Category: Thoughts

Forbes is carrying an editorial about European pension systems and how they’re underfunded and over-generous, that taxes and pension funding make it too expensive to employ people, etc. etc. The implication is that the US has it all right. Bullshit. Yes, tax burdens on employment are lower, for the employers, but they fall onto the employees instead, which is pretty close. And of course the big issue is not how generous the pension, or how early the retirement age is, or how much vacation you get, but whether it’s funded properly. In the US and in Europe, it’s a PAYG system: Pay As You Go. Meaning that the workers today pay for the retirees of today. And if there are more retirees than workers, then you have a structural problem, and that’s the problem that most of the developed world is having. Not just those [epithet] Europeans.

It’s jingoistic and misleading to imply otherwise.

Brad DeLong comes through again with one, and two whoppers from Bush.

Discourse.net has a touching story about how our grandparents knew about creeping fascism and we’ve grown complacent. As I’ve asked before: how do you know when to leave? You don’t. You just don’t.

And the humor section is an email that’s been floating around of Bush/Cheney ’04 bumper sticker slogans. Here’s a few of the best:

Four More Wars!
Apocalypse Now
Because the truth just isn’t good enough
Compassionate Colonialism
Deja-voodoo all over again!
In your heart, you know they’re technically correct.
Leave no billionaire behind
Less CIA — More CYA
Lies and videotape, but no sex!

Hey you stupid fuck, why don’t you wake up and notice that your leader supports none of his supposed principles? Are you too in love with your SUV to care? Would it be too much to ask that you check the facts? Well, you’re going to get your ass kicked anyway.

Conventional wisdom has it that Massachussets can’t possibly vote any way other than Democratic, except for a Governor’s election, and I don’t doubt it. So what can I do, aside from vote, to convince people that Bush is a loony nutbag kleptocrat?

Also, where the hell are those stamps I had just a couple days ago?

Politics have been making me physically ill recently. I can only stand about twenty or thirty minutes of looking at this before I cringe and want to stop. So I’ve been reading the victorian-style novel Tipping the Velvet and the non-political contemporary nonfiction Kitchen Confidential instead. Good stuff.

But here’s the politics: The cover story in The Nation is titled “Blood in the Water,” about how the Dems are now on the attack. So, yeah, they’re attacking. Dean’s stumping madly, and everyone who sees him speak seems to be impressed with his candor and control– this is not sputtering, red-faced, clinton-conspiracy anger.

And of course Paul Krugman, celebrity economist is certainly making some carefully-documented, well-reasoned, statements that we’re being lied to. I’ll be seeing him speak at a Harvard Bookstore event this week.

Lies lies lies: Slate has an article about Condi’s misstatements on post-WWII history. And of course Brad DeLong has been keeping track of all the people keeping track of Bush’s lies. My favorite, however, is that even the
WSJ Editorial Page is questioning Bush’s integrity. When the avowedly rightist, pro-wealthy, pro-big-business WSJ editorial page is questioning you, you know you’re tainted. Jeff Skilling, Kenny Lay, Trent Lott, meet Dubya, Perle, and Cheney: the new recipients of the ostrakon.

Talk like a pirate day is coming up. Of course, nobody specified what kind of pirate that was.

Almost everybody has already seen this Popular Science article on the worst jobs in science. Of the worst jobs in computer science, I would have to say user interface design is one of them: everybody has an opinion about it, and most of them are wrong, but they’ll argue with you and criticize you and hate whatever you do anyway. At least, that’s what it feels like. It’s a fine line between listening to customer feedback and just ignoring the whingers, because there always are some whingers, who will like the new UI once they get used to it.

Of course, I think the UI designers say that the QA people have the worse job, and the QA people make fun of the support techs… I mean, we all chose these jobs. I’d take any job in science or software over most of the others, any day of the week.

But not DBA. You have to be crazy to be a DBA.

