Things I’d Like to Post About Today ….. (010709, Morning)

….. But I don’t Have Any Time For:

• The Institute for Supply Management Data from the last few days has been grim, but the patient still has a pulse — The Manufacturing Index (covering about 15% of the economy) dropped again in December, this time to a pitiful 32.4%. The Non-Manufacturing Index (covering the rest) went up to 40.6%, but is still firmly in contraction mode (which is anything below 50%). If there’s a silver lining, it’s that the more important NMI walloped expectations that it would go down to 36.5% from November’s 37.3% (but Manufacturing trailed expectations badly).
• Ed Morrissey fired a rare blank yesterday at Hot Air in “Lesson not learned: SUV sales outpace sedans.” If families conclude that they need large vehicles and are willing to pay the (gas) price, what’s wrong with that? Besides, given current worldwide reserves, an unencumbered market for oil should be counted on to deliver sub-$2 gas for many, many years. It’s when the cartels and governments try to reduce consumption, pretend that we can live without oil, or pretend that we’re running out of it — when the reality is that they are obsessed with preventing us from getting what’s there — that prices rise steeply.
• The 149th Carnival of Ohio Politics, adroitly assembled by Dan Williamson of Buckeye RINO, is here.
• Thanks to the Anchoress for this squib — “Best Business Blog: For the life of me I don’t know why Bizzyblog isn’t in here.”
• Ted Strickland is clearly happy with Ohio’s 2008 early-voting fiasco as it went down, because he vetoed a bill that would have prevented same-day registration and voting. Glad that’s on the record. So is my unrefuted and backed-by-experience assertion that early voting is a travesty.
• From the “All Is Not Lost” Dept. — “Humana to add 700 jobs; Already moving nearly 1,200 employees into its new building in Walnut Hills (in Cincinnati), Humana Inc. will add up to 700 more jobs in the region during the next three years.”
• OK, regulation cheerleaders, regulate this — “A PIONEERING climate change project in Africa run by Robin Birley, the socialite, has been accused by the European commission, its main donor, of making unsubstantiated claims about its environmental impact. ….. The project attempts to offset an individual’s carbon footprint by paying poor farmers in Mozambique to plant trees …..” Go further, and you’ll see that the project is really causing trees to be cut down.
• After all the scare tactics employed at the prospect of people having control of their Social Security retirement funds three years ago, it’s nice to see that Americans, according to Rasmussen, favor giving people the right to opt out of the system by 46%-38% — which also proves as much as one poll can that this is a firmly center-right country. Unfortunately, the political class could care less.