Weekend Reads: Productivity Sappers and Tea Baggers Edition

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Spring sunshine, Fantasy Baseball and Twitter all combined to put a major crimp on my productivity this week.

It seemed like every time I sat at my screen, all I wanted to do was check baseball stats for a make believe baseball team and read the humorous tweets related to Tea Party planners who lacked the foresight to see the impending teabag/teabagging debacle.

I view the whole Tea Party event as a semi-decent idea gone horribly wrong because organizers didn’t do their marketing homework. Had anyone bounced the idea off of a 15 year old teenager who had spent a single day in a male locker room, the mental image of conservatives and anti-Obama types teabagging one another would not have sent shivers down my spine.

Seriously, if you’re going to raise a national debate about something this huge… think it through a little better. At least get a mental filter and choose your words more carefully next time.

I could really care less about the popularity contests going on between the two major political parties, but someone really needs to remind the GOP to add a few young, non Ivy League, consultants to the payroll who know what “the cool kids” are talking about these days.

Instead, the only thing Tea Baggers did (in my opinion) is waste a lot of time, get tea bag stains on the sidewalks and come away with a free Dirty Sanchez.

Best Reads from the Personal Finance Blogosphere

Time Warner Cable finally got their dues for attempting to screw consumers out of more cash with their experimental metered broadband program. More than likely, they will setup a campaign to re-educate their customers why it’s OK to charge more money from broadband customers who ditch their digital cable services, and watch their favorite shows for free online.

Should the Bailout Mascot be a condom? Hilarious!

Have you really considered how much you pay in taxes after you pay your taxes? Can anyone say “flat taxes”? Anyone?

Do you think a 4.2% interest rate on a 30 year mortgage is a possibility? Could be. If housing prices readjust to historical norms, there is a decent chance.

When you go shopping for investments, how much time do you spend searching for a great mutual fund instead of examining your own financial plan. I actually caught myself ripping on a colleague last week because even though he had the newest and most advertised tools that money could buy, he knew next to nothing about completing the project at hand. Same goes with a financial plan. If you don’t have the broad schematic (e.g. a plan), chances are you’ll just waste your time and money on overpriced hype.