Yesterday, it was raining. Just barely. It was more like ice balls. Then it actually hailed. Not because it was a huge storm, but because it was so cold. This morning, it was raining snow. It wasn't raining water drops and it wasn't actually floating around like snow, but it wasn't quite ice, so it wasn't hail. It was snow balls. Not even sleet, either, because it wasn't rainy enough. And now? It's raining ice again, which I guess is hail. Once again, not because it's storming, but because it's COLD.

You know I'm really not feeling the whole global warming thing this year?

I just wanted to say, "GUESS WHAT?"

(You ask, "What?")

I've been in a pickle. See, I was schooling myself in computer networking. It's not really a degree, but rather a "concentration" that bundles an unknown "Associates Degree in Microsoft Networking" with Microsoft and CompTIA certifications. It was okay, but it soon got very old. To be honest, there was a lot of just plain old memorization and a lot of "this is what [networking component] should do, but it doesn't always, and here are ways it can differ" and a lot of "when troubleshooting [networking component], you should always try this first, but it won't always work, so just be a good troubleshooter." In other words, I quickly realized there's a theoretical science behind networking, but in practical application? Everything you know should be suspended because each network is basically a wad of cables and a lot of prayer. That's not the life for me. I want strict rules. Give me something like Mathematics and I'll eat it up! Perfect, ultimate IF/THEN rules that never change from equation to equation. Addition is addition, multiplaction is multiplication. When it gets complicated, it's still just addition and multiplication.

So I decided to transfer to a university that offered Computer Science: Indiana Wesleyan University. Not exactly what I expected, but I quickly realized the vastly different approach to programming from networking. I mean, the intoductory class was nothing I haven't already learned, but I like it all the same once the professor started giving us more freedom in our programs. There were problems, of course, but it was always something like "oops, I forgot a semicolon!" and nothing like in networking where you do everything you're supposed to and it just doesn't work because it doesn't want to. I can't stand that!

And then I met the love of my life. Macroeconomics. It was perfect in every way. It was as logical as math and programming! Once you learned a rule and took it to the next step to make it more complicated, it still made sense. If you made a mistake, you could rest assured that you were the one in error and that it wasn't some complicated relative unknown variable like the rainy weather that was breaking all the rules. It was heaven. My first class of the day at 7:50am and I was wide awake and taking it all in: "Oh, so that's why Obama is pursuing that terrible plan!" "I see, so when they print money, it artificially lowers interest rates on savings and that's why we get asset bubbles!" "Woah, so that's why a recession happens?" "Why can't the government take this class and solve all our problems right now?!" Great revelations such as these made it all the more attractive.

And thus came my pickle: Do I do what is probably the smart thing and stay with a major in Computer Science? Do I bundle my lifetime hobby with a degree so I can work on something I already know so very well? Or do I switch to Economics? Do I advance a relatively new, although still very strong, hobby of political commentary and get a degree in something related so I then have authority in what I say? I know what jobs a Computer Science degree can get, but how does an Economics degree help me get a job, anyway? WHAT DO I DO? Well, pray, of course. Which I am still doing. But an opportunity presented itself during one of the awesome lunches my Economics professor holds before every exam!

He asked me what my major was, and I told him. Then I said, "Although, I was wanting to ask you who I would talk to about switching my major to Economics?" And he gave the perfect answer: "Well, me!" Apparently, he's the Economics program advisor, which is... Perfect. I can't say it any other way. It was always in the back of my mind that if he was the advisor, then I would have a really hard time staying with Computer Science. When it turned out that he actually was, I literally said, "Niiiice!" After that, he said they have brochures that explain what jobs an Economics major can get (mostly investment, banking or government, which is awesome) and that since I caught him before I was a Junior, I could still probably get Computer Science AND Economics done in the same time.

