Obama “I sometimes forget the magnitude of the recession”

I’m not troubled by that, it must be hard to remember the suffering of the unemployed when you’re relaxing on Martha’s Vineyard,  But Dollar Bill is appalled:

“If he really doesn’t remember the event it says something deeply troubling about him.”

It’s so painful to witness the disillusionment of a true believer.

Houston, we have a problem

The WaPo’s prime witness attesting to Romney’s gay harassing in 1965 now claims that despite having been “long bothered” by the incident, he wasn’t there and in fact had never heard about it until the paper called him up this year and told him about it. Jesus wept.

UPDATE: Family of “victim” says the story’s inaccurate, “disgusted that people would use this for political gain”.

Too bad it won’t just affect the green loonies who pushed it through

They won’t even allow me disposable toilet paper!

LA joins San Francisco (and Connecticut is soon to follow) in plastic bag ban while doctors report that reusable grocery bags harbor noroviruses. You’ll get the runs, puke all over your kids and end up in the hospital (800,000 per year) or dead (800 per year), but you’ll have saved the rest of the world,  and isn’t that priceless?

While the plastic bag ban is a useless, feel-good gesture, I do look forward to all my green neighbors holding their dog’s leavings in their hand while scurrying back home to dispose of them down the toilet. Now that’s going to  be priceless. I’ll take pictures and post them here.

Planning & Zoning’s Laura Siefert cashes out, and at the top

Her three-lot subdivision on Riverside’s Meadow Road has a buyer just 14 days after being listed at $6.750 million.  Although I’m disappointed that she made out so well I do take some comfort in knowing that she can now leave town and stay away.

But who would pay $2 to $2.6 for these half-acre lots? Obviously a builder, since all three sold at once, but how much can you charge for  5,000 sq.ft. house? I don’t get it.

Bottom story of the day

NYT editor regrets (getting caught) contributing to Obama campaign.

Wait til the bombs start exploding – these problems will be meaningless

 

Coming at you!

British Olympic Games shaping up to be a financial/organizational disaster. The Muslims have had years advance notice that this summer was coming. They have surely recruited their suicide bombers (Britain has a ready supply of them these days) and put them in place. Complaining about long “ques” for a coffee will seem quaint before this is over.

A quiet day in Greenwich real estate, again

80 Porchuck

Well you can’t call a contract on a $14.5 million house “quiet” but really, there’s been nothing else of significance to report. There is a price cut on 80 Porchuck, down to $1.525 from this morning’s $1.795 (and $2.2 million originally). The house is 2,757 sq.ft. and you’ll never add another inch because it’s on just 0.83 acres in the four-acre zone, but it’s a pretty nice house for $1.5. It sold for $1.3 million in 1999 ($1.685 in 2010 dollars, according to the CPI) and was extensively renovated in 2001, with various improvements since. Were i to compare this with what I could buy in Riverside for the same price, I think I’d choose the longer drive to town.

But that’s just me.

Shhh! Intellectual midgets at work

So who needs cellphones?

The Hartford Yahoos vote to ban cellphone towers, vaccines and witchcraft. Our own Greenwich representatives approve.

“Stupid, sure,” Scott Frantz told FWIW’s Scusie, “but since there is no such thing as scientific certainty, can anything be too safe not to ban? If it saves the life of just one child …. Next term, electricity! Who knows what’s seeping from our wall outlets?”.

There was a time when I’d have expected better things from Frantz but I suppose the miasmas in our capital have seeped in between his ears and caused brain rot.

First thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers

Or in the case of China, the auditors. China orders big four accounting firms to go all-Chinese; they’ll take things from there. This is an obvious prelude to expanding that country’s corruption but I suppose it’s no different from our own state of Connecticut which, to balance the budget this week, “suspended” (don’t hold your breath waiting for their return) general rules of accounting so that Hartford Magic could make the numbers work.

That didn’t take long

A couple of weeks. 12 Indian Drive, Old Greenwich waterfront asking $14.5 million has a fully executed contract.  It does seem as though people with zillions are still willing to spend some of it when they see what they like and want,  and those in the under-$3 million range are buying too, but everything between “moderate” and super-expensive is just not moving.

Failed contract

Byram waterfront at 125 Byram Shore Road  dropped $2 million in price, to $5. 950, and reported an accepted offer not long ago. Now it’s been “returned to market” as we like to say, so if you missed out the first time, here’s your chance.

Interesting that the property comes with a house built in 1986 but is being marketed as land. Obsolescence comes ever more quickly here in Greenwich.

This may not work out as well as the seller hopes

The owners of 8 Alpine Road have given up their idea of building a $12+ million spec house and now offer the land itself for $3.995 million, $1 million more than they paid for it in 2008. I was unaware that land values had increased so much since ’08.

(Ignore the picture of the house in the linked-to listing, and its claimed construction date of 2009.  No house was ever built; I guess the broker just hasn’t gotten around to putting together an accurate listing in the past three years).

Brave new world, on the left

 

Betsy warren’s prom date, 1965

Obama “brave” for “evolving” his view on same-sex marriage and bestiality after opposing both just last week.

Romney a bully and bigot for harassing gay student in 1965.

The country has evolved since 1965 and so have many kids who were teens at the time. Heck, in that same period Elizabeth Warren evolved from a white chick to Pocahontas  and back to white. No one I know is saluting her courage, just noting the change.

Oil state dictators around the globe will weep

Just about nothing on today’s open house tour so I’ll be saving gas. Some mid-country retreads and that’s about it. There’s a tired old listing in Riverside that amuses me each time I see it on the roster. Priced just below $2 million, its owners and agent have angrily rejected offers (not mine) in the $1.6s. My personal opinion is that anything above $1.450 is probably too high but if this house can’t sell in Riverside despite the past months of fevered market activity then it’s not just my opinion that’s evaluating it, it’s buyers’, and they say the price is too high. I understand the owners’ disappointment, but their agent does them no favor in joining in their fury. A delusional agent is even worse than a homeowner because she’s supposed to be the one bringing a little rationality to the process.

In any event, there’s no need for me to see it again. It’s a price cut that will sell this place, not an offer of free sandwiches.

Shared sacrifice

Well, maybe a day or two at Gay Head, just to shore up the base

Obama to forego annual Vineyard vacation this summer. To join his comrades in Afghanistan who’ve been dying on his behalf? Well no, but he will be at every state fair that will let him in, downing deep-fried Twinkies and corn dogs. “War is Hell,” White House spokesman Bill Ayers told reporters this morning, “but Ohio in August is Hell and Texas, combined. And those Twinkies? Gheck.“

West Virginians aren’t racists, they’re just smarter than Wall Streeters

When a man running for president promises to shut down and bankrupt your state’s only industry, you vote for anyone else, even an imprisoned felon. Wall Streeters, on the other hand, respond to the same threat by showering the guy with money, some of that from fear but a huge amount from people who want to see him succeed. Go figure.

Here’s Obama’s vow to extinguish West Virginia: