FRIDAY MORNING RAMBLE: The miner miracle edition

Friday, thank Galt it’s Friday—and time for another ramble ‘round the ‘net.  And with the miner miracle yesterday in Chile and the minor miracle on the netball court in Delhi, it’s the end of a week with much to celebrate.  But first, there’s more to be said about Simon Power-Lust ‘s wish to “regulate” the “Wild West” of the internet….

• Eric Crampton is incensed. “I moved to NZ taking less money for more freedom. National is reneging on the deal. Somebody punch Power for me.”
  MacDoctor explains the point for Simple Simon: “There is a word for regulation of opinion: censorship. New Zealand is a free society precisely because I can call you an idiot, Mr Power, and not be shot at dawn by your goons.”
  Go Fer Yer Guns, Power! – MACDOCTOR
  Regulate What? – PUBLIC ADDRESS
  The Thought Police are Mobilising – OSWALD BASTABLE
  Cry “Power-Lust” and let rip the censorship of the blogosphere – NOT PC
• God gets none of the blame for getting the miners trapped, but all of the credit for them getting saved? Does that seem fair? Especially when it was capitalism that saved the miners. “The profit = innovation dynamic was everywhere at the mine rescue site.” [Hat tip Ari Armstrong]
  Capitalism rescued the miners – Daniel Henninger, WALL STREET JOURNAL
  Where Was God when the Miners Needed Him? - SOLO
• Why is the Royal NZ Herald going so hard to sell Ian WishHard’s new book? A “story that fills the entire front page … a story about an unsolved murder committed forty years ago, a story prompted by the reaction of the victims' daughter after reading a book by Ian Wishart, a book which puts the blame on a man who is now dead and which offers no new evidence.” Why?
  Second that emotion – Paul Litterick, FUNDY POST
• Len Brown’s been dreaming the Think Bigger dream—an Auckland train set bigger than any ever seen before in these parts. The simple truth however is that his ideas will (at best) benefit only a tiny percentage of commuters at a cost of thousands of dollars for every other Aucklander.
  Len's boondoggle – LIBERTY SCOTT
• Do we really need to have several years effort and $1.7 billion (plus cockups) of our money spent on a new motorway between Puhoi and Wellsford, when with a little tinkering, a quarter of the time and just one-tenth of that sum the existing road could be made to work?
  “Operation Lifesaver” – a better solution for Puhoi-Wellsford – AUCKLAND TRANSPORT BLOG
• Oh yeah, the Big Mac Index is out this week, “a clever, if simplistic way” to measure the purchasing power of the world’s currencies—and potentially very useful as currencies begin their race to the bottom.
  The Big Mac Index is Out – ECONOMIC POLICY JOURNAL
• And because you’re bound to ask, according to the Big Mac Index, the NZ Dollar is undervalued by 4% according to this measure. 
  Big Mac Index 2010 – ANTI DISMAL
• More on moron Bernard Hickey.  And there’s something strange when the Business Editor at left-leaning Scoop, for goodness sake, has to explain free markets to someone who claims to have been a one-time supporter.
  SMELLIE SNIFFS THE BREEZE: What future for Smellsianism? – Patrick Smellie, SCOOP
• Pakistani jihadists are insisting that American aid to the benighted state should have all the branding deleted because it offends them. Delete the branding? You know what, says Pamela Geller, why not just delete the aid?
  Perhaps we should just delete the aid – ATLAS SHRUGS
• John Lennon would have been seventy this week. In a land that had forgotten what music sounded like, it’s easy to remember how refreshing his music was.
  It’s Johnny’s Birthday. . . – RATIONAL JENN
• Margaret Thatcher was eighty this week.  In a grey, fey socialist seventies, she truly was a real breath of freedom and fresh air.
  Happy Birthday, Maggie – LIBERTY SCOTT
  
  
  

 

