Liberals are the People of the Future

My understanding of liberals and conservatives goes like this: Liberals are optimistic about change. Whether it's religious freedom in Rhode Island hundreds of years ago or Civil Rights 50 years ago, it was liberals pushing for change they believed would improve the country. Conservatives on the hand are skeptical of change. Whether it's the fight over the National Bank in the 1800's or FDR's New Deal, it was conservative trying to stop the change they believe would harm country.

Liberals are looking forward to improve the world and conservatives are looking backward. That means, if life is changing then by default, liberals are the people of the future. What was reprehensible in the beginning of the 19th century was the norm by the end of the century (think the train, the lightning rod, and jazz).  What was reprehensible in the beginning of the 20th century was the norm by the end of the century (think the car, birth control, and rock and roll).

But that does not means liberals are always right. The future is not always better. Growing government, shrinking families, stagnant economies are just a few problems of modernity. However, this can help us predict what cultural shifts will become normal. For example, recently in Italy a woman convicted of murdering her sister had her prison sentence reduced based on her abnormal brain scan. Another example is the future option of choosing our children's genetic futures. These ideas make me very uncomfortable, but I'm not sure if they'll make my grandchildren uncomfortable.

My rule of thumb has been to ask myself if once the change is complete, is the world better off or worse off. Ignore the technological and political hurdles required. Ignore the cultural destruction it will cause. Ignore how it makes you feel and try to calculate how it could make you feel. Or, just see what your liberal friends think.

Emptying the Bottle: Late-August '11 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile links I've Bookmarked recently:

• Exchangeable credits for skipping class to prevent skipping class.


• The misunderstood history of negative campaign ads [video].


• Turning good workers into criminals and criminals into bad workers.


• Ability to change your mind = Ability to Reason [graphic].


• Less than 3 percent of spending in the U.S. goes to China.


• How a secret roll of the dice can account for lying in large samples.


• Wishing someone luck (if they believe in it) can improve performance.


• Explainxkcd.com, explaining nerd humor to the rest us (via Justin).


• When it comes to group work, be sure to put someone in charge.


• Are youth the most discriminated people in America today [video]?


• Spoiling the ending makes for a better story [audio].


• The richer you are the busier you are (earlier).

As always, feel free to email me anything interesting you come across.

Why Many Ignore Ron Paul

I've been an open supporter and voter for Ron Paul (here, here, and here), who recently placed second in the Iowa straw poll. Yet, you may not have heard about it. Jon Stewart explains it as only he can:

Here's Tim Stanley from the Telegraph with a pretty good explanation why:

Sometimes the media ignores Ron Paul out of ignorance or spite. Sometimes it’s because they’ve done the math and convinced themselves that he can’t win. Other times, I suspect that they take a look at the people chanting his name in the bleachers and they don’t like what they see. The Paulites are good folk worried about the direction of their country, but their exclusion from the mainstream makes them come off like the vanguard of a Hicksville revolution. Television is a cool medium. Ron Paul and his angry army are too hot for it.

Update: But Ron Paul's not frustrated. From Dr. Paul:

it’s not like I’m just trying to win and get elected. I’m trying to change the course of history.

Do you feel PERSECUTED? If NO, speak up?

Last night I blogged about one apparent opposition party staff who tweeted about calling a particular 'religious group' to go to a particular rally.

Today, I read about one Tony Yew who made a police report - yes, against that Twitterer.

Mr Tony said this on his blog... "A few nights ago, one of CM Lim Guan Eng's staff had saw it fit to jump on the bandwagon (despite normally blogging about her mundane life) of Bersih 2.0 by calling on 'all Christians to march for the persecution 'they' had done to us and our lord'. If you ask me if there are any persecutions, I would fault it on a former Education Minister who removed the Cathechism classes and replaced it with POL. Are there any other? There is talk of crosses being removed from church buildings, and I challenge those who accuse the government of having an official policy on this. But to incite ALL CHRISTIANS to march and turn a gathering into a religious one? What is she thinking off? More importantly, what has CM Lim Guan Eng been talking to his staff about to bring about these kinds of attitude? All these simply points to the 'Christian Nation' issue recently as not being far from fiction! We must all behave responsibly, and making such reckless remarks hardly qualifies one to work for a Chief Minister! Especially if one is in his 'Media team'."

So... now it is up to the relevant authorities to investigate and make the right decisions against any potentially irresponsible remarks. =)

Picture sourced from here.

The Unseen Costs of Easy Money

For several years now the Federal Reserve has been printing money (quantitative easing) and lowering interests (through the discount window) in attempt to improve the US economy . Here's why that's not that great of a great idea:

More than any other policy action, monetary policy suffers from the sense that there is a free lunch to be had. Yet the interest rate is a price for the savings that are transferred to spenders. To the extent that the Fed manages to push this price down (and some economists will dispute its ability to push any meaningful interest rate down), it taxes the producers of savings and subsidizes the spenders of savings. Clearly, no government considers pushing down the price of any real good an effective way to stimulate the economy – any gain to consumers is a loss to producers, and the loss typically will outweigh the gain if the market price is a fair one.

Do we really want to be discouraging saving and encouraging debt?

Our PM in Kazakhstan for Official and Unofficial Visit. =)

Our Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak is in Kazakhstan right now for an official visit - as well as attendance to the WIEF, and subsequently, for his daughter's engagement/wedding. All the above - are indeed in Kazakhstan. Najib's daughter Nooryana, 22 years old is set to marry Daniyar Nazarbayev, the son of the top Kazakhstan official. Somehow, based on the articles that I read - the opposition have decided to bash our PM and the First Lady for apparent abuse of power and for lacking class.

Our PM, the First Lady and their daughter.

If you read Rembau MP KJ's twitter, you'll hear of Mr KJ defending our PM on this issue - calling PAS' Dzulkefly Ahmad's attack a cheap shot and concocting "despicable lies" and "desperate spins".

I would think that PAS' Dzulkefly Ahmad, DAP's Sibu MP Wong Ho Leng and even Batu MP Tian Chua - all of whom decided to bash our PM and accuse the PM - have obviously done that as... like what KJ calls it - a cheap shot. An international forum such as the World Islamic Forum (WIEF) would take at least 12 months in advance to plan... and that itself is already evidence that perhaps the Opposition had not organized a big event before.

But instead of thinking and accusing that our PM had arranged for the official site visit and also the WIEF to coincide with his daughter's wedding - perhaps our PM had arranged the wedding to be similar time as the visits/forum so that he doesn't waste extra time flying around so that he can have more time to serve us better?

The zebra, could be white on black, or black on white. It's just which side you choose to see.

Emptying the Bottle: Late-May '11 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile sites I've Bookmarked recently:

• Republican professors are more comfortable with grade inequality (earlier).
• Being in charge makes us less empathetic (earlier).
• Honesty is bravery [graphic].
• The costs and benefits of logic [graphic].
• The point of owning of pet (by my request).
• Sorting email into folders doesn't help.
• Eating breakfast can help you lose weight (earlier).
• Exercise, multi-tasking, sleep, stress' affect on the brain.
• Boys who lack empathy don't react to a fearful face (earlier).
• Cable network news tickers decrease comprehension.
• Let the dead pay for Medicare.

As always, feel free to email me anything interesting you come across.

Economic Strategy to Fight Protesters

I've always been skeptical of the benefits of protesting as a way to shout your vote. The infamous Westboro Baptist Church, as I've shared before, is a great example of protest gone bad. This may be the best strategy to get rid of them:

Comedy’s Lovable Queen of Mean Lisa Lampanelli made good on her promise to donate $1,000 to the Gay Men’s Health Crisis for every Westboro Baptist Church member who showed up to protest her recent stand-up show in Topeka, taking to Twitter after the show to say “Thanks to these a-holes, $44,000 will be donated to the GMHC!!!” 

