Fiery Scribe

I agree with a left-liberal black man

2009-01-22T12:02:00.003+08:00

I love the comic/show, The Boondocks. It's well-designed, it's smart and most importantly, it's hilarious. I can't wait to see more of Huey and Uncle Ruckus.

Recently, the creator of The Boondocks, came under fire for saying that the 44th President wasn't black. He has explained himself and it is one of the most thought-provoking pieces out there.

He explains his view of who Obama is and what he represents. He is factually right and since I can't speak on the black experience, I won't comment on the rest. It is interesting to note that a lot of black people have adopted him as one of their own, though.

I do not agree with him about the imminent collapse of America and I do not believe America is beholden to corporate interests as much as is believed, at least in the executive branch. Congress is a different issue entirely. But I did find myself agreeing vehemently with one paragraph:

After 9/11, I witnessed most of this country become obsessed with squashing dissent and silencing critics. I hope this election does not turn Black America towards this same, fascist mind state; but already I am starting to see it, and it saddens me greatly. I absolutely wish our new President and his family success and safety. But after all I have witnessed in my lifetime, and especially in the last eight years, I am not ready to lay down my skepticism or my outrage for this government. To do so would be unwise and, ironically enough, anti-American.

I see a lot of people willing to give the new President a honeymoon period and willing to forgive any mistakes he makes because he's better than the alternative(s). But that's not right, and as Aaaron puts it, it's down-right anti-American. In his defense, even the President wants people to challenge him and that is impressive.

The Spirituality Crisis

2009-01-13T17:40:00.005+08:00

Yet another religious figure has attempted to identify the causes of the current economic crisis. The Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Buddhist leader and Nobel Prize winner, has voiced his belief that the current situation is a consequence of flagging spirituality around the world. He notes:

People have become selfish and materialistic, which has led to the economic slowdown.

This reflects the view of Pope Benedict XVI who said in his Christmas message:

If people look only to their own interests, our world will certainly fall apart.

Both of these men, as leaders of spiritual and religious movements, would prefer us to focus our attention and resources on spiritual and religious ideas. This is as natural for them as it is for Wall Street financiers to extol the virtues of finance and sell their trade. The only difference is that you don't see JP Morgan or Goldman Sachs preaching about religion.

As a matter of economics, however, the question is how well spirituality correlates with economic well-being. One can point out the poverty in Tibet, the Dalai Lama's home, as a rather scathing rejoinder, or that we had centuries of focus on religious activity before we gave capitalism (aka greed) a shot, but let's try actual research.

Robert Barro and Rachel McCleary released an NBER working paper, entitled Religion and Economic Growth, in 2003 documenting the effect of religion on economic growth. They reach the conclusion that belief in certain tenets of religion (like heaven and hell) correlates positively, and church attendance negatively, with economic growth. They reach a similar conclusion in their article, Religion and Economy, for the Journal of Economic Perspectives (Vol. 20, No. 2, Spring, 2006).

Spirituality, however, is not the same as belief. Spirituality would entail more church attendance and more participation in religious activity. That, as the researchers note in their work, would take resources away from other, non-religious sectors for very little benefit.

Democracy and Freedom

2009-01-05T13:13:00.003+08:00

As the world takes small, Zeno-esque steps towards freedom on all fronts, certain countries are taking giant leaps backwards.

The British government has quietly adopted a new plan to extend warrantless "remote searches" by the police of PCs anywhere in the UK. More importantly, this is taking place across the EU for which it's called "warrantless intrusive surveillance of private property" and European police can instruct the British (and one presumes vice-versa) to conduct intelligence-gathering on their citizens. This is all nothing more than flowery language for hacking. 1984 is only 15 years late.

Not to be out-done, the incoming US administration is constructing an economic stimulus bill which may contain "buy American" provisions "that could favor U.S. companies over foreign competitors". This only a few months after Obama voted 'yes' on a bill extending warrantless wire-tapping of the very citizens whose votes he was trying to win.

