Notes and observations. Diversions and digressions. All done far too infrequently.
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Ah yes, Walt Whitman, that free trader was no Lou Dobbs Democrat
Not everyone loves the New York Times; we can see why
If Ms. Heaton has made her surgery fair game, her political views are not so easily pigeonholed. Some derive from the “seamless garment” doctrine of her “devout Catholic upbringing” (she opposes both abortion and the death penalty) while others are clearly her own. (She supports gay rights and the use of most birth control.) And she is not, in person, prudish or judgmental. Most of her friends have had abortions, she said, and they’re still her friends.You have to laugh at boycotting liberals. As a group they really are rather vile.
It isn’t so much her views that cause her trouble as her unwillingness to finesse them for public consumption. She is compulsively honest, though she feels that’s not so much a virtue as “an illness, like Tourette’s.” Even her more extreme positions are stated without hedging: If it were up to her, she said, there would be no abortion for any reason. But she offers such thoughts with a sense of helplessness, as if she were trapped by the implications of her core principles.
And then there is her un-wingnutlike desire for conciliation. As soon as she realized what had happened, she sent Mr. Fox a message saying that she was sorry and that she prayed for his recovery. He responded graciously (the amendment passed with 51 percent of the vote) and later said, “If we can have a healthy dialogue about issues that people see differently, that’s marvelous.”
That’s a big if. Most of the dialogue, Ms. Heaton said, has been brutal: “People saying they hope my kids get sick and die so I’ll know what it’s like to need medical research.” Colleagues have attacked her at industry functions; gossips claiming to know her have described her as a horrible person. A theater Web site recently ran a discussion thread on boycotting “The Scene.” And castmates have told Ms. Heaton that their friends were saying things like: “You’re working with her? You know what her thing is, right?”
Brain waves
“Listen to this,” Daniel Levitin said. “What is it?” He hit a button on his computer keyboard and out came a half-second clip of music. It was just two notes blasted on a raspy electric guitar, but I could immediately identify it: the opening lick to the Rolling Stones’ “Brown Sugar.”Revealing all the mysteries of life sometimes eats away at the soul.
Then he played another, even shorter snippet: a single chord struck once on piano. Again I could instantly figure out what it was: the first note in Elton John’s live version of “Benny and the Jets.”
Dr. Levitin beamed. “You hear only one note, and you already know who it is,” he said. “So what I want to know is: How we do this? Why are we so good at recognizing music?”
This is not merely some whoa-dude epiphany that a music fan might have while listening to a radio contest. Dr. Levitin has devoted his career to exploring this question. He is a cognitive psychologist who runs the Laboratory for Music Perception, Cognition and Expertise at McGill University in Montreal, perhaps the world’s leading lab in probing why music has such an intense effect on us.
“By the age of 5 we are all musical experts, so this stuff is clearly wired really deeply into us,” said Dr. Levitin, an eerily youthful-looking 49, surrounded by the pianos, guitars and enormous 16-track mixers that make his lab look more like a recording studio.
This summer he published “This Is Your Brain on Music” (Dutton), a layperson’s guide to the emerging neuroscience of music. Dr. Levitin is an unusually deft interpreter, full of striking scientific trivia. For example we learn that babies begin life with synesthesia, the trippy confusion that makes people experience sounds as smells or tastes as colors. Or that the cerebellum, a part of the brain that helps govern movement, is also wired to the ears and produces some of our emotional responses to music. His experiments have even suggested that watching a musician perform affects brain chemistry differently from listening to a recording.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Sweden the Model? Perhaps not
Sweden is not all that it's crack up to be. Not a terrible economic basket case, at least not yet. In fact it's welfare state model, built mostly for a uni-cultural society, works a lot better than the French or German one. Sweden encourages people to get back into the work force a lot quicker than the continentals. However, there are some underlying problems.
How Sweden handles increased internation competition as it moves to a more multicultural society is an experiment worth watching.The political left has for many years portrayed Sweden as the ideal liberal experiment; a nation that has maintained a vital market economy alongside a large welfare state. Many Americans and Europeans alike seem to see our system as a proof that you can achieve full employment despite rigid labor markets, and very high labor discouraging taxes and benefits.
In reality, Sweden has considerable economic problems as its population has adjusted to the many years with welfare politics and is increasingly taking advantage of government programs. High taxation, extensive regulations and comprehensive systems of government handouts discourages individuals from work and have resulted in a drop in entrepreneurship and working ethics. The best estimates of true unemployment figures for Sweden are somewhere around 20 percent, almost four times higher than the more flexible U.S. economy. Note here that discouraged workers and those who are underemployed are not included in either country, but that the figures are again higher in Sweden than in the United States.
The problems with high unemployment, low working morals, lack of entrepreneurship and dependence on government programs are not unique for Sweden, but shared with other European welfare states such as France and Germany. In all three countries, voters are dissatisfied with the ruling political parties, but as many are dependent on government handouts, few are willing to accept reforms that scale down the size of government benefits.
Somebody doesn't like Geico
Meanwhile, in Massachusetts about a third of the state's drivers won't be able to benefit from the new and lower mandated rates.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Always worth reading: R. Samuelson
WASHINGTON -- Consider it a good omen. In October, the U.S. trade deficit dropped unexpectedly to $58.9 billion, about $5.4 billion less than in September. Although the largest cause was lower oil prices, strong American exports -- up 14 percent from a year earlier -- also contributed significantly. And that's exactly what the economy needs in 2007: an export surge. It would ward off recession and narrow today's dangerously large global trade imbalances. We need what economists call a "rebalancing'' of our economy and the world's.
This should be more noteworthy
Fannie Mae's stock price has been on an upswing since late summer, reflecting investor confidence that a Democratic Congress would make strict scrutiny of the mortgage giant less likely (see the nearby chart). And there's no doubt that with Barney Frank wielding the gavel in the House Financial Services Committee, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will have a pal on Capitol Hill. Mr. Frank is already talking about expanding the companies' operations (and thus taxpayer exposure to any financial accident).
Fortunately, James Lockhart is still running the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, or Ofheo, and he's shown no appetite for tolerating the shenanigans of the two lobbying powerhouses. This week he filed a 101-count notice of civil charges against Franklin Raines, Fannie's former CEO, and two other former executives. The suit seeks $115 million in restitution of ill-gotten pay and another $100 million in
fines for six years' worth of proven financial misrepresentations at Fannie.
This is something for Mr. Frank to consider as he negotiates with Treasury over an Ofheo reform bill. Few big businesses inspire the Massachusetts liberal's regulatory forbearance the way Fannie and Freddie do. This is ironic, because the fact that the two companies are government-sponsored and hold an implicit government guarantee on their debt means they deserve more scrutiny than the average private company. The companies are playing in effect with House money.Fannie's friends on Capitol Hill ran out the clock on a stronger oversight bill in the GOP Congress. And with Democrats back in charge, Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson is now trying to negotiate a compromise. One of Mr. Frank's demands is the creation of a new "affordable housing fund" that the mortgage giants would finance -- a several-hundred-million-dollar Fan-and-Fred tax to dole out to such partisan liberal outfits as Acorn. Whether funded as a percentage of profits or revenues, such an annual patronage bonus would give Congress one more political incentive to see the siblings grow.
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Drezner on "Grand Strategy"
The grand strategy that wins out in the end may be the one that --regardless of specific positions on Iraq or terrorism -- convinces Americans that it is possible to have free and fair trade at the same time. By a hair, then, the front-runner is Lieven and Hulsman's ethical realism. By economizing on other forms of power projection, ethical realism potentially frees up resources to cushion the domestic costs of globalization.
