Thursday, December 31, 2009

I can! Canoe?

Some police go the extra mile. And get their man.

I can't believe that guy jumped in that water. And that the cops went after him. Ick.

(Nod to Anonyman)

Shareholder Value Destruction

Shareholder Value Destruction following the Tiger Woods Scandal

Christopher Knittel & Victor Stango, University of California Working Paper, December 2009

Abstract: We estimate that in the days beginning with Tiger Woods' recent car accident and ending with his announced "indefinite leave" from golf, shareholders of
companies that Mr. Woods endorses lost $5-12 billion in wealth. We measure the losses relative to both the entire stock market and a set of competitor firms. Because most of the firms that Mr. Woods endorses are either large or owned by large parent companies, the losses are extremely widespread. Mr. Woods' top five sponsors (Accenture, Nike, Gillette, Electronic Arts and Gatorade) lost 2-3 percent of their aggregate market value after the accident, and his core sports-related sponsors EA, Nike and PepsiCo (Gatorade) lost over four percent. The pace of losses slowed by December 11, the date on which Mr. Woods announced his leave from golf, but as late as December 17 shareholders had not recovered their losses.

The LMM Dances with Neanderbill

An unretouched photo, from the Duke Faculty Prom. (I'm serious; we have a prom).
Neanderbill dances with the LMM. Yes, he really is 18 inches taller than she is.

Rowland S. Howard has died!

People it has been a very bad week for the music world. On the heels of Vic Chesnutt, Rowland Howard has died of liver cancer.

I am a huge Rowland S. Howard fan. He was a member of The Birthday Party, the incredible, seminal Aussie punk/garage/noise/grunge band.

Beyond that, I loved These Immortal Souls, which I took to mainly to be a solo project and his collaboration with another one of my now dead heros, Nikki Sudden.

Man, Nikki Sudden, Epic Soundtracks, and now Rowland Howard are all dead.


Stupid Human Tricks

Article from the Wilmington Star News (I was in Wilmington to do a radio interview on THE BIG TALKER)

Man arrested day after leading Wilmington PD on chase through town

A man was arrested Tuesday night after he led police on a chase in Wilmington the night before, officials said. Johnnie Mack Shingler, 23, faces charges including speeding to elude arrest, driving the wrong way on a divided highway and driving without a license, according to Sgt. Matt Hardee of N.C. Highway Patrol.

Shingler is from the state of New York.

On Monday, Hardee said, troopers joined a pursuit, which was started around midnight Monday by Wilmington police who spotted a 1972 Plymouth Valiant driving without a license plate, Hardee said. The chase went from Wilmington, down Carolina Beach Road and toward Monkey Junction. At one point, Hardee said, the fleeing driver drove north in the southbound lanes of College Road. Rather than following, troopers tracked the driver from the other side of the road. Eventually, the driver ditched his car off of Trombay Drive, ran into the woods and escaped.

Authorities found pictures of Shingler and his birth certificate in the car, Hardee said. – David Reynolds

1. A 1972 Plymouth Valiant? REALLY?
2. The guy left his picture and birth certificate in the car. IN. THE. CAR.
3. Monkey Junction?

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Gas Me With a Spoon: Three Articles....


Meghan Busse, Christopher Knittel & Florian Zettelmeyer, NBER Working Paper, December 2009



Qualitative Effects of Cash-for-Clunkers Programs

Eugenio Miravete & Maria Moral Rincón
University of Texas Working Paper, October 2009

We document how automobile scrappage incentives similar to the '2009 Car Allowance Rebate System' (CARS) may influence drivers' tastes in favor of fuel-efficient automobiles. Between 1994 and 2000 the market share of diesel automobiles doubled after Spanish government sponsored two scrappage programs. We show that demand for diesel automobiles was not driven only by better mileage; that gasoline and diesel models became closer substitutes over time; and that automobile manufacturers reduced their markups on gasoline automobiles as their demand decreased. These programs simply accelerated a change of preference that was already on its way when they were implemented.


Malapportionment, Gasoline Taxes, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

Lawrence Broz & Daniel Maliniak
University of California Working Paper, November 2009

Gasoline taxes vary widely among industrialized countries, as does support for the United Nations’ effort to curtail the use of fossil fuels to address the climate change problem. We argue that malapportionment of the electoral system affects both the rate at which governments tax gasoline and the extent to which governments participate in global efforts to ameliorate climate change. Malapportionment results in a “rural bias” such that the political system disproportionately represents rural voters. Since rural voters in industrialized countries rely more heavily on fossil fuels than urban voters, our prediction is that malapportioned political systems will have lower gasoline taxes, and less commitment to climate change amelioration, than systems with equitable representation of constituents. We find that malapportionment is negatively related to both gasoline taxes and support for the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (where “support” is measured as the duration of the spell between the signing of the Protocol and ratification by the domestic legislature).

Nod to Kevin L, who walks)

Sneak peek at Andy Roddick's tennis wardrobe for 2010

Izod has really outdone themselves!!

