While the boring Koran non-burning story was running, over on Radio 5 Live someone used the metaphor that "you’re not allowed to shout ‘Fire’ in a theatre" as the basis for circumscribing free speech. And here is a grander person, namely US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, saying the same […]
Twitter (for those not yet in on it) is a simple and therefore powerful way for people individually and collectively to share their thoughts, all with 140 characters. You can Follow the thoughts of people you like or find interesting and, of course, have people who Follow your thoughts, such […]
I have surged from a measly 76th place in 2009 to a glorious 40th place this year in the Total Politics 2010 list of the Top 100 right-wing blogs. As a treat I offer you this review by Leon Wolf of the book Dirty, Sexy Politics by Meghan McCain. It is […]
Awesome Guardian piece on the Cuban regime’s bold plan to stop paying people nothing to do nothing: Authorities announced yesterday they will lay off more than 1 million state employees in the island’s biggest economic shake-up since the 1960s. Cuts begin immediately, with 500,000 jobs due to go by March. […]
Jonathan Freedland keeps popping up in the Guardian on the subject of the dishonesty and falsehood of equating Soviet and Nazi crimes. Here he was in October last year. And now again today: For one thing, the equation of Nazi and communist crimes rarely entails an honest account of the former. […]
My only ‘live’ encounter’ with Pope Benedict XVI came in May 2006 when His Holiness visited Poland. The venerable Catholic Church hierarchy this time did not need any miracles to turn water into wine – amidst the drought of an alcohol ban for Poles, through a miracle there came Plenty! I was […]
I creep towards modernity. Postings on this site are now likely to be Tweeted on Twitter, where I have a happy but select group of (as of right now) 200 Followers. If anyone on Twitter has not yet followed Lileks, do so. He is the master of this demanding genre.
An interesting piece by James Kwak about how his economics students tackled a problem supposedly about fairness in business practice: Today in class, the professor posed the first question from the paper: “A hardware store has been selling snow shovels for $15. The morning after a large snowstorm, the store […]
My analysis of this phenomenon, ably brought to our attention by eclectic Lefty Keith Ruffles in a comment on my latest BBRU, is over at Business and Politics: But where does ‘real influence’ come from? Only from the systemic discipline which comes from people having the chance to vote both […]
One of the main jobs top civil servants have – arguably the only main job – is to tell politicians that their policies are reckless if that is the way a sober look at things adds up. If the politicians then ignore the advice, civil servants have all sorts of […]
