John Arkwright's Blog is Now

Critique and Revision Process

2011-09-01T22:15:00.009-04:00

After I finish putting a story together, I am not sure that it all works. And there are probably plenty of typographical errors and maybe a grammar and/or punctuation mistake. Here is my method that has evolved over the years.

First, the story goes to my Gang of Three. I thanked my gangster friends, by name, in my acceptance speech at Writers of the Future in 2011. We are writers. We trust each others. We understand the genres we write in. We love history. We have an acquaintance with literature.

Our Gang of Three critiques are "soup to nuts." Does the plot work? Is it boring? Are there unnecessary scenes? Does the plot work? Were you ever confused about the action? Did any words sound wrong? All of it.

Then I revise. My gangster friends are generally convincing, so I take about 80% of their suggestions.

Next I send to a few writer friends who do not necessarily "get" the genre I'm working in--historical speculative fiction, mostly. Since the gangsters understand me, it's great to hear from people who are a little less on my wavelength. Once a friend pointed out how confused he was through two pages. He was not exactly sure what was going on. The problem was remedied by changing "man" in the first sentence of the story to "rider." I thought the horse in sentence two was obviously underneath the dude.

Next I throw it open to Codex, a forum for new writers, though some of the "new" writers joined a few years ago and are now highly successful. They take things apart well. By this time I have many of what I recognized as "kinks" worked out. So I usually have to consider advice seriously before I change things. However, sometimes I get a review from a friend on the forum that I immediately agree with and make lots of small revisions. The big revisions are probably done by now, though.

Finally my wife reads the story. She's a fabulous reader. She can spot all the errors that crept in from the revisions. And she reads for story and flow. Now and then she'll give me a suggestion that leads me to undo revisions that writers suggested. I trust her.

Sometimes I send to friends, but usually I never hear from them. Most are not that interested. Heck, if the world's greatest romance writer was a friend, I doubt I'd be that interested in reading her latest take on girl hates boy, girl is put in position that she can't get away from boy, girl gets interested in boy, boy gets interested in girl, then a big misunderstanding . . . See, I don't get it.

Somewhere in there I may send the story through my larger group--Stonepile Writers. But we only do six pages at a time (1500 words), so the only complete stories I would see critiqued are flash fiction. I don't do much flash. I crawl 40 page stories through, six pages at a time, though. It's good to participate. And I sometimes get a few good suggestions that I would possibly agree with. But by now the work is polished.

This seems way too complicated. But it gives me confidence that I have honed the story into the best form possible before submitting it to a seriously critical reader--a slush reader or an editor.

Idea Stories

2011-08-21T12:24:00.013-04:00

A long time ago I talked about how I built an idea story. The idea came from saying, "We know that people vote in elections using names of dead people. But what if the living voted in an election for the dead." I was satisfied with the story. But it never sold to a speculative fiction magazine or anthology. I think the biggest problem was that the editors wants to see on the first page that this is really a speculative fiction story--wants to have someone casting a spell or projecting their consciousness onto the internet.

Suffrage has a vicious military incursion, matched by decisive explosive violence, followed by brief, intense sorrow, and then the zombies arise in the aftermath and the real crazy stuff starts. I never found a reader who said, "I stopped reading after the second page because I didn't see zombies." Readers glowed about the story. But writers have to take the business as it exists and under those conditions, Suffrage was not marketable without a big named author on the masthead that said, "Oh, yeah, you'll get zombies, baybee." I gave the story to my local university press. I'm glad people got to read it.

Then I formulated another idea story, set on an outlying planet in the reemerging galactic empire. I wrote almost the whole thing, worrying that it might become boring, then watching it become boring. The problem was that, unlike Suffrage, I only took a cursory amount of time to create characters, and the characters were mostly described by their professions. It was like science fiction from the 1950s.

Now I think I figured it out. The two characters from the empire were not just professions. They were student and teacher. Teacher is taking advantage of gaps in knowledge of the reemerging empire, to travel around and do good on a planetary scale. He has had five successes. But the empire is horrified that this loose cannon is interfering on a massive scale with social development--those interventions could have been horrible disasters. So the teacher is an outlaw.

He contacts his student so that he can do another intervention. She has the ability to work inside the empire and get resources to help him. That's the first page or so. She gets to the planet and he points her toward personally discovering the problem that he wants to solve. She agrees. She investigates--where the most ink is spilled.

Then she decides. Then comes the ending.

This story does not have the Suffrage problem. However, when the story was "all idea" it was dead. Adding the drama was the hard part.

The Odds

2011-08-12T12:08:00.004-04:00

I have written before about the long odds of writing and publishing. I am now convinced if you write well, which entails a lot, then you just have to find the right reader for the stuff you write. And this may be a huge struggle.

It is frustrating to see stuff published that you write circles around. Does that really happen? Does the industry really care who writes something as long as it is well written? One author rigorously tested that theory.

His funny, but tragic, story is here.

You can find this story in other places, but this blogger reports it well.

The Crushing Irony of Keynesian Economics

2011-07-22T12:34:00.001-04:00

During the Great Depression John Maynard Keynes reprised a discredited theory that government spending stimulates the economy. Frederic Bastiat, in 1850, had provided the jiu jitsu response to this old theory by asking, "When you spend, where does the money come from?" That is, if the government is giving away food, shelter, and clothing, from whence do they get the resources? The answer is often, "From taking the food, clothing, and shelter of others."

Bastiat's idea that Napoleon could not make France more wealthy by burning Paris or by breaking all the windows in France or by paying workers to dig holes and cover them up without withdrawing resources from the economy is known as "crowding out." Government activity crowds out private activity. There is an irony to crowding out that exposes just how foolish Keynes' recycling of Napoleon's idea is.

If the government decides to boost the economy by paying workers to grow potatoes and make potato chips, then private potato chip makers are crowded out. However, if the government decides to dig holes and fill them in, no private "hole-digger-filler-iners" are crowded out, because the market does not perform useless tasks.

So the more useless the government's spending is, the less it crowds out private spending. Hence, Keynes is wrong in any case. But Keynes' government spending would do the most damage to the private economy if the government did something useful.

Fortunately, government mostly concentrates on useless production, such as giving cocaine to monkeys, constructing bridges to nowhere, and building tunnels for turtles to walk under the highway.

Thankful

2011-07-21T21:27:00.002-04:00

In my acceptance speech at Writers of the Future, I said "Thank you," a lot of times. And just now I got another rush of "thank you."

Due to Writers of the Future, excellent professional writers will give me the time of day. They know who I am. Many have offered to help and some have already helped. I am a member of an online group of newly minted professional writers and some young giants in the field.

All of my "Thank yous" from my acceptance speech are still the core of what took me to where I am. But it just occurred to me that I owe even more thanks than before.

Hewlett Packard dv8 FAIL

2011-07-19T19:50:00.004-04:00

I have written about my Pavillion dv8's problems before. It starts flipping the wireless on and off, along with the treble and bass controls as if it were haunted. I find lots of people with this same crazy problem on the internet. You can even see videos of the problem on YouTube.

An engineer solved the problem last February. But he is not an HP employee and HP techs still have no clue that there is a solution, even though it is on the HP support forums. So tomorrow I mail my computer to HP again and hope that they will follow the solution. The difficulty is that solving the problem is not exactly their job description. They are supposed to follow a preset algorithm, do various tests, and try stuff.

Last time I sent the computer to them it was over 20 days before I got it back. The problem did not recur until a month later, but it built over time and now it's paralyzing me for longer periods of time. I could just take the computer apart and fix it myself--it involves taping some stuff to shield from static. But that would void my warranty, so if my motherboard fries next week, I'll be out of luck.

I am not optimistic.

My Card

2011-07-17T15:33:00.009-04:00

Karate

2011-06-16T17:40:00.006-04:00

When my kids first started karate, it was pretty expensive each month. But they would miss some weeks and we paid by the lesson, so that was not bad for us. But it was terrible for the school because of the irregular cash flows. The boys cooled down on karate after a year or so.

Then my oldest decided to go back after a few months. This time we had to sign a two year contract with the "association" that was located in another state. We could either pay a huge chunk up front or by the month--which was just a bit more than the old "by the week" payments. After two or three months the owner/main guy was a jerk to my oldest and my kid didn't want to go back anymore (he was in third or fourth grade). So I quit sending payments. When they dunned me, I explained. Then they explained--threatened to ruin my credit rating. So I grumbled and paid it off.

I guess they got what they were aiming for, so it was a success for them. But I bet that the institution of "lump-sum easy-payments" for lessons for the kid got a bad cumulative word of mouth. I know I griped at every opportunity--even now, 11 years later!

Sad Truth About Writing

2011-06-08T08:48:00.010-04:00

When two economics professors meet, they talk about economics. When two writers meet, they do not talk about writing. That is part of my experience from meeting lots of professionals at Writers of the Future 27.

When I meet an economics professor, I want to know what area he/she does research in. I want to know what his/her approach to the area is. For instance, in this vein, I might tell another economist that I wrote my dissertation on terrorism. I looked at problems of terrorist bargaining and have published a lot about terrorism and the media. My favorite work I did on the subject showed that if terrorists vie for media attention, then there is an upper bound on the amount of terrorism as they shove each other off the front page and bore the public with more and more events. Then we would talk about what we're working on now.

Two writers talk about the kids and about the crazy thing that happened last week at Costco. They may talk about the business--how a publisher is trying a creative way of cheating them with a new contract offer. But they do not talk about what they just wrote or what they are writing. I have a theory as to why this is true.

Writing is like farming. When two corn farmers meet, they do not show each other pictures of their favorite ears of corn from the last harvest. "Oh, look at the silk on this one! It is enchanting."

There are thousands of farmers. There are thousands of writers. There are tons of corn. There are tons of manuscript pages. When a writer sends a manuscript to an editor it goes into a huge pile, called slush. There are thousands of other manuscripts there. Eventually someone--usually with a lowly station, "reads" them. Maybe they read a paragraph or two of them. When you have to pick one manuscript from a possible two thousand, you are not looking for small flaws that will exclude. You are looking for something that grabs you by the throat. And everyone's throat is different. Here is an article by Mike Resnick, who has published a few million words and has a stack of the top awards in his field.

Professional writers are accustomed to this view. Many writers produce lots of manuscripts and realize that they're going into a big pile--though well-known writers' manuscripts go into a smaller big pile than the slush. And well known writers will see plenty of rejection--which is not personal.

Writers do lots of writing. They see lots of writing. They do not want to talk about writing.

What about economics professors? I am in a class of professors that teaches and does research. And in my area of the profession, twenty-five publications in twenty-two years is considered great. I read about economics--for fun! I love to listen to economics podcasts.

Maybe when two of a different class of economists meet, they are more like farmers and writers. Some economists sit in front of a computer screen all day and churn out spreadsheets showing that this part of an company is efficient or that part is not. When two of these meet, I doubt they say, "My new spreadsheet technique works so well! Look how I pivot those tables. It makes everything so easy."

If writing is so boring, why am I now talking about writing? I'm new to writing--look at the luster of the kernels of this ear! It brings tears to my eyes.

Grandson

2011-05-22T18:12:00.003-04:00

So strange that my knuckleheaded son now has a son. I highly recommend being a grandpa. My son may even be maturing, growing into the role that he has accepted.

Johnathan is such a small thing--a miracle. He is now one month old.

Ramona's Pizza

2011-05-20T00:39:00.003-04:00

Ramona said, "You two have griped long enough about not having enough help here, so I hired some. I expect lots more pizzas to be cooked."

Pete looked up from the pan he was spreading dough in. "Thank you! Will they be working tonight? After the ball game, we'll be swamped."

"Yeah, they'll be here. All twelve of them."

Sophie said, "Twelve more? We're going to have fourteen people working in this place tonight?"

Ramona put her hands on the sales counter and leaned toward them. "Yup. So I expect that since you'll have seven times as many workers, you'll make seven times as much pizza."

