Links and Minifeatures 11 20 Monday

Carnival of Real Estate



Carnival of The Capitalists



Carnival of Personal Finance



UPDATE: Rino Sightings. Obviously the host has already eaten Thanksgiving Dinner, and is too bloated to be witty.

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Now this might cause people to accept $1 coins: U.S. Mint to unveil presidential coins



After it became blazingly obvious to anyone that the previous $1 coin was a product of affirmative action and political correctness, not merit, people weren't interested. I've got nothing against Sacajawea, but why should one of Lewis and Clarke's guides be featured on currency when Lewis and Clarke themselves aren't?



Susan B. Anthony started a noble cause, but her coin was too subject to confusion with the quarter. People didn't want it because they were handing out dollars when they thought they were handing out quarters. It was also one of the ugliest coins in the modern era - It even managed to make the Eisenhower dollars look good.



If the US wants to make a $1 coin popular, they need to take a lesson from the UK. They've got a 1 pound coin that looks and feels like no other coin. It's thicker, it's a different color - there is no way of mistaking it for any other coin. They also need to put some person who's part of our American consciousness on it. Susan B. Anthony is deserving, but not popular. This one might have it right, as many others did: Eisenhower (the dollar), Franklin and Kennedy (fifty cent pieces), Washington, Roosevelt, Jefferson, Lincoln. Before them, various Liberty figures. The previous nickel and penny were both Indian head (the nickel before Jefferson is also known as the buffalo nickel after the reverse). What do all of these have in common? Every schoolkid understands the part these figures played in our national history.



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Condition of Former KGB Spy Worsens

Doctors said Litvinenko was seriously ill after being given the deadly poison thallium - a toxic metal found in some types of rat poison that can cause damage to the nervous system and organ failure. Such poison has been outlawed in Britain since the 1970s, making it highly unlikely any could have gotten into his food by accident.

Every time the Clinton Adminstration had a choice between supporting democratic systems and supporting Yeltsin, they supported Yeltsin. Result: We now have Putin to deal with, and one of the most powerful countries in the world, with thousands of nuclear warheads, has gone from a nascent democracy in 1993 back to almost completely totalitarian. And people have to ask "what's wrong with the realism school of diplomacy?" Thank you, yet again, Warren Christopher and Madeline Albright. And they're trying to give us another...

Litvinenko, who has been a thorn in the Russian government's side since the late 1990s, fell ill after a meal with a contact who claimed to have details about the slaying of another Kremlin critic - Anna Politkovskaya, the Russian investigative journalist who was gunned down Oct. 7 in her Moscow apartment building.



Litvinenko blamed her killing on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

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Key Democrats oppose renewing military draft



Oh, those wonderful Democrats, protecting the country from the rapacious draft of the Bush Administration. Except that, down in the fourth paragraph, we are told that the Bush Administration didn't ask for a draft - it was a powerful Democratic legislator, incoming committee chair Charles Rangel.



Next, we're going to hear that the Democrats want an average of twelve hours per day of sunlight, favor trial by jury, and want to keep the First Amendment.



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Gingrich '08: The stealth candidate



The Republicans have been missing Newt, whether they realize it or not. Furthermore, for the past two years plus, he's been building support nationwide for his ideas. Yes, he's a polarizing figure. So was Ronald Reagan in 1976 and 1980 and throughout his Presidency, and for that matter, Lincoln in 1860 and throughout his presidency. Neither of those two men built any political alliances that lasted, did they? (The Republican interest alliance Lincoln built lasted until the Depression, and while Reagan's thirty year old alliance may be wounded, Gingrich supports it)



He appears to be trying to back the presidential campaign off a level. Instead of the war of personalities and supporters of particular candidates, he's trying to create a the demand for a presidential candidate whose views are compatible with his, and while I'm certain it wouldn't break his heart if he were he party's candidate in 2008, I think that if the Democrats win in 2008, by 2012 his ideas may be irresistable. Look at the parallels: An unpopular war effort, Republicans getting trashed in 2006 (1974). That's what we've got so far. Then a cosmetically appealing but incompetent Democrat wins the Presidency in 2008 (1976). By 2010 the Republicans are winning back seats (the Republican freshman congressional class of 1978 was huge), and in 2012 (1980) an ideas driven Republican wins office.



Would I vote for Gingrich? I honestly don't know. He's a bomb thrower, but at least you always know where you really stand with him, what his real take on the issues is, and he's not afraid to go to the mat - even in the face of a hostile press - and fight for what he believes is right.



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Palestinian human shields give Israel pause

In perhaps the most effective act of nonviolent protest in the six-year Palestinian uprising, hundreds of Gazans forced Israel over the weekend to call off airstrikes on the residence of a militant leader by swarming the house as human shields.

Why don't we ever hear about human shields volunteering to protect innocent Israeli women, children, and other civilians? I'll tell you why. Because there is no chance it would work. The presence of additional targets would be an inducement to the Paleosimians. "The normal women and children, plus some infidel volunteers? Wonderful!"



So while Israel lets the guilty go lest they attack the somewhat innocent, the Paleosimians light off a few extra rockets, because the presence of more innocent bodies in the area makes it more worthwhile to their way of thinking.



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I have my older daughter with me this week due to school closure this week, so new articles are going to be fewer as I have less time to write. Thanksgiving week traffic is pretty sparse anyway, but if you've got a question, please ask it.