The WorldNetDaily is a voice of the wingnuts, but they had an interesting story last week on the drivers licenses in North Carolina. Of course, it's slanted in aid of people opposing immigration and the alleged North American Union. (Ironically, for the right wing patriots, they bitterly oppose a dream of all of the Founding Fathers--one nation for North America.)
The problem starts--when an Ontario snowbird drives to Florida, how does the state cop recognize a valid Ontario drivers' license? If you have 75 political jurisdictions issuing licenses, it's hard for the police to know which ones are facially legit, and which are fake. So the motor vehicle administrators, who have their own organization, got together on a hologram of North America to put on the back of the license. North Carolina is the first to start using it. That sets off the wingnuts who are fearful of loss of sovereignty.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Stereotypes Blasted Away
In the last few days the Post's Angus Phillips, the semi-retired outdoors writer, has written about the diminished state of hunting in America. Now comes Mr. Beauregard to write about the start of the French hunting season, with their 1.4 million hunters.
Now, if I had asked this question: France has how many hunters (America has 4.1 percent)?
a .1 percent
b .5 percent
c .1 percent
d 1.5 percent
e 2.0 percent
how many people would really have said answer "e".
Now, if I had asked this question: France has how many hunters (America has 4.1 percent)?
a .1 percent
b .5 percent
c .1 percent
d 1.5 percent
e 2.0 percent
how many people would really have said answer "e".
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Localvores
A flurry of books and articles on eating locally. Barbara Kinsolving's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle"(book and website); Adam Gopnik in the New Yorker, this CNN piece,
McKibben's book: "Deep Economy".
Each to his own taste. I agree that locally grown food tastes good--that's why my wife and I garden. But "industrial agriculture" as John Phipps calls it is the reason we haven't had the famines in the world that we used to. So if you have the money and want to buy a McMansion, or a second house in the town where your child goes to college, fine. If you want to buy "fair trade" coffee, fine. If you want to spend time and money getting locally grown produce from community supported farmers, even finer. But don't think you're saving the world.
McKibben's book: "Deep Economy".
Each to his own taste. I agree that locally grown food tastes good--that's why my wife and I garden. But "industrial agriculture" as John Phipps calls it is the reason we haven't had the famines in the world that we used to. So if you have the money and want to buy a McMansion, or a second house in the town where your child goes to college, fine. If you want to buy "fair trade" coffee, fine. If you want to spend time and money getting locally grown produce from community supported farmers, even finer. But don't think you're saving the world.
Immigrants Working Harder
I posted a couple days ago about an article on a California farmer moving his vegetable operation to Mexico. Freakonomics picked up on the bit about Mexicans working harder in California and had about 40 comments on the idea.
I was waiting for my wife to buy basmati rice at a local Indian grocery. Indians and Koreans and Chinese immigrants often get into small business--food, dry cleaning, etc. If the family works 16 hours a day, they can make it. Then I remembered the "consensus" school of American history from the early 1960's. The idea, pushed by Louis Hartz and others, was that emigrants to America left behind much of the class structure of Europe--the lower classes didn't migrate, no money; and the upper classes didn't migrate, they had it too good. So America was populated by the middle class, and hence never had the class war to the extent Europe did. (Oversimplification.)
How does that relate to farm workers from south of the border? Well, when one emigrates north, one leaves behind a lot, family, friends, social structures. One of the less obvious things you leave behind is the whole entertainment industry. Entertainers don't move, they have it good enough where they are (much like the European upper classes). And you need a critical mass of people to support native entertainment industry. So I'd venture that the entertainment industry for any group of immigrants is smaller and less active than in their home country. So immigrants work harder in part because they have fewer entertainment outlets for their time and energy.
I was waiting for my wife to buy basmati rice at a local Indian grocery. Indians and Koreans and Chinese immigrants often get into small business--food, dry cleaning, etc. If the family works 16 hours a day, they can make it. Then I remembered the "consensus" school of American history from the early 1960's. The idea, pushed by Louis Hartz and others, was that emigrants to America left behind much of the class structure of Europe--the lower classes didn't migrate, no money; and the upper classes didn't migrate, they had it too good. So America was populated by the middle class, and hence never had the class war to the extent Europe did. (Oversimplification.)
How does that relate to farm workers from south of the border? Well, when one emigrates north, one leaves behind a lot, family, friends, social structures. One of the less obvious things you leave behind is the whole entertainment industry. Entertainers don't move, they have it good enough where they are (much like the European upper classes). And you need a critical mass of people to support native entertainment industry. So I'd venture that the entertainment industry for any group of immigrants is smaller and less active than in their home country. So immigrants work harder in part because they have fewer entertainment outlets for their time and energy.
Friday, September 07, 2007
"A Naive Country Boy"?--Me? No, Marion Barry
Effie Barry, Marion Barry's third wife, died of leukemia yesterday. The Post had some interesting pieces on her (she memorably maintained her poise during Marion's drug bust trial).
