Dear Palestinians: You Are Our Enemy

How many Palestinians polled give "Support to Al-Qaeda's actions like bombings in USA and Europe"? Interestingly enough for a place that receives hundreds of millions of dollars from us, 38% strongly support, and 27% support, Al-Qaeda actions like bombings in USA ans Europe.

That's 65% of the polled population. That is an enemy, not just the government, the entire country. A country that wouldn't exist if it weren't for us and Israel. Jordan certainly wasn't ever going to give them their homeland. The only place they ever had any rights to speak of was in Israel.

This is exactly the response to expect from 20+ years of negotiating with terrorists.

The poll results can be seen here.

Why I Love Public Transportation

It's the same reason I love gun control. Reliance on police takes away your ability to protect yourself. Reliance on public transportation takes away your ability to transport yourself. So now these folks are your only way to get to work. Merry Christmas.

So New Yorkers, you better give those transit workers the the respect they demand and deserve (and $50K a year), because you've already given them a government-sanctioned monopoly, and you'll never get your transport independence back.

Candid News Photo of the Day

This photographer has skillfully captured an honest, unrehearsed, moment of pure emotion.

"Iraq is worse than Vietnam."

Jimmy Breslin, Profiles in Moronacy

I don't care for Hillary Clinton, but Jimmy Breslin uses one of the lamest, most shopworn, tired, and stale statements ever constructed to criticize her politics:

If Hillary Clinton wants this war to go on, then she should send her daughter to fight in Iraq.

Oh, very clever, and fresh too!

Our fighting men and women continue to be 100% adult, 100% volunteer, whatever the Sheehans, Moores, and Breslins of the world pretend to believe. But "she should persuade her daughter to volunteer to fight in Iraq" doesn't have the same punch.

Fortunately for everyone, they are fantastic, brave, adult volunteers, and history will erase the nonsense of the naysayers and doom-and-gloomers.

More on the Negroponte $100 Fiasco

David Henderson makes some great points about the miguided $100 computer project, but I think he gives Negroponte far too much credit:

"Few people admire Mr. Negroponte more than I do, but his plan for how to distribute the computers is a tragedy in the making."

The results that Mr. Henderson points out were completely avoidable from the start, and they are inexcusable for someone with Mr' Negroponte's stated intentions.

For one, the entire project was inspired by the use of donated laptops by some Cambodian families. But when you read the story, you realize the laptops were being used as light bulbs. The target audience is far, far away from needing a laptop to put them over the top into the information age.

Further, the results of a public project like this are already being felt in places like Thailand, where schools that can barely stay open are being tasked with creating a network infrastructure to support these computers. Taking the decisions out of locals, the higher-ups in the government get to sign on to a sexy project like this one, and everyone crows about the vision, and avoids thinking about the results.

Last, November's over. The prototype didn't even get made. Trevor Bayliss came away less than impressed, saying the prototype "could have been made with Lego". This is the man tasked with creating the crank charging system.

Bottom line, read the David Henderson piece, it's more important to understand the economic mechanisms at work than to even worry if the product will ever exist.

Loser of the Day

$2.4 million accepted in bribes, by California Republican Representative Randy "Duke" Cunningham, to steer defense contracts. There is not much lower you can go.

This is one reason that I don't really care about immoral CEOs. They don't actually have the power to steal your money directly, without some kind of government help.

It's also why lawmakers need less power and less money, not more. Of course bribes are going to be offered, when they have the power to spend so many billions, through contracts, subsidies, and anything else they please.

Thank You Ms. Goldberg

From the comic genius who brought us this material (from 1993):



Comes a warning on racial insensitivity in this (from the 1940s):



About Looney Toons, Whoopi says, "These jokes were wrong then and they're wrong today." So they were wrong in 1993 as well, but it didn't stop her writing Danson's schtick.

Thanks, Whoopi, glad you're on the case.

Tough Luck Johnny

It seems Johnny Depp just can't find a home he likes these days, and I for one couldn't feel less sorry for him.

I don't really like his acting to begin with, but I like him even less for badmouthing America from his adopted home of France. "I was very lucky that something steered me to France back in '98... Thank God we escaped." You know, from the greed, wars for oil, etc. "What's it really all about? It's about dough; it's about money. That's ugly." And France's involvement in Oil for Food, selling arms to Saddam, and opposing our intervention? No, that's pure principle, that's beautiful.

But apparently the honeymoon is over, as even his deep myopia was shattered with the recent riots. "It's insane, that setting cars on fire is the new strike. I went there (to France) to live because it seemed so simple. Now it's anything but. I don't know how they'll recover from this."

I don't wish him ill, but it is entertaining. He sat back in France and laughed at America, as though ignoring the problems in the world, and those in France, was all it takes to live a peaceful life. That confronting a problem was somehow the same as causing the problem in the first place.

I doubt he'll learn, though. Most likely he blames us for Paris, as well.

My New Favorite Organization - World Can't Wait

This one's a new one to me, "The World Can't Wait." I thought about posting the list of members at the bottom but it's so long and unremarkable it'd be a waste. You should take a second and look at it just for fun.

It was slightly surprising to see Casey Kasem in the list, but other than that, it's the same tired retreads on every other Anti-Bush campaign out there.

And here are the reasons, all classic:

Your government, on the basis of outrageous lies, is waging a murderous and utterly illegitimate war in Iraq, with other countries in their sights.

One sentence, so many wrong answers. Read Bush's UN speech to hear the reasons. Then remember Clinton never even approached the UN before Bosnia, but who cared? There has never been a less murderous war, with more care taken for civilians.

Your government is openly torturing people, and justifying it.

Our government openly tries torturers, and convicts them.

Your government puts people in jail on the merest suspicion, refusing them lawyers, and either holding them indefinitely or deporting them in the dead of night.

Yes, please mirandize on the battlefield, and please don't deport overstaying terrorist suspects. And oh yeah, all this started with Bush.

Your government is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule.

No examples necessary from these folks, they put the key phrases in, it's self-evident.

Your government suppresses the science that doesn't fit its religious, political and economic agenda, forcing present and future generations to pay a terrible price.

Failure to fund with confiscated taxes is not suppression, sorry. And exactly how much funding was there for stem cells, of any kind, before Bush? Yeah, suppression.

Your government is moving to deny women here, and all over the world, the right to birth control and abortion.

Again, the fact that you can't force us all to pay for others' abortions is not a denial of any right.

Your government enforces a culture of greed, bigotry, intolerance and ignorance.

Bigotry and intolerance, yes, through affirmative action, racial classifications, multi-language education, and other programs that produce resentment and separation of cultures. Ignorance, yes, through a public school system that values job protection and choice restriction over parental rights and quality education. Greed, I wish. You sorry socialists could use a little yourself instead of trying yoke those that actually produce anything into towing you around. Again, what does this all have to do with Bush?

People look at all this and think of Hitler — and they are right to do so. The Bush regime is setting out to radically remake society very quickly, in a fascist way, and for generations to come. We must act now; the future is in the balance.

It didn't take long to bring Hitler in, I expect to see a lot more genius from these folks in the future. Good luck, freakazoids.

How You Know a Diet is Overdue

When, as you walk to the counter to pick up your pizza to-go, before you can say, "Pizza for Morgan," from behind the counter you hear, "Do I even have to ask?"

Support the Minutemen-- in Paris

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush?

I wait expectantly for Mr. Moore to lend his support the French Freedom Fighters, but as of yet I've seen nothing on his site. I haven't seen the groundswell of support for these heroes from DailyKos, DemocraticUnderground either, but I'm sure they'll be there soon.

As for me, I still don't say French (in protest) so I can only say I fully support the Freedom Freedom Fighters.

This Isn't News?

From the Washington Post:

"In August, new business startups in Iraq exceeded 30,000. Individual Iraqis are better off financially than they have been for 20 years. According to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, per capita income has doubled since the United States toppled the Saddam regime. There are more than 3.5 million cellular phone subscribers in Iraq, up from zero when Saddam ruled. Internet cafes are thriving in even small towns."

Let's see that again, and please, let me know if you've already seen this on the nightly news or PBS and it's old news:

1. In August, new business startups in Iraq exceeded 30,000.
2. Individual Iraqis are better off financially than they have been for 20 years.
3. Per capita income has doubled since the United States toppled the Saddam regime.
4. There are more than 3.5 million cellular phone subscribers in Iraq.
5. Internet cafes are thriving in even small towns.

No? Well, neither was I, actually. Because it's not being reported on. It's in the Washington Post blog section, and that's it.

By the way, for those that claim to support the troops, it might be a day to say "nice job, keep up the good work."

Ding Dong HR1606 is Dead

I couldn't be happier that HR1606 was defeated.

