Blogging on bureaucracy, organizations, USDA, agriculture programs, American history, the food movement, and other interests. Often contrarian, usually optimistic, sometimes didactic, occasionally funny, rarely wrong, always a nitpicker.
Monday, June 28, 2010
So Much for the Innocence of Nature
Chris Blattman passes on a research report which he labels: "Are Whales Racist"? Once you start distinguishing between "us" and "them", it's a short slippery slope to racism and war.
Weingarten and National IQ's
Pulitzer-prize winning columnist Gene Weingarten uses his weekly humor column to pass on his commencement address to the Bronx High School of Science graduating class. It's very good--first paragraph:
"I want to begin by apologizing for some of the many, many cruel things I've written over the years about this school. I was basing those comments on my time here, which was 40 years ago, and I can see right now that Bronx Science has improved enormously since then, particularly in the area of diversity. You're no longer all a bunch of Jewish nerds. Now you're all a bunch of Asian nerds"That quote ties in with an interesting factoid from a research paper I ran across, hat tip Tyler Cowen, I think. The paper was looking at the immigration in light of the average IQ of the countries from which the immigrants came. (I'd personally take it with a huge amount of salt--I can't comprehend how to obtain such a figure.) According to the table they used (in an appendix, but derived from other research), Hong Kong was 108, South Korea 106, and Israel 95.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Popcorn and Production Contracts
Way back when, popcorn growers were about the only farmers with whom ASCS dealt who had production contracts. There was an issue there: our definition of "producer", as in the person who was eligible for farm program payments, always required that the person share in the risk of producing the crop... But some production contracts could lessen the risk, thus raising the question of whether they should still be eligible.
If I remember correctly, we tried to write the regulations to exclude producers with production contracts, but the popcorn people had the clout to get Congress (or a key Congressman or two) to lean on USDA and get the regulation reversed. (This sort of thing is what will happen after the Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill gets enacted and the regulation writers get down to their work. That's when it pays to have a Congressperson in your pocket to apply a bit of pressure below the surface, where the media won't notice.)
This meditation is spurred by a farmgate article, showing the rapid increase in production contracts: " contract production has been growing, all the way from 11% of farm production in 1965 to 41% in 2005."
But the summary is also interesting: "Production contracts are being increasingly used to manage risk, however, when one tries to identify the commonality among farmers who use production contracts, it is difficult, if not impossible, to point to any given demographic, economic, or personality factor. Although the use of crop insurance would seem to have commonality with someone who wants to manage risk, that is not always the case, and many crop insurance users, do not go near production contracts."
If I remember correctly, we tried to write the regulations to exclude producers with production contracts, but the popcorn people had the clout to get Congress (or a key Congressman or two) to lean on USDA and get the regulation reversed. (This sort of thing is what will happen after the Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill gets enacted and the regulation writers get down to their work. That's when it pays to have a Congressperson in your pocket to apply a bit of pressure below the surface, where the media won't notice.)
This meditation is spurred by a farmgate article, showing the rapid increase in production contracts: " contract production has been growing, all the way from 11% of farm production in 1965 to 41% in 2005."
But the summary is also interesting: "Production contracts are being increasingly used to manage risk, however, when one tries to identify the commonality among farmers who use production contracts, it is difficult, if not impossible, to point to any given demographic, economic, or personality factor. Although the use of crop insurance would seem to have commonality with someone who wants to manage risk, that is not always the case, and many crop insurance users, do not go near production contracts."
Underground Electric Fences?
Via Washington Monthly, Rand Paul is proposing an underground electric fence for the Mexican border. Now I'm guilty of assuming that I know what "electric fence" means, so I'm laughing at the suggestion. Back when I was a boy, an electric fence was a single strand of barbed wire, strung on ceramic insulators attached to metal fence posts spaced maybe 10' apart, which served as a temporary fence to keep our cows in the meadows. Instead of going for multiple cuttings of hay, which on our soil and in our climate wouldn't happen most years, after we hayed the field, and the grass got a little regrowth, we'd turn the cows into the meadows. The "electric" part was that the barbed wire was hooked to a jobbie (I forget the precise terminology) which put an intermittent low voltage electric charge on the wire, giving a sufficient shock to any cow to deter them from pushing the fence over. A problem with the fence was that it could be grounded, if something (weed, brush) laid against the wire while still connected to the ground. Thus "underground electric fence" seems to be an oxymoron, but I'm sure Dr. Paul has a reasonable explanation.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Gardening Update
Since I've carped at the White House for not being more open about its garden, it's only fair I should open up a bit about our garden:
- it's in one of Reston's community gardens, all of which are located on top of a set of pipelines which run through the community. The pipeline right of way has to be kept clear of trees and permanent structures so it gets used for the gardens, some soccer fields, and the occasional parking lot.
- the garden is required to be organic, ever since I started back in 1977
- theoretically we've got a 20'x20' large plot and a quarter plot 10'x10'. That's on the plat of the overall garden, but actually the 20'x20' is more like 21' x 16'.
- we grow vegetables (the usual and a couple less common) and flowers (glads, dahlias, and sunflowers)
- the pipeline had to be repaired 3-4 years ago, which mean a total disruption of our plot, both the raised beds and the soil--we're still recovering. At least, that's my excuse for our garden not doing as well as others.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Long Tails, Black Swans, and 3-Day Tennis Matches
I've read a fair bit about the subject. As a fast summary, the bell curve distribution of events is what we think of as "normal". But in reality some distributions have a very long tail, the graph extends very far to the right. This is what Mr. Talibi calls a "black swan" event. And we've just had an instance of it in the 3-day tennis match at Wimbleton. It's much, much longer than any previous match. Don't know what the British bookies would have given as odds, before this week, because no one ever considered the possibility of such an event. Just as no one really considered the possibility of a big eruption from a broken oil well in the Gulf.
Who Says We Can't Reduce the Deficit?
Even the agricultural community is accepting the idea that farm program amounts will be reduced in the next farm bill, according to Farm Policy's summary. Of course, the food movement side of the industry will be pushing for more.
Further down Keith Collins is worried about trying to replace crop insurance with ACRE. And chairman Peterson is talking about replacing farm programs with crop insurance and ending payment limitations.
Further down Keith Collins is worried about trying to replace crop insurance with ACRE. And chairman Peterson is talking about replacing farm programs with crop insurance and ending payment limitations.
"Originalism" and the Israel Court
This Politico story on Kagan and the chief justice of Israel's Supreme Court mentions that Israel doesn't have a (written) constitution. Nor, for that matter, does Britain. I wonder how the "originalists" see the role of a judge in such a nation?
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Why Farmers Want Farm Programs
Given the structure of markets, prices can vary very widely. Few other industries see a 50 percent drop in income in 3 years, as did dairy in PA.
Connoisseur of Bureaucracy Must Read
Not side-splitting, but (some) bureaucrats have a sense of humor, as in this Federal Computer Weekly post about how many bureaucrats it takes to change a light bulb?
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