In reading the news today, it’s all very depressing.  Too many young (and old) people are dying.  It makes you realize how short life is and how important it is to enjoy every moment.

We haven’t decided whether or not we’re getting a student this year.  We’re still considering it, but we would very much like one from Spain, and that seems to be hard to find.  Today I was sent an email from our LC about getting a grant student that would be from the YES program.  I really like the sound of that, but need to discuss with hubby.  One of our reasons for hosting exchange students is to let American students meet someone from somewhere else and getting rid of the misconceptions and stereotypes.

<– WordPress won’t let me embed the video so go see it for yourself HERE

As part of the Ancestry.com World Archives Project:

• All indexes will remain free to the public on Ancestry.com.
• Ancestry.com will donate copies of record indexes and images from the project to partnering government archives and genealogy societies.
• Images and indexes from the project will be available for free to patrons at thousands of subscribing libraries across the U.S.
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And coming soon:

• Active contributors will be able to vote on which records the project indexes next.
  Currently, active contributors are participants who help index 900+ records per quarter.
• Active contributors will receive free access to original images in the project’s databases. Those who already subscribe to Ancestry.com will be eligible for a discount on renewal.)

I like free stuff, and if you’re transcribing you get to see the original records, for free   Plus I like to think I may help someone find that long lost relative.

From People:

Demonstrators protest the U.S. Congress’s proposed $700 billion bailout of the financial industry in New York City’s Times Square, Sept. 27

Keith Bedford / Reuters

The Administration and Congress have felt compelled to do something about the “financial meltdown,” so an inefficient and inequitable “bailout plan” has been rushed through the legislature despite harsh criticism from the right and left. That’s unfortunate. Both presidential candidates were stalling by qualifying the plan. Whichever candidate had had the courage to reject outright this proposal would have had the better claim to be President.

Do not be fooled. The $700 billion (ultimately $1 trillion or more) bailout is not predominantly for mortgages and homeowners. Instead, the bailout is for mortgage-backed securities. In fact, some versions of these instruments are imaginary derivatives. These claims overlap on the same types of mortgages. Many financial institutions wrote claims over the same mortgages, and these are the majority of claims that have “gone bad.”

At this point, such claims have no bearing on the mortgage or housing crisis; they have bearing only on the holders of these securities themselves. These are ridiculously risky claims with little value for society. It is as if many financial institutions sold “earthquake insurance” on the same house: when the quake hits, all these claims become close to worthless — but the claims are simply bets disconnected from reality.

Follow the money. Average Joes and Janes are not the holders of the other side of complicated, over-the-counter derivatives contracts. Rather, hedge funds are the main holders. The bailout will involve a transfer of wealth — from the American people to financial institutions engaging in reckless speculation — that will be the greatest in history.

Rescuing financial institutions is not the best solution. Yes, banks are needed to provide capital to businesses. But it is not necessary to spend $1 trillion to maintain liquidity. If the government is to intervene, it should pick and choose which claims to purchase; claims that are directly tied to mortgages would be a good start.

Let financial institutions fail, merge or be bought out. The faltering institutions will see their shares devalued and will be likely to be taken over by stronger institutions — as has already started happening. This consolidation of the financial sector is both efficient and inevitable; government action can only delay the adjustment.

The government should not intervene. It should leave overleveraged financial institutions to default on their derivatives obligations and, if necessary, file for bankruptcy. Much of the crisis has arisen from miscalculating the risks involved in a large book of positions in these derivatives. It is only logical that these institutions pay for their poor management.

Rather than bailing out Wall Street, we propose that the government should buy up the actual mortgages in question and do nothing else. The government should not touch any derivatives; that is, claims that do not directly tie into the actual mortgages. If money becomes too tight, then the Fed can certainly increase its loans to financial institutions.