In an otherwise normal science look at Valuing Google, Brad writes a sentence that deserves an article:
Social value is drifting away from potential profitability, and this threatens to become a huge problem in our collective social resource allocation mechanisms.
Hey Brad, maybe that should be our next collaborative project (after the one I already suggested we do this summer…)? I have ideas floating around about how you organize efficient state ownership of (some) things.
First we put half our stuff in storage. Then we moved into the front half of the house, about the size of a NY two-bedroom apartment, putting the kids into a bunk bed. The idea was to start the project in the fall, and finish by about, well, May or June. Then we had permit delays. Then, finally, in January we knocked down the empty half of our house — including a piece of the kitchen — so we could rebuild it better and bigger. Then they started to build, poured a foundation, built some walls, and almost a month ago got ready to pour the beam and install the trusses.
But wait! We failed inspection! The city of Coral Gables has tougher requirements than the County and even though these were noted on the plans, the engineer just did the routine calculations. Three week delay to recalculate, get twice as many trusses, re-inspect. Ok, that takes us to last week. Good to go to pour some beams, right?
Oops. Seems there's a cement shortage. As the contractor tells it, there were three local plants that supplied about 60% of south Florida's needs with the rest coming from abroad. Most of the imported stuff is being diverted to other places, like China, that are willing to pay higher prices than Florida (!). And all three of the local plants are having mechanical problems. The biggest plant has problems so severe that the owners have decided not to repair it, but just to wait for the new plant to come on stream in about a month.
So after a few days extra delay we managed to get a truck to come and bring some of this precious commodity, and we poured yesterday. Except we ran out.
Question: Is it more reasonable to imagine we'll finish in August (contractor's current estimate), December (my guess), or some time after next March….
One of the marks of a free country is that you can criticize the Maximum Leader without fear of investigations or reprisals.
Not in Seattle Prosser, Washington State, USA, where a boy was Investigated by the Secret Service, then disciplined by his School, for drawing Bush as the devil in an art class assignment on the Iraq war.
Art students at Prosser High School were told to keep a notebook of drawings depicting the war in Iraq.
One 15-year-old turned in a sketch showing President Bush, dressed as a devil, launching a missile.
Another of his drawings was of a Middle Eastern-looking guy holding a rifle in one hand, while in the other hand was a pole with an oversized head of President Bush stuck on it.
The art teacher found the drawings troubling.
Maybe it was the caption that said: “End the War.”
Anyway, the drawings were turned over to school administrators.
School administrators took a look and tossed this political hot potato to police, who took one look at the “Vote For Ralph Nader” slogan and called in the Secret Service.
Last week, Secret Service agents trekked out to Prosser and grilled the 15-year-old artist.
They left without charging him with anything, but that didn't stop the school district from punishing the kid anyway.
(emphasis added) AP version of the story. And this hyperactive tendency to investigate people is not a fluke but is now shared by many law enforcement bodies: Recall this previous incident? Or this one? All of which leads to self-censorship
Teach the children well, indeed.
[Corrected to remove slur on Seattle, per comment by froz]
Finally. The Bush records story is getting new traction, probably because Kerry himself is making an issue of it. Helpfully, Salon has published a child's guide (suitable for busy reporters) to some (only some) of the major gaps in the record. And the thoughtful and much-read Joshua Micah Marshall has endorsed this as an issue, going so far as to say that, aw shucks, he doesn't quite follow all the complicated details, but, it sounds important:
I just don't know the details of all this well enough any more to make a judgment about these various claims and accusations.
But why exactly can't the president just release his records the way McCain did?
And, is that story about [Maj. Gen. Danny] James[, commander of the Air National Guard Bureau in Arlington, Va.] getting a chance to go over these files true? If it is, I'd say some scribblers in town got suckered.
Big time, as the vice president would say.
So maybe the issue is not dead yet. When will a reporter stand up the press gaggle with a release from and ask if the President will sign it? Or, how about at a press conference if there ever is another one?
How absolutely amazing to find that two of the more interesting people I know from such different parts of my life are almost related. It turns out that Ed Hasbrouk, the Practical Nomad, whom I know virtually and from conference calls, is partnered with the cousin of Eric Muller, a law school classmate and now fellow law prof. The occasion for this discovery is that both of them are participants in a great NPR segment called Making Contact.
The show is not being played on either of the NPR stations I can get on my radio, but Ed notes that it can be heard online “from the National Radio Project. You can listen to streaming Real Audio or download a high or low bandwidth MP3.”
For the very interesting details as to how Ed and Eric met, and what they have in common and what they argue about, see Eric's blog entry and Ed's.
The host for this blog, Dreamhost, has just sent out an email reporting that it has been under attack but is coping better than last time,
Starting at around 2:45 PDT this afternoon, we experienced yet another Denial of Service attack launched at a completely different target from the previous attacks. Within 15 minutes, we had established the destination of the attacks and had them blocked at our network's edge. We're currently waiting for our upstream providers to provide us with more global protection from the attacks, but for now network performance is running at only a slightly degraded state. We hope to have full service restored within the hour.
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