Flip Saunders has had enough!

Flip went medieval on his team's sorry ass after the Wizards lost to my Thunder last night. Here are some selected quotes:

“This team, the last five years, has been known as one of the worst defensive teams. … We couldn’t stop anybody out there.”

Spots will be open. If guys don’t like it, that’s fine but that’s the way it’s going to be,” 

“I’m not going to sit there, stand there and look at that any more. You evaluate for 30 games where you’re at. Right now, where it’s going, it ain’t getting done.”

“Guys want to come out of the zone and play man-to-man, but they can’t guard anybody. I can go out there on that floor and take anybody on our team on one-on-one at 52 years old and drive right around them,” Saunders said. “We’ve got to wake up. As I told them: Don’t think it can’t get any worse, because it can. There’s no question it can. We’ve got to have a sense of urgency.

Well the Wizards are 7th from the bottom in points allowed, but they are in the middle of the pack in FG% allowed. I find them more objectionable on the offensive end, where they are next to last in assists.  

However their real problem lies with management. They have 3 super-chuckers (Butler, Gil, and Jamison) often on the court at the same time and many of their players are complete knuckleheads (Blatche, Stevenson, Haywood, Young).

Plus Flip is a lousy coach. He kept KG out of the NBA finals while in Minnesota, he totally lost his team in Detroit, and no one pays any attention to him in DC.

He's right that at least one spot will be open, and I think it will be his! 

One last thing, I would pay cash money to see Flip play one on one vs. Antawn (0r really any of the Wizards except Boykins). I bet Flip would emerge with a broken nose at the very least.

Montesquieu Reincarnate!!

Montesquieu famously had this amazingly racist explanation of the different "characters" of nations. And it was based! Weather causes "certain" people (for the racist M, that would be "dark" people) to be lazy and no 'count. Check this:

Spirit of the Laws: Book XIV. Of Laws in Relation to the Nature of the Climate

1. General Idea. If it be true that the temper of the mind and the passions of the heart are extremely different in different climates, the laws ought to be in relation both to the variety of those passions and to the variety of those tempers.

2. Of the Difference of Men in different Climates. Cold air constringes the extremities of the external fibres of the body;[1] this increases their elasticity, and favours the return of the blood from the extreme parts to the heart. It contracts[2] those very fibres; consequently it increases also their force. On the contrary, warm air relaxes and lengthens the extremes of the fibres; of course it diminishes their force and elasticity.

People are therefore more vigorous in cold climates. Here the action of the heart and the reaction of the extremities of the fibres are better performed, the temperature of the humours is greater, the blood moves more freely towards the heart, and reciprocally the heart has more power. This superiority of strength must produce various effects; for instance, a greater boldness, that is, more courage; a greater sense of superiority, that is, less desire of revenge; a greater opinion of security, that is, more frankness, less suspicion, policy, and cunning.

In short, this must be productive of very different tempers. Put a man into a close, warm place, and for the reasons above given he will feel a great faintness. If under this circumstance you propose a bold enterprise to him, I believe you will find him very little disposed towards it; his present weakness will throw him into despondency; he will be afraid of everything, being in a state of total incapacity. The inhabitants of warm countries are, like old men, timorous; the people in cold countries are, like young men, brave.

Now, unbelievably, check this!

The Income–Temperature Relationship in a Cross-Section of Countries and its Implications for Predicting the Effects of Global Warming

John Horowitz, Environmental and Resource Economics, December 2009, Pages 475-493

Abstract: Hotter countries are poorer on average. This paper attempts to separate the historical and contemporaneous components of this income–temperature relationship. Following ideas by Acemoglu et al., we use colonial mortality data to account for the historical role of temperature since colonial mortality was highly correlated with countries’ average temperatures. The remaining income–temperature gradient, after colonial mortality is accounted for, is most likely contemporaneous. This contemporaneous effect can be used to estimate the consequences of global warming. We predict that a 1°C temperature increase across all countries will cause a decrease of 3.8% in world GDP. This prediction is robust across functional forms and an alternative method for separating historical effects.

Wow! Global warming allows lefties to be racists! Yikes!

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Doing the least with the most

The Painted Area (tag line: "In Hubie We Trust") lists its underachievers of the decade in a very informative and entertaining post. 

The winners were:

Baron Davis
Tim Thomas
Lamar Odom

And its underachieving team of the decade: 

The Dallas Mavericks.

Quien es lo mas Loco?

People, who the craziest? Janet Napolitano or Al Queda?

Janet of course made her case by claiming that "the system worked" in the aftermath of the attempted Christmas firebombing of a commercial airliner full of people. I guess if "the system" she's refereeing to was to rely on an incompetent bombmaker and a gutsy Dutch guy, then she's right. Otherwise, not so much.

Al Queda made its case by claiming "credit" for the attack. Umm, fellas, you do realize that the attack totally failed, right? The guy only hurt himself, we have him in custody, and in all probability we will learn a bit about your training networks and operations. 