McCain-Feingold, a ridiculously bad law, will not last long, in my opinion. People will not shut up about the elections 60 days before the next one, and the FEC will have to enforce it, and it will be challenged, and I don't see how it can stand up in court.

Had H1606 (Hensarling-Reid) passed, it would have smoothed over the results of McCain-Feingold and made it more difficult to get rid of.

The defeat, largely on party lines, can also be used as a club against Democrats next election season. Although people don't seem to care much, and it would be a dishonest attack in a lot of ways.

UPDATE: For a much more insightful explanation, John Stossel to the rescue.

ConocoPhillips Unholy Profits?

I've been seeing this story everywhere, including Drudge today, and it was mantioned on Rush this morning, and I get the impression that people are upset that an oil company's profits went up over the last quarter. Even worse, I have heard people refer to the story as ConocoPhillips making 89% profits.

That's just not the case, and I don't see that this is much of a story at all. They made $3.8 billion profit on revenue of $49.7 billion. Not even 8%. But the 89% number is what sticks out. All the 89% really means is that last quarter they made about half that percentage of profits, almost 8%.

As an example, if you were selling a chair you bought for $40, and you spent a couple dollars on transportation and your time, and you sold it for $50, you'd be in roughly the same boat, and I doubt you'd be excited about getting rich or you'd think you were "gouging" anyone. If you put $46 billion on the line, you better hope you're going to get a few back.

Just a quick look at another story from today, also reported by Reuters. Motorola made $1.75 billion profit on revenue of $9.42 billion, or almost 19%. I don't see any similar coverage or implications around this story, though, even with double the profits by percentage.

I applaud both efforts of course, but I wish people would take a second and realize exactly how much ConocoPhillips has at stake to make that much in profits. The best news of all is that when profits are increasing, there is more room for competition at the pump, and gas prices will likely continue to fall. Which, again, puts the lie to the gouging idea. Why would companies in collusion, on a product everyone claims is absolutely necessary regardless of price, reduce prices by more than 10% in a month?

Bad Movie? Blame the South

"Audiences want their war films straight. From the day we opened, we did not do business in the South."

Yeah, that must be the reason. He's smart though, I'll give him that, because without the "controversy" there's no reason that movie stays in the news so long.

Why is it Offensive to Keep Private Life Private?

ShowBizData has a story today about the Houston Voice claiming Shepard Smith and Anderson Cooper are gay. Apparently, to the Voice, they "choose to hide and deceive -- and to protect their incomes and images -- at the expense of contributing important weight and star power to the gay civil rights movement."

I don't know what about them proclaiming their sexual preference would lend weight to the gay civil rights movement. And I don't know if they could lend star power to any movement. But it seems to me pretty sad and hypocritical when a gay group lashes out at someone for behavior that in almost every instance is best left in the bedroom.

I can't imagine what me knowing Anderson Cooper is gay would add to the news coverage he does. He's exactly right that he's not supposed to be the story himself, so why should he be telling anyone anything like that?

I am not a fan of either of them to begin with (see: Katrina Hysteria) but for crying out loud let their business be their business instead of scaring gay people out of public careers altogether.

Any Decent Blog Recommendations?

Holy moly, there's nothing but Miers coverage in the blogs I read, and it's sooo tired at this point. I don't really see the big deal, she's the one that, as far as I know, has been helping with great picks for other judges like Brown, Owen, and now Roberts. My bottom line is I trust her judgement, and I don't understand why the President should try to get a bead on some else's beliefs if he already knows her.

Either way, though, it's a boring, boring story. So why did I write about it? I'm not smart.

Washingotn Post Clarifies Plame Scandal

This Washington Post editorial "Rush to Judgment" explains the basic stakes and known facts about the Plame affair better than just about anything else I've read, so if you're curious even after all the over-reporting or you've been ignoring it so far, it does in 4 paragraphs what took me probably 4 hours to clear up.

Maybe I'm just slow, though.

Bush Cranks Wilma To 5

All the better to cover the imminent frog-marching of Rove and Cheney, of course. He's working on aiming it at a black population center, but it's still early.

China's Space Flight

Look at these pictures and tell me China was anywhere near the upper atmosphere.

My favorite is the last one:



I had no idea anyone had the technology to add such big thrusters and fuel to such small craft, look at the actual size of the module compared to a man.



I knew those space costumes weren't real.

Can Companies Facilitate Censorship?

This NY Times article points out that some US companies are involved in helping some repressive governments filter access to the Internet in their countries.

It should come as no surprise that the Internet in Myanmar, the southeast Asian state once known as Burma and in the iron grip of a military cabal for decades, is heavily filtered and carefully monitored.

Of course it is no surprise, because they've been doing it for years. And as distasteful as it may sound, I don't think it's a problem at all that US companies are involved. In fact, I doubt most people had any idea of exactly how much filtering goes on in these countries before. If anything, I think our business involvement has brought more publicity to the problem than anything else in recent memory, and it makes it more and more obvious to the world just how repressive these places are.

Countries like China try to put on a good PR face to the world and show off modern cities like Shanghai, but it is a thin veneer over a terrible system of government. So I applaud the fact that this business takes the mask off of these states and shows them openly for what they are as they wouldn't be otherwise.

At this time, Google policy does not permit...

"At this time, Google policy does not permit ad text that advocates against an individual, group, or organization."



Keep up the good work, Google. I wonder what their "Don't be evil" mantra even means, it obviously doesn't mean "Don't be a liar".

For the record, I am aware that it is not censorship for Google to pick and choose the viewpoints they allow to advertise. They have no real power over whether you can or cannot advocate a point of view, they have power over their own ad network.

And we are free to point out that Google's self-righteous little "Don't be evil" slogan means jack squat, and so apparently, do their stated ad acceptance policies.

A side note, it is not lost on me that I am using a free Google service to post this, and they are free to cancel my account anytime. It doesn't change the facts, it's just slightly ironic.

Reminder - Pakistanis Are People Too

My apologies if you've already given, I'm just exhausted from Miers coverage when this is still in the critical stage where aid can really help.

Please give to the relief effort here: Salvation Army South Asia Zone Fund.

More Innaccuracies on Katrina - Toxic Flood

Good news for New Orleaneans, bad news (again) for the press coverage of Katrina. The report on the floodwaters in Katrina concludes - Floodwater Not as Toxic As Feared, Experts Say.

"What it most looks like is the storm water that is present in New Orleans every time it rains," said John H. Pardue, an environmental engineer at Louisiana State University, who headed the team whose research was published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. "We still don't think the floodwaters were safe, but it could have been a lot worse. It was not the chemical catastrophe some had expected."

Other than the location, and the fact that it was all Adolf O'Bushiburton's fault, I wonder what the news got right on this story?

Oh yeah, oops. I must be wrong, Dan Rather thinks it was great: "It's been one of television news' finest moments," Rather said. "They were willing to speak truth to power."

Keep up the great work.

Kind of Sick - Earthquake Dropping Off the Radar

The death count in Kashmir is well over 30,000, could possibly reach 40,000, and I am not seeing a whole lot about it around. For example, it's off Drudge, and I haven't seen anything on the bigger blogs I read since the 9th (Instapundit, Powerline, LGF, etc.). I know it's not something we can write a lot about, being on the other side of the world, but for crying out loud, how about a donation link at the top of the page? I actually sent those blogs the link below in hopes they would, but no such luck. Kind of disappointing, but it's their own business I guess.

Please give to the relief effort here: Salvation Army South Asia Zone Fund.

How Bad is North Korea?

They are building their first bicycle plant? And they need help from China to do it? Holy moly.

These Guys Are Brave

I mean come on, those are dollar store halloween costumes, not spacesuits. Somebody please tell them before it's too late!

Really though, I'd love to see a poll of whether Chinese support the expenditure, but you can't, because their government are dirty commies.

An Actual Disaster Now Seems Less

I see this headline, "Quake Kills More Than 18,000 in South Asia", and I think, "Wow, another big disaster like New Orleans." The feeling lasts for a second, maybe, until I remember that our media blew the casualty predictions by an entire order of magnitude. This isn't Anderson Cooper or Shepard Smith reporting, this is Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, who isn't likely trying to get his 15 minutes by reporting exaggeration and rumor. The count actually started around 3000 instead of 200,000, can you imagine that?

This Kashmir earthquake is literally 20 times worse already than the real (as opposed to portrayed) Katrina but somehow I'm so numb from it already being the end of the world that I don't notice it quite as much. It makes me wonder if any of the countries that sent aid for us are irritated that we blew it so far out of proportion.

So when you choose to donate, keep in mind the real magnitude of this disaster. These figures are likely to rise as they find more people. As a first step, you can give to the relief effort here: Salvation Army South Asia Zone Fund. Let's get it going. You know, all three of you that see this.

