Haven't gotten too far in to it but I like what I've seen so far. The graphics are nice, and it seems to blend strategy and RPG really well, which is good for me as I am not a hard core strategy kind of guy.
It involves some nice mechanics like flanking, suppressing fire, cover, leveling, and bloody combat when you zoom in. I wasn't overly familiar with the Warhammer world until recently, but the gist is that, way in the future, the people of Earth are busy trying to occupy every planet in space. Their soldiers are "space marines" which are equipped with bolters (firearms launching small explosive rounds at high velocities) and chainswords (super advanced sword with a biting edge kind of like a chainsaw). So when your boys charge in to the enemies and you hear the chainswords start whirring you can basically see the enemies fall to pieces. AWESOME. The amount of blood does the novels some justice.
Crysis
This one isn't actually on my comp at the time. I'm waiting to finish Bioshock first. I did play it a little when I first bought it and I'm really excited to start it. I can't remember the story but here's what I recall. You and a couple other highly trained commandos are pushing in to enemy territory on some jungle island. The enemies are good in this game, for real. The advantage you have, however, is that you and your boys have these advanced suits that, with a push of the middle mouse button, can alternate between a shield, strength, speed, camouflage, and maybe some other things. Oh yeah, and all of a sudden you find that there is some sort of alien activity as well.
Battlefield Heroes
Mindless entertainment at its best. This is a free to play online game. It's quite simple and not nearly as strategic as some other online shooters. I think they currently have about 5 or 6 maps and 3 classes (soldier, gunner, commando). You choose one of your characters and the game grabs you and whoever is waiting and throws you in a map. Hilarity ensues.
The game pissed off a large amount of the fanbase a couple months ago as they took a number of items that you used to be able to "buy" with points you earn in the game and made them astronomically expensive and opened up more options to those willing to spend a few bucks. That, and the fact that the game seems to be infested with cheaters has turned me off recently, and I haven't played much at all lately.
Whoever needs to cheat at a free to play online video game is a sad sad person.
Dungeons & Dragons Online
I recently heard that this game suddenly dropped the subscriber cost so I figured, why not give it a shot. I only finished the tutorial at this point but it seems fun so far. I'm not a huge MMORPG guy as almost none of my friends are in to anything other than Madden, so I don't have a base of people ready to form a guild or anything. I also have found from my time playing Guild Wars that 99% of these people are incredibly immature, obnoxious, and generally a pain in the ass. So, as you can see I am not quite cut out for joining up with a bunch of strangers to go slay the dragon. Because of that, my involvement in this game will probably be minimal but it will be a good change of pace from time to time.
But, I'm not ashamed to admit that I played some D&D back in the day and so I had to give it a try. Thus, Dellinor Caesaryen, the Warpriest Dwarf was born.
Civ IV
I have obsessed over this game multiple times in my life. I install it, stay away for weeks, devote a solid week to playing it for hours, get disgusted and uninstall. This game is crack. That is all.
Runes of Magic/Runescape/Second Life
The magazine PC Gamer has been devoting alot of coverage to online games recently and has been pointing out which games are free. I am nothing if not a fan of all that is free. So, I currently have these three ready and waiting on my desktop, but I rarely get them going. If anything I will go with Runes of Magic as it appears to be the most polished. Second Life I hear is a great game and I'm pretty sure you can make real life money while playing it. Runescape I will probably never get around to as everytime I go the library I see these pre-teen kids lined up at the computers playing it. There's nothing like pwning children but I suppose I'll have to pass.
Oblivion
Damn you oblivion. I was pretty far in to that game at one point but when I bought my new computer a little over a year ago I didn't bring over my save. I am now making the painful process of restoration my goal. This game is deep. Miles and miles of land to explore. Tons of quests to complete. Piles and piles of caves, ancient ruins, abandoned forts. Countless room to construct new weapons, spells, and potions. And the mod community is crazy good. I don't know when I'll ever get around to finishing the game but I have found that the main quest isn't even close to that important. It's just a real damn good game.
Neverwinter Nights 2
This game pissed me off. I was pretty thoroughly invested in to it last year when all of a sudden these glitches started occurring. I had one character that just stopped responding to any and all commands. I tried researching all of the console commands to figure out how to fix it but I think I just made things worse. It was awful. There's nothing like investing tens of hours into an RPG only to have to start over. That is one thing I hate about PC games. It seems like often times they will rush to get a product on the shelves even if they haven't worked out all the bugs. Anyway, the game is plodder, so it will be hard for me to get back to the point I was before. We'll see...