Woah, what? Double major? I had considered it before, but I thought it was far too weird. Programming and investment? What? I had abandoned that idea. On the one hand, it would give me two completely different sets of jobs to pick from, but, on the other, I could double major Computer Science and Mathematics and be so much more "buffed" in one job area. Apparently, though, he's had several CS/Econ majors before. I knew he was trying to prove a point when he changed his tone and asked why I picked Computer Science. I knew it was a trick question, but I just went for it and explained to him that I was in computer networking, but it's so unpredictable and I went with CS because it's far more rule-based and if something doesn't work, it's not something out of your control. And he, also, literally said, "Aha! That's why you like Economics so much, too! It's the logic!" At that point, I knew what I was gonna do.

Well, relatively speaking. I'm still praying about it. Seriously, with something that's literally going to impact the rest of my natural life, I need some divine help here! I think I've got a green light. I'm excited and can't wait until the Fall. I figure the only thing that could hold me back is money. I still haven't formed an opinion on loans. I'm usually of the opinion that loans should be avoided at all costs... But since I'm paying for college myself, I have to take all the government aid I can get. FAFSA and Stafford loans. It makes me unhappy, but is there any other choice? On the bright side, since Indiana has such a nice grant, I don't have to draw so much on loans. With my estimates, I can live at home for a year after I graduate and be able to pay back my loans if that's all I did. Is that Biblical? I don't know. Bill Gothard doesn't seem to think so, but the Israelites got their law from God Himself and in that law were several things about helping alleviate loans that people couldn't pay back. I mean, these laws were for paying back loans, not preventing loans. He obviously allowed for loans and debt if they were planned wisely.

So I don't know. I guess I'll wait and see how it all unfolds. But, to be honest, it's not like I have any other alternatives if I can't go to school. I do so well in the academic setting, too. I love it there! I'm expecting all As again this semester, too. Maybe some Bs. We'll see. It's not like I want a bunch of As to show off... If I don't get an A, that proves to me that I didn't work hard enough. Oh well. We'll see after Wednesday! My final final! (Hah... Final final. I made a funny!)

But, indeed. My plan for the future: Double major in Computer Science and Economics. Hopefully, I'll be able to use these skills to either work at a university (my personal choice would be, of course, IWU) or maybe even a bank. Maybe I could write banking software? That would be awesome. Maybe CS/Econ is a good thing, after all! Totally different, yet so very similar.

Language warning if you link to the article to see for yourself, but suffice it to say that David Axelrod, the man known as Obama's puppeteer speechwriter, has decided to take it upon himself to declare the Tea Party movement as "misdirected" because, after all, Obama has given 95% of the country a tax cut! I mean, honestly! How could anyone be so misled as to think that protesting tax cuts is a good thing? After all, isn't that what Republicans want at all costs?

First, the mistake that the liberals make is that the Tea Parties are a strictly Republican idea. They're wrong. I'm a Republican. Actually, scratch that. I was a Republican. I am not a Republican as of right now. I don't stand for the ideas of Democrats and I don't stand for the ideas of the Republicans. I've never been a party member, but I have thought (up until this election) that the Republicans are the best vehicle for Conservatism. That is no longer the case. I am a Conservative. I am not a Republican. The Tea Parties, I would say, are anti-government, not anti-Democrat. We don't like what's happening, period. We don't want Democrats and we don't want Republicans. Period. We're ticked off at the federal government as a whole. Period. There's no partisanship here. This is not a bad thing considering that the federal government has burst through the confines of the United States Constitution on just about every level. We want our Constitution back. The government fired the CEO of a private company? Really? That should terrify you! If it doesn't, you are WHACKED. The government is supposed to guarantee private property, not interfere in ANY way.

Second, is Axelrod really so stupid as to assume that we're stupid enough to not realize what they're doing? A trillion dollar bail out that nobody wanted that is doing absolutely nothing to help our economy, coupled with tax cuts? Is Axelrod the only one who doesn't see the disaster that such huge deficit spending is going to cause? Oh, no worries! We'll just print a ton of money that we really don't have the assets to back up and it'll all be okay! Except for the ghastly high inflation we're going to have in about a year, right? Yeah. Except for that.