"You're kidding." Pete said.

Sophie threw her hands up. "Where will we put them all? There's not room for that many workers in this place. We'll be lucky if we make twice as many pizzas as usual."

Ramona said, "You're very creative. You'll figure something out." She pulled her inventory clipboard out from under the sales counter and went into the back.

Sophie put her face in her hands, smelling bell pepper on them and wondering if her eyes were going to start stinging. "Those are going to be the most expensive pizzas we ever made. I should just quit now."

Volume 27

2011-05-18T21:24:00.003-04:00

Writers of the Future, Volume 27 is here. The trailer is here.

The week in Hollywood was fantastic. Authors' Services and Galaxy Press staffs were excellent.

The week long workshop, taught by K. D. Wentworth and Tim Powers, was phenomenal. We got advice from the old pros and the young stars--both were spectacular.

The writers were all great folks with substantial talents. I enjoyed talking and laughing with them tremendously. I hope that we can form a lasting cohort.

The illustrators were nice folks, too, but we did not spend as much time with them. The illustration that Irvin Rodriguez did for The Sundial was wonderful.

The awards show was polished and professional. The trophy is a beautiful Lucite pyramid with a silver quill inside. They're mailing it to me.

The experience was highly rewarding and exhausting fun.

Burning Money

2011-05-04T19:11:00.008-04:00

It was hot, the night we burned chrome. -- William Gibson

I like the way that Gibson turned the phrase. "Burning" can be a present progressive tense verb or a modifying gerund. In a two word title "burning" sounds like a gerund, that is, I first assumed that "burning chrome" was a noun phrase--"chrome," the noun, and "burning," telling me what kind of chrome. But Gibson immediately turned my expectation inside out. He used "burning" as a verb and "chrome" as a direct object, as in, "We are getting out the blowtorch and burning chrome."

"Killing Words," one of my short stories, uses Gibson's ambiguity.

But I want to talk about burning money.

The Writers of the Future staff suggested a dress code for the workshop and events during the week. One staff member's clarification made it clear that I was well set, with clothes that fit the code. Later, another staff member interpreted the code differently--I was a bit below the bar.

For me, spending money on clothing is akin to burning it. I have enough clothes to rotate through most of a week, then wash them, then rinse, and repeat. So I do not have the amount of clothes that normal people have. This is one facet of my nerdhood.

My view of buying clothing has led me to make friends with my decades-old shirts. When they're finally too worn to wear, it is like saying "goodbye" to an old friend. I identify with Brian Eno, who once sung, "The passage of my life is measured out in shirts." I think Eno's line is a reference to J. Alfred Prufrock's life, which he has "measured out in coffee spoons."

So today I went to Walmart and bought $150 worth of clothes. Man, that hurt. Yes, I know it will make me a bit more normal to have an office casual wardrobe that can span 10 days or more before a wash. And I know that even though I spend, perhaps, $50/year on clothing, that normal people spend much more than that. And normal professionals do not buy $150 wardrobes at freakin' Walmart. But I am not normal.

However, it just may be the case that people who buy books would rather think of the author as being like them--as being normal. My bet is that WOTF's suggestion is like a flu shot. I did not want it. But it will be good for me.

Of The Future

2011-05-01T22:19:00.003-04:00

In a week I leave for the Writers of the Future workshop, book signings and awards ceremony. The idea is too big for my head.

Sundial will be published in the best selling science fiction and fantasy anthology in the world.

WOTF will pay for me to fly to and stay in Hollywood for a weeklong workshop conducted by two excellent, successful authors--K. D. Wentworth and Tim Powers.

I will be able to meet authors who are new forces in the genre and authors who are venerable powerhouses.

"Calm, calm," I keep telling myself. But I don't listen.

Punctuation

2011-04-08T21:48:00.006-04:00

I went home over spring break to stay with dad while he was in the hospital for surgery. But he was in the Veterans Administration hospital system, so the diagnosing hospital forgot to send the orders to the surgical hospital, so I was there a week early. Since I already bought the ticket I spent a week with dad outside of hospitals.

We had lots of great time to talk. We went to the Vicksburg Battlefield National Park with by brother. I saw the restored ironclad warship, Cairo (pronounce KAY Ro). It looks like a neat little model in the picture. It was wonderful to walk around inside, getting a feel for how it would have been to work on one.

We also went to Colfax, Louisiana, sight of the Colfax Massacre, the most violent episode during Reconstruction. 150 to 250 blacks were killed, along with three whites, during a contested election in 1873. The citizens of Colfax erected a marker dedicated to the three whites "who fell in the Colfax Riot fighting for white supremacy." Stupidity and hate is great fodder for stories.

The week after I left, dad had his operation. Where his : was, now he has a ;

At this date, he is home, eating solid food, after spending around two weeks recovering. He is my hero. I feel blessed that he is doing well.

A Fable

2011-04-01T05:46:00.001-04:00

Biff said, "Diamond Point will never be as rich as Arrowwood unless we stop paying poor people to do our landscaping!" Ted agreed. They convinced the homeowner's association, overriding Chuck's objection that hiring landscapers was charitable to the poor. So Diamond Point would only hire residents. Here's what happened.

Ted said, "Biff, I gave up $40K in legal work this year because I was landscaping. Would you do my landscaping for $10K?"

Biff shook his head. "No way. I think I'm down $30K from last year. I would hire you, but your lawn sucks. Man, take some time off to figure out how to balance your ph."

"Time off? Can't I just hire somebody to do that? I can't afford more time off."

Biff rolled his eyes. "Read last year's agreement, man. We agreed not to hire out for ANY landscaping services. I hired a Diamond Point accountant to spread lime for $2K. He said that getting a landscaping education cost him $60K's worth of business so he had to charge."

Ted said, "Maybe Chuck was right. Maybe we should be charitable to the poor folks in Jones Ford and hire them."

"Get real, dude. That subdivision is so poor that they're full of free trade economists."

Victorian Era

2011-03-30T08:26:00.002-04:00

"On Dec. 8, 1881, a fire consumed Vienna's elegant Ringtheater during an opera performance. Hours later, when nearly 400 bodies had been removed from the smoldering ruin, the policeman heading the recovery operation reported to the emperor's famously tender-hearted cousin, Archduke Albrecht, 'All saved, Your Imperial Highness.' In old Vienna, one maintained a good facade no matter how awful the truth."

-- Barrymore Laurence Scherer, Wall Street Journal, March 30, 2011

Fascinating.

Mark Twain and Unions

2011-03-09T19:38:00.002-05:00

The riverboat pilot's union that Mark Twain describes in "Life on the Mississippi" added value to society. For a long time the union tried to push on a rope--they just demanded higher wages and bargained themselves out of jobs.

Eventually the union pilots began to record their observations on the latest developments with the ever-changing rivers--where a sandbar had formed, where a new wreck lay, where a new channel was cut. They dropped these written observations in locked boxes where the steamboats moored. Union pilots, therefore, were the best informed on the river.

When an insurance company was contracted to underwrite a steamboat cargo, it insisted on a well informed union pilot. That's when the pilot's union found success by providing valuable information in the market.

People are free under the Constitution to assemble and form whatever associations they want. People are free to resist forming associations, as well. Unions should be free to organize. Business should be free to just say no, if they want. Unions will be successful if they can add value.

Fiends

2011-03-07T17:51:00.000-05:00

HP tech support is chock full of lying fiends who can't do math.

2 days to get a Fed Ex box, 2 days to send the comp back to them, 2 days repair, 2 days back to me = 2+2+2+2 = 23 days estimated turnaround.

Excellence

2011-02-23T12:11:00.005-05:00

Writers of the Future sent their edits on my bio and on my story, The Sundial.

The edits on The Sundial were excellent. They kept all of Bess' bad English, while getting rid of all of my bad English. I was mortified to see that some of my errors remained after so many reads and readers.

I had worried that since my bio was different than the other authors' bios I had seen, that the editors would "sameify" it. But they left everything in it. I was pleased. The bio I submitted is similar to the bio that accompanies this blog.

I cannot talk about me unless I talk about the web of folks who have been part of my life.

The Future

2011-02-12T20:32:00.003-05:00

The Sundial, my story about an immortal Egyptian witch's difficulties in the American Civil War, will be published in Writers of the Future's volume 27. Mosby's Raiders, the confederate partisan cavalry unit, is prominently featured in the story.

Writers of the Future is the best selling science fiction and fantasy anthology series of all time, according to Locus Magazine. I feel as if I have been struck by lightning.

New Wave

2011-01-19T21:50:00.004-05:00

Fell into the new wave tonight.

The Call: Walls Came Down

Squeeze: Black Coffee in Bed

Bram Tchaikovsky: Girl of My Dreams

Thomas Dolby: One of Our Submarines is Missing

Madness: One Step Beyond

Wall of Voodoo: Mexican Radio

The Tubes: Talk to Ya Later

Moon Martin: Bad Case of Lovin' You

New Strange Course

2010-08-24T09:41:00.002-04:00

The guy from down the hall who makes decisions on how we spend much of the income from our $10 million endowment asked me if I wanted to teach a new course.

A local businessman who keeps an eye on the regional economy said that we are shifting from agriculture to health care. He wanted to know the impact of this shift.

The guy from down the hall wanted to create a course that would do a research project exploring how this shift would affect the region. The course would have 5-8 students and would produce a substantial study of the topic, which we would publish in a scholarly journal. This is not my usual macroeconomics course.

I thought for a moment and decided that I might enjoy it. I told him I would take the chance and began thinking about how I would prepare to teach the course next spring. He left.

He returned with my associate dean, who asked which of my normal classes I would like to give up in order to teach the new class. I said, "I usually teach three of the same course."

He said, "But which one?"

I paused. "Do you mean this semester?"

"Yes, starting tomorrow."

Boom.

Well . . . uh . . .

So I am teaching this odd course with zero preparation.

Except now we only have one student who wants to take it. So I do not know what they will do. They already have a part-time faculty member teaching one of my sections.

I cautiously await.

New Class Tool

2010-08-23T12:38:00.001-04:00

I am using Facebook to pass information to students in my courses this semester. Since I do not want to see what they are posting to their friends, I am hiding their posts. One can easily learn things one would rather not learn.

Brave New World

2010-07-26T02:17:00.004-04:00

I recently saw this on Facebook.

"Progress usually is a result of people who take an unpopular position. 'Well, we've always done it this way is the worst excuse we can use."'

This is 99% garbage and 1% correct.

The reason we do things in the ways we currently do them is that those ways work. 99% of the time when we strike out to do things in a new way, Old Lady Reality slaps us across the cheek and says, "Idiot! We do things that way for a reason!"

Paul Solman And Economic Theory

2010-06-03T13:18:00.009-04:00

I saw Paul Solman, a PBS economic journalist, at an economics teaching conference in Pittsburgh in 2003. He showed us a video of his report on how the new tax cut on dividends would not affect financial markets, since companies would not actually pay dividends. As evidence, he interviewed a top executive with Harley Davidson, who did not see how the cut to their shareholders' dividend taxes would affect HD--so HD was not going to pay a dividend.

My response at the time was that both Solman and the HD executive were wrong. They were both concentrating on supply, but were neglecting demand.

People buy stock to enrich themselves. The dividend tax cut meant that people who bought stocks that paid dividends could keep more of their income; hence, after the tax cut people would be willing to pay more for stocks that paid a dividend. Therefore, companies that paid dividends would have a higher market value and would find it easier to raise money.

Sellers do not care that much about your tax bracket, except when it influences you to buy their product at a higher price. They do not care about your demand, per se. But in the market, either they respond to you or they fall behind.

Today I read on Harley Davidson's website that they pay a dividend. Economic theory is powerful.

Immigration

2010-05-01T22:45:00.003-04:00

I believe in freedom.

Like nearly all economists, I believe that freedom to trade makes us better off. This trade includes free trade of labor.