• You know, there might be a way NZ fiction writers could make more money.  (But if their marketing and distribution costs go down, won’t their selling price go down too?)
  A Method Whereby New Zealand Fiction Writers Could Actually Make a Reasonable Income – David Haywood, SOUTHERLY
• How to be a man in an age when bands have only one ball between them? [Hat tip Marnee D]

• Now this is cool, especially with your speakers up to eleven: Obama can’t Gymkhana [hat tip Marcus B]
  
  
• There are a thousand reasons for procrastination—and a thousand ways to do it—but (as Austrians could have told you) Time Preference has a lot to do with it.  And Victor Hugo might have had the best way to avert it. [Hat tip Amy P]
  Later: What we can learn from procrastination – NEW YORKER
• A recovering anti-plastite confesses.” Plastic is a good thing. Why did I let the Luddites infect my thinking for so long? (Warning: this post is a rant, and only a rant.)”
  Don’t Be a Plastic Bashing Luddite! – Amy Mossoff, THE LITTLE THINGS
• "Don’t give him the Nobel – he’s right-wing!” Some members of the Nobel committee are wondering if they might have made a blunder with the award to Mario Vargas Llosa.
  "Don’t give him the Nobel – he’s right-wing!” – SPIKED
  Mario Vargas Llosa wins the Nobel Prize despite having abandoned the Left – Daniel Hannan, TELEGRAPH
• Here’s a few simple solutions to every country’s immigration problems.
  How Should the US Reform its Immigration Policy? – MOTHER OF EXILES
• “Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life.”
  brGlobal warming fraud: the tide begins to turn – James Delingpole, TELEGRAPH
• Carbon dioxide is bad for the planet? Hell no, Carbon dioxide makes plants grow.  Latest evidence of the bleeding obvious:
  Warmer, wetter climate helping US farmers grow more crops – USA TODAY
• Long delays, usurious costs, and messy decision-making means High Court litigation cases are in “a death spiral,” with most potential litigants plumping instead for arbitration, mediation and other initiatives to resolve disputes rather than go to the main courts. The collapsing of the courts has been in full plummet for some years…with the result that many enterprises are not willing to do any business at all in New Zealand because of their lack of confidence in the courts.
  ”Meanwhile, down at The Northern Club, members mourn – after 70-odd years of coining it at the estate’s expense - the hasty settlement in Jarndyce and Jarndyce.”
  Why 'private courts' are booming – NBR
• Today’s sage advice is that older women are always better.  They don’t tell, they don’t smell, they won’t yell, and they’re always grateful as hell.  Apparently Benjamin Franklin understood this 230 years ago!
  On affairs with older women – STEPHEN HICKS
• And you thought you knew how to make a pencil?  It’s a little more complex than you might have thought…
  
  
• Reuters picks the world’s top ten sexiest building.  They only score five out of ten by my count, but any list with both Calatrava and Wright is my kind of list. (Make sure to click on the slideshow at the top right.)
  Top 10 sexiest buildings – STUFF
• You want to know what the world of online communities looks like?  Here’s an online map.
  Online Communities 2 - XKCD
• Dear friend,
  Do you want to learn how to use Web 2.0 Social Media to become a millionaire overnight? How would you like to increase your Twitter followers by eleventy-billion in 3.68 seconds? Do you want to use Twitter to make a gazillion dollars through affiliate marketing and multi-level marketing schemes? Do you use the term "Twitter Coach" to describe yourself?
  Great news! You're well on your way to becoming a Social Media Douchebag^TM already!
  Now with more Web 2.0! – SOCIAL MEDIA DOUCHEBAG
• The Onion has caught up with a script that’s been floating around Hollywood for at least 75 years. It’s had more than 250 stars and 300 directors attached, and been rewritten 600 times, but backers swear this time it’s a go.
  Script Has Been Floating Around Hollywood For 75 Years – THE ONION
• Cult hero Max Rooke announced his retirement this week from Australian football—not even Geelong’s Man of Steel can last forever—prompting #MaxRookeFacts to immediately become the top trending Twitter topic in Australia. Sample “facts”:
      * Max Rooke once participated in the running of the bulls. He walked. The bulls ran away.
      * Godzilla is a Japanese rendition of Max Rooke.
      * Max Rooke faked his 2009 concussion to allow Joel Selwood a few moments to experience what it's like to be Max Rooke.
      * BREAKING NEWS: RAAF unveils new weapon consisting of Max Rooke and his mate Harry (right)
      * I've just got word from the International Chess Rules Committee... They have renamed the Castle piece the "Max Rooke"
      * Aus $ surging for parity against US$ due to Australia being a safe haven – it’s protected by Max Rooke.
      * E.T. only went home because Max told him to.
      * Max Rooke has refused to be in the next series of 'Underbelly'...he wanted something tougher.
      * Retiring after Max Rooke is like going on stage after Elvis.
      * Max Rooke didnt retire because his body wont hold up, he was worried about the body of every other player.
  And from his former captain, Tom Harley:
      * I just told Max about #maxrookefacts. He said "What's twitter?" I'm closing my account because what Max doesn't know, isn't worth knowing.

