Massachusetts needs more Deval Patricks? - Well, there's a kernel of truth here on the Plank: "As I noted before, Massachusetts' political class is arrogantly unresponsive to the will of the voters. The state legislature has scuttled the people's will on liberal and conservative causes ranging from public financing of elections to term limits. These know-nothings believe they know best." What a great state! I wonder why everybody's leaving...

Not a rave review - Christopher Hitchens on "A Loser's History": "George Tenet's sniveling, self-justifying new book is a disgrace."

The accumulation of empty promises

From Edward Glaeser in the Boston Globe: "Cleaning up the public pension system"

Today, public employees have been promised almost $13 billion more in pension benefits than Massachusetts has set aside money to pay for. We owe another $13 billion for other post-retirement benefits to public workers. The average US state funds 83 percent of its pension liability. The Commonwealth has funded only 73 percent of its debt, and a lot of cities of towns are in much worse shape. Quincy has funded only 58 percent of its pension liability; Springfield has funded less than half. These pension debts reflect the high benefit levels in places like Quincy, which is a leader in six-figure pensions.

What's the solution? The transparency of defined-contribution plans such as 401(k)s that allows public workers to earn their way to retirement instead of depending on the shaky promises of the government:

Moreover, since pensions vest slowly, they create an artificial incentive for workers to become long-term employees of local government. The average public employee in Quincy is 47 years old. Experience is great, but there is also much to be said for the Roman ideal of Cincinnatus, who went back and forth between saving the republic and plowing his fields. We should have a system that is as friendly to those who would serve the state briefly as it is to those who want to spend their entire careers in government.

Moving to defined-contribution plans for new public employees would be a step in the right direction. In the private sector, defined-contribution plans are ubiquitous. They allow workers to move more readily across firms. They make payment more transparent and reduce the risks posed by unfunded liabilities. Defined-contribution plans for public employees would have the same benefits.

The Big Three automakers played the same game by offering lavish benefits in exchange for keeping wages under control. But this is just borrowing against the future since wages are expensive but promises are cheap.

Whither the GOP - Oak Leaf over on Polipundit has a post on the drift and fade of the Republican party.

But he got a nice advance - George Tenet's book hasn't hit the bookstands yet and already he's being knocked for inventing conversations and dereliction of duty.

The end justifies the surrender - Jeff Jacoby asks "What drives the Democrats?" and concludes that it's all politics: "Democrats, all smiles, prefer to lose the war and win the campaign. They're not alone. In Iraq, Al Qaeda is smiling, too."

Amazing Race update - The never-ending Race

When are they going to put us out of our misery and end this gimmicky All-Stars edition of the Amazing Race? We've now had two back-to-back non-elimination legs and this season has stretched my patience to the breaking point. It's not as bad as the execrable Family Edition, but it's a close second.

Teams must travel from Macau to Guam and find a U.S.military base. The Blondies make the first ferry off the island and book the first flight from Hong Kong to Guam; everybody but Oswald & Danny make this flight but they're connecting on the same flight from Tokyo to Guam, assuming they can make a tight connection. Back from commercial, they're on the plane so now everybody's bunched on the same flight to Guam.

Once there, teams grab marked cars and race to the base which doesn't open until 7am. A military escort takes Racers to an Air Force control tower and they run up the stairs. On top, it's the Detour: Care Package or Engine Care. Teams may either prepare a food package to drop from a C-17 cargo plane, or clean off the engines of a B-17 bomber. Everybody chooses to clean the bomber except Charla & Mirna who instantly tick off the Air Force officer by tossing stuff into the care boxes without much care. Dustin & Kandace try to charm the cleaning sergeant but he wants his plane cleaned. After they finish, they need to drive from the Air Force base to the Naval base. Charla & Mirna finish the Detour last even though they keep asking the pilot of the bomber to fly faster.

At the Naval Base, it's the Roadblock: using a GPS, one team member must find a search & rescue expert (a "downed pilot") who will then direct them to another position where they will set off a smoke bomb for helicopter extraction. Team Blondie finishes first and Kandace (or is it Dustin?) gets hoisted up first. Danielle finds her pilot next while Charla can't seem to figure out which direction to walk, once again confirming my belief that Charla & Mirna can't do anything right. The military escort with Charla tells her no fewer than four times to not touch the buttons on the GPS. The Blondies head to the Pit Stop at Fort Soledad.

Oswald finishes the Roadblock just behind Charla so it's looking very likely that Oswald & Danny will be eliminated because they're carrying over a 30-minute penalty from last week's non-elimination leg. No need to wait: they arrive last and are eliminated

Final standings:

#1 - Dustin & Kandace Prize: ATV
#2 - Eric & Danielle
#3 - Charla & Mirna
#4 - Oswald & Danny - PHILIMINATED

Next week: The finale, finally.

Extra - Pat will have his recap up before you know it.

Highly educated babysitters - Joanne Jacobs has a post titled "Why teachers quit" about why so many teachers pack it in after a couple years. The short answer is that they're under too much stress enforcing classroom discipline.

