Black Coffee

John Taplin: "The trouble with democracy"

2009-07-18T10:16:00.001-07:00

Read it for the content, but also read it because it includes the gem, "China is going to grow at 8% this year and we’ll be lucky if we grow at 1% and these assholes in Congress are fighting over the placement of deck chairs on the Titanic."

"Acoustic warfare: moths jam bats' echolocation"

2009-07-18T10:09:00.000-07:00

I hate ripping off titles and the works of other people, so here's the link to a really neat article over at Nobel Intent on Arstechnica: "Acoustic warfare: moths jam bats' echolocation." Just, so, freaking, cool!

GE Works on the "Model A"

2009-07-18T09:49:00.000-07:00

Self-sustenance has seemed something of an antiquated idea for over a century. Since the Industrial Revolution showed us how much more efficient large-scale production is compared to the small-scale, few people have seriously considered self-sustenance a practicable reality. We are all inter-connected and all reliant upon technologies, people, factories, and energy located far from home.

With the increased focus on OMG Global Warming Is Going to Kill Us All!^TM, energy-efficiency finally is coming to the fore as a topic of serious consideration. The ugly truth is this: Energy is our capacity to produce. The more energy we have, the more we can produce. Reduce our consumption of energy, and you have reduced our economy and our lifestyle. This is where focusing on energy-efficiency, reducing the amount of energy that gets burned up unnecessarily and turned into waste heat, is appealing: If we can reduce the amount of energy produced for each unit of energy actually consumed, we can have our cake and eat it, too.

GE is betting that the best way to accomplish this (in the home) is to link together every energy-consumer in the house on a network, then try to strategically control the consumption of energy. This accomplishes a few strategic things:

It involves the resident in his energy consumption in a way that makes him more conscious of it and encourages him not to engage in wasteful behavior
It allows for load-levelling of energy demand; by moving energy consumption away from "peak" hours to "off-peak" hours, the strain on local power plants goes down, allowing them to operate more efficiently (and hopefully saving the consumer costs, too)
It allows for intelligent integration of eco-friendly energy sources into a home; specifically, an unoccupied house during the daytime is receiving maximal sun exposure during a period where the only energy needed is to run climate control systems for food and humidity control; solar power generated during this time could be sold off to the "grid" which is currently sucking energy to keep offices, etc. running in exchange for off-peak traditional power at night when the consumer is actually home

The whole package is a few years off and the price-tag makes it more of a luxury than an economic purchase, but this is precisely how cars got off the ground. Nobody who bought a Ford Model A bought one because it was the most economical transportation choice--it was a luxury. No one will (initially) buy a home-power system from GE, but as prices fall and the technology improves, expect consumers to start localizing their energy and installing a GE "Model T" at home.

Stimulating classroom material

2009-07-18T09:39:00.000-07:00

No, I'm not talking about sex-ed courses. I'm talking about doing something that would actually have an impact on the classroom, a positive one. First, let's start with what's wrong with our current primary education system: It is a disaster, mitigated only partially in some communities by parents concerned about the education of their children, who are active in their homes and in their schools. How do I draw this conclusion, well, the first is a nice editorial from IBD on the efficiency of our education system (read it now). The second is the much-complained-about-by-liberals fact that children who go to "rich" public schools do better than those who go to "poor" schools. This is not because the "rich" schools are unfairly advantaged, but rather, that all public schools are an embarrassment and a failure to their students, and only kids who go to "rich" schools have enough parents who do not have to work full time jobs that can volunteer at their local schools and help Johhny at home, too.

I say we damn the entire public education system as the failure it is and re-introduce the idea of school choice to the equation. Sure, we can still fund the kiddies education from the public purse, and each kid gets the same amount. Then let the schools duke it out. We'll quickly find that some models of education are far more successful than others (hint, those are the schools with lots of kids at them) and which ones are ineffectual (they'll look like less-crowded versions of today's schools).

The global rise of localism

2009-07-18T08:54:00.000-07:00

Couldn't resist the grandeur of the title, forgive me.

An article in the Economist suggests that the internet, despite its promise of increasing our reach throughout the globe, may in fact be limiting our horizons.

First, I will describe the research used to reach this startling conclusion, then I will offer my analysis of how that likely came to be, and then we'll finish up with a more general bit.

The research tracked baby names, specifically the frequency of names within geographies. What they noticed was an increase in localization of names that corresponded with the rise of the internet. They speculate that this tendency to choosing names already common within a geographic regions may be evidence of a broader trend toward a more local view of the world.

I would suggest that social networking sites, with their promise of keeping you connected with far-flung friends from long ago, actually succeed in promoting something of a ceaseless conversation among local friends. I have witnessed many people (supposedly working, since I've witnessed this at work) spending hours on social networking sites, gossiping not with their long-lost best friend in Anchorage, but instead with the mother of the children that live across the street. It seems that the internet has allowed people to become more aware of their local community and that function has trumped its global reach.

This is not entirely surprising. After all, for millennia we have lived in small, local communities that were generally tight nit. (For better and for worse!) Then, the industrial revolution happened, shifting the center of population towards large, unconquerable cities. You could never know everyone in your city, but you might be able to know everyone on your block. So as things changed, they stayed the same. Then, the suburban diaspora happened. The exodus of people from communal living in cities to free-standing, self-supporting homes located miles from community gathering places and traversed, not on foot or in communal mass transit, but individually by car, finally broke apart communities. People who grew up in suburbia rarely feel a particular attachment to their community; indeed, that is one of the greatest complaints about it.

But social networking (and the internet, in general) has allowed people to re-commune, even as our physical geography and topography discourage it, we finally have in the medium of the internet, a means of conquering suburbia and submitting it to our collective desire for a comprehensibly small community. It is little surprise then, that finally given a tool to allow us to do what we had done for centuries before, we should return to a more natural, comfortable state.

The internet is still a wonderful place for people to expand their horizons, its just that most people, given the choice of travelling the world or flying their long-lost cousins in for a family reunion, will choose the latter. As for me, I'm still longing to taste French wine while sitting fashionably at a Parisian cafe, watching the people go by. And when I tire of that, there are over two hundred countries left to visit, each with its appeal.

Taking this to its logical conclusion...

2009-07-18T08:32:00.000-07:00

Google's willingness to encourage and try new ideas looks to have hit on something quite spectacular: A new data center that will fundamentally changes the "climate control" game. They are taking advantage of Belgium's cool climate, combining it with a global load-balancing system, and excising the expensive and power-hungry cooling systems usually needed to keep data center components from de-soldering themselves. (OK, the silicon bits will fail before that happens, but those computers put off a lot of heat.)

The estimate is that the center will only average seven days a year when equipment will need to be shut down due to high temperatures in Belgium. With a global system of backup and redundant servers, this is probably not much different than giving the Belgian crew an opportunity to do maintenance, anyway.

But, let's follow this out to its logical conclusion: If you could get a tube fat enough (remember, the internet is just a "series of tubes") with low-enough latency, why not stick every data center in Alaska, upper Canadia, or Siberia? (I guess I should include Antarctica, pardon the hemispherical bias, my friends down under.)

I only see a handful of troubles that need to be overcome:

Tube + latency
Energy on sight (portable, self-contained nuclear powerplants, you say?)
Geeks trying to overclock their data centers during wintertime
Geeks dying of sun exposure during summer (remember that whole sun-not-setting-in-the-summer thingy?)

(3) and (4) could be addressed by through a combination of automation and strategic employment decisions. (1) is probably the biggest technical hurdle, although I've never been overly bothered by the latency issues when reading UK rags in the US. (2) isn't so much a technical challenge as a political one; I mean, PETA is going to go absolutely ape---- when somebody draws the first cartoon of a glowing-green polar bear.

Other than that, should work.

Obama Gets Schooled by Russia

2009-07-14T11:32:00.000-07:00

Mr. Obama,

Now that you have had a chance to rest and reaquaint yourself with eastern standard time after your trip to Russia, I hope that you will take the opportunity to reaquaint yourself with a concept that you may not have thought about since your undergraduate days: Realpolitik. It's that messy idea, born in the ununified German states of the nineteenth century that suggests that practical considerations ought trump any other in global politics. Actually, let's use another phrase you may not have thought about since then, geopolitics. You know, that concept where you actually have to consider the relative strategic importance of various allies and resources. I know, these were probably dismissed as passé by your professors, but, while they are living out their days in the Ivory Tower, you are now leading a real country, in the real world, where there are real consequences to your decisions (and your lack thereof).

"Russia says no Iran sanctions for START deal," reports Reuters. Must have come as something of a shock to you, after how chummy you and President Medvedev (or was that President Putin? so easy to get the two confused, I guess) got during your visit. Welcome, my dear Mr. President, to the world of realpolitik. It matters not that these simple, practical, plebian considerations should play any part of your world of high-brow, dispassionately-intellectual, and well-intentioned desires for the world. If your enemy choses to play the game of realpolitik, you are in the match, by sitting the match out, you merely leave the board and all the turns to your opponent.

This might all seem very new to you, Mr. President. I am aware of that, and I come ready with an exercise that should speed you on your way to understanding the rules of the game of realpolitik. You must remember back to the days of Daley's Chicago (not a very distant memory, not nearly distant enough), you must remember how Chicago functioned. Favors, favoritism, bribery, lies, slander, et al., you know these blunt instruments of power well. Now imagine that the world is like Chicago, where you as an individual in Chicago are now America to the rest of the world. Mr. Putin, via President Medvedev has engaged you in this game. Now stop being naive and fight back! If you've forgotten the Chicago ways, I'm sure Mr. Emanuel will be able to remind you of them--he never lost his fighting spirit.

Take care, my dear Mr. President. I wish you the best on this new venture; it may not be one that you expected at the outset, but it is your task now. Oh, and don't forget: This is all part of growing into your office. Until you have, may I suggest you retain Mr. Kissinger's services to aid you in this regard.

Regards,
BlackCoffee

Obama Smells the Coffee: Economists Consensus on Unemployment Finally Taken Srsly

2009-07-14T11:22:00.000-07:00

It took him this long to figure out that unemployment will crest 10% and go on increasing for months? Most of the respected economists projected precisely that...back in March. (Others, before then.) Any kid who's taken an economics class in high school (maybe not a public one, but I digress) should be able to tell you that unemployment is a lagging indicator; i.e., employment only rises after the economy is well on its way to a rebound and employers are comfortable hiring new staff.

Obumbles is only now admitting that we're not through the thick of it.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D99EB86O3&show_article=1

TOTUS: Two indespensible for just one

2009-07-14T10:12:00.001-07:00

(Yes, I know the title should read "too." Just a little punning; now put down the gun you grammar Nazi and help me get my punctuation straight.)

Boortz writes:

Maybe this is the real reason why Barack Obama always has two teleprompters on hand.

After his Obumbles' performances without a functional teleprompter, it's a wonder they don't have three on hand. That way he can still look at the right side of his audience when TOTUS-stage-left goes down. But that's just the engineer in me wanting to overdo everything... Man I miss having Palin around teasing the teleprompter operator when the text went out of sync with her speach, then damning the thing altogether and going on to give a coherent acceptance at the Republican convention, sans notes. Those were the days, man.

Heritage & Identity Politics, Sotomayor Edition

2009-07-14T10:06:00.000-07:00

Is Judge Sotomayor right to bring up her heritage as a point that will potentially influence her opinions? Yes, and no. The "yes" is the part where we must all recognize our own personal biases if we are to try to approach a subject objectively. Eugene Robinson opines for IBD:

The whole point of Sotomayor's much-maligned "wise Latina" speech was that everyone has a unique personal history — and that this history has to be acknowledged before it can be overcome. Denying the fact of identity makes us vulnerable to its most pernicious effects.

He almost gets it right. So close, yet so ideologically far away. Yes, personal history must be acknowleged before it can be overcome. But, that was not the "whole point" of Sotomoayor's comment--it appeared another time in a different form:

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." (Emphasis added)

Now, that is a very different remark. It supposes that the experience of one group is superior to that of another.* Specifically, it supposes that "white males" are either incapable of checking their biases before a case or that "white males" are somehow so out of touch with "that life" that they could never reach the best conclusion (or both). Each of these are preposterous conclusions, if we bother to look at history for a moment.

Let us suppose for a moment that Sotomayor intends by "that life" the life of the economically downtrodden and the life lived by minority groups in America. It would seem, then, that the cases worth examining are ones where her experiences as both (growing up in public housing as a minority) would provide relevence; specifically to other cases involving the downtrodden and minorities throughout American judicial history. Our author, Mr. Robinson, after duly noting the exceptional and rare minorities who have recently come into high office, reminds us that, "Aside from these exceptions, the White House and the Supreme Court have been exclusively occupied by white men." This is, indeed, true.

What is also true, is that white men, who often came from backgrounds of wealth and privelege, were responsible for the Civil Rights legislation that leveled the playing field for minorities. White men were also largely responsible for upholding and expanding this legislation in the face of challenges from other white men. White men (and women) could see the troubles of segregation, and participated in the freedom rides and civil rights marches that defined a generation. To be sure, none of the civil rights movement could have existed without the aid, action, and unbreakable will of the minorities who also participated. However, there exists a spectacular record of white men able to, dare I say, "empathize" with groups with whom they had little personal experience.

Would it be true to say that Sotomayor would never reach a better conclusion than a white man? Absolutely not--there are certainly instances where her experience could inform a decision in a way that other experiences might not. But she claimed that this would happen "more often than not"--a much broader claim that would seem to malign the experience and ability of generations of judges that have preceded her. Indeed, this is the point, Mr. Robinson goes on to say:

Yes, justice is supposed to be blind. But for most of our nation's history, it hasn't been — and women and minorities are acutely aware of how our view of justice has evolved, or been forced to evolve.

We just cannot let go of race and past sins. President Obama promised to be the "post-racial" candidate, yet no one can take him seriously on this pledge if he is appointing a candidate who believes that her racial background allows her to "better" decide than others. Surely Obama could have found a candidate who was informed by an ethnic heritage other than the mainstream, but who did not have such an incendiary view towards others' heritage and experience. Exposed to the light of day, Sotomayor has gone on to defend her remarks. As reported in Reuters:

"I do not believe that any ethnic, racial or gender group has an advantage in sound judgment," Sotomayor said, adding that she believed every person has an equal opportunity to be a good and wise "regardless of their background and life experience."

This statement is true, but can we believe that she believes it? Is this a case of a "confirmation conversion," as Senator Lindsey Graham opined today? Her summary dismissal of the Ricci case, something that her fellow 2nd Circuit Court Judge Cabrenas disagreed with, is evidence that she does not believe this. She will, however, most certainly be joining a court that unanimously agreed with Judge Cabrenas in decrying her summary dismissal, saying that the matter warranted a proper hearing.

Most of this discussion is irrelevent, however, as Sotomayor is most certainly to be appointed. After all, says Mr. Robinson:

The only real suspense in the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is whether the Republican Party will persist in tying its fortunes to an anachronistic claim of white male exceptionalism and privilege.

Mr. Robinson, there is no claim of "white male exceptionalism" happening in the mainstream of the Republican party. Indeed, this is an idea that few Americans would rally behind. Rather, the cries against Sotomayor are against her concept of wise latina exceptionalism and the continued race-bating in a country that desperately wishes to be post-racial. Thank you, Mr. Robinson, for keeping race part of the discussion, decades after the mainstream of America stopped caring whether it associated with blacks, caucasians, east-asians, hispanics, south-asians, or any other sliced and diced ethnic group.

Yes, "White Males [are] No Less Biased Than Latinas," Mr. Robinson, but I grew in a generation (Y) that is tired of paying for racial sins committed by generations far past. I, for one, will pay no more.

