Couldn’t Help But Notice (032408)

Municipal Wi-Fi isn’t working out (”Hopes for Wireless Cities Fade as Internet Providers Pull Out”), because the private sector (i.e., the people who had better know what they’re doing, or they won’t be around to do it) is solving the problem in its own unique way:

Prices for Internet service on the broader market also began dropping to a level that, while above what many poor people could afford, was below what municipal Wi-Fi providers were offering, so the companies had to lower their rates even further, making investment in infrastructure even more risky, he said.

Maybe I’m missing something here, but the prices are low enough that almost anyone who really wants it can afford it. And besides, muni Wi-Fi was meant to be a service for all, not just poor people.

“Somebody” thought the chances of muni Wi-Fi working were low almost two years ago.

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Don Luskin thinks that “The Worst Risks of the Credit Crisis (have been) Averted.”

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Starry-eyed optimists’ vindication alert (HT NixGuy) –

Massive Oil Deposit Could Increase US reserves by 10x

America is sitting on top of a super massive 200 billion barrel Oil Field that could potentially make America Energy Independent and until now has largely gone unnoticed. Thanks to new technology the Bakken Formation in North Dakota could boost America’s Oil reserves by an incredible 10 times, giving western economies the trump card against OPEC’s short squeeze on oil supply and making Iranian and Venezuelan threats of disrupted supply irrelevant.

The “Peak Oil, Schmeak Oil” crowd must be in mourning.

Nix has the same concern as I — that the enviros will try to keep us from getting to it.

Memo to JS3m3 (John Sidney the Mad Maverick McCain III) — If ANWR would make energy independence a day-to-day slam-dunk reality, we should drill there too. The enviro arguments against ANWR are specious.

With all the free-trade bashing they’ve been engaged in, the presidential candidates I refer to as BOOHOO (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama) and HR4C (Hillary Rodham Cackling Crying Complaining Clinton) should be doing cartwheels over the idea of energy self-sufficiency….. right?

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Mrs. Clinton, who told Gen. David Petraeus last year that one would have to have a “willing suspension of disbelief” to believe that the Surge would work, has done a 180 (HT Hot Air), saying that he is “an extraordinary leader and a wonderful advocate for our military.”

Of course, Old Media hasn’t noted it.

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The BBC’s latest distortion is of a statement by President Bush (as documented here, the Beeb’s original headline has now been changed from the false “Bush speech hails Iraq ‘victory’” to its current “Bush says Iraq invasion was right”).

The idea of “News Without Reporters,” as written up by Steve Boriss at Pajamas Media (HT Instapundit), grows ever more appealing.