JonLowder.com

$42 for Chucks?

My daughter just got home from a short shopping excursion she talked Celeste (my lovely wife) into taking with her.  She's been hell-bent on getting a pair of Chuck Taylors and so she took her hard earned babysitting money and plopped over $40 on a pair of black Chucks.  My reaction was, "Huh?"

When I was a kid we wore Chucks only because that was the only option we had.  Buying shoes was kind of like buying a car back in the 1920s.  You know, "Would you like your car in black or very black?"  In our case it was "Would you prefer the black or white canvas Chucks?"  That changed in the mid to late 70's and I can distinctly remember wearing a pair of red suede Puma's my Mom let me get and I also vividly remember all my socks turning pink when it rained. (This is the same woman, by the way, who dressed me in a peach denim leisure suit and my brother in a lime green leisure suit).  Chucks became what you wore when your parents were intent on torturing you or simply refused to pony up the cash for some Nikes or Adidas.

I have to take my hat off to the marketing geniuses at Converse who somehow made the Chucks cool again.  It probably began when they introduced various colors all those years ago.  For me personally those colors will always seem un-cool because I had a kid in my class my senior year of high school who wore a different color of Chucks every day of the week. They matched the color of his corduroy pants and long sleeve button down shirt.  If I remember correctly on Mondays he wore blue, on Tuesday green, on Wednesday red, on Thursday purple and Friday was black.  I used to think of Thursday as "Grape Day" and Friday as "Johnny Cash Day."  Miraculously he made it through the entire year without getting hassled once.  Quite frankly we all thought he was nuttier than a fruit cake and we figured he was just the type who would hunt us down and kill us slowly with a pair of tweezers and Super Glue so we didn't mess with him.  That's also why I'm not naming him.  I really don't feel like being hunted down and slaughtered by a middle-aged monochromatic-Chuck's-wearing wacko.

All of this is just to explain why I'm absolutely befuddled that my daughter just dropped so much coin on a pair of shoes that in my mind are the ultimate in dork-fare.  Of course this also explains why the large gap that used to separate me from cool has now grown into a bottomless chasm of un-cool. Hell I'm starting to ask the kids to interpret things I hear on TV!  Next thing you know I'll be saying "Boffo!"

Vernon, Vernon, Vernon

Vernon Robinson is at it again.  His latest ad for his campaign against Brad Miller for the House seat in North Carolina's 13th District is just flat out over the top. It's an attack ad...kind of.  He doesn't call Miller names, but he does say that Miller voted against a bill that would have paid for more body armor for the troops in Iraq and then lists a litany of sex-related bills that Miller voted for.  Actually he cherry picks line items out of larger spending bills, but you can't miss the point.  Watch the video below and make sure you watch it all the way through;  I swear you will actually hear the words "probes attached to their genitalia".

You may recall that Vernon was the only Winston-Salem leader to take me up on my offer to host their blogs for free (he was a member of the City Council at the time), but the blog never really took off.  If he'd brought even 1/100th of the, uh, creativity of his ads to the blog it would be in the top 10 on Technorati.

Unexpected Benefits of Being a Wetmouth

I have a few physical attributes that I find truly annoying.  First, I seem to be replacing all the hair I'm losing from my head with hair on the rest of my body, particularly my back.  I've seen guys with worse back hair (much worse) but I'm not happy that I'm starting to resemble Bigfoot.  Second is my amazing propensity to sweat.  It can be 50 degrees outside and if I walk more than a couple of blocks I'm in a full-on, shirt-drenching sweat.  It truly makes the summer miserable sometimes.  Third is my mouths ability to produce spit.  It usually doesn't bother me that much, but when I go to the dentist it's a royal pain in the ass.  If they don't have that sucker thing in there just right I can drown in a matter of seconds while the hygienist is blissfully scraping away.