See, we don't mind the tax cuts. We would prefer tax cuts across the board. The key is "95%". The upper 5% are getting crushed by taxes. (Darn those capitalist pigs, right?) We want tax cuts for EVERYONE and we want government spending to STOP so that we actually have a surplus? You know... That thing that has to happen so we make money so we can actually pay off the debts we have already? The government may have cut taxes for the majority of people. (Personally, I don't see those cuts anywhere.) But it won't matter! In a year or two, we'll have inflation that will take the place of the tax cuts. We have to pay for high spending somewhere, people. That's a fact. You have to pay for it in high taxes, high interest rates, or high inflation. You will ALWAYS pay for it. Some ways are natural (high taxes and interest rates) and some aren't natural (high inflation). If you have inflation, that won't actually ever take care of the problem.

Anyway, before I get carried away with another economics lesson (it may be too late), I'm gonna stop and just say: Axel-face, my man. We appreciate the tax cuts. Really, we do. You're right when you say it's what we "Reaganites" have always wanted. But, see, we're not stupid. We realize that tax cuts without everything else that should accompany tax cuts is not a tax cut in the long run. In the long run, the federal government is DESTROYING the country's economy. All the government cares about is fixing things today, but we citizens are smart enough to look toward the horizon and see what's going to happen tomorrow. The government has stepped far out of the Constitutional boundaries with huge power grabs like with Government General Motors. We all know what it's trying and we've had it. You and your ilk have been pulling this crap since Carter and we're DONE.

And you know what else? It ain't personal. See, the Republicans are just the same way. They betrayed everything they stood for by reaching across the aisle to the liberals who have nothing but themselves in mind. The Republican party is equally as stupid to realize that this bipartisan plan is not going to work. It cost us a vital election. We would have had the election on a silver platter if McCain was as solid a conservative as Palin. So now, with the government swelling to engulf our entire lives and with the economy falling apart around us, we blame Republicans. We blame Democrats. We blame everyone in the government right now and we want you ALL to get out! We want the small federal government of old!

Thankfully, the Constitution guarantees us the right to criticize you. So call off your Homeland Security peons.

Thank you, and good night.

Why haven't I been writing? Well, quick answer: School. Which, I might add, will be done next Wednesday, so I can get back to my good ol' political blogging routine that I know everyone misses terribly! Did you hear about how the Department of Homeland Security warned everyone about the "danger" of us crazy right-wing conservative extremists gathering together for Tea Parties on April 15? (That's the word they used: Extremist.) I would have attended one myself, but I was busy with school. Since when was it a national security threat for Americans to protest the government? I must have missed the memo sent out between the last anti-Iraq War protest and the Tea Parties. What everyone misses, though, is the fact that we're not just upset with Democrats. We're upset with Republicans. We're upset with government, period.

So just because I'm silent doesn't mean I'm not watching what your precious Obamessiah is doing to our country. I just don't like to dwell on commentary when I should be studying for classes, but I do keep up on events! But again, my last final is on Wednesday and I can come roaring back to the spotlight of your Internet lives! Heck yeah!

I might not have been blogging, but I've definitely been writing. If I wasn't writing so much, I'd probably have the time to blog. As such, I think I'll make a page where you can read all the papers I've written for this semester! Won't that be exciting?! Maybe for my Mom. No, but seriously. They're some good papers. Mostly about religion, since I have all the mandatory Wesleyan Church classes this semester. I really lay into some of the things we're supposed to analyze and respond to. (If I'm not tearing apart a liberal, I can at least tear apart some of the common incorrect beliefs of the teenagers coming out of public high schools these days, right?)

I'll announce it once I find the time to get them posted. Maybe I can dig up some of the relevant papers I wrote during my stay at Ivy Tech, since there were a few papers that required me to analyze something stupid and I told them exactly what I thought. I mean, academically, these papers are rock solid. They usually manage to land me perfect scores. The lowest score I've had on a paper was about 97%. An A+ no matter how to look at it. Yes, sir! The folks may not like the content I present, but there's no doubt I know my stuff, eh?

What's up?! Well, you know what? I don't care! If I cared, I'd be reading your blog right now, which I'm not. You're reading mine. Which hasn't been updated since forever. So I'm going to write stuff that comes to mind... Namely, I'm going to write about what prompted me to post to begin with!

