What kind of person blows up a market full of women and children like the attack in Pakistan? It is evil. Whatever your cause or religion is, I want no part of it.

I have a granddaughter! Sweet Stella Jane came into the world Saturday night. She has a Faux Hawk! There is lots of black hair, cute little face, long fingers and legs. She is very beautiful.

This, of course, means I am a grandfather. I don't feel old enough to be a grandfather, but I am happy to have a new baby in the family.

Don't tell my mom, but this makes her a great grandmother, so she really cannot get away with telling people she is 39 any longer. She has forbidden me to tell my age for years, but the grand child will otherwise be hard to explain.

It's funny how your identity changes over the years. First, I was Pete and Bernice's boy. Especially living in small towns, you hear this: "you're Pete's boy aren't you?" right before he calls your father or mother and tells them what you'd done.

When I take coffee up to the hospital to see Joy Bird, they say "hey, you're Joy's husband, aren't you?" Then she introduces me around as "my husband".

Then, I had kids. I became Michelle's dad, Lindsey's dad, Claire's dad.

When I'm at church, it's "this is my sunday school teacher".

Now, I'll be known as Stella's grand dad.

Obviously, the people around me define me. I exist in terms of who I am to them.

A philosopher once said "I think, therefore I am". I think I would say "I relate, therefore I am".

When I am alone, I have an identity crisis. Who am I? Who do I belong to?

Maybe then I belong to the dog. Do dogs talk to each other while they are sniffing their privates?

"Hey, this is my guy."

"Cool. Can I sniff him?"

Our dog prefers the Little Woman to me, actually. So, I think he tells them "this is the guy that takes mommy away from me" or "this is the guy that makes me get off the bed and get in my crate when he quits reading".

But at least I have an identity.

I have to go. Someone just said "tell your dad dinner is ready".

There are two tenets of atheism: One, there is no God. Two, I hate him."
--Douglas Wilson

Ann Althouse's pictures almost make me want to live in Madison, Wisconsin.

HAVE A HEART

I always thought of heart disease as a man's thing. Any time you see a heart attack on television, for instance, it is a man.

However, cardiovascular disease happens to be the leading cause of death in the United States. 500,000 people die from it every year. But here is the kicker: more women in the United States die of heart disease than of any other cause.

Myocardial infarction, one form of this, claims the majority of these deaths. In every year since 1984, MI has killed more women than men. The mortality rate for women following a heart attack is 8% in the first month. This is more than double the rate for men. Women who do survive myocardial infarction have high risk for repeated heart attacks.

Women are also more likely to have diabetes mellitus, congestive heart failure (CHF), and hypertension prior to myocardial infarction (MI) than men.

So, ladies, don't neglect your heart in health care, assuming only the men die from heart disease.

MORE MATH ON CASH FOR CLUNKERS

I'm not the only one doing the math on Cash For Clunkers.

Irwin Stelzer, an economist at the Hudson Institute says that, at best "the reduction in gasoline consumption will cut our oil consumption by 0.2 percent per year, or less than a single day's gasoline use."

So, you could hardly justify the program based on reduced gas consumption, although that is exactly what the president did.

What about overall benefit, environmental improvements and the benefit to car buyers and companies? Take that and subract the overallcost of the program. Is it a postitive benefit for America or just a negative cost? (and did the President do any of this math?) Burton Abrams and George Parsons of the University of Delaware calculate a net cost of roughly $2,000 per vehicle. That means the program made the nation $1.4 billion poorer.

I do not really think the President did the math or even cared about the math. I think he wanted to look like he was doing something. And, the people who got the cars, and the people who want to redistribute wealth in this country, like it and will support him in it. I think the President wants to distribute wealth. Hillary Clinton did and said it. This guy is more careful and charming with his words, but maybe less truthful.

HEALTHCARE LEGISLATION

It is hard to believe there were 550 amendments offered to the health care "reform" bill of Max Baucus. I think it shows a great lack of agreement on healthcare issues. However, the Senate Finance Committee says they considered them all.