Update: The figures keep climbing, at this point no one knows where it'll stop, but it's terrible. Donate if you can.

InTouch with Reality

This is just a remarkable cover of a magazine. An absolute classic. Talk about answering your own question, just look at the photos in sequence.

For starters, we have possibly the most offensive question you can direct at a woman, "Are you pregnant?" It's just not something to guess on, period. Besides which, Angelina looks great in the picture. But she must be pregnant, see the telltale bump? Any girl with a belly like that's just got have a bun in the oven.

Britney's looking nice as well, for that matter, and I'm not exactly a fan. But apparently she's 70 pounds overweight, can't you tell by the photo? I must like girls 100 pounds overweight, because I've done double-takes and rubbernecks on chubbier girls than this, and I am not alone.

OK, I guess Oprah's never been attractive to me. But I am going to claim this is a good picture of her, and does not look like what I'd consider a woman with a weight problem.

Now here's a weight problem, in my opinion-- and although it's probably just a bad photo, Julia Roberts looks older than she should, and worse than she could. "Why so thin, Julia? Why so thin, Terri Hatcher, Nicole Richie, Mary-Kate Olson, Kate Hudson, Lindsay Lohan..?"

Angelina Jolie looks pregnant! Britney has 70 pounds to lose! Oprah is gaining again! But Julia, why so thin? Who is making these women feel fat and lose so much weight?

Thanks Iain - Mass Transit in Disasters

Finally found somebody on my side, and even better, someone much more persuasive than me, on the subject of the worthlessness of public transit in an emergency.

Read Iain Murray's "Sic Transit Maria Landrieu" for more.

Today's thing I hope no one ever says to me again

"For future reference, we also keep the King Size Baby Ruths up next to the register."

More Low Expectations from The Media

This story makes it even plainer that the media has no concept of what black people are like. You could sense it when news reports kept referring to how black the city seemed, like it was some kind of shock to them to even see so many in one place.

Now the excuses for the horrifying coverage point out even more problems for the media and New Orleans officials.

Times-Picayune Editor Jim Amoss cited telephone breakdowns as a primary cause of reporting errors, but said the fact that most evacuees were poor African Americans also played a part.

"If the dome and Convention Center had harbored large numbers of middle class white people," Amoss said, "it would not have been a fertile ground for this kind of rumor-mongering."

Some of the hesitation that journalists might have had about using the more sordid reports from the evacuation centers probably fell away when New Orleans' top officials seemed to confirm the accounts.

Nagin and Police Chief Eddie Compass appeared on "Oprah" a few days after trouble at the Superdome had peaked.

Compass told of "the little babies getting raped" at the Superdome. And Nagin made his claim about hooligans raping and killing.

First, "telephone breakdowns"? How does that make reporting less accurate? "Hey, I couldn't get anybody on the phone, I'll just make something up. Pedophile rapes? Sounds true enough."

Second, I guess somehow the fact that the flood victims were black made it fertile ground for rumor-mongering? How could this be, amongst our enlightened media? Upper, middle, lower, black, white, any color, I don't normally expect people to rape, murder, or cannibalize others. Is Amoss saying it's generally assumed black peole are savages in the media?

Third, Nagin and Compass used Oprah to make unfounded statements and accusations about their people? That's sick, and I think they should have already both resigned for fanning the flames of hysteria, but it's even more so that these things were just parroted on every channel.

It seems like even in the midst of covering the bad coverage, there's a little thread of "well, it's understandable, you know, with all those black people around, that we'd have thought that."

This whole thing truly is turning into a global embarassment. Maybe our journalists and Compass and Nagin need to spend some more time around regular New Orleans folks before they report on them next time.

The Bigotry of the Lowest Expectations

The hysterics over Katrina revealed plainly what I think is the true force of racism in the U.S. today. From affirmative action to government housing, the ideas of the left are driven by the fact that Democrats simply don't think black people are capable of taking care of themselves. And from the start of Katrina, the local officials, the media, and much of the left's leadership has believed the worst of the people of New Orleans.

Rapes of babies, rampant murder, and cannibalism, all reported, all repeated, all false. All easy to find the truth of. Why didn't anyone look into it any further? Because for them, it was too easy to believe that a relatively black city would descend into Thunderdome inside of a week. From the Times-Picayune:

In interviews with Oprah Winfrey, Compass reported rapes of "babies," and Mayor Ray Nagin spoke of "hundreds of armed gang members" killing and raping people inside the Dome. Unidentified evacuees told of children stepping over so many bodies, "we couldn't count."

The picture that emerged was one of the impoverished, masses of flood victims resorting to utter depravity, randomly attacking each other, as well as the police trying to protect them and the rescue workers trying to save them. Nagin told Winfrey the crowd has descended to an "almost animalistic state."

I'm so tired of being defensive on the right from accusations of racism. We've been right at every major junction, from the Civil War, to the Civil Rights Act, to Senator KKK Robert Byrd.

I've walked through the "wrong" parts of New Orleans at 3 in the morning (sober), and I don't remember ever feeling I was in danger. I wonder how it is that people were so ready to report, and so ready to believe, that a city of black people is just hours from anarchy at any given time. I think it's time the lefties started answering some questions.

What is Mayor Nagin's Punishment?

As I watch the continued story of the nursing home owners indicted for negligent homicide in New Orleans, it leaves me wondering what Mayor Nagin's punishment will be for a similar level of negligence. My prediction? No punishment, but for kicks let's compare the two situations:

The Manganos Executives of a Residence Established Emergency Procedure Failure to Implement Plan 34 Dead 34 Counts of Negligent Homicide

Mayor Ray Nagin Executive of a City Established Emergency Procedure Failure to Implement Plan Around 600 Dead Airtime for Hysterics and Accusations

I don't really know if Nagin's on the hook for anything, or even has a chance of being removed from office at the next election. And many of those dead would have stayed behind even if the evacuation had been carried out according to plan. But it seems to me odd that we hold private business owners so much more responsible than government executives.

If that's the case, maybe the way to get government to keep their promises is to privatize it. It'd be great, each city has a list of services they require, companies bid to provide them, and when it hits the fan, they either do what they promised or they go to jail. I like it.

Cindy Sheehan Beats the Odds

Cindy Sheehan proved her critics wrong today when against all odds, she proved that she in fact can get arrested in Washington.

Back to Photo-Op Criticisms

I forgot to mention, and it was hilarious as usual, that the photo-op criticism is back for Rita, a return to Charley/Frances-style sniping. No end of coverage on how W was slow on the uptake for Katrina, and instant criticism if he learns a lesson from the media bloodbath.

Dan Rather Hasn't Lost a Step

Rather praised the coverage of Hurricane Katrina by the new generation of TV journalists and acknowledged that he would have liked to have reported from the Gulf Coast. “Covering hurricanes is something I know something about,” he said.

“It’s been one of television news’ finest moments,” Rather said of the Katrina coverage. He likened it to the coverage of President Kennedy’s assassination in 1963. “They were willing to speak truth to power,” Rather said of the coverage.

Amazing, "truth to power" eh?

Here's just a few of the bits of truth the Katrina coverage:

1. 10,000 dead

2. New Orleans shut down for 6 months

3. Worst natural disaster in U.S. history

When you think about how much stupid Rather's statements are, you need to take into consideration that he said this last weekend, after it was obvious the coverage was ridiculously off the mark.

It's no surprise that he'd enjoy that sort of unsubstantiated, breathless coverage, but it's sort of sad that he's out there reminding everyone why he's no longer working.

Get a Grip

How can the world's lone superpower be brought to it's knees in such an embarassing way as this? 10,000 dead in a major U.S. city! Why was the federal response so slow? This is the worst natural disaster in U.S. history! While everyone's trying to assign blame for everything, they are missing the fact that none of these things are true.

For one, our federal response to the disaster was not slow. Federal responders are not meant to be first responders, and can't actually just wait there during the hurricane. And they responded faster than they did in other recent hurricanes, such as Andrew.

There are not 10,000 dead, a pathetic estimate by fearmongering people and a panicking mayor with zero faith in individuals. Unfortunately for them, many people still can take some care of themselves and have survived. I don't know why they didn't just guess 50 or 100 thousand, for all the facts they had.

It was not the worst natural disaster in US history, and it won't even crack the top 5. And that's leaving out heat waves, which would knock it out of all contention.

Why bring up heat waves? Well, it wasn't so long ago that Parisians truly were dying by the thousands in just such a natural event. It was actually just 2 years ago, August 2003. Estimates range between 11,435 and 14,802 dead, 80% of them elderly and ostensibly being cared for by the government in France's socialist worker's paradise. Now that's what I call a pathetic government response.

