Reverie

"I was told by the founding members of the Women's Studies Department at the State University of New York at Albany that I had been brainwashed by male scientists to believe that hormones even existed, much less had any role in the shaping of our identity and character."--Camille Paglia

Filming people doing attention-getting things like climbing 62 floor buildings is like indulging acting-out children: It only gets worse.

The spectacular Lindsey Vonn was led into her Trump comment by a reporter and was not as much as a volunteer for controversy as it first was allow to appear. Regrettably she is getting death wishes from deranged Trump supporters. 

An interesting quote from Cochrane: The sad paradox of free markets is that free markets do not need people to understand them to work. But democracy does require voters to understand how things work.

The bakery case over the wedding cake for a gay couple is very complex and thought-provoking, especially with Justice Kennedy's surprisingly astute comment that it involves an act as well as a product. Andrew Sullivan, equally complicated,  wrote this: "And it is a hard case constitutionally. It pits religious and artistic freedom against civil equality and nondiscrimination. Anyone on either side who claims this is an easy call are [sic] fanatics of one kind or other."

I have no real legal background (that has never stopped me from having legal opinions) but my reading about totalitarians in history leads me to emphasize the right of free association in such a debate.

“Protectionism is not a principle but an expedient.” Disraeli said that. Trump is a protectionist, a position I do not understand well. It seems to say that a culture is economically benefitted by creating scarcity, a position that sounds pretty crazy. I do think there is a security question. For example, should a nation allow important military producers be squeezed out of existence by foreign nation's dumping?

Who is...Laura Kipnis?


A wonderful line that should be memorized: He has been a life-long foe of Mephistopheles, who advised the student in Goethe’s Faust to use words to conceal ignorance, to substitute words for what he did not understand….

In 1937, during the Sino-Japanese War, Nanking, the capital of China, fell to Japanese forces, and the Chinese government fled to Hankow, further inland along the Yangtze River.

To break the spirit of Chinese resistance, Japanese General Matsui Iwane ordered that the city of Nanking be destroyed. Much of the city was burned, and Japanese troops launched a campaign of atrocities against civilians. In what became known as the “Rape of Nanking,” the Japanese butchered an estimated 150,000 male “war prisoners,” massacred an additional 50,000 male civilians, and raped at least 20,000 women and girls of all ages, many of whom were mutilated or killed in the process. This was so horrifying that it drove some students of the period mad.

The number of Americans severely behind on payments on federal student loans reached 4.6 million in the third quarter, a doubling from four years ago, despite a historically long stretch of U.S. job creation and steady economic growth.

From Clark's review of Wolff:

Even more surprising, inherited wealth is much more important in the lives of those who have relatively little wealth than it is in the lives of the super rich. For the top 1% of wealth holders from 1989 to 2013, inherited wealth accounted for only 17% of their assets. (The 1%, in this analysis, is an overwhelmingly self-made group.) By contrast, for those with assets of just $25,000-$50,000, inherited wealth accounted for 52% of their worth.

As a bizarre consequence of this pattern, African-Americans, who have low levels of net worth on average, are the social group for which inherited wealth represents the largest share of their net worth. Another odd implication is that inheritances tend to make overall wealth-holding more equal. Were inherited wealth to be completely abolished, the wealth of the poor would decline more than that of the rich. Inherited wealth is the great equalizer.
Who knew?




Walt Disney Co. said it would buy select assets of 21st Century Fox for $52.4 billion in stock as it moves to bolster its video streaming and television businesses amid a changing media landscape. (wsj)




From the wsj on the FBI and their possible plans to influence an election. (While only suggestive, it's a lot stronger than the Russian evidence):

“I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office—that there’s no way [Trump] gets elected—but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk,” Mr. Strzok wrote Ms. Page in an Aug. 15, 2016 text. He added: “It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.”

What “policy” would that be? The “Andy” in question is Andrew McCabe, the deputy FBI director. FBI officials are allowed to have political opinions, but what kind of action were they discussing that would amount to anti-Trump “insurance”?

Here is the entire (short) article: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-fbis-trump-insurance-1513210929



Trump's tax cuts have matured from pro-growth to redistribution:

 

This is a little autobiographical note I received in an alumni letter from Wesleyan:

Hello! I’m Melisa Olgun '20. I’m an FGLI (first-generation, low-income) potential neuroscience and molecular biology and biochemistry double major (okay, maybe psychology) with a certificate in social, cultural and critical theory, and I’m also on the pre-med track. I also dabble in music as your favorite neighborhood flautist (with WesWinds) and am hoping to start a research project with music and cognition. I am from New York and Turkey, and here I am, all dressed up, for the Muslim Student Association’s first Eid Banquet earlier this semester! Stay tuned to have a look at my iCal-organized life!