Well, I think I need to embrace my spit glands.  I just read this little item at Freakonomics:

As much as I generally dread the dentist’s chair, I always wind up learning something. Yesterday was no exception. I was asking Dr. Reiss about the causes of tooth decay—genetics vs. diet, etc. etc.—when he began explaining why toothpaste is such a bogus product. Any claims that toothpaste makes about preventing decay, whitening teeth, etc., are totally falacious, Dr. Reiss told me, because the F.D.A. can’t and won’t allow the ingredients necessary to perform those chores in an over-the-counter product that children can easily get hold of. (That’s why he recommends an antibacterial product like GlyOxide, a fairly foul-tasting but apparently effective means of killing the bacteria that cause decay.)

The other thing I learned yesterday was far more interesting, with far greater implications. He told me that tooth decay in general, even among wealthy patients, is getting worse and worse, particularly for people in middle age and above. The reason? An increased reliance on medications for heart disease, high cholesterol, depression, etc. Many of these medications, Dr. Reiss explained, produces drymouth, which is caused by a constricted salivary flow; because saliva kills bacteria in the mouth, a lack of it means increased bacteria, which leads to increased tooth decay. Given the choice of taking these medicines versus having some tooth decay, I’m sure most people would still choose the medicines—but I am guessing that most people haven’t thought about the link between the two.

So my spit is my friend!  Maybe I'll discover equally encouraging news about my sweaty ape tendencies, but somehow I doubt it.

Whole Lotta Hittin' Goin' On

Here's a little piece of YouTube goodness for you. These are some all-time classic NFL hits and my personal favorites are those featuring Earl Campbell.  You'll also see a lot of hits that would be illegal today since some are QB headhunters and others involve spearing or leading with the helmet. Enjoy:

More Fun With Congressional Payrolls

I've done a little more digging over at Legistorm and here are some fun numbers about the payrolls of North Carolina's congressional delegation.  This time I've included the Senators, both of whom are Republican (Dole and Burr).  Please keep in mind that these numbers are extrapolated from the first quarter 06 numbers reported by House members, and 1/2 of the payroll reported by the Senators between 10/1/05-3/31/06.  That means they may not be exact to the dollar but they're definitely close:

• Total Payroll for Congressional Staffers in 06, not including the members's salaries: $17,579,880
• Cost per NC resident to cover Congressional staff salaries in 06 (not including the members' salaries and based on US Census's most recent Estimate of NC Population): $2.02
• Total Number of staffers: 359 (306 full time)
• Avg. pay per staffer: $48,969.03
• Avg. pay per staffer in Senators' offices: $80,135
• Avg. pay per staffer in Rep.'s offices: $42,849
• Highest payroll for a NC member of the House: $969,552 (McIntyre, D-7th)
• Lowest payroll for a NC member of the House: $645,382 (McHenry, R-10th)
• Average payroll for Republican House members: $802,231
• Average payroll for Democratic House members: $906,577
• Average payroll for Senators: $2,023,399
• Average number of full time staffers for Senators: 42
• Average number of full time staffers for Representatives: 17

If you want to be a well-paid Congressional staffer in NC you definitely want to first try and get on a Senator's staff (they pay almost 90% better than House members do) but since there's a limited supply of those jobs you're more likely to get a job on the House side.  I had my suspicions that the amount that members of the House were paying might have a correlation with how long they'd been in office, so I decided to rank them by seniority and then by their payroll.  Below is a list of Representatives in descending order (longest serving to shortest) and in parentheses is their rank in terms of payroll (1 is highest payroll and 13 is lowest).

• Rep. Coble (2), R, 11th term 
• Rep. Price (4), D, 9th term
• Rep. Taylor (10), R, 8th term
• Rep. Watt (5), D, 7th term
• Rep. Myrick (3), R, 6th term
• Rep. Jones (9), R, 6th term
• Rep. McIntyre (1), D, 5th term
• Rep. Etheridge (8), D, 5th term
• Rep. Hayes (11), R, 4th term
• Rep. Miller (7), D, 2nd term
• Rep. Butterfield (6), D, 2nd term (served a partial term in 04)
• Rep. Foxx (12), R, 1st term
• Rep. McHenry (13), R, 1st term

My suspicion was borne out somewhat.   If you want to work for a Representative who pays well then you need to work for one who's been in office for at least five terms and if you can't hire on with one of them then get in on the ground floor with Rep. Butterfield;  he's showing early signs of being a generous boss, at least financially.