What I'm left wondering is who will take responsibility for blowing the storm out of all proportion? Who will apologize when, as likely happened this time, people ignore evacuation warnings because it's never as bad as they say? Does the media ever apologize, or get called out on things like that? Do they get fired? Do they even care if what comes out of their mouths is accurate?

Los Angeles

It is reported that black outage victims in Los Angeles have begun fashioning candles from corpses to survive the night.

Four hours after the "accident", hundreds of thousands of blacks in Los Angeles are dying in the dark like dogs. No-one has come to help them.

I am a sixty-four year old African-American. Los Angeles marks the end of the America I strove for.

I am hopeless. I am sad. I am angry against my country for doing nothing when it mattered.

This is what we have come to. This defining watershed moment in America's racial history. For all the world to witness. For those who've been caused to listen for a lifetime to America's ceaseless hollow bleats about democracy. For Christians, Jews and Muslims at home and abroad. For rich and poor. For African-American soldiers fighting in Iraq. For African-Americans inside the halls of officialdom and out.

My hand shakes with anger as I write. I, the formerly un-jaundiced human rights advocate, have finally come to see my country for what it really is. A monstrous fraud.

But what can I do but write about how I feel. How millions, black like me, must feel at this, the lowest moment in my country's story.

Not Everyone is Glenn Reynolds

Just because half of Instapundit post remarks end with "I don't know if I'd go that far..." doesn't mean that some baseless conciliatory gesture in your own writing makes you Mr. Reasonable or something. And as much as you want it to, it doesn't make you as smart as Glenn Reynolds.

Here's the standard line start from conservative and libertarian leaning blogs right now:

"While there were plenty of problems at the federal level... " and then blah blah blah, ranging from Nagin stinks to Blanco stinks to whatever.

The problem is, prepending that statement onto things doesn't make you somehow more reasonable or reasoned at all. It doesn't present any proof, and thus it's worthless and misinformed.

In other words, when you throw out a blanket accusation at the federal response, it would be nice if you had at least one fact to start with. Something empirical would be especially nice, like "Compared to previous federal responses, the Katrina response time, from the moment of the request, was 2 days slower."

The reason you don't see those statements is because it's not true. It's just convenient, and it sounds nice to people that like to think they sound reasonable by being "moderate".

And by the way, people, if you're so anxious to agree with everyone, what are you writing for at all?

Emergency Preparedness Tasks in New Orleans

Below is the City of New Orleans emergency preparedness task list. The thing that strikes me when I read this isn't just how poorly executed it was, but how little it mentions George W. Bush as being responsible for everything on it.

I'm also left wondering if "first responders" complaining about the federal response are as prepared to abdicate all authority to the federal government as they are to pass the blame. If Bush is responsible for all local emergency preparedness, maybe we should just fire the police and fire departments, and immediately declare martial law and move the military in every time something goes bad.

Also note the specific reference to using buses to evacuate people when you look at the sea of unused school buses dumping oil and gas into the flood.

A. Mayor

* Initiate the evacuation.

* Retain overall control of all evacuation procedures via EOC operations.

* Authorize return to evacuated areas.

B. Office of Emergency Preparedness

* Activate EOC and notify all support agencies to this plan.

* Coordinate with State OEP on elements of evacuation.

* Assist in directing the transportation of evacuees to staging areas.

* Assist ESF-8, Health and Medical, in the evacuation of persons with special needs, nursing home, and hospital patients in accordance with established procedures.

* Coordinate the release of all public information through ESF-14, Public Information.

* Use EAS, television, cable and other public broadcast means as needed and in accordance with established procedure.

* Request additional law enforcement/traffic control (State Police, La. National Guard) from State OEP.

C. New Orleans Police Department

* Ensure orderly traffic flow.

* Assist in removing disabled vehicles from roadways as needed.

* Direct the management of transportation of seriously injured persons to hospitals as needed.

* Direct evacuees to proper shelters and/or staging areas once they have departed the threatened area.

* Release all public information through the ESF-14, Public Information.

D. Regional Transit Authority

* Supply transportation as needed in accordance with the current Standard Operating Procedures.

* Place special vehicles on alert to be utilized if needed.

* Position supervisors and dispatch evacuation buses.

* If warranted by scope of evacuation, implement additional service.

E. Louisiana National Guard

* Provide assistance as needed in accordance with current State guidelines.

F. Animal Care and Control

* Coordinate animal rescue operations with the New Orleans SPCA.

G. Public Works

* Make emergency road repairs as needed.

H. Office of Communications

* Release all public information relating to the evacuation.

Oh, If Only We'd Had Buses...

"Don't give me your money. Don't send me $10 million today. Give me buses and gas. Buses and gas. Buses and gas. If you have to commandeer Greyhound, commandeer Greyhound. ... If you don't get a bus, if we don't get them out of there, they will die."
- State Rep. Karen Carter, New Orleans

By all means, someone should get Greyhound doing something productive, I would have thought The Hague would have shut them down by now for the appalling conditions on their buses.

But in the meantime-- Hey Ray! Nice evacuation planning and timing (Sunday!?), way to utilize resources and way to lead. There's a reason Rudy Giuliani is a giant. He handled the critical early situation in his city and he lead, until reinforcements could get in to help clean up and rebuild. He was inspiring, confident, and hopeful.

By the way, when do you think the National Guard should have been there standing by, during the hurricane?

Take Solace, Lefties and Euthanasists

At least if people are somehow starving in 4 days, you guys can rest assured it's a peaceful, dignified death:

"What happens is she loses fluid from her body, she enters a peaceful coma and she gradually passes away, very gently and very peacefully."

I should be so lucky as to starve... I don't remember my last peaceful coma.

Were They Unaware of Any of This?

I'm sincerely shocked that only a year ago New Orleans was able to evacuate 600,000 people, and somehow this time it went so poorly. It's not a new situation, in fact maybe it's almost a boy who cried wolf type of a situation:

An estimated 600,000 people evacuated from the New Orleans area in what some state officials called one of the largest evacuations ever in state history.

Evacuees were upset at the long delays, and officials feared that the mass evacuation could backfire because people may be less willing to get out of the path of a hurricane in the future.

It was also the second time in six years that the city emptied out to only find the threatening hurricane veer off and miss New Orleans. In 1998, people fled the approach of Hurricane Georges.

Estimates show that about 11,000 vehicles an hour were on roads out of the New Orleans area last week. Faced with Hurricane Georges in 1998, about 4,000 vehicles an hour left the area.

I don't know what to make of all that, except that it's creepy to read now. It just seems like the local plan fell completely apart somewhere.

On a side note, for some reason no one needed President Bush actually standing on I-10 directing traffic last year to get the evacuation done. Amazing.

Make Up Your Minds

Apparently George Bush was asleep at the wheel during Katrina, if only he'd got on his waders and gone directly to New Orleans to stop the flooding and looting, things would be fixed already.

Paradoxically, that same response was somehow a problem during Florida's Hurricane Charley and Francis devastation:

I find it deeply disturbing that President Bush may use his trip to survey the damage of Hurricane Frances as a photo opportunity.
-Rep. Robert Wexler from West Palm Beach

George Bush only went to Florida to show off. There is not a sincere bone in his body. He is the world's greatest con-man and four-flusher. The people in Florida are no better off because of him, and neither are the people of Iraq, or America, for that matter.
- Mildred Perry Miller - Chattanooga, Tenn.

We all know this is a photo op for Bush. I actually don't need him to come here, he has already designated funds.
- Scarlet on News Hounds

Of course Bush will use the storm as a photo op. His gordo little brother already has. The goofy bastard uses 9/11 and active duty soldiers as his backdrop, of course he will try to mine this tragedy. That's what he does. That's ALL HE DOES!
- Gabby Hayes of News Hounds

So what is it exactly that you think should be done? Do you know, or do you just default to the opposite of whatever Bushitler does? I would agree more with the above sentiments than with current criticisms. It doesn't really help anything for Bush to walk around New Orleans, especially at present. Symbolically? Yes, maybe later, but it's just not important.

People forget, but we have phones, we have planes, and we have people working with the President. People get put in charge of things. Things get done. The President doesn't necessarily actually drain New Orleans himself.

For me, it is becoming more and more reassuring that Bush is not directly affected by polls and public opinion. I don't need him calling a press conference to sign some paper to show he's sending help.

In the meantime, Lefties, make up your mind and try to stick with it. If you find it's difficult, well, it might be because you are a kneejerk Reactionary.

Does Price Gouging Exist?

Prices are spiking on gasoline, and the complaints of price gouging are flooding into the FTC. My question is, is there such a thing as price gouging? In a voluntary transaction between two entities, how can there be?

In this particular situation, the probability exists of some level of shortages in supply around New Orleans especially. Should those gas stations be compelled to sell at the price they sold the day before, even though they will surely sell out and essentially be out of business until supply come back?

Their gas is worth exactly what customers are willing to pay to get it. If they charge too much, people will look elsewhere. If they charge too little, they will sell out and have to shut down until who knows when.

In Bend here in Oregon, there was a biodiesel station selling it for around $3.10 a gallon. If regular diesel blows past that, say to $3.20 or so, is it price gouging if the biodiesel station raises their prices to $3.40? There was no change in their supply or costs, how can they justify 20 cents for nothing?

They are justified, of course, because demand changed. Their supplies are always limited, but people will preferentially buy biodiesel as it nears diesel prices. If diesel passes it, well, they will not be able to supply all of their customers. The choices are: the price goes up to adjust to demand, or the owner is compelled to sell at some other price someone else "feels" is appropriate.

Our system naturally adjusts to these situations, and it is best left alone. It is the only rational way to allow resources to be allocated correctly. Prices through the roof? Probably people will adjust their driving, share rides, walk or ride to work, etc. People in life or death situations or businesses will likely pay it, because it's worth it to them.

That is exactly as it should be, unless you want politicians setting prices, causing outages and rationing as in the 70s. As kind as it sounds on the surface, it is cruel, irrational, and damaging to artificially "correct" our system, it just happens that if it hurts a few business owners over a crowd of workers, people think it's OK. It is not.

If businesses should be compelled to sell at a "reasonable" price, set by some official as opposed to supply and demand, I wonder if people would agree to be compelled to buy gasoline at that same price when a cheaper, better, alternative comes along, as it will eventually. What will happen when prices go through the floor and nobody really wants it? Who is looking out for the jobs and millions of dollars invested in gasoline production and sales?

No one is. Or rather, no person is. But Capitalism is. It is looking out for the people of New Orleans as it looks out for all people and businesses, by allocating scarce resources in the most rational manner possible.

BTW, Thanks for the "Mass" Transit

Just a note, thanks so much for the mass transit in New Orleans. Those quaint street cars did a lot for evacuation efforts. The news reports of the hundreds of thousands without individual transportation to escape the city are just propaganda anyway, the forward-thinking rail transports got everyone out in plenty of time.

Oh, if we can only get more people out of their cars, stranded and dependent on governments for getting around, it'll be so much easy to control the simple rabble.

After that, if we can just get the guns and keep people from protecting themselves. From there, we need to control the dinner table, people just don't know what to eat to stay healthy.

Somebody's just got to compel these unsophisticated hicks and rednecks to live the civilized way.

Can We Drill Now? Please?

Just asking, Democrats, but is ot OK if we drill for oil on 3.13 square miles of an area the size of South Carolina? Can we grow up and get serious?

The bottom line is your Priuses are still running on the same gas we already use, and it's going to be a while before we're off the teat here. So you can't keep crying about Big Bad Oil and our foreign dependence while simulataneously standing in the way of new refineries and new oil exploration.

Or rather, you can, and you do, because your "Reality-Based Community" has nothing to do with its name.

Send in the Cowards?

Apparently W sending National Guard folks to Iraq has ruined any chance of a rescue operation in New Orleans, and it probably caused the hurricane as well, what with all that pollution from deploying playing havoc with Mother Nature.

What I want to know is, who wants the Nasty Guard's help? As we all learned from the Democrats in the 2004 election, they're nothing but draft-dodgers and cowards anyway. Who needs them in an emergency? Has the world gone nuts?

In Good Company

Here's some real classic quotes:

"The President is nothing more than a well-meaning baboon... I went to the White House directly after tea where I found "the original Gorilla" about as intelligent as ever."

"Filthy Story-Teller, Despot, Liar, Thief, Braggart, Buffoon, Usurper, Monster... Old Scoundrel, Perjurer, Robber, Swindler, Tyrant, Field-Butcher, Land-Pirate."

And now... the rest of the story, as if you didn't see it coming or know already. These quotes are not about our current President George W. Bush, they are about another Republican Liar-in-Chief, Abraham Lincoln. First from General McClellan, the second Harper's Weekly.

I sometimes get discouraged when G.W. doesn't get out and defend more directly the positions we support him for. But when I think about it historically, I really start to love that he doesn't get all amped up about every sorry moron that calls him Hitler. Those people matter nothing in the grand scheme of things, and you can't change their minds anyway, they are determined to see every glass as half-empty.

The really nice realization is that negative do-nothing reactionaries like our current Democrats will always be around, they will always be negative, and they will always mean nothing.

Jon Stewart Arguing the NULL Position

Christopher Hitchens was on Jon Stewart to talk about his book, but apparently Jon geared up for a big confrontation to see if he could get an answer for why we're in Iraq from Hitchens.

The interesting thing, and the thing that stands out to me about people opposed to Bush in general, is that Jon Stewart is not arguing for anything. He has no position, only an attempt to negate another position. And nothing is easier to defend than nothing.

Throw out a few cute lines, make faces, point out stutters, but do not by any means actually put an idea foward, or you might have to defend it. If you're just attacking what others do, and doing nothing yourself, it's easy. You've got hindsight and humor on your side, how can you be wrong?

He asks why not Iran? Why not Saudi Arabia? But does he say he supports action against them? No, because he doesn't really support anything, because he doesn't have any ideas except "Bush = Wrong". Wow, how clever he is, I love his smirking asides to the audience and how they bolster his non-position.

He's by no means the only one, but it was just another in a long line of lefties with nothing but negativity going for them. Keep it up smarties.

Bolton Too Mean, Roberts Too Nice...

This week President Bush used the recess appointment to install John Bolton at the U.N., over complaints that he is intimidating, rude, confrontational, etc. Never mind that in a dysfunctional organization buried in rape and financial scandal might need a firm hand on our end, his alleged poor treatment of subordinates makes him a bad choice.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said it is important that Bolton, who earned a reputation for a confrontational and intimidating style, work with his diplomatic counterparts in "a spirit of give and take."

One assumes Kofi does not mean "give" as the U.N. staff gave in Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea and Congo, or "take" as U.N. staff took money in the Oil for Food scandal.

Now John Roberts is under the scope, and apparently he's so nice it's creepy somehow or it's a reason to distrust him.

I would humbly submit that we should take a closer look at his preternatural niceness. It seems a little too nice to be nice. His behavior raises serious questions about whether he is a sly conservative.

I'm left wondering what the "correct" level of niceness would be, but I also know that it makes no difference. The discussion has nothing to do with intellectual honesty, it is simply a weak attempt to come up with something, anything, to paint these people as weird, or as disguising their true selves. It's about as relevant and honest as Jonathan Chait's criticism of Bush's physical fitness.

More Bad News from Reuters - No Canada Rush

Unfortunately the predicted post-election reverse brain-drain to Canada apparently didn't come to fruition after all. According to Reuters,

Canadians can put away those extra welcome mats -- it seems Americans unhappy about the result of last November's presidential election have decided to stay at home after all.

Well, once again, so much for the big pre-election talk from Democrats. Just like the celebrities they love, they backed off their promises once the election went Bush's way.

Data from the main Canadian processing center in Buffalo, NY shows that in the six months up to the U.S. election there were 16,266 applications from people seeking to live in Canada, a figure that fell to 14,666 for the half year after the vote.

Maybe they never really meant what they were saying, or maybe they've changed their minds about Bush now. Whatever the reason, it might help more in the elections if they promised to stay if a Republican is elected. Get Johnny Depp out there saying he'll move back if a Republican is elected, and the threats might actually net Democrat candidates some votes.

It just takes a little understanding of incentives on behavior.

"Staff Puke" Madness Over Rush Call

This was an entertaining little excursion into Google today. Apparently (I didn't hear it), Rush referred to Ohio's Paul Hackett as a "staff puke" in response to a caller describing Hackett's position.

So obviously, every lefty site out there is outraged today, as this Google search shows. Roughly 400 results overall, most of the first results from places like Daily Kos, and a bunch of places linking to that post.

By searching for "staff puke" without a reference to Rush, you see a couple of interesting things about the term. First, a lot of people refer to themselves as staff pukes, and if anything it's used in about as derogatory a fashion as "college boy" is on a construction site, for example.

More interesting is how often the sites referring to the comment say Rush called hime "just a staff puke." Well, no he didn't and calling anyone "just" an anything is more derogatory than anything Rush said. There's nothing wrong with Hackett's position in the military, but clueless lefties obviously think there is. Ironically, one site points out all the "staff pukes" that have been killed. That changes nothing about the Rush non-story, because he isn't disrespectful to those people. The only disrespect is thinking that being called that is some kind of put-down.

An argument might be made that Rush, not being in the military, can't use the term. That may be true, but it's not a big deal. He was talk to a military officer, and was using it for clarification, not denegration.