While it's close, I have to give the nod to Janet due to her amazingly smart ideas about how to combat this latest threat: no blankets and no bathrooms in the last hour of flights!


Yes, beloved government of mine, that's the appropriate lesson to be learned here. 

Blankets and bathrooms are the real enemy.

Monday, December 28, 2009

Starry, Starry Bush Roads

Anonyman writes, "They followed a forest road for 35 miles?!? GPS doesn't seem like their biggest problem."

About this
, I mean.

What's your favorite thing about this incident? Here are two of MY favorite things:

1. Thinking about the conversation the LMM and I would have if I got us that lost in the mountains, for three days, using GPS. "STOP and ask for directions!" "Ask WHO? Besides, I know where we are. Look at this map!" "I told you not to...." and "I think there are some lights up ahead," and so on.

2. The woman's name is Starry Bush-Rhoads. No, really. They got lost for three nights in the mountains on bush roads, and her name is....well, you see my point.

The Grand Game!

Sometimes here at KPC someone sends a link that is just SO sweet that we have to examine it, savor it, and then leave it by the side of the road to rot.

While Sweden has a large state and well developed public services, in Japan government social expenditure makes up an unusually small part (compared to other OECD countries) of its Gross National Income. The same contrast exists among US states - even between neighbouring states like Vermont and New Hampshire. Vermont takes the big government route and New Hampshire the small. But despite the contrast in how greater equality is achieved, Sweden, Japan, Vermont and New Hampshire all enjoy good health, lower rates of most social problems - i.e. all the benefits of greater equality.

Here is just such a link, a set of "studies" so noisome, so nonsensical... well, enjoy. Here is the "evidence" page. This is a rare combination of almost painful self-importance and bad social science.

J. Gruber joins the dark side

People, did you know that any money you actually get to keep is simply a temporary tax break generously allowed to you by a beneficent and magnanimous government?

Me neither.

But according to Gruber, the so called "Cadillac tax" on generous health plans, is not a tax at all, but rather just a partial mitigation of an existing tax break:

"The assessment proposed in the Senate is not a new tax; it is the elimination of an existing tax break..."

Now, I don't deny that what Gruber is saying is true in a weird world where we start with everything belonging  to the government, but have we really come to that? Maybe so.

By the way, not only is it not a tax, it's also magic:


No word yet on whether or not it will cure male pattern baldness, but I am hopeful!

Sunday, December 27, 2009


I have written about nachas before. But about sports.








I'm so proud....


Vic Chesnutt, R. I. P.

American poet/songwriter Vic Chesnutt is dead

Wow, this is very bad news. I was very late in arriving at an appreciation of Vic. It didn't happen until Mrs. Angus and I saw him play live in a bizzaro "super-group" called "The Undertow Orchestra" which was him, David Bazan (Pedro the Lion), Will Johnson (Centro-matic), and Mark Eitzel (American Music Club). 

We went because of Bazan and Johnson, but Vic stole the show.

Check out his music if you haven't had a chance, starting perhaps with "West of Rome" or "Silver Lake". 

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Beginners' Guide to Liberty


(Nod to Angry Alex, who is no beginner)

Registration Map of NC


Overall, only 1 in 1,000 registered North Carolinians are L's.


Republicans are Hypocrites








Wednesday, December 23, 2009

The Cutest Darned Baby Panda

Little guy leaves the den, and has adventures.

Mostly falling awkwardly on his face.

To each according to their needs





Full circle, people!

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Lazy Students, or Just Clueless?





Happy Solstice from Angus & Mungowitz!

"it's a Saturnalia miracle"

Back From NYC, and Rapping It Down



Monday, December 21, 2009

Spanish is so great




The EYM Comes Home





LMM: "And he's better now, somehow?"





"Stupidly Hot Shower" (just because)





Go Josef, it's your birthday






You got it Ivan!!

Don't walk him, but don't give him anything good to hit


Apparently Nicholas Sarkozy watched the same show and internalized the meme:





Sunday, December 20, 2009

Markets in one less thing






I guess Mr. Ed can finally visit Paris, eh?

Good Books, Bad Books

On the "good" side of the ledger:



On the "bad" side of the ledger:



Descartes' Muse?

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Incontrovertible proof that Economics is a Science!

Hat tip to Gabriel M.!!

Twitter Experiment: Avatar today, Rap Video Tomorrow!

So, I'll try out this whole TWEET thing.


Today, going to see 3D Avatar.

Tomorrow, flying to New York to play the role of "The Bouncer" in Russ Roberts' rap video production. I can't post details, but the Wall Street atmospherics should be worth something.

So, follow if you will....

Just too obvious

Tiger Woods was named the PGA tour's "Playa of the Year"! 

Natch, who else could match his "record"?

ps. if you are looking for a Christmas present for Tiger, here is a good suggestion.

Friday, December 18, 2009


Anonyman sends this link, noting that the LMM and Anonyspouse have similar views on Tiger-Edwards-Spitzer-Sanford. (My wife has made it clear that if I dillied or dallied, she would leave. But she would not leave empty-handed. She would be carrying with her the official "Lorena Bobbitt" souvenir edition portion of me, as a keepsake. Since I would not be needing it any more.)

Why is it, then, that Hillary Clinton gets so much respect? Remember that extraordinarily condescending interview, where she said she would NEVER bake cookies and stand by her man? And then she did EXACTLY that, like a whipped dog? Sure, she made Bill miserable, for more than a year. But she stayed with him, as a calculation of her own interests, in effect selling and demeaning herself. She did "make" him sleep on a couch. That is a little funny, because they already had separate bedrooms!

Why would any woman with independent financial means stay around to be humiliated?

You go, girl. Go out the door. Leave. You are better than that.

UPDATE: I have to add this. Here is the treatment the Hill had to endure after the scandal, and Bill fessed up. WHY did she stay?


The big story continues to be President Clinton's best selling book. On the
news tonight they interviewed Clinton's editor. Editor? The book is 957
pages long! What the hell did he edit?

The book is huge. And actually, it folds out into a bed.

The "New York Post" is reporting today that Clinton now feels he has two more autobiographies left to write. That's what I love about Clinton. He's the only guy in the world who has three different versions of his life story. One for him, one for Hillary, one for the grand jury.

In the book, Clinton says that "in politics, if you don't toot your own horn, it usually stays untooted." And if you get someone else to toot your horn, you get impeached.

In his book, Bill Clinton talks about the point where Hillary started to laugh again. It was when he told her "Look, I'll never cheat on you again. I promise." Apparently she got hysterical.


It's only been out a day, Bill Clinton's book is already number one on the
"New York Times" bestseller list. The book is called, "My Life...As A Dog."

It's a fascinating read, this Clinton book, in the book he claims he led a double life. There were 2 Bill Clintons. Bill Clinton claims he led a double life. He was kind of like Dr. Jeckyl and Mister Hyde the salami!

In the book, Clinton reveals one night when he was five or six years old back in Arkansas. His step dad fired a gun in the house but it didn't hit him or his mother. So it looks like this bad aim thing runs in the family.

The most quoted thing in the book is where Clinton talks about after the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke, he slept on the couch for two months. That's how you know Hillary was mad, they had separate bedrooms and she still made him sleep on the couch!

Today Monica Lewinsky was not sympathetic. She said if Bill thought the couch was uncomfortable, he should try getting under that little desk.

Bill Clinton is really busy right now. He's so busy signing books that he had to cancel his 3 o'clock intern.

I went to the book signing and I was surprised the book was already 30 percent off. Just like his pants.

Angus's favorite music of 2009

To me, there was one release that stands above all others this year. "Bitte Orca" by Dirty Projectors totally knocked my socks off. It's just so f-ing triumphant! Here is a song from the album called "Cannibal Resource"

I also really liked "XX", by The XX. I think this is their debut album. Kind of Edwyn Collins meets Young Marble Giants (i.e. freaking tremendous).

Here's a sample:

Another fantastic release for 09 is "All My Friends are Funeral Singers" by Califone. I have this as double vinyl album and it sounds so incredibly good. Califone has been good for a long time, but they really stood out to me this year in particular. Here's the video for the song "Funeral singers".

Next is a definite guilty pleasure release. I mean, come on, these guys are soundtracking Cadillac commercials. I got it for Mrs. Angus and swore I wasn't going to like it, but Holy Crap!   ">"Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix" by Phoenix is such a fun and practically perfect rock record, it totally won me over. Here's the video for "Liztomania":

The next picks are weird in that while they stand out from the rest of 09's releases, they are not quite as good as music by the same people from last year.

"Tarot Sport" by The F***k Buttons would be in my top picks except it's not as good as last year's "Street Horrrsing", which was my record of the year for 08.

Same for "Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle" by Bill Callahan. Stellar, but not as good as " Woke Up a Whaleheart" from 2008.

The last example of this phenomenon is "Blood Bank", the 2009 EP by Bon Iver which is awesome, but not as good as last year's "For Emma, Forever Ago".

People, could "Skinny Love" be the best song of the decade?

I also really enjoyed new releases by stalwart groups like Built to Spill's "There Is No Enemy" and Dinosaur Jr.'s "Farm".

The best live shows I saw this year were Built to Spill at the Diamond Ballroom in OKC, and Bill Callahan at the Granada Theater in Dallas

Thursday, December 17, 2009

App State is HOT HOT HOT

Would this make you MORE likely to apply? I don't think so....

Episode II: The Women Strike Back

Wow. One can't condone the violence.

But sports trophy wifes are saying, "Enough!"

Elin beat Tiger like a punk.

And now Chris Henry has actually died being thrown out of a truck. Mr. Henry's fiancee was upset at him, and basically killed him. The description was that "he came out of the truck." Sure he did. Because she was swerving around and screaming at him.

Hell hath no fury.....