This is what we have come to after years of freedom: society over citizen, citizen over foreigner. Both are immensely mis-guided in their efforts. There is no protection gained in the evisceration of the freedom of individuals in the guise of security and there is no economic benefit gained by subverting market processes and the freedom of trade in the name of patriotism.

The sad fact is that the ordinary voter would have no major issue with either policy as politicians are adept at selling these abhorrent ideas as beneficial to their electorate and the ordinary voter has no idea why it's not. Even sadder is that we cannot expect government to fail in carrying out these plans. As Sir Humphrey Appleby once said, "[w]ell, almost all government policy is wrong, but...frightfully well carried out."

Arnold Kling's Lectures on Macroeconomics

2009-01-02T14:44:00.004+08:00

Arnold Kling has started blogging his take on Macro-economics in a series of lectures. They are thoroughly enjoyable as they link real-world scenarios with micro-economics concepts and marcoeconomic theories.

Here's the course outline:

Alternatively, you can read the entire series in one go.

For those of us who've taken an economics course before, we will notice that the lectures deviates from the norm. I do believe, however, that this is a better way of introducing students to the concepts by discussing events rather than introducing theoretical breakthroughs. After all, macro-economics is hardly a science.

Happy ♬ Year

2009-01-01T00:45:00.003+08:00

Why is it that certain motorists feel it is appropriate to ~~ring~~ blare in the new year with a sound generally associated with frustration at the inability to move forwards?

Opportune moments

2008-12-31T17:16:00.002+08:00

Dr Richard Wiseman, psychologist, magician and skeptic, wrote in his book, The Luck Factor:

Unlucky people are generally more tense than lucky people, and this anxiety disrupts their ability to notice the unexpected.

He came to this conclusion after running a rather interesting experiment. He asked volunteers, who described themselves as either consistently lucky or unlucky to contact him via ads in national newspapers. He then asked them to rifle through another newspaper counting the number of photographs. One of the photographs was an Easter Egg. The lucky participants spotted it more often than the unlucky ones.

It does appear to be, then, that luck has something to do with an open, positive attitude and a keen eye for opportunities. It's a pity that Dr Wiseman didn't consider how the unlucky ones were able to spot the opportunity to participate in his experiment in the first place.

Thought of the day

2008-12-30T02:20:00.002+08:00

"We're in a race to see whether politics will become the dominant means of allocating financial wealth in this country." - Tyler Cowen

Tyler is no hard-core market fundamentalist and I'm ill-placed to say if he's right or wrong on this, but if it is so, it's rather disturbing.

Every time politics and politicians have dominated the allocation of financial wealth, there has been ruin, be it under the guise of monarchy, communism, fascism, corporatism or any other -ism out there. Maybe we've forgotten this lesson of history because TARP doesn't end with those three letters.

I Wanted To Believe

2008-12-29T06:28:00.002+08:00

A Utahn survivalist, Leland Freeborn, predicted that riots would break out before Christmas as a result of Obama's victory and that the Russians would use this as an excuse to nuke the hell out of the country. By December 25th. 2008.

The Parowan Prophet, as he is known, will still have a band of followers. Thanks to the wonders of confirmation bias, they will continue to believe in a kook. He himself admits that prophecy isn't an 'exact' science. I, on the other hand, wasn't even aware that it was a science. Predictions are certainly falsifiable, so that's one tenet down.

The sad fact is that news organizations, like LiveScience.com and the LA Times, which first broke this story, give these nutjobs a voice. They should have urged him to get his brain scanned or something. He does have iodine to combat radiation though, so it might be a bit tricky.

Above my pay-grade

2008-12-27T13:24:00.004+08:00

A recent study concludes that paying for grades does work, at least for high-achieving students.

My mom instituted a pay-scheme when we, her kids, were younger. We were to receive a small payment for a good grade and were required to pay a much larger amount upon failure. While, we certainly couldn't opt in or out of the system, our real motivation came not from the punishment, but from a rather different source:

I'm not so sure that item serves as much of an incentive as it did back then.

