Kindle v. Ipad thought of the day

Posted on April 11, 2010 by Daniel

The iPad is emphatically not a serious readers’ device: the only people who would genuinely consider it a Kindle killer are those for whom the idea of reading for pleasure died years ago; if it was ever alive. The people who will spout bullshit like “I read on screen all day” when what they really mean is “I read the first three paragraphs of the New York Times article I saw linked on Twitter before retweeting it; and then I repeat that process for the next eight hours while pretending to work.” That’s reading in the way that rubbing against women on the subway is sex.

Larry Summers says that Obama’s environmental policies are harming the economy

Posted on April 6, 2010 by Daniel

Of course that’s not how Larry put it, but it is exactly what he said:

In a speech at a U.S. Energy Information Administration conference, Summers said passing legislation would help reduce uncertainty that may be discouraging businesses from investing and hiring.

"The cheapest stimulus program in the world is enhanced confidence," Summers said.

The Senate has struggled to strike a compromise on a bill that would reduce the country’s greenhouse gas emissions and boost alternative energy without unduly burdening businesses that are slowly recovering from a recession.

…

Summers said uncertainty over the timing and scope of energy legislation was hindering businesses from making major investments in projects, such as building new power plants, restraining hiring when the economy desperately needs jobs.

Why is there uncertainty? Because Obama is pushing policies that would increase the price of energy and make it more difficult to do business in the United States. Also, his EPA is busying regulating greenhouse gases and the results aren’t necessarily predictable.

So what is there a lack of confidence (in the context of what Summers is talking about)? Obama’s policies. In other words, Obama’s policies are harming the economy.

Bill Simmons’ take on sophisticated baseball stats

Posted on April 5, 2010 by Daniel

Bill Simmons has converted to liking sophisticated baseball statistics:

I didn’t want to believe it. Cautiously, nervously, I started researching the advanced stats, begrudgingly coming to one conclusion: The baseball friends were right. Baseball is an individual sport disguised as a team sport. The players are Strat-O-Matic cards with arms and legs. Like Strat-O-Matic, there’s more than a little luck involved, but other than that, you are who you are. The numbers don’t lie. Coming up with the right numbers … that’s the trick. And the numbers indicated the 2010 Red Sox would get on base, get quality starts and catch the ball much better than in 2009.

Little did I know, the ball was rolling for me. I spent March reading and surfing sabermetrics for mostly selfish reasons ("I want this column to be better," "I want an edge for fantasy purposes," "I’m bored"), but also because the advanced formulas weren’t nearly as intimidating as I had expected. Full disclosure: I, um … I-I kinda like them. I even understand why stat junkies take it so personally whenever a mainstream guy spouts out an uninformed baseball opinion. It’s too easy to be informed these days. Takes a lot less time than you might think.

Without further ado, here are seven statistics that — assuming you aren’t already saber-obsessed — will help you understand baseball better without cluttering your mind, breaking your brain or causing you to feel like you’re trapped in an AP calculus exam from hell. These stats make understanding baseball more fun. At least for me.

Obama believes were are undertaxed

Posted on April 5, 2010 by Daniel

…if not, but else would it take him 17 minutes to respond to a simple statement that we are overtaxed. From the Washington Post:

Toward the end of a question-and-answer session with workers at an advanced battery technology manufacturer, a woman named Doris stood to ask the president whether it was a "wise decision to add more taxes to us with the health care" package.

"We are over-taxed as it is," Doris said bluntly.

Obama started out feisty. "Well, let’s talk about that, because this is an area where there’s been just a whole lot of misinformation, and I’m going to have to work hard over the next several months to clean up a lot of the misapprehensions that people have," the president said.

He then spent the next 17 minutes and 12 seconds lulling the crowd into a daze. His discursive answer – more than 2,500 words long — wandered from topic to topic, including commentary on the deficit, pay-as-you-go rules passed by Congress, Congressional Budget Office reports on Medicare waste, COBRA coverage, the Recovery Act and Federal Medical Assistance Percentages (he referred to this last item by its inside-the-Beltway name, "F-Map"). He talked about the notion of eliminating foreign aid (not worth it, he said). He invoked Warren Buffett, earmarks and the payroll tax that funds Medicare (referring to it, in fluent Washington lingo, as "FICA").

Obama’s automobile hypocrisy

Posted on April 4, 2010 by Daniel

I really dislike hypocrisy in politicians. Many, like the President, will tell the rest of us to do one thing while they do something else. Obama’s limo is a good example. In the video below, he explains why he can have a hybrid limo. His answer is that the Secret Service says that a hybrid’s performance isn’t good enough. That’s funny, because he’s willing to foist a new fuel economy mandate on Americans that will lead to more traffic deaths, but he doesn’t want to reduce his own safety.

You know those crazy right wing radical militia members…

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Daniel

They might not be so right wing. According to the best-named newspaper in the land, the Toledo Blade:

Most of the indicted militia members accused of being anti-government extremists have active voting records, a check with area voter registration offices showed yesterday.

One is a registered Democrat, and the party affiliations of the rest could not be determined.

Jacob J. Ward, 33, of Huron, Ohio, voted as a Democrat in the 2004 and 2008 primary elections, and in 10 other elections since 2000. Voters’ political affiliations in Ohio are determined by which party’s ballot they request during even-year primary elections.

Why don’t the new fuel economy standards impact global warming?

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Daniel

Today, the Obama Administration announced their new fuel economy standards and required automakers to produce cars and light trucks that get an average of 35.5 mpg by 2016, four years faster than the law passed in 2007. The Washington Post calls this the “White House’s most significant achievement yet in addressing global warming.” You would expect that the “most significant achievement yet in addressing global warming” would actually have an impact on global warming, but you would be wrong.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency itself, "global mean temperature is estimated to be reduced by 0.006 to 0.015 °C by 2100 . . . and sea-level rise is projected to be reduced by approximately 0.06-0.14cm by 2100." (See page 355 of the final rule.)

It might be surprising that a rule that will have serious repercussions for automobiles in the United States results in a climatically meaningless amount of reduction in global temperature, but that is because the vast majority of future greenhouse gas emissions are projected to come from the developing world. In fact, it’s already happening. According to the Global Carbon Project from over the past 10 years, U.S. carbon dioxide emissions only increased 2 percent while China’s carbon dioxide emissions increased 112 percent, India’s increased 53 percent, and Russia’s increased 12 percent. Even Japan, the country in which the Kyoto Protocol was signed saw its carbon dioxide emissions increase nearly 7 percent.

So while forcing American to buy more fuel efficient cars might seem like a “significant achievement” in “addressing global warming,” it isn’t.

Life, Liberty, and Property

Monthly Archives: April 2010