Free Republic

>>Last week, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight said home prices fell 3.1 percent in the first quarter, the largest drop in its 17-year history and only the second quarter of price declines recorded.<<

Someone needs to tell Texas and New Mexico. I've been closely watching home prices in west Texas and in New Mexico for months and I have not seen a drop in prices. The overpriced house next door to mine in Albuquerque sold in less than 30 days.

Coyotes are not listed as threatened or endangered under the Federal ESA. However, States may have their own protection mechanisms.

Americans who are still studying in the National Archives are just starting their research so there is always a lot of "scurrying" among excited "new discoverers." In the D.C. area, the Library of Congress is "where it's at" with more books on your particular American family lines than you can read in a lifetime.

Since our children are getting so little knowledge of American history in our public schools beyond the fact that Thomas Jefferson may have had black children, a personal study of one's own American heritage has become the home study course for real American history. Also, knowing where one comes from gives one a better sense of where you need to go.

BTW, anyone need a LOC copy card with $20 or $30 still left on it? :) I had only the opportunity to scurry around the place for about five years when more urgent retirement plans took me out of the City of Information.

BTW, the LDS Genealogy Center at Kensington, MD is another good place to scurry about.

Reminds me of the time New York City wanted to bury their human waste in New Mexico. My thought is you make it in your State, you bury it in your State. The same goes for for nuclear waste.

Let me see if I get this right. OPEC and oil speculators do everything in their power to drive up the price of oil and fuel prices in order to increase their profits. This is smart business. Rising fuel prices result in an interest in alternative energy sources and American farmers find themselves handed a golden goose. However, for farmers to cash that goose they must be greedy?

Consumer interest in ethanol, as well as rising prices for food and consumer goods, only follows skyrocketing fuel prices. To say that using grains for fuel is the only cause for food shortages is the sort of analysis that selectively picks its facts. Ethanol production is only a middle link in a chain of events that led us to this point.

>>"I believe that the Constitution confers an individual right to bear arms. But just because you have an individual right does not mean that the state or local government can't constrain the exercise of that right," he said.<<

And just because Article II of the Constitution established the Office of the President, whose to say we need one?

Route 66! Yep, I remember that TV series. Martin Milner and George Maharis starred in it. I live just a mile or so from Route 66 and occasionally can be found in the Route 66 Diner in Albuquerque. That 'Vette that Milner had in that series was I believe a 1960 model. It would be worth more than a few bucks nowadays. My favorite is the 1962 model.

Who knows I may buy a Corvette yet. Who needs teeth and what's there worth hearing anymore?

The rules of frugality also work in another way as well. When I was 18 years old, I wanted a Corvette but did not buy one instead electing to put my money in the bank. Now that I’m sixty and have the money to buy a Corvette, I don’t want one and can spend my savings for teeth and a hearing aid.

No, the dog would probably be allowed to take a taxi home.

God bless your uncle. He sounds like he was a very unselfish person. I once knew Mr. Ed Dean, head of the Texas High Plains Cotton Growers, Inc. who almost died during the Bataan Death March. He too was amazing fellow.

Most Americans would put their mother in the trunk for a 5” black and white TV. For a large flat screen, they’d tie her to the roof.

>>18 years ofcontinuous use required by state law in order to assert the squatter's-rights law.<<

In Texas the "public" may take your property in only six or seven years.

For those who don't know, this small west Texas town built a street across my lot a couple of summers ago while I was away one weekend. They did this without my permission or a "right-of-way." By Monday, the public was already using the street. A strategically placed 40' railroad tie and a meeting with the City Manager stopped what was essentially a land-grab by the City government.

I can't speak for the rest of the world but for the U.S. who still has significant amounts of farm land, the last census revealed that farm kids are just not staying on the farm. Just yesterday I (a retired 60 year old) was offered a job at $100 a day driving a grain combine because the owner can't find dependable workers. His employees last summer tore the automatic transmission out of his tool truck in Colorado and one left the diesel tank cap off one of the semi-trucks during a rainstorm and very expensive injector work was required.

This all doesn't speak well for the continued health and welfare of the human species at least in America.

>>Yeah likely the libs, but ethanol? <<

My thoughts exactly. It's a piecemealed logic at best to overlook the ever-rising prices of diesel and gasoline used in the harvest and transport of the limes. Even the interest in ethanol can be blamed on high gasoline and diesel prices.

McCain said he knows very little about how the economy works. If gas prices are truly driven by market pressures, removing the taxes would be expected to have little effect on the price at the pump. And too, even if (and it’s a very big “if”) retailers and wholesalers actually passed the savings toward the consumers, increased demand would drive the cost right back up. It’s an idea not well thought out.

As a crew chief on the now-defunct F-111 fighter-bomber in the late 1960s and early 1970s, it is my understand that had I gone to England with the aircraft in the 1970s, I could not give blood today. One F-111 pilot actually died from the disease.

Much of this nonsense derives from the many U-Haulers and retirees who are now flooding the State from their own socialized-sickened States. Just go to City-Data forum for New Mexico and read some of the threads about those planning to move to New Mexico. The State is actually thriving during these tough housing market times. See that story here. It's a great time to sell my Albuquerque home to one of these U-Haulers and headback west Texas, one of the few refuges left for conservatism.

My family’s prayers are certainly with you. My 86-year old mom fell during Hurricane Rita and broke her arm when the family had to evacuate the Texas Gulf coast. From that accident her health declined rapidly and in June of 2006 she exited this short sad life and began an eternal happy one.

When the birds start feeding on the mice in my garages and barns, I’ll defend them against the feral cats that inhabit this west Texas property. Also the cats keep the obnoxious European Starlings away. Right now, my vote is for the cats.

There’s a rumor fast spreading that Werner Trucking has filed for bankruptcy due to the rising cost of diesel fuel. Apparently this is NOT true.