Political Science: The Best & Brightest

Look at who is the latest political science major:

Yes people, that's  Anders Breivik, newly matriculated at the University of Oslo to major in......

.....Political Science!!!

The future of the discipline is in good hands.

*****Bonus Snark********

Do you know what Norway gave him for killing 77 people?

21 years.

That's a little over  3 months per victim.

Butler April 10: Throwdown!

Richard Epstein, Jamie Galbraith, Russ Roberts, Robert Sidelski in a giant cage match.  Oh, and me, too.  Butler U, Indianapolis, April 10.  Bios of the panelistas here....
 

Actual invite, with working links, here....

NYT and Bubbles

I was pleased to see that the NYT actually had reverted, if briefly, to being a newspaper instead of a hack mouthpiece for the Obama regime.

They had this very plausible story about the "green energy bubble." And it's true: many of the companies that were recently photo ops for some grinning Obama regime rep (including Mr. Obama himself) have gone belly up. They only were created to suck down subsidies from idiots. A classic bubble. The Green she go boom. Pop go a bunch of weasels.

But then I looked more closely. Far from focusing on the actual bubble, the one in green energy, the one that has already burst, the Green Lady of News is actually forecasting a bubble in...natural gas. The discovery of enormous new reserves of cheap, clean-burning fuel is very annoying to the Green Energy Gods, the apparatchiks of the regime who want to use public money to pay off their pals. And for the "peak idiocy" bunch....fugeddaboudit. Natural gas is a disaster for the authoritarians who want us all to return to sad stone age lives perched in caves and contemplating the sins of "late" capitalism.

Amazing. Just when you think the NYTimes can't sink any lower, they submerge into the muck.

(Nod to the Blonde)

The Culture that is Oklahoma

47th in life expectancy,

40th in school spending,

but....

1st in the BCS!!!

At least we excel at what's really important.

What do you call a lawyer wearing a bow tie?

Let's just say it's something that Pablo Picasso was never called (at least not in New York):

Raymond E. Stauffer was shopping at a New Jersey mall when he noticed something peculiar about the bow ties on display at Brooks Brothers: They were labeled with old patent numbers.

Mr. Stauffer, who calls himself a "sharp-dressed man," also happens to be a patent lawyer. He sued Brooks Brothers Inc. in federal court, claiming it broke the law by marking its adjustable bow ties with patents that expired in the 1950s.

And of course we are off to the races:

Marking a tube of toothpaste or paper cup with a patent that is out of date or doesn't exist has been against the law for years. It is considered anticompetitive. Until late last year, the most a violator had to worry about was paying a $500 penalty for misleading the public.

But in December, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington ruled that defendants could be held responsible for up to $500 per offense.

Lawyers for product manufacturers now fear clients are liable for up to $500 for every tube of mascara or box of garbage bags marked with an expired patent—an error that turns out to be quite common.

In recent months, would-be plaintiffs have been fanning out across retail stores and the Internet searching for expired patent numbers on everything from toothpaste to toilet plungers.

I have to admit that to me the most baffling part of this story is that there once were patents on bow ties and toilet plungers!

Hasta Luego, Borrego!

Got up early this am and gathered up Mrs. A and Mr. 2T for a hike in the mountains north of Santa Fe. We did the Borrego / Bear Wallow loop.

For the first 3/4 of the trip, we only saw 3 or 4 other hikers, also with dogs. 2T had a blast playing with the dogs and wading in the creek that we hiked down to (Big Tesuque Creek). The last 1/4 we ran into a fair amount of folks getting a late start and doing the loop in the opposite direction that we did.

Here is a nice description of the hike.

On the way back, which is pretty much uphill all the way, 2T kept looking up at me like I had totally lost my mind. He made it in good order though, which is awesome for an 11.5 year old flatlander from OK.