  “Beware of all politicians everywhere.
They excelled at recess
when they were in school but
have excelled at little since."
             - investor Jim Rogers, from his new book A Gift to My Children

• Ben Bernanke is about to announce a program of easy money…not just a little easy money…but a lot of it. The markets seem to be jumping for joy at the prospect. This would be a mistake, however.
  Why Bernanke’s Money Printing Promises Spell Disaster – DAILY RECKONING
• The ratings agencies still haven’t spotted it, but the US has already lost its gold-plated triple-A rating.  It’s all to do with inflation Quantitative Easing…
  Debt market strips U.S. of triple-A rating – FORTUNE MAGAZINE
• But can’t money created out of thin air create wealth?
  The Illusion of Modern Money – DAILY RECKONING
• Drowning in a sovereign debt crisis, Belgium begins dismembering itself. And people are saying, if Belgium can’t hold, then how on earth can Europe?
  As Belgium Spirals Towards Dissolution, Sovereign Debt Being Tossed Around Like Hot Potato – BUSINESS INSIDER
• Prime culprits in the financial meltdown were US government mortgage factories Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These need to go.  America, and the world, needs them to go cold turkey now.
  Going Cold Turkey: Three Ways to End Fannie and Freddie without Slicing Up the Taxpayers  - Peter, J. Wallison, AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE
• Economic freedom in the US? Well, it’s certainly not what it was.
  Stossel on Economic Freedom – GUS VAN HORN
• You know what, at root, is behind America’s economic collapse? The answer (and it’s a warning for  us all, my friends) is entitlement. {Hat tip Ari A]
  Entitlements Threaten American Prosperity: Barry Poulson – YOU TUBE
• Peter Schiff: “The US dollar is now collapsing”
• Peter Schiff: “Our standard of living is unravelling”
• Dollar collapse. The Schiff has hit the fan. Time to start getting out of Dodge? That time was around 2008, when Schiff was explaining how things would play out to those few who were listening back then:

• But the US government needs to spend more, says Paul Krugman!!  Open your eyes, Paul, it already has been.
  Yes, Paul Krugman, Spending Has Steeply Increased – HERITAGE
• When the US sneezes, we catch a cold.  So when the US gets pneumonia … Doug Reich has a great summary of where the US is now. Economic illiteracy. Bailout crack. Capital strike. A “race to the bottom” for the world’s currencies. New ways for the govt to get into your pocket.  Yes, Virginia, it’s all bad.
  What I'm Thinking #1 – Doug Reich, RATIONAL CAPITALIST
• It happened this way with the Roman Empire too, you know.
  Inflation and the Fall of the Roman Empire – Joseph Peden, MISES DAILY
• When you can see economic disaster from the air, you know a country is really stuffed. Here’s the Florida housing bust from the air. “The images of half finished (and barely started) developments are strangely beautiful, with a geometric symmetry that belies the state of human misery these developments represent: Lost deposits, bankruptcy, misallocated capital.”
  Aerial Footage: Portrait of a Housing Bust -  Barry Ritholtz, THE BIG PICTURE
• Even devotees of Austrian Economics have debates about Fractional Reserve Banking—to what extent it’s part of the problem, and how it might be made not. John McVey suggests talking a little bit of Fractional Reserve Banking is like taking a little bit of radiation…
  Historical data in the fractional reserve banking debate – JOHN McVEY
• Former chairman of BB&T Bank John Allison—who during his 2o years at the helm saw it expand to thirty times the size it was when he took over—and who ensured it was one of the few to successfully weather the present financial storm—has a few things he wants to tell you about the financial meltdown. And when Allison talks, it makes sense to listen. [Hat tip Stephen Hicks, who’s linked all eight clips in the series together for you]

• The week before he was in Sydney talking to us, Yaron Brook was in Guatemala talking to the only institution in the Americas dedicated to freedom.  A busy man before a receptive audience.  And guess what, people: not everybody is a “utility maximiser.”
  Ayn Rand: Radical for Capitalism – Yaron Brook, UNIVERSIDAD, FRANCISCO MARROQUIN
• Eric Crampton has made his debut in Sydney on the Mont Pelerin stage (something Yaron can’t do until next year) with a presentation arguing that nannying is bad economics—i.e., “that paternalism is far less beneficial and far more costly than voters expect.”  As a public choice economist however, he is unfortunately silent on the morality of minding your own damn business.
  Address to the Mont Pelerin Society - OFFSETTING BEHAVIOUR
• Pssst. While the danger still exists of the American Tea Party movement being commandeered by religionists, it’s worth reminding ourselves of a bit of history.
  America is a Monument to Reason, not Faith – RULE OF REASON
• I’ve said it before. A love of good art is essential to human cognition.
  The Cognitive Function of Art – ROBERTO SARRIONANDIA
• Induction is at the root of all knowledge. And Francis Bacon is at the root of virtually all induction. So wouldn’t you want to know what he had to say about it?
  Bacon’s Theory of Induction as Presented in the Novum Organum Part 1 of 2 – Roderick Fitts, INDUCTIVE QUEST
  Bacon’s Theory of Induction as Presented in his Novum Organum, Part 2 of 2 – Roderick Fitts, INDUCTIVE QUEST
• Pretty much every Objectivist in the world wants to know what’s going on between Leonard Peikoff and John McCaskey, and what it means for Objectivism. The Doctors Hsieh do their best to get to the bottom of it all.
  The Resignation of John McCaskey: The Facts – NOODLE FOOD
• An online US College advice blog has a list of the 30 best blogs for exploring Objectivism. A few strange ones there (Kinsella, FFS!), but a good start.
  30 Best Blogs for Exploring Objectivism – ACREDITED ONLINE COLLEGES
• And an Objectivist blogger is volunteering to do for Objectivist blogs what Tim Selwyn hasn’t had time to do with NZ blogs since December—to rank them all.  Big job.
  Who’s Actually Getting Read in Objectivism (Online) – DANIELLE MORRILL
• How does drug prohibition affect current violence in the U.S. and Mexico? How do you think.
  Prohibition Déjà vu – THE UNDERCURRENT
• To mark what would have been Beatle John Lennon’s birthday this week, here’s his best song from their second-best album:
  
  
• And to mark the passing of Australian soprano Joan Sutherland this week, here she is in the very scene of the very opera that first brought her fame, and which she and her husband brought back to the stage: the Mad Scene from Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. First a short one, then the full scene (complete with a very strange intrusion from the TV show on which it appeared)
  

Have a great weekend!
And keep an eye out for those possums on Great Barrier.
Cheers,
PC