The Literary Omnipresence of Jesus

2008-12-26T12:34:00.019+08:00

(Cross-posted on Nirmukta.com)

Institutions, old or new, have a tendency to borrow ideas from each other as they seek to evolve, to revitalize their traditions, to broaden their spheres of influence. We've seen this more vividly in recent years as financial institutions redeveloped their models and ideas for mortgages. Newspapers have started to adapt themselves to the new age by embracing blogging and other 21st century technology trends, in an effort not to get left behind. Most tragically, terrorist cells have grown increasingly martial and organized, borrowing training and tactics from military institutions.

Religions are no different. Much like the business model made famous in the United States v Microsoft anti-trust trial and the "Halloween documents", religions and belief systems have taken, once again, to "embrace, extend and extinguish". In September, the Vatican embraced evolution, adding its voice against the specter of intelligent design. A few days ago, it embraced science once again when Pope Benedict XVI, like his predecessor, paid tribute to Galileo Galilei, once branded as a heretic by the Catholic Church for telling the truth. The Papacy was less cordial with Georgetown University's Peter Phan, a Jesuit theologian, when it launched an investigation into his view of Buddhism as Christianity's equal on the road to salvation. Most bizarrely, however, is the syncretic adaptation of Hindu scriptures to the Son of Man.

The Sundance Channel in the United States debuted Paul Davids' documentary, "Jesus in India", on the 22nd of December. Davids follows Edward T. Martin, who has written two books on the subject, as he treks across South Asia looking for proof of his theory that Jesus spent his lost years in the subcontinent, learning from Hindu and Buddhist monks. His entire theory is based on a supposedly ancient text, the Talmud of Jmmannuel, discovered in Israel, which is considered of dubious origins by most Biblical scholars. It may tickle readers to note that one of the those who discovered this text, a man by the name of Eduard Albert Meier, claims to have had contact with UFOs.

However, Martin is not alone in his linkage of Christ and India. Stephen Knapp discovers correlations between the nativity stories of Christ and Krishna as well as in their philosophies.

Parthenogenesis, or the virgin birth, is a rather popular motif in myths and legends. In Hinduism, Karna, also a figure in the Mahabharata, was born of a virgin, as were his cousins, the Pandavas. Dionysus, of the Greek legends, was said to have been born of a virgin, on a rather familiar day: December the 25th. The other similarities are of a more dubious quality. A manger is hardly equivalent to a prison. Rohini, or Aldebaran as is its astronomical designation, is typically one of the brightest stars in the sky (13th to be exact). It also is part of the constellation Taurus, which corresponds to the vernal equinox, and not December. His last major connection is that of a tyrannical king. This is indeed truly special, given the scarcity of authoritarian monarchs in history.

His connections in their philosophies is even more spartan. It boils, largely, down to both figures having claimed to be the Lord of Creation and to have been righteous. I'm quite sure that this is rather standard of God-men and the like. He connects walking on water with that of walking on hot coals, something plenty of skeptics and rationalists like James Randi and Bill Nye have thoroughly debunked as nothing more than physics at work. His specious logic does not end there. He continues to "prove" that Christianity is a derivative of Hinduism because words (in various tongues) associated with the former are similar to, or derivative of, words from the language related to the latter, Sanskrit. His view of Bethlehem is even harder to swallow as historical record shows the town existed and continues to exist even today.

He does however show a hint of skepticism when he writes:

Since there were no real witnesses of Christ’s birth and hardly any history in the gospels of the life of Christ up to the age of thirty, it is likely they applied the story of Krishna to Jesus’ life. Otherwise, there is little historical evidence that any of it is factual.

While acknowledging the paucity of evidence related to the life of Jesus, he fails to do the same for Krishna. The poetic verses of the Bhagavad Gita according to him are simply of more evidentiary value than the non-poetic verses of the New Testament. The rhymes, it seems, add veracity to the tale.