At present, however, there is little consensus on a Kennan-like grand strategy. But remember, Kennan's strategy looks a lot better now than it did during the Cold War. The precise definition of containment "was at best ambiguous and lent itself to misinterpretation," Kennan acknowledged in his memoirs. Certainly, Jimmy Carter interpreted containment differently than did Ronald Reagan, who interpreted it differently than did Henry Kissinger.
The foreign-policy establishment may be stumbling around right now, searching for the one strategy to rule them all. It is possible, however, that what looks like disarray today may appear smarter, better -- grander? -- in the future.
More on "ethical realism" at Radio Open Source.
Friday, December 15, 2006
Maybe Barr's onto something
A former Georgia congressman who helped spark President Clinton's impeachment has quit the Republican Party to become a Libertarian, saying he is disillusioned with the GOP on issues such as spending and privacy.
Bob Barr, who served eight years as a Republican congressman before losing his seat in 2002, announced Friday that he is now a "proud, card-carrying Libertarian." And he encouraged others to join him.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
The decline of the "New Hampshire Advantage": Part II
The good folks behind the Granite State Fair Tax Coalition must not think very highly of New Hampshire people.How long can the anti-tax crowd hold out?
Based on their public statements, coalition members have to believe one of two things: 1. The people are being duped by politicians into accepting a "morally bankrupt" pledge not to raise taxes. 2. The people themselves are morally bankrupt by insisting that politicians take the pledge.
"Morally bankrupt" was the term used by Rev. William E. Exner, vice president of the coalition, to describe New Hampshire's famous anti-tax pledge, that great bogeyman of big-government aficionados. The coalition last week launched a campaign to wipe the pledge from New Hampshire's political landscape.
"The 'Pledge' perpetuates a burdensome property tax," states a coalition resolution.
That's funny. We always thought it was the people who perpetuated the burdensome property tax because it was a lot better than an even more burdensome sales or income tax.
The clueless romantics who envision New Hampshire's people trapped in the grip of a beast called The Pledge completely ignore the actual political history of New Hampshire while fantasizing of a future in which the people are released from their misery by higher taxes.
The decline of the "New Hamsphire Advantage": Part I
CONCORD – They came not to praise but to bury the pledge against broad-based taxes in New Hampshire.Nice sentiment Governor, but don't tell us the election of a Democratic majority in New Hampshire hasn't emboldened the liberals to start a push for new taxes. The Kerry "victory" in 2004 in the Granite state and now the vastly energized Democratic majority in Concord leads one to think they everything that's sacred like the Pledge is on the table.
The Granite State Fair Tax Coalition kicked off an ambitious three-year campaign to build support at the local level to urge the Legislature to keep an open mind when it comes to fundamental change of the state tax structure.
The first goal of the group is to bring their message and encourage a healthy debate at churches, public libraries and town halls across the state according to David Lamarre-Vincent, the group’s president.
"We are here to declare the good news in New Hampshire," said Lamarre-Vincent who is executive director of the state Council of Churches.Other member organizations include the American Friends Service Committee, the League of Women Voters and societies for the Unitarian and United Church of Christ Churches.
The Democracy of New Hampshire, World Fellowship Center and Women Making a Difference are also supporting the group.
Coalition officials stressed they would not advocate a specific tax and will not lobby the legislative or executive branches of state government.
Group leaders acknowledge they are getting organized right after an election in which Democrats won sweeping victories, but only in part because they abandoned any desire to impose a sales or income tax.
“We are pointing towards 2008. We recognize that influencing the Legislature in 2007 is not a winning strategy, but the debate over an adequate education we believe is going to lead to a meaningful discussion of tax reform down the road,’’ said Mark Fernald, the group’s treasurer and 2002 nominee for governor.
Gov. John Lynch has recently repeated his vow to veto either tax.
The devolution of New Hamsphire into a Blue State courtesty of the influx of Massachusetts residents will wreak havoc over the long term.
Meanwhile, I have a question for the pro-tax Democrats: Can you guarantee that new income or sales taxes will stop the rise in property taxes?
I bet they can't make such a "pledge."
Monday, December 11, 2006
More on the Republican - libertarian crackup
If Republicans can't win New Hampshire and the Mountain West, they can't win a national majority. And they can't win those states without libertarian votes. They're going to need to stop scaring libertarian, centrist, and independent voters with their social-conservative obsessions and become once again the party of fiscal responsibility. In a Newsweek poll just before the election, 47 percent of respondents said they trusted the Democrats more on "federal spending and the deficit," compared to just 31 percent who trusted the Republicans. That's not Ronald Reagan's Republican Party.Read the whole article.
One more bit from our post-election Zogby poll: We asked voters if they considered themselves "fiscally conservative and socially liberal." A whopping 59 percent said they did. When we added to the question "also known as libertarian," 44 percent still claimed that description. That's too many voters for any party to ignore.
Rep. Barbara Cubin (R-WY) told her Libertarian challenger after a debate, "If you weren't sitting in that [wheel]chair, I'd slap you." It took 10 days to certify her re-election, perhaps because that Libertarian took more than 7,000 votes. A better strategy for her and other Republicans would be to try to woo libertarians back.
Mythbusting from a Nobel Laureate in Economics
There's no better way to get people worked up about something than to call on their sympathies for their beloved grandkids. The last thing that I want to do is to burden my own grandchildren with the sins of profligacy. But we should stop feeling guilty -- at least about government debt -- because we are in better shape than conventional wisdom suggests.
Theory and practice tell us that the optimal amount of public debt that maximizes the welfare of new generations of entrants into the workforce is two times gross national income, or GDP. This assumes 1% population growth, 2% productivity growth, 4% real after-tax return on investments, and that people work to age 63 and live to age 85. Currently, privately held public debt is about 0.3 times GDP, and if we include our Social Security obligations, it is 1.6 times GDP. In either case, we could argue that we have too little debt.
What's going on here? There are not enough productive assets -- tangible and intangible assets alike -- to meet the investment needs of our forthcoming retirees. The problem is that the rate of return on investment -- creating more productive assets -- decreases as the stock of these assets increases. An excessive stock of these productive assets leads to inefficiencies.
Total savings by everyone is equal to the sum of productive assets and government debt, and if there is an imbalance in this equation it does not mean we have too little or too many productive assets. The fix comes from getting the proper amount of government debt. When people did not enjoy long retirements and population growth was rapid, the optimal amount of government debt was zero. However, the world has changed, and we in fact require some government debt if we care about our grandchildren and their grandchildren.
If we should worry about our grandchildren, we shouldn't about the amount of debt we are leaving them. We may even have to increase that debt a bit to ensure that we are adequately prepared for our own retirements.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
She was beautiful
Friday, December 08, 2006
It's Tax Time for the Patrick Crowd
BOSTON --Gov.-elect Deval Patrick's new budget chief said Thursday that local option taxes on meals, hotels and other services should be one of the things the state considers as it seeks to create a stable long-term financial picture.
Leslie Kirwan also said she isn't sure she can find the $735 million in wasteful spending Patrick said he wanted to eliminate during this fall's gubernatorial campaign.
At the same time, the outgoing financial official for the Massachusetts Port Authority said she isn't sure the state can cut property taxes, as Patrick said he hoped to do when he said he opposed a rollback in the state income tax rate during this fall's gubernatorial campaign.
Kirwan, a former aide to Democratic Gov. Michael Dukakis and Republican Gov. William Weld, did say she will undertake a top-to-bottom review of state finances so they can plot the most financially secure course for achieving the governor's policy
goals.
"I think it's a matter of how you approach them and what the ramp-up is, and I think there will be options for introducing these policies in the first budget and building on them over time," Kirwan said as she joined the governor-elect at a news conference in a downtown hotel.Patrick himself said he wants his new Administration and Finance secretary to "lean forward" as she seeks creative solutions to state financial problems, and to improve the state's relationship with city and town governments.
