October 13, 2007

THE HENRY REED CAUCUS: Right-to-lifers want some comfort from Rudy Giuliani about abortion; I want some comfort on this vital issue.

A MAN OF HSUPERIOR TASTE:

Disgraced Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu had a well-known affection for fine living and all things Clinton. And his collector's taste and eye were on display Wednesday, when federal authorities unsealed documents showing they had seized more than 180 bottles of pricey wine from Hsu's New York apartment, as well as a saxophone believed to have been autographed by President Clinton.

Experts valued the wine collection -- which includes dozens of bottles of Chateau Lafite Rothschild and vintage Cristal champagne, as well as California wines such as Opus One -- at up to $100,000.

"I wish I had this collection," said Robert Yetman, a wine-industry consultant and professor at the UC Davis Graduate School of Management. "It's a little showy, but nice."

Per Holmberg, director of acquisitions for Vinfolio, a San Francisco company that sells fine wine to collectors, called Hsu's selections classic -- the choices of "a true bon vivant."

Until recently, Hsu, 56, traveled in glittering circles as one of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's most prolific supporters, raising more than $1.2 million for the New York Democrat and other Democratic candidates in the last three years.

Still not much evidence as to where his money came from, though.

UPDATE: Bill Quick finds Hsu's taste a bit nouveau:

This “collection” sounds like something thrown together by a guy who walks into BevMo and says, “What’s the most expensive champagne you got? Cristal? Great. Gimme a couple of cases. And some of that Rothschild stuff, I hear about that all the time. How about domestic red wines? Opus One? Fine. Three cases of that, too.”

Ouch.

ANOTHER SHOE DROPS: Former Duke Lacrosse Coach Sues School.

MY EARLIER MENTION OF DORIS LESSING'S NOBEL PRIZE prompted readers to recall this column of hers on political correctness and communism's legacy in language, and that reminded me of this commentary by Lessing on the gender wars, linked in the very earliest days of InstaPundit. And -- alas behind a subscription wall -- this scathing piece on Robert Mugabe.

MICHAEL BARONE LOOKS AT FIVE BOOKS ON AMERICA AND BRITAIN: Two of them are books mentioned here more than once: David Hackett Fischer's Albion's Seed, and James Bennett's The Anglosphere Challenge.

MY MUNCHKIN'S BETTER THAN your munchkin.

UNFIT TO PRINT? It's all about the narrative.

THE U.S. SENATE: UNITERS, NOT DIVIDERS! A reader sends this summary, not available online as far as I know:

* Iraqi Figures Launch Campaign Against US Senate Resolution

Iraqi political and religious figures in addition to Arab figures have launched a campaign to collect the signatures of one million people, who oppose the US Senate resolution on partitioning Iraq into federal regions on sectarian bases. A conference was held in Amman to this effect, during which the participants, who represent various sects, called on the Arab countries to stand by Iraq and condemn this resolution.

(Dubai Al-Sharqiyah Television in Arabic -- Independent, private news and entertainment channel focusing on Iraq, run by Sa'd al-Bazzaz, publisher of the Arabic-language daily Al-Zaman)

Soon, the U.S. Senate will be held in as much esteem in Iraq as it is in America.

I DON'T DO FACEBOOK, but I like this.

FREE TV ONLINE: Including the new reality show, The Search for the Next Elvira, though that one inspired this review: "This show actually made me a fan of the current Elvira."

Plus, uncensored South Park.

IOWAHAWK: You may already be a winner!

UPDATE: Oops. Wrong link above -- though it's funny too. I meant to link to this IowaHawk parody, and instead linked to That Darn Sandy!

MAKING DUKE AND DURHAM LOOK LIKE PIKERS: "The Knights Templar, the medieval Christian military order accused of heresy and sexual misconduct, will soon be partly rehabilitated when the Vatican publishes trial documents it had closely guarded for 700 years."

THE CARNIVAL OF CARS IS UP: Including immunization advice for car fans visiting our nation's capital.

BRUCE KESLER ALSO NOTICED what the media reports left out regarding General Sanchez's speech.

UPDATE: Sanchez echoing Rumsfeld.

And Captain Ed observes: "It seems that half of the message retired General Richard Sanchez intended to deliver missed the cut at most newsrooms, and with most bloggers. . . . Why? Well, it turns out that Sanchez considered his first target the media itself, which he blames for a large part of the problems he sees in Iraq . . . . Given that, it seems highly ironic that the journalists covering the story attempted to cover up the acidic, biting, and mostly accurate criticisms of their own performance in this war while giving front-page treatment to Sanchez' criticisms of the political structure at the same time. If Sanchez has such credibility and standing to bring this kind of criticism to bear on Washington, why didn't the Post and other news agencies give the same level of exposure to his media criticisms as well? He basically accuses them of cynically selling out the soldiers to defeat American efforts to win the war, and made sure that those accusations came first before his assessment of the political failures, but you'd never know that from the Post."

THIS LOOKS COOL: McIlhenny's Gold: How a Louisiana Family Built the Tabasco Empire. There are lots of hot sauces I like, but Tabasco remains the gold standard.

OKAY, THIS IS BIZARRE: After one county web page in California was hacked and redirected to a porn site, the GSA -- which controls everything ending in .gov, including state and local websites -- shut down access across the state of California:

They used a shotgun to kill a flea," state spokesman Jim Hanacek said on Friday.

