Sentence of Sept 7

"People who thought that we could end unnecessary ER visits by expanding access to primary care underestimated the vast reserves of American health paranoia."  From Megan McArdle  Not sure I agree with the implications, but it's a good sentence.

Congressional Websites Are Like the Executive Branch's?

Some paragraphs from a critique of Congressional websites (and this)

Incumbents are locked into a website design, and sites that were rated as high quality one year typically dropped the following year, according to the report. Congressional offices also tended not to ask constituents what they want to see on their representatives' or senators' sites. "The problem with most political websites ... is they are producer-focused," said Marc Cooper, associate professor of communication at the University of Southern California.
The sites carry information about elected officials, but they don't provide a way for the constituents to communicate with them, he said. The Web pages also don't offer a lot of incentives to visitors to explore the online information. "They don't have a reason for you to continue to be there as a participant on the site," Cooper said. "Once you get the information, there's nothing left for you to do."
While congressional members often believe their sites are cutting edge, the sites often are not engaging or transparent, he added.

Seems to me the same things could be said of many government websites, particularly those I see at USDA. I'm not sure, though, how much involvement the public really wants with government.

Farm Bill and the Elections

Farm Policy today has some discussion of the 2012 farm bill by Chairman Peterson and the Iowa Farm Bureau. Of course, the results of the November elections will have a big impact on the bill.  The Republicans may find themselves forced to go against their base to carry out some of their promises.  It seems to me the Republicans are usually supportive of farm programs.  If cutting expenditures is the platform they win on in 2010, then they can't simply extend  farm programs in the next farm bill.  We'll see.

Down With Tenured Eggheads

Dan Drezner finds no surge of hostility towards tenured professors.  I thought I'd supply some.  If government bureaucrats are going to be scorned for their job security, so too should those eggheads in ivory towers.

Government's Achievements

No oil slicks around the Statue of Liberty recently.  See this photo  (from early 70's)

It's easy to forget, except sometimes for geezers.

King and Beck--Taylor Branch

Taylor Branch has an op-ed piece in the Times today which I think is consistent with my post here.  There's a process of building a shared mythology which Glenn Beck is participating in by buying into MLK's myth.  Branch, a biographer of King and a friend of Bill Clinton, gives some background to the whole thing.

Surprising Factoid of the Day

From a NY Times book review of a history of the battle of Cannae:

"The battle is unparalleled for its carnage, with more men from a single army killed on that one day, Aug. 2, 216 B.C., than on any other day on any other European battlefield: something like 50,000 Romans died, two and a half times the number of British soldiers who fell on the first day of the Somme."

 There's the observation that each of these man had to be stabbed, hacked or beaten to death.  Makes one think.

So Much for the Mediterranean Diet

Matt Yglesias provides an international comparison of BMI's (body-mass-index) figures.  Greece is right up there, if far from the U.S. measure of amplitude.  Last I looked Greece had a Mediterranean diet. And what's more, they're not on the list of countries with McDonalds

Klein: Better One or Better Two?

Ezra Klein has found a great metaphor for how we should think about politics: the eye exam. Anyone unfortunate enough to have to be fitted with glasses knows the routine: after trying to read the eye chart without glasses, and misreading the "E" as "P", the optometrist inserts a lens in front of your eye, has you read down some lines, then starts the comparison routine, quickly switching between two lenses and asking: "better one or better two?" [Note: Klein uses the ophthalmologist, but optometrist is easier to spell.]

That's mostly how we need to think about many political and social issues.  For example, evaluating teachers.  Is it better not to evaluate or to evaluate by having the principal monitor the class a couple times a year?  Is looking at class test scores better than principal monitoring, or worse?  Is a combo of test scores and monitoring better than either alone.  Is looking at "value-added" scores better than raw scores?  etc. etc.

True Ugliness

Via Marginal Revolutions, those carpets had better stay in Vegas.  I wouldn't be surprised if the poor workers who ran the looms to weave the carpets and the installers both didn't have to put in for workmen's compensation.