Monday, September 02, 2013

Monday's Child

1.  Lumpy Brits taking off their knickers and supporting (or protesting, it's hard to tell) tigers in the zoo.

2.  As the EYM notes, a strong title here.  And then some strong claims.  If nonsense can be strong.

3.  This is tough.  You have to feel bad for the kid.  Yet, as the DA notes, "I would have shot him."

4.  The top ten "best cities" in the world to live in.  Before you look, think of your own favorite five cities.  I predict little overlap.  For me, there was one:  Vienna.

5.  This talks about this.  Russ and I thought that was interesting enough that we did this.
MOREMOREMOREBELOW...



6.  Thomas Frank writing for "The Baffler."  I thought that was going to be his superpower.  He has always baffled me, that's for sure.

7.  The "racial dot map."  Interesting.

8.  B. Weingast on the violence trap.

9.  Political leaders discuss Syria on Facebook.

10.  Check your water for blood worms, as the US becomes a 3rd world country.

11.  Aussie bookie declares, "We have a winner!"  Should this be illegal, if it keeps down turnout?  (Not in Australia, where turnout is mandatory...)

12.  There are so many things about this story that strike a false note.  Makes one wonder what is real.  What is the objective?

13.  If the guy who invented the "giant finger of foam" thinks you're tacky...well, you are probably tacky.

14.  Among the MANY reasons the US should not attack Syria is that we are not nearly as dependent on oil from that region.  Frack baby, frack!

15.  So now "French Fries" are back IN at the White House Mess (love that name)?  And "Fish and Chips" will be banned?

16.  This is as diverting as any map I have seen for a long time.  May hang up loading, because so many are looking at it.  But one person is one dot.  "Color" coded.

17.  Grand Game, extensive edition.  This article is long, and chock-full of ....targets.

18.  People criticize Obama for "acting like a king," but that's not fair.  Kings had to ask permission to go to war.  Obama can just be indignant that somebody called his bluff, and do it alone.

19.  An amazing story of economics.  Not a happy story, not a sad story, an amazing story.  Though parts are happy and parts are sad.

20.  The invisible hands gets stepped on by the visible jackboot.  AGAIN.

21.  Strange weather makes for cool weather maps.

22.  Cities decide that without chain stores, there would be more jobs.  Which shows that cities can be every bit as dumb as the people who live in them.

23.  What really ails Detroit?  I have tried for years to argue this:  from 1945 through 1977, the US was able to serve a huge and consumption-starved domestic market, and the rest of the world had been so considerate as to blow up its capital stock.  For Michael Moore (in his movies), Robert Reich (in his books of economic light fiction) and others to claim that THOSE unusual conditions are somehow normal is bizarre.  


Headlines:

1.  Colorado Porta-Potty Peeper Gets 3 Years in Prison.  Yes, that does mean just what you think it means.  Ew... They "saw a feces stained man running away."

2.  Man accused of shooting marijuana-wrapped arrow at Wash. jail says he was hunting squirrel.Yeah, I suppose we're all huntin' for squirrel, buddy, one way or another.

3.  Egyptian authorities detain suspected 'spy' bird.  It's actually a real bird.With a tracking device.






8 comments:

Tom said...

So... people keep cows in India, even though it doesn't seem economically justified. Hmmm, cows are sacred (to many) in India.

Cows make bullsh!t; Anagol et al did the neat trick of converting bullsh!t into a PDF.

Don't know about buffaloes.

Old Odd Jobs said...

Wow, the "best cities" list compiler really likes Australia and Canada !

Anonymous said...

Regarding the story about the homeowner shooting the burglar, it wasn't the District Attorney who made this statement:

"I'm a bleeding-heart liberal," said former New Orleans City Atty. David Cressy. "I would have shot him."

The official charged with prosecuting those accused of crimes is the Orleans Parish District Attorney.

The City Attorney handles municipal law, not criminal law.

Mike said...

6. Frank looks at a part of the economy that is smothered with crazy government regulation, entrenched interests that are protected by regulation, and third party payers, and blames it on capitalism. Stuff like that is what drives me crazy about leftists.

17. I remember the seminar covering Jensen's paper. What a great session. But yeah, from a Grand Game aspect there is an awful lot of "you" telling "me" what to do with "my" money. And not a damn word about what makes Americans too expensive to employ, relative to the rest of the world. And I can't remember where I read this: Jobs are cost!

Finally, when you put up these Monday lists I realized that I didn't get that PhD, not because of math, but because I can't read fast enough.

Tom said...

The "amazing story of economics" (19) links to http://www.blogger.com/

Not a story at all.

John Covil said...

I just wanted to add a little nuance to my post that you graciously linked to (18): there is a qualitative difference between consulting with a parliament of nobles (I don't believe there was a franchise at the time, or if there was, it was limited to massive landowners) and with a freely elected congress in a fully-enfranchised nation.

That said, the broader point remains.

Pelsmin said...

Top ten cities my, uh, arse. The Economist Intelligence Unit seems a bit skewed towards members of the empire. And as you dive into their overall rankings you see the nonsense in their criteria.
Using the number of UNESCO cultural heritage sites to determine cultural rankings leaves every American city with the lowest possible cultural score (shock!) except NYC, which receives the second lowest score. For the city with Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Met, the MOMA, etc., NY only possesses one UNESCO Cultural Heritage Site, the Statue of Liberty, which appears to be three fewer than Ghana.
If an American publication presented a list of the world's top cities, and 8 of the ten were in our country, it would be laughed out as blindly jingoistic.

Dave EcontalkMUNGERfan said...

Regarding 'Top Ten Cities' - Australia DID have some very nice State Capital Cities when houses and land in the surrounding suburbs were more affordable and when food was less expensive. Unfortunately they are now NOT those things and lack good transport infrastructure and have horrendously expensive cost of living and mega-over regulation of day-to-day life has ruined the place completely; and ..er..a partly multi-racial society is great but we're heading towards a multi-cultural nightmare very quickly. Oh, unless anyone thinks it's worked well in Britain?