If I am made better off by trading with someone across town (maybe she mows my lawn) then there is no reason that I cannot also be made better off by trading with someone in another state. Perhaps someone in another state can so something for me cheaper or better than anybody in my town.

Non-economists might say, at this point, "But you are killing jobs in your state by trading with other states." That is true. Just like when I hire someone across town I am killing a neighborhood mowing job. Get off my back, neighbors! I should be free to hire whomever I want.

If I buy Wisconsin cheese I'm putting a Georgia dairy farmer out of work. Too bad it's more efficient to do dairy farming in Wisconsin. Should I support people who want to raise reindeer in Georgia since the climate is all wrong for the reindeer? Enough with you pushy reindeer ranchers!

And if Wisconsin seceded from the U. S., it would still make me better off to trade with them, rather than starting up more Georgia dairy farms.

So I believe that trading with Mexico or Lichtenstein or Japan makes us better off. We only engage in trade with people who can do it better or cheaper or will do lousy work that we do not want to do.

And if it is efficient to import grapes from Mexico, then it may also be efficient to import grape harvesters from Mexico and put them to work in grape orchards. If it did not make me better off, the vineyard, who wants my business, would not hire them.

Yes, somebody will be hurt by immigrant labor, just like that poor Georgia dairy farmer is hurt because I buy cheese from Wisconsin. This is the way that resources go to their most valuable use. (Warning, this link contains strong language.)

But I insist that we not import problems into the U. S. We have enough murderers and thieves here. Let's do a background check on anyone who comes in. Further, we need to keep the murderers and thieves from sneaking in.

I would also insist that not one dime be taken involuntarily from anyone and given to those poor grape pickers. Sorry, no public schools. No public health care.

But, if you have read my views on freedom, you already know that I do not want a dime to be taken from anyone involuntarily to support that Georgia dairy farmer either.

ID

2010-05-01T22:12:00.008-04:00

Last fall my son picked me up at work and made an illegal turn as he left the parking lot. Campus police pulled us over. My son did not have his license with him.

The cop chewed my son up one side and down the other, then chewed on me for a while. How could I let him drive without a license? I did not tell the officer that I do not usually frisk people before I get in the car with them--I did not even tell the cop that I remind my son to grab his license every time he leaves the house. How could I let him make an illegal turn? I did not tell the officer that fighting my son for control of the steering wheel as he started the illegal turn could have been dangerous.

The cop seemed ready to haul my son in. If I had not worked for the university my son would have likely been arrested for driving without a license and making the illegal turn. After all, my son once spent a night in jail because he did not obey an officer directing traffic at night at a Y intersection on an unlit curve in the road--because he did not see the officer until he was upon him.

You may not like that we have to carry I. D. when we drive. Heck, legal residents of the U. S. who are not citizens are instructed by federal law to carry their green cards. MyVenezuelan brother-in-law always carried his green card. It's not that hard.

So what is the big deal about the state of Arizona saying they would detain those who were stopped in the normal course of police work if they could not show ID? I do not hear a lot of logic from those who object to Arizona's new law. I just hear the chant of "Nazi, Nazi, Nazi."

If requiring I. D. is the test of a Nazi regime, then our requirements to carry driver's licenses and green cards for non-citizens made us into Nazis decades ago and the chanters are just waking up to that. The chanters should all burn their driver's licenses.

I hear a tumult of illogic that police in Arizona are going to detain every Hispanic in Arizona. The latest census says Hispanics make up 30% of Arizona's population. Are the police really going to pull over one of every three cars and ask for ID? The prison population of Arizona is (by my best Internet search) 30,000. Are the police going to arrest the 2,000,000 Hispanics in Arizona and make their prison population 2,030,000? That could be expensive.

Can't you folks in the other world think about this just a little? Or is it just that you enjoy being outraged more?

Rat

2010-04-21T16:18:00.003-04:00

Some medicine had been called in to the only all-night drugstore in town. The store was busy so the prescription not ready until around 3:00 AM.

Since it was so late, I went as I was--shorts, tie-dyed purple shirt, flipflops, and hair past my shoulders instead of bound in a ponytail.

I was on my way back to the truck with the medicine when I saw a huge rat run across the parking lot, climb up on the tire of my truck and disappear up into the underside of the truck. Where could it have gone? I waited for him to leave. He did not. I approached cautiously.

I jumped in the truck and slammed the door quickly. I did not know if the rat could get inside the truck from the outside. There should not be any holes big enough, but I know rats can get into places they should not be able to.

I cut a couple of donuts in the empty parking lot to see if I could sling the rat out from under. I did not see him leave. On the way home I hit every pothole that I could and changed my route in order to go over some bumpy railroad tracks. But there do not seem to be any bad potholes when you need them and apparently the road crossing the tracks had been smoothed.

I slung the truck into the parking lot of Catfish Cabin and cut a couple of donuts, then slung it back onto the road. Then I saw the blue lights behind me.

I pulled into the parking lot of an auto dealership. The officer told me to get out of the truck. I realized that I was wearing my cut-offs, tie-dyed shirt, flipflops, and had mountain-man-hippie-hair. There was no way I was going to avoid being hauled in.

Then he looked at my license and asked me why I was driving so erratically.

And I realized that I was about to tell him about a huge rat under my truck at three in the morning. No way.

But I did. I told him about the rat. He looked the truck over and said, "Is he still under there?"

I said that I did not know--I never saw him leave.

He thought it over and said, "Drive safely on the way home."

I did.

Move Over Beckett

2010-04-17T16:04:00.005-04:00

Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner talked about the "too big to fail" problem this week. He said "when large companies manage themselves to the point that they cannot survive without the government, that we put them out of existence."

So if a company gets too big to fail, they kill it.

Geithner is the new master of the absurd, filling the shoes of Lewis Carroll, Samuel Beckett, and John Cleese. If they are too big to fail, we will not let them fail, we will kill them.

Perhaps next week Geithner will decide that attempted suicide will now be punishable by the death penalty.

If we survived the utter destruction of the World Trade Center, no company is too big to fail.

What Is Important?

2010-04-01T18:32:00.003-04:00

I was giving a test that started at 8:00 this morning. I had my laptop on and my work email up. At 8:36 a student mailed me. She was "stuck" at registration and would have to miss the test. Could she take it tomorrow?

I thought, "She's five minutes walk from the classroom. They won't let her leave? Taking a test is not as important as registering now?"

Those were the negatives. On the positive side, she was not lying. I suspect that half of the students who take makeups lie about having to miss the original test. Since she was not lying, I mailed back, "You may take the test with another class at 9:35 or not at all."

She replied, "I can't take it then. I have a class."

I began to understand. Taking a test was not as important as registering. It was not as important as attending another class. I was tempted to ask, "Is taking this test the least important possible use for your time?"

But I didn't. I answered, "Then I will assign a zero on the test."

She replied, "I will talk to my teacher at 9:35 and see if it is OK."

She showed up and took the test.

I cannot spend a lot of time worrying about a young lady who is so self-centered, putting emphasis on anything immediate and expecting me--who has the job of evaluating her--to fit myself into her schedule. But I have taught for over twenty years, and that was a first.

Symptoms

2010-02-28T14:50:00.005-05:00

I heard an excellent Econtalk.org podcast this morning. Mike Munger put it something like this.

People want to get rid of the money and lobbying to influence politics. But that is the symptom, not the cause.

If we give away wealth, people will compete for that wealth. Giving away wealth brings money and corruption into politics. If you want to reduce the symptom, advocate eliminating the cause. Advocate that government stop giving wealth away.

I thought he boiled it down well. So I will belabor the point by creating a non-government analogy, in direct opposition to his concise wisdom.

If Walmart opens the door every Monday and gives everything in the store away, people will fight and scratch to obtain their weekly or monthly food and necessities and luxuries, resulting in injuries and deaths. Free market prices provide orderly competition and eliminate the fighting and scratching.

Pejoratives

2010-02-23T11:01:00.020-05:00

Words do not usually hurt me. When someone in grade school called me a "bastard" it never made an impression on me. When I saw someone rage at being called a bastard, I wondered if there was not some special sensitivity there--perhaps the kid's parentage was in doubt.

I have some Native American ancestors. Even though my personal experiences are far removed from my ancestors' I feel a kinship. The word "Injun" does not bother me, though, even when people might apply it disparagingly to my downtrodden ancestors.

My immediate ancestors were called "white trash." I often refer to my personal habits as part of a white trash heritage--to the shock and horror of those who say, "Human beings should not be referred to as trash!"

As Space Ghost once said, "Yeah, whatever."

Words that were once merely descriptive, such as "bastard," "idiot," and "moron," were destined to become pejoratives, leaving us to find more sanitary descriptives. "Poor countries" became "the third world," then "developing countries." The new descriptives become outre, and the process continues.

Now "socialism" is coming to be seen as pejorative. My view of the word is that socialism describes an economic system under which the individual works for the good of society. Capitalism describes an economic system under which individuals are free to work for the good of whomever they wish--mostly themselves.

Socialism has a bunch of branches and I glaze over when a socialist thinker finely parses the thicket. I have satisfied myself with understanding these three: communism (we own everything and we tell you how to serve society), facism (we don't own everything but we tell you how to serve society), and the soft socialism of Europe and America (we don't own everything but we tell you how to serve society and we take your income and use it for society).

I am not a fan of socialism. I am a fan of freedom. Under socialism, if you disagree on how society is best served or if you do not want to serve society, you will be coerced by force or by the threat of force to serve--if there is no threat, then the socialist system devolves to capitalism, in which people serve whatever they want to.

Since "socialism" is now pejorative, what will we call people that we formerly called "socialists?" Perhaps we will find an term like Warmfuzzies, which will last for a few decades until people recognize that term for the slur that it is.

Titanic

2010-02-21T22:02:00.000-05:00

It sank almost 100 years ago with 1,500 people aboard. Get over it, people. It is not that interesting.

Writing News

2010-02-19T09:39:00.006-05:00

My story, Refiner's Fire, was one of eight finalists in Writers of the Future's* fourth quarter 2009 contest. Alas, it did not place in the top three, which would have guaranteed that it would be published in their yearly collection of stories.

I am left slightly better off than I started. Finalist status confirms that I can write a really good story, as judged by someone who knows--the judges are successful writers. In my arrogance, I always knew that I write good stories, but it is good to have that confirmed. I think that there may be 10,000 people out there writing good stories. There is room for 4 new writers this year, as judged by observing agents who get 300 queries from authors per week and ask for a partial manuscript from 1 author, who already has some writing credentials.

A place in the WOTF volume would have been a credential. So I am about where I started with regard to having a writing income. I will submit another story this quarter, raising my lightning rod in case a storm blows up.

---------------

*WOTF is the world's foremost science fiction and fantasy writing contest, judged by professional authors. Their yearly collection of winning stories is published in mass markets. I can find it at the department store in my small town. The judges and staff are the best.

Does This Bus Stop At 82nd Street?

2010-02-19T09:19:00.002-05:00

Ben Bernanke, the Fed Chairman (oops, just lost Rasa on this post), charted a course to take a road trip to Terra Del Fuego, at the southern tip of South America. He confidently strode to the parking garage, strapped himself into his Beemer and drove for a block and a half. Then he realized that he was using a map from 1932. He went back to his apartment and found there was no map to where he wanted to go.

Bernanke has shown supreme confidence that he can suck $1 Trillion out of the banking system at will (the banking system usually has about $2 billion in excess reserves--the two differ by a factor of 500). To say that no one has ever faced such a task is akin to saying that I have never beaten up the Toronto Maple Leafs.

In taking the first move to return to normalcy, Bernanke cut the rate at which the Fed lends to banks. Markets dove. Bernanke said, " That is not it at all. That is not what I meant at all."

So the first glitch happened on Bernanke's first action. The surprise was delivered by rational expectations theory. That is, people watch what you do, figure out what you will do next, and make plans accordingly. People know Bernanke is going to start sucking money out of the system. They saw the first sign. They sold.

Bernanke said, "No, no, not yet!"