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
More on the libertarian - liberal mash up
Virginia Postrel has more on the topic as does Julian Sanchez.
The classically liberal-inclined (read:market liberal) Economist "newspaper" has this to say.
Monday, December 04, 2006
More on the conservative - libertarian - Republican crack-up
The southern evangelicals may have played out their hand with Terry Schiavo and stem cell research -- two wedge issues that alienate the Republicans' libertarian wing. Having had enough of southern, big government Republicanism, and not satisfied with divided government, libertarians are considering the previously unspeakable: joining the Democrats. Picking up on Cato's Brink Lindsey's dispatch in the New Republic, (sorry it's gated), the Washington Post's Sebastian Mallaby has more.
Why react to the temporary corruption of a party by abandoning it outright? Lindsey's answer is that Republicans are not merely failing to live up to their principles; the principles have altered. The party has been virtually cleaned out of the Northeast; it has suffered setbacks in the Mountain West; it increasingly reflects the values of its stronghold in the South. As a result, it has lost its libertarian tinge and grown more religious and traditionalist.
There has always been a tension between Republican libertarians, who believe that individual choices should be unconstrained by received wisdom, and Republican traditionalists, who believe pretty much the opposite. In their history of the conservative movement, John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge recall that Barry Goldwater believed Jerry Falwell deserved "a swift kick in the ass;" and Goldwater's wife, Peggy, helped to found Planned Parenthood in Arizona. But for a long time the two wings of the party could paper over these differences. Christian conservatives and libertarians agreed that misconceived government programs were harming traditional values. Schools forced sex education on children. The tax system and the welfare system penalized marriage.
Those days are gone in part to the souring mood about Iraq. Is this what the neocons have wrought in the Big Tent GOP?
Marginal Revolution has more on the libertarian-conservative fissure with comments.
But Reason's Hit and Run Katherine Mangu-Ward doesn't trust the Democrats.
Meanwhile Pat Buchanan, thumping away, says the Republicans and Bush lost big but conservatives did not.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
Serendipity in the Marketplace
What was I doing when this band hit the scene? Gee, Frank that was 1996!!! I really need to get out more often.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
A footnote worth sharing
Robert Nozick, PHILOSOPHICAL EXPLANATIONS (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1981):597.There is a story told that Martin Buber once spoke to a group of Christians saying something like the following: We Jews and you Christians hold many beliefs in common. Both of us believe the messiah will come. You Christians believe he has been there before, so that he will be coming for a second time, while we Jews believe he will be coming from the first time. For the foreseeable future, there is much we can cooperate together on -- and when the messiah does come, then we can ask him whether he's been here before.
There is only one thing to add to Buber's remarks. I would like to advise the messiah, when he comes and is asked the question whether he's been here before or not, to reply that he doesn't remember.
Worthy of your time; A few readings in economics
Plenty of good material from the most recent issue of the eminently readable Journal of Economic Perspectives.
"The Macroeconomist as Scientist and Engineer" by Greg Mankiw is a good survey.
Also a must-read is a pretty tough critique of residential recycling by Thomas C. Kinnaman.
And a very scholarly look at "What Has Mattered to Economics Since 1970" in which the authors E. Han Kim, Adair Morse and Luigi Zingales compile a very impressive list of the most cited journal articles in the field.
Meanwhile over at Cato, I had the opportunity to spend a train ride home reading Sallie James's new policy brief, "Milking the Customers: The High Cost of U.S. Dairy Policies." The paper confirms what every free trader knows U.S price supports and other farm subsidies are a crime against the poor.
The new Cato Journal has two great articles (scroll halfway down). William Niskanen casts doubt on Milton Friedman's "starve the beast approach" to limiting Leviathan (government)while Jerry H. Tempelman is less pessimistic. Niskanen also has a review of James Buchanan's new book, Why I, Too, Am Not a Conservative: The Normative Vision of Classical Liberalism.
And who knew? Naples as a fashion capital! Michael Ledeen reports.
Jim Webb is one tough cookie for Bush and maybe the Democrats
At a recent White House reception for freshman members of Congress,
Virginia's newest senator tried to avoid President Bush. Democrat James Webb declined to stand in a presidential receiving line or to have his picture taken with the man he had often criticized on the stump this fall. But it wasn't long before Bush found him."How's your boy?" Bush asked, referring to Webb's son, a Marine serving in Iraq.
"I'd like to get them out of Iraq, Mr. President," Webb responded, echoing a campaign theme."That's not what I asked you," Bush said. "How's your boy?"
"That's between me and my boy, Mr. President," Webb said coldly, ending the conversation on the State Floor of the East Wing of the White House.
Webb was narrowly elected to the U.S. Senate this month with a brash, unpolished style that helped win over independent voters in Virginia and earned him support from national party leaders. Now, his Democratic colleagues in the Senate are getting a close-up view of the former boxer, military officer and Republican who is joining their ranks.
If the exchange with Bush two weeks ago is any indication, Webb won't be a wallflower, especially when it comes to the war in Iraq. And he won't stick to a script drafted by top Democrats.
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
The decline of the NH Advantage?
The state went for Kerry in 2004 and threw out its two Republican congressmen -- in favor of left-wing Democrats. Happy days are here again for the levellers, the pro-taxers. I say NH gets a broadbased tax within those two years to pay for all those services that Massachusetts exiles are pining for. Here's the Union Leader with an opposing view:
How much of the Republican debacle at the New Hampshire polls this month was due to the national mood and how much was due to more local factors remains debatable. But the oft-repeated line that we are turning Democratic because of the influx of people from Massachusetts is just bunk.
We have long thought that some of the strongest believers in small government and low taxes and spending were the people who have fled to New Hampshire from the Bay State because they want to lead their own lives without Big Governmen's "help."
A University of New Hampshire Survey Center study this month seems to confirm this.
"People moving here from Massachusetts are the only reason that New Hampshire is staying as Republican as it is" says Andy Smith, head of the survey center.
Traditional Republican voters, the survey said, include the very kind of small-business owners and working-class people who have fled Massachusetts and settled mainly right across the border in Salem, Windham and other towns.
In fact, all 13 state representatives elected from Salem and Windham this month were Republican, quite a contrast to the results elsewhere, which have resulted in the first Democrat-controlled House in modern times.
The bad news, of course, is that if Republican office holders and party leaders don't practice as well as preach the small-government, low-tax philosophy that has made New Hampshire what it is, they will lose the votes of even the most stalwart of the party faithful.
The good news is that with the big-spending Democrats in Massachusetts having just elected a governor to go with their one-party Legislature, we can expect more and more refugees in the years ahead.
Bunk? The estimable Union Leader is living is a state of denial. I'll give the Union Leader less than two years to prove me wrong.
Friday, November 24, 2006
What I'm listening to at the moment
Shostakovich, Dmitri
Symphonies 5 & 9, Op. 47 & Op. 70
Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra
Ladislav Slovak
on Naxos
Very nice.
An afterthought: Why am I playing one of the greatest Russian composers of all time? Perhaps this has something to do with it? Stalin, the devil who haunted Shostakovich, apparently has nothing on V. Putin.
Hardly solid state radio: Is Red State WRKO going to turn Blue State?
A thought about Thanksgiving Day
The sad part is that some people don't even have an idea of what it's like. Nor would they because they are subsumed with white guilt. Like this hyperliberal teacher who pisses on American history.