On Dancer! On Prancer!

What kind of sick person would do this?
What kind of sick person would put it on their blog?

Banks Not Lending?

A letter:

I have been struggling with figuring out where the banks are getting money to pay back the TARP loans with all the bad loans they have on books and the fact that they are not lending money. I do not see where they are making money suddenly to pay off TARP and pay bonuses!

Thank goodness you got to KPC in time, where ALL can be explained!

The banks are getting money from two sources:

1. The Federal Reserve System, through the its Open Market Desk in NY, and through other outlets, is POURING money into the system, in the form of reserves. Banks, as a result, have an extraordinary amount of cash.

How does the Fed do that? They buy long-term Treasury bonds. Banks can hold reserves in cash or bonds. Many were holding bonds, because there is an inverse relation between interest rates and the value of bonds. If interest rates fall, bond owners take a capital gain. Rates have fallen a lot over the past 14 months. But now rates are near zero. So banks are happy to sell bonds.

When the Fed buys t-bonds, it takes money out of its account at the Treasury (and that account is NOT part of the money supply) and transfers it to the accounts of banks and other entities. Say Fed buys a $1 million dollar bond from Bank of America. BoA has no more wealth than before, but it suddenly has an extra $1 million in cash it needs to invest. The Fed has been increasing the money supply in just this way for the past year or more, at a rate of 10% per month. (I didn't stutter, 10% per month, biggest sustained increase ever, in absolute terms).

2. The assets (collateralized debt obligations and other mortgage-backed securities) have become a little less illiquid. A year ago, nobody would buy CDOs at any price. Now, that part of the credit market has unfrozen a little bit. Banks may still be bankrupt, on their balance sheets, but they can get their hands on some cash, lots of it, by selling off CDOs and other assets.

So, why aren't we seeing the RETAIL credit market unfreeze, since the WHOLESALE credit market, described above, has plenty of cash?

Again, two reasons. First, banks are still trying to avoid risk. And it is not clear that recession is over, in the real world. So banks are borrowing money from the government, at 0%, and then buying NEW federal debt, which pays 3%. That's a guaranteed 3% real return, with no risk. So the Fed buys up debt to increase the money supply, to get the banks to lend. But the banks just buy more government debt, lending to the government instead of lending to small businesses or even large businesses.


Second, the rush of cash is causing an "asset inflation" which I had always thought was just a wild hypothesis, something that could never happen in the real world. But it IS happening. We aren't getting broad inflation (though the Producer Price Index has been up at a nearly 6% annual rate the last two months!). But the stock market is looking pretty good. But it may simply be because the Austrian Econ prediction of an asset inflation is correct.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

A bad day to be in Copenhagen

Consummate statesmen Robert Mugabe and Hugo Chavez addressed the climate change conference.


Mugabe was as incisive as ever:

"Why is the guilty north not showing the same fundamentalist spirit it exhibits in our developing countries on human rights matters on this more menacing threat of climate change?"

And Chavez too got right to the heart of the matter:

"If the climate was a bank, they would have already saved it."

Now that things have devolved to a circus, why not go all the way and have Ahmadinejad say a few words?

What's that? He's on the schedule for tomorrow?

Holy Crap!

So Sweet I can't stand it....

(Nod to Angry Alex)

Two quite useful posts

on inflation

and on the "carry trade" argument we have argued about before. Angus has noted a weak dollar is not a problem, and of course that's right. But a strong dollar is also not a problem. That's why, as Angus put it, using technical economics language, "Who gives a crap about the dollar?"

This Math is Hard to Understand

The problem, I think is obvious. If you add up the percentages, you get 193%. This is obviously wrong, since even Rachel Maddow knows that a circle has 360%. And a pie chart is a circle. Therefore, a duck is made out of wood, just like a witch.

Thus, we all want to know about the missing 167% has gone to. That is too big to be reporting error.

Perhaps the explanation is that the source is "Opinions Dynamic." Dynamic, indeed.

(Nod to RL, who is only partly made out of wood, and even then only after a glass of wine)

Best. Samuelson. Quote. Ever.

“Like herpes, math is here to stay,”

Source is here and the hat tip goes to LeBron!


Tuesday, December 15, 2009

A bad week for Icons

First Paul Samuelson, then Arthur Goldberger and now Oral Roberts have died this week. Oral was 94 and apparently an Okie.

UNC Library, Midnight Flash Rave

The culture that is Germany: Polar bear edition

Remember Knut? The polar bear cub rejected by his mom and hand raised by keepers in the Berlin zoo? Well he just turned 3 and is doing well, having avoided being banished to a lesser zoo, and even gaining a temporary "girlfriend" that his fans hope to make permanent.

A way out for Eldrick

People, Tiger's cone of silence plan is not working. Accenture has dropped him, Gillette has de facto dropped him, Tag Heuer is thinking about dropping him, Gatorade has de facto dropped him, and Elin is rumoured to be dropping him, even though he's promised muchos Benjamins for her to stick around.