But people watch what you do.

Bernanke has lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
But human voices woke him.

Terra Del Fuego, here we come!

-----------------

Apologies to T. S. Eliot

Parting

2010-02-15T07:09:00.003-05:00

Things went well. We found a cheap (and inexpensive) hotel. We ate and talked. His food was excellent, mine was barely passable. We slept fairly well from 9 P.M to 3 A.M.. We showered and packed and found that the Waffle House was full at 3:45. So we went to the airport.

A 6:30 flight? No problem. Few flights will be going. Lines will be nonexistent. Security will be depopulated. Well, no.

At the busiest airport in the world, the leading airline, Delta, had one lone person checking bags in.* After being in line for about 45 minutes, I wondered if we would make it through by 5:45. If we were not done by 5:45, they would not let him fly because they demand time for the bags to be searched and for him to be supersearched if need be.

We made it.

But we could not sit down and eat with so little time. He could not relax until he was through security on time. So I said goodbye to my nearly-twenty-year-old son at the beginning of the security queue.

He has been with us the longest. I'll miss him. Maybe I'll see him in six weeks.
----------------
*As an economist, I should have forseen the paucity of Delta personnel.

Not A Cent

2010-02-13T19:46:00.000-05:00

Bush's final Treasury Secretary, Henry Paulson, arranged a shotgun wedding in which Bank of America bought the ailing Merill Lynch. BoA was given an escape clause if Merill proved to be a millstone.

Merill proved to be a millstone. The BoA president told Paulson that he would escape. Paulson threatened him to hit BoA with a government regulatory sledgehammer to spite BoA for upsetting the government's applecart.

Now Paulson is selling a book. I will not pay a cent for the book. I will not rent it from the library.

Paulson is a thug.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574447171063275730.html

Learning to Lighten Up

2010-02-12T22:05:00.001-05:00

When I was seventeen I worked for the Council on Aging. I worked with a 67 year old and a 76 year old--handymen, riding around the area, doing small repairs for old folks.

We screened doors and porches, we replaced rotting boards in floors. We fixed plumbing. We did about everything one can do around the house.

The young guy, Albert, could not say "no" to women. So when an old woman would ask him to plumb her trailer, he would say, "We would have to take out the wall, and we might not get it back together."

To which the old woman would reply, "Well, then that's what you have to do."

And Marion would grumble under his breath, "He can't tell her 'no.' He just tells her how hard it would be, and she cares about it getting done, not about how hard it is."

My dad had begun to teach me to lighten up. Albert and Marion finished the job.

They would drive a nail in two strokes. I took around twenty strokes, and would have to redo every fifth nail. Marion would say something like, "I don't think that nail is scared of you, John."

Or Albert would say, "We pay by the nail, not by the stroke."

One day I had enough and snapped back at Marion. It surprised him. He apologized.

And I realized how stupid I had been. It is strange that thickening my hide was accomplished by someone who only showed me how thin my skin had been.

Census

2010-02-02T17:05:00.009-05:00

In 1980 I drove around my town and asked people to fill out their U. S. Census forms. The folks that I visited had already ignored multiple requests, so they were not interested.

One old woman thought that the U. S. government was cooperating with the Russians so that when they took over that they would know how many rooms she had so they could quarter troops.

I warned one woman, as I had been trained to do, that the next visitor with a census form would be a federal marshal.

I was such a jerk.

Mr. Hood

2010-02-01T20:04:00.000-05:00

Your employer pays you because you create more value in working than you use up in resources. You buy stuff that gives you more value than you have to sacrifice to get that stuff.

Now Robin Hood takes $1 from you (who earned that dollar by providing more than $1 in value) and buys a geegaw for me (you would have spent the dollar on a doodad that gave you more value than $1). Robin Hood does not know me well, so the geegaw he bought for me is only worth only 50 cents to me. So Mr. Hood destroyed your more than $1 worth of value to give me 50 cents worth of value. Mr. Hood made life worse, overall.

And if Robin Hood keeps visiting you, you may end up spending money on hiding your money from Hood. But hiding your money gives you no direct satisfaction--the doodads you would have bought if there were no Mr. Hood do give you satisfaction. So more value is destroyed.

Of course, Robin Hood is a government that redistributes income.

This is all too optimistic, though. Robin Hood knows where the money is coming from and where it's going. Government is so big, it has no idea.

Incentives

2010-01-29T01:43:00.001-05:00

The public school system turned one of my sons against government. The system has perverse incentives. He was talking to me about bullying.

In my experience and my son's, teachers turn a blind eye to bullying. Now and then teachers and administrators work around the edges, but they are reluctant to get serious. Here are the incentives.

If little Aristotle bullies little Socrates and the school lets this happen, what is little Socrates' parents' recourse? They can demand the school do something. Suppose the school does nothing? Probably nothing happens. Socrates' parents can sue. To the parents' attorney, the school presents the paper trail they left that showed they were doing something to try to stop the problem. The paper trail may be two sided, since the bully, little Aristotle, denied and lied at every stage.

Suppose the school expels little Aristotle? Little Aristotle's parents have ironclad evidence that the school expelled their son. Yes, the school has a paper trail, which may be two sided. But there is clear evidence that the kid was expelled. And maybe there is some theory by which the school singled out Aristotle.

Little Aristotle's case for being expelled is much stronger than little Socretes' case that the school should have done more. Bad incentives guarantee that most of the time the bullies win.

Part Time Job

2010-01-22T16:21:00.001-05:00

At sixteen I had a job as a night watchman at a funeral home. They would call me when they had a body and I would spend the night.

In the rear end of the building was a small living room with a television. Sometimes I had to bang on the side to get the picture right, but it had cable back in the days when cable did not cross the mill pond and go into the little community where I lived. I would invite friends over and we would play games and pop popcorn.

There was a bedroom, too. In the morning I would shower and drive to school. For that, I made $20.

When the heating or cooling system would kick on, it would make a few loud bumps, which would make me jump. Other than that, the job was sheer gravy.

At one point someone mentioned that I was there for insurance purposes. Other than that, nobody ever told me what I was watching for.

Entropy

2010-01-18T10:42:00.001-05:00

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold -- William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming

Systems tend toward disorder. This is a casual paraphrase of the Second Law of Thermodynamics--the Law of Entropy.

Orson Scott Card's "Alvin Maker" books frame evil as the destructive force, which the world tends toward, like water flowing downhill. Whereas good, the constructive force, must work against the tide.

Things wear out, rocks erode away, the sun cools slowly.

Over a decade ago, I read something that Marilyn Vos Savant wrote. I paraphrase it, thus. Information is not subject to entropy. That which stores the information is subject to entropy--paper decays, your hard drive crashes.

Other than Card's "Alvin Maker," I have not read anything which makes entropy a character in a story. But now I am thinking about it. Right now my ideas are soup. I have to overcome my own entropy to make it into something solid.

And the winner is!

2009-12-30T22:50:00.000-05:00

What should we call him? The Nigerian terrorist? The Christmas Day terrorist?

Mark Steyn found the perfect name for him.

The Panty Bomber!

The Barn Door

2009-12-29T11:42:00.076-05:00

I have published a bit of research on terrorism, beginning over twenty years ago. So I think a lot about the subject. The attempt by a Nigerian to blow up a plane enroute to Detroit has me musing again.

Enhanced security measures adopted after 9-11 exasperated me. Rude, low intelligence, bureaucratic TSA screeners at airports were doggedly searching for men's razors and throwing them in the trash (no, that never happened to me--I did lose a few bucks worth of bottled water once). I yelled at the television more than once, "Nobody will ever hijack a plane using box cutters again! Stop it!"

I did not hear anyone agree with me until I saw a CSPAN Booknotes interview with Tom Clancy. Clancy said exactly what I had been thinking. The reason that box cutter hijackings worked on 9-11 was that the passengers had no idea that their plane was being hijacked as a projectile. They thought that they would be taken to a remote location and held for ransom.

Even on 9-11, the passengers of United-93, once they had used their cell phones to find out that they would likely be flown directly into a large building, attacked the hijackers. If the United-93 passengers had known the truth an hour or so earlier, the hijackers would have never entered the cockpit.

After 9-11, any hijacker without an AK-47 would be subdued or killed by the passengers. Clancy's analysis was perfect.

We are always closing the barn door after the horse has escaped--searching for useless box cutters and razors. Now, after a Nigerian attempt to blow up a plan, we are going to require that passengers keep their seats for the last hour of flight. Uh . . . because the Nigerian chose this time . . . to prepare . . . uh . . .

If we had this rule in effect before the Nigerian attempt, he would have triggered the explosive earlier in the flight. The new policy is regulatory lunacy.

If we had taken the box cutters from the hijackers on 9-11 the incidents would not have happened. But afterward we closed the barn door, by preventing incidents that would never again be successfully launched.

But with the Nigerian, we are not even closing the barn door. If we had put a new policy in place on the morning of his attempt, he would have had the same measure of success (pants flambe). This time the horse has escaped and we are painting the barn door.

Morality

2009-12-23T13:48:00.000-05:00

1. So if you are too moral to take bad gamblers' money

2. Shouldn't you be opposed to government programs that forcibly take your money and use it to take bad gamblers' money?

3. And shouldn't you be opposed to government programs that forcibly take your money and use it to give incentives to people to eschew productivity, the acquisition of human capital, and to create disfunctional family structures?

Cryptically yours,

John

Debate

2009-12-20T22:14:00.000-05:00

We had to debate in my high school speech class. Tommy and I were assigned "Pro: Immigration should be limited." Two young ladies were assigned the "con."

Everyone did a week of research and got their arguments and notes together. My side went first with an opening statement.

Then a member of the other side said to the teacher. "That was our argument. We were supposed to have that side."

Ms. McCartney looked at her assignment book and said, "No. You had 'Con: Immigration should be limited.' That means you should argue that immigration should not be limited."

The student said, "But we prepared to show that immigration should be limited."

Tommy and I made an easy A. I think the teacher was so disgusted by the ladies that we looked good by contrast.

High School Speech

2009-12-19T22:03:00.000-05:00

Two of my best friends in high school were in my speech class. We had lots of fun. The funniest thing have happened in class was at the start of a speech by a guy I knew.

Joe C. stood up at the podium and said, "My speech is on Tenne." Then he looked down at his notes and looked back up at the class and said, "Tennessee."

We laughed until we cried.

Stunning Example of Government Failure

2009-12-06T21:32:00.000-05:00

A decade ago a probe that NASA sent to Mars disappeared. An investigation revealed the following:

The peer review preliminary findings indicate that one team used English units (e.g., inches, feet and pounds) while the other used metric units for a key spacecraft operation. This information was critical to the maneuvers required to place the spacecraft in the proper Mars orbit.

"Our inability to recognize and correct this simple error has had major implications," said Dr. Edward Stone, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We have underway a thorough investigation to understand this issue."

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msp98/news/mco990930.html

Possible Turkey Disaster

2009-11-26T09:59:00.001-05:00

We are eating ribs today. We have had plenty of turkey and ham on previous holidays.

When I was a kid, my family would often cook non-traditional holiday meals. We would have rabbit stew on holidays, for instance. We were among the first to fry a whole turkey.

Back in the 1990s, I fried a turkey for my family. On the patio, the oil was heated on the outdoor cooker when I lowered the insert containing the turkey into it. The oil bubbled up, overflowed, and caught fire. I turned the gas off quickly, to avoid disaster.

Then I could not figure out what to do. I removed the big pot from the cooker and set it down on the concrete of the patio. The turkey continued to fry. I let the pot set there for 40 minutes, frying all the while. Then the turkey was done.

It was delicious.

Guys With Guns

2009-11-16T16:06:00.001-05:00

Adam says to Karl, "I'll trade you two steaks for 10 pounds of potatoes."

Karl replies, "I'll take two pounds of steak in exchange for two pounds of potatoes because that is fair."

Adam says, "I don't think so. It's not worth it to me."