The "different point of view" is not without its own shortcomings. But Jules Crittendon has a better piece over at his blog. (Heaven help us if we Boston newspaper readers ever lose him!)LONG BEACH, California (AP) -- Teacher Bill Morgan walks into his third-grade class wearing a black Pilgrim hat made of construction paper and begins snatching up pencils, backpacks and glue sticks from his pupils. He tells them the items now belong to him because he "discovered" them.
The reaction is exactly what Morgan expects: The kids get angry and want their things back.
Morgan is among elementary school teachers who have ditched the traditional Thanksgiving lesson, in which children dress up like Indians and Pilgrims and act out a romanticized version of their first meetings.
He has replaced it with a more realistic look at the complex relationship between Indians and white settlers.
Morgan said he still wants his pupils at Cleveland Elementary School in San Francisco to celebrate Thanksgiving. But "what I am trying to portray is a different point of view."
Others see Morgan and teachers like him as too extreme.
"I think that is very sad," said Janice Shaw Crouse, a former college dean and public high school teacher and now a spokeswoman for Concerned Women for America, a conservative organization. "He is teaching his students to hate their country. That is a very distorted view of history, a distorted view of Thanksgiving."
Even American Indians are divided on how to approach a holiday that some believe symbolizes the start of a hostile takeover of their lands.
Chuck Narcho, a member of the Maricopa and Tohono O'odham tribes who works as a substitute teacher in Los Angeles, said younger children should not be burdened with all the gory details of American history.
"If you are going to teach, you need to keep it positive," he said. "They can learn about the truths when they grow up. Caring, sharing and giving -- that is what was originally intended."
Adam McMullin, a member of the Seminole tribe of Oklahoma and a spokesman for the National Congress of American Indians, said schoolchildren should get an accurate historical account.
"You can't just throw an Indian costume on a child," he said. "That stuff is not taken lightly. That's where educators need to be very careful."
Becky Wyatt, a teacher at Kettering Elementary School in Long Beach, decided to alter the costumes for the annual Thanksgiving play a few years ago after local Indians spoke out against students wearing feathers, which are sacred in their culture. Now children wear simple headbands.
Some people like to see the Indians as a peace-loving, yet warrior-chic people who lived in wise harmony with nature and each other. But they had been doing the same thing to each other ever since, archaeological finds such as Kennewick man now suggest, they crossed from Asia and overwhelmed the physically distinct Eurasian aboriginal inhabitants of North America about 7,000 B.C.
Iroquois, Sioux, Navajo, Comanche, Aztecs, Incas, death cult societies of the pre-Columbian southwest, all warred on their neighbors and if they were strong enough, attempted to subjugate them. Often with unspeakable savagery, on a par with any Catho vs. Prot 30 Years War atrocities. This is because we are human, and this is what humans do. As Jared Diamond has posited in his book, "Guns, Germs and Steel," the significant difference from one group of humans to another, the reason why we're speaking English here and not Wampanoag in England, has largely been one of resources and opportunity. For reasons too numerous to mention here, our boats were bigger than their canoes. Our guns were better than their bows and arrows. Our diseases were worse than theirs were.
It is only within the last few centuries, primarily and ironically enough within the bloody, widely disparaged crucible of ideals that is America, that we have slowly and painfully tried to break with that past and become a higher people. We've tried to become a people that, growing out of ancient hatreds in Europe and violence here in America, have absorbed elements of all those histories and become something distinct from them. A people who acknowledge the misdeeds of the past and try to correct them. A people dedicated to universal justice and prosperity and always striving for them. A people moving forward.
Within that context, victimhood is a trap, every bit as vile and destructive as the trap of subjugating others that we now reject. They are traps that ensnare us in the terrible past. Whatever we might have come from, we are the survivors now, who hopefully have moved beyond that. And for that, today, we should be thankful.
Friedman on the fad of "corporate social responsibility"
Corporations exist to make profits which indirectly benefit the public interest by providing goods and services and yes, good jobs at good wages. It's not the job of corporations (even though CEOs spout pithy commitments to CS) to do anything except to secure the faith of its owners, which incidently may be a number of obnoxious non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
The esteemed Henry Manne says it better.
Now I realize (I should have known) he was absolutely correct about the significance of proposals for socially responsible corporate behavior, whether they emanated from within or outside the corporation. These proposals reflect, as well as anything else happening today, the inability of many commentators to distinguish between private and public property--in other words, between a free enterprise system and socialism. Somehow large-scale business success, usually resulting in a publicly held company, seems mysteriously to transform the nature of numerous individuals' private investments into assets affected with a public interest. And once these corporate behemoths are "affected with a public interest," they must either be regulated by the state or they must act as though they are owned by the public, and are therefore inferentially a part of the state. This attitude is reflected not merely by corporate activists, but by many "modern" corporate managers.
An integral part of the older notion of public utility regulation required that the enterprise be, or act like, a monopoly (whether "natural" or not), in order to be affected with a public interest. But in today's confusion, there is no such equirement. No arguments, weak as they are, about natural monopoly, market failure, government creation of corporations or the alleged government gifts of limited liability and perpetual existence, are required to justify the demands now regularly placed on business entities.
Any large enterprise, no matter how competitive its industry and no matter how
successfully it is fulfilling the public's desires, has a social responsibility--a term that makes mockery of the idea of individual responsibility--to use part of its resources for "public" endeavors. Today's favorite causes are environmental protection, employee health, sales of goods at below-market prices, weather modification, community development, private enforcement of (not merely abiding by) government regulations and support of cultural, educational and medical facilities.
How did this transposition from private to public responsibility come about? After all, even the largest corporation started simply as an idea in someone's head. At first this person hires employees, borrows capital or sells equity, produces goods or service and markets a product. Nothing about any of these purely private and benign arrangements suggests a public interest in the outcome. But then the business begins to grow, family stock holdings become more diffused, additional capital is required and, voilà , another publicly held corporation. In other words,
another American success story.
"Corporate social responsibility" is another excuse for letting the camel's nose in the tent. It is nothing more than a power grab by advocates of big government.
More on Milton Friedman
Fortunately for Friedman-haters, Friedman tainted himself by traveling to Chile and meeting with General Pinochet, the most hated military dictator in the western hemisphere. The Left used Friedman?s visit to Chile to brand him as a fascist, an accusation that was widely disseminated among universities around the world and which resulted in protests and disruptions at his Nobel award ceremony. This sentiment is alive and well today ? The Democratic Underground's discussion of Friedman?s death includes comments such as "Memo to Pinochet ? Your buddy just went to hell and is waiting for you" among its less vulgar sentiments.
When I entered Harvard in 1979, it was commonplace in most circles to refer to Friedman as evil without debate, reflection, or justification.
Now, of course, Chile has a democratic government, the strongest economy in Latin America, and a surging middle class ? all legacies of Friedman?s influence. More relevant to the claim that Friedman was tainted through his one conversation with Pinochet is the fact that he later went to China and gave very much the same advice to Chinese leaders as he had given to Chilean leaders ? and no one even remarked upon the trip, despite the fact that the repression practiced by the Chinese government makes Pinochet look like an amateur.
Friedman was, in fact, critical of the Pinochet regime and clearly stated that his goal was to alleviate human suffering based on economic dysfunction, which he did so superbly. By contrast, J. K. Galbraith visited Mao?s China and praised Mao and the Chinese economic system, which had caused incomparable misery.
Focus on this: Friedman is tainted by one conversation with a dictator, whom he openly criticized, and the advice he provides ultimately brings great benefits to the people. Galbraith is not tainted by praising one of the most ruthless tyrants in human history, after disseminating his own advice, which has brought poverty to every developing nation which followed it.
By any reasonable human rights standard, Galbraith?s praise of China should be regarded with the loathing still associated in some circles of Friedman, whereas Friedman?s support of successful economic policies in Chile should be regarded as far-sighted and heroic. But we must await another generation of historians to write justly and honestly about the 20th century before that is likely to happen.
