A HOLIDAY SPENDING reality check.
Archive for 2013
October 22, 2013
NEWS YOU CAN USE: How To Drink Like Frank Sinatra.
LATEST IPO BARRIER: The Twitter Quitters.
ANNOUNCING THE NEST PROTECT, a smarter carbon monoxide and smoke alarm.
MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Technology Is Killing ObamaCare, But It Might Save The Rest of Us.
WHY IS THE OBAMACARE ROLLOUT FAILING?
Why, it’s obviously because President Barack Obama and his top aides hate government, and therefore can’t be trusted to run a major government program. When the government is run by political forces committed to the belief that government is always the problem, never the solution, that belief tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Key priorities are neglected; key functions are privatized; and key people, the competent public servants who make government work, either leave or are driven out. What we really need is a government that works, because it’s run by people who understand that sometimes government is the solution, after all.
Doesn’t make any sense to you? It made just as little sense when Paul Krugman made the argument in 2008, imaginatively (to say the least) positing that George W. Bush and John McCain were wild-eyed libertarians, and that the former’s purported libertarianism was the cause of FEMA’s incompetence in dealing with Katrina.
If you start with the presumption that Paul Krugman is wrong, you won’t do too badly.
LIFE AMONG THE DYSFUNCTIONAL: Fecundophobia: The Growing Fear Of Children And Fertile Women.
SCIENCE: Poor Sleep Linked to Alzheimer’s in Study of Brain Scans. “Brain images of adults with an average age of 76 found that those who said they slept less or poorly had increased build-up of beta-amyloid plaques, one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s, according to research published today in JAMA Neurology. None of those in the study had been diagnosed with the disease.” Which is cause and which is effect is unclear.
SCIENCE: Universal law of urination found in mammals. “You’ll never look at Dumbo in the same way again. Elephants, cows, goats and dogs all take roughly 21 seconds to empty their bladders. A “law of urination” now explains the physics behind what happens when you just gotta go. Patricia Yang and colleagues at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta use high-speed video to study how fluids and animals interact; they have previously investigated how dogs shake themselves dry.”
DUMB IDEA: Oregon launching new program to tax drivers per mile. “Oregon is moving ahead with a controversial plan to tax motorists based on the number of miles they drive as opposed to the amount of fuel they consume, raising myriad concerns about cost and privacy.”
I had some thoughts about an earlier version of this plan here.
DEALS GALORE AT THE Amazon Veteran’s Day Sale.
MY USA TODAY COLUMN: Technology Is Killing ObamaCare, But It Might Save The Rest of Us.
WELL, IT’S A PIECE IN SALON: Better To Not Protest the NSA Than To Hold Hands With Libertarians, Says Progressive Scribbler. Well, the whole “liberaltarian” business from 2008 was always doomed, and pretty obviously so. But a surprising number of libertarians were fooled, at least until the election was over.
THIS SHOULD PROVE POPULAR: Rand Paul pushes constitutional amendment on Congress. “The Kentucky freshman Republican has introduced a constitutional amendment that would preclude senators and congressmen from passing laws that don’t apply equally to U.S. citizens and Congress, the executive branch and the Supreme Court. The amendment is aimed squarely at Obamacare provisions specific to members of Congress and their staffs that became a central point of contention during the government shutdown.”
SHOCKER: Much breast milk bought online is contaminated, analysis shows. If you don’t have breast milk, it’s better to go with formula than with breast milk from strangers. The unscientific response from breastfeeding cultists is just that — an unscientific response from cultists. Breastfeeding is good, but if you make it a religion you’re an idiot. As the piece notes, taking untested breast milk from strangers is like taking untested blood from strangers.
DIDN’T STEPHEN HAWKING ALREADY SAY THIS? Black Holes May Have ‘Hair.’
A WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY DEAL ON KINDLE: Athwart History: Half a Century of Polemics, Animadversions, and Illuminations: A William F. Buckley Jr. Omnibus, $1.99.
ON THE TRAIL: Meet The New Hillary.
THAT’S RACISM, STRAIGHT UP, THAT’S WHAT THAT IS: Obamacare Site for Spanish Speakers Has Never Worked.
I CAN THINK OF A REASON OR TWO: Why Not Start A Law Firm?