Dragon Age Origins
Being the RPG buff that I am, I had to try this one out after all the rave reviews it received. I did get it going and, so far, I am impressed. I definitely have some fine-tuning to do as visiting a small town caused my frame rate to plummet. The action is bloody and each battle is difficult if you don't plan properly. It's supposed to be one of those "mature games" where not everything is peaches and cream. That sounds good to me. The cookie cutter stuff doesn't quite work for me as much these days.
So, if you know anything about games, you know what my problem is here. I'm an RPG gamer and I have far too many RPGs that I have fallen behind on. Not only am I in to the most time consuming genre that there is, I am someone who likes to investigate every nook and quest and possibility while avoiding the main quest as long as I can. So, the chances of me finishing any of these are kind of low. Final Fantasy 7 and above are still not finished. Dragon Warrior II is waiting for me somewhere. It was only through sheer effort that I forced myself to finish off Fallout 3 not too long ago. I'll still enjoy them, though. Hopefully this wedding business and house owning thing don't get too much in the way.
I wasted way too much time on this blog post. Back to work!
Life has also thrown a number of curve balls in my direction lately. In the effort of trying to capitalize on the first time home buyer tax credit and super low interest rates, the Hot Mary and I have decided to double our orphans and go for the wedding/house combo in this 2010. You know, because last year was boring and we needed to spice things up.
Anywho, we found a place we liked and were balls deep in the purchasing process when the sellers decided to go with the "oopsy, we don't really want to sell after all" maneuver for which there is no defense. That little bit of fuckery left us in a situation where we then had to worry about both recovering our losses and finding another place before we ran out of time. If you follow the link you will see "sale pending". We got to that late stage of the game when they pulled the plug. Jerks.
Luckily, we quickly found a nice spot with a nicely finished basement and had our offer accepted just last night. This spot isn't as sweet in the bedroom size dep't but the basement is sweet and our backyard isn't ass-to-ass with any neighbors; just the regal woodlands of Anytown, USA. Hopefully this goes off without any complications. Any other bumps in the road may cause my head to explode.
We're gonna be homeowners. Yee-haawww!
I will now share the general cluster-f' of goings ons as they appear in my brain.
GAMIN'
A couple of games have been keeping me busy. The one I've been playing the most lately is Bioshock. Brother-in-law Chris is letting me borrow that one with high recommendations and I have to say that the game is awesome. I was a big fan of the game F.E.A.R. (which is one of the few games I have actually shelled out money for which says alot) because of the spooky vibe and sweet enemy A.I. Bioshock will also gives you some chills and allows for a lot of variety in how you want to play.
The difficulty isn't too much either, which is nice. First Person Shooters (or, FPS in the biz) are not my forte by any means so I often will get discouraged. I was scared as shit of taking on the Big Daddy's but after a couple of tries where I had to use every single First Aid kit and then still die 2 times after that, I can now take them down without healing at all if I plan right. It's really just a 5 step process:
1) Lay down a couple proximity mines 'twixt you and him,
2) Get on the other side of the mines and unload on him with gun of choice,
3) Zap him with the lightning plasmid and then unload four rounds of shotgun with electric buck,
4) Back up while reloading shotgun,
5) Repeat 3 & 4 until done.
I'm sure there's other ways as well. Each weapon (seven in all) has 3 different types of ammo and there are a bunch of plasmids to mix up as well.
Anyways, the story behind the game is fascinating and the conversations and monologues of the various inhabitants of the mysterious underwater city are creepy as hell. The story is that some rich guy with a vision decided to create an underwater utopia, population gets involved in some pretty heavy genetic engineering, everyone goes crazy, utopia falls apart. Good times.
Other than that, I have a few other games loaded on my PC, although the amount of time I spend playing them varies.
Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War 2
I recently started up Warhammer. It's supposed to be similar to one of the best strategy games I've ever played, Company of Heroes, so I figured what the hell. Haven't gotten too far in to it but I like what I've seen so far. The graphics are nice, and it seems to blend strategy and RPG really well, which is good for me as I am not a hard core strategy kind of guy.