* Incidentally, I would not go so far as to say that this is a false pretense of operation, but it is one that flies squarely in the face of the multiculturalist approach to the world, whereby no one culture or experience may ever be called superior to another. The hypocrisay of the left regarding these matters is embarrasing to mention--much in the way that one feels a mild sense of social discomfort when politely pointing out an errant piece of brocolli lodged in between a colleague's teeth. A "wise latina" is allowed to be superior, and this causes them no cognitive dissonance! Any clear-headed appraisal of the world and its various cultures and experiences will show that some are superior to others, especially if we introduce an element of relativity to the equation:

The experiences and knowledge of the most enlightened eighteenth century philosophoers would be wholly inadequate to engage effectively in modern life.
The experiences of a modern inhabitant of a sub-Saharan village who grows crops at the level of subsistence would be inadequate to engage effectively in modern American life.
The experiences of a modern American, ammusingly, would be utterly worthless in the pursuit of basic sustenance at any other time or place in history.

It is maddening, however, that when we are dealing with an individual's capacity to read and interpret the rule of law, that these differences should be given so very much credence. The goal of justice is to be blind; she may not always succeed, but it is an open goal. The experiences we should be looking for are not ones of ethnicity, gender, and "identity group," but ones of legal experience and soundness of mind.

2009-07-06T13:42:00.000-07:00

Physics v. Train

Usually, whenever we think of trains and physics, they've teamed up against some wimpy opponent, like an eighteen-wheeler. This time, physics and mother-nature tag-team a train.

Physics, this time in the form of our old friend F=m*a, shows up twice.* First, F reveals herself through through the form of wind, where a small amount of mass moving at high speed derails the lighter bits of a train. Then, she shows up again in the form of a very large amount of m conserving its momentum right into the backside of a previously-unscathed boxcar. Let's just remember, that even though the a isn't very spectacular, F was still sufficient to throw a real train just as far as a three-year-old can throw his toy one.

Wind action starts around 1:00, watch to the end for a tanker-skidding-with-sparks-to-complete-devastation ending.

*Well, more than that, but I'm simplifying for dramatic effect here, d---it.

Why Concept Patents Should Never Exist

2009-07-06T09:23:00.000-07:00

For some background reading on the argument surrounding concept and software patents, go read through Arstechnica's Law & Disorder. Actually, this google search will return some more relevant results.

It's not that I think people should not be rewarded for their ideas, it's just that these concept patents tend to inhibit creativity. This one is a great example: Sony patent on any-object motion control. Right now, no one has produced a working example, but the basic concept is fairly obvious: Use a camera to detect an object and track its motion. Many people have been researching in this area for quite some time, and Sony's "patent" should be offensive to anyone who has put any effort toward researching object recognition. Why? Because, if approved, it means that many of their prior efforts could be subject to future litigation. The continuation of their efforts now sits under the threat of litigation. All the while, there is no evidence that Sony has produced a working model; only filed a concept patent. The real work lies ahead, in producing a working object detection and movement capture system. In fact, this has always been the real work. Now, anyone interested in actually solving the damn problem has to do so with the spectre of patent litigation looming overhead. This means less creativity, less people and resources dedicated to bringing such a device to market. Only Sony (or a competitor who can purchase prior art from a researcher and some good lawyers) dares to build such a device now.

These patents should be removed from our legal system, stat.

Taxing Progress

2009-07-05T10:11:00.000-07:00

This maddening idea of a "per-mile-driven" tax comes up every so often, and I am afraid that it will eventually get traction. Aside from the obvious privacy concerns,* this program would ultimately be expensive and counter-productive. As it stands, we have decided (as a nation, via its government) that we would like for people to consume less fuel. To accomplish this, car manufacturers have stepped up fuel economy measures through innovations that cause less fuel to be wasted and cars to weigh less. Both of these positively affect the environment and our oil-dependency issues. The latter means less wear and tear on our roads.

In many ways, a fuel tax is ideal: It encourages people to use the resource carefully, and those who do not (or cannot) are forced to pay more of it. These are precisely the same drivers who cause the most impact on our roads (heavier vehicles, driving faster, accelerating quicker, etc.), and they pay the largest portion. It is dead easy to administer and the infrastructure is already in place. If we wish to further reduce fuel consumption or need to increase revenues for road maintenance, we simply raise the tax.

But per mile? Throws all of those bits out. Suddenly, there are no automatic incentives to be fuel efficient. Sure, we could base the rates on the vehicle's estimated miles per gallon, but then, if I own an old Camaro Z28, why not try to lift the nose off the ground at every stoplight? (OK, gas will still have a price, and so will tires, but the tax revenue side of the equation is gone.) If we really want to curb fuel use as a nation, the Europeans have provided a smashingly good model: High as Marlane Wayans in Scary Move N fuel taxes.

Is this about revenue? Doubtful. I have shown a model that would be easier to implement and could generate revenue while accomplishing other social goals. So, what is it about? Hybrids? Money? Naw, I'm going with power. If the gub'ment knows where you are, and you know that the government knows where you are, your behavior will change. (Unless you're a lowlife criminal who robs a convenience store while wearing a 24-hour monitoring anklet. Then, you are a man who either likes to be raped or a man who is too dubm to be persuaded by any type of reason.) And that, my friends, is neither freedom nor liberty.

*The gub'ment gets to stick a GPS locater on your car that reports back everywhere you have driven; tell me that database won't get abused or compromised, and I'll tell you I've got a great deal on some Fla swampland...

UPDATE: When you need a gentle touch...

2009-07-04T11:11:00.000-07:00

UPDATE (7/4/09)
Has it really only been a day? Good, God! Crazy Uncle Joe's already gone and done something stupid in his new post in Iraq. "Biden says violence may cause disengagement from Iraq." Great going there, buddy. Why not just encourage the moral of the enemies of Freedom in Iraq? Oh, wait, he did!!! Let's tell the waning, dying fraction of Iraqi citizens and their hate-loving imported cousins from around the region that their cause may yet succeed! If only they can stir up just a little violence, we'll be out, and they'll be back in the game. It's like a coach yelling across the field at the start of the fourth quarter to the team that's behind three touchdowns, "hey, if you guys just start tackling hard again, we'll roll over and let you guys finish the game." What a complete, total, idiot. ~~Or, worse. This is either idiocy or damn near treason. Take your pick, Unca Joe.~~

ORIGINAL POST (7/3/09) When you need a gentle touch...
...tap Joe "one foot in my mouth, the other in your ass" Biden to make sure everything runs smoothly. He will be in Iraq to oversee political reconciliation (really? reconciliation?! roflolwtfomg). It's not like he has a propensity for accidentally blabbing sensitive information, or anything.

Although I do have a theory on this one: Mr. Biden will be off to deal with Iraq, in Iraq, where nobody but the interpreters speaks "Biden". Which means, if the interpreters are carefully chosen, there will be something of a filter to keep the worst Biden moments from happening. It's gonna be a little weird to be an Iraqi, though, sitting there hearing Biden say something into the microphone and then looking over to the intepreter, who's looking at the other interpreter, who's nodding back at the first, with neither saying a word. A little awkward, yes, but definitely better than whatever loose-cannon Joe said actually making it to the ears of the Iraqi people.

The side benefit of all this being, of course, that Biden disappears from American politics for a little bit, giving his stateside handlers a bit of a breather from what must be a very exhausting job.

Rookie of the year

2009-07-04T10:32:00.000-07:00

A Putin spokesman says what every single rational American was screaming at the tops of their lungs as November began last year: Obama not fully informed on Russia. Well, we were a little broader in our assessment, we realized that Obama was not fully informed on anything relating to statesmanship, but nobody seemed to care.

Shamelessly lifted from a damn good article (which you should read, and heart click some adverts for them!):

Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, in mildly-expressed comments, said: "I see that he does not possess full information. After visiting Moscow, President Obama will know the realities better."

Judging by these statements it is very good that the meeting with Prime Minister Putin is on President Obama's agenda. I am sure that after the meeting with Putin, President Obama will change his point of view," Peskov added.

I must hand it to the Ruskies, they're very good with their press statements. It's almost like they've had almost a century's worth of experience hand-picking statements to be read to the public or something. This one's just too good to pass up, a real kick in the 'nads:

[Referring to Obama's quote "that Putin had one foot in the old ways of doing business,"] Peskov complained that the United States had kept in place trade restrictions, some of them dating back to the Cold War years. "If that is not a Cold War approach, what is it then?" Peskov said.

Ouchies!

Self-immolation for Democracy

2009-07-04T10:17:00.000-07:00

OR "Live Free or Die!" but that article title has already been taken.

The Hondurans are willing to die before having their constitution trampled on by a lawless president with dictatorial aspirations. God bless them, and hang in there, brothers. We who believe in Freedom are a rare bunch, may I suggest you take a cue from our founding fathers with this, my favorite of the historical American flags:

It's not about the money or the economy, stupid...

2009-07-04T10:03:00.001-07:00

"It's the economy, stupid." One of those quotes that will never die--except when it isn't true. In this case, let me start off with (yet another bit of priceless) commentary from Michael Ramirez:

And now to Mr. Chavez' latest move: the nationalization of Banco de Venezuela. This is only the latest in a string of seemingly endless nationalizations. Well, there will be an end to the nationalizations, once Mr. Chavez controls the entirety of the means of production within his personal fiefdom. It was once argued that the nationalizations were in the best interest of the common man of Venezuela, that the greedy and corrupt owners of private industry could not be trusted with the means of production.

However, anyone with the slightest knowledge of economic history can attest, raising the GDP of a country is the surest-fire way to improve the plight of the common man. (Not 100% effective, but generally so.) So it is surprising to learn this fact:

The Venezuelan consulting firm Ecoanalitica calculates those [other] nationalizations have cost Chavez's government some $23 billion.

If they cost the government money, it was most likely from declined tax revenues relative to the amount of cash Chavez was able to siphon off his newfound properties. This would suggest that the industries are faring much worse (from an economic-output perspective) than they were in private hands. Which means our poor Venezuelans aren't doing so well right now.

So--what's the real motive? Chavez knows his actions are not helping industry, which in turn, has increased the plight of the poor. So, it's not the poor that Mr. Chavez is concerned with. Let us follow the game to its end again--controlling the means of production. Control. Power. This, as with every other game played by Chavez, has nothing to do with helping other people or creating a socialist workers' paradise: It is about extending his power as far as possible.

So--why show the "bird's of a feather" cartoon? Because, it is becoming increasingly obvious that the work of the present Presidential Administration in our own country is not at all concerned with the economy. The "stimulus" package was hawked as immediate and necessary, yet the funds have yet to be doled out either with immediacy (most are still unused) or going toward necessary projects. The executive branch executed the most daring increase in its own power since the days of FDR. We should be very, very frightened.

What do you find so bizarre, bird-brain?

2009-07-04T08:48:00.000-07:00

By now you may have seen the story about the art-judging pigeons making the rounds. When I first read the story, I was amused, but thought little more of it than yet another study that showed that our "bird-brained" cousins happen to have a little more brains than we have given them credit for. Pigeons and crows, especially, have been shown to be particularly intelligent beasts,* so this latest study came as little surprise.

However, the title of the report that Drudge linked to is what has made me think a little more on this topic; the UK's Daily Mail calls the study "bizarre." What, exactly, is bizarre about it? The article doesn't bother to explain its conclusion that the study is bizarre, we the reader are supposed to have reached the same conclusion by default.

Yet, nothing is bizarre about it. There are two basic bits of information to come from this study: (1) Animals demonstrate something akin to intelligence--in that they are able to learn a task when trained with a food reward and (2) there exist qualities of an image that allow for consistent labeling. Possibly a third, that pigeons can do (2). Why is any one of these bizarre? We have known (1) for a while, and (2) only verifies that the visual systems of disparate species are able to be trained to identify the same characteristics. Apparently, birds see shape, color, texture, and their relative proportions, in the same way we do. That they can be trained to identify certain combinations as "good" or "bad" only re-affirms and expands upon our understanding of (1). Bizarre? I should assume that our scientist friends went into this study fully expecting the success of the pigeons.

There is, perhaps, a slightly more metaphysical angle to look at the study from. If we go so far as to assume that the birds were capable of actually identifying an aesthetic quality in each of the pictures, this has big implications for our conception of beauty. If some fundamental principles of aesthetic are hardwired in our DNA, it means that the concept of an aesthetic or proper arrangement had existed long before homo sapiens walked the earth and developed a language to express the concept.** It could be argued by theists that this is evidence that there is a divine conception of beauty that has been passed on to every living creature. It also comes to mind that our concepts of aesthetic are founded in very practical matters. Symmetry and balance, for example, are concepts that would tend to keep creatures away from things about to fall. Contrasts of light and dark would mean that a creature is viewing a scene where objects are more readily identified, whether they be friend, foe, or food. Emptiness is something to generally be avoided, as a creature heading into emptiness is heading away from food and toward being easier to spot as food. From these perspectives, suddenly the concepts of aesthetic begin to look more natural and less bizarre for animals to possess.

Have fun chewing on that, and let me know your thoughts in the comments.

*I'm not going to bother linking to anything here. Crows have made waves in the psychology and biology literature on more than one occasion, showing their ability to not only learn simple tasks, but to discover how to complete a complex series of tasks to solve a problem and have demonstrated the ability to remember how they solved previous problems. Pigeons, iirc, have fared similarly (but not quite as remarkably) well in other studies. Google is your friend, if you have doubts.
**Remember your Greek philosophy here: Concepts are quite capable of existing in the absence of words to describe them or thinkers to think them. They are immutable, even if undiscovered or forgotten.

UPDATED: Funny the names we call things...

2009-07-03T13:41:00.000-07:00

UPDATE 2 (posted 7/3/2009): A nice writeup from IBD called "Honduras Defiant" should go on your reading list. Here's a sample:

Democracy: Nations aren't usually put to the fearsome test to "live free or die." But Hondurans are accepting it as the world pressures them to reseat a potential dictator in office. They aren't bending.

And another from NRO, "The Honduran Counter-Coup":

At first blush, the news from Honduras sounds like a sad return to Latin America’s past: A democratically elected president has been exiled by the military. But make no mistake: The Honduran soldiers who escorted Pres. Manuel Zelaya from his home on Sunday were acting to protect their country’s democracy, not to trample it. Moreover, they had the full support of the Honduran Supreme Court, which had rejected Zelaya’s bid to hold a referendum on “constitutional reform.”

And yet another from WSJ, who is sadly the only member of the MSM that is even bothering to cover this with a semblance of objectivity, "The Wages of Chavismo":

Yet the events in Honduras also need to be understood in the context of Latin America's decade of chavismo. Venezuela's Hugo Chávez was democratically elected in 1998, but he has since used every lever of power, legal and extralegal, to subvert democracy. He first ordered a rewrite of the constitution that allowed his simple majority in the national assembly grant him the power to rule by decree for one year and to control the judiciary.

Go on, read them. You sure aren't going to hear about this from ABC/CBS/NBC/CNN/NYT/et al. And one more quote for the records, this one from the WSJ article above, "We mention these not so small details because they are being overlooked as the world, including the U.S. President, denounces tiny Honduras in a way that it never has, say, Iran." Thank you!!!

UPDATE (posted 6/29/2009): President Obama weighs in. Guess who he backs...and I'll give you a hint that it's not the same side that the Honduran Congress, Supreme Court, and military are on...

Original Post:
"Military Coup" conjures images of bloodshed, leftist and rightist (but ultimately, statist) dictators, especially when used in context of Latin America.

Which is why I'm so surprised to see that the term is being mis-used by our media, who really ought to know better. (There have been plenty of real military coups over the years, you would think they could recognized one by now.) Seems that all is not as it has been portrayed in the Western media in the Honduras.

Read this little ditty posted in the WSJ Opinion column. Huh; seems the military were hardly doing the coup thing, but rather complying with Supreme Court orders. Also, seems that the military's top commander, Gen. Romeo Vásquez Velásque, is not the acting leader in the country. One would expect that from a military coup. Instead, the Honduran Congress, acting within their constitutional authority and obligations, met to appoint an interim president (one Mr. Roberto Michelette) and set a date in November for a proper election to be held.