He needs a game changing play.

My advice? Medicalize it!

That's right, "my name is Eldrick Woods and I am a sex addict". People, it's perfect. Release a statement, go into rehab and come out at the end of 3 months or so magically transformed into the sympathetic figure in the play.

How can a sponsor drop him for having an illness? Jeez, even Elin would seem unsympathetic if she followed through and divorced him or even ratcheted up the pre-nup.

Think about it Tiger, I want to see you play all four slams this year!

Monday, December 14, 2009

Puppy Christmas!

A Tiger Documentary

I had not seen this. You probably have, I understand. But I had not.

Whole Foods Republicans

A terrific article, by Michael Petrilli, in today's WSJ.

Answering the question: Could 2010 be 1994 all over again.

Probably not, and for some useful reasons.

Words Fail Me

And dancing failed them....

(Nod to Angry Alex)

The Liberal Surge was actually a High Water Mark

Just one year ago, the chattering-battering class was thumping its thin little chest and whooping it up for the new liberal takeover of the world.

Well, how do you like us, now? Germany has selected a surprisingly conservative government. Chile appears to be well on its way to electing a VERY conservative fellow (though with some social liberal stands, bless his heart!)

Fact is, Obamamania was not the return of the left to American, or world, politics. It was the reaction against an unresponsive and tin-eared militarist and corporatist regime called Bush.

Obama even won a Nobel Prize for not being Bush 43. Although Bush 41 could easily have given the same speech that Obama gave when Obama got the Nobel for not being Bush 43. Obama may be trying to centerize himself, in spite of his instincts for lunacy, and his surprising inability to understand even basic economics.

But the deficit, the mishandling of TARP, and unbelievable mishandling of health care by the left (again) have all combined to make the alternatives look pretty strong.

I still wonder if the Republicans aren't going to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, by "New York 23rding" themselves into irrelevance.

Many voters seem to prefer to vote for a loser they really like, rather than reduce the majority Nancy P and Harry R need to do their dirty work. And so the dirty work will go on.

My own view is that if you are going to do a protest vote, then do the principled thing. Don't go halfway, and vote for a RINO. Vote Libertarian!

Poison Can Quench Your Thirst

That Ben B. He really is putting us in a bad spot.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is prescribing “poison” to the U.S. economy by keeping interest rates near zero and fueling a wave of speculative capital that may cause the next global crisis, former Morgan Stanley chief Asian economist Andy Xie said.

Bernanke is making decisions based on “marginal considerations” that will help short-term growth and employment, instead of focusing on the “soundness of the system,” Xie wrote in an e-mailed note today. The next worldwide crisis will probably strike in 2012, driven by inflation as the low cost of borrowing spurs increases in asset prices, he said.

“There is a Chinese saying that one could quench the thirst by drinking poison,” said Xie, who predicted in September 2006 that the U.S. economy would fall into a recession in 2008. “Bernanke seems to be prescribing exactly this to the U.S. economy. The slower Bernanke raises interest rates, the bigger the next crisis.”


Sunday, December 13, 2009

Deny Me Three Times, Before the Cock Crows

It turns out that NC has a law that outlaws public officials who deny the existence of God. (It's in Article VI, Section 8, by the way. I had assumed that officials just ignored that article, the same way that they ignore most of the U.S. Constitution).

So, this guy is going to get hassled.

(Nod to Anonyman)

A boy and his flagpole

So, a kid actually did it. He put his tongue on a cold flagpole.

And it (his tongue) froze there. And the kid is dancing around, tongue-tied to the flagpole, yelling "Geh ah hung ah uf hag hole! OWWW!"

And so they called the fire department!

Because the firemen, understanding fire and its uses, would know to use WARM water. (It helps to be trained....)

Apparently, the kid was "triple dog dared" to do the tonguey thing. (For the REAL "Tonguey thing," you will need to rent "Kung Pow! Enter the Fist!")

(If you simply must see "Toungey," then it is in this trailer, the sign of being the "Chosen One"...)

Paul Samuelson: RIP




Boudreaux's Versatility

You all know about Don Boudreaux's many unpublished letters to the editor.

But did you know about Boudreaux's Butt Paste, and Butt Bath?

I didn't. But it is a NASCAR sponsor.

Markets in everything: Santeria edition

Looking for a great investment vehicle? Consider the human skull.

In 2007, UPI reported that, in Venezuela, practitioners of "black magic" were robbing graves for human bones and that skulls were selling for $300!

Two years later, the NY Times reports that the pace of Venezuelan grave robbing has accelerated and a skull now goes for $2000!

People, that is an average annual return of over 250%!

The Times has also upgraded the robbers from practitioners of "black magic" to adherents of a religion (transplanted from Cuba) called "Palo" (though this source perpetuates the "black magic" label)

Saturday, December 12, 2009

England is SO SCREWED

Sorry to have been so obsessed about England lately.

But what a seriously messed up place.