It involves some nice mechanics like flanking, suppressing fire, cover, leveling, and bloody combat when you zoom in. I wasn't overly familiar with the Warhammer world until recently, but the gist is that, way in the future, the people of Earth are busy trying to occupy every planet in space. Their soldiers are "space marines" which are equipped with bolters (firearms launching small explosive rounds at high velocities) and chainswords (super advanced sword with a biting edge kind of like a chainsaw). So when your boys charge in to the enemies and you hear the chainswords start whirring you can basically see the enemies fall to pieces. AWESOME. The amount of blood does the novels some justice.
Crysis
This one isn't actually on my comp at the time. I'm waiting to finish Bioshock first. I did play it a little when I first bought it and I'm really excited to start it. I can't remember the story but here's what I recall. You and a couple other highly trained commandos are pushing in to enemy territory on some jungle island. The enemies are good in this game, for real. The advantage you have, however, is that you and your boys have these advanced suits that, with a push of the middle mouse button, can alternate between a shield, strength, speed, camouflage, and maybe some other things. Oh yeah, and all of a sudden you find that there is some sort of alien activity as well.
Battlefield Heroes
Mindless entertainment at its best. This is a free to play online game. It's quite simple and not nearly as strategic as some other online shooters. I think they currently have about 5 or 6 maps and 3 classes (soldier, gunner, commando). You choose one of your characters and the game grabs you and whoever is waiting and throws you in a map. Hilarity ensues.
The game pissed off a large amount of the fanbase a couple months ago as they took a number of items that you used to be able to "buy" with points you earn in the game and made them astronomically expensive and opened up more options to those willing to spend a few bucks. That, and the fact that the game seems to be infested with cheaters has turned me off recently, and I haven't played much at all lately.
Whoever needs to cheat at a free to play online video game is a sad sad person.
Dungeons & Dragons Online
I recently heard that this game suddenly dropped the subscriber cost so I figured, why not give it a shot. I only finished the tutorial at this point but it seems fun so far. I'm not a huge MMORPG guy as almost none of my friends are in to anything other than Madden, so I don't have a base of people ready to form a guild or anything. I also have found from my time playing Guild Wars that 99% of these people are incredibly immature, obnoxious, and generally a pain in the ass. So, as you can see I am not quite cut out for joining up with a bunch of strangers to go slay the dragon. Because of that, my involvement in this game will probably be minimal but it will be a good change of pace from time to time.
But, I'm not ashamed to admit that I played some D&D back in the day and so I had to give it a try. Thus, Dellinor Caesaryen, the Warpriest Dwarf was born.
Civ IV
I have obsessed over this game multiple times in my life. I install it, stay away for weeks, devote a solid week to playing it for hours, get disgusted and uninstall. This game is crack. That is all.
Runes of Magic/Runescape/Second Life
The magazine PC Gamer has been devoting alot of coverage to online games recently and has been pointing out which games are free. I am nothing if not a fan of all that is free. So, I currently have these three ready and waiting on my desktop, but I rarely get them going. If anything I will go with Runes of Magic as it appears to be the most polished. Second Life I hear is a great game and I'm pretty sure you can make real life money while playing it. Runescape I will probably never get around to as everytime I go the library I see these pre-teen kids lined up at the computers playing it. There's nothing like pwning children but I suppose I'll have to pass.
Oblivion
Damn you oblivion. I was pretty far in to that game at one point but when I bought my new computer a little over a year ago I didn't bring over my save. I am now making the painful process of restoration my goal. This game is deep. Miles and miles of land to explore. Tons of quests to complete. Piles and piles of caves, ancient ruins, abandoned forts. Countless room to construct new weapons, spells, and potions. And the mod community is crazy good. I don't know when I'll ever get around to finishing the game but I have found that the main quest isn't even close to that important. It's just a real damn good game.
Neverwinter Nights 2
This game pissed me off. I was pretty thoroughly invested in to it last year when all of a sudden these glitches started occurring. I had one character that just stopped responding to any and all commands. I tried researching all of the console commands to figure out how to fix it but I think I just made things worse. It was awful. There's nothing like investing tens of hours into an RPG only to have to start over. That is one thing I hate about PC games. It seems like often times they will rush to get a product on the shelves even if they haven't worked out all the bugs. Anyway, the game is plodder, so it will be hard for me to get back to the point I was before. We'll see...
