Whipped Cream Difficulties

Before we start in on this week’s TMQ, we wanted to throw up a link to this fine article on the University of Alaska Fairbanks rifle team. Shall Not Be Questioned linked this yesterday, but we didn’t get around to reading the article until we started prepping this week’s TMQ Watch. Now that we have, we commend it to your attention.

And now the jump…

“Denver is using tactics that are likely to result in an explosion of yardage late in the game.” You can now ignore the Tebow.

“Sports is still good for college” even though player graduation rates are pathetic. And we wonder how TMQ defines “elite colleges and universities”. “Big-deal football and basketball cause colleges to be seen by young people as exciting institutions to attend.” Agreed, but is this a good thing? “In Europe, fewer students attend compared to the United States.” But is this just due to sports, or are there other cultural factors? “Yet though scandals have plagued college athletics for a century…in the same period, American higher education has expanded in an historically unprecedented way.” How much of that is due to things like the G.I. Bill and the higher education bubble rather than college sports? Easterbrook’s assertions about the benefits of collegiate sports, at least in this section of the column, make us deeply suspicious.

Lauren M. seems to us to be the best thing the Colts have going for them right now.

Sweet and sour: Carolina – Atlanta, Washington – New England, Texans – Bengals.

Gregg, if you want weapons for Christmas, skip the marshmallow launcher and go NERF.

We would pay money to watch the Fiasco Bowl. (We are sure this does not come as a surprise to our regular readers. Both of them.)

We missed the NYT single malt scotch review. Thanks for the link, TMQ.

We see that TMQ has also picked up on the Fiesta Bowl scandal (though, to be fair, this broke during TMQ’s post-season down time). We did, however, miss the tax fraud indictment: but TMQ says “Junker was indicted”. The way we read the Boston Globe article, it was Natalie Wisneski, “former chief operating officer” who was indicted. Are we missing something? And TMQ continues to equate “tax exemption” with “subsidy”.

Creep. Weasels. The Decemberists.

Chicken-<salad> kicks: Cleveland. Cold cheerleaders.

We are fairly sure that we’re going to get argument in the comments from friends of WCD, but: we dispute Easterbrook’s assertion that “The new MPG standards are one of government’s most important achievements in the past decade.” First of all, it is unclear to us how “the average gas mileage of new cars and light trucks” is going to be made to double by 2025 unless someone pulls magic unicorn fart technology out of their ass. Secondly, “Raising the MPG levels of new cars and trucks will make them a little more expensive to purchase, but more than pay back the cost in fuel savings.” It’d be nice if TMQ gave us a cost estimate on the purchase price increase here, but we suspect he didn’t because he doesn’t know. Probably nobody knows what the purchase price impact is going to be.

“Americans need to start think about fossil fuels in ‘life cycle’ terms — not what is cheapest to buy up front but what is cheapest to buy and then operate for a number of years.” Good luck if you’re poor and can only afford a small upfront cost. (Edited to add: We forgot that we intended to link to this blog entry by Jay G. on the economics of the Chevy Volt. We’d be interested in seeing some challenges to Jay’s math, if there are any; one thing we’ve seen mentioned is that Jay doesn’t account for the tax subsidy deduction available to Volt buyers. And we’ll admit that we are kind of dangling stinky bait into the water again, but not as blatantly as we did yesterday.)

“If you think this way, you’ll purchase compact florescent or LED lights;” Unless you think that the quality of light from incandescent bulbs is superior, and are willing to pay the higher overall cost. “high-MPG or hybrid vehicles”. Unless the ones available don’t meet your needs; for example, insufficient towing or passenger capacity.

But the big point we would make is: what business does the government have dictating fuel economy to the auto makers? Let them sell whatever the market will bear, and let the makers and the public bear the consequences. We will give one point to TMQ, though: we agree with his position on “clean diesels” and would like to see more of them in the United States.

Tight ends. Kepler 22b. (If the planet is Kepler 22b, and the star is Kepler 22, what is Kepler 22a? Or are we misunderstanding astronomical nomenclature?)

“…the Packers need to get over their allergy to rushing”. Corzine bashing. Don’t put your dishwasher safe Calphalon in the dishwasher. The Patriots went 21-0 from 2003 to 2004, you maroon.

“Perhaps Wisconsin Residents Would Like to Purchase Some Greek Bonds”. Or perhaps not, since Packers stock is actually worth something. We would expect TMQ to support public ownership of teams, even if the stock doesn’t pay dividends. (We also wonder what the Green Bay annual meetings are like.)

We did not see the Arizona game (we were out and about) but we caught the highlight on “Football Night in America”, and we’re with TMQ: what in the blue blazes happened with the replay? And we understand TMQ’s point about the Detroit game: “there is now a clearly enunciation (sp?) rule that quarterbacks cannot be hit during turnover downs”. But we’re inclined to think that’s a stupid rule, especially when the quarterback is trying to make a tackle.

“The Bills, hot early in the season, now have not won in the United States since early October.” They are, however, 5-8: TMQ picked them to go 2-14 at the start of the season.

Mount Union 28, Wesley 21. Wisconsin Whitewater 20, St. Thomas 0. “These two games set up yet another rematch of Mount Union versus Wisconsin Whitewater in the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl.” Is the Stagg Bowl male-only, or are women allowed to attend?

That’s all for this week. Keep an eye on the comments, where we expect to be challenged by our friends and possibly our enemies.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 13th, 2011 at 2:56 pm and is filed under Cars, Clippings, NFL, Politics, Sports, TMQ watch. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.