Friedman?s long-standing recognition of the economic policies that enriched Hong Kong, combined with his direct policy proposals to Chinese leaders, contributed to the spread of Hong Kong-like special economic zones across eastern China, which are now bringing a million people a month out of poverty. At current rates of economic growth, China is expected to reach a U.S. standard of living in 2030. India, after a shift from Galbraithian policies in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, began to embrace free market reforms in the 80s and 90s. At recent rates of economic growth they will reach a U.S. standard of living in 2050. If China and India had both followed Friedmanite policies in 1947, it is likely that each nation would be as wealthy as Hong Kong, which has a higher per capita GDP than Britain. (See Bill Easterly's article in this year's Fraser Institute Report on Economic Freedom for evidence on the correlation between economic freedom and per capita GDP).
Tens of thousands of NGOs devote millions of hours and billions of dollars in the effort to alleviate poverty, empower women, reduce child prostitution, and reduce violent conflict. If every scholar at every university had promoted Friedmanite policies throughout the 20th century, most of this work would be unnecessary. Poverty in the developed world exists, but it is a ?poverty? which often includes televisions, cell phones, refrigerators, air conditioning, and obesity. There are billions of truly poor people who would risk death by crossing deserts or oceans in order to achieve this kind of poverty...
Thursday, November 23, 2006
A note on Thanksgiving and Lincoln and such
Lincoln's devoutness grew throughout his life; when he spoke of God, he never spoke pro forma. In his message proclaiming that November 1864 Thanksgiving, he said that the Lord "has been pleased to animate and inspire our minds and hearts with fortitude, courage and resolution sufficient for the great trial of civil war." And he prayed for the "blessings of Peace, Union and Harmony throughout the land, which it has pleased him to assign as a dwelling-place for ourselves and for our posterity throughout all generations."
The Biblical language is typical of Lincoln. Like many Puritan-minded Americans, he thought of his country as a new promised land.
Thanksgiving has been celebrated annually ever since. But the day of thanksgiving Lincoln proposed in his last public speech that final April of his life was a bonus, over and above the annual observance.
Monday, November 20, 2006
The great economics writer on the great economist
Above all, Friedman believed in the power of ideas. Some of his were wrong. He thought cutting taxes would restrain government spending ("starve the beast''); it didn't. His faith in "privatization" for the old Soviet Union was overdone. He wanted the Fed to limit growth of the money supply; unfortunately, the money supply proved hard to define. But these are footnotes. For decades, Friedman cheerfully and relentlessly pushed his main ideas, although they were outside the political and intellectual mainstream. From 1966 to 1984, he wrote a column for Newsweek. With his wife, Rose, he became a best-selling author ("Free to Choose," in 1980, a pro-market manifesto). Time was on their side. Competing ideas proved unworkable, inferior or wrong. Friedman never joined the mainstream, but the mainstream joined him.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
This is a very bad move
"Entercom's WRKO AM 680 which sacked its news department yesterday will now be getting its local news/weather/sports updates from Metro/Shadow Broadcasting group which already provides traffic reports on the Talk Station. The station will also run national Fox News Radio alerts at the top of the hour."
" To say WRKO will be better off without a news department while it "beefs up" its talk programming is an insult to its already-furious listenership. The Red Sox surely must now be wondering how they could have become burdened with such a profoundly troubled and disorganized station. Newspapers and television stations are having a field day reporting on WRKO's daily disasters. It's an early holiday gift for WTKK."For more check out one of the most under-rated local newsblogs, Boston Radio Watch.
An iconoclastic view on AIDS in Africa
I've studied the epidemic from that perspective. I'm one of the few people who have done so. And I've learned that a lot of what we've been told about it is wrong. Read more here.
So much for transparency
Dutch Muslims have hit out at a proposed government ban of face veils, saying it was over the top, ill-conceived and infringed religious rights. On Friday the Dutch cabinet said it was proposing a bill banning clothing that covers the face in public, targeting in particular Muslim woman wearing the burqa or niqab.
The burqa is an Islamic veil covering the entire face and body and a mesh screen to see through, while the niqab is a veil covering the face but leaving the eye area clear. The garments are worn by a few dozen women in the Netherlands. Rita Verdonk, minister of immigration and integration, said the bill proposed a ban on the basis that covering the face constituted a risk to public order and safety.The ban would be imposed in public and "semi-public" places such as schools, courts, ministries and trains, her spokesman Martin Bruinsma told AFP.
"In this country, we want to be able to see each other. The ban is a question of security," daily De Telegraaf quoted on Saturday the minister as saying. But representatives of the country's Muslim population were unimpressed. "They are going to have to find a better argument than security. It is an infringement on the freedom of religion," said Ahmed Markouch, a Moroccan mosques representative.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Student on mentor, Sowell on Friedman
As one of those privileged to have studied under Friedman, I felt a special loss at his death but also a sense of good fortune to have learned from him, not only when I was at the University of Chicago but also in the years and decades since then. He was a tough, no-nonsense teacher in the classroom but a kind and generous human being outside.
Students were not allowed to walk into his classroom after his lecture had begun, distracting others. Once, I arrived at the door just minutes after Friedman began speaking and had to turn around and go back to the dormitory, wondering all the while whether what he taught that day would be on the next exam. After that, I was always in my seat when Friedman entered the classroom. He was also a tough grader. On one exam, there were only two B?s in the whole class--and no A?s.
The other side of Friedman was his generosity with his time to help students, and even former students. In later years, long after I had left the University of Chicago, he helped me with his criticisms and advice on my work--only when asked. When I was offered an appointment to the Federal Trade Commission in 1976, he was asked by the White House to urge me to accept but he declined to do so. It was the best non-advice I ever got. I would have been miserable at the FTC.Although in recent years we were both members of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, we each lived miles away and neither of us was physically present there with any great frequency, so the chance that we would both be there on the same day was virtually nil. The last time I saw Friedman in person was in 2004, when we were jointly interviewed on television. Afterwards, he gave me a ride in his little sports car over to the Stanford faculty club, where we joined a group for lunch. Then he drove back to his home in San Francisco, 30 miles away, though he was at the time in his 90s.
More recently, I happened to chat briefly with Friedman on the phone a few days before his death, and found his mind to be as clear and sharp as ever. That will always be a special memory of a very special man, one of the giants of our time--intellectually, morally, and as a human being.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
One of the great minds of the 20th century has passed away. RIP Milton Friedman
He was one of the most important minds of the second half of the twentieth century and his influence remains felt all around the world. In purely academic terms, he easily could have won two or three Nobel Prizes from the quality and quantity of his work.
Nicely said.
The Financial Times story is here.Sunday, November 12, 2006
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Will they succumb to the power in D.C.?
As they headed to Washington for their orientation, many of the incoming freshmen still spoke like outsiders. Tim Walz, a Minnesota teacher, retired National Guardsman and newly elected Democrat, described himself as ?a farm state Democrat-soldier who?s concerned about the environment and civil liberties.?
He has seen how ugly the partisanship can get in American politics, Mr. Walz said, and is adamant about changing it. ?I?m convinced that what we need to do is heal,? he said. ?Tuesday was not a Democratic referendum; it was an American referendum. It?s not that the American people are so enamored with the Democratic vision, but what they believed is what we said about cleaning up corruption, having some real open debate. It just seems so broken.?
Walter Williams explains basic economics
"...Politicians talk about "free education," "free medicine" or "free housing," but that's nonsense. Resources are required to produce each of them. Of course, some people received these goods at a zero price, but that doesn't mean they didn't cost someone, usually a taxpayer, something.