Federal authorities, who have ultimate authority over most local and state Web sites, attempted to block all domains ending in ca.gov Tuesday, Hanacek said.

State agencies across California experienced rolling e-mail and Web site outages for about seven hours, and Internet users had trouble pulling up some state Web sites, he said.

The General Services Administration, which shut down the sites, apologized for the inconvenience on Thursday and said it would try to find a more targeted solution for similar problems in the future.

Jeez. (Via Kevin Drum).

HOMEOWNER VS. BURGLARS: "When you hear a pump shotgun click, it makes everyone think twice." Video here.

GOOD THING I'M NOT ONE, THEN: "Good Catholics support government-run health care."

VIDEO: Doris Lessing learns of her Nobel prize and displays a proper level of enthusiasm.

ALL ABOARD THE Smooth-talk Express!

JAMES LILEKS: "Leave it to a guy to invent reversible underwear."

OUCH: "Writing for CNN today, Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, and Harvey Wasserman share some thoughts about nuclear power (Note: Don't think about that last sentence too hard. You'll hurt your head or bring on the apocalypse or something). They're worried that the siren song of cheap, clean energy will seduce us once again, when we should be rightfully seduced only by Bonnie's dulcet tones."

WHEN GENERALS DENOUNCE THE PRESS, the press doesn't report it. "It's quite a luxury to be able to decide whether criticisms of your own conduct ever see the light of day--a luxury the mainstream media not only enjoy, but abuse."

UPDATE: Some other things that were missed.

THOUGHTS ON INTELLECTUALS AND MARKETS, from Gary Becker.

October 12, 2007

JESSE WALKER OFFERS ADVICE ON how to win a Nobel peace prize.

AMORY LOVINS ON why global warming and peak oil are irrelevant. Expanding on what I mentioned the other day.

FROM JOHN TIERNEY, an inconvenient question:

I don’t want to dampen the celebration over Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize, but I wonder if this is, as they say, a “teachable moment.” Should he skip the trip to Oslo, Norway, on a fuel-burning jet and instead accept the award by teleconference? . . . Should Mr. Gore follow his own advice here? You could argue that the publicity generated by his presence in Oslo would do more to combat global warming than the reduced emissions from trip. But you could also argue that the symbolism of staying home would send an even more powerful message about the need for everyone to conserve energy. He could generate plenty of publicity by delivering the Nobel lecture through a video link and letting the prize be sent to him on an energy-efficient ship.

Plus, an exercise for the reader!

HEH.

MEGAN MCARDLE: "This self-flagellating column by Jonathan Rauch about what he got wrong on Iraq made me go looking at the Iraq Index from Brookings to see just how guilty I should feel this month. (Who doesn't enjoy a spot of self-flagellation?) Instead, I got a happy surprise."

UPDATE: Some interesting stuff on water, sewer, and electric utilities in Iraq in the comments, as you scroll down.

I, FOR ONE, WELCOME OUR NEW ROBOTIC SPOUSES: "Researcher: Humans will wed robots."

I've already got a bionic wife, and I'm cool on that.

UPDATE: An educational clip from Futurama explaining why you shouldn't date robots.

BAINBRIDGE ON fixing SSRN.

UPDATE: Hey, it occurs to me that no sooner do I crack the SSRN's Top Ten U.S. Law Professors list than people start talking about "fixing" it. Coincidence? . . . .

IT SEEMS THAT QUITE A FEW PEOPLE ARE questioning the timing of the Armenian genocide resolution.

UPDATE: Including Dr. Melissa Clouthier.

DEROY MURDOCK LOOKS AT "RUDYPHOBIA" ON THE RIGHT: "What do Giuliani’s Religious Right detractors really fear he will do about abortion?"

HATE SPEECH AND DOUBLE STANDARDS: Parsing Lee Bollinger.

NOT YOUR FATHER'S JACK-O-LANTERN: Extreme pumpkin-carving.

HOW THE "FAIRNESS DOCTRINE" WORKED -- some history.

BEST. SPIN. EVER.

Bush Ties Peace Prize Record

With the selection of the International Committee on Climate Change and Al Gore, Jr., for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, President Bush has moved into the record book for most Peace Prizes awarded to Americans during their presidency.

His Presidency is tied with three others for most Americans winning the Award!

Previous American Presidents to share multiple peace prizes during their Presidency were Ronald Reagan, Richard M. Nixon and…Herbert Hoover.

Heh.

UPDATE: Related comments here.

MADE IT HOME IN ONE PIECE: Today Delta got us everywhere on time, with no hassle.

ARNOLD KLING: The road to McMedicine.

PROGRESS: We're in Atlanta.

THE TURKS ARE UNHAPPY ABOUT THE ARMENIA VOTE: I don't have a problem with the resolution as such, but who decided that now is a good time to upset the Turks?

UPDATE: Some thoughts on the subject from Max Boot.

ANOTHER UPDATE: I've gotten a lot of comments like this one from reader Dave Schneider:

Who thought this would be a good time to upset the Turks? The Democrats, who see the possibility that we might NOT lose in Iraq slipping.

So, if you can't cut off funds for the war, be more subtle: provoke the Turks into cutting our supply lines and make success much more difficult.

I don't think the Democrats are quite that Machiavellian, but clearly quite a few other people feel differently.

DOES HOWARD DEAN want Gore in the race?