Or just go after the Democrats, since with the exception of Rep.'s Myrick and Coble the Republicans appear to be pretty tight with the dollar.  Here's the ranking by party, again 1 is the top paying office:

1. Dem
2. Rep
3. Rep
4. Dem
5. Dem
6. Dem
7. Dem
8. Dem
9. Rep
10. Rep
11. Rep
12. Rep
13. Rep

Of course the real money play is to get a job with one of these folks, put in a few years and then go work for a lobbyist.  The trick, of course, is to make connections on the right side of the aisle (i.e. for the party that's in the majority) so you may want to wait until after this November to apply.

What Do Foxxy and Her Cohorts Pay?

There's a new website called LegiStorm that allows you to look up what the members of Congress pay their staffs.  My US Representative is Virginia Foxx and she paid her staff $167,538.89 from 1/1/06-3/31/06, or in other words the first quarter of the year.  If the payroll stays consistent then her payroll for Foxx's staff for the year will be about $670,000. If you include the Congresswoman's salary of $165,200 for the year then the overall payroll for her office is $835,200. Here's the breakdown by staffers with quarterly income and then the estimated yearly amount:

• Rep. Foxx, Member, $41,300.00 ($165,200.00)
• Richard Hudson, Chief of Staff, $27,941.67 ($111,766.68)
• Deana Young Funderburk, Legislative Dir., $18,750 ($75,000.00)
• W Todd Poole, District Director, $15,000.00 ($60,000.00)
• Robert Honold, Legislative Asst., $11,000.01 ($44,000.04)
• Amy Auth, Press Secretary, $9,624.99 ($38,499.96)
• Christopher Wall, Legislative Asst., $9,000.00 ($36,000.00)
• Michael Church, District Caseworker, $8,750.01 ($35,000.04)
• Aaron Whitener, Field Rep, $8,375.01 ($33,500.04)
• Mary Carpenter, Executive Asst., $8,000.01 ($32,000.04)
• Joshua Wall, Constituent Liaison, $7,749.99 ($30,999.96)
• Erica Shrader, Legislative Corresp., $7,500.00 ($30,000.00)
• Rebecca Potts, Constituent Liaison, $6,750.00 ($27,000.00)
• Emily Beth Richardson, Constituent Liaison, $6,624.99 ($26,499.96)
• David Ward, Jr., Staff Asst., $6,458.33 ($25,833.32)
• Teddie Hathaway,Shared Employee, $5,499.99 ($21,999.96)
• Carrie Church, Part-time Employee, $3,750.00 ($15,000.00)
• Lindsay Moore, Part-time Employee, $3,000.00 ($12,000.00)
• Nicole Gustafson, Shared Employee, $3,000.00 ($12,000.00)
• Jeff Stockdale, Staff Asst., $763.89 ($3,055.56)

So if you include Rep. Foxx herself you could look at her office as a small business "owned" and financed by we members of NC's 5th Congressional District with 20 employees, 14 of whom are full time, and a total payroll of about $835,000.  This is another reason why we truly need to work hard to hold our representatives accountable; not only are they setting the direction for our country they are also a considerable investment of our money and resources.  And remember this is payroll; it doesn't include other expenditures of the Member's office or even the employees' benefits.

Now I'm not being critical of Rep. Foxx or her employees here. (If you look at the comparison of all NC Representatives she has the second lowest payroll).  No one is getting rich off of these salaries, especially those who are working in her DC office.  Even Mr. Hudson's six-figure salary doesn't go that far when you take into account the DC housing market.  And those lower level staffers who work in DC aren't in it for the money.  They're either doing it out of idealism, or they're putting their time in before they leave the Hill to make their financial futures on K Street, or maybe both.  Still, this is a significant investment of our taxpayer finances and we need to keep an eye on it.

