A reader enjoins me to "write something funny", and comments on my light blogging of late. Sorry all, I've been busy at work this week (Santa is a facist and we of the Elves Union have been contemplating a strike, along with the Brotherhood of Flying Raindeer and the Light and Tinslers Union Local 24. Lots of voting, alcohol and declaritive statements since Sunday).
Also, I must admit, loggin has been light because, in part, I'm having a lot of trouble typing. Don't know why, probably becuase I have put in a number of late nights and early mornings.
I'll try to write something amusing tomorrow.
Friday, December 16, 2005
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Coveted Victim Status
or (CVS). Usually something I associate with majorities who use CVS to advocate for more benefits to cement their majority (e.g. Catholics, Republicans, Creationists, the Mentally Retarted). However, it seems folks don't much like athesits.
50% of Americans have an unfavorable view of people whose great sin, as best I can tell, is that they refuse to take on faith what others are willing to take on faith. I'm pleased that hostility to Jews and Catholics seems to be much less than what it used to be in the past. I hope the same will soon happen as to Muslim Americans and Evangelical Christians; that one may disagree with some Evangelical Christians' political agenda, for instance, is surely no reason to view them unfavorably as people (just as one's disagreement with most American Jews' liberalism is no reason for viewing them unfavorably). Yet the high level of disapproval of atheists should make us worry about American religious harmony and tolerance more broadly.
This does not surprise me in the least. No one likes a smart ass, especially ones who quietly believe your belief in the invisible is some kind of mental disorder. Even if it's not said, that's what most people think atheists think about them. And they resent it.
Yet, fundamentally, there is no way around the problem. Except for this blog, I am generally not evangelical about my unchurchedness (and the exception is here because no one is forcing you read this stuff. You can tune in for just the funny bits). Atheists are almost always perceived by believers as being judgmental about their choices. The irony in this is extraordinary and inconsistent, but it's definitely true.
Hence, the one group who least values CVS, has a better claim than most MSRs.
50% of Americans have an unfavorable view of people whose great sin, as best I can tell, is that they refuse to take on faith what others are willing to take on faith. I'm pleased that hostility to Jews and Catholics seems to be much less than what it used to be in the past. I hope the same will soon happen as to Muslim Americans and Evangelical Christians; that one may disagree with some Evangelical Christians' political agenda, for instance, is surely no reason to view them unfavorably as people (just as one's disagreement with most American Jews' liberalism is no reason for viewing them unfavorably). Yet the high level of disapproval of atheists should make us worry about American religious harmony and tolerance more broadly.
This does not surprise me in the least. No one likes a smart ass, especially ones who quietly believe your belief in the invisible is some kind of mental disorder. Even if it's not said, that's what most people think atheists think about them. And they resent it.
Yet, fundamentally, there is no way around the problem. Except for this blog, I am generally not evangelical about my unchurchedness (and the exception is here because no one is forcing you read this stuff. You can tune in for just the funny bits). Atheists are almost always perceived by believers as being judgmental about their choices. The irony in this is extraordinary and inconsistent, but it's definitely true.
Hence, the one group who least values CVS, has a better claim than most MSRs.
KABURA
The new RX-7 replacement from Mazda??
I know now what I'll be squandering the boy's tuition on instead of Drexel next year...
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Bing
This is a description of Stephen Bing, first in the LA Times and now (allegedly) in an RNC memo on MoveOn.org:
Bing, Who Enjoys Strip Clubs And Las Vegas Casinos, Lives In Two-Bedroom Bel-Air Home But Bought Seven Adjoining Houses With Plan Of Demolishing Them To Create “Palatial Grounds.†“A determined bachelor, he lives in a small two-bedroom home in Bel-Air but has bought the seven adjoining houses with the intention of knocking them down and creating palatial grounds. He’s a fan of strip clubs, has been a high roller in Las Vegas for years, and yet he can discuss the dense Robert Caro biography of Lyndon Johnson.â
OMG! He can discuss a book!
An actual book!
The horror!
NOW I want to meet this guy.
Bing, Who Enjoys Strip Clubs And Las Vegas Casinos, Lives In Two-Bedroom Bel-Air Home But Bought Seven Adjoining Houses With Plan Of Demolishing Them To Create “Palatial Grounds.†“A determined bachelor, he lives in a small two-bedroom home in Bel-Air but has bought the seven adjoining houses with the intention of knocking them down and creating palatial grounds. He’s a fan of strip clubs, has been a high roller in Las Vegas for years, and yet he can discuss the dense Robert Caro biography of Lyndon Johnson.â
OMG! He can discuss a book!
An actual book!
The horror!
NOW I want to meet this guy.
Gold
An interesting short essay on why the price of gold is currently through the roof.
Alan Greenspan knows all this. Before he became an integral part of the nanny state's machine, he wrote the following in a 1966 essay titled "Gold and Economic Freedom":
In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold. If everyone decided, for example, to convert all his bank deposits to silver or copper or any other good, and thereafter declined to accept checks as payment for goods, bank deposits would lose their purchasing power and government-created bank credit would be worthless as a claim on goods. The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves.
This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists' tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard.
Essentially, Greenspan's point is that gold enforces consequences. That's why Nixon officially decoupled the dollar from gold in the early 1970's; as the U.S. printed excess money to pay the debts from the Vietnam War, it sought to disguise the consequences. Greenspan refers above to the government making the holding of gold illegal. In 1933, Roosevelt outlawed the ownership of gold by U.S. citizens as the government tried to remove any constraint on its ability to reflate during the Great Depression (history buffs can view a copy of FDR's executive order here).
The essay also contains a truism I've heard from a number of traders:
"All of economic history is one lie and deceit after another. Your job as a speculator is to get on when the lie is being propagated and then get off before it is discovered."
Alan Greenspan knows all this. Before he became an integral part of the nanny state's machine, he wrote the following in a 1966 essay titled "Gold and Economic Freedom":
In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold. If everyone decided, for example, to convert all his bank deposits to silver or copper or any other good, and thereafter declined to accept checks as payment for goods, bank deposits would lose their purchasing power and government-created bank credit would be worthless as a claim on goods. The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves.
This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists' tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard.
Essentially, Greenspan's point is that gold enforces consequences. That's why Nixon officially decoupled the dollar from gold in the early 1970's; as the U.S. printed excess money to pay the debts from the Vietnam War, it sought to disguise the consequences. Greenspan refers above to the government making the holding of gold illegal. In 1933, Roosevelt outlawed the ownership of gold by U.S. citizens as the government tried to remove any constraint on its ability to reflate during the Great Depression (history buffs can view a copy of FDR's executive order here).
The essay also contains a truism I've heard from a number of traders:
"All of economic history is one lie and deceit after another. Your job as a speculator is to get on when the lie is being propagated and then get off before it is discovered."
Monday, December 12, 2005
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)