On Morning Joe this morning Bryan Williams was lamenting the imminent demise of newspapers. Several of the big papers, including the New York Times and Chicago Tribune, and a lot of the smaller ones are on the verge of bankruptcy. He said that this will cause people to rely more on internet news and opinion sites, and he is worried that the people running the internet sites and providing the reporting won’t be “classically trained” as journalists.

I wonder what he thinks the people now working for the newspapers will do after their employers close their doors. I would think they will just turn to the internet. In fact, a lot of them already have. Most all newspapers of any size already publish most or all of their content on the web. Some of them require subscriptions for access but most offer free access and rely on advertising for revenue. The New York Times switched to free access a year or two ago.

Yes, there are a lot of web sites out there putting out unreliable news and opinion (like this one?), but there are also a lot of printed “rags” out there too.

The cost of publishing and distributing print versions is huge. Without this cost some of them might survive by turning exclusively to the internet.

I wonder what Williams thinks the institutions that “classically train” jounalists and publishers will do after the newspapers go away. I would think they will start training them to operate on the internet.

Apparently he thinks we can’t adapt to significant change. Perhaps he’s still puzzled about how we managed to move from horse-drawn vehicles to cars and trucks.

More from Winston Churchill via Burt Prelutsky:  “For a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

Some people want more tax on fuel to discourage driving and the emission of carbon. But they want to spend it on improving the highway system which would encourage driving. The real reason? More money flowing through the government.

Fox News reports that Caroline Kennedy failed to vote in a number of elections since registering in New York City in 1988. Her reaction:

“I was really surprised and dismayed by my voting record.” I’m glad it’s been brought to my attention.”

Oh, was I expected to actually vote before being given a seat in the Senate? Why did everyone wait until now to tell me?

Actually this is encouraging news. It’s obvious that a Democrat is going to be appointed to Hillary’s seat, so having someone in there who can’t be bothered to vote could be a good thing. She might not even show up to vote “present.”

Some have said that Bernard Madoff ran the largest Ponzi scheme ever. Not even close. That record still belongs to our government’s Social Security program.

But if you are a regular visitor you already know that. It’s quite obvious. I’ve radically changed the style and reorganized the content. As you can see, the home page content area now shows only the latest posts and asides. To see listings of recent comments, archives and blogroll you will have to click the appropriate link in the navigation bar in the header.

I built this theme from scratch. In fact that’s what I named it, Scratch. Well, it wasn’t totally from scratch. I used the default theme as a guide to the ground that a theme should cover. If you have any problems with it, please let me know by commenting on this post or e-mailing me at the address given on my contact page. I tested it only in Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 3.

From George Will: “Friday the president gave the two automakers access to money Congress explicitly did not authorize. More money than had been debated, thereby calling to mind Winston Churchill on naval appropriations: ‘The Admiralty had demanded six ships: the economists offered four: and we finally compromised on eight.’”  Priceless.

I hear that Vice President-elect Joe Biden will oversee a task force that will make recommendations on how to build the ranks of the middle class. As far as I can see, he plans to do that by moving people down from the ranks of the wealthy.

President Bush just announced that the government will lend GM and Chrysler over $17 billion to help them stave off bankruptcy. A better plan would be to allow each taxpayer to decide how much he or she believes the car makers need to be saved by sending them money directly. Oh, that’s right. We already have such a plan in place. It’s called buying stock. And apparently there aren’t many people who believe the car makers are a good investment.

So Bush rides to the rescue of companies that the people have already decided aren’t worth saving. Or, more accurately, he rides to the rescue of unions that the people have already decided aren’t worth saving. We have several car companies that are operating at a profit without the help of the UAW. But we have only one UAW and the government is afraid that it will collapse without a bailout.

Propping up failing companies will work in the long-term about as well as the practice of promoting students to the next higher grade despite their inability to perform at that level. Come to think of it, perhaps the government and industry are now being run by people who received social promotions in grade school. Perhaps they are contributing to our current economic woes.

One thing is certain. Our economy will collapse completely if we establish the policy that no aspect of the economy is allowed to fail. Preserving the inefficient, the unneeded and the unwanted, will harm the efficient, the needed and the wanted. Can you imagine where we would be today if we had refused to let the horse-drawn industries disappear? What about typewriters? Would you buy one if retailers still stocked a wide selection? How about at a government-subsidized low price?

While researching the past and present Kennedys in Congress I came across this from a 1998 Washington Post article about Joseph P. Kennedy II leaving Congress:

He also eventually made a mark as a legislator through his initiatives to end housing discrimination against minorities. Because of his efforts, banks now have to disclose racial statistics on mortgage borrowers, a tool the Clinton administration has used to enhance services in minority neighborhoods.

So, “because of his efforts” (and lots of others since then) the housing and financial markets have collapsed. Clinton “enhanced services in minority neighborhoods” by forcing financial institutions to lend to people who didn’t otherwise qualify for a loan. It looks like Joe II didn’t quit soon enough.

There are still two Kennedys in Congress, Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) and his son, Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy (D-R.I.). We don’t need to add Caroline to the mix. We already have enough wealthy Northeasterners who think we common people can’t survive without their help, and who are too dumb to realize that their efforts usually turn out to be more harmful than helpful.

Some think that Ted is about to croak, so adding Caroline will just maintain the status quo. I say forget the status quo. One Kennedy is a lot better than two Kennedys.

Some say that she lacks the experience to be a Senator. I say perhaps not, but the fact that she is a Kennedy is reason enough for the New York governor not to appoint her to fill Hillary’s seat.