Be Nice to Conservatives/Libertarians

I think Virginia Postrel falls in the conservative/libertarian camp, but not aggressively so. Whatever her politics, she deserves praise for this:

Texas Monthly June 2006: Here’s Looking at You, Kidney:

"Most important, it turned out, I had the right personality. Donating a kidney isn’t, in fact, a matter of just showing up. You have to be pushy. Unless you’re absolutely determined, you’ll give up, and nobody will blame you—except, of course, the person who needs a kidney. When I went to see my Dallas doctor for preliminary tests, the first thing she said was “You know, you can change your mind."

Problems with Patrick Henry College

Patrick Henry College started a few years back as a college for home-schooled students and religious conservatism. It grew and thrived, but today's Post indicates there may be problems:
5 Professors Quit Religious School:

"Nearly a third of the faculty members at Patrick Henry College in Loudoun County are leaving the school because of what they described as limitations on their academic freedom, causing unusual introspection at the politically connected Christian liberal arts college."

It may be simply a conflict between an opinionated founder and some faculty. But it may also be just another instance of a college starting with a clear and narrow vision which the dominant culture forces to fuzz and spread. Or, like a flashlight beam, the beam is sharpest closest to the bulb.

Misunderstanding Reality on the Right

John at Power Line blogs on English as the official language closing with this line:

"My Congressman, Col. John Kline, is a long-time advocate of legislation establishing English as the country's official language. The principle is sound, but the question is, will the legislation make any difference? To the extent that we still hear, 'Press 1 for English,' the answer may be No."

It's amazing that a conservative, presumably strongly in favor of free market principles, would make such an elementary mistake. The use of multiple languages in company operations is a direct response to competition among companies for customers. No company is going to try to exclude potential customers, whether they're Hispanic, French-speaking, gays or evangelicals. At the margins making another sale is pure profit and that's what companies do.

The same principle applies to government bureaucracies--while we aren't profit driven the more people we serve the more power we get on the Hill.

And the same works for colleges. Most colleges [Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc.] in the country started with an affiliation to a church. As time passed and they competed for students they found themselves leaving the affiliation behind.

Conservatives laugh at the French, who try vainly to preserve their language against the onslaughts of English. They need to look in the mirror.

Farewell to Tax Evader Richard Hatch

In the end to a story that I blogged about early on, Richard Hatch was sentenced to 51 months in prison for tax evasion. See ABC News: 'Survivor' Tips for Richard Hatch in Prison for details:

"'Survivor' winner Richard Hatch might want to rethink his affinity for recreational nudity as he heads off for more than four years in federal prison.

Several legal experts gave practical advice to Hatch, the reality show's first million-dollar prize winner, after he was sentenced to 51 months in federal prison for failing to pay taxes on the $327,000 he earned as co-host of a Boston radio show and $28,000 in rent on property he owned."

As far as I'm concerned, it's an end that should be shared by many white collar criminals. (Feeling particularly Calvinistic today.)

Business Opposes Free Flow of Information

The Post today has an article on business opposition to a proposal that the public be informed of where (what stores) meat was recalled from. USDA List Would Pinpoint Locations of Recalled Meat:

"The prospect of these names being made public led the National Meat Association , which represents meat processors and packers, to tell the agency in an open meeting in April that it should abandon the proposal.

'The publication of this information would be extremely advantageous to a firm's competitors. A competitor would have the ability to identify specific retail locations . . . and then offer their products as an immediate substitute . . .,' said Brett Schwemer , an attorney representing the NMA.

'We're opposed to it, and so is most every other trade association that has anything to do with food,' said Mark Dopp , senior vice president and general counsel for the American Meat Institute ,"

I shouldn't be amazed at this, but I am. I suppose the rationale for the opposition is that the retailers are innocent parties in any recall, so their business shouldn't be damaged because of a mistake by the meat packer/processor. But the general rule should be that information obtained by bureaucrats paid by the public should be available to the public and let the chips fall where they may (or where the free market may shift them).

Economics and Real Life

Today's Post had an interesting article on gift-giving, focusing on the conflict between economics (gifts don't make economic sense) and psychology--Searching for a Sense of Meaning in Gifts:

"At its core, gift-giving involves risk, said Mark Osteen, an English professor at Loyola College in Baltimore. There is a risk in giving the wrong gift -- besides the financial loss that Waldfogel identified; there is the psychological loss of having the recipient conclude the donor does not know her very well.

But the understandable desire in modern American society to minimize the risk in gift-giving is paradoxically what is causing a devaluation of the gift's intangible qualities, Osteen said. In the tension between what makes economic sense and what makes psychological sense, the economic argument is winning. This is why people tell loved ones what they want for gifts, why donors include receipts, and why so many people exchange gift cards. All are ways to minimize economic and psychological risk."

I think there's a general element in economics of ignoring complexity in order to model exchanges. If I get my ambition up, I'll blog on it.
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Housing Costs, Suburbia, and Murdered Cop

Fairfax County lost its first police officer to gunfire the other day. The tragedy has several aspects, handling youths with mental problems, the responsibility of friends and parents, the wisdom of gun control, etc. See these links for more details:
Fairfax Gunman's Home Yields More Weapons and Dedicated Detective Remembered Also for Deep Faith.

One aspect is the detective was commuting from Culpeper, VA, some 40 or so miles away. No doubt she and her husband thought that was a good place to rear their kids. But high housing costs in Fairfax also played a part. Public servants like the police and teachers can't afford the lifestyle they want here. What will happen over the next 20 years?

FEMA Bureaucrats

Stephen Barr in the Post covers the DHS awards ceremony in Honoring Those Who Went Above and Beyond During Katrina:

"Chertoff and Jackson honored more than 75 employees and employee teams at the secretary's second annual awards ceremony, held at Constitution Hall. Many awards ceremonies in Washington are perfunctory events, but not Chertoff's 2005 awards fete.

The department's gold medals went to employees who met the challenge of Katrina and are, Chertoff said, symbols of 'the thousands of employees who brought distinction to the department throughout the hurricane response effort.'"

USDA and Agitprop

George Buddy nudged my elbow when he saw this editorial (registration required)An Agriprop Guide to Cluck and Awe - New York Times:

"A furious collective heehaw is surely the only proper response to the news that ranking bureaucrats and other occasional speechmakers at the Department of Agriculture have been instructed to include 'talking points' of praise for President Bush's handling of the Iraq war in their routine rhetorical fodder."

It's based on an Al Kamen piece in the Post, quoting from a message by a USDA speechwriter to political appointees in USDA that also got sent to some career types. The message showed how to include talking points on Iraq into ag speeches. This is called "message discipline" which has evolved in the executive branch over the last few administrations. I'd expect the same sort of thing in a Democratic administration (except that Bill wasn't disciplined on anything). When Hillary wins, she'll crack the whip.

It's similar to the flap over denying contracts to those who don't support the administration, something that happens on both sides, but which is normally kept out of sight.

The Care and Feeding of Genius, II

This week's New Yorker has two articles that are relevant: One is on Ivan Lendl's golf-playing daughters. Just teenagers they're doing well and Lendl seems to follow the pattern of Earl Woods. He says that kid athletes need a parental push early, but the parent needs to step back at some point. (What's different in sports these days is the early specialization. When I grew up, the 3 or 4 letter athlete was common (football, basketball, baseball, and maybe track). These days teens specialize early. )

The other article is on an ex-Harvard undergrad who developed Facebook, sort of a MySpace site tweaked for college. The point here is the familiar story of the computer whiz who spends lots of time and effort developing an application (similar to Napster and innumerable other applications). It's a combination of talent, effort, and the environment.