Conservatives Should Protect Roe at This Point

The entire discussion of overturning Roe v. Wade is becoming less and less important, and will continue in that direction. I am not a fan of the decision, and I think we'd already have a decent rule in place if the rule had been legislated rather than decided by an untouchable judge.

That being said, I think it's always been a waste of time fighting to overturn the decision to stop abortions. Roe essentially allows the right to an abortion prior to the viability of the fetus. This has been defined as being "potentially able to live outside the mother's womb, albeit with artificial aid."

Obviously, the date of viability will continue to move earlier and earlier, rendering the decision useless, and further exposing the pro-abortion crowd as the barbarians and/or cowards that they are. They will be forced to defend the position of wanting the right to kill a person that could survive and have a long life outside of the womb.

This position is already completely irrational, as is easy to determine. Just ask a pro-abortion advocate when the limit should be. Should it be 9 months from fertilization? Or should it be when the entire body is outside the womb? If you think it's extreme to look at it this way, listen to the rhetoric on the partial-birth abortion ban. This is not just a few people.

So what about late births? Should a baby be protected just because a calendar says it should have already been born, and by all scientific measures it is the same as a birthed baby? The mother is still providing all the oxygen and food necessary for the baby to live, so shouldn't she be able to cut its head off as long as it's inside her?

What about premature babies? Shouldn't a woman still have the right to kill a preemie after it's born? After all, she didn't have the same time to make her decision, or to raise money, or to figure out that she was pregnant, that other women might have had. So how do you tell her she can't kill her preemie? Who are you to control her body? Why can't she have its brains drained out with a turkey baster just because it popped out early?

This approach could already have been so much more effectively used by now if Christian groups had concentrated on furthering the science of fetal care instead of working on the judicial battle. At this point, I want to see these people defend the logical conclusion of their position. They want to kill inconvenient, or unsuitable, or defective babies. Or they are men that are so intellectually milquetoast that they just can't bring themselves to possibly take a position, or to be thought to have taken an unpopular position, which of course is a position itself.

There is no reason to wait decades for the potential of Supreme Court changes, when there is a clear and much more illustrative path available. I fear it won't really pique the interest of most anti-abortion folks, who are usually all or nothing. I don't see why we couldn't get just as excited about truly reducing real numbers of abortions as we do about the slim possibility of outlawing the practice someday.

The bottom line is, earlier viability provides the ability to restrict the right to abort a fetus earlier, and it is both a practical and particularly entertaining direction of approach.

Shouldn't We Have Learned This Stuff Somewhere?

You know, if there was a way to get every voter to read the very basics on statistics and economics, I think there'd be a lot fewer ridiculous news stories, claims, and crises to deal with. Or at the very least, the completely worthless studies and stories would get less traction.

To that end-- read these, I am. I feel bad not choosing Thomas Sowell's Basic Economics, but these are both paperback:

Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt - Roughly $9 new.

Practical Statistics Simply Explained by Langley Russell - Roughly $12 new.

Just imagine all the garbage and noise that could be discounted if this could be considered common sense again.

When I hear about George Washington feeling self-conscious about not having really learned his Latin and Greek in his few years of formal schooling, well, I puke just a little bit when I think about my 12 years of public schooling.

Little Wonder Geldof's Frustrated

I don't even know if I know any Geldof tunes, but in general it's getting tougher to listen to music as more musicians get their genius quotes in print. Radiohead and their "Fair" trade, Chris Martin's evils of shareholders, the list goes on.

If Bob Geldof thinks he's the man to cure any of the poor's ills, he might get a handle on market economics first. Here's his latest distilled brilliance, when he found out (surprise) that Live8 tickets were for sale on eBay:

"It is completely against the interests of the poor. The people who are selling these tickets on Web sites are miserable wretches who are capitalizing on people's misery."

Is it? Are the poor getting less money because of the auction of tickets? Well, indirectly, yes, because Mr. Geldof sold the tickets for less than they're worth in the first place. So the responsibility for the short-changing of the poor rests squarely on his shoulders. He got a whopping $5.4 million for 150,000 tickets, roughly $35 per ticket. For a concert of this profile, and additionally for charity, that is simply pathetic.

I can understand his frustration, because based on the sale prices of the some of the tickets (almost $1000), it is obvious that his lottery sales method is leaving a ton of money on the table that his beneficiaries will never see. And whether it happens on eBay or not, those tickets are going to be sold to people that want them. Maybe next time he'll take a page from reality and set aside some tickets for auction instead of crying about capitalism.

Which brings up another problem-- how does someone so clueless about market economics hope to help the poor in any significant way? He obviously can't be hoping to convert them into "miserable wretches" like we all apparently are-- you know, we people who buy and sell things for (gasp) money.

Beyond that, another annoying moment in the item is where he blames eBay for ever allowing the tickets to go on sale, as though eBay has a responsibility to proactively monitor every individual auction and judge whether Mr. Geldof is offended by it. It is in no way illegal to sell the tickets, keep in mind, but Mr. Geldof expects some other kind of standard. He calls it "a sort of example of corporate arrogance that it thought it could operate outside the morality of its audience."

I absolutely agree with him on one thing. The problem is arrogance.

Eugene Robinson's Thoughts on White "Damsels"

After seeing too much white "damsel" coverage for his taste, Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post thinks that:

"...the pattern of choosing only young, white, middle-class women for the full damsel treatment says a lot about a nation that likes to believe it has consigned race and class to irrelevance."

Which I think is completely untrue. It may say something about a nation's demographics and human nature, but it's not some kind of indictment of American race relations. People tend to viscerally relate to people that look like they could be in their family. America is mostly white. News stories live on ratings. News subjects tend to play toward the largest audience. Wow.

I don't think it's a problem that he notice this trend, I just think it's stupid to try to chalk it up to some kind of latent racism, and claim that "those stubborn issues are still very much alive" in America today.

Obviously, Mr. Robinson is somewhat less affected by these stories of white women, as I would expect to some degree, but that doesn't make him a racist. I would expect him to more naturally relate to stories that he could see himself, a father of sons, in. For example, a story about a boy roughly his son's age that looks something like his son.

We all do it, all the time, and it's not a problem. Unless people try to make it one by creating mistrust and resentment that don't even exist.

I don't have a daughter or a sister, and I don't relate to these stories either. I do have a girlfriend in Thailand though, and I did relate to a lot of the suffering that went on after the tsunami there. But I did not, and do not, feel that America was somehow anti-Asian when most of the stories were about the few missing Europeans, Australians, or Americans.

It's harmless, it's not malicious, and it's just the way we are. Don't try to make it something it's not.

Please Explain the Benefits of the Minimum Wage

I'm wondering if I can get somebody to explain, in the comments or via email, what benefit the minimum wage gives, and to whom. Flipping through radio stations I heard Bill O'Reilly say he supported a $7 an hour minimum wage, but he gave no reason at all.

To me, it seems like most people support it because they don't really want to think about it. But why $7, or why any amount? Why not $100 and hour? If the market can't determine wages, should we trust it to determine prices?

The common thought, I imagine, is that getting rid of the minimum wage would hurt our lowest wage earners. I believe exactly the opposite, and this article describes better than I can why.

That doesn't mean I won't try, but I thought I'd see if I can get someone to defend it or at least give a rational reason for the minimum wage to exist.

Freakonomics Background on TCS

I haven't even read Freakonomics, but this article on TechCentralStation brought to mind exactly what I think is completely missing in today's education system: economics, statistics, and logic. I think it's a lot of the reason things like Super Size Me get going. It's too easy to play with statistics and make it look like there's some kind of causal link somewhere there isn't.

In any case, read the article, it's a top-ten list of counterintuitive realities out there, and it's very interesting. I think the main reason it's counterintuitive is that education is lacking in this area.

Changing Gears a Little

I'm going to see if I can make a few more, shorter posts to keep things a little more regular around here. I know it's a common problem, maybe I'll be able to find a nice combination of sentence-long posts and multiple paragraph pieces.

It's not that I don't care about anything right now, but I'd like to work toward getting more comments so maybe I'll try to start discussions on things I haven't decided 100% about. We'll see.

Erring on the Side of Life

My opinion on capital punishment has changed in the last few years based on the idea that one mistake is too many for it to be worthwhile. To be executed innocent, knowing that you will always be remembered as guilty for something you didn't do, is as bad a fate as I can imagine. The financial cost of lifetime imprisonment seems a bargain compared to doing this to someone else.

I would not have to look far to find Democrats that agree with me on this view, and I know some that feel this way for the same reason. Why is it then, that they are so opposed to playing it safe with situations like Terri Schiavo or abortion?

