Lampe: Expect a Debt Ceiling Vote Late Sunday Evening

Heres the scoop since yesterday:
- Boehner's plan cuts $838 Billion in Spending
- Reid's plan cuts a little over $2 Trillion in Spending
- Both plans have little chance passing both houses

However, as Chris Matthews put it, "the pre-game" strategies are now over and the real negotiations begin. As reported yesterday morning, the tea-party freshmen Republicans reluncantly got their "asses" in line (Boehner said it, not me). In this time of constant political positioning for candidate campaigning, it only makes sense that a grand deal will happen in the final hours of Sunday Evening, hours before the opening bell of the markets begin to panic, or sigh in relief. I believe a repeat congressional performance of the health care bill will happen with the debt ceiling vote.

According to a recent poll, it seems like Obama is winning the rhetoric on this issue of compromise (56% of Americans Agree) with the Democrats holding their guns with the "shared sacrifce" anti-tax for the rich strategy and the Republicans trying to blame the President for lack of leadership. Hopefully the political theatre will die down considering the tea party policy shift on the debt ceiling issue.

Considering some bill will pass that has the debt ceiling saving us from credit rating catastrophe, I start to wonder if the debt ceiling debate should be part of the political arena. Just like the interest rates and printing money, shouldn't the debt ceiling be considered on the same circumstances. After all, if we do not raise the debt ceiling, global economic calapse is highly likely. Therefore, I believe that the debt ceiling should be under the Federal Reserve, the entity that allows our economic power to flow freely without any governmental disruption.

Although, for the markets' sake, we can get this debt ceiling crisis done earlier, these modern political times trends to the likeliness of last minute politics. Where the last bill will likely be the foundation of the grand compromise. If you listen to the news today, you are hearing that a 'new bill' is in the works. Let's see what that bill is... Didn't someone mention 'grand compromise'?

Life after College Blog Saga: Life without Cable?! (Technology Outlook)

It's pretty close to the end of my AmeriCorps Service and things are starting to wrap up at the office. The students are gone and I am stuck doing administrative work. This has given me a lot of time to reflect how things went at work. At the same time, the aleviated stress gives me the opportunity to look at my life after UW-Sheboygan.

It will be close to a month and a half before I move into my apartment and attend Marquette for Graduate School. For those of you who know me, I'm a guy who wants to get their hands on the latest technology (of course, when I can actually afford it). After researching what to budget for, I started realizing the next wave of technology coming to a living room near you.

How did I realize this? (Don't worry, I won't quote the bible on the prophecy of the cable rapture.) This became apparent when I started researching cable/internet providers. I started asking the question, do I really want to pay $50 dollars a month for watching television. Part of that could go toward my groceries or having a "guys night out".

Previously, I tried out Netflix for the free trial and didn't like it. I was hoping for movies and tv shows I liked being streamed via internet. Unfortunately, most movies I liked, I needed to get it mailed. They also did not have many television shows I wanted to watch. I am currently trying Hulu Plus, which has pretty good variety of content.

I have been noticing reviews on Hulu Plus about how they are annoyed with the ads that run in between the content. I can understand if they use it as a supplement to cable. However, there is a difference looking at Hulu as a supplement versus an alternative. Since I see Hulu as an alternative, I will be paying $7.99 vs. $50.00 with the same if not less commercial interuptions. Even though I like watching news channels (CNN, MSNBC etc.), I can easily access their content on their websites.

Hopefully this blog will help out some of you who are moving after college to a new job. If you are a huge cheapskate, you can watch most of the primetime content online. I was able to watch the whole season of Kitchen Nightmares at fox.com for free. I will also mention that I will probably get an antenna for my apartment to get news after I am done with work and school.

The Situationalist,
Mike