Here is a guy who is being fined (a LOT) for....not producing enough garbage! I have blogged before about the government claiming to own your garbage,!

(Nod to Reason Daily Brickbats)

The Latest Insult

The latest insult on the interwebs, just in time for the holiday season!

The easy version: GIYF---"Google is your friend!"

The smackdown version: LMGTFY--- "Let me google that for you!"
fill in the search field in this URL:

Suppose someone in comments says, "Neil Young! Who is Neil Young?" You would say, condescendingly, "GIYF!" (In other words, the doofus should use Google, not use you as a research assistant.)

But you could also just give them," (TRY IT!)

The implied insult is even clearer, and LOTS more fun. Try it at Christmas parties. Family members LOVE being condescended to by a geek!

Sphinctered by the man

People, this is not what you want to encounter when you've gotten up at 7:00 am on Saturday to get some labwork done:

Obamacare! Come save me!

Friday, December 11, 2009

A Town Called Sue: You Are Libel to Lose!

Amazing, again, how messed up England is. Interesting article with clear discussion of the problem of assignment of burden of proof.





What is Central Bank independence in a dollarized economy?

I must confess upfront that I find this story confusing. The president of Ecuador's allegedly independent Central Bank resigned under pressure yesterday because he didn't transfer a portion of the Central Bank's reserves to public sector banks quickly enough.

President Correa had ordered $2.4 billion to be transferred for use on spending programs to lower unemployment. The new Central Bank head is also the Economy Minister and a member of Correa's cabinet. 

At this point in the proceedings, one would usually be thinking, goodbye Central Bank independence, hello inflation.

But here is where it gets tricky. Ecuador is dollarized, right?  They don't have an exchange rate to defend. Does the Central Bank even need any international reserves? And how did it acquire them? Are these reserves somehow left over from the pre-dollarization days?

When Correa says "We are restructuring the Central Bank so that everyone understands that it has to follow the policies of our citizen's revolution" (todays WSJ p. A16), what does that mean? 

If a country is dollarized, do they even need a central bank, let alone an independent one? 

Isn't the Fed really Ecuador's central bank? 

OMG, is Correa restructuring the Fed? Is Chris Dodd Correa's puppet?


Thursday, December 10, 2009

Duke Faculty Prom Tonight!

No, I'm not kidding. The faculty "dinner dance" (clearly a prom, with a band, and hot women like the LMM) goes down this evening.

Me? I'll be wearing the black tux.....

Clean shirt, new shoes
And I don't know where I am goin' to.
black tux, black tie,
I don't need a reason why.
They come runnin' just as fast as they can
Coz every girl crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man.

Gold watch, diamond ring,
I ain't missin' not a single thing.
And cufflinks, stick pin,
When I step out I'm gonna do you in.
They come runnin' just as fast as they can
Coz every girl crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man.

Top coat, top hat,
I don't worry coz my wallet's fat.
Black shades, white gloves,
Lookin' sharp and lookin' for love.
They come runnin' just as fast as they can
Coz every girl grazy 'bout a sharp dressed man.

Raleigh Charter Rulz!

Both my sons went/are going to RCHS. (School site)

US News just came out with high school rankings
. RCHS is 24th nationally. And it is a charter school, like many of the schools in the ranking.

AND....admission is by lottery. AND the school is in downtown Raleigh.

Why is the minority enrollment so low? (It's not THAT low, it's 10%)
Remember, admission is by lottery, the school is in an urban area where the minority population is 25% or more, and the school has enormous value-added (class size 12, teachers with PhDs, etc).

Overall, NC does reasonably well.

Some people have called RCHS a "segregation academy." That doesn't make sense to me. Why don't more minorities apply? The lottery, after all, ensures that the proportion that apply will be the proportion accepted.

And your final score is Angels 55 - AGW 36

Here is the full scoreboard from Foreign Policy:

Percentage of Americans who believe in angels: 55

Percentage of Americans who believe in evolution: 39

Percentage of Americans who believe in anthropogenic global warming: 36

Percentage of Americans who believe in ghosts: 34

Percentage of Americans who believe in UFOs: 34

Go to the link for sources. We are a wild and wacky bunch, aren't we?

Hat tip to Gabriel M.

Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Feeling Good

The Tetris God: Job

The Bishop sends this link.... the God of Tetris. He is a vengeful and an arbitrary God. THIS is the real book of Job.

Mungowitz Joins the Angus Party; STILL Not a Republican

Full disclosure: Angus has never, ever been a Republican. Not even close, really.

Me? I was.

People ask me why I am not a Republican, and I stumble for an answer. To paraphrase Jimmy Buffet, the answer is so simple it's like the Charleston, it plumb evaded me.

I do have a pretty good answer, now. It was sent to me by Anonyman. But it was written by Andrew Sullivan, who has always been one of my favorite conservatives.