I could sooner find a Democrat ready to march for lobster's rights than I could to entertain the notion that late-term abortion could be wrong. They either tuck their tail and chalk it up to a woman's decision, about as cowardly and intellectually dishonest as you can get, or they refuse to believe an 8 month old fetus can be called alive. A lobster? Yes, of course, it feels pain, something must be done to stop their cruel boiling deaths. A fetus? Well, brainwaves schmainwaves, it's not a person until the feet are out. Up until then, suck it, slice it, chemically dissolve it, anything goes.

And Terri Schiavo? I can't count the number of jokers calling in to radio saying, "I'd never want to live like that, I'd want to die." So is that the standard now? Ooh, how unseemly, I'd sooner die than live like that, so anyone else should die too. No, don't try and rehabilitation, if she can't feed herself she's toast. Parents willing to help? How hideous, can somebody just get her dead already? And please, no details on her horrific dehydrating death.

The only difference I can see between a mistaken death penalty victim, and late-term abortion victims or disabled victims is the death penalty victim actually has a chance to defend themselves. The second two are defenseless, and I would think those would be even more important to defend.

I really don't understand it, and I wish I did, because maybe there's a great reason to cut off half of an otherwise viable fetus's head to keep it off of welfare.

Also, interestingly enough, much like in the Iraq War, we find the Democrats hoping for the worst to avoid having their ideas crushed. If Terri Schiavo is rehabilitated, or fetuses become viable earlier because of better medicine, what happens to abortion rights and assisted suicide? Better to starve the lady and not find out of course.

In my opinion it's a losing battle for them, but I hope these same Democrats will hold strong to their barbaric beliefs even when medicine can safely take care of younger fetuses. At least then the argument will be more honest, they want to actively kill inconvenient or undesirable babies and disabled people.

Is This Paragraph Actually Journalism?

In "Wolfowitz tapped for World Bank" by Elizabeth Becker and David E. Sanger of The New York Times, they discuss the planned nomination of Paul Wolfowitz to the World Bank. I don't think it's supposed to be an opinion piece, but I also don't know what you'd call this paragraph:

The announcement... was greeted with quiet anguish in many foreign capitals where the Iraq conflict and its aftermath remain deeply unpopular and Wolfowitz's drive to spread democracy around the world has been viewed with some suspicion.

The depth of my journalism knowledge extends to the old "Who, What, When, Where, Why, And How?" Maybe that's obsolete, but I would think that the paragraph is supposed to pass on some data to the reader.

So let's take it from the top-- "The announcement... was greeted with quiet anguish". Maybe Elizabeth and David are just highly empathetic, but exactly what does that mean? Did anyone say anything, like "I'm in anguish over this Liz" or is that the extent that journalism goes to? "Trust me, even though it was quiet, it was anguish. Take it from me, the New York Times."

Let's assume they measured the anguish and it's sound amplitude and they're right. It was greeted with quiet anguish where? Well, "in many foreign capitals where the Iraq conflict and its aftermath remain deeply unpopular and Wolfowitz's drive to spread democracy around the world has been viewed with some suspicion." OK, let me get my almanac and see which capitals those are. I would assume that maybe they spoke to some people in these capitals, wouldn't it be easier to just list them so I don't have to figure it out myself? Or is it easiest to just type sentences that mean nothing, that say nothing, and send it up through whatever editorial process they have?

They've succeeded in claiming there's quiet anguish over the possible nomination, that the war remains deeply unpopular in many capitals, and that Paul Wolfowitz's democratic drive is viewed with suspicion in those capitals, without having to say who, or where, or what they said that conveyed those feelings.

Two journalists worked on the story, and I assume at least one person read it before approving it. So out it goes, a paragraph of nothing really, from authors who assume they have their finger on the pulse of those nameless capitals and anguished, suspicious people. Impressive work indeed. Story templates, preconceived ideas, and assumptions must save a lot of money on phone bills and travel expenses.

Note: There is more in the story, and some quotes from actual people as well, but to me that only makes the inclusion of this paragraph more curious, why not just say what they heard and leave it at that?

Conservatives and Homosexuality

Between Jeff Gannon/Guckert and Dick Cheney's daughter, it seems pretty obvious that the left in America has a problem with homosexuals that oppose them. Or at least they think we're supposed to have a problem with them when they're "discovered" on our side.

For the record, I'll state my position on homosexuals, homosexuality, and gay marriage:

I doubt you could find an issue that is less threatening to me than homosexuality. By its very nature it has nothing to do with me, I'm heterosexual. If anything, I should be happy with the reduced competition for females out there. I do find acts of homosexuality unsavory, but again, I'm a heterosexual, that seems to make sense. It just doesn't turn my world on end.

In terms of homosexuals, the actual people, I have to admit that at times I have a hard time relating. However, those are times when someone is extremely open and talkative about it, and I just find myself unsure if I'm acting normal. I bet 99% of the time I don't even know if someone is gay at all, which again makes sense, because it has nothing to do with me.

Gay marriage is a little more complex and conflicting for me, but I personally feel like the state shouldn't be involved in religious institutions, and there should only be universal civil unions. Marriages should be kept within church, and I think it's sad how much energy is being wasted "protecting" a governement institution, when it's the religious portion that should be important.

So that's that, I don't even know if those views are offensive to anyone, but I hope it's clear that I'm relatively nice to people.

What really puzzles me is the left's reaction to gay people on the right. They really seem to relish the discovery of a homosexual in our midst, and I know a lot of it is, "Ooh, the party of the religious right, what hypocrisy!" And I'm sure for some few on our side it is somehow distasteful. But not for the vast bulk of the party, and I personally think it'll be good for us moving forward to have more varied input, so we might actually get less government involvement in everybody's lives.

It's fairly entertaining to watch, because the "tolerant" left sounds pretty intolerant when they bring the issues up. "Can you believe Cheney has a GAY daughter? A GAY guy got a day pass at the White House? Unbelievable." The emphasis on their homosexuality is nothing but gay-baiting, an attempt to increase tensions with homosexuals on our side, and while I think it's disgusting, it's not surprising when you remember Clarence Thomas and other conservatives being called Uncle Toms.

We're not exactly perfect in our interactions with homosexuals, but I hope in time that as a group they will move more towards our maybe slowish, but honest, acceptance, and away from the claimed tolerance, but ultimate hostitlity toward any differences on the left.

Walmart, Linux, and Slashdot

Apparently, sometimes the evil corporations running roughshod over our lives are so evil the do exactly what you've been wanting. And no combination of circumstances could be worse for the sad sacks at Slashdot.

Have a look at the comments on this story and you'd think it was Hitler selling yarmulkes or something. A cheap laptop running Linux, something many have clamored for from there, is apparently a real conundrum when it comes from Walmart. Caught between the "virtue" of Linux and the "evil" of Walmart, what does a properly groupthinking Slashhead do?

There's not a lot to say on this except to say that the blind Walmart bashing that goes on is the absolute epitome of lazy thinking. Everybody laps it up, so it must be right, everybody knows Walmart is bad somehow.

It is always a concern when a group as large as the community at Slashdot is so narrow in its opinions, especially in a field where I'd think generally smarter people are. But I console myself thinking that maybe most people posting are those that have nothing else to do.

Which reminds me, I've got something else to do.

I've Had Enough of Hybrids

The feeling I get from listening to people talk about driving a hybrid reminds me a lot of the Simpsons where Ed Begley, Jr. buzzes of on a go-cart fueled by his own sense of self-satisfaction. I don't begrudge anyone wanting to cut back on the amount of fuel they use, and in fact I'm delighted it's still a choice left to individuals. But hybrids are nowhere near the improvement they are generally made out to be, especially when taken against existing, reliable diesel technology.

The details of the comparison of modern hybrids against modern details can be seen in an excellent article at Consumer Guide, but it boils down to this: a new VW Jetta TDI is very close to the Toyota Prius and Honda Civic hybrids in terms of gas mileage and emissions, and at the same time it has many inherent advantages.

1. Proven Diesel Technology
Diesels last significantly longer that standard engines, tend to be more reliable because they are simpler in design, and are the choice in many commercial vehicles because of that. There is no reason to be concerned about the choice you've made when there's as much experience in engine design as there is with diesels. Hybrids, on the other hand have a limited history of use.

2. No Battery Pack, No Extra Motor
The batteries are expensive to replace, they need to be recycled carefully, and they are attached to an electric motor and control computer that are unproven in the long-term. For as much extra technology is packed into these cars, the relative gains are very small. Safety becomes an unkown in collisions with these electrical systems as well, and emergency crews have special procedures for dealing with them.

3. Ready to Burn Domestic Biodiesel
Biodiesel is getting easier to get commercially, in my area there are 3 Pacific Pride cardlock stations that carry it. California has decent coverage as well. Regardless of your location though, today's hybrids will never have this option, and do little to reduce our use of foreign oil in a significant way.

