This is just the beginning. When a commodity doubles or triples in price, people’s use of that commodity declines. This year’s driving season may not be that large of a drain on gasoline inventories on which the analysts always blame higher fuel costs.
CLEVELAND (AP) — High gasoline prices are turning some drivers into riders, say public transit authorities in several states.
It’s a trend that Joe Calabrese, general manager of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority, expects to continue as long as a gallon of gas remains about $2.
…
However, in an Associated Press-AOL poll conducted last Monday through Wednesday, 58 percent of Americans said they have reduced the amount of driving they do as a result of recent increases in energy prices. The telephone survey of 1,000 adults had a sampling error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
Local venues this summer holiday season may be a little more crowded than usual as more people decide to stay home instead of traveling to the lake.
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I just noticed that my site, when viewed on IE, looks like shit.
Whenever I make any design changes, I pretty much always check the site on Firefox, the browser I use, and Internet Explorer and sometimes will check Opera and Konqueror just for giggles. When I made the recent changes to the design I know the CSS looked the same on Firefox and IE at that point. So something I jacked with after I checked IE the last time makes IE choke.
Anyway, sorry bout that. This evening I’ll get it all sorted out along with the date display on the main page of the new repo repository.
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The Dude, Where’s My Car Category is going bye-bye. Few repomen come in here any more. I’ll get a flurry from time-to-time, but for the most part no regular readers from over at Repoman.com any more. So, in an effort to clean up some of the stuff in this blog that may not be exactly “on-topic”, whetever the hell that is, I’m moving all my repo related stuff and it can henceforth be found here.
That includes Larry the Liar, Baby Shane, and a few orphans in Business and whinsy that I might keep cross-posted.
I’ll add a link to it in the BlogRoll list for future reference for anyone who just can’t go any longer without having a Shane moment.
I’ll be moving some other stuff out too.
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Bigger than expected I think. Headlines such as these seem to be continual.
(Polo Ralph Lauren)
I don’t think these big companies will ever be able to adequately safegard their data.
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But bad news for Harley-Davidson:
Shares of Harley-Davidson Inc. (NYSE:HDI - news) fell 16.5 percent to $49.06, its biggest percent drop in more than 13 years, after the motorcycle maker cut its profit and production targets for the year.
I predicted this many years ago back when there was a six-month to a year wait for a new motorcycle. I used to say, “One day there will be plenty of Harley’s for everybody at much cheaper prices. My thinking was that the vast majority of bikes were being sold to weekend warriors who bought the bikes on a whim with a swipe of their Gold Mastercard and who then left them in the garage only to break them out for the occasional Sunday ride. When things got tough, such an expensive toy would be one of the first things to go, thus causing the supply to outstrip the demand. Thus causing prices to drop.
Last year when I couldn’t dump my Harley Road King for less than book I thought the writing may be on the wall for Harley. Recently, looking at the classifieds for pre-owned scooters, I knew that if something didn’t happen soon with the economy, Harley was going to be in the soup. The big bikes were selling for anywhere from $10,500 to $13,000. Low miles, garage- kept, chromed-out with every accessory, the whole bit. Weekend warrior bikes.
If you’ve ever wanted a Harley and you have a decent job with a little job security, it is definitely a buyer’s market for Harleys.
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Finally a prison sentence that might make these damn spammers re-consider their risk vs. reward analysis.
First Convicted Spammer Gets 9 Years
LEESBURG, Va. (AP) — He was once considered among the top 10 spammers in the world, using the Internet to peddle pornography and sham products and services like the “FedEx refunding processor,” prosecutors say. Convicted in the nation’s first felony case against illegal spamming, Jeremy Jaynes, 30, on Friday was sentenced to nine years in prison for bombarding Internet users with the junk e-mails.
But Loudoun County Circuit Judge Thomas Horne delayed the start of Jaynes’ prison term while the case is appealed, saying the law is new and raises constitutional questions.
The wishy-washiness of the presiding judge’s comments makes it look as if the spammer will probably go free in the end. They have already let the guy’s cohorts off scott free.
Horne said he might also reconsider the sentence if Jaynes loses the appeal.
“I do not believe a person should go to prison for a law that is invalid,” he said. “There are substantial legal issues that need to be brought before the appellate court.”
Great, another pro-crime judge. His heart just doesn’t seem to be up to the task of giving these spammers the punishment they deserve. Corporations spend a lot of time and money to block spam. In some cases, as much as eighty-five percent of incoming email traffic is filtered as spam. Everyday people suffer a similarly scaled assault. When you consider the spy-ware component of the stuff, the problem is magnified a hundred times due to the risk of malicious code being turned loose on a network.
This guy made his seven hundred thousand bucks a month at the cost of billions to everyone else. A parasite of the worst kind. Nine years sounds about right to me for a first offense.
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