Again, not what one would expect from a military coup.

It seems that, besides the Western media, the only ones calling this thing a "military coup" are the Chavistas, Hugo Chavez and his leftist, thug allies. Wonder where the media's hearts are...probably waiting with ousted ~~thug~~ President Zelaya in Costa Rica.

Also going to toss this li'l hand grenade out there: Why has President Obama come down so swiftly and harshly against the legal actions of a Congress not wishing to see its President do an end-run around the law to place himself in position of president-for-life (a plague all-too familiar to any student of Latin American politics), yet the very same man, not a week ago, could not find in himself the courage to confront a stated enemy of our country* who had illegally (but with the legal blessing of the Ayatolah) tampered with a vote? Both were men trying to extend their political reign, but one happened to be a sworn enemy of the US and our allies who is hellbent on building nuclear bombs and is killing his own citizens in violent repression of their voice, while the other was a leftist in a comparatively inconsequential country in a slightly less explosive part of the world. I'm afraid the only logical explanation is, our President has no ca-hones.

*We didn't declare it; he did. Sorry, it's a fact. Iran has sworn us their enemy, regardless of what positions or posturing we might like to do.

Mmmm...Hopey & Changey

2009-07-03T11:31:00.000-07:00

Smells like Hope & Change!

More Equine Fecal Matter

2009-07-03T10:59:00.001-07:00

This time, it's copulating. I'm so sick, tired, and disgusted by these stories that I'm tempted to stop posting them. But, ya know what? If we don't keep track of every filthy, dirty, rotten, lying, self-serving scumbag of a politician trying to pass himself off as a representative of the people, we'll never be able to get rid of them. The one benefit I'm starting to see of the bailout, incidentally, is that with more money floating around, the rats are scampering out of their dark hiding places and grabbing every bit of the largess they can.

This time, we have a Senator making sure that Federal bailout money goes to help a bank in his home state. Which, normally, would be vile enough to use Federal money from all states to help one, but this one is more than just pork-barrel favoritism: Our Senator happens to have a large personal investment in the bank...large, like, most of his net worth large. Like, he'd be wiped out if the bank went under large.

If you are a voter in Hawaii, make sure to vote Senator DANIEL INOUYE out of office. Better yet, if you are a registered DEMOCRAT in Hawaii, make sure this bloodsucker doesn't get past the primary.

h/t to DrewM @ Ace.

Error of Omission

2009-07-03T10:41:00.000-07:00

When I prepare taxes, if I were to omit a piece of information that should be included on the tax return, I mislead the IRS. You see, each piece of information that the IRS asks for is required for the IRS to have an accurate picture of the tax return. Oftentimes, leaving something out is far more deceptive than changing a number. Errors of omission on tax returns often come with very, very steep penalties that are levied by the IRS; there's no forgiveness for "oops, I forgot," because "forgetting" often leaves big holes and greatly misleads the IRS on the amount of tax owed.

Now that I have that out of the way, let's go on to an "oops, I forgot moment" from Politico. As reported on Ace, seems that they "forgot" to mention that Obama knew the questions he would be asked beforehand, actually, he hand-picked them. This changes a town hall meeting into a press conference; or really, a press release. It fundamentally changes the game. Thanks, Politico, for keeping it ~~real~~ objective.

Jesse Jackson: Beware the serpent's sweet lie

2009-07-03T10:09:00.000-07:00

From Boortz, "Quote of the Day" (Shamelessly reproduced here in its entirety):

By Neal Boortz @ July 1, 2009 8:23 AM

"Our penchant for rugged individualism and laissez-faire survival of the fittest seduces us into believing that every person is entitled to every benefit society has to offer and that no individual should pay a price for the greater good of the society as a whole."

Any guesses as to who would be so distraught over the idea of individualism? I'll give you a hint ... he's a race pimp.

Enjoy!

"Race pimp" in question is none other than the ever-wholesome and perennially-agreeable Jesse Jackson.* The quote is eerily "seducing," itself. Actually, if I shaved it down a little bit, I would agree with it entirely. Let's try this on for size:

Our penchant for rugged individualism and laissez-faire survival of the fittest seduces us into believing that every person is entitled to every benefit society has to offer.

Oooh! I like that--our penchant for rugged individualism and laissez-faire survival of the fittest really gets me going. It's something that might cause a swell in the collective heart of our founding fathers. We are rugged, England, we have survived. We have fought it out on our own for two hundred years, and we have been at our best when you have left us the heck alone. We will govern ourselves, because we have never really needed your governance, anyway. Now p--- off.

And how about the next bit: [the fruits of the successful are so bountiful and there are so many successful people in America that being around this success] seduces us into believing that every person is entitled to every benefit society, the successful, has to offer. Damn the welfare mentality. No one should be entitled to the benefits of anyone's success other than his own. We are a supremely successful society precisely because every man has to succeed on his own. Being surrounded by success seduces the young and the incapable of believing that success is a birthright of being an American; whereas our birthright as Americans is not success itself, but an environment where the pursuit of success goes unhindered. Understand that, when you believe that you are entitled to something you see in greater society, you are desiring what is not yours by right, but what might be yours if you work hard enough.

But then we get to this part of the quote, and things become muddled: "...and that no individual should pay a price for the greater good of the society as a whole." Well, taken in one sense, no individual should be taxed or burdened or asked to pay the way for any other individual in society. But we know this is not what Mr. Jackson intends, nor believes. He believes precisely this: that certain individuals should be made to make a sacrifice for the sake of the greater good of the society as a whole. Because what he means is really this:

Our penchant for rugged individualism and laissez-faire survival of the fittest is a lie. The greater good of the society as a whole is the absolute definition of good, and therefore, every person is entitled to every benefit society has to offer. This, however, comes at a price that some individuals will have to pay, a price they should gladly pay, for the benefit of society as a whole. Many of those individuals, however, believe the lie and also believe that they should not pay a price for the greater good of the society.

It is a twisted, twisted lie. He wraps the lie so artfully in truth that it at first appears true, but he has warped the syntax such that it does not sound a lie. But read, and considered, the lie becomes deathly apparent. Wicked.

*Speaking of which, wasn't it "The Reverend" Jesse Jackson for a while? When did he drop "the reverend" from his shtick? Was it after the first or the second bastard child was outed?

Twisted Humor, Animated

2009-06-29T16:32:00.001-07:00

Twisted humor of the day:

http://vimeo.com/4996834

There's six, be sure not to miss a one!

More Mike Ramirez: Government is the answer to everything

2009-06-29T15:42:00.000-07:00

A smarter man than I, and far more talented with a pen:
Probably better-looking, too. And that's just as it should be.

Mmmm...Academic Racism at its Finest

2009-06-29T15:29:00.000-07:00

All in the name of "diversity," I guess.

Appealing to Stalin

2009-06-29T15:16:00.000-07:00

Wouldn't the Russians remember just how bad life was under Stalin? Life under Khrushchev, not considered by many to be exactly the "swinging sixties" as enjoyed by the rest of the civilized world, was markedly better.

So much better, in fact, that the man known for de-Stalinization was quickly replaced by the insufferable Brezhnev, who was a much better communist.

Now the (Russian Communists) are raising billboards Stalin, accompanied by such press-release quotables as this gem, "Everybody knows that under Stalin our country achieved the highest rate of economic growth and development in other spheres, and the great victory (over Nazi Germany)."

This is not, precisely speaking, a good sign. Oh, it's under the headline " Communists turn to Stalin to fight crisis." Swing wide the gates of the gulags!

Equine Fecal Matter

2009-06-29T14:28:00.000-07:00

Where to begin...there's so much out there. I've already written about the President Obama-approved failed coup by now-exiled President .... of the Honduras. (Alternatively, I've written about the President-Obama-disapproved upholding of law and order by the rest of the Honduran government and enforced, only after extreme provocation, by the Honduran military.) How about some more horse doody?

Firing an Inspector General (whose duty is to expose fraud and waste) for exposing fraud and waste by denouncing him as a mental invalid. This is now called "an act of political courage."
Refusing to answer questions regarding the matter, is now a hallmark of "the most open and transparent administration, ever." ~~Wonder what they're trying to cover up?~~
Newsweek (Newsweek?!?!?!) agrees that this administration is not quite as forthright as it could be...
No lobbyists ~~may enter through the front door~~. Lobbyists through the back door? That's totally cool.
Months after first using the "jobs created or saved" metric, the Administration finally ventures a ~~woefully and embarrasingly inadequate~~ definition for the term.
Also, we'll be creating green jobs to fuel our green economy by using methods already proven in Spain...to destroy jobs.
Seems "the powers that be" dislike very much investigations that might expose some unfortunate truths about close allies. In this case PBO & ACORN. (Most transparent, EVAH!!!)
Labor's not a lobby, is it? Nothing to ~~SEIU~~ see here, folks. Move along. I am not having inappropriate relations with that organization...
On a lesser note; there's more evidence that the very personal and highly influential (to many idiotic voters) book "Dreams From My Father" may have been ghostwritten by a known, unrepentant, domestic terrorist.
NYT, formerly the paper of record, cooks the books like a little Bernie Madoff to find support for the President's Healthcare plan.
A nice, introductory guide that illuminates the ~~stinking, slimy, muckhole of a~~ culture of politics from which our President came; thus making Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4 much more comprehensible.
When the CBO, the independent group whose only responsiblity is to put a price tag on things, is the greatest threat to your (healthcare) plan, maybe you need a new plan.
Stolen straight from Neil Boortz: "The Politico seems to think that there is going to be a Republican resurgence within the next year. Based on what? Mark Sanford?"
States borrowing money that will be repaid tomorrow to pay for unemployment claims today, where tomorrow means sometime in the distant future when things will surely have gotten better.

Whew! I think that about does it. I do believe I shoveled that thick, heavy, pile of s--t quite nicely, don't you?

Because federal regulation of other things has gone so well...

2009-06-29T13:49:00.000-07:00

We'll do it to financial products, too.

Just remember how well this has worked for us in the past:

Aspirin, which would never pass a clinical trial to make it to market, is still an effective analgesic and is helpful to patients with heart troubles. Trouble is, I don't believe anyone has shown precisely what action Aspirin has in the body to accomplish either of these functions. Thank goodness Bayer started marketing it before the FDA.
Acetaminophen, aka Tylenol, is a frighteningly bad drug for our bodies. It wrecks havoc on the liver, while accomplishing its task of relieving pain. (So if one were to dose oneself to the point of liver failure, the normal gut-wrenching pain associated with such an act would go relatively unnoticed.) Many physicians regularly argue that many prescription pain relievers are far safer to be taken on a daily and ongoing basis than Acetaminophen.
Peanut butter. Seriously. People died from eating peanut butter (well, technically, contaminated peanut butter). All on the government's watch.

OK. So the gubm't doesn't have such a hot track record with keeping bad things out or good things in our bodies. And now, we're going to let (a sure to be heavily lobbied) new government agency tell us what Wall Street can and can't sell us? (All the while knowing that Wall Street is lobbying the hell out of the lawmakers whose rules the new agency will be applying.)

Let's also not forget the inevitable "mission creep," whereby things that have absolutely no business being regulated by the regulatory agency inevitably fall under their purview: Cheerios, in this case.

Please don't tell me anyone out there is really dumb enough to believe that this will actually help matters. Oh wait. There are. Dammit.

Wouldn't it be great to get a chance to "do-over" the Subprime Meltdown?

2009-06-29T13:28:00.000-07:00

It would. We have distance on the issue, and we have seen how the various policy decisions made during the Subprime crisis actually affected financial markets, homeowners, and bondholders. Wouldn't it have been nice to know all of this at the start of the crisis?

Yes; it would. Unfortunately, we are on the front-end of a second crisis in housing. A second group of loans were issued during the Subprime boom years that are just as dangerous, but given to a less dangerous group of people, but in far greater numbers. I.e., we have a bigger problem that will manifest itself later than the subprime problem did. (Article here.)

Unfortunately, we still have delusional politicians and complicit bankers in the mix. No one has admitted that the true problem that underlay all of the greed on Wall Street, greed on Main Street (don't think the homebuyers were innocently accepting the 'fact' of homes doubling in price every two years as an ancillary byproduct of owning a home), and unsafe lending practices was really bad government policy. Colossally bad policy that artificially raised the number of prospective homeowners, artificially raising demand, artificially raising prices, then self-reinforcing until the bubble burst.

Since then, housing prices haven't "collapsed" so much as they've returned to normal minus some overbuilding. (OK, egregious overbuilding in Fla, SoCal, and Nevada.) The next threat is from ARM borrowers (and others with reasonably good credit) who are underwater on their mortgages. Seeing how completely, totally, comprehensively, worthless the last government intrusion to housing markets was, let's try to learn from the lessons of Subprime. Government must get itself out of the housing market, completely.

Initially, some areas of intrusion (deductibility of mortgage interest) and receivership of Fannie/Freddie will have to continue. But other policies (FHA, CRA, et al.) should be immediately scrapped or privatized. There should be no government influence pushing Fannie/Freddie or anyone else to lend to anyone other than those they see fit to lend to.

What will happen? Homeownership rates will drop; dramatically. This, contrary to your suspicions, I argue is a good thing. Americans with sufficient excess capital will buy up a good number of homes and rent them. To people who should be renting homes, not buying them. Homeownership is great, if you have a stable job in a stable neighborhood and the excess capital to afford the luxury of not dealing with a landlord. If, however, you are like the vast majority of Americans who move regularly from one job to the next, whose income stability is good, but not excellent, then renting is the better choice. There are two reasons for this:

1) People who may need to move in the next ten years are not well-served by a conventional mortgage.

a) Mortgages cost more than just interest; there are closing costs to consider, as well. Real estate agents must be paid (this happens whether buyer or seller pays; it's one pie, no matter how it's cut) and mortgage brokers must make their commission. These kind of expenses are (i) large and (ii) should not be repeated often.

b) In ten years, the housing market may have fluctuated north or south, without any kind of madness injected into the system. Real estate goes through cycles, just like stocks. Most (honest) brokers will tell you that you should never own stocks with money that you may need to use in...wait for it...the next ten years. Why? The risk of you needing to get out at a time when the market is at a bottom is too great! Same goes for houses.

c) No family is well-served by any kind of mortgage other than a conventional one; other mortgages are for investors, speculators, and real estate professionals, not families. 30 years is long enough to make the payments similar to the rental cost of the home, and a fixed-rate is the only thing that ensures predictable payments. Families need both of these to properly budget; Investors can take risks that are imprudent for a functional dwelling.

2) People should not look at their own, personal place of dwelling as a savings vehicle. The only exception to this, of course, are those who are able to buy the home they intend to die in outright.

a) People have used their home as a kind of "piggy-bank" to borrow against. Great, except when the realization comes that by leveraging their home to its value, they are now renters, again. But with less flexibility, more overhead, and more risk. Again, piggy-banks should be shaped like either "piggies" or "banks"--not houses.

b) People have used their homes as a store of value for retirement. Fundamentally, this is a bad decision from the perspective of liquidity; how to make the value of the home liquid?

i) The house could be sold. This creates liquidity, but what to do with it? Buy another house (which will cost just as much for the same house in the same area) and thus negating the liquidity? You could also rent with that money...but why not have done this all along and stored the value someplace else?

ii) A reverse mortgage could be taken out. But this, again, puts the "homeowner" in the position of renter to the lender, again. And without flexibility!

c) By placing value in residential real estate, homeowners have given up the ability to place that capital elsewhere. Many households' net worth is held almost entirely in residential real estate. What does investing 101 say about diversification? Do it. And holding fifty or more percent of one's assets in one asset class is general considered poor practice.

Renting, is good for most Americans. We should encourage it. Ownership for those who can, renting for the rest. Harsh? Not at all. Losing your home, having your credit destroyed, and retiring a pauper, those are harsh endings. But they are the endings that have been brought about by present policy. Let's learn from our mistakes, stop encouraging senseless homeownership policies, and get back to living.

