Couldn’t Help But Notice (010807)

I’m STILL trying to talk myself out of having a daily “Bleep You” award. The idea would be that a person or group has done something so outrageous and offensive that you just want to go up and say “Bleep you” to them in the loudest, shrillest voice possible. The whole concept is so negative that I’m sure I’ll avoid doing it.

But stories like these definitely test my resolve:

A survey by researchers at Villanova University has found that 85 percent of Roman Catholic dioceses that responded had discovered embezzlement of church money in the last five years, with 11 percent reporting that more than $500,000 had been stolen.

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They probably think it’s a “swell” development — “Report: Specialized Skill Shortages to Swell IT Salaries.”

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William Jefferson (D-LA) needs money. Apparently the freezer is empty, and he either doesn’t know or doesn’t care (HT Hot Air) that you don’t ask for campaign money using official Congressional stationery.

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The always brilliant George Reisman contrasts obit headlines at the New York Times on the deaths of Pinochet, Mao, Stalin, and Lenin? Guess who looks worst?

A previous Reisman post punctures one of the most dangerous fables in existence:

It is the fable that those who are responsible for the attempt to socialize a country’s economic system, such as Chile’s, are well-intentioned and therefore deserve to be immune from bodily harm and certainly do not deserve ever to be killed.

….. all the writing, speaking, and peaceful protest in the world have no prospect of ever achieving socialism, because they will never persuade very many people to voluntarily donate their property to a socialist state. So at bottom, it must all be futile, unless at some point it erupts into violent action.

Such Marxists, such socialists, i.e., the serious, dedicated ones, are not at all saints or martyrs, but dangerous people with a criminal mentality.

Read the whole thing. “Inconvenient truths” indeed.

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“You Don’t Say” Dept. — “Falling Oil Prices Should Help Drivers”

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Electronics Store Strength — Best Buy’s December sales were up a whopping 15%, and Circuit City’s 5.9%.