This NYT article on happiness made me understand, at least a little, why it is that I find it so hard to get out of bed in the morning, as much as I intend to do so when I go to sleep the night before. And how, if not why, I screwed up my last relationship. And why it seems, each time, like you’re never going to recover, even though you know in the back of your mind that you will. At least, after the first time, you know you will. So, I figure, jump in with both feet: you know the risks, you know you might, and in fact probably will get hurt. But it’s OK, you’ll get over it sooner than you think. Whoo.

Someone’s taken up the challenge posted by Volokh and seconded by me, to try to present a real reason that homosexuals should be second-class citizens, given that the majority of the objections to homosexuals and homosexuality are religious in nature. Something of an argument, I guess, although not by any stretch of the imagination convincing. Volokh follows up here.

For awhile now I’ve been wondering about the distinction that I make between the church and the state. This is particularly relevant what with the whole mess down in ‘Bama right now. secular editorialists were pretty angry about the encroachment of religion on the state, and religious editorialists felt the opposite, a but I find the most interesting discussion to be the one over at Volokh’s blog, and it hardly mentions the giant rock at all.

It discusses the differences between Hinduism and homosexuality. Few Christians would be able to argue that a Hindu should be denied rights, despite the fact that Hinduism violates several of the ten commandments. Really, if the ten commandments are so important, why do we allow people to violate them regularly? Blasphemy, idolatry, worshipping non-Judeo-Christian gods, coveting… none of these things are criminal acts.

Nor are the majority of the laws of Leviticus applicable today to blended fabrics, dietary practice, menstruation, selling your wife and children into slavery, or sleeping with your dead brother’s wife so that she can bear an heir to his estate.

So, why do they argue against homosexuality? It’s terribly difficult to make an argument that homosexuality is inherently dangerous, unhealthy, or damaging to society. I mean, really– if you want stronger families, why not encourage gay marriage? A gay family might not be your ideal family, but at least they’re married.

The objection to homosexuality is a religious objection and has no basis, and no place, in secular law. The only response I’ve been able to coax from the right on this one is “my objection to homosexuality has nothing to do with religious doctrine, it’s God’s word!” I hate to break it to you, buddy, but the things God says to you constitute a religious doctrine, a warning sign of paranoid schizophrenia, or both.

So, the religious right today, as represented by Judge Moore, insists on some, but not all, of the commandments. It insists on some, but not all, of the laws of Leviticus. These are profoundly inconsistent religious arguments about secular matters that just come down to “this is what I believe.” Well, good for you. We’re just going to have to agree to disagree then, so quit pushing it on me.

People like that make the vast majority of the faithful look bad. Those who are truly religious can be a powerful inspiration for those around them and for the world at large. But it takes a true force of belief, and humility, and respect for others. Religion is a beautiful thing, and what Moore and his ilk push isn’t religion. It’s political maneuvering and self-aggrandizement and arrogance.

Grrr. I shake my tiny fist in rage.

Plan Colombia comes in for a lot of flak from the left as being a militaristic adventure on the part of the DEA, and it’s certainly had its problems. But I recently got a rather involved comment on it from someone involved in some of its more successful, nonviolent, actions. Read on for some very well-reasoned opinions (which may or may not reflect those of any government agency or associated company and are not an official statement of any sort) about policy, economic development, and more. I’ll follow up later with links on guerillas, terrorism, drugs, and alternative development in Colombia and the world at large.
Continue reading “Plan Colombia”

My Do We Need Nature post keeps getting responses. Most of them seem to completely miss the point, both of the post and of the essay contest.

My post asked “would there be a legitimate argument that nature is not necessary?” and noted that the best likely answer to that sort of question is to attack the question rather than accept its legitimacy. Responders stated, more or less, “nature is good!”

Yes, thank you. Thank you also for noting that puppies are cute and rainbows are pretty.

The essay contest, doesn’t even ask the question ‘Do we need nature?’ That’s just a theme. The essays are supposed to define an appropriate place for humanity in the world. No, I don’t think I’ll be entering– I’m not sure I have an opinion on humanity’s just place in the world.