Clueless on Iran

2009-06-29T12:48:00.000-07:00

Title, shamelessly, stolen from Charles Krauthammer.

Let me be incredibly blunt: Read. This. Now.

Krauthammer, once again, perfectly articulates what I've been struggling to piece together since the revolt began in Iran. I'm afraid it's too late, now. Obama will be rightly damned by the very same Muslims he believes he reached out to with the Cairo speech. If Obama truly cared about Muslims, not some theoretical construct of a group, but about real, live (though many now dead) Muslims, he would have bothered to respond much more quickly and much more favorably to the demonstrations. Seems that Cairo was, like so many others given on the campaign trail and from the White House, just a speech.

And it seems it is already too late. I guess there was wisdom in not responding quickly to an international crisis; it has already resolved itself. Soon enough, the graves will have been covered and we can get on to the "real" business of dealing directly with the regime that still wants both us and an ally wiped off the face of the map. Bravo, Mr. Obama, bravo. You, sir, are ~~a spineless, gutless, wretch of the shell of a man~~quite the statesman.

UPDATE: Thank you, Mr. Ramirez, for providing me with a thousand words on which I have to waste not a breath:

If you have to ask, you'll never understand

2009-06-27T13:21:00.000-07:00

Quarter-shrinking via a big-@$$ capacitor bank. Do I need to say more? Yes, I do: Watch both videos.

http://intellectualventureslab.com/?p=71

Healthcare: Oversimplifying is better than bloated governmentcare edition

2009-06-27T13:14:00.001-07:00

http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/06/a_real_free_market_health_care_1.html

Tattoo Location Decoder Ring

2009-06-27T13:00:00.000-07:00

Who doesn't love a good decoder ring? I mean, you could, like, send messages to other people and nobody else could possibly intercept them. (Unless somebody else happened to eat the same brand of cereal as you...)

OK, this isn't a decoder ring. But it is funny. Enjoy.

Has Chavez Finally Gone Too Far?

2009-06-27T12:46:00.000-07:00

Doubtful. He still is quite popular with the masses; Robin Hood hasn't robbed the country blind, yet. But he has begun doing something that union interests worldwide should certainly pay attention to: Socialism eventually means the nationalization of all means of production, and once under government care, industries that used to enjoy fabulous union protection start to look quite expensive to their new governmental overlords.

Note that Chavez is over a decade into his power grab in Venezuela. He began with the support of the unions, as initially, unions and socialists make good bedfellows. They continue to, so long as you are a union boss and not a union worker. Remember, it is all about power. A powerful influence over union bosses' beliefs is their own greed and powerlust; they treat their adversaries (private enterprise) as though they were themselves. This is not to say that private enterprise does not have these characteristics; it just does not have them always, whereas union bosses universally do.

It'll be fun to watch this one shake out. These kind of things are coming to America; note the special clause in the healthcare tax bill that protects 'negotiated-contracts' from the tax on private healthcare. However, as cozy as this clause may sound today, most union contracts expire every five years, and the clause about currently in force means that these same union benefits would have to be shielded again in a couple of years. Will the union (members) still wield the kind of power they do today? Or, will they wind up the victims of an American Chavez?

An Operetta! Everything's an Operetta!

2009-06-24T16:02:00.000-07:00

Only were it true. (And it is!)

These are troubling times, indeed, when the most reliable information we can come by fits into a hundred and forty characters and goes by the name "tweet." The desperate cries of nameless Persians have the tone of veracity, whereas the pre-packaged sound bites coming out of the White House and parroted by a complicit press corps donk with the bhumb of a dissonance. It is not that the message coming out of Washington is not consistent (although it isn't, always), it is dissonant in the way that a bad note sounds foul to the ear. It is disingenuously pretending to be a true note, but it is not. Musicians have discovered, however, that a dissonant note repeated often enough can become its own melody. Disillusioned and protesting songwriters have been exploiting this knowledge for at least the last half a century, and now, it seems, so is our President.

He's being called out on it by two writers, from two newspapers generally agreed to be at opposite ends of the political spectrum. Both the Washington Post (or P---, if you happen to have been incarcerated as a result of their investigative journalism and afterwards had a radio show soap box*) and the Washington Times have published op-eds writing about the disgraceful pageantry that has replaced serious inquiry for most of the White House press corps. Go and read them both, they will be well worth your while.

In the meantime, I must go find the Master and discuss this business of political operetta...**

*G. Gordon Liddy, of Nixon administration infamy, and later, a radio talk show host, never seemed to be able to forgive the Washington Post for their role in outing his deeds in Watergate.
**If you haven't read The Master and Margarita by Lenin- and Stalin-era Russian playwright and novelist Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov, you, my friend, are missing out on a masterful piece of political satire wrapped in excitement and illuminated by brilliance. Read more about it here or, if you would do yourself the favor, go ahead and add it to your library.

Washington, Center of American Devolution

2009-06-24T12:48:00.000-07:00

"They say that the one great thing that separates us from the apes of the wild is our unique ability to learn from our environment. Yeees, we alone among the species have advanced to a state where we can remember our past experiences and learn from them. It is what makes us great. It iiis what makes us, human.

Washington devolved a little bit today, with the announcement that Representatives Barney Frank and Anthony Weiner have asked Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to (further) laxen lending standards. Lax lending standards were precisely what brought the US housing market and the building and banking industries to the brink!

Remember that, since the 1950s, we have learned that most apes show the ability to learn from their environments, from their past mistakes. We have also learned that many birds are similarly capable, with crows showing a remarkable ability of learning from past mistakes. So to call this proposal "bird-brained" would be insulting to the creatures who have made better use of their peanut-sized bits of gray-matter than our congressmen have made of their grapefruits. God. Help. Us.

(Via Reuters)

Lies, Damn Lies, and...

2009-06-24T11:40:00.001-07:00

~~Statistics~~NYT Polling. Seems that they had a slightly less than representative sample when they conducted their poll showing that 72% of Americans are in favor of President Obama's healthcare plan. So much for the paper of record...and they wonder why print journalism is dying; I believe they call it "suicide" when one kills oneself...

It's OK as long as they don't hit us...

2009-06-24T10:29:00.000-07:00

UPDATE 2 (7/4/09)
Test fires 7 missiles. Drawing condemnation. Oh, and we are "closely monitoring" their activities. The diabetic dictators is shaking in his boots.

UPDATE (6/24/09)
Everything's going to be A-OK! Even though the DPRK has just started using Ahmadinejad-ian language to make its threats, the world stands ready to respond. When your enemy says that they will "wipe out the aggressors on the globe once and for all," you expect that the world would quickly take aggressive action to prevent such a threat from escalating to reality. Just what kind of aggressive action are we taking? Well, the AP reports (via Yahoo!):

...a flurry of diplomatic efforts were under way to try getting North Korea to return to disarmament talks.

Good. I feel so much better now.
Originally posted at 2009.06.21, 3.29p:

Worth a flaming skull? I'm afraid so:

http://minx.cc/?post=288715

Meanwhile, in realityland, screaming "bomb" on a plane will get you arrested, severely questioned, and possibly result in the your civil rights being trampled upon. Unless you're a diabetic, alcoholic, ego-maniacal, repressive dictator who also happens to (maybe, if he hasn't already tested all of them) have nukes. He's just so lovably nutty! He couldn't really hit us, could he?

Playboy blogger faces down a real woman

2009-06-23T15:30:00.000-07:00

And chokes. It's been pulled (for a while), but here's a little recap.

When Playboy let one of its bloggers go on a misogynistic, sexist, disgraceful screed against conservative women, I was thoroughly disgusted. One needed not any familiarity with the subjects to know that what was written was a hateful portrayal of women that intimidated the author. While I knew a handful of the women on the list, not every one was familiar to me. So it is that I report back on one of those, whom I have now had the opportunity to see in action.

I am not sure that it even warrants repeating the accusations against Megyn Kelley, but suffice it to say that they are the normal charges leveled at most every attractive blonde who has seen success outside the world of modeling, cooking, and home improvement shows. Indeed, there are currently cable news anchors who were chosen primarily for their good looks, secondarily for their capacity to read a teleprompter, and thirdly, well, I am not quite sure there is a 'thirdly.' Ms. Kelley stood accused of being such, and of not being particularly good at even the second qualification.

After watching her numerous times, I must say that I am thoroughly impressed with Ms. Kelley's abilities. She is attractive, yes, and she does read the teleprompter with poise and fluidity, but it is what happens when she turns away from the teleprompter that shows Ms. Kelley's true abilities. As she interviews guests it becomes clear that she is articulate, witty, and intelligent—and that she needs no prompting or coaching to be any of these.

I can now see exactly why Ms. Kelley so intimidates a Playboy blogger: He has all day to spend writing and rewriting and revising and editing his thoughts before they ever see the light of day (or the computer-lit night when his audience takes a momentary break from its masturbatorial pursuits to reinforce their warped perceptions of femininity and sexuality), while Ms. Kelley must articulate her ideas intelligently on live television. She is clearly more capable of not only creating, but speaking a cogent idea than our Playboy blogger—and she does this while maintaining the perfect visage of femininity and grace, while our blogger knows that his best ideas are written hunched over a keyboard, wearing sweaty pajamas, and sporting a adolescent-grade five-o'clock shadow.

Ms. Kelley is every bit as pretty as the girls that take off their clothes for his magazine, but he knows that he could never persuade her to do so, that he could never be in a position of power or authority over her. His rape fantasy is all about this fact. Rape, in literature and sadistic fantasy as in life, is more about power than sex. It is the perversion of sex from an act of mutuality and unification to an act of power and subjugation. Our Playboy author's rape fantasy is a sickening reminder that there still exist petty, miserable, weak men whose insecurity is so great that they are threatened by even the slightest success. The misogyny exists because of this: That they do not come out publicly against the men who are more successful than they, but feel as though they can denigrate the women with impunity. The misogyny persists because we, as a society, allow these individuals—these petty, miserable, weak men—to get away with it. Thankfully, this time, the response from the blogosphere was swift, pointed, and loud enough to push Playboy to take down the post. Lets hope that this is demonstration of changing attitudes towards women, and let's also hope that other petty, miserable, weak misogynists keep outing themselves to public scrutiny.

Oh, and I just discovered a great bit of Megyn Kelley responding, and, wait for it, she does so with grace and poise.

Smoke a "J" to your reproductive health?

2009-06-23T14:00:00.000-07:00

Too prurient not to post. So the short version is summarized on NI's Weird Science section (third entry), but I have to send you to the original paper for you to really appreciate the science here.

We've known for quite a while that Marijuana affects the human body in more ways than can be accounted for by its "active ingredient," THC. As researchers have studied the stew of active chemicals known as cannabinoids, they have discovered that we have something of a "cannabinoid" system in our body where our own production of cannabinoids helps to regulate various functions. An amusing byproduct of this is our article: That certain cannabinoids are helpful to making sure that meiosis in the testes progresses properly. So I'm sorry to say, ladies, that there's no scientific research (yet) that suggests that you'll see any benefit--this night with Mary Jane is strictly for the boys.*

*Actually, if we must get technical about it, it's strictly for the boy-mice. Though mice and men are surprisingly similar (pun-tastically bad reference very intended), there's no way to be entirely sure that the same cannabinoid has the same effect in humans. If ever approved for study in humans (fat chance), I can just see the college stud(ent)s lining up out the door to participate in this one. "You mean, I get to smoke pot and jack off for science?! Schweeeeet."

Hawthorne Effect

2009-06-23T13:00:00.000-07:00

Most anyone who has ever taken a business management or psychology course is familiar with the "Hawthorne Effect" whereby the very act of observing a group changes its behavior. Specifically, productivity rose no matter what change was introduced to the study group at a factory; lights up, lights down, etc. I had always been wary of the Hawthorne Effect for this one, nagging, question: If we assume that there are practical limits to human productivity, how can we continue to see increases in productivity every time some aspect of the work environment is changed? I.e., why doesn't every factory say that it's in a study and continually shift the lighting, and then see that every shift in the lighting produced better productivity? At some point, people (without new methods or technological aids) are limited in the ability to produce.

Seems I wasn't the only bothered by the Hawthorne Effect, but I had been asking the wrong question. They asked a more fundamental question: Exposed to the same rigorous statistical and procedural methods used to scrutinize data today, would the Hawthorne Effect stand up? Turns out, it doesn't. I suspect that there may still be something of a real Hawthorne Effect, but that its gains in productivity will be much more minor and not at all sustained. Intuition (or years of reading about the effect in every textbook where it was even a tangentially-related subject) would suggest that when the boss, or anyone else, is watching, you will work harder than when not observed. As soon as the cat's away, the mice will play (again).

Broken Promises, Broken Laws

2009-06-23T12:30:00.000-07:00

I am amazed I have yet to ~~rant~~ write on the topic of the Chrysler bondholders. While courts have historically had wide-ranging power to modify the contracts of a company in bankruptcy, there are certain contracts that take priority over others. Specifically, when companies are on the rocks, they must generally agree to different terms than are offered to companies that are more likely to repay their debts. It is often in the best interest of both the creditor and the debtor to write bonds that give the creditor recourse to specific assets of the company and place that creditor ahead of all other creditors. Why? Simple: Creditors make nothing if they aren't repaid their principal and the usual route to dealing with this added risk, extremely high interest rates, is not a cost that a company on the rocks can generally afford. So, both parties agree to bonds that are senior to all others and have lower interest rates (corresponding to the lowered risk taken on by the creditor).

These are precisely the bonds that were held by the Indiana teachers' pension that were cast aside by the Obama-approved Chrysler bankruptcy. These bondholders were wiped out. Meanwhile, another pension fund, that held by the union workers of Chrysler (who were much farther down the seniority list) end up with a fat stake of equity in the "new" Chrysler. This is a clear violation of the terms of the bonds and the rule of law. The Supreme Court's decision not to review the case effectively ruled in favor of the administration and against the rule of contract law and common sense. (A nice summation can be found at IBD.

The consequences of this decision will be far-reaching. This case will materially affect the bond markets, creditors, and debtors. Everyone who issues debt will now have to factor in yet another risk: The risk that the contract is broken by governmental fiat. How to price such a risk? No one can really say for sure, the market will have to work this out. But what will most certainly happen is that the price of existing bonds will decrease (as buyers demand a higher yield to compensate for the new risk*) and new bonds will be issued at higher rates to reflect the added risk introduced to the market. Capital will get more expensive, making it harder or more expensive for companies to borrow. Companies with the poorest ratings will be hit hardest, and many that might have been able to find life-saving financing before the Chrysler ruling, may find no willing lenders and die.

Laws are written for reasons. Contracts are written for reasons. This administration does not seem to understand either of these facts (or believes itself to be above such constraints). We will all, ultimately, pay for these broken promises and broken laws through higher retail costs and slowed economic growth.

*Bond prices are inverse to bond yields. Price goes up, yield goes down; price goes down, yield goes up.

Bloody Bits

2009-06-23T11:05:00.000-07:00

As reported in The Wall Street Journal, Iran's web spying aided by western technology. Normally, the ethical questions would be roundly discussed, with advocates of personal freedom and civil liberties decrying the actions of the technology companies and the technology companies politely reminding everyone that the policies of sovereign nations that are not actively making war with other nations or committing genocide against their own people are their own business. And the obligatory, "If we don't make it, somebody else will. So why not get paid?"

Except that the troubles in Iran have progressed in a manner that is anything but consistent with "normally." The trouble starts with this bit of information:

The Iranian regime has developed, with the assistance of European telecommunications companies, one of the world's most sophisticated mechanisms for controlling and censoring the Internet, allowing it to examine the content of individual online communications on a massive scale.