HOUSE JUDICIARY VOTES TO extend the ban on taxing Internet access, "though the Senate's taking its sweet time."

LOTS OF PEOPLE WERE INTERESTED IN THE DANGEROUS BOOK FOR BOYS, and now it's time for The Daring Book for Girls.

DUE TO A SERVER GLITCH AT XM RADIO, the Pajamas Media show will air tonight, instead of its normal timeslot of last night. It'll be on at 6 pm Eastern, XM Channel 130. But you can listen online now here.

IBN WARRAQ VS. TARIQ RAMADAN: A debate on the superiority of Western culture.

GETTING READY TO BOARD THE FLIGHT: Wish us luck.

THE ENRON WHISTLEBLOWER who wasn't.

HOW THE UNITED STATES BECAME SWITCHBOARD TO THE WORLD: The accompanying illustration explains why it's so useful to the NSA to be able to intercept calls among foreigners that pass through the United States.

GREG MANKIW HAS THOUGHTS ON academia's growing diversity problem.

A HOME FIRE-SAFETY CHECKLIST.

A NOBEL PEACE PRIZE for Al Gore. I think he makes a fitting addition to the pantheon of Nobel Peace Prize holders.

UPDATE: Big Gore roundup here: "Al Gore’s got an Oscar, an Emmy, and as of today a Nobel Peace Prize. And the 'Draft Gore' movement thinks they’d all look good on his desk in the Oval Office."

October 11, 2007

IRANIAN STUDENT PROTESTERS: "We wish we were Columbia students!"

MICKEY KAUS: "This isn't the first time kausfiles hasn't met Drudge's journalistic standards!"

JIM GERAGHTY: "One of Hillary Clinton's lawyers from Whitewater was in charge of reviewing copy at the Enquirer?! What are the odds of that?"

READER ALLEN ROBERTS WRITES: "So, given your air travel woes, are you still as down on those who travel by private jet?"

Hey, I never said they were stupid. I just don't want them to lecture us on greenhouse consciousness.

UPDATE: How should air travel look? I wrote about that a while back in this column. And don't miss this article by James Fallows.

WELL, THE POPULAR MECHANICS FOLKS FOUND US A HOTEL, so we're set up. Thanks to all the people who emailed with offers of help. On a trip where we actually only spent one day doing what we came to do, we'll have beein in airports on four separate days. Air travel needs work.

I can't really blame Delta for this. It's weather, apparently. But the fact is that air travel can't be counted on to get you where you need to go when you're supposed to be there. It's a dysfunctional industry, and needs major fixing.

FLIGHT CANCELLED. No more flights until tomorrow. No airport hotels available.

Remind me not to fly again.

YES, WE'RE STILL STUCK AT LAGUARDIA: The Delta folks are now claiming that our 3:25 flight to Knoxville will depart at 6.

PHILIP LEVY ON FREE TRADE: "As the Bush Administration and Congress gird for battle this fall over four newly signed free trade agreements, one could be forgiven for thinking that these FTAs must be economically momentous to merit the looming conflict. But one would be wrong. While the global political stakes are huge, the domestic economic stakes are penny ante."

A WALK THROUGH RAMADI: Video from Michael Totten.

BRAD ROURKE: "Have we forgotten what it’s like to make an effort for anything?"

SO I PUT UP THE POST ABOUT AIRPORT DELAYS and a minute later my cellphone rang. It was Hallerin Hill, who's teaching a class in communications for the MBA program at UT. He wanted to know how I was blogging from the airport -- I explained it was via the Sprint wireless card. Works great, even where there's no wi-fi.

UPDATE: Hallerin texts that it's the UT "Executive Development Program," not the MBA program. See how fast we can fix errors in the blogosphere!

IN SALON: A look at Bill Clinton's influence in a Hillary Clinton administration:

Laws designed to minimize real or perceived influence peddling limit the activities of a sitting president. But campaign and election law attorneys say nothing prohibits Bill Clinton from continuing to accept big checks made out to him or his foundation, even if his wife is elected president. "I don't know of any law that would restrict that," said Meredith McGehee, policy director at the Campaign Legal Center in Washington. "The spouse is not exactly a federal employee." . . .

But if Bill Clinton raises and makes money in 2009 the way he has in recent years, it will be at a blistering pace. He started his William J. Clinton Foundation in 1997 to fund the construction of his presidential library in Little Rock, Ark. But the organization has since expanded to encompass an umbrella of nonprofit initiatives to fight HIV, assist developing countries and combat climate change. Donations have increased exponentially. He has accepted hundreds of millions in donations to date; tax records for 2005, the most recent available, show Clinton raised more than $80 million for his foundation in that year alone.

Foundations are not required by law to reveal the identities of donors, and the former president has resisted showing where the money for his is coming from.

Read the whole thing. (Thanks to Walter Shapiro for the link).

AIR TRAVEL SUCKS (CONT'D): Flight to Knoxville is currently showing a one-and-a-half hour delay.

CULTURE OF CORRUPTION UPDATE: "Here's how the Democrats “drained the swamp” and ended the Republicans’ 'culture of corruption' on Capitol Hill: Roll Call recently reported that three top Democrats on the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee got more than $100 million in earmarks for clients of the PMA Group, an Arlington-based lobbying shop run by their former chiefs of staff. The earmark recipients coincidentally (we are supposed to believe) donated $542,350 during the first half of this year to the ethically challenged trio."