Karl slots a clip into his AK-47 with a clack and says, "Think again."

Under capitalism, we trade voluntarily. Nobody pulls a gun. Everyone has the right to withhold from everyone else if they do not think they're getting a fair deal.

Under socialism, trade is structured according to someone's conception of what is fair? Who decides what is fair? The guys with guns decides what is fair.

We now have a bill passed by our representatives that proclaims that it is fair that everyone should be forced to buy health insurance if they can afford it. Suppose you do not want to buy it?

You can be sentenced to five years in prison.

Enforced by guys with guns.

The Divide

2009-10-30T20:36:00.001-04:00

I think about what is right and wrong.

If people do not agree with me, then I am ready to discuss how they think about the subject.

A good friend of mine did an excellent job of teaching me about the other side of the argument. She said that she does not think about what is right and wrong. She just knows what is right and wrong.

My friend and I are divided. Since we are extremely tolerant, we are able to remain friends.

I first read about such the divide in a book by Thomas Sowell over a decade ago. I have heard/read similar libertarian discussions over the years. These discussions did not come home to me until my friend gave me the viewpoint above--she knows what is right and wrong, just like Sowell, et. al. said she does.

How do the people on either side of the divide view each other? Since my friend is so tolerant, I will leave her, in particular, aside in this analysis.

To me, the folks on the other side should think--should do analysis. They do not have impure motives. They are honest folks that have faulty methods.

But the folks on the other side see right and wrong as obvious observation that needs no method of analysis. So they view me--who differs from them--as purposefully choosing evil.

These are the two worlds.

A few years ago I was in the DMV, listening to a conversation between two young women. One was telling the other how to achieve the good life. "Have your baby. Apply to this place for your housing. Apply to that place for your support check. Apply to this place for your medicaid. Apply to that place for . . . "

The one was teaching the other a life plan.

Young women like these end up being supported by government--never learning personal responsibility. For me, that is no life at all. Such a path gives no hope of achieving any meaningful purpose. Typically, those mothers remain single and poor. Their children will be poor. They will more likely fall into a life of crime.

My heart breaks for these young women. My heart breaks for their children. I hate the system that robs them of the opportunity for achievement--though they are willing participants, I understand that a corrupt system will corrupt them, too.

But this is on my side of the divide.

On the other side of the divide, my friend's heart goes out to the single mother with no means of support. How will her child live? Where will they live? We must give her housing and food and medical care and other necessities. It is only right.

On my side of the divide the answer is to tear down the system that encourages the terrible existence. A child must be a burden to the girl's parents if she is to be seriously taught not to bear children that she cannot care for.

That is tough. For me it is tough love--and the only kind of real love. For those on the other side of the divide it is hate.

Part of the divide is analysis vs. emotion.

Part of the divide is short run vs. long run.

But there is little hope convincing someone on the other side because both see the other's approach as alien. Now and then someone has an epiphany.

The people to whom I have spoken that have come over to my side of the divide have felt the ephiphany as powerful as being hit by lightning. And the epiphany is as rare as being hit by lightning.

Abductions

2009-10-29T11:59:00.004-04:00

In China you can abduct a baby and sell it in a rural area for $4,500. About 2,500 cases are investigated each year.

Sounds like a writing prompt.

Sparks

2009-10-28T10:58:00.000-04:00

My seventeen year old has been taking part in online political discussions lately. Maybe because he was raised by me, he lives in my world--the world in which one cannot spin straw into gold.

My son is amazed by the ability of people to deny and denigrate arguments that come from basic assumptions that one cannot live without.

One bugaboo that these folks are worried about is "net neutrality," which, in his community seems to have no concrete definition. There is some agreement that if a law were passed guaranteeing net neutrality, your internet service provider could not limit massive downloads that take up lots of bandwidth--such as downloading movies.

But, it turns out, that if you force your ISP to accommodate the big downloaders, you also force them to inconvenience moderate users. So which is best?

The invisible hand smacks everyone around in this way. The ISP wants to maximize its profit by creating a service that people are willing to pay for. The ISP has no incentive to hurt a user for the sake of causing hurt. The ISP likes happy users. And when some users make others unhappy, the ISP is out to provide the most overall value for users, whomever they are, since the ISP is rewarded more for providing more value--and this works whether the ISP is a monopolist or a competitor.

We can let ISPs and individuals both have freedom. Or we can have government decide which users are angels and which are devils and set up rules by which some are hurt while others are helped.

But government does not have skin in the game. The ISP loses money if they have more unsatisfied customers. The government does not.

In addition, who knows which unintended consequences the government will create when it tries to solve peoples' problems?

When my son is overcome by the strange view that comes form the other world, he has to unburden himself.

And that is the sound of thinking.

The Truth About The Balloon Boy

2009-10-24T20:32:00.000-04:00

I was home when the balloon blew across much of Colorado, pursued by helicopters and ground rescue, possibly carrying a six year old named Falcon, possibly alive, possibly dead.

The balloon touched down lightly. Maybe he was alive!

He was not there. Falcon's brother said he saw the him fall out. Could he still be alive?

He was hiding in the attic the whole time.

Yes, the hoax cost multiple law enforcement agencies lots of money.

It was the best thing on television since the chase of the white Bronco.

Good entertainment at any price.

Bread and a Lie

2009-10-22T19:56:00.000-04:00

I was an only child at age three. My mom walked into the room and saw a loaf of bread on the seat of my high chair. It was squashed flat.

She asked, "John, did you squash this loaf of bread."

I said, "No."

Kids have no idea how transparent their lies are.

First Time Writer

2009-10-02T00:18:00.000-04:00

I saw another first time writer tonight. They always start their stories the same way. Two years ago, I was one of them. Here's the story.

Jorgamundor laced up his left work boot, stained with oilfield muck. Jenny was still sleeping. Jenny had been so upset lately. But Jorgamundor knew why.

He remembered when Jenny's mother had yelled at her in front of him last week. His poor wife had been so ashamed. "She never loved me," Jenny had sobbed to him that night. And now she walked around morose all the time.

Yesterday Jenny had even forgot to pick up Smolish, their 6 year old, from school. Now Jenny was worried that the school might report her to social services. And they might, too.

Then Jorgamundor put on his right work boot.

First time writers want to tell everything all at once. So it's twitch a finger, long flashback, twitch another finger.

It's cute, in a way, seeing it being done over and over. "Awww, wook at the widdow witer. I wemember when I was wike that."

Now I have other problems!

Before It Happens

2009-10-01T10:12:00.000-04:00

Some things cannot be taken seriously until they happen, especially for the young. After all, the young have not seen much of the world. (This is something I need to keep in mind while writing fiction.)

My students do not believe me when I tell them how to study for my tests. Then they get the test back and start asking me how to study for my tests, though I already told them. I even put it in writing on the web.

Here we go again.

Unforever

2009-09-26T23:45:00.000-04:00

She's a witch from ancient Egypt. She watched Moses kill a man and hid that knowledge. She had a spiritual experience that led her to believe that because she had chosen right, she would never die. She exalted in the knowledge.

A few thousand years later, she wants to die. She sees a raider kill a federal agent in wartime. She knows that this is her karmic chance--that if she turns in the raider she will be allowed to die.

But is she falling in love with the raider? And if she lets him live, she will keep on living, and he will die and leave her alone for thousands of years.

Original Joke?

2009-09-21T12:00:00.000-04:00

What do you call the fear of being enclosed in a chimney?

Santaclaustrophobia.

Fed's Parable and Joke of the Day

2009-09-18T11:38:00.002-04:00

Parable

Ben's children were carrying their eggs to market in their egg baskets. Ben cautioned, "You children might trip and fall into one another. So all your eggs might break."

So Ben took each child's eggs and put them in his super basket. That way . . .

Nevermind.

Joke

O. K., get this--the federal government is worried that the actions of individual banks can create risks for the entire banking system--systemic risk. So (this is too funny) the Fed will regulate the entire system of executive compensation to eliminate risks that affect the entire system!

Get it!?

They're worried that banks who put all their eggs in one basket may upset the baskets of other banks. So . . . the fed is putting all of everybody's eggs into their big basket! That way, if the Fed drops that big basket . . .

Nevermind.

Just Love

2009-09-17T16:01:00.002-04:00

We finished talking about unemployment today. One topic was how the official unemployment rate could systematically err. (Yes, this post is really about love.)

A student asked about how illegal aliens would affect the unemployment rate. As usual, I asked questions and had them answer.

If you're an illegal and you get the call from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, do you tell them that (1) you have a job (2) you don't have a job (3) you are looking for a job?

I got the answer that I consider to be most likely. If you are that illegal worker, you hang up the phone.

So the first conclusion is that the unemployment rate likely does not reflect the presence of illegals at all.

My next statement and question was this. If illegals are not included in the official statistics, because they do not participate in the survey, will that increase or decrease the unemployment rate? The answer depends on whether illegals are more or less likely to be employed.

I got the right answer again. Illegals do not have unemployment insurance. And they would often find it more difficult to get any other welfare benefits. That means they probably are more likely to be employed than non-illegals. So illegals really lower the unemployment rate, though we never pick that up in the data. The official rate is likely overstated.

The students' unprejudiced analytical view was too much for me. At that moment, I just loved my students.

Letter to a Friend

2009-09-16T13:40:00.001-04:00

Victor,

On the way home I pondered your question about whether it was moral to set up the sneaker factory in Vietnam and employ 6 year olds--or maybe it's 12 year olds, since I'm not sure how much 6 year olds can contribute.

I think that those who choose to work in a new factory only do so because they think their lives would be improved by it. Perhaps they are choosing to live in the factory or die in the jungle. Unless I could be convinced that Nike is using force or the threat of force to acquire workers, I think that Nike would be immoral to forego setting up up the factory for the sake of political correctness.

Similarly, were those kids we discussed who lived in the coal mines choosing between living in the mines or dying on the city streets? As I said, the choice between living in 1600's Jamestown or living in 1800's Philadelphia is an easy one to make.

Maybe it is immoral for dad to tell the kid to work in the factory, rather than play in the jungle (and maybe die in the jungle). A middle-eastern friend of mine once said, on this topic, "That is why you have the damned kid. He is supposed to help the family. He helps support the family, he supports you in your old age, and his kids support him in his old age."

Maybe we would rather have a lot of government aid to bring those kids into Y2K America. It never seems to work, though. Self improvement through freedom is the path up. (Then once a country is up, they seem to decide that this path is distasteful and try to short-cut advancement through a welfare state that ends upward progress).

If government concentrates on eliminating coercion, individuals improve themselves. And as they improve themselves, they cannot help but improve others. Donald Trump does not want to make a lot of people better off, but his gaudy empire employs a lot of people. If we squash him because we disapprove of whatever it is that he produces, then what happens to those people who had jobs in Trump empire?

I probably did not say much that was new. My point in writing was just that I consider it immoral to bow to the utopian protesters at WTO meetings who demand that we refuse a hand up to the third world, since we can't offer them the Garden of Eden.

John

Capitalism Fails!

2009-09-15T18:14:00.004-04:00

Michael Moore is right! Capitalism has failed.

The cord on yet another set of my earphones has a short. I only get sound in one ear unless I hold the cord juuuuuust right, at the plug.

Yes, I have a heavy duty set of earphones with a cord as thick as a suspension cable on the Golden Gate Bridge. The sound quality of those earphones is great, but they uncomfortably clamp onto my head.

I also have a headset that works fine, but I cannot always walk around with a mic at my mouth--and I sleep with my headphones on.

In the same way that a doctor would rather cut a diabetic's foot off, rather than treat the diabetes*, electronics companies would rather make a headset wire with the consistency of a pretzel, than than use a thicker, woven wire.

---------------

*Barack Obama, Town Hall Meeting, August 15, 2009

The Heart and the Head on 9-11

2009-09-12T13:03:00.002-04:00

My heart takes a back seat to my head in almost all decisions. That does not mean that I never make mistakes because I think everything through correctly. By extension, my analysis of situations that I have no direct control over is primarily mental. This shapes my opinions.