Others, such as Dr. N. Sharath Babu, a Spicer College professor, connect the Messiah to the Vedas rather than the Bhagavad Gita. The Rig Veda and the Upanishads, written centuries before the birth of the Nazarene, supposedly contain predictions which correlate to the Biblical narrative. The problem lies in the loose translation of verses from these texts in order to confirm one's own conclusion. Take Rig Veda 10.90.7 (Book 10, Hymn 90, Verse 7), from the Purusha Sukta, quoted in the original Sanskrit:

तं यज्ञं बर्हिषि परौक्षन पुरुषं जातमग्रतः |
तेन देवा अयजन्त साध्या रषयश्च ये

This is interpreted by Babu as follows:

The sacrificial victim is to be crowned with a crown made of thorny vines.

However, it was translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith, a scholar of indology, as:

The balmed as victim on the grass Purusha born in earliest time. With him the Dieties and all Sadhyas and Rishis sacrificed.

It is hard to say who is right and who is wrong and care must be taken to avoid an argument from authority. Translations of texts in archaic language by different scholars always results in discrepancies. As skeptics, however, we can easily note that Babu gathers his evidence for the Vedic Jesus from various sources, usually in quotes of one or two lines. These sources were composed and compiled in different time periods. This suggests the presence of a selection bias in his research.

Such loose theological scholarship is not limited to doctors. Meher Baba, an Indian mystic, also holds an unorthodox view of the New Testament. The Silent Avatar, as he is known, had a lot to say, ironically, about the life and times of Jesus in a lecture given in 1937 in Nasik. Speaking for Jesus, he says:

You, Judas (pointing to that one) loves [sic] me very much. I turn the key and you go against me for my work. You do not go against me of your own accord. I make you go against me in order to tell people about me. You do it willingly knowing that people hearing you would beat me and crucify me.

Aside from the obvious contradiction, in consecutive lines no less, between the claims of Jesus making Judas betray him and Judas doing so willingly, Meher Baba's viewpoint is reflected in the apocryphal Gospel of Judas, made famous in recent times. This Gospel is not accepted as part of the Biblical Canon and its authenticity and narration of events are disputed by modern theologians. It is important to note that Meher Baba held this view before the modern discovery of the text, which suggests that this view is nothing but his own interpretation of Biblical scripture, one without any real evidence or proof.

The larger questions of the existence of the Son of Mary and his divinity are shrouded in doubt and may never be definitively answered, as is the case with most prophets and god-men of history. Nevertheless, both theists and atheists must remain skeptical of charlatans with loose translations and shoddy research. Retrofitting out-of-context quotations and calling it a prediction, thereby extolling the prophetic abilities of age-old sages, or linking various obscure facts in a bold-faced attempt at solidarity, they should be viewed as nothing more than feel-good attempts at defrauding the faithful. If anything, these people are a reminder that atheists serve more than others of their kind with their skepticism; they also help theists adhere to their theological scholarship.

Perhaps there is no word that succinctly describes this religious inclusivism than Bill Maher's latest neologism: religulous.

FaceBook ... to the Future!

2008-12-26T02:17:00.002+08:00

Great Scott! Facebook has gained a rather extraordinary ability:

That's right: I'm able to receive comments from the future. This can mean only one thing: the power usage at Facebook's server-farms has reached exactly 1.21 gigawatts.

Urbi et Greedy

2008-12-26T01:10:00.002+08:00

Every Christmas, the Pontiff addresses the world with the now-traditional Urbi et Orbi. He reads out a litany of global transgressions and asks his Lord and Savior to pardon those who have done wrong. This year was no exception. As is usual of a Pope, he focused his attention on the tragic and grizzly socio-political struggles of Zimbabwe, Darfur, Israel and Palestine, Iraq and Somalia amongst many others. While this hasn't helped much in the past, perhaps this is the year. One can only hope.