I believe that my modest hopes for the Democratic congress -- that it wouldn't be any worse than the crooked GOP congress we had before -- were nonetheless too extravagant for reality.

THE INSTAWIFE was interviewed by CNN on what to do if your job is giving you a heart attack.

IN THE MAIL: Stephen Colbert's I am America! (And so can you!)

GOOD NEWS: "All branches of the Armed Forces met or exceeded their recruitment goals for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, and the Army expects to accelerate its expansion in the next two years, top brass at the Pentagon announced Wednesday."

DEREK LOWE on the latest Nobel prize in chemistry.

MARK LEVIN ON FRED THOMPSON: "This 'senior moment' and 'Fred Thompson-is-lazy' stuff is really starting to irk. I remember hearing the same comments about Ronald Reagan in every campaign in which I participated — 1976 and 1980."

GOOGLE BANNING ADS CRITICAL OF MOVEON?

OUR MEETUP WITH ANN ALTHOUSE: If a picture's worth a thousand words, then this is a New Yorker feature.

We'd never actually met before, but between the blog and the vlogs and the podcasts I felt like we were already old companions.

October 10, 2007

A LOOK AT YOUR RIGHTS IN the District of Columbia:

“Whatever right the Second Amendment guarantees,” wrote the District’s chief law enforcer, “it does not require the District to stand by while its citizens die.”

What an excellent example of unintended humor — the District’s government is a national leader in standing by while its citizens die. Our homicide rate hit a 20-year low in 2005 — just 29 victims per 100,000 residents. That is slightly better than New York City’s rate (30.7) under Mayor David Dinkins in 1990, when the Big Apple suffered 2,250 homicides. . . .

D.C. residents are strictly forbidden from owning handguns, even in the privacy of their homes. Any long guns must be registered and kept “unloaded and disassembled.” It is not even legal, strictly speaking, to assemble and load your gun when you hear an intruder downstairs. A lower court ruled the ban unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court will decide later this year whether to take up the case.

In the debate over the gun ban, there is a strong statistical case that an armed citizenry is safer than one disarmed by unconstitutional laws, but this argument is not even necessary. There is absolutely no valid case that the District’s gun ban makes me safer as a District resident. When Singer and Mayor Adrian Fenty (D., of course) penned a September 4 Washington Post op-ed stating that “The handgun ban has saved countless lives,” were they really suggesting that without the ban there might have been 1,000 murder victims in 1991, instead of just 482? The implication is that D.C. is so totally ungovernable that only a total deprivation of constitutional rights can make it barely livable.

Read the whole thing. Related post here.

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON shares some final impressions from Iraq.

MORE PICS FROM THE BREAKTHROUGH CONFERENCE: It was like a grownup science fair. With an open bar and fancy snacks.

POLITICAL COVERAGE: Howard Kurtz says the problem is you.

MICKEY KAUS: "If Edwards sinks or disappears, does it benefit Hillary? You'd think no--she doesn't want a clarified head-to-head race against Obama. But Obama is counting on Edwards to do the dirty work of taking Hillary on. ... The ideal outcome for Obama would be if Edwards loses most of his support yet stays in the race long enough to go on the attack."

THE NETROOTS DEMONSTRATE THEIR POWER AGAIN: Majority of Democrats will vote to fund war.

LAUGHING, CRYING, WHATEVER:

In a rare display of honesty, Zimbabwe's dictator Robert Mugabe has acknowledged that his "redistribution" of white-owned farms (which included giving land and equipment to thousands of people who hadn't a clue how to farm) has been a disaster, and that it has turned his country into a "laughing stock."

But it's not his fault.

NOT A MOMENT TOO SOON: "Federal investigators are hinting that a fresh wave of campaign-related theft and corruption investigations of Members of Congress are moving through the pipeline, signaling that indictments may be on the horizon." (Via The Influence Peddler, who has some thoughts).

Next is a panel with the modest title of How to Save American Science, with physicist Shawn Carlson, who won a MacArthur Fellowship for science education, and who founded the Society for Amateur Scientists; science educator David Connelly; Prof. Hod Lipson from Cornell who won a Breakthrough Award this year for developing universal fabrication technology, and student Breakthrough Award winner Kelydra Welcker, who came up with a way to remove ammonium perfluorooctanoate from drinking water.

BLOGS TARGET JIHADIS ONLINE. Blogger Rusty Shackelford appears: "Asked why he does it, 'Mr. Shackleford' said, 'Because my wife won't let me go shoot them.'"

MATT SULLIVAN JUST TOLD ME that they've got a big roundup, with video online, with background on a lot of the stuff I'm writing about, plus much more.

NOW IT'S A PANEL ON LOW-TECH SOLUTIONS FOR GLOBAL PROBLEMS: It's Jock Brandis from the Full Belly Project, Shawn Frayne, who won a Breakthrough Award this year for generating a new, low-cost wind generator, Ashok Gadgil of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, who got a Breakthrough Award for designing a high-efficiency cookstove for refugees in Darfur, and Peter Haas, who heads efforts on incubating for-profit enterprises targeting poor people who need clean water, sanitation, and energy.

Biggest take-away point so far: "Simple technology" doesn't mean "dumbed-down." It's not really even "low tech." It often takes a tremendous amount of intellectual input to create a simple, rugged, inexpensive device that cleans water, makes electricity, etc. And while it may seem that the opportunity for small-scale invention has passed, it turns out that there are lots of places where individual inventors can accomplish huge things -- they're just mostly in the poorer parts of the planet.