Personal story: over the years, people have often suggested to me that they thought I would make a great teacher. As a lark, I even went so far to take the Massachusetts certification test for teachers, which I aced. But I keep hearing stories like this and I realize I'll never be able to hack it. Too bad, that.

Bears beets Battlestar Galactica - Jim as Dwight on "The Office."

Sunday morning lineup - Tim Russert will spent an hour with Joe Biden, which is how long it takes for that guy to say "hello." Condi Rice is making the rounds, also.

A billion angry stockholders - The Economist has an article about the burgeoning Chinese stock market titled: "The people's republic in the grip of popular capitalism - Tens of millions of Chinese are risking their shirts in a stockmarket frenzy. If it goes wrong, things could get nasty." I wonder what Mao would think about the 91 million accounts held in the Chinese stock exchange? It's not an affirmation of socialism.

Big fish in London town - According to the UK Times, Al-Qaeda operative Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi is believed to be the mastermind behind the 7/7 bombings in London.

Extra - Much, much more from Allahpundit: "Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi was captured by the CIA as he was attempting to travel back to his native country, Iraq. He was going to Iraq, officials say, to "manage" al Qaeda's operations, including plots on Western interests outside of Iraq."

"Reconsider your position before it's too late. For us and for yourselves." - Via Pajamas Media, Iraqi Omar Fadhil asks Congress to think twice about the surrender legislation: "The democrats just offered al-Qaeda victory on a silver plate. For free. An imaginary victory for sure, for now, but it can still be used by al-Qaeda to promote their ideology of death and attract more recruits." Read it all.

Social Security: the retirement package so good, they had to make it mandatory

Here's the president of the Club for Growth on personal accounts for Social Security:

The benefits of personal accounts over the current system can be illustrated with a numerical example. Let’s take a hypothetical 25-year-old male earning $32,000 a year with average wage growth. Under the current system, he will receive $2,780 per month when he retires, or a measly -0.72 percent return on his contributions (according to the handy calculations of the Heritage Foundation). Now imagine that our hypothetical worker invests the retirement portion of his payroll taxes in a bundle of stocks and bonds, earning a modest 4.9 percent return. When he retires at the ripe age of 67, he will have an account with his name on it worth $1.1 million, or $9,546 per month, ready to be spent on that cabin in the mountains he always wanted.

So the debate over Social Security comes down to one simple question: Would you rather have $2,780 a month in your retirement or $9,546 a month?

Personal accounts have the added benefit of keeping money out of the hands of the government where, inevitably, it will be mishandled and misspent. The government has been able to live beyond its means by masking the true size of the budget deficit by using the Social Security surplus, which is converted into government securities. When the bill comes due in 2017, it's going to be a shocker.

He'll fix your icebox and wireless, too - Here's a profile of one of America's last typewriter repairmen. They still make typewriters? And fix them when broke? Weird. (HT: Fark)

Chris Dodd?!? No way! - Mark Coffey grades the Democrats' debate tonight and declares the virtually unknown Connecticut Senator (the other one) as the upset winner.

Must be nice to be popular - Bill Whittle rubs it in: "To my utter amazement and deep embarrassment, I discovered that even with three or four months between postings, I was still receiving around 1500 hits a day." How super for you.

The nightmare scenario

Was it really just a year ago that Republicans controlled every branch of government? I'm skeptical the Republicans can hold the White House in 2008 if only because Americans rarely keep the same party in power for three terms (George Bush Sr. being a recent exception in a phenomenon known as "Reagan's third term.") But now political observers are floating the scenario that the Democrats could capture a filibuster-proof 60 vote majority in one or two political cycles:

Controlling 60 seats is the holy grail in the Senate. It allows the majority party to block filibusters from the minority and truly run the chamber.

The last time a party held 60 or more seats was three decades ago when Democrats had 61 seats in the 95th Congress (1977-1979). But, the combination of a toxic political environment for Republicans and a relatively small number of Democratic vulnerabilities has skilled observers -- including Fix friend and Roll Call columnist Stu Rothenberg -- starting to talk about the possibility of Democrats getting to 60 in the next two or four years.

Oh. My. Heck. Of course, two years is an eternity in politics but there's no shortage of reasons why the Republicans blew their hard-fought majority after just twelve years.

It's not "Lady Chatterley's Lover" - From the Boston Globe: "Plastic bags may be banned in Boston" It's a good thing there aren't any other big problems in Boston to worry about.

Broder slams Harry Reid

From today's WashPost, David Broder is not so enthralled with the Senate's top Democrat:

Instead of reinforcing the important proposition -- defined by the Iraq Study Group-- that a military strategy for Iraq is necessary but not sufficient to solve the myriad political problems of that country, Reid has mistakenly argued that the military effort is lost but a diplomatic-political strategy can still succeed.

The Democrats deserve better, and the country needs more, than Harry Reid has offered as Senate majority leader.

Can you believe this guy's a Mormon?

Extra - Al Qaeda quotes Harry Reid.