Dragon Age Origins
Being the RPG buff that I am, I had to try this one out after all the rave reviews it received. I did get it going and, so far, I am impressed. I definitely have some fine-tuning to do as visiting a small town caused my frame rate to plummet. The action is bloody and each battle is difficult if you don't plan properly. It's supposed to be one of those "mature games" where not everything is peaches and cream. That sounds good to me. The cookie cutter stuff doesn't quite work for me as much these days.
So, if you know anything about games, you know what my problem is here. I'm an RPG gamer and I have far too many RPGs that I have fallen behind on. Not only am I in to the most time consuming genre that there is, I am someone who likes to investigate every nook and quest and possibility while avoiding the main quest as long as I can. So, the chances of me finishing any of these are kind of low. Final Fantasy 7 and above are still not finished. Dragon Warrior II is waiting for me somewhere. It was only through sheer effort that I forced myself to finish off Fallout 3 not too long ago. I'll still enjoy them, though. Hopefully this wedding business and house owning thing don't get too much in the way.
I wasted way too much time on this blog post. Back to work!
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
We takes the money!!!
Working for a bank has given me some insight in to the current banking crisis that, unfortunately, is more bad news than good. On the bright side, I have the pleasure of being employed at an institution that has not required any TARP funds in order to stay afloat. We have suffered losses, obviously, but nothing to the extent where the business is suddenly in trouble.
It seems to me that the largest banks are the ones that have been hit the hardest and have needed bailouts the most. Now, if about 95 banks have failed as I read recently then a good chunk of them must have been small but most of this money has gone to financial institutions that have risen above the pack. Why is that? Why would the supposed "cream of the crop" be hurting the most? I suppose there are a number of reasons to account for that whether it's blatantly over-the-top executive pay, risky investments, poor accounting practices, or whatever. But these are the guys who have gobbled up most of the government money and, if this report is true, have not learned a thing from their recent struggles. Or perhaps they did learn. Maybe they learned that every time they fuck up the government will come and throw them another fist full of cash.
Where all banks are affected by this is by the FDIC insurance. This is the funding that makes sure we, the customers, don't lose our money when a bank goes under. Prior to the banking crisis the bank I work for had to pay something in the thousands for insurance. After the crisis we were hit with a special assessment fee that hit us up for a cool $2.5 million. Very soon they are getting together to find out about an additional assessment that could hit us up for about $10 million. I do a lot of peer analysis for the company and I've seen that these fees have knocked net income figures for a number of banks in to the red, taking what looked like a promising year in a time of trouble and change and wiping it out.
So here's the way I see it: we, the smaller banks are busy propping up all the failed banks and a good number of the big boys. The huge banks of the world get government cash injected which they are using to do everything but what they were told to do. These banks then go and buy out the little guys who are getting crippled by increased insurance costs. These banks then continue sketchy investment practices, albeit with less inclination to lend to their customers. They eventually fail again, people get laid off, government throws more money at them.
So who wins in all of this? The executives, obviously.
Why does it seem that everything is set up for the guys at the top? And when is somebody up there going to do something about it?
It seems to me that the largest banks are the ones that have been hit the hardest and have needed bailouts the most. Now, if about 95 banks have failed as I read recently then a good chunk of them must have been small but most of this money has gone to financial institutions that have risen above the pack. Why is that? Why would the supposed "cream of the crop" be hurting the most? I suppose there are a number of reasons to account for that whether it's blatantly over-the-top executive pay, risky investments, poor accounting practices, or whatever. But these are the guys who have gobbled up most of the government money and, if this report is true, have not learned a thing from their recent struggles. Or perhaps they did learn. Maybe they learned that every time they fuck up the government will come and throw them another fist full of cash.
Where all banks are affected by this is by the FDIC insurance. This is the funding that makes sure we, the customers, don't lose our money when a bank goes under. Prior to the banking crisis the bank I work for had to pay something in the thousands for insurance. After the crisis we were hit with a special assessment fee that hit us up for a cool $2.5 million. Very soon they are getting together to find out about an additional assessment that could hit us up for about $10 million. I do a lot of peer analysis for the company and I've seen that these fees have knocked net income figures for a number of banks in to the red, taking what looked like a promising year in a time of trouble and change and wiping it out.
So here's the way I see it: we, the smaller banks are busy propping up all the failed banks and a good number of the big boys. The huge banks of the world get government cash injected which they are using to do everything but what they were told to do. These banks then go and buy out the little guys who are getting crippled by increased insurance costs. These banks then continue sketchy investment practices, albeit with less inclination to lend to their customers. They eventually fail again, people get laid off, government throws more money at them.