UPDATE: Best line, from Ashok Gadgil: "The fun of doing this kind of stuff is amazing!"

Second best, from Shawn Frayne: "You can actually make a living at this."

And from Peter Haas: "There's a renaissance in tinkering going on."

Biggest problems in third world countries: Corruption, government bureaucracy, and lack of legal infrastructure.

FAKE HATE SPEECH at George Washington University. The administration was fooled.

UPDATE: Reader Randy Bean emails: "Actually, it was real 'hate' speech. The posters were intended to paint the YAF as racist for sponsoring an event discussing the issue of radical Islam. FWIW."

I'M AT THE POPULAR MECHANICS BREAKTHROUGH CONFERENCE, and Amory Lovins is talking about how the whales were saved by technological innovators and profit-maximizing capitalists. He also says -- and I agree -- that it doesn't matter whether you believe "peak oil" catastrophe scenarios because you ought to be doing the same thing anyway. Likewise the global warming debate, which I also agree with. "The debate about energy conservation is about costs, but it's not about costs -- everybody who saves energy makes money on it."

That's Lovins on the right, and Popular Mechanics editor Jim Meigs on the left Some nice thoughts on non-hairshirt environmentalism, something I've mentioned before.

UPDATE: Below, Lovins talks afterward about how we're nowhere near the feasible limits of improving efficiency in, well, nearly everything we do.

IN THE MAIL: Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger's Break Through: From the Death of Environmentalism to the Politics of Possibility.

Plus, Paul Aligica's Prophecies of Doom and Scenarios of Progress: Herman Kahn, Julian Simon and the Prospective Imagination. Kahn and Simon's predictions have certainly been borne out to a much greater extent than those of their contemporary doomsayers like Paul Ehrlich.

WRAP YOURSELF IN NANOFABRICS.

MORE THOUGHTS ON TAXES AND PROGRESSIVITY, from James Joyner. "It’s not what it was before the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts, by any stretch, but it’s hard to argue that those who earn 21.2% of the nation’s income should pay 39.4% of all federal income taxes when taken in isolation. Second, while FICA is undeniably a tax, it’s of a different sort than income taxes. Social Security is, in theory anyway, a pension system rather than a means of collecting general revenue. The reason the very rich pay a smaller percentage of their income into Social Security is that the payout is capped and therefore so is the collection threshold."

DRAINING THE SWAMP by "declaring it a wetland and moving on."

THE DUTCH HAVE no use for heroes. Heroism makes people who behave unheroically feel uncomfortable.

FINDING MARIA BARTIROMO depressing.

MICKEY KAUS: "Mickey's Assignment Desk--Baracktrackers: 2,000 words on Dem policy bigshots who went with Obama when he looked like the coming thing--and are now desperately trying to somehow get back in Hillary's good graces. Foreign policy types are usually the most obvious about this sort of thing."

MEGAN MCARDLE on S-CHIP: "I have to ask conservatives and libertarians: is this really the hill you think we should die on? I do understand your objections to the program, but an informal survey of swing voters, in their current incarnation as my mother, indicates that this is killing you with the moderates. Save it for national health care next year, is what I'm saying. This debate is framing the issue in a way that is going to make things harder, not easier, when Hilarycare is on the table again."

Of course, not debating would have the same effect, wouldn't it?

THOUGHTS ON CARBON TAXES, from Megan McArdle.

HEH: "Among actual scientists, in the physical and biological sciences, the percentage who identify themselves as Marxists is zero."

MAUREEN DOWD: "About as funny as a David Duke speech."

KEEPING IT QUIET, at the Los Angeles Times.

BACK AT THE AIRPORT: Don't ask. Wish us better luck this time.

October 09, 2007

A LOOK AT PHOTO-UNSCRAMBLING TECHNOLOGY and its implications for privacy.

CAR LUST: The 1968 Mercury Cyclone 428 Cobra Jet. Iowahawk probably has two, one of them converted to a low-rider version. "Big-hearted, torquey, and happy either purring along or in full snarl, the Cobra Jet was a world-class engine worthy of legendary status--not its current anonymity."

Plus, rare appreciation for the Mazda MX-6: "to my eyes, the smooth, flowing contours of the MX-6 are both lovely and understated in a way that is, admittedly, thoroughly out of style today." I had one of those, and I liked the looks -- inside and out -- very much. The V6 it came with was reasonably powerful, and extremely smooth.

LAUNCHING HUMANS VIA AIR CATAPULT: "This crazy giant catapult, probably built by Will E. Coyote out of two construction cranes and ACME industrial-grade rubber bands, is designed to send a man into space with no security cables or net. As you will see in the video, after surviving the bazillion-G-force launch in one piece, he has to open a parachute to return safely to land."

RED LIGHT CAMERAS: Literal money machines! "They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but in Albuquerque pictures of traffic violators are worth $10 million, according to an audit which renews the debate over excessive fines."

TURNING FUEL EFFICIENCY INTO A VIDEO GAME.

A LOOK AT ANTI-AMERICAN BIGOTRY IN NEW ZEALAND: Just respond with the sheep-jokes they tell about Kiwis in Australia.

