Whenever I try out the old saw that "a women can never have too many shoes"  on Mrs. Philosopher, she counters that based on my example, "a man can never have too many flashlights." I have to confess that it is true - I have one (or more) for every room in the house and every desk and every vehicle, not to mention special purpose ones like spotlights, lanterns, and penlights.

Lately, I have been reading the LED flashlight reviews, checking out the various on and offline stores, and converting or replacing most of the existing flashlights with LED flashlights. The advantages of LEDs are obvious - much better bulb life and better battery life than incandescent bulbs. In recent years LED prices have gone down and LED flashlights have gotten brighter and started using standard batteries instead of the usually pricey (and unrechargeable) coin cells that used to be typical. LEDs are also showing up in much more than light bulbs, but even sticking to that, traffic lights everywhere are converting to LED as well as many exterior car lights excepting headlights for which LEDs are still not bright enough.

Now here's the big puzzle. How did this major power saving technological improvement occur without Senator Barbara ("Call me dopey") Boxer and some Federal bureaucracy mandating its use like the annoying and poisonous Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFL)? It sure is a puzzlement, but maybe, just maybe, it has to do with LEDs actually being better than incandescent bulbs for many applications and not some just some ecoweenie fantasy.

So why don't they make LED replacements for regular incandescent light bulbs? Actually, if you look around you can find some and they provide similar power savings and much better color rendering than CFLs without the poisonous mercury, but at the moment they are still rather expensive. Hopefully they get down the commodity pricing curve soon before the greentards give us all mercury poisoning.

Labels: Ecoweenies, Gore-bulbs

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 3:10 AM -

Apparently Barack Obama's handlers can't keep him from bowing to every foreign "royal" he meets despite the fact that US citizens, particularly Presidents of the USA do not bow to foreign royalty.  The last time when ole Barry was bowing to the King of Saudi Arabia, his spinners said it wasn't a bow. A better excuse would be that the poor lad was tricked by those sneaky foreigners and couldn't help himself.

The original Saudi trick:

Obama falls for the same trick in Japan.

One can't help but wonder what Obama would do for a bucket of Extra Crispy.

Labels: Barack Obama, Fried Chicken

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:37 AM -

Veterans Day 2009: Our thanks to all those who have served and are currently serving. They are our bulwark against tyrants both foreign and domestic.

Labels: US Military, Veterans

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:53 AM -

I used to be an extensive eBay shopper, but have tapered off over the years as the grasping nature of the management team has ruined the ambience. Still, I can't help marveling at how they have managed to kill the golden online auction goose and consequently I got a chuckle out of their latest faux pas - eBay Payment Reminders: eBay screws up again:

Do you remember when eBay was the Great White Shark of online auction sites? Now they seem to be more like Bozo. The latest evidence is the great eBay Payment Reminder debacle which started on Friday. Instead of sending out a "You’ve Won…" notice to winning auction bidders and purchasers from eBay stores, they are waiting 48 hours and then sending out collection agency style emails that are fetchingly titled "Please pay for your…".

...

The problem with this is that many eBay sellers encourage buyers to shop around for multiple days amongst their other auctions and eBay store items to buy more and save on combined shipping. Sellers woke up Saturday to find irate emails from customers they had encouraged to keep shopping, but who had exceeded eBay’s arbitrary 48 hour limit and were hit with the "Please pay…" emails for their purchases over the past few days.

The sellers can't change the emails or opt out of them so they are suffering from outraged buyers who can't discern that the emails came from the robots at eBay and not the sellers themselves. Undoubtedly eBay sees some money in this for themselves, but it is hard to see how. Meanwhile the sellers are scrambling to figure out how to tell their customers that it is yet another eBay screw-up.

Labels: eBay

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 10:10 PM -

After yesterday's House Call on Congress, Obamacare is punch drunk and reeling. Get on the phone and call your congressional representatives, particularly if they are on the "leaners list". If they aren't on the list, tell them why they should be:

Labels: Obamacare

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 1:23 PM -

Some of the wags at Free Republic came up with this snap of  porcine Dede Scozzafava coming out of the closet.

Of course, the real question is what she got from the White House for endorsing the Democrat candidate in the NY-23 congressional race after she ended her faux Republican campaign. From the looks of ole Dede, I'm betting she is going to be Obama's Pizza Czar. "Every American deserves large pies with 2 meat toppings and triple cheese."

Don't let the garage door hit your wide load on the way out, Dede.

Labels: Dede Scozzafava, Democrat party

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:52 PM -

Labels: Barack Obama, Halloween, Michelle Obama

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:18 PM -

Michelle Malkin kicks fat fool Frank Rich's butt:

Make Frank Rich cry: Donate to Hoffman for Congress.

Labels: Frank Rich, MSM, New York Times

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:14 AM -