As Knut Wicksell wisely pointed out nearly eighty years ago, most economists talk as if they are advising  a benevolent despot.  But, of course, such a despot is nonexistent.  Governments embody the choices and the actions of quite ordinary people, from voters who exercise their ultimate political rights of franchise through legislative representatives who act for voters and for themselves, to bureaucrats who actually carry out policy decisions, including some of their own.  The complex structure that is government cannot readily be controlled at any level, and any target is likely to be missed. --Buchanan

That is a good line about advising a benevolent despot.

ABC has decided to quit airing the third season of The Great American Baking Show after harassment allegations have surfaced involving judge Johnny Iuzzini.

Net neutrality: Generally the more upbeat the law's name, the less the name resembles what's in the law. There has been a bomb threat over the passage of the new net law. A bomb threat. The jurisdiction for regulation of the internet providers (vs. content providers) was changed yesterday from the Federal Communication Commission to The Federal Trade Commission. That is to say, changed back to the way it used to be before 2015. ISPs will again be under the jurisdiction of the Federal Trade Commission, which will again be responsible for pursuing cases to protect consumer privacy and data security, including cases involving fraudulent, deceptive or otherwise unfair and anti-competitive business practices. There has been a lot of angst over the threat of this change but were things so bad before 2015? And the Open Internet rules the FCC devised based on its Title II authority expressly permit ISPs to block, filter and curate content.
Is that so good?

The nature of those seeking to govern us should be clear to everyone now. And it should be clear that government, as The Great Attractor, attracts some characteristics more than others. We should all remember that none of us will be protected by what a law says. (Remember "Separate but Equal?")  We will be protected by only one thing: Vigilance-with-a-Spine. Drag the lava lamps into the safe spaces and everyone hold hands. We'll be ok with this one (as long as the lovers of freedom, peace and harmony don't bomb us.)

An editorial on the subject: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-internet-is-free-again-1513297405


Golden oldie: http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2014/04/putin-redux.html

Putin Redux steeleydock.blogspot.com http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2010/10/chilean-miners-and-k-141.html A debate has popped up over which economic system is responsible fo...

The killings of two members of South Africa’s ruling African National Congress, both set to cast crucial ballots at the party’s leadership conference this weekend, mark the latest in a violent spree that has left at least 40 local politicians dead since the start of last year. (wsj) Ah, Politics.

"No society can truly flourish when a significant portion of its people feel threatened or unable to fulfill their potential. Nor can it prosper by excluding those who want to make positive contributions. This isn’t just a noble principle; it’s a basic fact, borne out through our national history.
Dreamers are doing their part. They have shown great faith in the United States by coming forward, subjecting themselves to background checks, and submitting personal and biometric data.
Now, the rest of us need to do our part. Congress should act quickly, ideally before year’s end, to ensure that these decent people can work and stay and dream in the United States."--Cook and Koch in WashPo
Is this true?


Abuse update: An MSNBC spokesman confirmed the company made a separation-related payment to one of Chris Matthews employees after the woman complained about sexual harassment.


Don forwarded an article that questions the West's confidence in its origins and development. It contains this interesting segment--the American Exceptionalism line is more complicated (and a bit misleading as Obama is actually misunderstanding the origin and meaning of the phrase) but the Swedish observation is fascinating:

"During a press conference in Strasbourg in 2009, for instance, then-President Barack Obama began by downplaying the uniqueness of the United States. "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."

In addition, in 2010, Mona Ingeborg Sahlin, the leader at that time of the Swedish Social Democratic Party, told a gathering of the Turkish youth organization Euroturk:

"I cannot figure out what Swedish culture is. I think that's what makes many Swedes jealous of immigrant groups. You [immigrants] have a culture, an identity, a history, something that brings you together. And what do we have? We have Midsummer's Eve and such silly things.""

Having weathered one Title IX investigation last year in response to a critical essay she wrote about Title IX prosecutions in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Northwestern film studies professor Laura Kipnis was accused of Title IX violations again this fall for her new book, Unwanted Advances: Sexual Paranoia Comes to Campus. In other words, as First Amendment lawyer Ken White observed, she was investigated for writing a book about being investigated for writing an essay about being investigated.

Bitcoin's price set a new record on Saturday as the virtual currency rose above $19,000 for the first time on the Bitstamp exchange. The gains came just hours after the currency crossed the $18,000 mark. Bitcoin's value has doubled over the last three weeks, and it's up more than 20-fold over the last year.

The Pentagon finally acknowledged the existence of the $22 million program today to the New York Times, while also claiming that they closed the program five years ago. "But its backers say that, while the Pentagon ended funding for the effort at that time, the program remains in existence. For the past five years, they say, officials with the program have continued to investigate episodes brought to them by service members, while also carrying out their other Defense Department duties." This was a program initiated by the giant brained Harry Reid.

Aaaaaaaannnnnnnnndddddd.......... a picture of FGLI Ms. Olgun all dressed up for the Eid Banquet: