We're losing our heroes...

I met Buzz Aldrin at LAX once waiting for our luggage. Didn't get a chance for an autograph so a handshake had to do.

And then in 2015, I attended a conference where Gene Cernan was one of the keynote speakers (I was also one, but on a different day and we didn't get to actually meet face-to-face).

That being said, I was at another conference where again I was one of the keynote speakers along with Homer Hickam, the author of the book 'Rocket Boys', which was later made into the movie 'October Sky'. Hickem, while he was never an astronaut, worked worked for NASA, training Shuttle crews for several missions including the one that repaired the Hubble Telescope, and when he retired from NASA in 1998, he was the payload training manager for the International Space Station. He was speaking at an engineering conference and I had the opportunity to sit next to him at the speaker's banquet the evening before. After the dinner, they previewed the movie 'October Sky' which was open to all the attendees and their families.

And going way back, while in college, Dr. Wernher von Braun came and gave a lecture. And while I didn't get to talk with him much, we did get to shake hands at a meet-n-greet they held afterwards (what struck me was that he was a lot shorter than what he looked in the movies).

OCU

This is just like RFK Jr suggesting that African Americans do not need to worry as much about being vaccinated against diseases since they are hardier and have a stronger immune system.

Sixty years ago today, Lyndon Johnson signed the 1965 Voting Rights Act on a small wooden desk which he had brought to the White House explicitly for this ceremony.

The historical significance was that this desk had been once used by Supreme Court Justice Robert C. Grier (1846-1870). Johnson chose to use this desk as a way sending a message and of trying to finally set right an historical wrong. Associate-Justice Grier was one of the Justices who wrote a concurring opinion in the now infamous Dred Scott case where the court ruled that Scott, a Black African slave, could not bring suit in court because he was not only a non-citizen, he was not, under the terms of the Constitution, even a 'person', but was rather, property. It took the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865 and 14th Amendment in 1868 to finally overturn the Dred Scott decision.

The desk is now on display at the Lyndon B Johnson Presidential Library in Austin, TX.

Thank God this desk is at the Johnson Library and NOT the Smithsonian. With the current attempt by Trump to remove all historical references to events which do not put America in it's best light, it might have soon been disappeared.

OCU

Firing the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics will have no real impact on the labor numbers which are released the first Friday of every month. The actual data is compiled by a large group of analysts and clerks who work based on a long and well designed protocol and in strict secrecy. In fact, the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics only sees the numbers the afternoon prior to them being released to the public, and they have have no opportunity nor any authority to make changes. All they can do is rubber stamp the numbers and arrange for them to be released the next morning.

OCU

Yes same thing happened under Biden, crickets from the crew now crowing. But it always said wait for the revisions.

You can never believe government statistics, it's not about because its good or bad, it's that the revisions are atrocious. So why would you even believe the revisions.

Good luck America you can't even count the number of people working correctly.

#13 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-08-02 03:16 PM

The process where as the numbers for the past couple of months being adjusted after better data has been collected and incorporated into the overall picture has been going on for years, long before the current commissioner of labor statistics has been in that job. In fact, i goes back decades, to at least the 50's, covering both Democratic and Republicans administrations.

OCU

And what's Trump going to do next month, when they adjust the July numbers down, stop issuing the jobs report altogether? And what happens when the tariffs start to really impact the inflation numbers, stop reporting them as well?

OCU

It appears that from Trump and Stephen Miller's point of view, if a job was given to anyone other than a white male, then it was obviously a DEI hire. Racism to them is giving any sort of consideration whatsoever to anyone who's not white and gender discrimination is giving consideration to a female. And if it's a non-white female, they totally lose their minds.

OCU

Revolution? Like the rabid leftist lunatic who set a newly-elected Republican councilman on fire?

#1 | Posted by lfthndthrds at 2025-07-31 11:09 AM

News reports have stated that it was a personal issue and not political which led to the attack. Nowhere have I read where they've identified the attacker's political leaning, only that they knew each other personally and that this came about as the result of something related to neither the victim being on the city council nor his political party affiliation.

OCU

And, fwiw, I found the folk of The Netherlands to be an awesome people. So happy. Even when I was taken into the countryside by my Dutch business associates.

Everybody seemed to be so happy.

#2 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-07-24 12:44 AM

Yes, and of all of the European countries that I've visited (at least 15), The Netherlands is the most cosmopolitan in that they seem to be equality welcome to anyone from anywhere (Switzerland is a close second). One indication of that is that virtually everyone in the country is fluent in several languages. We once had a company instructor from Holland who had to teach a class for our engineering software to a group of customers from various European countries. There were about eight engineers in the class and between them, there wasn't a single common language, so he proceeded to teach the week-long class in four different languages, simultaneously, none of which were Dutch.

OCU

Trump continues to hollow-out what were once seen as world-class, science-based government agencies.

OCU

Trump is really losing it in terms of what he thinks is appropriate to post this on his Truth Social account.

I'm sure if someone in Congress or a Governor posted something like this only it was he who was being shown arrested by the FBI and then sitting in jail, he would be demanding an investigation and perhaps a lawsuit.