She later bumped it up by $6k, tweeting “WBC inbreds counted 48 protesters, so I won’t quibble. I’ll make it an even $50,000!!!” 

Best part? The donation will be made in the hate group’s name. Thanks WBC!

Apparently this strategy has also worked for Planned Parenthood.

Worthwhile Sentences on Interventionism

From Mark Zuckerberg: "A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa."

From Tate Watkins: "What if an international peacekeeping force had descended into Charleston after Confederate troops bombarded Fort Sumter?"

From Planet Money: "Has any single human being, either directly or indirectly, cost the United States more money than Osama bin Laden?"

From John Mueller and Mark Stewart: "The cumulative increase in expenditures on US domestic homeland security over the decade since 9/11 exceeds one trillion dollars."

From Paul Valery: “Two dangers constantly threaten the world: order and disorder.”

The Stimulus Package Didn't Work

I've have discussed the stimulus package a lot. Here's the closing data:

Our benchmark point estimates suggest the Act created/saved 450 thousand government-
sector jobs and destroyed/forestalled one million private sector jobs. The large majority of
destroyed/forestalled jobs are in a subset of the private service sector comprised of health,
(private) education, professional and business services, which we term HELP services.

Emptying the Bottle: Mid-May '11 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile sites I've Bookmarked recently:

• Why Bollywood (bottom up change) is better for fighting radical Islam [video].
• Justin Scott's thoughts on bin Laden with which I totally agree (earlier).
• Why MySpace eventually lost most of its traffic to Facebook.
• How politicians get around answering uncomfortable questions.
• NY Hasidic newspaper cuts Hillary Clinton from the situation room photo.
• Winning the lottery hurts (especially if you're the type who plays the lottery).
• Interview with the simple billion (here's his house) Warren Buffett's son [audio].
• Is depression just over self reflection and if so what are the benefits?
• Voting is correlated with satisfaction, not unsatisfaction (earlier).
• Early start times for schools can increase car accidents for students (eariler).
• What you see is what you hear, even when you know it's wrong [video].
• Wisdom of the crowd only works if the crowd don't interact.

As always, feel free to email me anything interesting you come across.

Dirty South Improv Heads to Kenya?

33 seconds in.

Mega hat tip to Justin Wehr.

A Simple Morality Test

If we are more likely to choose the moral choice if the framework is simple, then here's the best tool I've ever heard. From economist and author Steve Levitt: "How would I feel if my daughter were engaged in that activity?" I don't have a daughter, but I bet little sister is a comparable substitute. I can honestly say I wouldn't mind my sisters working at Walmart, playing online poker, marrying interracially, not voting, buying from China, refusing panhandlers, speculating on oil, or smoking legalized pot.

Osama bin Laden Never Scared Me

Last night I came across part of an episode of This American Life. It's a conversation with a college student, Lexi Belculfine, who was one of thousands of Penn State students who took to the streets in celebration after announcement of Osama bin Laden's death. This celebration is something the interviewer, and myself, have struggled to understand. The student explained that people currently under thirty experienced 9/11 in a very different way than people over thirty today. To them bin Laden was the boogeyman who convinced a generation that they weren't as safe as their parents said they were.

I'm under thirty and I didn't have that reaction. When my wife called me and told me they found Osama bin Laden, I couldn't wait to watch the trial. To see what I saw when they captured Saddam Hussein. A sad old man who lived in a hole with his tired eyes and shabby beard. But when my wife called me the second time to say they killed him I was a little disheartened. I didn't understand why until I listened to the Penn State student's story. Unlike Lexi, I was never scared of bin Laden. I think it's a combination of 1) being in a mid-sized southern town, far away from NYC, DC, and the eyes of terrorists and 2) my general lack of empathy. For me, 9/11 was sad, in the same way the earthquake in Haiti was sad and the tsunami in Japan was sad.

