Apparently Torture Isn't The Only Thing Lynndie England Ruined For Everybody

The missus relayed a CNN report that a study commissioned by the Pentagon has recommended the military ban the use of tobacco entirely.

As a never-smoker, who personally despises cigarette smoke and all of the things it does, I am nonetheless absolutely appalled that the military is even considering this breach of basic human liberty. Ok, scratch that, I’m still appalled, but on grounds of utility rather than principle. Are the quasi-conscripted enlisted to be spared nothing? Look for mass mutiny if this is ever enacted.

Of course, I am preemptively invoking Godwin’s Law by pointing out that both the motivation and the apparent receptivity of senior military brass for banning the vile weed from America’s sainted Imperial legions echo another old soldier’s logical enthusiasm for banning tobacco.

Motley look, great band. Canada wins again!

The Dears Money Babies on YouTube

I don’t usually look to musicians for economic illumination

- (except maybe blues musicians - this IS a Depression, after all, and blues IS Depression Music) -

…but I just LOVE The Dears’ “Money Babies”;

Our money is elastic. Our money is elastic.

Gotta get milk for the baby and our money is elastic.

Decapitative laughter is keeping us alive.

Cavalcades of losers, losing their minds.

Hoping for disaster. Settin’ off alarms.

Amid all of the deranged. Amid all the charmed.

Do you remember that time when we thought we were gonna die?

Well, baby nothing much has changed.

And yet they haven’t been the same since at all.

Our money is elastic. Our money is elastic.

Gotta get milk for the baby. Gotta get milk for the baby.

(Honorable Mention - not economic, but also Canadian - Hey Rosetta - “Red Heart”)

Oh, and - Holy Shit! - The Hold Steady - “Constructive Summer” - (Joe and I can relate to this)

Raise a toast to St. Joe Strummer / I think he might have been our only decent teacher / getting older makes it harder to remember / we are our only saviors

Will the stimulus bill facilitate that much-needed transition to more efficient technologies? Severin Borenstein, for one, is doubtful. Borenstein, the director of the University of California Energy Institute, says the problem with the stimulus funding is that when it comes to existing technologies, the DOE will need to pick which projects to support. "The worry is that the government will invest in the wrong technologies," he says; picking technology winners is something that "historically it has not been very good at."A far more effective way to promote the growth of renewable energy, he believes, is to put a price on carbon dioxide emissions through a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade scheme (see "Carbon Trading on the Cheap," p. 72). Either approach would provide market-based incentives for deploying renewables and would represent a more efficient and "technology-­neutral" government policy. At the same time, he says it is important for the government to fund research into new renewable technologies.

From an economist’s perspective, Borenstein says, government subsidies are justified to address "market failures": cases in which the market doesn’t allocate enough resources to the pursuit of socially desirable goals, such as reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. The government incentives then support efforts that are financially risky but are likely to provide a common benefit. In such a context, he says, the argument for public spending on research into new solar technologies is strong–but the case for subsidizing the current commercial technologies, particularly photovoltaics, is "really weak." Existing photovoltaics are expensive even compared with other renewables such as wind and solar thermal, he says, and they won’t necessarily lead to cheaper technologies, either. "You’re obviously going to get [solar] panels put in, but is that going to generate something that will have a lasting benefit? Will it help you build a solar industry? I think the answer is probably not."

Borenstein says direct government subsidies to support existing photovoltaics could in fact impede the development of more efficient technologies. "There is no question that there is what economists call ‘option value’ lost when you invest in the current technology," he says. "If the technology is about to get a lot better, and is about to get a lot better for reasons that don’t have to do with building out the current technology but because the science is going to improve, that’s an argument for waiting. You’re crowding out future investment by investing now. The money would be better spent five years from now on the new technology."

I hate to tell him this but “socially desirable goals” are like assholes; everybody has one. How does he rate solar power in relation to education? Or clean water? Or recycling? Or the preservation of whales? The answer is much simpler than he thinks. The market will rate all of these things and more seamlessly. But he does admit that present photovoltaic technology is not to a point where it would make sense to install solar panels just yet. Why the sudden onset of common sense? Could it be because he would like taxpayer largess to be spent on academics like himself?

Severin Borenstein, director of the U.C. Energy Institute, argues that state and federal subsidies for solar panel installations should instead go to increasing research and development budgets.

The Porkulus Comes To South Jersey

But look closely at logo at the lower left - it looks vaguely familiar;

Look Familiar?

“America is a lot more than the US government. America is Fox News, CNN, and NBC and the Cato Institute and lots of other people.”

I presume that by “lots of other people,” he’s referring to the likes of Max Boot and Geraldo Rivera. Scroll to 5:42 to hear it for yourself. So America is no longer you and I and the printer and the school teacher and the baker on the corner. It’s now just a metaphor we use to refer to the movers and shakers such as Boaz and his elitist Washington thinktank buddies.

Two lovely and very talented women, Annie Clark (St. Vincent) and Shanti White (Santigold)

Two women whose music I have admired for a while - St. Vincent’s Annie Clark performs “Laughing With A Mouth Of Blood” from their new record “Actor”, the time she spent in Sufjan Stevens‘ touring band is rather evident  in the string arrangement, and the use of ’stage space’ to evoke a feeling of traditional 50’s and 60’s pop music within a modern context;

Santigold (Shanti White’s nom de musee) has provided a song, “Lights Out” that Budweiser is using to sell its lime-flavored beer. As with other recent advertising synergies, who is using who is arguable, see Feist; with it’s chugging, Breeders-like, melody, Juliana-Hatfield-esque vocals, and lyrical phrasing that reminds me of the Clash’s “Spanish Bombs”, White does little wrong here, very different from the MIA-inspired fau-ca (e.g. “Creator”) she has been doing recently.

(I will only briefly mention that she is the daughter of deceased Philadelphia attorney Ron White.)

We don’t have a very good track record of staying out of Iran’s business though;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat

http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/library/news/2009/intell-090113-rferl01.htm

While Obama, against all odds, continues to state this bafflingly sensible policy, Limbaugh, Hannity, et al have been busy persuading my “conservative” friends and family that we need to whip some “democracy” on Iran, causing them to look at me like I have three heads when I say we have meddled in Iran enough already.

…Yes, what downloaders and blog-rippers are doing is technically illegal under monopoly-protecting copyright law.

And yes, it quite often serves the interests of those who are “ripped off” despite the fact that it is illegal, and the artist being “ripped off” can get the full force of the law after the rippers at any moment, hardly a fair or transparent business model if you ask me.

No one ever talks about what would happen if copyright didn’t exist (another argument AGAINST the US constitution, BTW);

Q: Would people still make art and music?
A: Just try and stop them.

Q: Would they make money?
A: About as much as all the other existing businesses who don’t enjoy copyright protection.

Q: Won’t big movie studios and big record companies go out of business, preventing records and movies from ever being made?
A: Are you dense? There are MILLIONS of individuals, cooperatives, and small studios and labels out there already. Do you think they would see the big guys fail, and just say “well, I guess that’s it, let’s close up shop”?

Will they bollocks.