This is towards the end of the interview piece, talking about Marion, the divorce (after he got out of prison) and his remarriage:I can see it. It was and is part of his con, the "bama" who's still on the side of the underdog, who's fighting the good fight and putting it over on the "man". Another James Curley (famous Boston pol/mayor/convict/Irishman). But you can't use it in a con unless it rings true as well.
"The reality is that the two of you will always be connected because you are parents of this one child. . . . You try to develop a positive dialogue; and I must say it was certainly a challenge because his wife, Cora, had, at one time, been one of my best friends. . . . I will always respect him as a man of great intelligence. . . . I will always have a great deal of concern . . . for him. Because underneath it he is this very naive country boy. . . .
Thursday, September 06, 2007
British Bureaucrats Screw Up Farm Payments
To the best of my knowledge, FSA has done better than the Brits:
The handling of a £1.5bn computerised farm payments scheme by two senior civil servants is condemned by MPs today as "a masterclass in bad decision-making" which could land taxpayers with a £500m extra bill. A highly critical report from the Commons public accounts committee accuses Sir Brian Bender, then permanent secretary at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, of being "largely responsible" for the fiasco, which left tens of thousands of farmers without any cash from the European Union.Some interesting points that pop up as sidenotes--apparently the EU has a small payment cutoff--like $100 or so, which the Brits didn't use, giving them lots of small claims to pay. And the EU is able to fine the British over their failures of administration. The British fired some of the people responsible, but had to pay compensation for not fully following the rules (sounds familiar). And most familiar of all--a top guy is criticized for not having the nerve to stand up to the leaders and give them the bad news.
Bremer the Bureaucrat
L. Paul Bremer has an op-ed in today's NY Times outlining the bureaucratic process by which the Iraqi Army was disbanded (countering the report in the Draper book on Bush that Bush's policy was to keep the Army going). It's full of clearances, reviews, revisions--makes me nostalgic for the USDA bureaucracy.
The problem is perhaps bifocal--it's easy for the essence of the matter to get lost in the minutia of the process, so Bush's bureaucrats may not have realized what they were doing, and Bush may have been ignorant. On the other hand, you have to pay attention to the details and process. If I understand, a big problem with recalling the army was the process. Everyone had deserted, so there was no skeleton to use to recall the troops, or at least it wasn't readily identifiable to the US (whose intelligence about the state of Iraq was a little short). So, because it would be hard to recall and because the Shia, whom Bush's father had screwed, wanted the disbanding, Bremer went along.
The problem is perhaps bifocal--it's easy for the essence of the matter to get lost in the minutia of the process, so Bush's bureaucrats may not have realized what they were doing, and Bush may have been ignorant. On the other hand, you have to pay attention to the details and process. If I understand, a big problem with recalling the army was the process. Everyone had deserted, so there was no skeleton to use to recall the troops, or at least it wasn't readily identifiable to the US (whose intelligence about the state of Iraq was a little short). So, because it would be hard to recall and because the Shia, whom Bush's father had screwed, wanted the disbanding, Bremer went along.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Farming and Immigrants
The Times has an article a a California farmer moving to Mexico because of problems getting sufficient labor. He's a big operator, lots of acres, lots of employees. This may be the odd case, or it may be part of a trend. I suppose there's not much difference in travel cost or time between shipping lettuce from California or Arizona and Mexico, particularly with the border becoming more open to trucking.
A couple things struck me--instead of paying $9 an hour he's now paying $12 a day. He claims to be following the same sanitary procedures as he would in the States, and I suspect it's to his self-interest to do so. The other thing--his workers don't work as productively (i.e., hard). I find that interesting. I think it's part of the advantage of emigrating, at least for work. You leave lots of distractions behind and you've put yourself at risk, so you work harder.
A couple things struck me--instead of paying $9 an hour he's now paying $12 a day. He claims to be following the same sanitary procedures as he would in the States, and I suspect it's to his self-interest to do so. The other thing--his workers don't work as productively (i.e., hard). I find that interesting. I think it's part of the advantage of emigrating, at least for work. You leave lots of distractions behind and you've put yourself at risk, so you work harder.
Tim Harford--We Need More Girls in the World
From Slate, on research:
Boys pollute the educational system, it seems, for a number of unmysterious reasons: They wear down teachers, disrupt classes, and ruin the atmosphere for everyone. And more boys are worse than fewer boys, not because they egg each other on but simply because more of them can cause more trouble in total.
It is all rather troubling, especially for the parents of little angels like my daughters. Evidently, it is impossible to satisfy the—apparently justified—parental demand to educate girls in single-sex schools and boys in mixed classes. (Not for the first time in my life, I conclude that the world doesn't have enough girls in it.)
Farm Bill in the Senate: Pay Limit and Disaster
From Jim Wiesemeyer via Agweb:
Where the House offered producers a one-shot option of a revenue-triggered disaster payment plan, the Senate may make the plan cover all farmers (replacing counter-cyclical payments) and will tighten up the payment limitation language in the House bill.
Where the House offered producers a one-shot option of a revenue-triggered disaster payment plan, the Senate may make the plan cover all farmers (replacing counter-cyclical payments) and will tighten up the payment limitation language in the House bill.
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