For these reasons, I found it intolerable after 2003 to support the movement that goes by the name "conservative" in America. I still do, even though I am much more of a limited government type than almost any Democrat and cannot bring myself to call myself a liberal (because I'm not). My reasons were not dissimilar to Charles Johnson, who, like me, was horrified by 9/11, loathes Jihadism, and wants to defeat it as effectively as possible. And his little manifesto prompts me to write my own (the full version is in "The Conservative Soul"). Here goes:

I cannot support a movement that claims to believe in limited government but backed an unlimited domestic and foreign policy presidency that assumed illegal, extra-constitutional dictatorial powers until forced by the system to return to the rule of law.

I cannot support a movement that exploded spending and borrowing and blames its successor for the debt....


There's more. It's good. And he's right.

Shine on you crazy diamond

Did you guys catch Jared Diamond in Sunday's NY Times? Ouch.

He starts out with an ode to corporate environmental responsibility:


But somehow ends up in Thomas Friedman crazyland:

While the United States is dithering about long-distance energy transmission from our rural areas with the highest potential for wind energy generation to our urban areas with the highest need for energy, China is far ahead of us. It is developing ultra-high-voltage transmission lines from wind and solar generation sites in rural western China to cities in eastern China. If America doesn’t act to develop innovative energy technology, we will lose the green jobs competition not only to Finland and Germany (as we are now) but also to China.

Class, repeat after me:

(1). Green jobs are NOT a zero sum game where nations are competing for a fixed number of them.




Suppose I go to a baseball game, with my teen-age son. I've just been to the bank, and the smallest bill I have is a $100.

I send my son up to get two hot dogs, some peanuts, and two diet sodas. I know that costs maybe $18.

He comes back with the stuff and sits down. I ask him for the change. He looks at me like I'm crazy. "That money is going to be spent on other things! That's leftover money!"

What would I do? I'd grab him by the belt, and shake the money out of his pockets! That's my money! I want my change back. I WANT MY CHANGE BACK!

That's what we should be telling President Obama about the TARP money. I WANT MY CHANGE BACK! Obama and his bunch of geniuses in Congress said they needed our money, that there would be a DISASTER unless we gave them a $1 Trillion bill. Maybe that was true, maybe it wasn't.

But we gave them the trillion dollar bill. AND THEY DIDN'T NEED IT ALL.

WE WANT OUR CHANGE BACK! It is outrageous that they are keeping the change, just so they can spend it on something else.

Tell the President: WE....WANT....OUR.....CHANGE...BACK! Apply the money back toward the deficit, don't treat it like a high school kid at a baseball game, on the equivalent of cotton candy and corn dogs.

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

The Culture that is Germany VII

Or Saw -1?

Here it is, direct from der Spiegel:

Was it mass cannibalism, ritual slaughter or both? Archaeologists who unearthed the remains of 500 Stone Age corpses in the German town of Herxheim say the meat was cut off their bones as if they were livestock. One conclusion is that the people were eaten -- after volunteering to be sacrificed.


Drug war over: We win!!

hat tip to Art Carden!

Part of the VANGuard

This guy lived in a van, on the Duke campus.

Or so he says.

(Nod to Chelsea)

An Email Exchange

A delightful email exchange.


From: Simon Edhouse
Date: Tuesday 17 November 2009 11.07am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Logo Design

You just crossed the line. You have no idea about the potential this project has. The technology allows users to network peer to peer, add contacts, share information and is potentially worth many millions of dollars and your short sightedness just cost you any chance of being involved.

From: David Thorne
Date: Tuesday 17 November 2009 1.36pm
To: Simon Edhouse
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Logo Design

Dear Simon,

So you have invented Twitter. Congratulations. This is where that time machine would definitely have come in quite handy.

When I was about twelve, I read that time slows down when approaching the speed of light so I constructed a time machine by securing my father's portable generator to the back of my mini-bike with rope and attaching the drive belt to the back wheel. Unfortunately, instead of traveling through time and finding myself in the future, I traveled about fifty metres along the footpath at 200mph before finding myself in a bush. When asked by the nurse filling out the hospital accident report "Cause of accident?" I stated 'time travel attempt' but she wrote down 'stupidity'.

If I did have a working time machine, the first thing I would do is go back four days and tell myself to read the warning on the hair removal cream packaging where it recommends not using on sensitive areas. I would then travel several months back to warn myself against agreeing to do copious amounts of design work for an old man wielding the business plan equivalent of a retarded child poking itself in the eye with a spoon, before finally traveling back to 1982 and explaining to myself the long term photographic repercussions of going to the hairdresser and asking for a haircut exactly like Simon LeBon's the day before a large family gathering.

Regards, David.

(Nod to Prabhu)

Monday, December 07, 2009

The never ending temporary tax?



  • Contingency funds to cover unforeseen costs ($17 million)


More reasons to not worry about the demise of newspapers





Hey, but at least they do have Dilbert!



But...CDOs? Really
? That's bad.

(Nod to Reuters)

Sunday, December 06, 2009

Wow! Great Britain is Messed Up!

two stories that caught my eye:





So, our sturdy lad did as he was told