Grades! Not my grades, really, but other folks' grades. You see, in my Macroeconomics class (which I will discuss later), I was there early one day and around me were a bunch of other folks who also happened to be there early and were actually awake enough to talk! They talked about the only thing we had in common: That class. What I heard was disturbing... They all thought it was boring. Woah, hold on. What did they think the class was about? You see, it's in the social science division here at the University (or the Uni, as my European friends abbreviate these places). A degree requires 2 of these classes, and economics is only one of many of these in that division. You could have picked something else! Something else, dare I say, more on your level of thinking? (In other words: You could have picked a class that didn't require thinking! They're there!)

So these people were all whining about how none of it made sense and how they couldn't understand any of it (even though Professor stops multiple times to see if there are any questions, and constantly repeats key points) and one of them even said that their roommate had already been through Macroeconomics and would filch the answers from them. One of the others would keep falling asleep. On the front row. (If I was a Professor, I would concoct an ingenious method of totally embarrasing anyone who fell asleep in class. I think the Professors here are far too lenient on students, but that's another story for another day.) I was there thinking, "Wow. I can tell you guys don't pay much attention... Slurping your expensive Student Center coffees and idly doodling on your notepads. I sure would love to see your grades when this is over."

Well, I sort of got my wish today. We had our second exam for the class on Monday, and we just got our results back. I had gotten a B on my first exam because I saved the essay questions for last and ran out of time and got hit for not explaining everything properly. I think he knew I knew what I was talking about, but he kept writing "explain" in the margins. I was displeased. (Technically, I got an A on the multiple choice portion and a C in the essay portion, which got me a B. The C was scary and ticked me off.) So I endeavored to study my tail off on the weekend leading up to the second exam and did half the essay questions first, then half the multiple choices, then the last half of essays, then the last half of questions. This got me an A! Woohoo! I am now happy.

So we were given our scantron sheets to look at and see what we got wrong, and then Professor went around to all the front row students (of which I am always a part of) to collect everyone's sheets. Everyone behind us would collect the sheets and pass them up to us. It was in this way that I managed to inadvertantly see the grades of some key students. The person beside me had the sheet from the fellow who wasn't paying attention because they (I am masking their gender, even though it makes the sentences look odd) could use their roommates notes from last semester? I had never seen that letter before... I knew of their existence, but I'd never seen one in their natural habitat: An F. Apparently, using someone else's notes hadn't quite worked out. The scantron sheets all need to be lined up, so I thought I would make sure they're sorted before I handed them back. I thought I put mine on top, but it wasn't, and I was staring at a brilliant green D+ from the person directly behind me.

Clearly their attitude toward the class is hurting their grades... It's not like they couldn't have switched, either. I mean, the only reason you would absolutely HAVE to take it would be if you were an Economics or Business major or something like that. If the class is required, they should think about switching to a major that might suit them better... If you're just filling a social sciences requirement, might I suggest something less mathematical and something more abstract? Like Psychology, perhaps?

Seriously, though, it made me mad because Macroeconomics is such a neat class. I am kidding you not when I say that after this class is finished, I will know more about why the economy is in its current state than Congress or the Federal Reserve itself does. We've discussed economic schools of thought (Congress is currently pursuing Keynesian principles right now, by the way) and why some of them (namely those Keynesian principles) are absolutely laughable when you're presented with the evidence. Keynesian economics is like Darwinian evolution. It only works if you ignore everything that doesn't fit inside the model. They don't look at the state of an economy and ask "what works and how can we explain this", they look at the economy and say "we have a problem that isn't being solved, so let's just do more of the same because clearly our ideas are right, but we're just not doing enough of it to make a difference." (Hello, multiple, increasingly large stimulus packages!)