Now as the to the minimum wage, another mythological free lunch. Liberals hope that by raising the minimum wage we won't hear the tree drop in the forest. That the natural labor market distortion will be lost in the noise of economic growth. This is good example of busting that myth.
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Less government, less services, less taxes
Q: All other things being equal, which type of candidate for Congress would you
be more likely to vote for? A candidate who wants to reduce overall federal
spending, even if that includes cutting some money that would come to your
district; or, a candidate who is willing to increase overall spending on federal
programs and grow the federal budget, in order to get more federal spending and
projects for your district?
A: Cut spending 57.3%
Bring home projects 27.6%
Don't know/Refused 15.1%
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Jesus and the capital gains tax chain
How times have changed. Keeping the Bible out of public policy was the left's line in the 1980s. Now they've switched to trying to get a 25% marginal tax rate on long-term capital gains out of St. Luke.
It's not so far fetched as might seem at first. Jesus, in fact, did speak about capital gains. He told a story about three stewards. One achieved high capital gains on the owner's investments. The other also did well. The third one, failed to achieve any capital appreciation at all and was fired.
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
New Hampshire will be Blue
Results as of 10:28 via Fox News
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/youdecide2006/races.html?NH
Paul Hodes
Democrat
82,696 (53%)
Charles Bass (i)
Republican
70,857 (45%)
Ken Blevens
Libertarian
2,908 (2%)
Similiar thoughts here.
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Take note of more liberal hypocrisy
Angry that illegal immigrants were targeted in the gubernatorial campaign, immigrants are mobilizing at unprecedented levels for next week's election, say those who work with them.
Community groups say they are signing up growing numbers of immigrants, both citizens and noncitizens, to help register neighbors and encourage them to go to the polls. Dozens of voter mobilization efforts have kicked into gear across the state.
It is difficult to say what impact the effort will have Tuesday. But those who work closely with immigrant communities say they have never seen this level of engagement.
In large part, Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey's high-profile opposition to benefits for illegal immigrants appears to be driving the new activity.
The fervor crosses party lines and economic classes. "This has grabbed the attention of many people who otherwise would have been more politically apathetic," said Alberto Vasallo III, editor in chief of the Spanish-language weekly El Mundo in Jamaica Plain. "It has upset an extraordinary number of moderate leaders in the community."
Tomorrow, volunteers with Nuestra Voz Cuenta (Our Voice Counts) will speak at Holy Redeemer Church in East Boston after each Mass to remind the mostly Latino congregation to vote. The volunteers, both citizens and noncitizens, will also put reminders that look like parking tickets on car windshields, hand out leaflets in Maverick Square, and knock on doors to identify voters who might need help getting to the polls.
Take a peek an see how the liberal Boston Globe conflates opposition to illegal immigration with general opposition to immigration. They clearly seek to obfuscate the issue.
I have long maintained that two institutions benefit from illegal immigration, the Demcoratic Party and the Roman Catholic Church. Neither of which consider the long-term need to take action against illegal immigration nor do they seek to culturally assimilate legal immigrants nor the cost to taxpayers. Moreover, as the Catholic Church finds itself in direct competition with more evangelical Hispanic congregations, the need to pander to illegal immigrants intensifies. It's not like the early 20th Century when most of the Italian immigrants were Catholic; today they are likely not to be Catholic. One only look at the explosion of small storefront churches or the huge battalian of Hispanic evangelicals that marched in the most recent Columbus Day parade in East Boston.
What a shame and you wonder why fewer people are going to Mass. The child abuse scandals are one reason; the indifference to squatters at Mt. Carmel Church is another.
How can we take the Catholic heirarchy seriously on gay marriage if they don't support laws against illegal immigration?
Saturday, November 04, 2006
The New York Times is at it again
I have to say that President Bush is blessed by his enemies.
Pundit Review exposes the frauds at the Times.
Good stuff.
Friday, November 03, 2006
Monday, October 30, 2006
Rest in Peace, Red Auerbach, the man who made the Celtics
Friday, October 27, 2006
A Brit's brief for the U.S.
The real question about American power is whether the realities that underpin it are shifting. There, I?m afraid, the news for Americaphobes is grim. The US economy continues to grow at a pace that far outstrips its rivals in the industrialised world. Though China is growing at three times the pace of the US, America?s economy is so large ? $12 trillion annually ? that , even in the unlikely event that China will continue to grow at its current rate, it will take 30 to 40 years to catch up with America.
Despite the heated rhetoric, the US is not going bankrupt ? its fiscal deficit is falling and its accumulated debt is easily manageable. Compared with most other advanced economies, its demographics look indecently healthy. This month the US population passed 300 million; it will be 400 million in less than 50 years, and still relatively
youthful.
The libertarian wedge, it doesn't move
And how much effort are these voters worth? Although it is true that the libertarian vote is up for grabs, in other ways it is a tactically unappealing target, because it will always be up for grabs. With a social conservative, or an anti-market statist, you know where you are. It is worth investing in those kinds of voters -- not in changing their minds, of course, because you cannot do that, but in persuading them that you have moved to their side. But you will never turn a libertarian into a loyalist of any party.
That is not all. Because they are skeptical not just about government but also about politics and the people who devote their lives to it, libertarians may be disinclined to get out and vote. The commentators who have recently been arguing for divided government, saying that it is better to have a weak, do-little government than a government, whether Left or Right, with the ambition and the capacity to do lots of big things, certainly have a point. But unfortunately that temperament is close to the one that wearily says, "I cannot be bothered and want nothing to do with this process." Disenchanted and few in number: Why spend limited resources on reaching them? Libertarians are disenfranchised for a reason.
The American idea -- expressed in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution -- is quintessentially a classical liberal idea. It is all there: Limited government; checks and balances; civil liberty and economic liberty. Libertarians won those arguments, but they have been on the losing side for about the last 70 years.
Today's main political battle is between those who want to run the economy from Washington and those who want to dictate the country's morals from Washington. (George Bush's Republican Party apparently wants to do both.) And we libertarians should not delude ourselves: If this is true, it is not because politics is letting people down but because most Americans feel comfortable in one or the other of those camps. As long as only one in 10 people reject both of those ideas, the choices facing the electorate will continue to be about as inspiring as the choice that presents itself on November 7.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
We have it too easy
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Go ahead have a laugh
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Bono, operating at the margins
Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bono, the rock star and campaigner against Third World debt, is asking the Irish government to contribute more to Africa. At the same time, he's reducing tax payments that could help fund that aid.
After Ireland said it would scrap a break that lets musicians and artists avoid paying taxes on royalties, Bono and his U2 bandmates earlier this year moved their music publishing company to the Netherlands. The Dublin group, which Forbes estimates earned $110 million in 2005, will pay about 5 percent tax on their royalties, less than half the Irish rate.
"Among the wealthiest people I suppose it's the norm,'' Jill Cassidy, 23, said on South King Street near a plaque marking the site of Dublin's Dandelion market, where U2 played some of its earliest concerts. "In U2's position, it does come across as quite hypocritical.''
The tax move has tainted the image of Bono, nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and U2 at home. Now promoting a new DVD, book and album, the band is fighting back. Lead guitarist David Evans, known as The Edge, earlier this month defended the publishing company's move as a sensible decision for a group that makes 90 percent of its money outside Ireland.
"Our business is a very complex business,'' Evans said Oct. 2 on Dublin radio station Newstalk, breaking the band's silence after weeks of public criticism. "Of course we're trying to be tax-efficient. Who doesn't want to be tax-efficient?''
As residents of Ireland, members of U2 remain liable for personal income taxes. Any Irish-based companies they control will pay taxes on their profits.