So who wins in all of this? The executives, obviously.
Why does it seem that everything is set up for the guys at the top? And when is somebody up there going to do something about it?
Monday, August 24, 2009
Even more shit you probably already knew...
Back in 2003 Fox fought for their right that it isn't illegal to lie about the news.
Repeat after me:
Fair and balanced
Fair and balanced
Fair and balanced
Repeat after me:
Fair and balanced
Fair and balanced
Fair and balanced
This guy almost makes me want to like Sid the Kid
I have to admit it. Ovechkin is sick to watch on the ice. He plays with an enthusiasm and flair that is extremely rare in the NHL. He celebrates goals in cheesy displays and loves the camera.
This dude is good.
But everytime I read an interview he does I get a little disgusted. It's hard to equate properly but he may be the NHLs version of TO or Ochocinco. I can't stand either one of those guys. While checking the baseball box scores this morning (Logjammin is on FIRE!) on Yahoo I saw another one of his interviews and a report of his clothing line release party. Some of the shit he says is extremely obnoxious. Maybe it's just because he's foreign but it seems like he goes out of the way to show how much of a pimp he is.
This dude is good.
But everytime I read an interview he does I get a little disgusted. It's hard to equate properly but he may be the NHLs version of TO or Ochocinco. I can't stand either one of those guys. While checking the baseball box scores this morning (Logjammin is on FIRE!) on Yahoo I saw another one of his interviews and a report of his clothing line release party. Some of the shit he says is extremely obnoxious. Maybe it's just because he's foreign but it seems like he goes out of the way to show how much of a pimp he is.
Look at him!
He's always talking about the ladies. Often times the guy who talks about how much tail he's getting is usually getting the least but maybe the rules are different in Russia. I don't know. I suppose he could serve as an example to every ass-ugly dude out there that anyone can lay some pipe despite a d-bag personality and a face only your mother could love. Of course all you need in that situation is to be the future of the NHL and make a shit ton of cash.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Eli getting PAID!
Eli just went and got himself 97 million reasons to live today. If I were to rank the top 10 quarterbacks right now I highly doubt that I would be putting him in there but he's certainly built himself a decent resume. It's sometimes hard to look past the stupid face and the fact that he cried his way out of San Diego and remember that he is a Super Bowl winner and has kind of done pretty well for himself.
Now, in all honesty, I don't really think he earned this cash. His Super Bowl legacy was completely saved by one excellent drive and a very very very lucky catch. For a while he had the best end zone bailout you could possibly have in Plaxico. He's shown flashes of brilliance at times and complete boneheadedness at others.
But hey, I'm not here to hate. I'm here to appreciate. That's a ton of cash, and I'm happy for him. I just wonder if he and Peyton make Cooper do stupid shit and then throw dollar bills at him.
Congratulations Eli. I'm probably just a little bitter that my 'Skins have only had a small taste of playoff success in the last few years. Here's hoping Haynesworth doesn't try any funny business on you this year.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Rozlúčiť, Hossa. We hardly knew Ye.
Well, that didn't take long. Hossa has come to the decision that the road to the Stanley Cup goes through Chicago. Or maybe he just decided that he'd like to lay in a big pile of money every night like Scrooge McDuck. Not only was he MIA during the playoffs, he immediately jumps ship from a perennial Stanley Cup threat despite stating his desire for a championship.
I guess I can't blame him. Sometimes it makes sense to get paid if you can't win it big and Chicago is a young up-and-coming team.
But Chicago has no excuse for locking the dude up for 12 years. He'll be in his 40s by the time he's done cashing in on this gig. Have fun with that one.
I guess I can't blame him. Sometimes it makes sense to get paid if you can't win it big and Chicago is a young up-and-coming team.
But Chicago has no excuse for locking the dude up for 12 years. He'll be in his 40s by the time he's done cashing in on this gig. Have fun with that one.
Monday, June 29, 2009
See ya, Bernie
So 150 years is the sentence for this jackass. The dude is over 70 already so it seems a little like overkill, but I'm pretty sure they were trying to make a statement. I honestly don't even really know what to say about the case as the scope, duration, and money involved are way beyond my reckoning. My big financial concern is that Subway now charges $2 rather than $1 to add bacon to a footlong sub. I wouldn't mind seeing the person behind that being put behind bars for 150 years.
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