UPDATE: Reader J.D. Bell emails: "This is not a new phenomenon. Robert Heinlein noted it in 'Tramp Royale' which covers his around the world tour in the 1950's."

I'M STUCK AT THE AIRPORT but Pajamas Media is covering the Republican debate. And Stephen Green is liveblogging.

UPDATE: Still stuck. But there's more at The Corner.

MORE: Stephen Green, above, didn't seem very impressed with Fred's performance but Emily Zanotti reports: "The general feeling around here is that Fred Thompson pulled out a narrow win over Rudy and McCain, though a few hardcore Mitt supporters are attributing that to low expectations. I have to disagree. Mitt looked scripted, and even if it was calculated, Fred looked free and easy by comparison, and stayed consistently on message."

Plus, comments here, including Mitt Romney's startling handsomeness, and missed opportunity re Scalia.

AL QAEDA'S QUAGMIRE IN IRAQ: Hey, I thought we had the quagmire thing all sewed up. They're stepping on our turf!

THANKS, DELTA: At the Knoxville airport. Nonstop flight to NYC cancelled. Now being routed though Atlanta. Air travel sucks, which is why I do it less and less.

BAINBRIDGE on the Stoneridge case.

HOWARD KURTZ'S NEW BOOK, Reality Show, is out. And he's blogging the book, here. My copy hasn't come yet, but I expect it's interesting.

EVEN THE COOKING BLOGS think media Hillary-hype is out of control: "As Newsweek gets more and more excited about the impending Hillary Clinton coronation nomination, they decided to highlight various women who have made it to the upper-echelon of their respective fields and make a by-proxy comparison to how Clinton might lead the country. The most prominent woman on the cover is the ubiquitous Rachael Ray. Who are the other two? Does it really matter? Actual female leaders don't help magazine sales."

HILLARY CLINTON will unveil her new retirement-security plan today, and I'm told that much of it is based on the thoughts of Gene Sperling. I certainly hope so, as there's a lot worse advice out there -- and, as I've said, the Clinton economic team in the 1990s was good.

MAX BOOT: Our man in Mosul: "What the article doesn’t mention is that the U.S. troop presence in Mosul is down to a battalion—about a thousand men. In other words, Col. Qader and other members of the Iraqi security forces are managing to maintain order in this populous and volatile region pretty much on their own. That’s a cause for long-term optimism." So long, he says, as we don't draw down too fast.

CROSSING THE LINE.

And inspiring this response from Dan Riehl.

MICHAEL MOYNIHAN: "Porkbusting Congressman Jeff Flake (R-AZ) is still preaching the limited government gospel to his congressional colleagues, though they are, obviously, not paying much attention (I'm looking at you too, Ron Paul)."

NOPE. No escape.

ROGER SIMON: Why they hate the neo-cons.

THANK GOD IT didn't say Allah.

A LOOK AT WHAT WON THIS YEAR'S Nobel prize in medicine.

THE SOLUTION TO GLOBAL WARMING: More meetings!

BOB OWENS: The New Republic Re-Interviewed Beauchamp... Over a Month Ago.

IN THE MAIL: Matt Welch's book, McCain: The Myth of a Maverick.

MICHAEL YON HAS POSTED another dispatch from Iraq.

MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: "From a snippet of a patient’s skin, researchers have grown blood vessels in a laboratory and then implanted them to restore blood flow around the patient’s damaged arteries and veins."

JOHN TIERNEY: Diet and Fat: A Severe Case of Mistaken Consensus. "The notion that fatty foods shorten your life began as a hypothesis based on dubious assumptions and data; when scientists tried to confirm it they failed repeatedly. The evidence against Häagen-Dazs was nothing like the evidence against Marlboros."

TURN THE BEAT AROUND: Some questions the GOP candidates should ask Chris Matthews.

ANOTHER INTELLIGENCE BLUNDER? "Al Qaeda's Internet communications system has suddenly gone dark to American intelligence after the leak of Osama bin Laden's September 11 speech inadvertently disclosed the fact that we had penetrated the enemy's system." Let's hope things aren't as bad as this report makes them sound. This constant leaking is a real problem.

MICHAEL BARONE: "I am old enough to remember when America's colleges and universities seemed to be the most open-minded and intellectually rigorous institutions in our society. Today, something very much like the opposite is true."

THE BEARS are back.

PETER WALLISON: A lesson for our time.

Particularly apt in light of this.

A CONGRESSIONAL ELECTIONS WIKI: You're invited to participate.

PRIVATE LIVES, PUBLIC DISCLOSURES: Thoughts on Martha Stewart and more.

A PORK PROBLEM for Hillary?

ARMED LIBERAL: "It's just so damn much fun to read Yglesias again."

TEACHER MOVES TO carry her firearm at school. "We're going to see more of this."

DR. ROBERT BUSSARD has died.

AN UNUSUAL spy ring in San Diego.

MICHAEL YON POINTS TO THIS REPORT and emails: "Basra is not in chaos. In fact, crime and violence are way down and there has not been a British combat death in over a month. The report below is false." False reports from Iraq? Say it isn't so!

UPDATE: Thoughts from Bob Krumm.

And, via the comments in this post, an article from The Telegraph that supports Yon's version more than the other: "Indeed, wherever one looks in the British sector, there are grounds to believe that, far from degenerating into all-out civil war, the Iraqis are finally coming to terms with their post-Saddam condition and are starting to acquire the confidence and the institutions necessary for running their affairs."