It's amazing... Taking an economics course should be mandatory for politicians before they handle money. What Congress and the Federal Reserve is doing right now is a textbook definition of something that has NEVER worked and there is data to prove it. What caused the housing market to expand? Low interest rates (which led to bad mortgages). How do you keep interest rates low? You may not know this, but interest rates change by two things:

1. The amount of money deposited in savings accounts in banks. Think about it. What's the single most important function of a free market economy? Supply and demand. How do you measure supply and demand? You look at the prices! If something is hard to make, the price goes up. If people don't buy something, the price has to come down to a point where they will. The same applies to money for loans. If there isn't a whole lot of money "in stock" in the banks to supply to borrowers, the interest rate goes up. What does that do? It gives an incentive for people to loan money! What happens then? The interest rates go down, which gives an incentive for people to start borrowing the money! Interest rates are supposed to be an indication of what money is available for borrowing.
2. The money supply as a whole can artificially affect interest rates, which is what the Federal Reserve is supposed to "monitor." Interest rates go too high, which signifies a shortage of loanable money, right? This encourages people to save more, right? Well, the Federal Reserve sees these high interest rates and decides to "correct the problem" by increasing the amount of circulating money, which will also reduce interest rates. This, however, creates inflation, as we all know. So, to combat inflation, the Federal Reserve cuts back on the supply of money, which drives up interest rates. The hilarious thing is that they can never seem to find the perfect equilibrium between interest rates that are "just right" and inflation that is "just right", and we always have an overdose of one or the other. (I say they should just stop trying to meddle, but, again, that's another story for another day.)

The housing market expanded rapidly due to the artificially low interest rates given off by the high amount of money that Federal Reserve had been pumping out in response to September 11, 2001 and the recession we experienced after that. It takes a while for inflation to catch up and make prices go up, but it finally hit us. You may remember oil prices going insane? Food prices? Literally everything? You can thank our good friends at the Federal Reserve for that. That was a first hand experience at inflation. So what did the Federal Reserve do? Well, we all know inflation is bad, and inflation is too much money circulating, so the Federal Reserve cut back on the money they were printing...

Guess what happens when you cut back on money? The interest rates start going up to reflect the true amount of money in savings accounts. Uh oh. People were depending on those low interest rates to buy their houses. Okay, well, do big deal. People will just start selling the houses they can't afford to keep, right? Well, what happens when there's a bunch of stuff on the market that people don't want? The prices go down. There was a surplus of houses that people were selling and the prices started going down across the board. People who had taken out mortgages on their houses after assuming that prices would keep going up suddenly found themselves owing more than their house was worth and, as we know, things went out of control from there.

So what is the Federal Reserve doing as a response to this? They're printing money! What does printing money do? It lowers interest rates. The target rate that started this train wreck was 1%, which was the lowest rate in the history of our economy. They pushed the rate up to 6%, which popped the housing bubble, and now they're printing money for a target rate of 0.25%. That's not a joke. My Professor said it several times over the course of the week. To fix the financial crisis, which was started because of artificially low interest rates that caused people to borrow amounts of money that wasn't actually there, the Federal Reserve is printing money so there can be an even lower interest rate.

Now do you know what I mean when I say I can safely assume that I know more about the economy right now than Congress and the Federal Reserve itself? At least when it comes to what caused this particular recession. It's a textbook definition cause, and to fix it, they're using... The textbook definition cause. Thank you, Congressional Majority! Thank you, Federal Reserve! Thank you, Federal Government, for appointing people to run our entire economy that have absolutely no idea how it works.

So that's what's been going on in my life. I'm not saying I'm better than they are, but I'm wondering what they're thinking if this is in an introductory economics course. I mean, seriously. These guys are supposed to be professionals? It makes me want to actually major in Economics... But I don't know what kind of jobs would open for someone with just Economics. Maybe Business or Accounting AND Economics. Not just plain Economics. And I need to get a job... So I'm sticking with Computer Science. Bah.

Time for some more music... And anyone who LIVED during the early 90s will know what I'm going to talk about when they take the post title and add "music" to it. That's right. Rockapella! I was using StumbleUpon lastnight and it dropped me at a certain YTMND page with the theme song to "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego"... (Which will now be referred to as WWCS.) How StumbleUpon finds these things with my profile information is amazing. But OH MAN, I hadn't heard that song in years and years. Instant time warp to the past! Wait... What's this? The music isn't complete. The clip only has half the lyrics sung! It's not like it's cut... So it's probably a TV rip, right? Hmm. This calls for the great investigation skills of MISTER PUPPY! And it didn't take me long to find out that there was a CD made of all the WWCS songs. Sadly, something that old has been out of production for a very long time and even used CDs are 50 bucks at the cheapest, going all the way to 200 for new copies. Insane!

