Solving World Hunger: Let’s Kill All the Hungry People!

Sure, that idea sounds like a bad solution. But The New York Times seems to think it works!

Politics Failed, but Fuel Prices Cut Congestion

Soaring gas prices and higher tolls seem to be doing for traffic in New York what Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s ambitious congestion pricing was supposed to do: reducing the number of cars clogging the city’s streets and pushing more people to use mass transit.

I wasn’t a big fan of Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing plan, but at least I understood the idea behind it. Pollution and congestion are externality problems; it has costs, but those costs aren’t borne particularly by those who create pollution and congestion. The idea is that if people actually have to bear the costs of those behaviors, they are more likely to adjust their actions. Some obscure economist came up with the idea. What was his name…. oh, right, Milton Friedman.

So, by the standard of the rationale behind congestion pricing, that high gas is reducing driving in New York City is not only not “working” by whatever standard the Times is inclined to use, but it is also besides the point. The idea wasn’t to reduce driving or to promote mass transit. The idea was to make drivers pay the cost their driving exacts from the rest of us, and that this might end up changing people’s behaviors was the bonus.

Ah well, they’re just the paper of record, after all.

The Less You Know

Publius over at Obsidian Wings makes some comments on executive privilege that seem very sensible.

But I can’t help but to feel that this whole issue is very odd. All of these people, including the President, ostensibly work for us, the American people. It seems to me that we have a right to their work product, seeing as we paid for it. Further, the notion that should you be so fortunate as to actually be able to get a job giving advice to the executive of our country, you aren’t going to waste the opportunity simply because what you say might have an impact which goes outside of the room you happen to be talking to the President in. Indeed, I would think that having your advice to the President have public import is the purpose of giving advice to the President. And if you are willing to have your advice matter in the kind of way that advice to the President of the United States matters, then it is sort of pathetic to suggest that you aren’t willing to identify yourself as the source of that advice.

The American public is generally very opposed to secrecy in their government; the widespread ire over Congressional earmarks is evidence of that. Yet when it comes to executive privilege, people are fairly supportive of Presidential claims. I cannot explain that dichotomy. But it has always struck me as odd. After Nixon, people always said that no other President would be so stupid as to allow tape recorders in the White House. I always felt that, considering the import of the Nixon tapes, it was strange that the American people who supposedly rule this country didn’t demand that every conversation in the White House be recorded from then on. We might like to know what really happened someday. And considering we pay for it, don’t we have a right to know?

I Will Follow You Into The Dark

Joe Posnanski is one of the authors linked in my blogroll. Part of that is because I love baseball, and he is one of the best writers about baseball out there. But part of that is because he is simply an amazing writer. Witness:

The lead singer and main guy from Death Cab — Ben Somethingorother* — is standing right next to me, and he just looks like a GUY, a GUY you would run into at a ballgame, a guy you might see at the bookstore, a GUY who you would like hanging out with even if he has made a somewhat unfortunate sideburns decisions at times. I don’t know him, obviously, and I certainly am not going to talk to him now — I told you I don’t like these meet-and-greets, and anyway enough people are already coming up to tell him how great the show was, how great he was, how incredibly awesome he is and so on — but I do have to say that I have a new appreciation for him.

I was a moderate Death Cab fan before — I actually like Ben better in his “Postal Service” mode — but this was a great show. The whole band was great (Death Cab has GREAT drums). Still, by far the most mesmerizing moment of the night happened when everyone else in the band left the stage, and a spotlight dropped on Ben, and he sang, “I Will Follow You Into The Dark,” which might be the best love song of the last 20 years. I’m not sure how many people in the world can flat spellbind an audience with a single guitar, a soft spotlight and a microphone. To me that’s the real trick in life. It seems to me that any band with a couple of hits, trick lighting, and really loud “this goes to eleven” amps can overpower an audience. But can you wow them when it’s just you, them and no fire breathing floating heads overhead? I always say that 20 of the most magical minutes of my baseball-watching life was watching Ozzie Smith take infield practice. That’s all. Just infield. That’s the feeling I got watching and listening to Ben sing “I Will Follow You.”

*No, seriously, that’s his name. Or Ben Whateveryoucallit. One or the other.

I tend to feel that Death Cab peaked with The Photo Album, although We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes is easily my favorite. And generally speaking, I tend to have a diminishing interest in any band once they have reached a certain level of fame. I know that is pretty silly; good music is good music, and it isn’t any better if it is obscure or unpopular. But I’m still, sadly, captive to the feeling of being in a special club when I love something that most people don’t know about yet. And I simply can’t be bothered to shell out more than $20 for almost any concert, nor to rush out to get tickets right when they go on sale (The Magnetic Fields are clearly the exception that proves the rule).

But there really is something to be said for Death Cab, and their ability to not only acquire but hold on to the sort of wide, mainstream audience that they have with the kind of music they play. It reminds me a bit of the Nirvana phenomenon from when I was young, or The White Stripes – there is something remarkable in the fact that they are able to make music of their own idiosyncratic type, and still reach the masses through their sheer brilliance. For a huge Twin Peaks fan, I tend to forget sometimes that sometimes, art is popular because it is great.

Reading, Writing, Psychics and Brands

It seems that public school teachers are branding kids with crosses and reported child abuse to Children’s Services based on the reports of psychics.

I can’t wait to have kids.

Welcome!

This is my initial post.  Exciting, eh?

For the handful of people who are reading this, feel free to make suggestions of what you’d like me to write about here.  I must admit to having a dearth of ideas.