Some oddities from the news:
- From the “Not a Hallmark Moment” Department: Russia is moving to ban the Western holidays of Halloween and Valentine’s Day as bad influences on the nation’s youth. Maxim Mishchenko, a Duma member, says he is pushing the bill to guard the “moral and spiritual upbringing” of the nation’s youth and to promote traditional Russian culture and values rather than those imported from the West. What’s next? Are they going to ban Mothers Day and Fathers Day?
The proposal dovetails with a new Russian version of Valentine’s, called the Day of Family, Love and Fidelity. The holiday, held in June, was backed by first lady Svetlana Medvedev and the Russian Orthodox Church. Among its goals: stimulate a sense of family life and to stem Russia’s declining birth rate. Mishchenko says students should celebrate Russian holidays, not those heralded in the United States and Europe.
- From the “Everything Old is New Again” Department: You all know how transfats are bad for you. No hydrogenated oils. Why not go back to the real thing. Lard! Yup, lard is becoming popular and trendy again. Now who says you can’t put lipstick on a pig!
- From the “Counterintuitive” Department: Remember how the airlines said they were losing money when the price of oil went up? Well, United Air Lines is now noting that falling oil prices will also lead to a sizable net loss. Next thing you know, they’ll want a bailout.
And speaking of bailouts, it looks like Arnold has reached an agreement with the state legislature on a budget. About damn time. The good news is the assembly has acceded to Arnold’s demand for tighter restrictions on lawmakers’ access to the state’s rainy day fund, and have eliminated a proposal to raise $1.6 billion by increasing tax withholdings from Californians’ paychecks. The money will be raised instead by hiking penalties on corporations for late payment of taxes. A corporate tax amnesty program approved by the Legislature and intended to raise hundreds of millions of dollars was also eliminated to be replaced partly by cuts the governor intends to make by line-item veto and by shrinking the same rainy-day find that he has insisted be built up in the future.