Which should surprise absolutely no one who is even remotely familiar with technology and the internet. (Or repressive regimes, for that matter.) What takes this beyond the ordinary is the violence that the current regime in Iran has imposed on dissent. The death of innocents, of (mostly) peaceful protesters is not something that we in the West find at all compatible with our moral system. But it gets worse--very, very worse:

Instead, in confronting the political turmoil that has consumed the country this past week, the Iranian government appears to be engaging in a practice often called deep packet inspection, which enables authorities to not only block communication but to monitor it to gather information about individuals, as well as alter it for disinformation purposes, according to these experts.

I want to focus on two aspects of this quote, first, the one that is less an ethical consideration and more a practical one, the second, the far more reaching ethical aspect.

The words "as well as alter [the information leaving Iran] for disinformation purposes" cannot be understated. The technology that has been sold to Iran directly inhibits the ability of the rest of the world to understand with any degree of accuracy exactly what is happening in Iran right now. A particularly diabolical implementation of this technology is as follows: Allow a real dissenter to establish credibility with Western reporters; then begin intercepting and altering that dissenter's communication to portray a different picture of reality than what is really happening. This technology could allow, for some time, both parties to believe that the proper information has indeed been communicated and received. Imagine Hitler being able to simultaneously sniff out every mole and replace its communication with disinformation that is helpful to the German cause. This is not good, practically.

But what is worse is this: "to monitor [the dissenters] to gather information about individuals" (emphasis added). The Khamenei/Ahmadinejad regime has showed itself more than willing to kill dissenters, and we have provided them the technology to dissenters. We have provided murderers a means to show up at the doorstep of an individual, the "right" individual, with all the information they need to justify a hanging. If my position on this matter of ethics is not clear by now, let me state it plainly: The providers of this technology have blood on their hands.

I believe that the companies who provided the technology are not guilty of "murder"--rather, "manslaughter" seems a more appropriate term. "Manslaughter" brings with it a sense of the unintended nature of an action that directly led to the death of another person. This seems an apt description of the technology provided to Iran: The providers did not intend for it to lead to the death of individuals, but it has (or soon will).

How do we cope with this? Surely we do not keep companies for developing and exporting technology. But maybe, as we do already with physical arms, we identify that there exist classes of technology that may be used by a government for nefarious purposes and we restrict the export of these to countries we believe likely to use them against their own population. I am basically proposing that we not sell chlorine to countries that have used it to gas their own people before. Can those countries still come by said matériel (both physical and technological)? Yes, but at least the blood will not be on our hands.

Computers should be intuitive

2009-06-23T10:46:00.000-07:00

I had quite a nice business going fixing computers and teaching folks how to use them. One of the frustrations that my clients would always have is that something unexpected would happen, and though I would immediately know how to fix it, they worried and wondered why they could not fix it themselves. To explain the years of experience, trial-and-error troubleshooting, 2am nights, etc. that were involved in building the basis of skills that I use to "easily" solve a problem is impossible. As frustration discourages learning, however, I always would quip that the particular problem should not exist in the first place; computers ought to be easy to use.

But they aren't (a fact that I hope will find me a job). They are very far from being easy to use and intuitive. Users are still barraged with errors, messages, situations, etc. that they do not, can not, and will not understand. Should we try to increase education about computers? Sure. But, does every computer user really need to understand how volatile RAM works? How a hard drive interfaces with a motherboard and how that information gets communicated to the mystermagical processor that then does things with it? And we haven't even talked software!

That's why this writeup over at Dan's Data is so good. He uses a wonderful analogy that also happens to give us a useful idea of where we really are in the progression of making computers universally usable:

Let's, instead, consider that weird old phrase "computer literacy", these days seldom used except by the hardy souls teaching Windows to the elderly. Let's compare computer literacy with ordinary literacy. Reading and writing.

In this respect, I think you can make a case that computer technology has made it to the late sixth century AD, at best.

I'm afraid that he's quite right. Go on and read the whole thing, it won't turn your ~~computer-illiterate~~ stomach, too much.

Pretty Colors Science: Good for more than tricking middle-schoolers into taking chemistry seriously

2009-06-23T10:02:00.000-07:00

I usually jokingly refer to science demonstrations that result in big booms, puffs of smoke, flashes of light, or vibrant colors as, well, "pretty colors science." They are the kind of things that keep little children (and college freshman, but I repeat myself) interested in science long enough that they actually want to learn about the more complicated bits. I wish I could say that I was the one who originated the term, and I wish even more that I could remember to whom credit is due for it.

Today, however, I found a wonderful article that takes the basic premise of "pretty colors science" and uses it to beautifully practical good. What other field of scientific application is vastly helped by simple, readily-reproducible methods result in immediate and dramatic visual changes? If you guessed "testing for dangerous things in our food supply," give yourself a gold star! This link will take you to the full article talking about a new method to test for melamine in food products, and the test happens to be everything you want out of a good field test: Easy, reliable, quick, sensitive, and dramatic.

On another note, I was surprised to (finally) learn that it is not melamine itself that is toxic when ingested, but rather the combination of melamine and cyanuric acid that leads to a frighteningly stable chemical in the body that is toxic. (Stable in the body usually means bad--if it doesn't leave or get metabolized, it will eventually build to the point where it starts mucking with things. Like kidneys, in this case.) Wish I would have known that during the "toxic milk" scare.

Just a day on the links...

2009-06-23T09:10:00.000-07:00

I will never be accused of being too much the fan of golf.* I have seen first-hand the deleterious effects that sport can effect on a business. The temptation is great to spend day after day on the course networking, and while networking is good, companies suffer when their owners and managers spend so much time there that they forget to follow through on the business they have already negotiated. All said, however, I will rarely begrudge a man of importance unwinding on the golf course.

I will begrudge the media, however, for entering into yet another blatant round of extreme bias. CNSNews.com rightly reports the issue with a beautifully-concise storyline:

Obama’s Repeated Golf Outings During War and Recession Garner Little Criticism

Under near-identical circumstances, President Bush was lampooned by the media for his golf outings. Now, whether it is wise for the President of the United States to be on a golf outing whilst managing wars and an economy in the tank is a matter worth discussing. However, for the media to make an issue of it for one President and not another should embarrass every man and woman who lay claim to the title "journalist."

Journalists be warned: When lowly bloggers can routinely and accurately criticize your credibility, the end is near. I believe it's the fifth sign of the journapocalypse...
*Frankly, I have never found a keen interest in the sport. I have taken lessons and am not bad on the course; I have watched the major golfing tournaments with those who enjoy them. It is not for lack of trying, just that golf gives me neither enjoyment nor maintains my interest for very long.
Also, I have always found it absurd that Florida, my home state, is one of the most popular states for golfing. Yes, I know it has a dearth of arse-freezingly cold days, but its abundance of 90°F/80% humidity days and frequent thunderstorms would seem to be better reasons to avoid it.
Moreover, any sport that requires its players to dress up only to stand around sweating for an hour and a half while exerting almost no physical effort...

Scale

2009-06-17T13:07:00.000-07:00

Sometimes we need to see something put in context to really understand it.

Things I learned in Kindergarten: When you give a mouse a cookie...

2009-06-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

"When you give a mouse a cookie" is one of the few children's books that has endured my maturation and still resides in my mind. The short of the story (you deprived soul! go to a library and read it, you will smile) is that a small, initial act of kindness towards a mouse is followed with a relentlessly growing burden of requests, each a small and logical succession from the prior. (I'm doing the story no justice.) As an enginerd*, I find the most useful instruction from the story to be that any change must be considered in light of what other changes it will bring about. In other words, the world is a complicated place, and there is no way to change any one part of it without affecting many other parts, possibly (although, not necessarily) undesirably.

So now to Britain, where it was decided upon a long time ago that guns ought to be banned. I do not wish to discuss in any detail whether this was a good or bad decision, but rather, point out an unintended consequence that has fallen out of this decision. The British have been remarkably successful in keeping guns out of the hands of the public, a success that has been aided, no doubt, by their geography: It is simply harder to smuggle goods onto an island bordered on the North, East, and West by frigid and treacherous waters and bordered to the South by a continent where guns are mostly contraband as well. The absences of firearms has not managed to much change human nature, and Britain still has its share of would-be murderers.

With guns not an option, these would-be murderers must turn to the next most effective means of violently bringing about the end of their prefix, so that they may be called more simply, murderers. Knives, those pointy things that are ever so useful for chopping parsley and radishes, also happen to be devilishly effective at chopping people. So, with no guns to effect a murder, murderers have resorted to knives as their preferred weapon.

With knife crime on the rise, the question of how to prevent (or mitigate) such crime has obviously been on the minds of many a Brit. Well, one fellow happens to have come up with a rather ingenious solution: Get rid of the pointy tip that is most effective at delivering stabbing, fatal blows. How this will affect the future of knife crime (once all the evil, stabby knives are sent to the scrapyard) is what is now on the table for discussion. Have fun!

Oh, and here's a picture of the emasculated veggie cutter:

*Enginerd = Engineer + Nerd. I hope that doesn't need any more explanation.

The Grand OLD Party

2009-06-16T08:00:00.000-07:00

There once was a time when I self-identified as a Republican. My parents voted Republican, we were generally conservative, and the Republican party seemed to identify with us. It has been at least five years since the last time I strongly identified as a Republican, and I have been struggling with this ever since.

Did my party move away from me? (As Specter has claimed.) Or, have I outgrown the ideologies of my youth, maturing into my own person who just happens not to identify with Republicanism? Some of both, perhaps.

It's a question whose answer involves a combination of ideology, perspective, and good 'ole down-and-dirty politics. The American political landscape changes with every generation--Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans were once at the vanguard of racial issues, only now to endure charges of racism...

Ideologies are often said to stagnate. I do not particularly care for this framing: It assumes that ideas are fast changing, flowing and moving throughout the course of history. While the ideas that we hold onto as people may change quite fluidly, the ideas themselves do not. How we use ideas may also change, but the ideas themselves remain, whether fixed and steady or buried and discarded. It is our use, misuse, or abuse that changes throughout time. Fascism still has a quite despicable reputation, mainly because it conjures images of Hitler and Mussolini (not the most popular politicians of the 20th century, iirc). Yet, the ideas of fascism never went away. Fascism didn't suddenly become an ineffective ideology, just an unpopular one*.

Given this, none of us should be surprised to learn that the Republican "ideology" has changed over the past two decades: The "ideology" of the Republican party is something of a sum of the people that it purports to represent, and their personal "ideologies" are quite subject to change. So let us make a distinction at this point: personal "ideologies" are really beliefs, which may be subject to change on even the tiniest whim or variance in digestion. The Grand Old Party of today is still more or less the conservative coalition brought together under Reagan (and again under Gingrich), but this coalition is no longer united, fracturing into ever smaller groups all purporting to be the true heirs of the GOP.

I am one of those islands, broken off from the mainland. The rift appears permanent, but I am not opposed to a bridge being built between myself and the Republican Party. The grandeur of the GOP really came from its ability to unite social conservatives with economic conservatives (properly called economic liberals elsewhere in the world) and keep them happily under one tent. Conservative Christians willingly left this tent. Economic conservatives (liberals, believing in free trade and unrestrictive governance) have been forced to pass a litmus test of their social positions and have rightly refused. All other manner of issues-based test of ideological purity threaten to utterly disintegrate the Republican party.

So what next? If conservatives (of every stripe) are willing to accept that our geography is less like Cuba and more like the Bahamas**, we may yet be able to unite and succeed. At this point, it is the Republican Party's game to lose. If the GOP cannot re-unite the many conservative islands for the 2012 elections, then I suspect that the opportunity will be ripe for a third party to succeed the GOP as the bastion of conservatism. It is possible to unite the Isle of (Pro-)Life with the Lands of the Libertine, the Kingdom of Christendom with the Merchants' Republic; it has been done before, and it will be done again. The Whigs showed us that it is quite possible to lose a party in America; if the Republicans cannot reunite conservatives, it will happen again.

* Fascism != Good. Fascism == Bad. Fascism is (in my mind) conservatism gone horribly awry--where the desires of the masses for stability and cultural heritage destroy personal liberty, freedom of expression and dissent, and personal economic opportunity. Let us never travel that road again, no matter how sweet the Siren song of stability may sound to our ears.
** In case the analogy is in need of further explanation: Cuba is a large, contiguous island, whereas the Bahamian islands are a collection of smaller land masses, separated by water, but grouped together in political alliance under the flag of the Bahamas. What I intend to convey has nothing to do with the present state of politics, economics, or prosperity (although...). It is that the title "conservative" applies to so many different ideas in America. There are gay conservatives. There are conservatives whose only agenda, it would seem, is to keep gays in the closet. There are economic conservatives (who are really economic liberals, properly speaking), there are social conservatives, there are religious conservatives, there are skeptical and atheist conservatives, etc.
Our common causes are fairly simple: We generally believe that the founding fathers of our nation knew what they were doing and we do not like anyone treading on our turf. We do not wish to have our views questioned or denounced by the government, whose size we generally advocate to be smaller, rather than larger. We dislike taxes, almost instinctively. We tend to be patriotic, but we also tend to disagree with one another rather vociferously about what, exactly, it means to be "patriotic". We generally advocate personal responsibility in place of state entitlements. We love to call ourselves many things, but often eschew party loyalty. (Hence, the prevalence of "independent" voters who vote, almost religiously, with the "conservative" party.) We may fly an American flag, with the pride of our founding fathers and veterans; we may fly a Confederate flag, with the pride of independence and rebellion; we may choose to fly no flag at all; but we all secretly smile when we see the "Don't tread on me" flag. (To read more about the Gadsden flag, click here.)
Speaking of which, I'll be flying this beauty on this Fourth of July:

Here's to hoping that either the GOP gets it, or they put the "OLD" out and bold in the GOP, and we see a new party rise up in 2012. Either way, us damn conservatives are here to stay. Get used to it.

First Post (Redux)

2009-06-16T07:30:00.000-07:00

This may not be a blog about grinds (blessed, caffeinated grinds), but it is just like the name says: No milk, no sugar, just a flavorful jolt of the essence of the matter. I aim to write about current issues, politics, economics, and maybe a bit of personal finance along the way.

I do not write for you--there are already too many others who have taken that charge--but rather, I write for me. I write to express my opinions and perspectives. I hope that by doing so regularly, and possibly in front of an audience, that I will drive myself to become a better writer. If anyone finds my perspectives of value, then I will be flattered. If anyone seeks to provide constructive criticisms, please do. I am grateful of anyone willing to spend their time improving my thinking and writing. (Yes, that includes a disagreement with my opinion, but only the kind of disagreement brought respectfully.) If you have any other variety of criticism, please do not bother leaving any comments--they will be removed.

Well, if this were the world I were about to graduate to...

2009-06-16T06:40:00.000-07:00

Much ado has been made about the excessive revelry of Cambridge students, no doubt in part due to the abundance of virile, young flesh caught on camera for otherwise limp-libidoed newsroom editors to devour like ravenous wolves. I have seen excessive drunken revelry on a college campus before--even walked the poor girls home--and what happened in Cambridge is likely a much more common occurrence than we would like to admit.

But you can hardly blame them. After all, these students are among Britain's brightest and surely know what lies ahead of them. They have a Parliament mired in corruption, a headstrong PM who refuses to step aside despite leading his party to the abyss, and now we find that even the police, the supposed protectors of law and order are in on the act, too. To the students of Cambridge: This ~~Bud's~~ Stella's for you.

Show of hands: Anyone surprised by this?

2009-06-15T19:02:00.001-07:00

When you live in a country where the individuals on the ballot are pre-selected by the Supreme Leader of the land, why on earth would you be surprised to find that the victor has also been pre-selected? When dealing with Iran, it is worth remembering that their country is essentially a theocracy headed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini; while Khomeini may not control every single decision made throughout the country on a day-to-day basis, he still resides as the single authority (appointed by Allah) to which the whole country must report.