"Poor Example"
Principle Management, U2's management company, declined to comment when Bloomberg asked for a statement from Bono.
Dublin-born Bono has been mentioned as a candidate for Nobel Peace Prize since 2003. The Norwegian Nobel Committee on Oct. 13 awarded the 2006 prize to Bangladeshi banker Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank for advancing social and economic development by giving loans to the poor.
Bono, 46, has toured Africa, established the pressure group Debt AIDS Trade Africa and become one of the most vocal supporters of the Make Poverty History campaign. In July 2005, he helped persuade world leaders to double aid for Africa to $50 billion a year by 2010 and erase the debt of the 18 poorest countries on the continent.
"I can see no connection between what he is doing and Make Poverty History,'' said Richard Murphy, a director at U.K.-based Tax Research Ltd. and author of a book called "Money Matters: Artist's Financial Guide.'' "He is setting a poor example by his tax affairs.''
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Another Saturday afternoon listening
I should be doing chores but a trip to the local library brought me this.
I'm enjoying it but here a mildly critical review. The first one at the top of Google's search on Bocelli and Verdi.
Bravo.
Dick Armey has a beef with the religious right
Read the whole piece.I am a free market economist by training, and I believe that economic freedom is vitally important in the defense of the American family. Big issues like retirement security, tax reform, school choice and spending restraint will determine whether or not families will be dependent and subservient to government. Who owns your retirement? Who decides how you provide for your family?s future. Can you leave your estate to your grandchildren, or is it the government's? Will the government socially engineer your life through the tax code? Will liberal education bureaucrats determine your child?s education? These are all issues that used to matter to the political leadership of Christian conservative voters.
And while for most in the Christian conservative movement these issues still resonate, the same cannot be said for some of our Washington, D.C.-based religious leaders. Right after I had left Congress and joined FreedomWorks, we found ourselves embroiled in a major tax fight in Alabama. Oddly, an old friend, Bob Riley, had been elected governor only to immediately reverse course, cut a deal with the teachers union, and advocate a massive tax increase to prop up the failing government school system. It was "what Jesus would do," he said. I took personal offense to that, as did many of the voters who had just worked so hard to elect him Governor. Our activists had joined forces with local Christian conservatives, including the Alabama Christian Coalition, to fight both bad policy and a sense of personal betrayal.
We were blindsided when the national leadership of the Christian Coalition endorsed the Governor?s proposed tax increase, joining forces with liberal interests in the state that had actively worked against our values for a generation. In the end we won, thanks in no small part to the fact that members of the local Christian Coalition chapter parted ways with the national organization and stood with Alabama FreedomWorks, the Alabama Policy Institute, local taxpayer organizations, and a host of other small government advocates all united in the effort to stop a big government tax-hike scheme.
Today, the national Christian Coalition has joined forces with MoveOn.org in another government grab of private property dealing specifically with ownership of the Internet. They are wrong on the specifics of the issue, and they are wrong to ssociate with and comfort radical liberals who have demonstrated nothing but disdain for conservative values. Armey's Axiom: Make a deal with the Devil, and you are the junior partner.
Another Armey's Axiom says that if it is about power, you lose. And unfortunately when it comes to James Dobson, my personal experience has been that the man is most interested in political power.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Are they serious? Gore's true believers go off the deep end
Grist Magazine's staff writer David Roberts called for the Nuremberg-style trials for the "bastards" who were members of what he termed the global warming "denial industry."
Roberts wrote in the online publication on September 19, 2006, "When we've finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we're in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards -- some sort of climate Nuremberg."
Gore and Moyers have not yet commented on Grist's advocacy of prosecuting skeptics of global warming with a Nuremberg-style war crimes trial. Gore has used the phrase "global warming deniers" to describe scientists and others who don't share his view of the Earth's climate. It remains to be seen what Gore and Moyers will have to say about proposals to make skepticism a crime comparable to Holocaust atrocities.
Is this a joke? Where are all the first amendment absolutists?
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Bowling Against the Other
A bleak picture of the corrosive effects of ethnic diversity has been revealed in research by Harvard University's Robert Putnam, one of the world's most influential political scientists. His research shows that the more diverse a community is, the less likely its inhabitants are to trust anyone ? from their next-door neighbour to the mayor.
This is a contentious finding in the current climate of concern about the benefits of immigration. Professor Putnam told the Financial Times he had delayed publishing his research until he could develop proposals to compensate for the negative effects of diversity, saying it "would have been irresponsible to publish without that".
Monday, October 09, 2006
Edmund Phelps has won the Nobel Prize for Economic Science
Here's an execerpt of my review of his 1997 book on wage subsidies, Rewarding Work: How to Restore Participation and Self-Support to Free Enterprise.
Phelps writes, "Low-wage employment subsidies, their imperfections notwithstanding, are the most effective instrument we have available to re-create lost opportunities for work and self-support, to restore inclusion and cohesion, and to reclaim responsibility for oneself and others."
It would work as follows: A firm that pays an unskilled employee $4 per hour would receive a subsidy, to wit, a matching grant of $3 per hour from the government.
This would raise the gross wage rate to $7 for the employee. On a similar schedule, if an employer pays an hourly rate of $6, he or she would receive a subsidy of $1.65 which would bring the gross wage to $7.65, and so on. The subsidy would cut off after $12, at which an employer would earn only six cents in subsidy. Under Phelps' plan, the subsidies would be applied against payroll and profit tax liabilities.The purpose of the wage subsidy is to draw unskilled laborers into the work force, expand their job opportunities with new work incentives, and, above all, lift the living wage of the unskilled. Phelps is convinced that his medicine is worth the cost of approximately $125 billion. It would require, among other tax measures, the elimination of the Earned Income Tax Credit and federal training programs that do not elevate the working poor's income.
In the long term, this subsidy would produce a net positive gain for taxpayers who would see less welfare and less spending on the criminal justice system. One of the direct benefits of the employment subsidy is that it would "shrink welfare's 'market share'."
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Currently listening to...
Haven't had the time to listen to an old favorite, Jean Luc Ponty so I borrowed this CD from my local library. Nice for a autumnal Saturday afternoon.
Here's the wikipedia entry on JLP.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
The good news is that the economy is strong, so let's stick to the negative meme
I decided to do a Lexis Nexis search of the Chicago Tribune for January 2000 to see if the paper also put a negative spin on the previous stock market surge (remember that surge occurred while Clinton was president). And guess what I found? An article with a very different tone. Starting with the exciting headline titled, "Bull Market Spreading The Wealth In America" and continuing through the many paragraphs touting the growth in wealth and the number of people investing in the stock market the article is remarkably different from today's.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Say it ain't so: Starbucks charged in unfair coffee competition
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The owner of a small coffee company sued Starbucks Corp. (SBUX.O: Quote, Profile, Research) on Monday, claiming the coffee shop's anti-competitive business practices put her store out of business.
The suit, which seeks class action status, was filed in Seattle federal court by Penny Stafford, the owner of Belvi Coffee and Tea Exchange Inc.According to court papers, Starbucks violated federal antitrust laws by leasing prime commercial real estate at above-market prices in return for the exclusive right to sell espresso drinks or specialty coffee in those locations.
A Starbucks spokeswoman said the Seattle-based company was not aware of the complaint and could not provide further comment.
The suit alleges that Belvi Coffee and Tea's efforts to enter such buildings in Seattle and Bellevue, Washington were blocked by Starbucks "through unlawful use and abuse of its monopoly power."
Starbucks is the world's largest coffee shop chain, with more than 12,000 locations in 37 countries. The lawsuit alleges the chain "possesses monopoly power" because it has "at least" a 73 percent market share of the U.S. coffee shop industry.
Is he ready for prime tax time?