So after more investigation (coupled with my brilliant sources), I managed to find the actual full-length theme. The entire amount of lyrics. So... Awesome... Okay! So I now offer my find to you! Voila!

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO.mp3 - 6.5MB, 2:48 minutes
Go get Adobe Flash Player!

And here is a copy of the lyrics, so you don't have to trudge over to another site:

Well, she sneaks around the world from Kiev to Carolina,
She's a sticky-fingered filcher from Berlin down to Belize,
She'll take you for a ride on a slow boat to China,
Tell me where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?

Steal their Seoul in South Korea, make Antarctica cry Uncle,
From the Red Sea to Greenland they'll be singing the blues,
Well, they never Arkansas her steal the Mekong from the jungle,
Tell me where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?

She go from Nashville to Norway, Bonaire to Zimbabwe,
Chicago to Czechoslovakia and back!

Well, she'll ransack Pakistan and run a scam in Scandinavia,
Then she'll stick 'em up Down Under and go pick-pocket Perth,
She put the Miss in misdemeanor when she stole the beans from Lima,
Tell me where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?
Oh, tell me where in the world is... Oh, tell me where can she be?

Ooh, Botswana to Thailand, Milan via Amsterdam,
Mali to Bali, Ohio, Oahu!

Yeah, she glides around the globe and she'll flim-flam every nation,
She's a double-dealing diva with a taste for thievery,
Her itinerary's loaded up with moving violations,
Tell me where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?

I love StumbleUpon. It's responsible for my rediscovery of Early Edition, too.

UPDATE 1: Got some news for ya! "That Man Came Back Today" has been extended by TW and released as a final version. Of course, he wanted it called the same thing as far as tags go, so I've had to replace the short copy with the extended copy. I would suggest you download the new version, which I've linked below... (And keep the old one, since it might become a collector's item when he gets famous! Even though that'll never happen, but it doesn't hurt to prepare.)

Alright... I have a treat for you folks! One night, Nomad and TW and I were in Skype and being morons like we usually are. In the middle of the conversation, I started saying "What?" over and over. Someone else (I could have sworn it was TW, but he swears it wasn't him, so it had to have been Nomad) started repeating "What?" back to me, and it was just us saying What? What? What? back and forth with (I guess) TW in the background laughing his butt off like the stupid face he is. He then decided it was something that should be turned into a song... (How he arrived at this conclusion, none of us can yet understand.)

So over the next few days, TW made Nomad and I record ourselves saying various things. Mostly "What?" and a few other special phrases, plus whatever we wanted to say on our own. We recorded ourselves repeating these random words several times and TW took them and put them into a freaky ambient musical track that makes it seem like we're floating in space. It's actually incredibly difficult to explain for those of you who didn't get premier broadcast on the Valentine's Day Cyan Chat Radio Show! Plus, I guess I'm supposed to be the official host of the sound files, so I've tagged them (with TW's real name as the artist) and uploaded them!

So, without further ado, the files!

QUESTIONS IN THE DARK.mp3 - 11MB, 5:00 minutes
Go get Adobe Flash Player!

(The first voice you hear is that of Nomad's. He says "What?" twice, and then that's me saying the third "What?" Hopefully that will get voices straight for people who don't already know our voices! I'm also the one saying "What are you doing here?" and "I am sounding like a robot." Nomad is saying the rest... So, yeah!)

THAT MAN CAME BACK TODAY.mp3 - 5MB, 2:08 minutes
Go get Adobe Flash Player!

(That Man Came Back Today is a quirky little thing TW put together with a single line of Nomad's, and it has somewhat of a, shall we say, "interesting" beat to it, for those of you I know that don't like that sort of thing.)