It is equally important to remember that this is not a theocracy of convenience, where religious leaders used the authority granted to them by God to pursue purely personal political gains. In the West, our most recent cultural memory of a theocracy came in just this form, via the Roman Catholic papacy and its influence over Medieval and Renaissance Europe. No; this theocracy is quite different. In the Iranian theocracy, the key players actually believe everything they say—they hold their political convictions because of their religious convictions. This stands as both a simplification and a complication: On the one hand, we have the documents and teachings of the hard-line Shiites that will show us precisely how our adversaries think; on the other, we in the West find it incredibly difficult to step outside our own cultural experience and understand precisely what the former reality means.

We misinterpret Iran at our own peril. It is now abundantly clear that Messrs. Khomeini and Ahmadinejad are both in alliance with one another and have just executed a marvelous concentration of their power. What is also clear is that there exists within the Iranian people a strong contingent that believe that their government is dead wrong. They are citizens and ex-patriots, united in their belief that the Khomeini regime is both corrupt and dangerous to the Iranian people. It is debatable how large their numbers are--a 64% victory at the polls suggests that it may be only a third of the population--but, this is a group that has showed itself willing to fight. They could be a useful ally; and though it could be easily argued that we would never find common ground, it is well worth remembering that we have had stranger allies come to our side in Iraq.

Weeding the Garden

2009-06-15T08:41:00.000-07:00

Over the last few months*, I have had the pleasure of starting a garden. It has not been nearly as easy a process as I thought it would be, but it has also been immensely more rewarding than I ever would have suspected. I am no green-thumb, and my goal was simple: Don't kill anything. I wish I could say that I succeeded, but an infestation of mites forced my hand with the snow peas, may they rest in peace, and I have been forced to replant.

Why am I talking about my garden? Because useful and convenient metaphors are at a premium these days, and it has taken months of labor, fighting fungi, unnamed diseases, worms, pests, weeds, and mother nature for the analogy to finally dawn on me. The Department of Homeland Security report on Rightwing Extremism** has caused quite a stir in the conservative community; one that I believe is both unnecessary and undesirable. The report does make mention of legitimate threats, and I am not the only one on the right to realize this. Charles at Little Green Footballs has been very good about keeping up with the many times that the DHS report on right-wing extremist threats has proved to be right. (He has also done an excellent job defending the realities of the report.) I, too, weighed in on this conversation some time back. And in light of recent events, it is time to write again.

The mainline conservative response to the issue has been abominable. Conservatives of every stripe are pretending that there are no weeds in the garden. Actually, the better analogy is this: There exist all manner of worms that lay dormant in the soil until a healthy plant begins to grow. As the plant grows and thrives in the fertile soil, the worms awake from their dormancy and begin to attack the plant, sucking the life from it. They leave tell-tale marks where they have chewed their way through the plant, weakening it. If not dealt with quickly, these worms may take down a green and fruitful plant, reducing it to a withered brown and yellow heap. If, on the other hand, the gardener is attentive to the signs, he can take swift action and poison the worms before they have a chance to do much damage.

So it is with the conservative movement. Much like a garden, it is host to all variety of plants, many that do not even get along very well with one another. The soil is fertile, we are all nourished by the ideas of the many men and women of genius that have come before us. However, there are, and always will be, weeds in the garden and worms in the soil. Alongside good men and good ideas, there are things of shame lurking in the garden of which we must be mindful. Let to run loose, the worms and weeds will destroy our garden, and if we are not attentive, they will do much damage before we even realize it.

The worms and the weeds are many, and one only has to look over the events of the last few weeks to see them in action: the murderer of Dr. Tiller and the murderer at the Holocaust Museum both flew the conservative flag. There are others still lurking, and all sensible conservatives who love life and liberty must band together to pull out these and lay them bare to the sun. Once they and their roots are exposed, they will wither and die. If we are to keep our garden safe, we must be as wary of threats from the outside as we are of threats from within. So, to the health of the garden of conservatism, please stop pretending that there are no weeds! Instead, let's all get down on our hands and knees and start weeding. As a gardener I can say with surety, it is soul-cleansing to tear out the bad, then watch it wither and die as the good grows, flourishes, and bears its fruit.

* I live in sunny Florida, where the last threat of a freeze happens in February, and temperatures are consistently in the 70s by March, when I began it. I'm sorry you live in , but remember that the price of admission to Eden includes geriatric New Yorkers, sweltering summers that last from April through October, incessant Mickey Mouse jokes, the occasional hurricane, and (recently added!) a housing market that rivals Nevada and SoCal for tops on the abysmal charts each month. Come join the fun!

** Pardon the HuffPo link; they have an uploaded copy of the original DHS report on this page, which is the only copy I've found. Reading through it, it is not nearly as inflammatory as it has been made out to be by the right.

Legislating or Politicking?

2009-06-11T20:17:00.000-07:00

So anyone really believe that the recent "defections" within the Democratic party on the climate change bill have anything at all to do with a genuine desire to improve the legislation? Nah. Me either.

Trouble emerged before the Memorial Day recess when Peterson and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) objected to Waxman moving the bill only through his committee. The two chairmen insisted they have a chance to mark up the bill, or at least see that changes were made. (emphasis added)

Did they want to suggest worthwhile changes to the language? No. Just wanted to "have a chance to mark up the bill"--is that like a dog peeing on a lamp post to say he was there? I suggest that this language means that these congressmen want to make sure that their names are on an important piece of legislation, even if they had absolutely nothing to do with its writing. Alternately (though, this could certainly be a "both and" situation), let's read that language again. "Mark up the bill"--could that mean that they intend to have their chance to tack on some pork for their constituents? I'm going with a "yes" on that one.

My verdict: Politicking.

Why would God allow...?

2009-06-11T19:43:00.000-07:00

It's a question that many often ask. And the answer from clergy and others who have studied theology extensively is often the unsatisfying, "His ways are higher than ours." This view is difficult to accept, it feels just like a parent saying, "because I said so."

So it's always nice when we learn something that gives credence to the answer. Why would God allow such a horrible thing as a typhoon? It only causes destruction and damage and death...right? Except when we find out that it may actually help save lives from even bigger devastation.

It seems that the forces induced on the island of Taiwan by a typhoon begin a slow earthquake. Not the kind that causes unpredictable, sudden, and massive destruction. No; a slow earthquake allows for the tension built between two geological formations to slowly, peacefully, release itself. And it seems that typhoons (at least in Taiwan) result in peaceful releases of these forces before they can cause massive destruction.

It seems, that sometimes, His ways are higher than ours. And it's always reassuring when we find a time when something that previously fell in the "why would God allow this?" category and now we have a logical, rational, scientific confirmation that it does indeed serve some good that we did not know of before. And it's these moments that make it easier to accept that "His ways are higher than ours" when we can't yet understand.

Daily WTF

2009-06-07T19:57:00.000-07:00

Make that hourly. Doesn't seem like I can read the news for very long before finding yet another WTF...

Oh, now this is fun, isn't it? So we arrest and charge a couple, now in their seventies, after he's retired, with espionage? Seems a bit late to me. Not that we shouldn't prosecute a murderer after the fact (I mean, the murdered is dead now. Not much that holding the murderer will do to bring back the dead.) Still, it seems that in a matter of state secrets, we'd be keeping close enough watch to have had him out before he had a chance to do much damage. Not waiting 'til after the b'stard retired!

Frog keeps changing colors; people start worshipping

2009-06-07T19:49:00.000-07:00

We do this in America, too. Scientology still draws lots of new supporters. Anyhow, it's a fun article, and it shouldn't be surprising to learn, in a land where many people believe in a seemingly endless pantheon of gods, that deity is a commodity affordable enough to be had by a frog.

Now for the money shot:

...from what I have heard, the frog at Kumar’s place changes colour so frequently it is a bit unusual.

At Kumar's place? This shouldn't be of any surprise at all. Just pull Harold out from the closet, smoke some of their stash, and you'll see the color changing frog, too!

Why math should be required in journalism school...

2009-06-07T19:26:00.000-07:00

From the Guardian, we have a little ditty on a proposal to raise $10b per year from a levy to be imposed on international airfare. This money is going to help developing nations cope with the costs of curbing greenhouse gas emissions. Sounds all well and good, so far. Except for this little quote:

The aviation levy, which is expected to increase the price of long-haul fares by less than 1%, would raise $10bn (£6.25bn) a year

Alright, then. Let's do a little math, shall we? If we are going to raise flights by less than one percent, it would seem innocent enough to round that figure up to one percent for a little calculation:

Annual revenue of international airline industry = Sum(all international airfare)

$10b = 1% * Sum(all international airfare)

Annual revenue of international airline industry = $10b/1% = $1,000b = $1t

I'm not sure about you, but somehow, I just can't believe that international flights produce ONE TRILLION USD a year in revenue. A quick google search yields this little tidbit of information: The entire US domestic airline industry takes in an annual haul estimated at $120b. This includes the amount of money that US domestic airlines make from flying passengers overseas. I.e., it is necessarily a part of the $1,000b number that we figured earlier.

This means that, either the entire international air travel market (including US revenues) are eight times the size of the entire US airlines' haul, or, that somebody's bulls---ing about the actual cost to passengers. Let's do some math that at least uses the right number of zeros, shall we?

If we assume that the international air travel revenues are roughly equivalent to the US revenues (in other words, a figure with 11 zeros rather than 12), we recognize that in order to raise $10b annually from such a levy, we are talking about a price increase of roughly 10%, not "less than 1%".

In other news, the price of tea shipped from China just went up.

Health Insurers Invest in Tobacco?

2009-06-06T17:10:00.000-07:00

Say it ain't so! Or, let's get past the initial shock of the matter and disect some reasons why this might be the case.

Firstly, it is worth pointing out that tobacco companies, largely in response to the state liability lawsuits from a decade ago, have made some very shrewd business decisions. Even in the face of multi-billion-dollar judgments, these companies still were flush with cash. Recognizing that the lawsuits they had been subjected to were not likely the end of tobacco litigation and possibly signaled the beginning of the end for the tobacco industry in general, tobacco companies went on a diversification spree.

Philip Morris, for instance, bought Kraft foods in 2003. The "new" Philip Morris was a diversified company whose products line the shelves of grocery and convenience stores with far more than tobacco; in honor of this new business model (and wanting to distance itself from its tobacco-dependent past), Philip Morris renamed itself "Altria". (Although Altria has since divested itself of Kraft, the company still produced 25% of its revenue from non-tobacco sources as of 2006). Altria is part of the S&P 500, an index that is widely used as a surrogate for the US stock market and was a part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average until 2008. If you own a mutual fund or are part of a pension plan, it is incredibly likely that you are exposed to shares of Altria.

Which brings us to the realization that anyone investing money in the US stock market is likely to own some "tobacco" stocks. Private insurers are among the larger investors in the US stock market, and so by direct extension, are likely to own "tobacco" stocks. Why would any rational investor exclude a significant US industry, especially one that happens to be recession-resistant?

Let's assume for a moment that the (evil) health insurers are purchasing shares of tobacco companies purposefully, and purposefully beyond the extent any ordinary investor in the US stock market would. According to the a source quoted in the article, this is a potentially worrisome conflict of interests: "If you own a billion dollars [of tobacco stock], then you don't want to see it go down...You are less likely to join anti-tobacco coalitions, endorse anti-tobacco legislation, basically, anything most health companies would want to participate in." But there is a vital assumption being made here: That a health insurance company (or life or disability insurance, which for reasons that are not entirely clear get lumped in with health insurers) invests money with tobacco companies expecting the investment to grow. "Why would any rational investor do otherwise?," you may ask. The answer is both surprising and does a remarkable job of showing that these investments might not be the conflict of interest they are purported to be.

Tobacco users are almost universally bad risks. They are prone to developing numerous health problems, tend to take more risks as a group, and generally die younger than their tobacco-free peers. Their insurance rates reflect these risks. However, the reality is that most tobacco users will not develop their problems immediately, not even in the near future. They may even develop their problems long after they have quit smoking and quit paying higher insurance premiums. What are insurance companies, who deal with large aggregates of people to do? While investing surpluses now to deal with shortfall later is certainly part of their strategy, what if they could invest some of their money in such a way that it would correlate with their future tobacco-related claims? Say, by investing in tobacco companies.

As smokers continue to smoke, shareholders of tobacco companies continue to receive income in proportion to smoking. In other words, insurance companies who hold tobacco company stock receive income in proportion to the risk they incur by covering smokers as part of their policies. As the number of tobacco users declines, so do the profits from the tobacco industry, and so does the risk born by health insurers. Seems rather sensible to me.

The most damning part of the article comes early on and is given laughably short mention by its author: The letter on which the article is based "is the third report that the doctors – who all support a national healthcare program – have published in the last 14 years." (Empasis added.) So now we know the real reason behind the report: It's not about tobacco, it's nt about conflict of interest, it's about universal health care. And anything that demonizes private insurers, is good for universal health care advocates.

Source article, "Health insurers want you to keep smoking, Harvard doctors say" via boingboing.net.

The March of Progress

2009-06-06T11:20:00.000-07:00

Love it or hate it, we live in a world of continual change. It may be argued that with the acceleration of technologies, the tempo of the march of progress ticks faster with every step. At first, a marcher may find himself just out of step, but if he does not correct his course quickly, soon he will find himself trampled and coughing on the dust of the world that has left him behind.

Enough with the metaphor: Newspapers and magazines have been in slow decline since the dawn of the internet. Right now their leaders are at crossroads trying to determine which course they will take. Their current situation is unenviable: Declining circulation, declining advertising, and declining advertising rates have left the industry starved for revenue. For those companies lucky enough to have sizable war chests and minimal leverage, living off their reserves is an option. But even they will be forced to face reality soon enough; like a polar bear lost at sea, his fat reserves can only last so long. For others, the threat is more immediate, and they are being forced to make decisions much more quickly.

At this point, I lead the reader to "The Newspaper Suicide Pact" (by xark!, via boingboing), where the author does a good job summarizing the option that the newspaper industry is about to take: Failure.

I could write a whole essay exploring the reasons why people (and organizations) choose to fail, but that juicy topic I will save for another post. Instead, I will explore the failure of media in the past, with an eye towards what a failed newspaper industry may look like in the future.

I choose the word "failed", but what I really wish to convey is "severely declined", to the point where the industry is hardly recognizable. Let us look to another "failed" medium: Live Theatre. Today it is largely relegated to high-end, high-dollar performances (Broadway) and locally-funded, volunteer-supported efforts (community theatre). Once, theatre was a lively, profitable, and common endeavor. Every city that could support a theatre had one; larger cities may have had multiple theatres in operation simultaneously. What killed live theatre?

To answer this question, we must look at the function that live theatre served: Entertainment. It told stories, provided a place of gathering and common experience, it helped people explore and live lives they could not otherwise experience. What other media provided these things? Books, which lived concurrently with live theatre, could only be enjoyed by those who were literate and whose imaginations contained an expansive-enough palette to color the words on the page. Theatre served a different audience: One that preferred its art already painted.

Movies, unlike books, could provide an experience much like live theatre, but at significantly reduced cost. While the production of a movie might entail higher initial costs (cameras, film, editing, etc.) than a live performance, a live performance required much the same costs to run every night and would quickly become much more expensive than a movie. Simple economics took over from here: If a person could receive his entertainment in much the same manner from a less expensive medium, why continue to go to the old, more expensive medium?

It would follow that theatre should have died out entirely, but it persists to this day. While movies provide an experience very similar to theatre, the experience is still somewhat different. There exist to this day a minority of people who possess the desire, means, and geographic concentration to support the continued existence of theatre. In large cities, theatre is supported by a combination of private and public donation, along with ticket prices well in excess of a comparable movie. The experience to these philanthropists and connoisseurs is worth the expense. In smaller cities and towns, community theatres are alive and well, presenting shows that, while not of the same quality (though this point is endlessly arguable) of their big-city companions, provide their audiences with the unique texture of a live performance. These, too, are funded by a combination of charity, philanthropy, and volunteerism.