BOSTON --While lamenting $985 million in fee and tax hikes he said the Romney-Healey administration proposed or used to close a state budget deficit in 2003, Deval Patrick refused Wednesday to outline how he would have eliminated the $3 billion cash shortfall.
The Democratic gubernatorial nominee instead insisted his solutions for coping with such a cyclical economic phenomenon were not as important as lifting the veil on what he calls the administration's "fiscal shell game."
Patrick said Gov. Mitt Romney and Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, who herself is now the Republican gubernatorial nominee, portray themselves as conservative fiscal stewards, yet property taxes have gone up $1.8 billion while they have been in office, and various fees and taxes have also increased.
Healey wants to roll back to the state income tax rate from 5.3 percent to 5 percent, a reduction Patrick says the state, municipalities and homeowners cannot afford.
"My point is that if we are going to talk about an income tax rollback, let's start telling the truth, and this administration didn't tell the truth," Patrick said during a news conference called to draw attention to his housing proposals.
"It continues to talk about how it's a champion of income tax cuts when, in fact, it's been responsible for sharply higher fees and taxes at the state level and at the local level, and if we're going to do this going forward, what people can count of from me is that I will tell the truth."
Asked to define the economic "truth" he would have conveyed to state residents in 2003, when the deficit was pegged at between $2 billion and $3 billion, Patrick replied: "I'm not talking about going back. I'm talking about today."
He then walked away from the microphones assembled outside his campaign headquarters
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Just finished reading: An assault on theism
If you have any belief in God, Sam Harris is about to disabuse you of it. I spent part of my Saturday afternoon reading this brief, deadly assault on religious belief at the local library which just received a copy. Not even liberal theologians are spared. It's a tough polemic that is hard to beat.
This is a must read book for believers and atheists alike. For believers, Letter makes them think hard about first principles and strategies for public morality. For atheists, the book is reminder about implications of the authoritarianism of science and any whether atheists are committed to a pluralistic society that protects freedom of religion.
Meanwhile, writing in the LA Times, Harris takes a shot at liberal denial about the Islamic threat to the West. Will liberals get it? They better since civilization is at stake.
Saturday, September 23, 2006
Bernard Lewis spells out the problem
What happened on 9/11 was seen by its perpetrators and sponsors as the culmination of the previous phase and the inauguration of the next phase--taking the war into the enemy camp to achieve final victory. The response to 9/11 came as a nasty surprise. They were expecting more of the same--bleating and apologies--instead of which they got a vigorous reaction, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq. And as they used to say in Moscow: It is no accident, comrades, that there has been no successful attack in the United States since then. But if one follows the discourse, one can see that the debate in this country since then has caused many of the perpetrators and sponsors to return to their previous diagnosis. Because remember, they have no experience, and therefore no understanding, of the free debate of an open society. What we see as free debate, they see as weakness, fear and division. Thus they prepare for the final victory, the final triumph and the final Jihad.
Friday, September 22, 2006
Tom Edsall is a good reporter even if he's a liberal
Read the whole transcript.
I do think that Hugh was a bit rough on Edsall who took it in stride.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Adjusted for inflation, that glass is still a little more than half full
And this, to me, is the area where the CPI overstates inflation most dramatically. When a good goes from being non-existent to existent, how do you capture the impact that has on inflation or consumer prices? Basically, prices have dropped from infinity (it's out of reach to even the most willing to pay consumer, even if he could offer the wealth of the entire world) to something that costs $50-$100 at BestBuy.
All of the things Jane mentioned that would prevent her from going back in time are things which came into existence quite recently. It's hard to take dour, left-wing academics seriously when the moan about how little things have improved for the common man while they pull links, citations, and documents from all over the planet electronically, and then post their thoughts to an audience of thousands, again all over the planet, without leaving their desks, with a technology that's cheap as chips today, and could not be found anywhere a decade ago. The truth is we live in an age of Wonders.
Meanwhile, Brink Lindsey takes one of those academics, Jacob Hacker to task in a review of the latter's book, The Great Risk Shift:
No matter how the doom-and-gloomers torture the data, the fact is that Americans have made huge strides in material welfare over the past generation. And with greater wealth, as well as improved access to consumer credit and home equity loans, they are much better prepared to deal with the downside of increased economic dynamism.
Well, what do you expect of economists?
What stinkers!!!The building where I used to work was shared with economists, who, living the sort of life they describe, had no incentive to flush and sometimes failed to do so.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Are you better off now than you were 25 years ago?
If you have the time read the comments too.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Pink Floyd only imagined one; Reagan helped tear one down.
ROGER WATERS [PINK FLOYD] CONCERT TOUR HITS NORTH AMERICA AND NYC WITH FLYING PIGS, URGING DEM VOTES IN ELECTION, 'IMPEACH BUSH' WRITTEN ON REAR OF PIG FLOATING OVER AUDIENCE... One concertgoer writes: 'Seeing Bush's name written across the pig's arse made me howl'... The pig had graffiti. 'New Yorkers/Don't be led to the slaughter/Vote November 7'... another attendee played off the hit 'Another Brick in the Wall': ''We don't need no thought control,' even from Mr. Waters'... Another sends a review: 'I attended the Roger Waters 9/15 show at Jones Beach, Wantagh, NY. At one point during the show Waters juxtaposed pictures of the President, Karl Rove, Ronald Reagan, and Margaret Thatcher with pictures of Osama bin Laden, Mao Zedong, Stalin, and other world tyrants. Rogers asked whether 'these people [Arabs] are really are enemies'. This took place during his anti-Bush/Blair song 'Leaving Beirut' in which he claimed 'that Texas education must have really f*cked you up' and asked why Tony the 'US poodle/pawn' is a warmongerer'What does Roger Waters really know? Fallacies about moral equivalence that's about it Mao killed millions. Are Bush, Blair and Thatcher in the same league? Pink Floyd fans must be really stupid if this goes unanswered. Roger Waters never tore down the Berlin Wall. He's a jerk really. By the way which one's Pink?
Saturday, September 16, 2006
A "new day" for the Bruins
WILMINGTON, Mass. --Boston Bruins owner Jeremy Jacobs proclaimed "a new
day" for the Original Six franchise on Friday, saying the job of ending the team's 34-year Stanley Cup drought now falls to general manager Peter Chiarelli and his hand-picked coaches and players.
"It's Peter's team and his organization," Jacobs told reporters at the team's media day, one day after veterans reported to training camp. "He should have the right to run it his way."The Bruins haven't won the Stanley Cup since 1972, hitting a low point last season when they missed the playoffs and traded away soon-to-be league MVP Joe Thornton.
Out went the general manager, the coach, and many of the players that presided over the team's last-place finish, as well as the longtime face of the front office, Harry Sinden, who last month resigned as president after 17 years to become an adviser to Jacobs.
Bruins fans have been abused for far too long.
All rage all the time, so much for dialogue, open debate and free speech
Tigerhawk spreads his wisdom.
For my part, I am sick of "Muslim rage." Whether inspired by the pope or Danish cartoonists or the clumsy use of the word "crusade" by a Western politician, there is simply no defense for the behavior of these imams and their followers. It is barbaric, and everybody who is not barbaric or an unreconstructed apologist for barbarians knows it. The Muslims who commit arson and mayhem in response to some Westerner speaking his opinion -- and the pope, as leader of the Roman church, is exactly that -- have chosen to act as enemies of reason, peace, and everything that is good in the world.
And by the way fuck the New York Times. They wouldn't have the balls to stand behind Orianna Fallaci who understood that the fight against Islamofascism is a fight for survival fo the West. Boy do we need her now!
Glenn Reynolds is right: "'Baptist rage' certainly wouldn't get this kind of slack from the Times."