The next step is for the Congressional Budget Office to "score" the bill's cost and estimate how many people it will cover. After that the Senate can vote on it.

The bill requires most Americans to have health insurance. There is a penalty for not having health insurance. An amendment was accepted that reduces the maximum penalty for a family to $800. The penalty will be phased in from 2014 to 2017. At least they did not require one of the family to agree to be killed.

The committee has also approved an amendment modifying the tax on high-cost insurance policies so that it only applies to policies with premiums more than $21,000. The threshold is $26,000 for health plans covering retirees or people in certain high-risk occupations.

All this coverage costs money,of course. Who pays? Well, taxpayers pay, of course. Those would be working people, many of whom are paying for their own health care coverage instead of buying cars in the cash for clunkers program and now also get to buy health insurance for said new car owners.

Old people will also pay (this administration clearly favors the young over the old). The bill reduces Medicare and Medicaid payments. This also impacts hospitals by $155 billion over 10 years. This is why hospitals are lobbying for many parts of the bill, by the way. It increases their revenues.

In addition, the bill imposes annual fees on insurers, drug companies and manufacturers of medical devices. Why? Because they can.

The American Hospital and Texas Hospital associations are part of the group lobbying for full coverage in order to increase their revenues. They are concerned that the legislation may not cover as many people as originally projected. The AHA reached an agreement with Senator Baucus and President Obama to support the legislation as long as it expanded coverage to 97 percent of the population. This is a revenue issue. The hospitals make a lot of money on Medicare and Medicaid that they need to offset the services for which they receive no payment. If Medicare and Medicaid are cut, the hospitals want expanded government coverage under the legislation to offset the loss and creat new revenue. If percentage of coverage is less, the AHA reckons it will not offset the $155 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. Thus, your local hospitals will be lobbying for greater coverage. Greater coverage costs more money. More money means more taxes.

There is another bill in competitions with the one from Senate Finance. If the bill in Finance is approved by the committee, it must be "merged" with the competing legislation already passed by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

While all this money is being tossed around, or they are considering how much to toss around, please note that the government already does not have enough money to operate on. Congress has to pass a continuing resolution to keep the government going until the permanent financing bills are approved. This is somewhat like you filling out the papers for a new mortgage on a new home while realized you have to get a pay day loan to buy groceries for your family. Or, say, to get a loan to buy a new car to take advantage of a government gift when you cannot afford to get your old car fixes.

THE CLUNKING SOUND AFTER CASH FOR CLUNKERS CASHED IN ITS LAST CLUNKER

After said clunker program ended, so did the buying. General Motors' sales were down 36 percent in September compared with August. Ford was down 37 percent. Chrysler was down 33 percent. Clearly, the only motivation provided by the program was the chance at free money for a new car at the expense of fellow taxpayers like this one.

It's not that I'm bitter. Ok, yes it is that I'm bitter now that I found my car needs $3,000 in repairs to pass inspection and I helped by new cars for all those other people and none of them even said thank you or bought me dinner.

Obama as economic messiah is in fail status.

Weekly jobless claims have risen higher than expected. No one want to hire when they wonder if they will be taxed out of existence or forced to buy so much health care they cannot operate. Job creation fail.

Consumer loan delinquencies remain at record highs. Credit structure fail.

Manufacturing growth has slowed. Stimulus fail.

The major stock market indexes have fallen. Financial sector confidence fail.

The stimulus plan is not working as planned.

Mark Noll: "The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is no evangelical mind."

Good post by David Heddle on International Blasphemy Day. I couldn't say it better, so I am just linking to his post.

The $8,000 tax credit for first time home buyers runs out on November 30. I'm hoping they replace it with an $8,000 tax credit for working men in their 50s whose cars were made in the previous century and who have paid for 3 weddings and college educations for their daughters and new cars for their wives and now want to buy a 5 year old sports car.