October 08, 2007

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS: Feminist hero!

IS IRAQ FADING AS AN ISSUE for the Democrats?

If so, T.M. Lutas will be patting himself on the back. And probably Kjell Hagen, too . . . .

THE TEN LEAST EXPENSIVE 2007 cars.

A BLEAK FINANCIAL FORECAST for newspapers.

TYLER COWEN REVIEWS NAOMI KLEIN: He is not impressed. "If nothing else, Ms. Klein's book provides an interesting litmus test as to who is willing to condemn its shoddy reasoning. . . . With 'The Shock Doctrine,' Ms. Klein has become the kind of brand she lamented in 'No Logo.'"

POSTER-CHILD ABUSE: "The newspapers don’t want to do their jobs. The vacuum is being filled. If you don’t want questions, don’t foist these children onto the public stage."

More here: "So executive vice-presidents' families are now the new new poor? I support lower taxes for the Frosts, increased child credits for the Frosts, an end to the 'death tax' and other encroachments on transgenerational wealth transfer, and even severe catastrophic medical-emergency aid of one form or other. But there is no reason to put more and more middle-class families on the government teat, and doing so is deeply corrosive of liberty." Maybe that is the reason. And hey, it might sell. (Via Danny Glover).

IRANIAN STUDENTS PROTEST AHMADINEJAD.

FRED THOMPSON on the Fairness Doctrine.

DELIGHTFUL: "Sandy Berger, who stole highly classified terrorism documents from the National Archives, destroyed them and lied to investigators, is now an adviser to presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton."

Though Jonathan Adler offers at least the hope that Berger's role is exaggerated, above.

UPDATE: Advice for journalists.

MORE: "My tepid support for Rudy Giuliani is growing warmer by the day."

ETHICS QUESTIONS for university administrators.

BURT RUTAN speaks.

"PARTIALLY NUDE PICTURES OF TEACHER" turns out to mean entirely non-nude pictures of teacher: "One photograph shows England shirtless, her left hand covering her right breast and her left breast is in the crook of her left elbow. Another picture shows her lying on her stomach, face down, wearing black panties. Her bare back is visible."

Feh. There's racier stuff than this in The Ladies' Home Journal.

UPDATE: Pictures here: A whole lotta nothin' goin' on.

It is absolutely pathetic that anyone is making a big deal over these pictures. Both Knox County Schools and the local and national media are making fools of themselves. (Via Dan Riehl).

IOWAHAWK LOOKS AT Lowriders of 1977.

GLEN WHITMAN ON INSURANCE MANDATES: "But how big is the free-rider problem, really? According to an Urban Institute study released in 2003, uncompensated care for the uninsured constitutes less than 3% of all health expenditures. Even if the individual mandate works exactly as planned, that's the effective upper boundary on the mandate's impact." (Via Greg Mankiw).

GEOFFREY STONE REVIEWS Jack Goldsmith's The Terror Presidency. Our podcast interview with Goldsmith, with transcript, is here.

THERE'S A POLITICAL JOKE IN THIS SOMEWHERE, but I can't think of it right now: Fertile strippers make more money.

IT'S A SPECIAL COLUMBUS DAY EDITION OF BLAWG REVIEW!

Lots of other blog carnivals at BlogCarnival.com.

VIDEO: The Unseen Beatles, now seen.

"HEAVEN IS A PLACE ON EARTH:" And has anyone considered the possibility that Barack Obama is just a big Belinda Carlisle fan?

AL QAEDA'S RAMADAN OFFENSIVE: So far, a fizzle.

And more here, from Omar Fadhil.

MEDIA SHIELDS FEDERAL SHIELD LAW.

CLAMPING DOWN on phony green claims.

SO I GUESS THE TAX CODE IS PRETTY PROGRESSIVE, THEN: Top 1% Pay More Income Tax Than Bottom 90%.

I think that degree of progressivity is actually bad. I think that everyone should pay at least some tax, and it should vary each year with how much the government spends, and should be enough to give people an incentive to care.

UPDATE: A reader emails: "The optimal tax code for the political class is one where more than 51% of the voters pay no taxes at all and where the politicians and their friends receive exemptions from most of the taxes. Explain how this differs from the current system."

ANOTHER UPDATE: A reader says the above doesn't demonstrate progressivity. But follow the link: "The linked PDF quite clearly states that the top 1% of payers pay 23.13% of their AGI, while the bottom 50% of payers pay 2.98% of theirs." That's a lot of progressivity, no? The numbers are on the last page of the PDF report. It's true, I suppose, that you could get this kind of a revenue distribution even from a flat tax if income variances were sufficiently broad, but we don't have anything like a flat tax.

MORE: Kevin Drum comments that the tax system as a whole is less progressive than the income tax. Yes, if you add in excise taxes, etc., that's certainly true. I was talking about income tax and should have been more precise. And if those other taxes followed my model -- with taxes going up and down from year to year with spending, and with individual taxpayers at all levels experiencing increases in their taxes when spending went up -- that would be a good thing, too.

Meanwhile, some of Kevin's commenters are misinformed. In fact, I've always been quite positive about the Clinton Administration's economic team. See, e.g., this post, or this one. Plus, rooting for Gene Sperling.