In a rather cunning segue, the Pope extended his prayer from paucity to excess:

Wherever the dignity and rights of the human person are trampled upon; wherever the selfishness of individuals and groups prevails over the common good; wherever fratricidal hatred and the exploitation of man by man risk being taken for granted; wherever internecine conflicts divide ethnic and social groups and disrupt peaceful coexistence; wherever terrorism continues to strike; wherever the basics needed for survival are lacking; wherever an increasingly uncertain future is regarded with apprehension, even in affluent nations: in each of these places may the Light of Christmas shine forth and encourage all people to do their part in a spirit of authentic solidarity. If people look only to their own interests, our world will certainly fall apart.

I'm quite certain that "fratricidal hatred and the exploitation of man by man risk being taken for granted" isn't quite what he meant. Then, again, this is the Church that took exploitation of boy by man for granted.

Even more awkward is his call for the Light of Christmas (presumbly the aurora borealis, made famous by Briggs' The Snowman) to shine on "[w]herever the dignity and rights of the human person are trampled upon." This comes just days after the Vatican opposed a UN draft declaration on gay rights. Their ambassador was quoted in a French newspaper as saying that such a proposal was “sad and outrageous” and represented the kind of “modern savagery that will dismantle our society from the inside out.” To be fair, one can't accuse the Papacy of trampling on gay rights if they don't have any.

Woven in that message, too, is an anti-Gordon Gekko-esque screed against greed. It's rather humorous that one believer in an "invisible hand" stands so much in opposition to another:

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages.

All the same, railing against greed and self-interest is as popular as ever, if not more so. It's a good thing, then, that the Holy Father didn't pimp himself up for the event.

Google re-zones Hong Kong

2008-12-25T00:50:00.006+08:00

Every year since 1997, NORAD tracks Santa's erratic path across the world as he hands out gifts to good little boys and girls. I logged in a few minutes ago to see that the jolly fatman had already visited Hong Kong. I was rather peeved not to see a SimTower-esque Santa flying past my window.

Then, I noticed something else:

That's right. It's a picture of Kowloon ... Island. I've always wanted to live across the harbor, but I could never afford the rent. I never realized I already did, apparently.

Now that's a Christmas present if there ever was one. Thanks Google and Merry Christmas.

Bipartisanship at its finest

2008-12-23T00:14:00.004+08:00

Salon's Glenn Greenwald is one of my favorite bloggers on the planet (he has some competition from Klaatu in the Universe category), and here's why (emphasis his):

Either way, Cheney's general claim is as clear as it is incriminating. According to him, key Congressional Democrats were told about the illegal NSA spying program in detail, and they not only actively approved of it, but far beyond that, they insisted that no Congressional authorization should even be sought, based on what was always the patently inane claim that to discuss the fact that the administration was eavesdropping on our conversations without warrants (rather than with warrants, as the law required) would be to reveal our secrets -- "our playbook" -- to Al Qaeda.

Basically, top Democrats signed off on the entire thing and insisted it shouldn't even be discussed in the legislative branch, lest the terrorist specters can hear the whispers. How do they have the cojones to berate Bush for his authoritarian streak when they whole-heartedly encourage it? This is the party Americans expect to get them out of messes they didn't even have the spine to discuss?

If this was the opposition party, who'd ever need a filibuster-proof majority?

Sony's English Joke Contest

2008-12-22T19:53:00.003+08:00

You can win a three-day, two-night trip to Hong Kong with a visit to Disneyland (how is that a prize?) by recording and submitting your humorous experiences related to the use of English.

It just tickles me that the winner will have a far better story after winning and visiting Hong Kong. In any case, it's probably just a contest between the 6.7 million Hong Kongers who will submit a story about "trying our breast."

Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares: Chez Mum

2008-12-22T17:35:00.005+08:00

This is Gordon Ramsay. This is Gordon Ramsay's mom. No, no, really. This is Gordon Ramsay's mum. And this is how not to run a kitchen.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Twat.