I know plenty of people for whom this is not the case. Their initial reaction is emotional. I probably cannot appreciate the benefits of the emotionally centered person. But in reflecting on 9-11, I may have uncovered a difference between the two types.

My analysis of 9-11 was the following. Islamic terrorists wish to target our unarmed, untrained civilians; we must send armed, trained troops to kill them. We must discover their plots in every way possible and prevent further slaughter. Even though we supplied weapons to Afgani fighters, so that they could kick the Russians out, the Afganis still considered us the enemy. I view that as evidence that Islamic terrorists cannot be appeased. Bin Laden clearly said that he was inspired by our weakness in withdrawing from Lebanon--he was not enraged by our strength.

This reason does not fade with time. I do not see that any of these assumptions have been challenged over time.

Emotions fade with time. We burn with love for a high school crush. Later our emotions are wholly different.

We cry on 9-11 for the slaughter of thousands. But we cannot cry every day like that, for every person who was slaughtered. Our heart does not have the capacity.

I view the current political retreat in the face of terrorism to result from a fading of the emotions of those who are prone to act primarily on emotion. When the emotion fades, it is hard to find the reason to continue onward. Those who react emotionally construct an elaborate rationalization which is consistent with their changing emotions.

Some may have said on 9-12, "We must kill this enemy. If we must invade countries, then we will. If we must torture these men who slaughtered thousands, then we will.* But we cannot allow this to happen again next week or next month or next year."

But, with a year of no further attacks . . . and two years . . . and eight years, this person's emotions have subsided.

Now this person says, "We must change our behavior so that the enemy will soften their approach. We must respect the sovereignty of countries who would plot our destruction, up until the day they take hostile action. We must treat the inhuman beast in a humane fashion, even if this means losing lives. Nothing has happened in the past years and that is a sign that nothing will happen."

After eight years, what I view as my reasoned response remains.

It happened. It can happen again. They hate us. Our attempts at concession show the weakness that inspires them. Our security was lax before 9-11. We needed new rules. We still need new rules.

My emotions have faded since 9-11. The images and the testimony of those who lost sons and daughters and mothers and fathers bring some of that emotion back. Fading emotions cannot sustain the resolve of a people--even to protect themselves--only enduring reason can.

----------------------
*Note that even high-level decision makers in Congress did not object when they were privately briefed on torture. They understood that protecting our sons, daughters, mothers, and fathers was worth harming the killers.

Romance?

2009-09-07T19:33:00.005-04:00

As a guy, I am deficient in writing about romance. But other than the writing, I have displayed some decent romance chops.

I have thrown multiple surprise parties for my wife. I have surprised her with romantic gifts. On one Valentine's day, I called her to the door as she was getting ready to go out. She was met by a barbershop quartet that serenaded her (I got to take their fee off my taxes, since they were a gift that I got from donating $60 to the local NPR affiliate--yeah, that part is not romantic).

Finally, on another Valentine's day, we dropped the kids at some friends' house and went out to eat. Over dinner she said, "This is so nice. I wish we did not have to go home."

I said, "We don't. I rented the honeymoon suite at the hotel across the street and dropped the kids' clothes and toothbrushes at the babysitter's earlier." And I really had.

But when my characters find love, it is usually a practical thing. Abe's family had died and so had these two women's husband. Jake Fox was forced to marry Aline Elliott by her father, Wiley. Wiley thought Jake was probably going to die and was hoping that Aline could inherit Jake's property. Bryton fell head over heels for Tonjan (literally), but she ended up rationally choosing the High Priest--but Tonjan is a Priestess of Aatar, and they are like that.

And on the horror side, one happily married couple is destroyed by her unfaithfulness--she chooses her past over her husband. And one husband has clearly invoked a power that has possessed him and will soon result in his killing his wife and child.

It is time I try to do a seriously romantic story.

Charity

2009-09-07T17:48:00.004-04:00

James attended his church since he was young. He was surprised when the minister asked him to give a little over $5,000 to repair the homes of poor folks who were members. He usually gave around 10% of his income in donations and the $5,000 would double his typical yearly donation. He said he would have to think about it.

A month later, James's minister called him in and admonished him to contribute. James told the minister that he cared about the poor, but that the contribution would take all of his emergency savings. James was not sure that he could afford to sacrifice his family's security. The minister said that God wanted James to give and that he would be rewarded. James said he would put a check in the plate next Sunday.

James could not bring himself to donate that much money next Sunday. He had heard rumors at work that his job would be transferred to another state. He might have to move. He might be out of work. Even so, he felt ashamed not to have contributed.

The next day, two deacons visited James at his home. They asked for the check. James was alarmed--he was outraged. They left without a check.

That evening, the minister and five deacons showed up, packing guns. James wrote out the check. The minister warned him not to stop payment, or bad things might happen to the family. The minister reiterated that the money was for the poor in the church and that James was being charitable--doing the Lord's work.

The church is the government. The donation is a new tax, meant to help someone. The church in the story is only as unethical as the government is in real life.

Why do people who contribute a pittance voluntarily, from their own generosity, feel that it is right to force others to contribute? How can forced contributions be charitable?

If you have, borne with this screed, thank you. It has been building for a while.

Goodbye, St. Simon

2009-09-06T08:50:00.005-04:00

St. Simon's Island has been wonderous. Today we leave. Alas.

I cannot afford such vacations. A part of my job involves working with a non-profit organization that lures its leaders to two days of meetings per year by holding them in a nice place.

The executive director told us of the particular donation that funds these perennial retreats. I guess that is why he seemed to have problems acknowledging my earlier thanks--maybe he sees his role as only supporting philanthropy. To me, however, he seems like a gardener who grows philanthropy.

The aim of the organization is not to hold retreats. The aim of the organization is to benefit students for the rest of their lives by teaching them how to make good decisions. The organization works through the students' teachers--helping them teach. In my state, business and individuals see this as such an important mission that they voluntarily sacrifice to see it carried out.

Capitalism is Evil

2009-09-05T23:28:00.004-04:00

Michael Moore's new film tells us that capitalism is evil. Capitalism is economic freedom. It is laissez faire (leave it alone).

Moore says that we should substitute democracy for capitalism. It is not hard to understand how the guy who seriously told us that Cuba's health care system is better than ours could mistake a political system (democracy) for an economic system (capitalism).

If I must compare the two dissimilar things (is purple wavier than 6.5?) I favor capitalism. Here is why.

A democratically controlled economy* would tell me what I should or should not buy, whom I should or should not trade with, and which profession I should choose. The majority defines what is permissible and necessary in a democratic economic system.

Would the majority keep their hands off of me? This question is out of order; if the economy were to actually run on democratic decisions, hands-off would be a cop out--it would, in fact, be capitalism.

Given this, the question is as follows. Would I prefer that a majority of my fellow citizens coerce me, or would I prefer freedom? Alas, I have begged the question.

The inevitable conclusion is that Michael Moore is an idiot of a magnitude that one can only achieve if one is bolstered by a peverse intelligentsia who does not attempt to practice what they preach. They accept capitalism's paychecks and live well, while decrying the freedom that feeds them.

Q.E.D.

Again.

-------------
*See how I try to make the two things similar. In any case, I feel obligated to repeat the oft-observed caveat: The U. S. is, more correctly, a republic than a democracy.

Gang of Three on Cemetary Ridge

2009-09-03T23:02:00.000-04:00

The Gang of Three liked Cemetary Ridge. They did a great job of helping me adjust the wording to maintain the reader's trance. The little flash story is now more clear and harmonious.

I had to leave a day early for my meeting on a coastal island. The last straw was when one of the organizers warned me about massive construction on the last 60 miles of highway, which would cause me to be late to the first session. So no Stonepile this month.

I Miss David Letterman

2009-09-01T23:40:00.000-04:00

I was in college when David Letterman got his first late night talk show. He was the new thing. He was funny. His sense of humor was fresh back then.

He was a skeptic about the glam of show business while he was working in that same medium. He was a skeptic about government and of other centers of power. In short, he was a comedian, and comedians are best when they're working as an "out" and not as an "in."

Tonight David interviewed a guest who once modestly proposed that a world wide government (goodbye, U. S. A.) might be necessary to impose forced sterilization and abortion to control population. In such a regime, you would be a criminal if you had too many children. If a woman was found to be pregnant without permission she would be hunted down and her baby would be aborted--that's what forced abortion is.

Monsterous.

Since I am an old guy, I associate such advocacy with Chairman Mao. A person who calls for such measures is crying for Big Brother to take control of the most intimate aspects of our lives. If you have read my writing before, you know I am an advocate of freedom--of people freely working out solutions to their problems.

David got along well with his guest. No, he was not discussing just how great forced sterilization and abortion would be with the guest. He was discussing one of the latest advocacy fads, which, if enacted, would result in shorter, less fulfilling lives.

But I can never take a person who, as a sober, well-trained scientist, seriously advocated Big Brother. David Letterman can now take such a person seriously.

Of course this guest is now in a position of power. David's interview was, essentially, speaking power to truth.

I'll miss David Letterman. I'm just glad the old David did not live to see the new one.

Real Life

2009-08-31T16:10:00.004-04:00

As an expert witness, I once had to estimate the dollar loss to a couple suing for a possible malpractice that resulted in the death of their three day old child.

So I had to find an estimate of the cost of raising a kid in terms of money spent and in terms of the market value of the service provided by parents (maid, cook, chauffer, babysiter, etc.). The estimate was around $400,000 per kid.

Kids are the costliest little decisions in the world. The time and effort that one must take to raise a kid is huge.

So my three kids cost something less than $1.2 million dollars. I say less because some services do not multiply exactly--for example, hiring a cook for three is not three times as expensive as hiring a cook for one.

When I teach economics I tell my students that we undertake decisions for which the benefits outweight the costs. And I say that the benefits of each of my kids outweigh the costs. Overall, having a family is the best thing that one can do with one's life.

This idea is at the heart of economics. Perhaps we would rather dwell on benefits of things that we favor. But there are always costs. Since I can be happy, even with this perspective, perhaps I am fortunate I found my profession.

I wrote a haiku in which I attempted to express the essence of choice: we take one option, and we give up another. Whether we consider any of our options "good" or whether we consider all options "good," the getting, as well as the giving up, is the nature of choice.

Choice is all about living in the moment. All action takes place, as Pirsig said in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenence, on the present's knife edge, cutting through a boundless, undefined future, and leaving a decided past. Here is my haiku.

Tender shoots encased

in an age of ice. The hare

Picks the best bait's trap.

Spree!

2009-08-29T00:20:00.003-04:00

If we trade credit cards for a day, you'll buy lots of stuff that you would not have otherwise bought.

Since you would not have otherwise bought it, that reveals that the stuff was not as valuable as the stuff you bought before you had my credit card.

And I will do the same. I'll buy lots of computer games with your card that I had looked at longingly last week. I didn't buy them last week, though, because I bought stuff that had more value--stuff that was necessary.

You and I will spend lots of money inefficiently.

Oh, now let's do the same with health care credit cards. Voila! National health insurance!

Vick

2009-08-25T21:18:00.003-04:00

Michael Vick went to prison for two years for operating a dogfighting ring.

He was recently released and will soon be able to play professional football again.

He had to confess how wrong he was. He had to say that he now loves Big Brother. Or maybe he was saying that he now loves Little Rover.

It reminds me of an old song I heard on my family's Edison record player. The record was a quarter inch thick and the phonograph had to be wound with a crank.

Eastward, westward, home's the best word,
When you're blue and all alone.
Little Rover, think it over.
Don't forget to come back home.

If You're So . . .

2009-08-20T17:16:00.002-04:00

I am a PhD economist. When someone wants to diss me, they can easily say, "If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?"

Because I am not rich. I am barely making it to the end of the month. This month, in fact, seems to get longer each day.

