IN THE MAIL: Linda Mills’ Violent Partners: A Breakthrough Plan for Ending the Cycle of Abuse. With blurbs from Kathleen Parker and Desmond Tutu, and an acknowledgment that men are often victims of domestic violence too, this isn’t your typical book on the subject.
Archive for 2008
September 28, 2008
A side-by-side comparison of bailout legislation. The payola for ACORN seems to be out. Related thoughts here.
CHINA’S NEW slave empire in Africa? “We have come a long way from Cecil Rhodes to Bob Geldof, but we still have not brought much happiness with us, and even Nelson Mandela’s vaunted ‘Rainbow Nation’ in South Africa is careering rapidly towards banana republic status. Now a new great power, China, is scrambling for wealth, power and influence in this sad continent, without a single illusion or pretence.”
REMEMBERING THE CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS: Doug Weinstein got a bill passed to create something similar in Tennessee — modeled on California’s Conservation Corps — and Lamar Alexander vetoed it. I think it was a good idea, and a bad move on Lamar’s part.
TAKING ON THE I.R.S.: Thirty Churches to Endorse Presidential Candidate From Pulpit Today. I’d deal with this differently, and tax churches like any other business. I think that the “nonprofit” sector has grown out of all proportion because of its tax-exempt status, and we ought to consider eliminating tax exemptions for nonprofits entirely. Failing that, we ought to limit them to organizations that provide direct services to those in need, and only to the extent of such services. The rest is a big subsidy that has created a nonprofit bubble in the economy.
UPDATE: Reader Matthew Conlan emails: “Since the power to tax is the power to destroy, how would you mesh taxing religious institutions with the First Amendment?”
The religious tax exemptions are part of a general nonprofit exemption that is a matter of legislative grace, not First Amendment right. In fact, an exemption limited to religious groups would violate the Establishment Clause. And as this story suggests, the exemption hasn’t exactly disentangled the IRS from religious expression. . . .
ANOTHER UPDATE: More on that entanglement here.
MORE: Reader Doug Levene writes:
Your comments on the growth of the non profit sector as a refuge from taxation are very important.
As part of my East Asian Studies M.A. at Yale many years ago, I studied a lot of pre-modern Chinese history and one fact that struck me then was the growth of tax-free “religious” institutions to the point where the tax base was severely eroded. Indeed, that was one of the major problems for the Chinese central government, such as it was. I wonder if that is happening in the US generally today? It obviously does happen locally – consider what percentage of the property in Cambridge, Massachusetts is tax exempt. What is the impact nationally? Have any economists or tax lawyers looked at this?
I don’t know, but the nonprofit sector has had explosive growth in the past several decades.
SINCE CZARS WERE ACTUALLY, YOU KNOW, TYRANTS, why the enthusiasm? Senate Passes Bill Creating ‘Copyright Czar’.
Of course, given that these “czars” always fail — remember the “Energy Czar?” And there’s always the “Drug Czar” — maybe there’s a different lesson here.
UPDATE: Dodd Harris emails: “I submit that the real issue is that we define ‘success’ and ‘failure’ differently from Congresscritters and bureaucrats. The ‘Drug Czar’ is a perfect example of the difference.” Yes, what’s bad for the country is usually good for Washington, a mis-alignment of incentives that’s at the root of a lot of our problems . . . .
INFLATABLE SURVEILLANCE BALLS for Mars. “Each foot-wide, 11-pound ball can roll up to 62 miles, snap photos at any angle, and take soil samples, drawing its power from the solar panels on its shell. Unlike wheeled rovers, the rounded scouts have fewer motors to repair, never flip over, and are easier to seal from dust. Plus, they rarely get stuck.”
WALL STREET JOURNAL: Lawmakers Reach Tentative Bailout Deal.
YESTERDAY’S POST on the ongoing phenomenon of watch markdowns led some readers to wonder if it’s driven by a change in behavior. Reader Chris Arfaa writes:
I suspect the frequency of watch sales is a result of a decline in watch wearing. I rarely use a watch, relying on the clock on my mobile phone. While I seem to be an exception in my age group (45), younger generations – those who grew up with mobile phones – seem not to wear watches. Wrist watches qua wrist watches may go the way of day planners and non-wireless PDAs (other items of personal technology whose functions are now built into the mobile phone).
And another reader emails: “I asked my son about a possible watch as a gift for his girlfriend. Both are late teens while I’m from the age of dinosaurs. He said no one wears them anymore because they just rely on their cellphones. Perhaps that might be one reason for the big watch sale?”
Yeah, my daughter is in the same boat. I try not to carry my cellphone with me all the time — not because I’m worried about infertility (at this point, I’m not sure if that’s a bug, or a feature), but because I don’t like the interruptions that come with carrying a cellphone that’s turned on. But when you’re texting your friends 24/7, the attitude’s different. Of course, once cellphones are small enough to go on your wrist, we may come full circle . . . .
ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader John Opie sends a long email saying that these cheap watches aren’t so good. Click “read more” to read it.
KARL OKAMOTO ASKS, what is the net present value of a law degree? “It appears that my students, as a group, have a very similar notion of what lawyers make on average. Unfortunately, it happens to be more than what at least 90 percent of lawyers actually do earn.”
PROFESSOR BAINBRIDGE: “The more I understand about the current financial situation, the more I’m persuaded that some form of government bailout of the financial sector really is necessary. . . . What’s not acceptable, however, are the barnacles already attaching themselves to the bailout.”
Yes, as usual the parasites are at work here. But will they kill the host?
THE TALE OF two bracelets.
READER PAT MCNIFF WRITES:
What financial crisis?
My wife and I just came back from going out to dinner. We ate at BJ’s Brewery which was packed with people waiting inside and outside.. Ditto Buffalo Wild Wings, PF Changs, Rock Fish , Buca de Pepo , California Pizza Kitchen, RA Sushi, Molly Branigans, etc…….
We live in the Mesa/Gilbert Arizona area which is about 25 miles east of Phoenix.. This area is supposedly the epicenter of declining home values and mortgage defaults…Well, not so much apparently…
Forget the bailout and the let the markets work….
I understand the point. My brother-in-law has a business hauling things — cars, boats, etc. — and says that he’s got more work than he can handle, and that there’s nothing like an economic slowdown visible. But the key word in “financial crisis” is “financial.” When McCain said the fundamentals of the economy are sound, he was talking about muscles and sinews. The problem we’ve got is more neurological.
BREAKING THE CODE:
In a brief post earlier today, I wrote that it was heartening that both McCain and, to a lesser extent, Obama, are talking about cutting federal spending. Various commenters suggested that I was being naive in thinking that either candidate will cut spending if elected.
The commenters miss my point, so let me clarify. I’m not heartened because I have any expectations of either mcCain or Obama. Rather, I’m heartened because they are both opportunistic politicians, and they wouldn’t be talking about cutting spending unless they thought that this is what the public wants.
I’d certainly like to see some spending cuts, though I found both candidates’ proposals a bit timid.
September 27, 2008
TALKLEFT: Innocent Man Freed in Durham. “In Daniels’ case as in countless others, the prosecution focused its efforts on proving the guilt of the man the police arrested, rather than asking whether the police arrested the right man. And once they got their conviction, it was case closed — even after it became apparent that the wrong man had been sent to prison.”
NASHVILLE’S GAS SITUATION — a report from the bunker. (Via Pattie’s Pop Culture Paradise).
DANIEL DREZNER ON WHAT WAS MISSING FROM LAST NIGHT’S DEBATE: Jim Lehrer didn’t ask a single question about China. “Think about this for a second. China is clearly the one country that can challenge the United States as a peer competitor in the next decade. There are economic, regional, security, human rights, and global governance issues where Washington and Beijing don’t see eye to eye. And there was no question that addressed any of this. “
MORE ON THOSE MISSOURI GOON SQUADS: Would people really refrain from criticizing Obama just because they fear being, er, sent to prison for it? “Oh, the fun we’ll have with a deep blue Congress and an Obama-run DOJ and FCC. He promised you a ‘new type of politics,’ didn’t he?”
More on this lame speech-suppression effort here. Really, I don’t understand the point of this stuff — for every critic it silences, it creates ten. Bad judgment. But are these things bad enough to support civil-rights conspiracy charges? Hard to say at this point. Will the Department of Justice take an interest? But spare me the Godwin’s Law violations, please.
WHO’D’VE THOUGHT IT: Intelligent design textbook “full of bad science.”
ANOTHER FEMALE TEACHER CHARGED for having sex with a 17-year-old male student. I don’t know, but I’m guessing that this isn’t actually any more common than it used to be, just more likely to lead to charges and publicity. My guess is that teenage sex, while becoming no less common, has been increasingly pathologized. And, of course, lots of things have been turned over to the criminal law that used to be dealt with more informally. Am I wrong?
Meanwhile, here’s a piece on the general subject I wrote a few years ago.
DARK CHOCOLATE: Good for you, but in low doses.
NO COURT FOR YOU! “A man described as ‘like Kramer from Seinfeld‘ has been banished from the Davidson County Courthouse where he’s been a fixture for 20 years.”
CAR LUST: Remembering The Volkswagen Thing. Those were everywhere for a few years, then disappeared.