I suggest that newspapers will follow a similar trajectory. Online and television news are quickly supplanting newspapers, as both are able to provide substitutable content at a lower price. Newspapers will never be able to compete on a large scale with "free" internet news, "free" broadcast news, and negligible-cost cable news. However, there is a certain texture that newspapers add to the news that these media will never be able to replicate. In cities of sufficient size to support them (and for publications with sufficient reach beyond their geography), newspapers will live on. They will not be the profitable enterprises of yesteryear, nor the ubiquitous part of everyday life that they have been for nearly a century, but dedicated aficionados will continue to demand their news, on newspaper. They will be willing to pay a premium for this luxury, even to the point of starting foundations for their local newspapers. Newspapers will live on, but as (mostly) non-profit organizations founded and funded through philanthropy, charity, and volunteerism.

The quicker the newspaper industry recognizes this reality and adopts its structure accordingly, the likelier it is to find success. The longer the newspaper industry puts off the inevitable, the fewer the institutions that will survive. The changes will be tough: Shareholders and other equity stakeholders will need to accept that a charitable deduction is worth more than a bankrupt note; well-paid editorial boards, luxury offices, and expensive perks will have to give way to the more modest realities of non-profits; and the new leaders of these companies will have to seek out volunteers and donors with the same fervor they once pursued advertising contracts. Ironically, these new newspapers will have to find ways to license their content from the very online and televised news companies that will supplant them. These realities may seem unconscionable, but they are rooted in history. For all of us who enjoy holding an easily-smugged, foldable, roll-able, recyclable bit of paper in our hands every morning, here's to hoping the industry will accept its fate before it dies out completely.

FUNemployment Even Higher Than Predicted!

2009-06-05T16:10:00.001-07:00

In case you missed LAT's great article on funemployment, you must read it first. Being part of the funderemployed, myself, I must say it's not nearly as much fun as LAT would have you believe. Sure, the beach is great, but it takes ga$ to get there and $un$creen and bottle$ of water and...you get the point.

Some of you will remember that Obama pitched the spendulus with a little graphic that projected unemployment figures with and without the bill passing. Well, the numbers were just plain scary without the spendulus. Ace contributor geoff noticed that something was a little off back in April, and now he's updated the numbers for May.

Here's the graphic in case you got confused by the linkfest:

OK, so we can say a couple of things about this: (1) It's worse than the worst-case scenario that Obama's planned for, (2) the spendulus hasn't done anything, which really isn't surprising since most of the spendulus money won't be spent for another couple of years, and (3) it looks to me like the rate of jobless claims is accelerating, not decelerating (as has been claimed elsewhere), though this could be some second derivative thingy or I'm just not looking at the graph right.

UPDATED: When Pro-Lifers Turn Anti-Abortion

2009-06-03T17:09:00.000-07:00

UPDATE

Turns out that this is one angry fellow. Oh, and threatening continued violence in the name of a "Pro-Life" cause stopped being humorously ironic the second the first bomb was placed outside an abortion clinic. Sickening.

ORIGINAL POST
I figured this topic had already been covered thoroughly, until Charles posted this on LGF:

A so-called “Christian” blogger compares suspected murderer Scott Roeder to Dietrich Bonhoeffer — the man who attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler — and suggests that murder might be an appropriate way to deal with doctors who perform abortions: The ethics of murder.

Bonhoeffer's actions are interesting from both a philosophical and ethical perspective, but I do not wish to discuss this now. Rather, I intend to show how Bonhoeffer's actions were materially different from those of Scott Roeder, and how that difference is relevent to the ethical discussion of Roeder's actions.

Let us contrast the differences between Bonhoeffer's and Roeder's respective nemesises. Hitler was an autocrat who controlled even the minutest of details within his government; Dr. Tiller was a front-line clinician whose activities were restricted by the government to whom he was subject. Clearly, killing Hitler would have had great impact in Germany, as it would have eliminated a key decision maker controlling public policy and directing public practice. Hitler ordered the murder of Jews, invalids, homosexuals, and a host of other groups he did not care for. While it is true that Dr. Tiller was responsible for the performing of abortions (murders, if you will), his actions and culpability for his actions are better likened to that of a staff officer of the SS. Certainly not a reputable figure, but not someone in a position to effect changes in policy.

We hold Hitler responsible for the murder of some six million, yet I have never once seen any evidence that shows that Hitler, himself, pulled the trigger of a gun or turned the valve leading to a gas chamber. Why? Hitler was responsible for the policies that led to the murders, hence we hold him accountable for the entirety of the slaughter. Bonhoeffer, it could be argued, may have had a reasonable expectation that killing Hitler would end the horrors of the concentration camps. Though unlikely, there was a fleeting chance that it could have occurred. Not so with Dr. Tiller. His murder will likely have no effect on the number of abortions performed in the United States or around the world, a fact of which Roeder was most certainly aware.

If anyone should want to compare Roeder in favorable terms to those throughout history who sought to right injustices through violence, let them compare him to those he his comparable to: The killer of an SS guard. We may find upon such comparison that there is no comparison, but speaking of Roeder next to Bonhoeffer distorts historical significance. It is my guess that Roeder will not be looked upon favorably by history, if we bother to remember him at all.

Where the comparison to Bonhoeffer becomes material is in their (publicly-avowed) personal beliefs: Bonhoeffer had lived as an ardent pacifist before becoming entangled in the plot to kill Hitler. Roeder, as has been mentioned unceasingly since Dr. Tiller's murder--even before anyone knew Roeder's name or the veracity of the claim, believed abortion to be murder. The turning of a pacifist into a conspirator to murder would seem on par with a Pro-Lifer committing murder. Here, I believe, it is worth returning to the scale and scope of the intended targets. Bonhoeffer had reason to believe that his actions would effect wholesale change in Germany--it could even be argued that his actions were not out of a hatred of Hitler but a love of Germany. Roeder could not have believed that killing Dr. Tiller would have effected wholesale change in the abortion industry in America; his actions, it appears, were done out of a hatred for Dr. Tiller (and others like him) specifically, and not a love of life.

And I will conclude with this, my title: When pro-lifers turn anti-abortion, they have lost the plot. If the crusade is about upholding the sanctity of life, then the crusaders must themselves uphold the sanctity of life in their words and their deeds. Roeder and his intellectual ilk must be castigated from the pro-life movement, lest the movement cease to have any meaning. Pro-lifers must categorically condemn Roeder's actions. There can be no room for budging, no "we think he did wrong but we're glad Tiller's dead." We must remember that we are in America, not Nazi Germany, and we have the liberty and capacity to effect wholesale changes in American law without violence. Pro-lifers, I implore you: Do not become anti-abortionists.

Condemnation for Tiller's Murderer, What of a Soldier's?

2009-06-03T16:54:00.000-07:00

I have already opined on Tiller's hate-filled murderer, but what of another hate-filled murderer? The circumstances are quite similar: Both murders acted out of religious conviction, seeking to destroy members of an institution they believed to be murderous itself, acted unexpectedly and in plain sight, and likely had multiple targets in mind. (Background reading here.) Yet one (Tiller) receives an outpouring of media sympathy and castigation for persons who hold similar beliefs, while the other hardly makes a blip.

Both events warrant our attention, and both should galvanize decent, thinking people together in denouncing extremist murders (and their aiders and abettors) in our midst.

I am, of course, referring to the murder of one of our soldiers, Private William Long, and the maiming of another, Private Quinton Ezeagwula, by Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad. I could, and would, go on, but the painful discrepancy between media coverage has already been well expounded on:

Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic: "Why the shyness? Why not tell people what is actually happening in the world?"
Michelle Malkin: "When a right-wing Christian vigilante kills, millions of fingers pull the trigger. When a left-wing Muslim vigilante kills, he kills alone."
DrewM at Ace of Spades: "If only there had been an abortion clinic on [Muhammad's] list, then maybe the press and Obama would be interested."

Worst of all (and already mentioned by Malkin) is the complete lack of a response by the Obama Administration, who where quick to respond to Dr. Tiller's murder.

President Obama: Your silence is deafening.

Heart Palpitations: Hugo the Horrible & I Agree!

2009-06-03T14:52:00.000-07:00

I never thought I would live to see the day, but Mr. Chavez and I agree on at least one point. Said during a lecture on capitalism (frequent occurrence in Venezuela, they're exhaustively educated by Mr. Chavez):

"Hey, Obama has just nationalized nothing more and nothing less than General Motors. Comrade Obama! Fidel, careful or we are going to end up to his right."

Well said, Mr. Chavez, well said. Now, I must go and cry a little more, because you have re-opened the wound inflicted on me by Pravda the other day.

Original link: http://www.reuters.com/article/ObamaEconomy/idUSTRE5520GX20090603?feedType=RSS&feedName=ObamaEconomy&virtualBrandChannel=10441

What does it mean to be Muslim?

2009-06-01T15:00:00.000-07:00

I do not like broad generalizations, because they do a poor job of characterizing individuals. That said, broad generalizations are quite useful when talking about a group, especially if they tend to be accurate enough to make meaningful predictions about the group.

Okey, dokey. Now that the disclaimer is out of the way, let's get to the interesting bit: Jawa notices a great comment made by a Muslim in Britain, then goes on to provide some excellent analysis. Read it; I'll wait. Done? For the lazy among you, here's the quick synopsis:

Britain has been enjoying some less than enthusiastic support of its war efforts in Iraq and elsewhere.
Some Muslims have made their displeasure known through violent protest
This has created a conversation within the Muslim community in Britain, where at least one individual gets the idea that:
Muslims are guests in the mainland of Britain, and should respect their laws and government
Jawa notes that there is a problem with this argument: That British Muslims are Brits, too

Now the question, "What does it mean to be Muslim?" Jawa goes on to posit that being a Muslim, for many, means that "the Ummah is your nation, Muslim is your nationality." If this is indeed how many Muslims view themselves, they have chosen to make themselves a group that is incapable of assimilation into their host society. While having a diversity of backgrounds may add to the richness of the flavor of a society, assimilation of identity (I am an American, not a German-American, and not a German) is crucial to the continued well-being of that society. Jawa says it better, and I will show the full context of the quote here (italics original):

If one begins [with] the premise that the Ummah is your nation, Muslim is your nationality, and that the place and the people you reside with are aliens then you are one step closer to supporting violence against your fellow countrymen. If sociology has taught us one thing it is that people are much less likely to commit acts of violence against other people of the same "tribe".

So, again I ask, "What does it mean to be Muslim?" If Jawa's take is correct for a majority of Muslims (or a majority of any other group, for that matter), then it follows that any country that desires peace within its borders should seriously review its immigration policy with an eye toward this knowledge. I do not know that this definition is characteristic of Muslims in general, nor of any other group. I do, however, know that this definition is one that is incompatible with living peaceably in a Western nation. No group can live peaceably in another nation if it forever sees itself as being not a part of that nation.

For a different, positive, perspective I look to India. Within the nation of India exist Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs. Within India government are individuals from each of these religions and surely some atheists, too. How do they co-exist peaceably? Simple. When it comes to matters of state, they are Indian. When it comes to matters of personal belief, practice, and heritage, they follow their respective religions. This is a model that we in the West should seek to emulate--that each immigrant is welcome to his beliefs, but that allegiance must be pledged to the state of residence, not a far-off land.

(To further my point, and to deflect any misinterpretation of my comments to mean that I wish to see no immigrants in America, I must tell you how I know anything at all about India. I have a dear friend who was born there and keeps close ties with India. He now lives in America and is a citizen. Without his knowledge and experience that he shared with me, one American to another, I would not have the background to write such an opinion. It is a beautiful thing when one person comes to another country and loves it so much that he chooses to become a citizen of it. It is not a beautiful thing when a person comes to a country, uses what he finds useful in it, but hates it in his heart.)

Moving to Russia...

2009-05-31T15:20:00.001-07:00

Any Soviet Ex-Pats out there willing to lend their linguistic knowledge to prepare me for my journey? You may want to brush up on your Russian, anyway. It seems we'll both have to head there soon, and for precisely the same reason you left your motherland in the first place.

From (I cannot even believe I'm about to say this) Pravda:
http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/107459-0/

Seriously. Read. The. Whole. Thing. Every last word of it. I'm going to go make myself a Vodka martini, now.

Murderous Crank Murdered by Murderous Crank

2009-05-31T14:07:00.001-07:00

This one's already made the rounds, but I believe that these acts can never be denounced loudly nor often enough. While Dr. Tiller practiced a form of abortion so controversial that his was one of only three clinics known to do so, nothing can justify the callous, cowardly, and overwhelmingly hypocritical act committed today.

If the murderer believed that he was acting as a righteous vigilante, he should be ashamed by the manner in which he committed his act. A Church, a place of repentance and forgiveness, a place where they read from The Book that says, "let he who is without sin cast the first stone," and the house of worship for He who is without sin, Who has chosen to allow any and all who are willing to confess and be saved. This murderer also committed his act before a congregation, likely including children, and before Dr. Tiller's wife. Even if the murderer believed that he was killing for the sake of good, his inclusion of these innocents chills my bones.

This murderer, though, knew exactly what he was doing. He knew that he was committing a grave sin--one that he would be held to account for here on Earth. Why else would he run? If he saw himself a hero, he would have stayed boldly, in the light of day, and proclaimed proudly his righteous deed. But he fled, to the shadows, where sin and agony lurk. This man knew his vendetta was an evil one.

If this man believed that life, even as yet unborn, is sacred, he would never have murdered Dr. Tiller. However, our society and our rules of law permit killing in a handful of circumstances--each hotly debated. Collecting the most liberal of these laws throughout the country, we can list them in two categories--laws that apply to individuals and laws that apply to government. For the sake of argument, lets explore and see if this man in any way acted lawfully:

Individuals
Self Defense
Physician-Assisted Suicide
Cessation of Life-Supporting Treatment
Abortion

Government
Death Penalty
Police Self-Defense
Military Operations

Many people object morally to some or even all of these sanctioned types of killing. But for a starting point of discussion, let us explore the matter as though all (with the exception of Abortion, lest we lose our antagonist) were morally acceptable. The man was clearly not acting under government orders, removing three of our choices. By all accounts, Dr. Tiller was healthy before his encounter with our would-be hero, ruling out all but self-defense. Here it would be simplistic to say that the act could not have been one of self-defense, because Dr. Tiller posed no immediate danger to the gunman.

But let us tease this out just a little further. "Self-defense" may well mean defending others: If a convenience store clerk has just been robbed and is about to be killed by his assailants, a stranger killing his attackers to save the clerk is normally considered a her. Think how many unborn lives our gunman has saved by killing their would-be attacker!

Now it is time for our straw man to be batted down. I see three meaningful arguments that should dash the heroics right out of our gunman. In the case of the store clerk, the threat was imminent, illegal under the law, and there were no other viable options present to save the clerk. By comparison, Dr. Tiller's threat to the unborn was not imminent, not illegal, and a host of other viable options were still available. Imminence is of utmost importance to proving a claim of defense; this point merges with the third, as having time allows for more persons and entities to become involved. Dr. Tiller was ushering at a Church, not ushering a woman to the nearest back alley, coathanger in hand. Legality will always be relevant--no matter that what is legal may not be moral. Had the assailant of our clerk been assailing him with dirty words, no matter how degrading or uncouth, no one would look to the gunman as a hero for ending the assailant's tirade with a bullet. No matter how vile, evil, or otherwise unsavory Dr. Tiller's profession, it remains a legal one. The most damning point, however, is the last: There remain many other alternatives. Protests, demonstrations, electing officials who will write and vote on legislation, rhetorical persuasion...the list of other, viable, legal, non-lethal solutions goes on.