And I wanted that for everyone else. I wanted them to see just how sad, tired, and foolish bin Laden was. I wanted the world, east and west, to agree that he was a terrible man whose plan on 9/11 actually failed miserably at it's goal of getting America to stop meddling the affairs of the Middle East. He was not a shadowy figure, but a self-righteousness propagandist. I'm not convinced the vengeful feelings of satisfaction are helpful. I don't think we should celebrate the death of America's scariest enemy. I think we should recognize that he was never that scary to begin with.

Emptying the Bottle: Early-May '11 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile sites I've Bookmarked recently:

• The government asked for information illegally, but make it illegal to report them.
• A marital Should-You-Bring-It-Up-O-Meter [graphic].
• Why we left the gold standard in the first place [audio] (earlier).
• The top reasons for Facebook un-friending?
• U.S. home prices, sung as an opera [audio].
• Why students who sit at the front of the class do better.
• Why poor people buy TV's and why others' choices seem irrational.
• President Theodore Roosevelt on limiting "degenerates to reproduce their kind".
• The way you shape your face affects how you respond and makes you more creative.
• President Obama and Seth Meyers burn Donald Trump [videos].

As always, feel free to email me anything interesting you come across.

Honest Discussion of Nuclear Power

I've tried (and tried) to show that safety isn't a concern, but that doesn't mean it's the right choice:


End all energy subsidies and tax all externalities so we can tell which is really the best choice.

Public Choice Theory 101

Here's the introduction to any good public choice theory class. It explains why the recent budget "cuts" turned out to not be real cuts and why it is perfectly rational for politicians to take from the many and give to the few:

Emptying the Bottle: Late-April '11 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile sites I've Bookmarked recently:

• Doing improv for more than just the laughs.
• Drug prohibition increases the homicide rate (earlier).
• Playing music only helps you learn if it's music you like (earlier).
• The BEST thing I've read on future budget and election issues.
• Half of all U.S. health care is already paid for by the government (earlier).
• Cooking today compared to the hassle from past generations (earlier).
• The one time America paid off it's debt (earlier) [audio].
• Even knowing our irrationalities (earlier), it's hard to nudge us successfully (earlier).
• Harsher prison conditions lead to more post-release crime (earlier).
• Tornados were mostly an American phenomenon [map].
• Our empathy affects our expectations for empathy, changing our interaction (earlier).
• You need 8 hours of sleep and worse, you aren't aware of it's terrible effects (earlier).

As always, feel free to email me anything interesting you come across.

Economics of Polygamy

Polygamy acted as husbandly insurance against an individual wife’s barrenness, as well as high child mortality rates, and made ill or aging wives less burdensome. If it was taboo to have sex with pregnant and lactating women (which increased a nursing child’s chances of survival), new fathers suffered neither sexual privation nor a waiting period to produce another child. And with so many children, polygamists had plenty of sons to work the land or contribute to their commercial ventures; in militaristic societies, these sons were prized as military recruits. Daughters, less valued, were still useful for domestic work, or to be advantageously married off to polygamous men.

That's from a wonderful article on the possibility of legalizing polygamy in Canada. A concern this article raised, but didn't answer, is how the culture of polygamy, like illegal drugs, might change if it was raised out of the legal shadows.

Moral Requirement of Voters

I talk a lot about voting, but rarely in the positive. If you do vote, here's some sound advice:

As a citizen, you do not owe it to others to provide them with the best possible governance. But if you take on the office of voter, you acquire additional moral responsibilities, just as you would were you to become the Federal Reserve chairperson, a physician, or a congressperson. The electorate decides who governs. Sometimes they decide policy directly. They owe it to the governed to provide what they justifiably believe or ought to believe is the best governance, just as others with political power owe it to the governed to do the same.

Or, as economist Bryan Caplan summarizes:

There's no duty to vote, but if you do vote, you have a duty to vote "only for things [you] justifiably believe would promote the common good."