Warren Buffett is worth $37 billion (he was worth $63 billion last year).

Buffett was an Obama supporter. He referred to Obama's Incarnation with the words, "You couldn't have anybody better in charge."

After seven months of spending, Buffet realizes that the deficit has exploded and that the administration only wants more spending. In a recent New York Times editorial, Buffet said, "Fiscally, we are in uncharted territory.”

He warns against more spending, though the administration clearly wants more. (That is what the current controversy is about).

Warren, how could you support the candidate that promised that government fix our mortgages, fix our banks, fix our companies, give us health care, give us a carbon-free planet*, and give us a free college education? Warren, how could you support him if you do not like mountains of government debt? Did you think he could spend straw into gold?"

Look at every single aspect of Obama's background and resume. Is there one single item that says that he thinks government should be bounded by law or by economic reality? How many items indicate that he knows of no bounds for government? (Yes, we can!)

So to Warren Buffett, I say, "If you're so rich, why aren't you smart?"

---------------------

*Yes, I know a carbon-free planet would be lifeless. I am giving a shout out to some friends who have told me that they hope mankind hurries and kills itself off, so that the planet can live in peace. I am doing them one better.

My Kid, Nostradamus, The Maya, and Obama

2009-08-19T21:02:00.006-04:00

My twelve year old read that the Mayan calendar ends in 2012 and that many kooks believe that the world will end along with the calendar. Now he's spooked.

Tonight he told me about aliens giving a woman the correct interpretation of Nostradamus's prophesies.* He decided, consistent with something his mom told him two nights ago, that the woman was nothing special. If aliens wanted to communicate with someone they would go to a world leader.

So my son sent an email to the White House.

I asked, "How did you do that?" I hoped that he did something that resulted in communicating with nobody.

But he said, "The White House has a web site with an email address."

I await the U. S. Secret Service knock at my door.

-------------------------------

*To help innoculate my kid against the goofballs that think that Nostradamus is coherent I found some of his prophesies and read them to him. He agreed that they were incoherent--not nearly as laden with meaning as the internet freaks would have him believe. Here is an example.

The large mastiff expelled from the city
Will be vexed by the strange alliance,
After having chased the stag to the fields
The wolf and the Bear will defy each other.

Oh, yeah, Nostradamus. I'll be sure to watch out for that mastiff if you'll keep track of that wolf and bear.

That's Amore

2009-08-18T22:42:00.002-04:00

My new associate dean's last name is Martin.

Today I asked him if he could sing. He did not know what to say. I said, "Now that you're Dean Martin, you've got to sing. Maybe you could practice, 'That's Amore.'"

It was the first time it occured to him that he is now Dean Martin.

He fired me.

Ebony and Irony

2009-08-17T18:06:00.001-04:00

I had to laugh.

Gene

2009-08-14T17:19:00.005-04:00

The dogs got hold of an old toy that we have had for years. This one does not have a lot of sentimental value for us, though. Nontheless we were not ready to have it shredded.

The toy is the small monkey that you see in this picture. It is about as big as your palm.

Julia said that the red thread that they pulled out of its mouth looked like a tongue. My twelve year old said, "From now on we should call him Gene Simian."

First Beating

2009-08-13T22:40:00.002-04:00

The university's fall semester is starting soon. We had our first beating of the year today. The bad news was a 6 day furlough--goodbye to a percentage of salary, since the state is broke.

The good news was that we have some private money and will get incentive rewards to publish. Even more unusual--they made the rewards retroactive to January 2008. The rewards can't be taken as cash payments. But they can fund travel to conferences or equipment/software purchases or even be used to "buy out" a course in summer.

Wrong

2009-08-11T11:24:00.003-04:00

Wrong is simple.

I own myself. It is wrong for anyone to violate that ownership.

How can someone violate my self-ownership? By killing me. By enslaving me. Killing is the greatest evil. Enslaving is the second greatest evil.

Slavery is taking away my choice by force or by threat of force.

If all property is owned by the king, I eat and live at his sufference. I must obey him or die. I am his slave.

I can only remain alive and free if I can trade my labors (part of me) in return for property.

If property is in the hands of many individuals, then I may be able to strike a bargain. I can cut your hair* in return for a loaf of bread, which you baked.

If the king forbids me from selling my services to others, he has enslaved me. If the king confiscates the bread which I earn from others, he has enslaved me.

If my neighbor's family decides that they will be kings, confiscating my property or otherwise enslaving me, that is wrong, too. If all use are free to confiscate or enslave, we do not make much bread. We spend lots of time defending.

So we need some means by which we protect each person from being coerced by others.

There you have it. Right and wrong.

All men [have] inalienable rights . . . life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secured these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their powers from the consent of the governed.

Note that if the government takes all my property, they have enslaved me. If they take half my property, they have half-enslaved me.

How do we fund a government to protect our rights? We can only do it through coercing each person to give up some of property in return for this protection. Hence, government is an illogical creation. The anarchists cannot get past that.

Many libertarians agree that government is a necessary evil. It is necessary, so we must have it. It is evil (coercion--partial slavery) so we should keep it small.

-----------------------
*You do not want me to cut your hair.

Surprise

2009-08-10T11:05:00.008-04:00

My brother's backwoods friend joined the air force. I think he was looking for a solid job that did not require a college degree--those were hard to find in the backwoods.

He trained to be a fuel technician. The fuel engineer sticks the nozzle into the plane's tank. The fuel technician operates the pump. At least that is what he told us.

The personnel officer asked him where he would like to be stationed. He said, "How about Alexandria," which was forty miles from home.

The personnel officer said, "How about Guam!"

He naturally figured that Guam was the closest base to Alexandria.

Surprise!

A Dog?

2009-08-08T11:22:00.000-04:00

On the way to the doctor's office, an SUV in front of us had a bumper sticker that read, "Beware of Dog."

Really? Was there a dog on board most of the time which passers-by should beware of?

Then, at the doctor's office a sign on the front door said, "Beware of Dog." We did not see any blind folks. We did not see any work dogs.

Apparently dogs have become ubiquitous in society.

By the way, neither sign had quote marks. I only used quotation marks to quote the signs.

"Bitter Barrier"

2009-08-07T16:53:00.001-04:00

I bought Bitter Barrier from OdaBall. If your dog has a chewing problem, spray this on what they like to chew and they stop, since it tastes bitter to them.

Ysabella was chewing on my Cat 5 cable. I sprayed the cable. She licked up the excess Bitter Barrier from the floor.

From now on I'll put quotation marks around "Bitter Barrier."

People With Jobs

2009-08-06T09:58:00.004-04:00

P. J. O'Rourke wrote about the following exchange with a friend in his book, Parliament of Whores.

"How come," I asked Andy, "whenever someone upsets the left, you see immediate marches and parades and rallies with signs already printed and rhyming slogans already composed, whereas whenever someone upsets the right, you see two members of the Young Americans for Freedom waving a six-inch American flag?"

We have jobs." said Andy.

In recent days crowds of people have packed U. S. representatives' and senators' speeches and town hall meetings to scream about current government attempts to reform health care.

The Obama administration and congress have dismissed these protesters as supported by various lobbying groups, implying that they are paid employees, not genuinely concerned citizens. The protesters have been said by Barbara Boxer, Steny Hoyer, and others to be dressed in Brooks Brothers suits.

I cannot figure out whom to believe--Obama/Boxer/Hoyer/etc. or my lying eyes. I have been watching these protesters for nearly a week. My eyes tell me that there are old guys dressed like my dad, in untucked collared shirts with vertical scroll patterns on the front, and women dressed in light blue cotton blouses, like my mom wore. There are middle-aged guys dressed in the collared knits shirts that I buy from Wal Mart for ten bucks. There are a few young folks, dressed in polos and khakis--like my students. My lying eyes have not revealed the rows of Brooks Brothers suits such as one can see at a banking convention.

On one hand, Obama/Boxer/Hoyer/etc. may have optic nerves that differ from mine (in fact, that would explain a lot). On the other hand, Obama/Boxer/Hoyer/etc. may not understand what it looks like when they see protesters who have jobs.

Quote Marks Strike Again

2009-08-05T21:13:00.002-04:00

At the doctor's office today, I saw signs that read:

"This is a no-smoking facility" -- GPM

Yes, the sign had quote marks on it. I previously ruminated on strange quote marks. In this case perhaps the office, GPM, was indicating that someone had, indeed, said this exact thing, so that the marks indicated a quotation, instead of adding a peculiar "emphasis."

Indian Cornbread

2009-08-04T20:47:00.003-04:00

The simplest dish that I know of is what southerners call indian cornbread. It is also called fried cornbread or hot water cornbread in some quarters.

Pour corn meal in a bowl.
Add some salt.
Pour in boiling water--paste should not be runny, but can stop just short of runny.
Shape into palm-sized disks with hands dipped in cool water.
Put in a cast iron skillet which has a thin layer of hot oil and fry until it starts to brown.
Flip, repeat.

My mom and grandma cooked it. My wife's mom and grandma cooked it. Men cooked it in wartime, since all you need is corn meal, water, and oil--when they could get even those simple ingredients.

So few people cook anymore that I do not know if indian cornbread will survive.

Rumpelstiltskin

2009-08-02T12:42:00.007-04:00

Yesterday my brother told me that he did not believe that any person who could get dressed in the morning could believe that one could tax (or borrow) a trillion dollars from the economy, spend it in the economy, and help the economy.

I assured him that I know plenty of people who are exactly like that. They believe that government can levy a $200,000 tax on a business person who takes home $150,000 per year and have no effect on anything.

I said, "There are two kinds of functional adults out there. One kind believes you can spin straw into gold (ala Rumplestiltskin) and another kind of person believes you cannot."

He said, "But they don't really believe that."

I said, "I have talked with many of them. They really believe it."

He said, "But they don't really believe it."

I said, "Yes. They really believe it. Some of my friends believe it. In my economics courses, there are always a few people who believe it. Some admit that they make decisions based on how they feel and don't want to think hard, but some think much too hard."

He said, "No. I mean, they don't really believe it. They couldn't."

We were at an impasse.

At the risk of offending those who believe we can spin straw into gold (as if I had not already), I think the perception comes from being a certain kind of intellectual. For instance, there are professors who insist that words have only private meanings--that there is no common meaning. And there are non-professors who follow these folks. But you should never ever hire one of those people to build a house for you, grow food for you, or do anything else in the practical realm where people could die.

Except for the professors and a few other "thinking" classes who follow them, however, no one asserts that such propositions (straw into gold, words mean nothing) are true with regard to practical matters such as immediate food and shelter.

However, people will assert that we can spin straw into gold with regard to the aggregate, or the abstract. With sophistry, we can put aside some basics.

For instance, during the health care debate in the Clinton administration, an economic truth came home to me. And it is a hard truth to dispel.

The nation pays for the nation's health care.

We can pay through out-of-pocket payments to doctors, through insurance premiums, or through taxes. But the nation pays for the nation's health care.

So the question becomes, "Which way is more efficient?" Which methods of payment encourage people to conserve while they consume? The best method of paying would have me never consuming $100 worth of something that is only worth $25 to me. Having others pay for my health care will invariably encourage inefficiency. Inefficiency means that we are taking food, shelter, and other worldly goods from people and destroying them. In my previous example, someone does not have food for the week because I spent their money on me. I may have destroyed $100 of their value to increase mine by $25.

Recently I saw a politician* assert that by looking at the cost of health care paid for by government, we dwell on the glass being half empty. That is true. The realist realizes that the glass is half empty and is also half full.

However, what that politician is currently attempting is to pour RC Cola** from my glass into someone else's glass, siphoning off some for his own glass. Meanwhile, he tells me that if I observe that my glass is nearly empty, I am a pessimist. That is, this politician says, "Forget about that guy with the empty glass," consistent with William Graham Sumner's noteworthy essay.

Since I have rambled in this post, I cannot end it properly.