The gunman has now joined the ranks of the many evil, cowardly men who have killed in the name of righteousness, but who really killed out of hatred, spite, and malice. Ted Kazynsky believed he was doing good by trying to destroy the world--a world he loathed and hated with all his being. Timothy McVeigh believed he was doing good by destroying an instrument he thought evil--an instrument he loathed and hated. The 9/11 hijackers believed they were doing good by trying to overthrow the "Great Satan" of the United States--a country they loathed and hated. And so, we find a man, who killed another man, whom he must have loathed and hated. We shall call him a murder. We shall denounce him and his work as evil. And we shall grieve for the blood that was spilled, for the lives shattered and ruined, and for the widow of Dr. Tiller.

Mrs. Tiller, my prayers are with you and your family right now.

Daily WTF: Weird Psych

2009-05-19T08:19:00.000-07:00

Surprised no one bothered to mention the "mass hysteria" or "social acceptability" elements in the weird hum article. It's gotta be teh technologies abouts to take us teh over!!! It's teh enddd oftha w0rlds!!!

The Forgotten Actor: India is part of the Pakistani drama, too

2009-05-19T07:31:00.000-07:00

I have often brought up the topic of India when discussing Pakistan (how can you not!?!, but I digress), and this article has a nice, succinct overview of the current situation in South-Central Asia. India is a name that should be on the radar of anyone with any familiarity with the region and its history, but due to an acute lack of geopolitical awareness by the American news media, no one is talking about it. This article does a splendid job of both bringing the reader up to speed on the situation, while also introducing me to another lens to view the map through: WWI.

I hadn't considered that the fall of Pakistan could be likened to WWI, but the analogy seems quite fitting. The key elements of WWI seem to have been an overwhelming sense of instability within Europe, centuries-old conflicts left under-resolved creating a sense of bitterness between adversaries, frightening and grisly new technology never deployed before on a battlefield, and a single small event was all it took to set off the tinderbox. Startlingly, the only element that is different is the tinderbox catching fire; though this is not for want of matches being thrown on it. Viewed from the perspective of this analogy, it is amazing the restraint that has been shown so far on the part of India: The assassination of Bhutto could well have been the tipping point. However, India restrained itself, even as a nuclear-armed Pakistan went (temporarily) without a leader. The Mumbai attacks, also, could have been a tipping point. Thankfully, they weren't.

I suspect (as does the editorialist) that if India believes a Taliban-lead overthrow of the government in Pakistan is imminent, they will make war. That we in the West have not bothered to discuss this with any degree of seriousness may turn out to be a terribly unfortunate decision for the region. India is well within its rights to attack regions of Pakistan right now, even if we were to apply the onerous burdens of justification self-imposed by America on herself to their situation. There is a clear and immediate danger posed to the nation of India by elements within Pakistan that are uncontrolled by the present government. Moreover, the US Military has a plan for "dealing" with Pakistan's nuclear arms, should the country fall, and there has been no formal talk of coordination with other regional players (India). This poses the very real possibility of American servicemen being on the ground in Pakistan when India begins their self-defensive strike. Imagine what would happen if American servicemen were killed by Indian soldiers--this could present a young and inexperienced statesman with a situation where he felt compelled to make war with India. We now have our WWI scenario playing out--bloodily.

I pray that this is not the case. I pray that I have just missed mention of this, or that India and the US Military are speaking quietly with one another. We have perfectly aligned short-term objectives in this particular case: Neither country will benefit from an unstable Pakistan and everyone should be deathly afraid of nuclear material going unaccounted for. Coordinating the effort would also offer meaningful benefits to both the US and India.

In the short-term, fewer US soldiers would be required to secure Pakistan if India were party to the operation. The US Military is already strained for want of servicemen--anything that could provide the US with more operational materiel is worthy of consideration if they are to take on a new commitment. Secondarily, fighting with a common cause would do much to bring the US and India closer together. This would help build trust between the two countries (something that is currently in too short a supply) and could aid both the US and India in achieving their regional goals.

Both parties would also, eventually, realize the secondary economic benefit of an increase in trust between countries: a vast increase in trade. Every country that the US has friendly trade relations with has benefited greatly from the arrangement, as has the US in return. Given India's population, it could easily represent a second China for the US, and India would be wise to position itself to enjoy the same benefits China has from its trade with the US. (Military operations coordinated for economic benefit seem unfathomably unethical, but this argument is more about seeing the long-term benefits of a friendly alliance that is grounded in strategic reality than the other way around.) Here's to hoping that we have both a new ally and not another World War.

Mid-East Roundup

2009-05-13T19:45:00.000-07:00

I almost love the Middle East, if for no other reason than the entertainment value. When you live in a region whose individual liberties laws and treatment of women make most of Africa look progressive by comparison, well, that's just sad. Here we go:

"Egyptian court 'bans porn sites.'" (1) The geek in me says, "if China can't ban dissent, how is Egypt going to ban steamy goat..." (2) Even assuming they can do it, is it really going to help the "degradation" of culture? More specifically, if there is the desire to view illicit material, is that not truly the sin itself? In Christian culture, the desire to do evil is considered a manifestation of the evil parts of oneself; the act of submitting that desire to what is believed to be good is an act of submission to God. If Islam means "submission to God," then how does removing opportunities for submission help one be more submissive? Eh, too late to think this one all the way through...

Just in case you were disillusioned and thought that the folks to the East of Iraq were living in blissful harmony...here's the trailer for "The Stoning of Soraya." Via The Jawa Report.

And finally (a little late, but still worth a nod): Saudi Judge OKs Slapping of Wife for Overspending. Oh, so, so much that is wrong with this. Shall we start with the blatant misogyny? Or the domestic violence is OK if it's "justified"? Or how 'bout violence solves all our problems? Disgusting. Just disgusting.

Money Roundup

2009-05-13T18:26:00.000-07:00

So the old school of economic thought said, "hey, if economic times are good, the marginal benefit of being a crook will decrease. Look out for bad times, because more people will turn back to crime." Not to sound the alarm early, but it looks like this is at least not the case in NYC. Via Freakonomics.

Read this, if for no other reason than it's title: "Darth Greenspan." Actually, you really should read it for its insight into our current situation. It quotes a young Alan Greenspan as saying,

"In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation."

Which should give pause to anyone familiar with (and negatively affected by) his inflationary tendencies. Is a gold standard a plausible reality? Probably not (anymore), but it makes one think...

Because it's possible to sell something without marketing it... No, really, it is! I tried selling CUTCO knives one summer (please, if you are reading this and thinking of doing it, please, don't!!!) and I did sell some. Without marketing. Because I stunk at marketing. Basically, what I'm saying is, my mom bought some. So, yeah; Chrysler can sell lots of cars without marketing...to their mom.

More good times (no pun intended*) from Freakonoics: "Let's avoid other New Deal Policy Blunders." The title says it all. *Freakonomics is a NY Times blog. Get it? Ha, ha, yeah, not that funny.

Because there are gas stations that don't already do this. It used to be that it was normal to offer discounts to buyers who had cash. Then most companies realized that it saved more time than it was worth to just swipe a card... Really, let people make their own decisions (businesses, too!). Eventually, the training wheels have to come off the bike...

Does this really have anything to do with money? Probably not (oh, wait, the money that Las Vegas lost due to executives being scared of a public outing for "wasting" their company's dollars on an extravagant stay in Vegas), but just as well, I'll include it anyway.

No Kidding Moment of the Day

2009-05-13T18:12:00.000-07:00

From the Department of You-Can't-Have-Your-Cake-and-Eat-It-Too, comes this tidy little post called, well, "You Can't Have Your Cake And Eat It, Too"

One of the core tenants tenets of capitalism is that risk and reward are related. The reason equities have done better than CDs historically is that they are riskier (move up and down a lot more).

Without the risk, they would behave like CDs.

If they behaved like CDs, they would pay like CDs.

Problems arise when you decide that you want (or need) the REWARD of owning equities without the RISK.

Click on through to the rest of the post. It's a short read on a great site. Go and check out the rest of BehaviorGap's material. Always insightful posts.

Government Spending Alert

2009-05-13T18:07:00.000-07:00

Looks like somebody had a bad experience with a drunk hooker in Guangxi...

The National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAA), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), will pay $2.6 million in U.S. tax dollars to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly on the job.

Is there really any other interpretation?

Via CNSnews

Cool Tech of the Day

2009-05-12T19:26:00.001-07:00

Giant water cannon sticking out the side of a car? Sounds like a _blast_! Jalopnik-Ford Engineers Strap Giant Water Cannon to Volvo

Good News & Bad News from the Middle East

2009-05-12T19:08:00.000-07:00

First the good news. Iran finally frees US journalist Roxana Saberi. Not that I suspect any kind of meaningful change is coming to Iran (bless those still held in captivity!), but this is a noteworthy development in a case that didn't receive nearly enough press. (H/t: LittleGreenFootballs)

Now, the bad: In a (sadly) unsurprising ruling, a Saudi judge has ruled that it is OK to slap a wife for spending "lavishly." This is wrong on so many levels, but let's dissect this anyway. Starting with domestic violence seems like as good a spot as any, but beneath the DV, I see there's something else quite sinister there, as well. The ruling suggests that a woman is incapable of listening to reason. People use loud noises to train a dog that something is bad, not because loud noises are an ideal method of communication, but because there's no way to reason with a dog to understand not to do that on the carpet. This goes beyond misogyny--the ruling places women on the same level as mute beasts. I am not quite sure how to comment on the "spending lavishly" bit--there are quite a few Saudi men known to spend lavishly without fear of receiving a slapping from their mullah. So why does this standard apply to women? I fear it doesn't--at least not to all women--it is a standard applied by a particular husband to his particular wife. And if someone were to view all wives as property of their respective husbands, then why not let the husbands hold their wives accountable to whatever standards they see fit? Disgusting.

Good Company != Good Politics

2009-05-12T18:46:00.000-07:00

So, I read this Letter of Amends from a Recovering Liberal in Berkeley. Normally, I would have just jumped and cheered that someone has finally seen the light. Except, I happen to be in a particularly introspective mood today, and something just didn't sit right with me.

So, I read the letter again. It only took a moment for it to hit me: This is no conversion of ideology, this is a conversion of "I feel better, here." Now, this doesn't mean that the author hasn't had a true ideological conversion, but the letter focused exclusively on "conservatives are nice people," not "conservative ideology is right." (No pun intended.)

Spending time with people because they are "nice" is a good idea--at the very least, it's preferable to spending time with "mean" people. I know many "nice" liberals, and I enjoy my time with them. I will not be persuaded to be a liberal, conservative, moderate, or otherwise simply by the company it would allow me to keep.

I can imagine that enduring events like the author recounts would certainly be cause for reconsidering one's affiliations, but why not take the simpler route and find some nice liberals to go play with?

Thoughts? (Other than the snark, "but if you hadn't have 'felt' something funny, you wouldn't have posted this in the first place." Yeah, I know, that's not totally "rational" of me, but wouldn't it be irrational to not question something after having a disquieted feeling about it?)

Why be skeptical?

2009-05-12T18:34:00.000-07:00

Really, why be skeptical? It's so much more fun to believe every claim of alien abduction, reading minds, etc. What's the fun in a rational world, anyway?

Oh, right. Turns out that it is awful fun(ny) to watch people try to verify their claims against rigorous scrutiny.

Not that I don't believe there are things out there that we can't explain, just that, more often than not, the simplest explanation turns out to be the right one. If there weren't phenomena to be discovered or explained, what would be the point of science?

H/t: Bad Astronomy

Let me fix that for you...

2009-05-12T16:52:00.000-07:00

Via BoingBoing, "Toilet snake bites man's ~~penis~~ snake."

Beautiful IR Image of the Shuttle Launch

2009-05-12T13:42:00.000-07:00

I barely was able to see it through the clouds. Still beautiful, no matter how many times I see it. Here's another perspective (h/t Bad Astronomy, full image can be see at Gawker.)

Living Free: How much does where you live matter?

2009-05-12T13:09:00.000-07:00

First, the link to the study that begat the idea for this post.

All done? Or did you get scared away by the link going to Newsmax? Either way, here's the synopsis: On the whole, "conservative" states are freer to live in than "liberal" ones. (When one is less free in a "liberal" state, we have ceased using the word properly.) The "freest" states: New Hampshire, South Dakota, and Colorado. Least: New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island.

The metrics they use to determine a state's relative freedom include personal liberties, unobtrusive government, etc.

My first response was, "New Hampshire, eck!, too cold. South Dakota? Even worse. Colorado? Well, at least the skiing is good there..." You will have to pardon my snap judgments, I am a Florida boy, and anything south of 60'F qualifies as cold. (Or is it north? Nevermind. Hemispherical bias.) But it does beg the question, is it best to live in a "free" state?

Discuss.

2009-05-12T12:51:00.000-07:00

Science is to geekery as needles are to crocheting (or something like that, y'all do use needles, right?). Geeks cannot exist without science constantly giving us cool new toys and ideas to play with. That's why I hope you will enjoy one of our friends at Arstechnica waxing lyrical about microscopy:

I love microscopes. Telescopes are cool and all, but they tend to sit on top of cold, windy mountains, and no one really looks into an eyepiece anymore. Microscopes sit right on the bench-top in front of you, and everyone still has a peak through the eyepiece to make sure all is well in the world of imaging. Then, once the lasers and computers have done their thing, pretty pictures emerge, along with (hopefully) some irresistible new knowledge about a highly contagious and dangerous bug. You get to combine pretty pictures, science, and life-threatening dangers in one perfect moment.

Follow the link on and enjoy the whole post. If your head starts to hurt before you can finish, the quick summary is: We know a new way to explore the world of the really small.

Geeky Moment

2009-05-12T12:16:00.000-07:00

The saddest part about seeing this post? My first thought wasn't, "ROFLMAO who would be caught dead wearing that!?" No, this little geek said, "wow, those would come in really handy the next time I get stuck deploying a bunch of computers." No more wires hanging round the back of the computer, no more keyboards stuck on top of beige boxes, just blissful work.

The saddest part? I already had a design change in mind: wireless.

Somebody help me!

A great excuse to buy a great car...

2009-05-12T08:12:00.000-07:00

I've never been a heavy sleeper. My mother is always too happy to trot out stories of my epic insomnia as a baby. She would spend whole nights crib-side, trying to unwind the ball of perpetual energy that was my infant body. One day, while my grandmother was visiting, she commented in exasperation, "I thought babies were supposed to sleep all the time!" Her mother, "They are!"

The only reliable way for her to get me to take a real nap (and give herself some much needed quiet) was to load me into the carseat of her early-80s 280-Z. And drive. We lived outside New Orleans at the time, and she regularly took me across the Mississippi border in her quest for respite. It worked like a charm. Even then, I could appreciate the muted roar of that straight six. I still have trouble forgiving her for trading it in for a Volvo DL to accommodate my baby sister. (In her defense, she tried to design a way to strap a car-seat to the cargo floor of the hatchback. Bless her heart!)

So it comes as no surprise to hear that Nissan is still building engines that future car enthusiasts can sublimely appreciate from birth:

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/jalopnik/full/~3/TJh93Jli0jc/how-to-put-your-kids-to-sleep-with-a-nissan-350z

Enjoy!

Just Who Do You Belong To?

2008-10-23T09:18:00.002-07:00

Interesting question posed on Boortz's website today:

"JUST WHO DO YOU BELONG TO?

Sounds like an odd question, doesn't it? But have you ever actually thought for a moment about who has ownership rights to you? This is no silly or meaningless exercise here. You exist. You have value. That value belongs to someone. The question is who? This is an important question in this election because there are quite a lot of people out there who earnestly believe that you belong not to yourself, but to the government. For the first time in my memory we have a presidential candidate who wants to raise taxes on a few not so much to cover the costs of the essential functions of government, but to bring about some sense of what he calls "fairness" in the distribution of wealth. This would mean that in the eyes of this particular presidential candidate (I would mention his name, but that would be racist.) the government owns a portion of you; a portion to be used by the government to enrich the lives of others in the quest for economic "fairness."

Let me know how this works out for you."

Definitely something I'll be responding to.