MyATMPinIs1234

There are some people I just think to myself, I wish I was the beneficiary on their life insurance policy. One of those people was Benazir Bhutto, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan. I said "was" not because I no longer wish to be her beneficiary, but because she is now deceased.

Good move standing out the sunroof in your limo, waving at supporters. If it didn't work in Dallas in 1963, it's certainly not going to work in RAWALPINDI in 2007! In case she hadn't noticed, radical islamic nut jobs easily take offense, and a woman trying to rule their country is something that might provoke their ire.

Of course, this whole thing is India's fault. If they hadn't decided to be socialist and partner with the Soviet Union back in the day, we wouldn't of had to ally ourselves with Pakistan, and we could've given the Indian army enough hardware to take care of this problem. Damn you, India!

Have you ever seen a 45 year old man throw a baseball? They don't throw pitches like Roger Clemens. At best, they can still throw crazy junk like Phil Niekro. So it should come as a surprise to no one that The Rocket was accused of taking steroids.

[here comes the part where I complain about people being stupid or blind]

So there is overwhelming evidence that steroids have pretty incredible beneficial health properties, ranging from vastly improved athletic performance to faster and more complete injury rehabilitation.

Yet, the hysterical ninnies in the media write about this stuff like it's injecting poison directly into your veins. They constantly write about how dangerous steroids are. Really? Well then I guess there should be numerous examples of people critically injured by them, right? Especially those body builders who take dosages 100x what a normal person would. Oh what is that? There are no examples of this other than a few anecdotal stories about bad things that happened to people who also happened to be taking steroids?

Are you telling me that the best example of steroids being bad for you that you can come up with is that 15 years ago Lyle Alzado blamed it on his brain tumor?

If someone were to describe to you a study on the effects of a newly invented medication that had the same benefits and side effects are most steroids, it would be hailed as a medical breakthrough.

Cheating in sports is a separate issue, but the way the medical community and media have handled steroids is really crazy. I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but it really does seem that the government spends all of its time cracking down on substances that don't have patent protection for a Pharmaceutical company.

"Sociology" and "science" should never be used in the same sentence, unless the sentence is "Sociology is not science."

In today's WSJ (I will link when Rupert makes it free), we are told:

Fully two-thirds of women and half of the men said they were "very" or "extremely" willing to marry for money. The answers varied by age: Women in their 30s were the most likely to say they would marry for money (74%) while men in their 20s were the least likely (41%).

"I'm a little shocked at the numbers," says Pamela Smock, a sociologist at the University of Michigan who has studied marriage and money. "It's kind of against the notion of love and soul mates and the main motivations to marry in our culture."

Pamela, Pamela, Pamela...

When you design a study that investigates something obvious, the results should not be a surprise. In other words, the fact that you are shocked, is shocking.

Also, your study was poorly designed. The survey only asked about how much money potential spouse had. People don't make financial decisions based on this alone -- they base it on physical and human assets (i.e. your job or schooling). It was only 50 years ago that Milton Friedman described the Permanent Income Hypothesis, which you might know about if you hadn't spent all of your time in sociology classes, bugging people who were actually studying to take your ridiculous class surveys.

I can't wait until the results of her next study. "Men wearing hospital scrubs or lab coats in their JDate profile pictures have better results than those wearing McDonald's uniforms." Shocking!

A Haiku For the Holidays

goldman tech party
asian beer tan abounded
and holiday cheer

Every so often you come across an idea that, once explained to you, is so simple and brilliant you can't believe it wasn't thought of earlier. You know the people who are bringing it to market are going to make a truckload of money.

I recently heard such an idea. It's probably not patentable, because there is clearly prior art, but there is a huge market and the product pretty much sells itself. Some of you have by now already guessed what I'm talking about. Yes, it's the return of American Gladiators.

Sometimes I watch the national nightly news, in order to refresh my memory on how terrible it is. It's hard to find a segment that isn't horribly biased, sensationalist, or just banal. I honestly think the only reason to watch the news is if you are a pharma analyst and want to keep up to date on all the bladder control and cholesterol medications advertised during the commercials.

Recently NBC news had a health segment on how much sodium we consume and how bad it is for us, which featured the following quote from Dr. Michael Jacobson, from the "Center" for "Science" in the "Public Interest."

"If sodium levels in packaged and restaurant meals were cut in half, that would save 150,000 lives per year."

First of all, this guy is such a whiny, nanny-state pussy, I don't understand how he doesn't get punched in the face every day. Eat a steak, stop complaining, and die early like a man.

But what really annoys me though, is how little sense his remark makes (and they always make this mistake). Are these 150,000 people going to not die? Does reducing sodium make people immortal? Then how will it save lives?

At best, if this is even true, in 20 years when the results of the action are felt there will be a temporary dip for a few years which will then rebound back to the steady state mortality levels. It's just a moronic concept. It's like saying that I saved $100 by paying my phone bill next month instead of this month.

So NBC news, get it straight. Zero lives will be saved. Some people will have additional time tacked on to the end, where they will continue to watch NBC news, but only if dementia has taken away their ability to understand how worthless it is.