So I return to my brother. He operates a crane on an offshore rig. If he messes up, people die and property is damaged. He realizes that words must mean things. He realizes that in the abstractions of life, that there are concrete necessities. And that when one smacks into concrete, it hurts.

Perhaps most engineering professors understand concrete--most journalism professors do not.

----------------

*Who, incidentally, has a string of ethics violations pending because he did not report taxable income.

**Although I have drunk RC Cola in the past, I am not a great fan. I use the example for its folksy twang.

News Flash: Dogs Fitting In

2009-07-31T10:39:00.000-04:00

Here are the dogs. They are both rat terriers from my dad's kennels. Jibbly is the black one with hair. Ysabella is the white one without hair.

Since I wrote about them before, they have reversed roles. Jibbly was coming out of her shell slowly, while Ysa blossomed all at once. Now Ysa seems timid, preferring to retreat to her crate until pried out. Jibbly is acting like she owns the place.

Once Ysa is on the couch beside someone, she's fine. As a pup, she has trouble with transitions. She seems frightened of going out the door. Once outside she is fine. And she is fine approaching the door from outside when she is ready to go inside. But she balks crossing over the threshold.

Both are healthy and happy and eating and fitting in.

My Alma Mater

2009-07-28T10:09:00.005-04:00

In its own way, this is the most beautiful campus in the world. Julia and I sat on that footbridge, day or night, watched and listened to the bayou.

When I did job search as I finished graduate school, I had an interview at my alma mater and at another university--one which was a cut above, with regard to research capabilities, which is what graduate students mostly consider.

I was torn. But when I got the offer to return to the bayou, I realized that I did not want anything else.

Oh, by the way, the University has classrooms, dorms, a huge library, and all the other stuff you need to educate a dozen thousand students.

Somehow, despite the fact that a medium sized university immediately surrounds this bayou, the natural beauty of this place is preserved. And somehow the administration manages to all-but-hide this jewel on their web site. I found it after a close inspection.

Lemma

2009-07-27T20:33:00.005-04:00

This is a lemma related to Murphy's law.

Even though you can't tie a knot that will hold in the face of any adversity, if you drop two sets of headphones in your bag, upon removal you will find them tied in undefeatable knots.

What's In "A Name"

2009-07-25T11:35:00.002-04:00

Julia and I were in a nearby city with a Mexican population so large that there is a Mexican side of town (with excellent authentic food).

We passed a sign that said,

"Sanchez" Auto Repair

Yes, the "Sanchez" was in quotation marks on the sign. What the heck was that?

Was the guy's name Santanna, but everybody called him Sanchez? Was the guy's name Sanders, but, since he served Mexican customers, they called him Sanchez?

Or did the guy have some deconstructionist outlook that views language, and also names, as artificial constructions that shape an arbitrary personal reality, such that any attempt at communication does not transmit information regarding a shared reality, but only reveals the biased worldview of the "communicator."

The latter is not likely because he is still in business. You can be a deconstructionist history professor, but not a deconstructionist auto repair person. "You say that your car is not running. But your car is 'running' our environment toward a cataclysmic ruin. $525.82, please. I don't take 'checks.'"

Dos Perros

2009-07-24T22:55:00.006-04:00

Dad let us pick out two dogs when we visted him on vacation. I had sent him a check earlier for one and he had returned it. The economist in me says, "I don't want you to sacrifice the amount of money you could get from selling a dog." But he would not hear of it.

We ended up picking out a very shy, small hairless dog. Also, the boys and Julia fell in love with a personable black hairy dog that Dad was going to give away. I did not want a hairy dog, but since she was so well behaved and playful, I relented.

Julia named the hairless one Ysabella. We call her EEsa.

My 12 year old kept trying to hang stupid names on the black dog. He wanted Rascal II, for instance. Too weird.

When he declared--probably his tenth sundry declaration--that the dog's name is Jibbly*--I perked up. She is, indeed, a Jibbly. It sounds sort of silly and fun, but unique.

Ysa bloomed at once. She became snuggly, playful, and possessive of Julia, just like Rascal was. She is so small that she could sit in an oversized coffee mug, but she does not eat food, so much as she attacks it for prolonged periods of time. She frolics, rearing up on her hind legs, throwing her forepaws up in the air, and pouncing. She's adorable.

Though Jibbly was so personable and playful at Dad's, she did not react well to the change of scenery. She wanted to sit on the couch, not get down and explore, not go outside (when I took her outside she only wanted to head to the front door to go back inside), not do anything, even eat or drink.

After we had her for about four days Jibbly began to throw up rocks. By rocks, I mean . . . rocks, like from my dad's yard. The largest one was the diameter of a quarter, and as thick as three quarters put together. The smallest was the size of two stacked dimes. There were four rocks in all. That may have had something to do with why she did not eat for so long.

After around a week Jibbly decided that our yard was not the most horrible place in the world and even got down from the couch. She began eating normally. She also began playing with us and with Ysa.

So now Jibbly is easier to like. Ysa's only problem is that she is not yet house trained. Alas. You can't spell "puppy" without a whole lotta' "p."

----------------
*The name "Jibbly" comes from a Homestarrunner cartoon. It is the sound Strongbad and others repeat over and over when they are weirded out to the point of twitching incoherence. I see Jibbly spelled on the net as Jibblie, but the pronunciation is not as clear with that spelling, a fact that been commented on by others on the net.

Morte d'Canid

2009-07-21T16:37:00.000-04:00

I previously talked about Rascal.

The electric fence failed repeatedly. Two batteries and a collar replacement later, the fence failed for the final time. Rascal got loose and was hit by a car.

We cried a lot.

On vacation we visited my mom's grave. On her headstone was a picture of her.

With Rascal.

It was like having a grave for Rascal there, too.

I didn't want my kids to start crying so I didn't show them.

Tow

2009-07-20T10:28:00.002-04:00

At the scene of my son's auto accident, the police asked whom I wanted to tow the wrecked truck. I gave them a name.

They could not reach my preferred wrecker service. They called another wrecker service who lived a mile from the scene.

The following day, I visited Ken's Wrecker Service. I said, "How much do I owe you?"

"$125."

Woah.

An expensive tow is $75. But, an economist understands that Ken was called out by the police and, as I stood there digesting that price, he had already performed the service, so I had no bargaining power. I would have bargaining power if I were stuck on the side of the road, calling different wrecker services.

$125.

I replied, "Impressive!"

He didn't know what to say.

Later, as my wife and I were looking for her cell phone in the car, calling it with another cell phone, Ken hemmed and hawed about how he had cleaned up the glass and had spread sand over the oil slick.

Yeah--I had watched Ken's labors. Some glass dust was on the road. Every window and windshield unbroken, but the front windshield was cracked, leaving the dust. The entire operation took him a minute.

But an economist understands absolute monopoly power, so I did not argue. It was nothing personal on Ken's part. It was business. He had me. He used all the power he had.

Since the month-old transmission had significant resale value, I needed the truck towed to my mechanic.

Ken did not get that job. Another wrecker service towed the truck from Ken's yard to my mechanic.

Nothing personal. Just business.

3:30 AM

2009-07-19T10:15:00.001-04:00

The phone rang at 3:30 AM.

My 19 year old said, "Dad, there's been an accident."

"Are you all right?"

"Yes."

"Is the truck all right?"

"No."

"Where are you?"

When I got there the police and ambulance were there. The officer asked questions about what happened and if drugs were involved. He took his word for it, even though police in this county have a reputation for hauling out the drug dogs even if you just failed to signal a turn.

The ambulance took my son's passengers to the emergency room and I took him.

They were all walking around. The girl had all the skin scraped off her chin, but was otherwise all right. The boy was all right.

My son needed seven stitches perpendicular across his eyebrow. His chest was cut and bruised from the seat belt, but there was nothing they could do for that.

The truck was totalled.

The truck was left to my wife and I by my father-in-law who died of leukemia in 1997. We had put around $3,000 of work into it--which was approximately the value of the truck--a month ago.

Goodbye second vehicle.

But my son is able to walk and talk and enjoy life.

Vacation Update III

2009-07-17T15:44:00.002-04:00

Part I: Rook

Rook is a Parker Brothers game that uses a weird deck of numbered cards (usually 5-14). Rook is like spades with a few twists. I remember going to my grandma's house and watching mom and dad play the game with my grandparents and their friends.

My grandfather played Rook on his death bed. He lingered in the hospital for three weeks after his heart attack in 1976. He had a few intravenous drips going, for which they taped some sort of board over his wrist and palm--I guess so he could not pull the IVs out.

He tried to shuffle and cut the IV board. He would mock my grandmother's bid now and then, as he had done many times. "90, by gawd!" He would discuss his luck at the cards and talk about what was going wrong and going right in the game.

I wrote a poem about the experience. It was special to me, but is probably confusing doggerel to the rest of the world.

I watched the U. S. Bicentennial celebration from the hospital chapel. I met a girl that I really liked, named Deanne Davis, from Raceland, Louisiana. My previously planned summer camp started and my parents insisted that I go. My grandfather died while I was there.

I was not going to tell a story about Wiley Edwards's quietly cantankerous son. This was about the vacation. But you need all that to understand why I had such a great time playing Rook with my 17 year old, my wife, and her aunt.

The first night, my son and I beat them badly. The next night, they began to beat us, but then we pulled nearly even before they won by a few points. It was great fun.

Part Two: Togetherness

My 17 and 19 year old boys had planned on us dropping them off to spend a week with their friends while we visited with relatives during our vacation. But the 17 year old decided he would rather stay with us.

The 19 year old was going to stay with a friend who would be moving out of his parents' home and into an apartment. But the friend was not out of his parents' home, and his parents were not amenable to putting up my son for a week.

So all three boys stayed with us. They were often bored. We always needed two hotel rooms. Eyi. Expensive.

Though everyone was dismayed at what might have been, I don't know how the vacation would have felt if we had not been together.

Vacation Update II

2009-07-12T22:06:00.003-04:00

A low point of the vacation was going to Lafayette, Louisiana and not being able to find good cajun food.

My sister-in-law took us to her usual place--Guidry's. Guidry is a great Cajun name. I even used it in Furnace Angel, my horror short story that crossed reality TV with Cajun folklore.

Guidry's was closed for a week or so. Sis-in-law could not think of another great Cajun place and neither could a friend she called. So we ate Greek food at the restaurant beside the hotel.

The food was great. Julia and I got a sampler platter that had some dolmades, hummus, tabouli, spiced lamb and spiced chicken. My 19 year old got an eggplant stuffed with other veggies--I warned him that it was a bold move. He hated it. My other two kids got stuff they liked. Sis-in-law hated feta cheese and hummus and could barely eat the shrimp--she didn't like the spices.

But the real high point was the laugh I got from my 11 year old.

A belly dancer performed. Nice.

The 11 year old was embarassed. He tucked his head into the neck of his shirt like a turtle. As the belly dancer was walking away, the waitress came up to the table and asked us if we needed anything else.

The 11 year old tentatively stuck his head up out of his shirt and said in a quavering voice, "Therapy."

Vacation Update I

2009-07-10T23:46:00.002-04:00

I discussed our problems getting started on vacation. I was going to do regular updates, but we have not had Internet access for most of the time. We were supposed to have plenty of access, but it has not worked out.

I will try to limit myself to one gripe per post and I will try to give one bright spot per post.

The biggest gripe is the car's air conditioner failure. In Louisiana heat, the AC worked for a few minutes yesterday and not at all today. When one needs a mechanic, the answer is "next Thursday, maybe," so we have had to bear with it. We are planning on (from now on) leaving early in the morning and stopping by noon or so.

A high point of the vacation was being able to complete a 1,000 word story for an Everquest II player-written book. The adventures of the unfortunate gnomish seige engineer, Pestal Pickworthy, are (I think) off to a good start.

I am still editing Pestal's first adventure a bit, but it is mostly there. Since I'm going to give away the story, I'll eventually publish the whole thing here.

More highs and lows tomorrow.