4. Passing Power
The Prius has a ridiculously low 82 lb-ft of torque, and the Civic Hybrid is not much better at 116. The Jetta TDI has 177 lb-ft, more than 50% higher than the Civic and more than double the Prius. Diesel engines are inherently good in this area, and if you think you might need to pass someone someday, you might think again before you choose a hybrid.

5. Repair Costs
As of now, this is still a known vs. unknown argument, but with all of the extra equipment on a hybrid, and having some existing track record for diesels, it is not much of a stretch to say hybrids will tend to be more expensive and difficult to repair.

For now at least, I see no reason to own a hybrid automobile, and it's disappointing to see how few diesel models we actually get in our market. But if perceptions change and dealers sense some demand, we could actually get more efficient diesel cars without giving up everything you lose with a hybrid.

Should We Root Against The Dems?

Today is one of those days I wish I had someone else's traffic, because I'd really like to have an answer to this question. Between John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, Ted Kennedy, just about any journalist, I think the Democrats have lost some credibility. And now with Dean's likely path to the DNC chairmanship, I've felt very good about the position the Republicans are in. I'd guess most Republicans feel similarly.

But lately I've been wondering if what appears like a bit of a losing streak on the Democrat side isn't bad to some degree for everyone. Is it good for us as Republicans when one of our two major parties becomes a joke? If you think of politics as a marketplace of ideas, I wouldn't think it is. The bulk of the ideas coming from the Democrats boil down to, "We're not Bush." I don't think it can stay that way, but I do wonder whether bad news for the Democrats is always good news for Republicans.

What I think it comes down to is whether it's better for Republicans in general to be in power and stay there, or for the Republicans to be met with the competition of a lively Democrat party. I definitely want to continue to win, I just wonder if it matters what we're winning against.

Which is exactly why I wish I had a pile of readers, because I'm certain many would have better insight on this.

My instinct is to think that more vigorous competition and close elections would be good for everyone, as it would normally be in a market situation for consumers. Dominance of one side would not normaly be good for consumers. But in the majority of races on the national level, in the House and in the Senate, when a seat is uncertain, it seems like the safest path to reelection is bringing home federal funds and working toward power in Washington instead of working on new or innovative ideas.

With safer seats and power in general, would the Republicans act more like Republicans are supposed to? Because so far I haven't been totally impressed with the size of government. I'm really hoping that further gains for the Republicans will lead to faster change and not complacency.

I suppose until I know, I'll follow my heart and keep rooting for more failures and jokes from the Democrats.

No Wonder They Say 'Fisked'

"What a bloody charade." I'd never read anything of his, but it showed up on Google News tonight and it's beyond belief, at least for my uninitiated eyes. Robert Fisk brings us another treasure I guess.

I'll leave it to others to be thorough, but just a few gems that popped out at me if you haven't seen it:

1. 'Many Iraqis do not know the names of the candidates, let alone their policies.'
Wow, what a powerful indictment of representative government. Watch out! He's a genius! This story hit the Internet about the same time voter turnout hit 70% and climbing. I don't know when the last time we hit that in America, and I can only imagine the percentage of people who don't know the name, much less the policies of our sitting President. Contrary to international opinion, we're doing just fine that way, but thanks Robbie. I'll trust under-informed voters over a dictator most days. I guess we'll agree to disagree.

2. 'The majority Shi'as, oppressed under Hussein, are expected to take a majority in the polling at the expense of the formerly dominant Sunnis.'
Actually that'd be what happens in a pure democracy, but fortunately Iraqis have a constitution. That's why there are constitutions in the first place. Obviously the majority is expected to take the majority in polling, but that's not at the expense of anyone necessarily. Where does this guy live?

3. 'The reality is that much of Iraq has become a free-fire zone (for reference, see under "Vietnam")'
Reality is the last thing Robert Fisk is qualified to report on. This is simply not the case. He might as well be claiming dragons are flying over the southern marshes. I can't prove that they're not, but the claim is in no way related to "reality" or any word root or derivation thereof.

4. 'And then the manipulation will begin and the claims of fraud and the admissions that the elections might be "flawed" in some areas.'
Again, welcome to Elections 101. People don't like losing elections (for reference, see under "America"). It doesn't make the system anything close to a "charade", it makes it very normal. So the Sunnis don't want to take part as much as the rest of the country. Big deal. They will.

So when Mr. Fisk gets all this completely wrong, does he ever go back and say "Oops"? No, of course not. Like anyone else who sits and whines and does nothing, he looks forward and sees doom, he looks backward and calls out mistakes of others, and his column necessarily retains no memory whatsoever of his numberless errors.

What a bloody moron.

Why They Love the GPL

Slashdot is obviously hugely popular as a site, but as a community it's just completely weak. Heavily anti-bush, heavily jobs-protectionist, this "News for Nerds" is about as rearward looking as a community could get. I don't know why I keep looking, maybe it's in hope that people in technology will start being a little more self-reliant, but my mistake:

There are a lot of good reasons to like the GPL: the GNU Public License. For one thing, it's a David and Goliath kind of thing. It's the little guy standing up to the corporate behemoths that run rough-shod over our daily lives by virtue of their influence, legal and otherwise, on government. For another, it's virtuous.

I've got nothing against open source software in general. I'm also not completely overwhelmed by it. But the attitude presented above is pretty sad. "Corporate behemoths running rough-shod over our daily lives"? Who? What corporation has any control over how I run my life? And "Virtuous"? It's not wrong, but virtuous?

In the vast majority of cases, people work in open source for personal gain or for personal satisfaction. The whole idea that all these people are just so selfless is completely deluded. Note how many open source luminaries leverage their experience into good jobs. They're smart, not heroes, any more than an intern in an office building is.

Also, without the corporate behemoths running (roughshod or otherwise) open source people would have nothing to do. What would they copy if there weren't UNIX, or Office, or Explorer, or Photoshop, etc? Obviously there are interesting new things, but the big things I am exposed to (Linux, Open Office, Firefox, GIMP, etc.) are attempts to replicate functionality brought to life or brought to popularity by evil behemoths like Bell Labs, Microsoft and Adobe.

An interesting thing happened with Firefox, I should add, in that the open source copy (in my opinion) overtook the corporate Explorer. Ever since Microsoft was nearly shut down for using the money they spent on Explorer development to their competitive advantage (the horror!), the advances stalled. Yes, finally, after all these years, open source brought us something better than Explorer 4 era browsing.

I do wonder what we lost, what we might have today, had Microsoft been allowed to have an incentive to continue improving Explorer. I also wonder where we'd be without these evil corporate behemoths, where open source (David) would be without them (Goliath). I can guess, but I'd rather not imagine it. I doubt the open source hero worshippers at Slashdot would agree, though.

Why Iraq is Like Vietnam

It's a common meme, you've seen the stickers, the t-shirts, the comics, and so on. "Is it Vietnam Yet?" There has been an effort to paint our efforts in Iraq as being an irreedemable mess, that we need to unilaterally pull out to minimize the problems we've caused.

Obviously, I don't think that's the case at all. I'll be happy when history proves our actions right. I think that for the first time, our foreign policy is going after the real roots of a problem, instead of pacifying outwardly-friendly dictators in the interests of regional stability.

So why is Iraq like Vietnam? Because the left are exactly as wrong today as they were on Vietnam. The hundreds of thousands of murdered South Vietnamese we left to their fates can attest to that. The constant drumbeat from the left caused us to lose our nerve, to not finish what we needed to. Regardless of how we got in, it was the wrong way to get out. The same would have happened in Iraq if we didn't have people in office with the spine to see this through. We saw a small taste of it after the first Gulf War, but somehow it couldn't happen this time?

The nice thing about being a naysayer is that you don't care if it works out OK. You could've protested WWII, demonstrated at the Capitol when we were obviously losing at the Battle of the Bulge, demanded someone take responsibility, and on and on. But at the end, when people that actually do what they say they'll do finish what they're doing, you can just go home and wait for the next reason to complain. I've never seen someone who says, "this won't work, it's destined for failure" have to answer for being wrong about it. One reason is that successful people don't care about inconsequential naysayers and just move on. But success doesn't always come instantly, so these people get a long time to spout their useless drivel.

Unfortunately, the media in general tends to lap it all up. The time to do something about the war is before it occurs, or at an election. We just had one, and they lost. But the insane rhetoric of our left is truly unpatriotic and damaging. They love to say dissent it patriotic, but it's the complete opposite during a war. It weakens our negotiating positions and reputations in the world, it demoralizes our troops, it demoralizes our country. And were they successful, and if it ended like Vietnam, they would never be called to account for the damage they did. Just as John Kerry was never hammered for contributing to the deaths of so many thousands of South Vietnamese.

Hopefully we've learned our lessons from Vietnam, and we can ignore the naysayers until we succeed and they disappear again.