Senate Homestretch: Republican seats in real trouble
Maine: We’ve been following the twists and turns of the funky Maine race in this space, but it looks that the dust has settled pretty much where things were at the start: former Gov. Angus King is expected to win as an independent, and is expected to caucus as a Democrat, although King himself has not made that commitment.
Nevertheless, everyone in the entire political universe considers King to count as a Democratic pickup. That being said, yours truly, perhaps alone, thinks that if King really is the “swing vote,” he will at least negotiate with the Republicans. At the end of the day, why wouldn’t he?
One reason may be that the GOP tried to angle for an upset here, and the Democrats didn’t, and allies of the Republican candidate ran negative ads to see if the GOP candidate could be competitive with King.
It didn’t work, and it looks as if King will be coming to Washington.
RealClearPolitics Average: King 46.0, Charlie Summers (R) 30.7, Cynthia Dill (D) 13.3
Massachusetts: This one was a tossup forever, but it looks like, finally, the uphill climb of Sen. Scott Brown (R) may be ending up short of the summit.
Brown got his seat in a special election following the death Sen. Ted Kennedy. He had the good fortune of running when concern about the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) was high, and to face an opponent who was error-prone and seemed to feel entitled to victory.
This time around, it almost seemed as if law professor Elizabeth Warren (D) would repeat history. She got off to a slow start, made some mistakes, and seemed to have initial difficulty connecting with some voters.
But Warren apparently was determined to make the same mistakes, and her campaign seems to have righted itself at the right time.
In the special election, polls were moving toward Brown at the end, even though some of them still showed him trailing. This time, pretty much all the data appears to be moving in Warren’s direction. In particular, independent women, who swung toward Brown last time, appear to be moving to Warren.
When incumbents are under 50 percent and their opponents aren’t, that’s never a good sign for getting reelected.
RealClearPolitics Average: Warren 50.5, Brown 46.0
Insider trading: Should investors beware?
It is tough for a shareholder when a firm is not transparent. Insider trading is what a lot of investors complain about and the main reason why investors shy away from the stock market and other security markets. I am here to tell you that insider trading is in fact good for investors despite its obvious cons.
The Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman along with other big-name economists have argued that insider trading serves to make information efficient in the markets. After all, investors are capitalizing on the stock picks of insiders for impressive results. It has come to pass that when a CEO buys a stock that stock will appreciate and outperform the market as a whole.
It has become easier than ever to find trading data on insiders. Yahoo! Finance has a whole section on Insiders that details their latest trades. With information becoming freely available, investors might want to see what insiders are doing and replicate these actions. Insiders are always going to have the most up-to-date and accurate information; they hobnob with industry bigwigs and have significantly more resources at their disposal.
There are two types of insider trading: legal and illegal insider trading. Therefore, some level of insider trading is considered normal and this, in my opinion (and a lot of others), makes it increasingly difficult to track legitimate insider trading cases.
Regardless, I want you to know that investing in stocks is the right way to go and to not be deterred by insider trading. Instead, make use of the opportunities it readily offers.
Links for November 1, 2012
Japan was marked by the turn of events on March 11, 2011 as by few others in its history, but Tokyo‘s Olympic bid officials don‘t think that the Fukushima nuclear disaster should affect their chances of hosting the 2020 Olympic Games. en.europeonline-magazine.eu
Legal threats have silenced security warnings at a recent systems-control conference. nakedsecurity.sophos.com
Florianopolis, Brazil
As I traveled through South America, headed toward my final destination of Rio de Janiero, fellow travelers kept giving me the same advice. Venture on to Florianopolis, Floripa, the spot to go in southern Brazil.
Santa Catarina is the name of the island, but Brazilians and backpackers alike simply call it Florianopolis, the name of the biggest town/city there. The city faces the mainland and has the bus station.
I finally made it on New Years Eve and was lucky to get the last hostel dorm bed on the whole island. Lots of Brazilians travel, so there are many hostels. They are often your cheapest options, unlike other parts of South America where cheap hotels are plentiful.
I met some Brazilians who had traveled down from the north. We all went out together to a huge beach party with low-flying, LOUD fireworks at midnight. Then we went to a club and danced all night to pagode music – similar to samba but more pop/rock, with a drum kit and electric bass.
The island is full of powdery white beaches – many virgin – with great surfing, each with a distinct village nearby. I stayed in three beach towns, and they were each different – one more mass market and for families, one quiet and all about the surfing and one party spot full of clubs and bars.
Florianopolis sucked me in and I ended up staying two weeks, spending most of my time playing guitar on the beach and drinking beer with Brazilians who were also on vacation. I caught great live music, especially reggae. I went surfing a few times and scuba diving once, during which I saw about 20 sea turtles. On one part of the island you can even rent a small board for surfing the sand dunes!
It was with great regret that I boarded an all night bus for Sao Paolo and its hustle and bustle. And when I finally made it to Rio, I barely spent any time on the beach. It’s nice, but it’s no Floripa.
Sententia
I enjoy quirky games. I love games that have an engaging plot. I even enjoy the simple mindless fun or other games. But I have a special place for those games that try to give a message, that propose some ideas that can cause one to think long after the game is over. Xenosaga made you think on what constitutes life. Morality, kinship. Metal Gear Solid made you reflect on the truer costs of war. So many games try to put in a message even if that message is troubling or subversive.
The Denpa Men
Ah Japan. We meet again. You are a country of wacky things. Well wacky to people not of your land so I’ll admit the bias right there. You have things that interest, fascinate and horrify but in ways no one can quite grasp. I personally dig your offbeat games. From rolling balls around the world that collects things, boring general jobs stylized into epic show downs – you even made lawyers cool. Stuffy courtroom drama is awesome.
Minecraft over-engineering
I haven’t played much of Minecraft. I found it aimless and a bit lonely. I’m not a big fan of building just to build with no character interaction person. My SO though loves the crap out of that game. So I get shown a decent amount of him building things, avoiding death by Creeper and so on. He loves doing extremely silly things like building up in the sky and crafting furniture in odd areas.
Get paid to slap people
This is just a man indulging in some humiliation fetish - it has to be. What person would air their dirty laundry if only to get attention for it? Seems this man would. See, he apparently works from home (So do I! Freelancers unite!). But he, like many other freelancers, found that if he tallied up the amount of work he got done in a day versus the time spent doing other things like checking e-mail, toying around on Facebook, etc., that he was not efficient at all. Time wasted is time that money was not made after all.
Hansel and Gretel
Yeah, I didn’t know about this movie either. Maybe the ads for it were on TV (I rarely watch TV)? I don't know, but I happened upon it as I was looking at another film’s trailer. I can’t say that I’m surprised it was made. Or that it twists a children’s tale into some action fest. I mean it looks like a slick Underworld/Resident Evil action trailer, but in "Medieval Europe."
I put that in quotes because the gear the two titular siblings have are so anachronistic. Maybe the film makes are riding on that strange Abe Lincoln movie? Then again everyone knew that movie was not to be taken seriously. This one seems like it’s cribbing from that questionable Red Riding Hood thing earlier. It’s full of boring tropes too.