(Hat-tip: Fark)

All the News That's Fit to Print

2008-12-21T01:09:00.004+08:00

China is blocking access to the websites of the New York Times and Ming Pao, a Hong Kong daily. That means no Will Shortz, no Freakonomics, no Krugman and no TierneyLab. On the other hand, that also means no Tom Friedman. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about this. Thankfully, it only applies to the mainland, so I'm OK.

This does beg the question though: did the Gray Lady's left-leaning bias piss the communists off or do they just really, really hate sites without full-text feeds?

Because the world just isn't weird enough ...

2008-12-16T13:16:00.003+08:00

An anti-kidnapping expert was kidnapped in Mexico. Now, if only there was someone who could offer advice on such things ...

H-UAW-LY CRAP!!

2008-12-15T03:05:00.003+08:00

Ford's contract with the UAW is 2,215 pages long. An 8.5" x 11" page with default margins in Microsoft Word is 84 characters wide by 56 lines long. The paper itself weighs about 28 grams and costs about $10 for 500 sheets.

The entire contract weighs about 10kg. That's equivalent to a 26" LCD TV. You tell me which is more entertaining!

A cartridge of printer ink for an inkjet printer has a page yield of about 3,000 (5% page coverage) and costs about US$ 30. Assuming a 10% page coverage, which is within the norm for such contracts, the page yield would be about 1,500 pages. So, if my math is correct, printing that contract out costs US $44.3 in ink and US $44.3 in paper. That's a grand total of US $88.6 for printing costs alone.

Adding in lawyers' fees, as well as that of their assistants and anyone else involved, is it a wonder the UAW doesn't want it changed?

State-side Zeitgeist

2008-12-13T18:05:00.002+08:00

While traversing through Google's Zeitgeist and related posts, I came across StateStats, a rather interesting site which correlates search queries with American states and a limited range of state rankings. The site uses Google Insights for Search, a fascinating tool, in and of itself to get data for the search queries. Certain correlations provide a Zeitgeist-esque look at the mind of Americans.

Take, Fark, for example. It has a high correlation with obesity and a low correlation with gay people. Who'd have thunk it? Both acupuncture and homeopathy correlate positively with voting for Obama, same-sex couplehood and income, and negatively with voting for Bush. Who says all Bush voters are idiots?

My favorite, by far, has to be Family Guy. Obvious Rhode Island tops the searches, given that the state is the setting for the show. More interestingly, perhaps, there is a moderate negative correlation between "Family Guy" and suicide. Let me the first to congratulate Seth MacFarlane for saving lives. Comedy, in general, has the same correlation. I'm not sure why I'm so surprised; if I didn't have a sense of humor, I'd probably want to kill myself, too.

Related to Family Guy is that rather memorable catchphrase from the Halloween episode: "Laura Bush killed a guy". New York, Texas and California were the only states to register searches for that query. I don't know what to make of that, honestly.

Perhaps, the most telling result is that of "death to America". This query only features in California. Why does Hollywood hate America?

It's a rather addictive tool, so go ahead and see what correlations you can find.

The weird and wacky of Google Zeitgeist

2008-12-13T17:26:00.006+08:00

Google has released its Zeitgeist for this year. An amalgamated summary of all the searches run on Google throughout the year, it's usually full of weird trends. If there's one artefact I'd like left behind to represent us after we die out, I'd like it to be Google's Zeitgeist.

Let's start locally, with Hong Kong. Most of the results seem rather normal; YouTube, Facebook, Apple and other brands fare rather well. However, something does stick out: #5 on the fastest rising searches is "Alexander Graham Bell". With 3.875 million fixed-line phones and 10.55 million cell phones in use (0.552 and 1.503 per person respectively), the interest in telecommunications is obvious. But the inventor?

