I've really been enjoying the Planet Money podcast from NPR. It does an excellent job of patiently explaining the financial crisis. The most recent episode (which I listened to on my way to work) included an interview with Mark Cuban (billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks (heh).

Very enlightening/troubling was the site Mark Cuban started with his own funds, an investigative journalism site bailoutsleuth.com which reported on how the very first contract awarded for the bailout by the Treasury Department is heavily redacted, removing what one would think would be pertinent information, like what we, the taxpayers, are paying Bank of New York Mellon Corp for their work on the bailout.

I commend to all the podcast and Cuban's site.

Two interesting quotes from John Owen's commentary on Hebrews (volume 20). The first is the preeminence of Christ, without ignoring the other "instrumental casuses" of salvation (braodly considered, of course)

The Lord Christ alone is the only principal cause of our eternal salvation, and that in every kind. There are many instrumental causes of it in sundry kinds. So is faith; so are the word and all the ordinances of the gospel; they are instrumental, helping, furthering causes of salvation, — but all in subordination unto Christ, who is the principal, and who alone gives use and efficacy unto all others. How he is so, by his oblation and intercession, by his Spirit and grace, in his ruling and teaching, offices and power, is the chief work of the ministry to declare. God hath appointed that in all things he should have the preeminence.

There are both internal and external means of salvation that he hath appointed, whereby he communicates unto us the virtue and benefit of his mediation. These it is our duty to make use of according to his appointment; so that we expect no relief or help from them, but only by them. So much as they have of Christ in them, so much as they convey of Christ unto us, of so much use they are, and no more.

And on the necessity of obedience

Salvation is confined to believers; and those who look for salvation by Christ, must secure it unto themselves by faith and obedience. It is Christ alone who is the cause of our salvation; but he will save none but those that obey him. He came to save sinners, but not such as choose to continue in their sins; though the gospel be full of love, of grace, of mercy, and pardon, yet herein the sentence of it is peremptory and decretory: “He that believeth not shall be damned.”

I was also intrigued to see how Owen included faith in amongst obedience

Hence it is faith in the first place that is intended in this obedience. For it is that which, in order unto our participation of Christ, first “cometh by hearing,” Romans 10:17; and that partly because the object of it, which is the promise, is proposed outwardly unto it in the word, where we hear of it and hear it; and partly because the preaching of the word, which we receive by hearing, is the only ordinary means of ingenerating faith in our souls. Hence to believe is expressed by [greek], “to hear” so as to answer the ends of what is proposed unto us. The ensuing subjecting our souls unto Christ, in the keeping of his commands, is “the obedience of faith.”

The Bomber as School Reformer by Sol Stern, City Journal 6 October 2008

Calling Bill Ayers a school reformer is a bit like calling Joseph Stalin an agricultural reformer. (If you find the metaphor strained, consider that Walter Duranty, the infamous New York Times reporter covering the Soviet Union in the 1930s, did, in fact, depict Stalin as a great land reformer who created happy, productive collective farms.) For instance, at a November 2006 education forum in Caracas, Venezuela, with President Hugo Chávez at his side, Ayers proclaimed his support for “the profound educational reforms under way here in Venezuela under the leadership of President Chávez. We share the belief that education is the motor-force of revolution. . . . I look forward to seeing how you continue to overcome the failings of capitalist education as you seek to create something truly new and deeply humane.” Ayers concluded his speech by declaring that “Venezuela is poised to offer the world a new model of education—a humanizing and revolutionary model whose twin missions are enlightenment and liberation,” and then, as in days of old, raised his fist and chanted: “Viva Presidente Chávez! Viva la Revolucion Bolivariana! Hasta la Victoria Siempre!”