OCU

It seem ironic that we have a Transportation secretary who has a phobia about riding in subways.

OCU

So much for looking out for our military and their families...

OCU

My advice would be to use the money to change your IRA withdrawal from monthly to once, annually.

I always tell clients to set the dispersion for December 15. That way, you a) get the advantage of the market gains, year in and year out, b) extend the life and value of the IRA, and c) have two weeks to make sure it happened, since if it didn't, that's legally YOUR fault.

Anyway, I also applaud your advisor's recommendation to diversify. While investing hindsight is always 20/20, we all remember Enron, and the lesson about putting all the eggs in one basket.

#6 | Posted by Danforth at 2025-06-21 01:57 PM

Note that both of our IRA's are very diversified and our return has been well above the market averages. That stock account is just where my wife's Required Minimum Distributions were deposited and is only about a quarter of what her IRA is worth. Note that the annual RMD's are the only funds that she's ever taken from her IRA.

When I retired (my wife, who's older than me, had already retired about seven years earlier to take care of her mother), in addition to our Social Security checks, I had also earned three defined benefit pensions (something that today's young people will never know anything about). Now one of these pensions was from where I first worked after graduating from engineering school, and it wasn't worth all that much, it was only going to pay something less than $150/month, so I took it as a lump sum when I turned 65 and just put it in the bank. Another pension I had to start taking when I turned 65, again, most of that money was banked. The third and largest pension I was allowed to defer while the cash value continued to collect interest. I didn't start taking it until I retired, which was when I was 68. That's also when I started my Social Security. BTW, both of my mountly pensions are fully vested so my wife will get 100% survivors benefit (although her being older, that might not be as big an issue as it would be with most couples).

Anyway, what we worked out with our wealth manager was that between our two Social Security checks, my two monthly pensions, plus a monthly draw from my IRA, we've managed to not change our life style. We're basically living on the same 'take-home' that I was getting just before I retired. Now that was just over nine years ago and my wife's IRA is now worth at least half again as much as when they rolled over her 401k (she's 79 and has had to take out those RMD's ever since she was 73) and mine is almost 85% of what it was when I rolled over my 401k and I've been taking out well over what the annual RMD would have been each year. So all in all, I think we're doing okay.

OCU

Wake me up when the deposits are late.

#1 | Posted by twinkhunter at 2025-06-21 02:30 PM

While my wife's SS deposits are still coming on the same day as they have for years, for the last few months, my SS deposit has been coming two or three days early. I've been retired for nearly 10 years, and the deposit was always made on the fourth Wednesday of the month, until these past few months. Since my deposit goes into my savings account at my credit union, while my wife's goes into the household checking account at our bank, it might be some change in how the credit union is processing the deposits. Anyway, it seems a bit odd.

OCU

I hate to admit this, but a few years ago, before Trump was returned to office, at the end of the year my wife was forced to take a Required Minimum Distribution (RMD) from her IRA (I take a normal monthly draw from my IRA so I don't need to take an RMD at the end of the year). Anyway, this happens every year and sometimes she takes the money and spends it on something extra that she wanted but that year she didn't really need the extra cash so our wealth manager (they used to be called financial analysts, but wealth manager sounds more positive) suggested that she purchase some stocks instead. He made a recommendations at the time, Palantir Technologies. We agreed and he bought 97 shares. The following year, after Palantir had dropped, he took my wife's RMD and added more Palantir shares. The last purchase was in April 2023. This put our cost basis at around $16/share. By then we had 223 shares of Palantir.

As of the market's close yesterday, Palantir was trading at $137.30/share, a gain of just over $27,000, for an annualized return of over 85%.

That last time our wealth manager added to the shares of Palantir, he also bought some Home Depot, which has only given us an annualized return of just under 5%, not bad, but I sure wish he had used that money to buy more Palantir, but it had just dropped to about a third of what our initial shares had cost us and he wanted to diversify a bit. At the time, it seemed the right thing to do as he was sure that both Palantir and Home Depot were a good investment, and while he was correct, it could have been a lot better if he had only invested in Palantir.

Anyway, we're now thinking of having our wealth manager sell the Palantir and take the profits, but then we'd have to pay at least capital gains tax as this stock account is not tax-deferred as it's been funded from the RMD's from my wife's IRA.

OCU

And now the question is, will Trump be flying the 51 star American flag, one of which can be seen across Lafayette Square, from the White House, hanging on the side of a government building

This is what Stephen Miller has been talking about, something called 'remigration', as a way of making America more white:

Also, the two new 100-foor tall flagpoles, which Trump is so proud of, one on the North Lawn of the White House and the other on the South Lawn, people are starting to wonder whether the Pentagon had any say in their placement. You see, when the president arrives and leaves the White House on Marine One helicopter, it traditionally lands on the South Lawn. It would seem that the Marine pilots will now need to be extra careful avoiding these two new 100-foot tall obstacles, particularly the one on the South Lawn (let's hope they've placed anti-collision lights on the tops of the flagpoles). Besides, it's not as if there were no flagpoles on or around the White house, there are several, just that none of them reached a height of 100-feet.

OCU

I hope no one was surprised...

OCU