SOME RATHER THUGGISH BEHAVIOR:

Rep. Henry Waxman has asked his investigative staff to begin compiling reports on Limbaugh, and fellow radio hosts Sean Hannity and Mark Levin based on transcripts from their shows, and to call in Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin to discuss the so-called "Fairness Doctrine."

"Limbaugh isn't the only one who needs to be made uncomfortable about what he says on the radio," says a House leadership source. "We don't have as big a megaphone as these guys, but this all political, and we'll do what we can to gain the advantage. If we can take them off their game for a while, it will help our folks out there on the campaign trail."

They told me that if George W. Bush were re-elected, we'd see enemies lists, dossiers, and naked abuse of political and regulatory power in order to silence criticism and secure an unfair electoral advantage. And they were right!

UPDATE: More thoughts here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Modest skepticism from Allah.

LATER: Waxman denies the reports. The American Spectator stands by its story. Allah is saying I-told-you-so.

A LOOK AT PUTIN'S REGULATION OF NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS: "NGO law represents one more effort on the part of President Putin's administration to assert control over Russian society . . . it should be viewed as part of the overarching effort to minimize political opposition, eliminate independent media, and silence Russia's oligarchs." Plus, thoughts on a response.

NEW SCRUTINY FOR NONPROFITS: As I've said here on numerous occasions, the nonprofit sector is awash in money and far more powerful than it used to be, but drastically lacking in transparency and oversight by comparison to the corporate world. More thoughts from Todd Zywicki, who observes: "I understand that other nonprofit institutions have been moving in a different direction, toward less board independence, less accountability, less transparency, larger board size, and a more powerful executive committee. Amazingly, these developments sometimes are even justified under the rubric that they constitute 'best practices' of board practice."

UPDATE: A reader sends this Financial Times link, too: "Philanthropic bodies, charities and non-governmental organisations are, indeed, businesses in the eyes of the law. Yet, perversely, today's FTSE or Nasdaq companies are far more transparent, accountable and responsibly governed than the typical wealthy foundation or charity. More damning, corporate results are measured in the marketplace while philanthropic results are not. That invites mischief and mismanagement." Indeed.

IN THE MAIL: Bruce Barry's Speechless: The Erosion of Free Expression in the American Workplace.

SOME DISTURBING THOUGHTS ABOUT politics and free trade, from Jonathan Adler. Bear in mind, however, that reports of declining support for free trade among Republicans may be exaggerated.

PERHAPS NEUROTIC BEHAVIOR PERSISTS because it offers an evolutionary advantage in some circumstances. I suspect that's the case in the real world, as well as in gaming.

A LOT OF PEOPLE HIT THE AMAZON OR PAYPAL DONATION BUTTONS this weekend. As I noted earlier, I think it's side-splash from the big fundraising drive over at The Corner.

If you donated via Paypal, I've sent you a thank-you email. If you donated via Amazon, and clicked the button that let me know who you are, I've sent you a thank-you email. If you didn't click that button, you're anonymous to me. But thanks, regardless!

CULTURE OF CORRUPTION. A look at who's keeping the money.

HEH. INSTAPUNDIT READERS aren't just kicking DailyKos's ass when it comes to energy conservation. They're way ahead of the government, too. Look how the D.C. Metro government is doing. Remember this the next time you hear a politician lecture Americans about energy waste.

HAPPY COLUMBUS DAY! "Columbus Day may be the most unPC holiday of the year. That’s why I intend to celebrate it doing the most unPC thing I can think of. Working for a living."

ANNA POLITKOVSKAYA'S deadly foresight.

Plus, some Putin jokes.

N.Z. BEAR STARTS A NEW COMPANY AND comes out of the closet. There's even a photo at the link. If you're smart, you'll hire him!

SENDING A MESSAGE in Afghanistan.

BRENDAN NYHAN ON Media Matters and Eric Alterman.

The important thing to remember is that Media Matters is "non political." No matter what you might hear.

FOR HILLARY, A HARSH BACK-AND-FORTH: "Randall Rolph said he came to New Hampton, Iowa, on Sunday to see Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) with an open mind about whether to support her candidacy. After a tough exchange over Iran, he left saying he had ruled her out."

AT ASK DR. HELEN, a conversation with a different Glenn.

MICHAEL TOTTEN REPORTS ON the best police force in Iraq. Remember that he's supported by reader donations, so if you like his reporting, you know what to do.

October 07, 2007

TOUGH ENOUGH? Jonathan Gewirtz writes: "Tom Smith is cautiously optimistic about the possibility of Hillary Clinton as president. I am not so optimistic. . . . Leaders and voters in democratic countries are sometimes tempted to put unscrupulous people into positions of authority, under the belief that such people will not hesitate to do what has to be done in tough situations. But unscrupulous people, by definition, have their own agendas, and it is a delusion to believe that they will provide some kind of short cut around the hard work, hard choices and pain of winning a war."

IT'S SHOWTIME FOR FRED THOMPSON.

TAPPING IN TO ONLINE RICHES! Who knew that it was so easy?

POOR PORKINS: X-Wing disintegrates, crashes. Video at the link.

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: So much for open government. "Things get heated as Sharyl Attkisson tracks down Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, D-Ohio, to question her about a $2 million earmark benefiting paint company Sherwin Williams." Ouch. How dare you question our political masters about their jobs!

Video at the link.

And don't miss this earlier PorkBusters post, with advice for the Department of Justice.

A READER QUESTION ON KITCHEN MIXERS earlier today generated a flood of email -- more than