En Passant

Why is it that when a company advertises one thing and does another,

that company is often the object of litigation, but when a politician does a similar thing, his or her statements are dismissed as merely campaign rhetoric?

Do diligence?

Individual investors should be faulted for failing to diversify, by putting the bulk of their savings with Madoff or with an intermediary.  But they should not be faulted for failing to do due diligence.  When I buy a municipal bond from Merrill Lynch, should I do due diligence with Merrill?  When I buy GE stock through Charles Schwab, must I (or my agent) personally inspect Schwab's books?  Some things in life just have to be taken on faith.

The biggest Ponzi scheme in the history of the world

may be Social Security.

I never thought I'd hear Democrats

publicly attack Caroline Kennedy.

With prices at the gas pumps at an unexpected low,

now is the time to begin raising the federal gasoline tax.

I'm uncomfortable with all the backward apostrophes one sees in print,

but I can't stand hearing people refer to the year 2010 as Oh-Ten.