Friday, November 20, 2009

College Majors, for $200

Climate scientists with the integrity to stick to the narrative.

What is Political Science?

Ignorance is Strength

Garry sent me this on the big story regarding the hacked climate-change e-mails. Then I found this quote in the NY Times, via Instapundit:

Dr. Trenberth said Friday that he was appalled at the release of the e-mails, which he said were private discussions. But he added that he thought the revelations might backfire against climate skeptics. If anything, he said, he thought that the messages showed “the integrity of scientists.”

Does he mean the scientists were "honestly lying" or "lying honestly." Because THAT'S integrity.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Message in a bottle

Cool thing happened today. I received a reply to an email I sent almost 4 and a half years ago from one of the members of the family I stayed with as a law student in Tokyo. It was like uncorking a message in a bottle.

John Stossel's reading list

Okay, I haven't posted in forever and I was pretty sure no one had noticed, and then Garry insinuated that I was mourning my football team and Squeezer called me out for slacking off. Now that all three of this blog's readers are accounted for, I'll just skip over the U.S. House's vote on healthcare and the Ft. Hood attacks and instead go straight to some something that was uplifting. I'm fast becoming a fan of John Stossel, who ranks with the PJTV guys--Bill Whittle, Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Klavan, et al., as a favorite read (but nobody beats Mark Steyn). I read his article on spending being worse than taxes, and then linked over to his reading list, which I will recommend to myself and both of the other readers:

Describing his experiences as an investigative consumer reporter, Stossel said, "It made me want to learn more about free markets. I subscribed to Reason magazine and read Cato Institute research papers. Then Milton Friedman, Friedrich Hayek and Aaron Wildavsky."

Add those to the list-

Friday, November 13, 2009

Off the Chart



Old news, but I feel compelled to log this chart for posterity.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Incentives matter

Fascinating article at the Wall Street Journal regarding football helmets:

As obvious as the problem may seem (wait, you mean football is dangerous?), continuing revelations about the troubling mental declines of some retired players—and the ongoing parade of concussions during games—have created a sense of inevitability. Pretty soon, something will have to be done.

But before the debate goes any further, there's a fundamental question that needs to be investigated. Why do football players wear helmets in the first place? And more important, could the helmets be part of the problem?

"Some people have advocated for years to take the helmet off, take the face mask off. That'll change the game dramatically," says Fred Mueller, a University of North Carolina professor who studies head injuries. "Maybe that's better than brain damage."

Same goes for cars. People drive faster because cars are safer. *Place a pointed spike on the center of the steering wheel and direct it towards the driver's neck and see if they slow down!

*Not saying I'm in favor; I like to drive fast.

(h/t Kyle Smith)

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Decline is a Choice - Part II

Decline, especially when it comes to blogging, is definitely a choice. For the most part I blame *Paul. I'll post later the other reasons this venture has taken a break.

(Mostly I was just tired of being negative all the time with respect to our national news. I can only take so much of this nonsense.)

Something, however, finally awoke me from my malaise.

We are dealing with cowards. Passing a sweeping mess of a bill that no one has read and no one outside of the circle of trust was allowed to see on a Saturday without any warning is just gross. These people are just incredible.

Anyway, it certainly woke me up, and hopefully others as well. We'll see if this gets anywhere.

*Just kidding. Paul has been in a little bit of a funk lately. Haven't spoken to him in a while. I hope he's OK.