Emotion

Having Won

Langevin's Turn

Jack Reed

Sheldon Does the Rounds

Red-Eye Patrick

Experimenting with Technology

What better time than while in the spotlight to experiment with technology. Here's some ambiance audio from the Democrats' party: MP3.

Warming up at the Biltmore

Scenes of Rhode Island

PROEM:

A reader sent in the following, and it took us some time to consider what steps to take — the difficulty being a request for anonymity. Given the whistleblower tinge of such notes, we thought it acceptable, provided the threshold is higher against personal attacks and unalloyed opinion.

We welcome future submissions along this line.

Well, I finally figured it out.

Every weekday I take the Gano Street exit off of the new I-Way (or the Suicide-Way as it's called since it came out that Rhode Island had been fined because it didn't inspect the concrete). Everyday I see a young woman working for the Department of Transportation standing by her truck at the end of the exit ramp. She stands, or leans, by her truck and watches us go by.

She is located at the end of the Gano Street exit ramp where a stop sign allows us to enter the new section of road. We stop at a "T" but there are no other vehicles coming or going from any other direction because it is a new road and doesn't go anywhere yet.

I looked at the payroll and see that the average semi-skilled or level 1 operator for the Department of Transportation is $34,869. And that doesn't include healthcare ($14,000) and pension. Why on earth, when we are all struggling to make ends meet, do we spend tens of thousands of dollars to have someone stand at the end of an exit ramp and watch cars go by?

But today I got it. I finally figured out why we spend that money. Today, the woman in question finally worked. She stepped out from beside her truck and carried another stop sign (different from the one posted at the end of the exit ramp) and held it in front of my car while a work truck went by.

So, there you have it. The Rhode Island Department of Transportation does not hire truck drivers who are capable of navigating around traffic so we have to hire assistants to make sure they don't run into us. Hopefully, the DOT is saving enough money by hiring these less-skilled drivers so to afford the assistants.

A Little Perspective

Another day at the office:

Not Really My Crowd, But...

My heroes so far in Disney Princesses on Ice:

The things we endure as parents. Now if I can endure the demands for $10 snow cones during intermission.

Not That Kind of Revolution

Andrew and I are at the Ocean State Policy Research Institute dinner with Grover Norquist at the Cuban Revolution in Providence, and as you can see, the atmosphere is full of thematic incongruities:

ADDENDUM:

All throughout dinner, something in Fidel's eyes distracted me. As everybody filtered out of the room, I walked over for a closer look:

My question: Was this a sly cut at the icon by the artist, or is death something that fashionable leftist-revolutionary-ophiles like to see as the gleam in their heroes eyes?

Re: Do Anything, Say Anything for Political "Victory"

Is it possible to view the MoveOn.org ad mentioned by Marc in the previous post as anything less than a questioning of General Petraeus' patriotism?

Tomorrow--as General David Petraeus provides his Iraq assessment to Congress--the antiwar group MoveOn.org is running a full-page advertisement in the New York Times under the headline: "General Petraeus or General Betray us? Cooking the books for the White House."

Governor Mitt Romney has already responded to MoveOn's message, via an e-mail to National Review Online…

Democrats must make a choice. Will they embrace these deplorable tactics or give General Petraeus a fair hearing? It should be the hope of all Americans that we give him a fair hearing. Certainly, he and our men and women in Iraq deserve it. In the coming days and weeks, there will be much debate about the future course in Iraq, but this debate should be free of the kind of shameful tactics MoveOn.org has shown today. It's time we heard from the generals, not Washington politicians and not ultra-liberal advocacy groups. All Americans should keep an open mind.

The Sufferers of Traffic

I always try to remember, when stuck in traffic, that my predicament is often the result of a situation that far outweighs inconvenience. How many hours of commute time would one prefer to being personally involved in a situation such as this:

An off-duty Portsmouth police officer has been identified as the driver who struck a 15-year-old Portsmouth girl yesterday afternoon as she was running across East Main Road near Clements’ Market. ...

The girl was in “bad shape” in the middle of the night, but Swanberg does not know her current condition at Hasbro Children’s Hospital. The state police have not named the girl...

The girl was not in a crosswalk, Swanberg said.
Mooney has not been charged in connection with the accident.

Escape from Aquidneck

Just as I came up on the traffic, I heard a radio report of a serious accident on East Main Road in Portsmouth, so I turned around and switched over to West Main. Well, this is what I encountered there:

The question is: Did WPRO mix up East and West, or is this just what happens when there are only two roads to accommodate so many people? If the latter, what an apt metaphor for life in Rhode Island.

ADDENDUM:
I just heard an update that part of East Main is actually closed down. Guess I just haven't gotten to the merging traffic yet.

The Wind as Landscape

With the release of Cape Wind, a book co-authored by the Projo's Robert Whitcomb, about rich and influential people, ostensibly with socially appropriate environmental consciousnesses, and their fight to kill an environmentally friendly energy project involving water-based windmills, the example on the grounds of the Portsmouth Abbey that I pass twice a day caught my attention more than usual today:

Maybe there's something in human nature that wind-driven motion sooths, but whatever the reason, I think it would add to, rather than detract from, the scenery if there were more of them around — whether waving to passing commuters or appearing as dots in the waterviews of the hoity-toity.

A Whitecastle on the Hill

Given some recent upgrades in my technology, I thought I'd make a practice of taking pictures as I wander about the state and uploading them, with commentary as appropriate — all at the speed of blog! So herewith, Sheldon Whitehouse's understated summer cottage, which I put in (my own) political context back before the election:

No doubt this is where the senator will commune with all of his important constituents.

A Whitecastle on the Hill

Given some recent upgrades in my technology, I thought I'd make a practice of taking pictures as I wander about the state and uploading them, with commentary as appropriate — all at the speed of blog! So herewith, Sheldon Whitehouse's understated summer cottage, which I put in (my own) political context back before the election:

No doubt this is where the senator will commune with all of his important constituents.