India is interesting for another reason altogether. The top 'how to' searches are rather revealing:

how to reduce weight
how to kiss
how to earn money
how to get pregnant
how to learn english
how to gain weight
how to play guitar
how to create a website
how to impress a girl
how to tie a tie

Accomplishing #1, #3, #5 and/or #7 will lead to #9, #2 and then possibly #4, which, in turn, solves #6. That leaves #8 and #10. If you can't do either in this day and age you might as well give up all hope of #9.

Speaking of 'how to' searches, the global results aren't that much better:

how to draw
how to kiss
how to write
how to cook
how to tie
how to hack
how to run
how to cite
how to paint
how to spell

I think I can understand most of them, but "how to run"? I could rant about that, but something else caught my eye: the number one 'diy' search is "diy wedding". Think about it. Number one. DIY. Wedding. I'm not sure people understand the concept of a wedding. On the other hand, marrying yourself isn't technically gay (or is it?), so it's probably not illegal in California. Not until the next election, anyway.

Go through it yourself. Who knows what oddity you'll come across.

Regulators, mount up!

2008-12-10T04:49:00.008+08:00

Dr Michael Shermer attempts to bury the deregulation myth pervading the conversations these days. His arguments are not fleshed out, but he isn't an economist by any measure. We can leave that for David Henderson. His piece for Cato is an obvious inspiration for Shermer's post and is far more thorough.

Of course, this is just an excuse to post this:

Spread that wealth around, NOW!

2008-12-10T03:46:00.004+08:00

Fresh off the farm stimulus, Obama presses on with more genius:

Mr. Obama also responded to criticism of waste and inefficiency in such programs by promising new spending rules, like a requirement that states act quickly to invest in roads and bridges or sacrifice federal money.

Problem: waste. Solution: call it investment.
Problem: inefficiency. Solution: do it quickly.

There's more on Obama's infrastructure plans here. Reading through, I'm reminded of this story:

An economist visits China under Mao Zedong. He sees hundreds of workers building a dam with shovels. He asks: “Why don't they use a mechanical digger?” “That would put people out of work,” replies the foreman. “Oh,” says the economist, “I thought you were making a dam. If it's jobs you want, take away their shovels and give them spoons.”

A Green Job for the 21st Century

2008-12-10T03:05:00.004+08:00

Barack H. Obama, the leader-of-the-free-world-in-waiting, plans to revitalize rural areas by:

Encourage Young People to Become Farmers: Establish a new program to identify and train the next generation of farmers. Provide tax incentives to make it easier for new farmers to afford their first farm.

Transfer payments of this kind can make sense in certain situations, but agriculture isn't it. If I understand the situation correctly, in the US, agriculture is increasingly a large business industry, because economies of scale are easy to obtain. I'm not so sure the costs are exceeded by the benefits of subsidizing a romanticized fantasy. After all, is it a good idea to increase competition when he also wants to: help family famers (sic) and rural small businesses find profitability in the marketplace and success in the global economy?

Perhaps this is a ploy to compete with China's "floating population."

(via Reason)

The Dictionary according to Thomas

2008-12-10T00:46:00.003+08:00

Thomas Sowell defines the recent Mumbai attacks for us:

They didn't strike again here, even though they have struck in Spain, Indonesia, England and India, among other places. Does anyone imagine that this was because they didn't want to hit America again?

Could this have had anything to do with all the security precautions that liberals have been complaining about so bitterly, from the interception of international phone calls to forcing information out of captured terrorists?

He seems to have forgotten that after the WTC was bombed in 1993, they waited until 2001 to give it another go. That's a full eight years (or 7 if the USS Cole counts), without the loss of any civil liberties. Indeed, much like last time around, terrorists were rather active elsewhere.

He does however nail it when he says: [t]hey want our soul— and if they are willing to die and we are not, they will get it. If the soul of the United States is not its Constitution and the liberties for which it stands, I don't know what is.

I'll leave the last word to Sowell himself: never underestimate partisan blindness in Washington or in the mainstream media.