Finally, back on the treadmill after a week nursing a cold. Managed a slow three miles, but didn’t want to push it. Keep it modest for the week and then push it again next week.
Today on the iPod: a mix that is a bit too diverse to explain.
South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press
The Blog of South Brunswick
From The Boston Globe:
Wine lovers have long used crystal stemware to help experience the exquisite nose of a French merlot or a frisky Australian vin ordinaire, and now the Boston brewer thinks beer connoisseurs have achieved a similar level of discernment when it comes to appreciating state-of-the-art advances in lager delivery-systems.
According to the company, the new Samuel Adams Boston Lager Pint Glass is the first glass specifically designed to showcase beer as brewers intended.
Sparing no effort, Boston Beer said it recruited “world-renowned sensory experts” to work on the design of a glass that beginning in March, will be sold in packages of four for $30 at www.samueladams.com.
One feature of the new glass is a neck-and-lip design that “helps sustain the head of the beer, which enhances the release of signature Noble hop aromas found in Samuel Adams Boston Lager,” the company said.
“It’s a personal passion of mine to develop a beer glass that elevates the craft-beer drinking experience,” Jim Koch, company chairman and founder of the Samuel Adams beer brand, said in a statement. “We wanted to create a glass that offers beer lovers a full sensory experience by fully showcasing Samuel Adams Boston Lager’s complex balance of malt and hop flavors.”
Hmmmm. I may have to order a set.
South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press
The Blog of South Brunswick
Nicholas D. Kristof, with whom I don’t always agree, offers the most concise and pointed response in his New York Times column today to the pro-surge crowd’s contention that leaving with result in a bloodbath.
His argument can be boiled down to this:
1. The Iraqis don’t support the surge and want us to leave.
2. Our presence maybe impeding a political settlement, meaning that the bloodbath maybe more likely to happen with us there.
3. We can minimize the potential for a bloodbath by reminding the Iraqi government that, should large-scale massacres occur, government officials will be prosecuted for war crimes.
4. We can create stability by bringing the regional powers — including Iran and Syria — to the table.
So at the end of the day, genocide is possible in Iraq, but there’s no crystal ball to tell anyone what will happen if we stay or go. Keeping troops in Iraq has steadily increased the risk of a bloodbath. The best way to reduce that risk is, I think, to announce a timetable for withdrawal and to begin a different kind of surge: of diplomacy.
A majority of Iraqis may well be right in thinking that we are part of the problem rather than the solution — and maybe a phased withdrawal will nudge Iraqis back from the brink and make a cataclysm less likely.
South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press
The Blog of South Brunswick
A group of homeowners is suing Monroe because it believes the township’s assessment ratio — the number used to translate today’s housing prices into assessments based on decade-old values — is out of whatck.
I don’t want to get into the specifics of their complaint, which includes questions about how the ratio was calculated and some accusations of improprieties. But the assessment problem does point out a more general problem with the way we pay for government in New Jersey.
New Jersey property owners, as everyone knows by now, pay the highest property taxes in the nation and use the property tax to cover nearly three quarters of the cost of government.
Towns, schools and counties set tax rates based on the value of property within their borders, the values being based on market prices. They are set infrequently — generally because a full revaluation of property involves inspecting every house, store and warehouse and is quite costly — meaning that most assessments are out of date. To address this issue when new residential and commercial properties are built, towns attempt to go back in time through an assessment ratio.
In the case of Monroe, new residents in several communities are saying that they are being assessed too high when compared to older homes, which leaves them paying more than their share of the cost of local government.
A full revaluation would fix this — though not fix what maybe a historical problem. And it won’t prevent this problem from popping up in the future.
The best way to address this is to lessen the property tax burden across the board — by shifting the cost of New Jersey government (meaning local, school and county) off property taxes and onto income taxes, which are calculated annually.
South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press
The Blog of South Brunswick
I think if you look up hypocrisy in the dictionary, you’ll find John McCain’s photo.
South Brunswick Post, The Cranbury Press
The Blog of South Brunswick
Hank Kalet 