So how does Rep. Foxx compare to her NC counterparts in the house?  Here's the payroll for each Rep.'s office, including the member's pay, for the first quarter of 06 with projected annual numbers in parentheses:

• Rep. Butterfield, D-1st, $266,157.44 ($1,064,629.70)
• Rep. Etheridge, D-2nd, $258,866.49 ($1,035,465.90)
• Rep. Jones, R-3rd, $257,483.31 ($1,029,933.20)
• Rep. Price, D-4th, $268,588.22 ($1,074,352.80)
• Rep. Foxx, R-5th, $208,838.89 ($835,355.56)
• Rep. Coble, R-6th, $277,340.42 ($1,109,361.60)
• Rep. McIntyre, D-7th, $283,688.05 ($1,134,752.20)
• Rep. Hayes, R-8th, $227,819.41 ($911,277.64)
• Rep. Myrick, R-9th, $272,511.11 ($1,090,044.40)
• Rep. McHenry, R-10th, $202,645.39 ($810,581.56)
• Rep. Taylor, R-11th, $246,365.99 ($985,463.96)
• Rep. Watt, D-12th, $267,562.67 ($1,070,250.60)
• Rep. Miller, D-13th, $262,803.37 ($1,051,213.40)

So if you total it up North Carolina's payroll just for our members of the House of Representatives is $3,300,670.76 for the first quarter of '06 which projects to $13,202,682.52.  In my next post I'm going to look at North Carolina's Congressional delegation in a little more detail.

I've Done Some Mean Things to My Kids, but...

I never put a Samuel L. Jackson toupee on my kid, or a Donald Trump, or Bob Marley,  or L'il Kim for that matter.  Want to get some blackmail pictures of your kids before they're old enough to do anything about it?  Visit babytoupee.com.

Iraq for Sale

If there's one area that I think most people can agree on the war, whether they're 'fer it or agin' it, I think most would agree that profiteers are the lowest of the low.  There's a new movie out (and yes it looks like it was made by some lefties) that I'm hoping comes out on Netflix soon or I'll end up buying it.  It's called Iraq for Sale and if you visit the site you'll find that there's a blog and all kinds of other information to be had there.

I've often written about the soaring real estate prices in DC throughout the late 90s and early 00s, but they didn't really take off until after 9/11.  The late 90s could be explained by the tech explosion (many people don't realize how much of the internet/telecomm infrastructure was based in the DC area) but I think the early 00s can only be explained by the huge run up of defense spending after 9/11 and through the beginning of the war.  DC has always grown rapidly during wars, but I think this expansion was particularly sharp because of all the money flowing to contractors who then created very high paying jobs (contractors pay their people much better than the government/military pays theirs).

I want to see this film, but I also want to see more hard hitting reporting done on the contractors.  Some of these companies are making HUGE money on the war, much more so than in past conflicts because so much more work that used to be done by military personnel is being done by contractors.  I want to see how the money is being spent with contractors, what the contractors are delivering in return and exactly how much lucre some of these companies' executives are getting at the cost of American blood.  Personally I think it's a non-partisan issue, and if some people see that kind of questioning as an attack on certain leaders of the country then I'd say that's a tacit acknowledgement of exactly what many of us suspect is going on. 

Screw it, I'll just say it: George, Dick and Don's friends are getting awful fat off of this little adventure in Iraq.

In Defense of La Siesta

Some of the smartest people I've known have been avid nappers.  For full balance and accuracy I should also tell you that some of the laziest people I've ever known are also avid nappers, but the difference is there is often no discernible time between sleeping and napping.  Anyway, it ends up that some brain studiers (neurobiologists) did a memory study on a bunch of folks and found that those who napped did 15% better than those who didn't.

It will not come as a shock to my friends and family, many of whose names I can never remember, that I never nap.

This is Your Egg. This is Your Egg Being Launched by an Induction Coil Rocket Launcher

How do people who are really smart (i.e. geeks) with some time on their hands entertain themselves?  Why, they build a do-it-yourself electro-magnet rocket launcher using something called induction coils.  If you care you can read about it here, but take my word for it that they get a lot of bang out of this gizmo.  Don't believe me? Watch the Youtube video below of them launching an egg.  Keep watching until the end to see how the inside of the egg ends up: