1. The Market and Human Nature -- from a 2005 Q&A with the conservative scholar Roger Scruton (via Rod Dreher):
MG: What deleterious consequences result from the "free market ideology" you mention? Are there particular economic arrangements that conservatives ought to prefer?
Scruton: The free market is a necessary part of any stable community, and the arguments for maintaining it as the core of economic life were unanswerably set out by Ludwig von Mises. Hayek developed the arguments further, in order to offer a general defense of "spontaneous order", as the means to produce and maintain socially necessary knowledge. As Hayek points out, there are many varieties of spontaneous order that exemplify the epistemic virtues that he values: the common law is one of them, so too is ordinary morality.
The problem for conservatism is to reconcile the many and often conflicting demands that these various forms of life impose on us. The free-market ideologues take one instance of spontaneous order, and erect it into a prescription for all the others. They ask us to believe that the free exchange of commodities is the model for all social interaction. But many of our most important forms of life involve withdrawing what we value from the market: sexual morality is an obvious instance, city planning another. (America has failed abysmally in both those respects, of course.)
Looked at from the anthropological point of view religion can be seen as an elaborate (and spontaneous) way in which communities remove what is most precious to them (i.e. all that concerns the creation and reproduction of community) from the erosion of the market. A cultural conservative, such as I am, supports that enterprise. I would put the point in terms that echo Burke and Chesterton: the free market provides the optimal solution to the competition among the living for scarce resources; but when applied to the goods in which the dead and the unborn have an interest (sex, for instance) it wastes what must be saved.
2. Charles Johnson on The End of the Black American Narrative
No matter which angle we use to view black people in America today, we find them to be a complex and multifaceted people who defy easy categorization. We challenge, culturally and politically, an old group narrative that fails at the beginning of this new century to capture even a fraction of our rich diversity and heterogeneity. My point is not that black Americans don't have social and cultural problems in 2008. We have several nagging problems, among them poor schools and far too many black men in prison and too few in college. But these are problems based more on the inequities of class, and they appear in other groups as well. It simply is no longer the case that the essence of black American life is racial victimization and disenfranchisement, a curse and a condemnation, a destiny based on color in which the meaning of one's life is thinghood, created even before one is born. This is not something we can assume. The specific conflict of this narrative reached its dramatic climax in 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama, and at the breathtaking March on Washington; its resolution arrived in 1965, the year before I graduated from high school, with the Voting Rights Act. Everything since then has been a coda for almost half a century. We call this long-extended and still ongoing anticlimax the post-civil-rights period. If the NAACP is struggling these days to recruit members of the younger generation and to redefine its mission in the 21st century--and it is struggling to do that--I think it is a good sign that the organization Du Bois led for so long is now a casualty of its own successes in the 1960s.
(HT: No Left Turns)
3. Demophilus on the Supreme Court's ruling striking down the DC gun ban:
Another interesting aspect of this is that the right to own a firearm was discussed very much in terms of "lawful self defense," which is to say the defense of one's home, property, and family. We might reformulate this by calling the decision one that affirmed that you can keep a firearm in your home, and keep it there in such a way that its use for self-defense is meaningful and plausible (i.e. not dismantled, locked away, etc.). Its curious that left-leaning judges on the Court will argue for "privacy," including that you can do just about anything you want in the privacy of your home, but then stop short of saying that includes law-abiding citizens keeping a firearm for self-defense in their bedroom (I thought the government was supposed to stay out of our bedrooms, anyways?). Its also quite a spectacle to see Stevens suddenly become a strict constructionist, probing the original intent of the Framers when it comes to the second amendment.
4. Because Sitting up is for Suckers: 70+ Tools, Tips and Hacks to Work from Bed (HT: The Presurfer)
5. How War Increases Our Vocabulary
Almost every aspect of war spawns new words, and, over time, many of them slip into everyday use. Sometimes, they even become downright peaceful in the process. For instance, triumph used to mean a victory ceremony for Roman conquerors, and skedaddle signified retreat during the Civil War. And if you're ever had a snafu ("Situation Normal: All F'd Up"), then you owe a debt to the WWI soldiers who invented the acronym to describe the trenches. With each passing conflict, the list of pacified war words gets longer and longer.
6. Stat of the Week: "... if you're in a cinema which gives you a choice between buying a medium bag of popcorn and a large tub of popcorn, there's a greater-than-50% chance that the medium bag will actually contain more popcorn than the large tub. (HT: kottke.org)
7. Ask Calvin's Dad -- Calvin's dad answering questions, quoted from various Calvin and Hobbes books by Bill Watterson. Example:
Q. How come old photographs are always black and white? Didn't they have color film back then?
A. Sure they did. In fact, those old photographs are in color. It's just that the world was black and white then. The world didn't turn color until sometime in the 1930s, and it was pretty grainy color for a while, too.
Q. But then why are old paintings in color?! If the world was black and white, wouldn't artists have painted it that way?
A. Not necessarily. A lot of great artists were insane.
Q. But... But how could they have painted in color anyway? Wouldn't their paints have been shades of gray back then?
A. Of course, but they turned colors like everything else did in the '30s.Q. So why didn't old black and white photos turn color too?
A. Because they were color pictures of black and white, remember?
(HT: Talking Out of Turn)
8. How to be a better guesser:
Take a guess. Now, take another guess, different from the first one, and average them. According to research reported on in The Economist, averaging the 2nd guess improves accuracy by 6.5%. Better still, wait 3 weeks before taking a second guess. Averaging now improves accuracy by 16%.
9. Russell D. Moore on Jeremiah Wright and the conservatives who preach just like him:
There is a liberation theology of the Left, and there is also a liberation theology of the Right, and both are at heart mammon worship. The liberation theology of the Left often wants a Barrabas, to fight off the oppressors as though our ultimate problem were the reign of Rome and not the reign of death. The liberation theology of the Right wants a golden calf, to represent religion and to remind us of all the economic security we had in Egypt. Both want a Caesar or a Pharaoh, not a Messiah.
Recent surveys have indicated that conservatives, on average, report being happier than liberals. Two psychologists wanted to know why, so they re-analyzed data from several large national and international surveys. The conservative-happiness relationship was not explained by differences in demographics or thoughtfulness but was largely explained by conservatives' greater rationalization of inequality, including belief in a meritocratic world. According to the authors, such beliefs serve a "palliative function" or act as an "emotional buffer" when confronted with inequality. The same was true overseas, especially in countries with lower standards of living. Moreover, the authors found that the happiness gap between liberals and conservatives in the United States has widened over the last three decades as inequality has increased here.
Alternate explanation: Lack of covetousness makes one happier.
11. Graph of the Week
more graph humor and song chart memes
12. Is attention a biological function?
After decades of research powered by fresh advances in neuroimaging and genetics, many scientists are drawing a much clearer picture of attention, which they have come to see as an organ system like circulation or digestion, with its own anatomy, circuitry, and chemistry. Building upon this new understanding, researchers are discovering that skills of focus can be bolstered with practice in both children and adults, including those with attention-deficit disorders. In just five days of computer-based training, the brains of 6-year-olds begin to act like adults on a crucial measure of attention, one study found. Another found that boosting short-term memory seems to improve children's ability to stay on task.
13. Ball Girl Makes Incredible Catch
14. When it comes to the Iraq war, good news is no news
According to data compiled by Andrew Tyndall, a television consultant who monitors the three network evening newscasts, coverage of Iraq has been "massively scaled back this year." Almost halfway into 2008, the three newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007. The "CBS Evening News" has devoted the fewest minutes to Iraq, 51, versus 55 minutes on ABC's "World News" and 74 minutes on "NBC Nightly News." (The average evening newscast is 22 minutes long.)
CBS News no longer stations a single full-time correspondent in Iraq, where some 150,000 United States troops are deployed.
15. The 15 Greatest Man Cries (Plus 5 Dishonorable Mentions)
16. William Deresiewicz on the disadvantages of an elite education:
If one of the disadvantages of an elite education is the temptation it offers to mediocrity, another is the temptation it offers to security. When parents explain why they work so hard to give their children the best possible education, they invariably say it is because of the opportunities it opens up. But what of the opportunities it shuts down? An elite education gives you the chance to be rich--which is, after all, what we're talking about--but it takes away the chance not to be. Yet the opportunity not to be rich is one of the greatest opportunities with which young Americans have been blessed. We live in a society that is itself so wealthy that it can afford to provide a decent living to whole classes of people who in other countries exist (or in earlier times existed) on the brink of poverty or, at least, of indignity. You can live comfortably in the United States as a schoolteacher, or a community organizer, or a civil rights lawyer, or an artist--that is, by any reasonable definition of comfort. You have to live in an ordinary house instead of an apartment in Manhattan or a mansion in L.A.; you have to drive a Honda instead of a BMW or a Hummer; you have to vacation in Florida instead of Barbados or Paris, but what are such losses when set against the opportunity to do work you believe in, work you're suited for, work you love, every day of your life?
Yet it is precisely that opportunity that an elite education takes away. How can I be a schoolteacher--wouldn't that be a waste of my expensive education? Wouldn't I be squandering the opportunities my parents worked so hard to provide? What will my friends think? How will I face my classmates at our 20th reunion, when they're all rich lawyers or important people in New York? And the question that lies behind all these: Isn't it beneath me? So a whole universe of possibility closes, and you miss your true calling.
(HT: Maggie's Farm)
17. Timewaster of the Week: Poiser (HT: Neatorama)
All maps distort whatever data they try to present. The examples below show, in increasing levels of magnitude, how badly this exaggeration can accumulate with scale....
Perhaps most exaggerated of all though has to be the images that are typically given to show the accumulation of "space junk" -- remnants of space flights and defunct satellites, etc. In this image each pixel represents approximately 114 miles; so a piece of debris the size of a car is marked with a point the size of Long Island -- easily a 6 order of magnitude exaggeration.
(HT: kottke.org)
19. 50 office-speak phrases you love to hate (British edition)
20. Why Don't More Colleges Teach Military History?
Two of the last five Pulitzer Prizes in history were awarded to books about the American military. Four of the five Oscar nominees for best documentary this year were about warfare. Business, for military historians, is good.
Except, strangely enough, in academia. On college campuses, historians who study military institutions and the practice of war are watching their classrooms overflow and their books climb bestseller lists - but many say they are still struggling, as they have been for years, to win the respect of their fellow scholars.
(HT: Chicago Boyz)
21. What Every American Should Know About the Middle East
Arabs are part of an ethnic group, not a religion. Arabs were around long before Islam, and there have been (and still are) Arab Christians and Arab Jews. In general, you're an Arab if you 1) are of Arab descent (blood), or 2) speak the main Arab language (Arabic).
(HT: kottke.org)
22. The Writer's Creativity Finder
23. Infographic of the Week: The Federal Landlord Map
24. Heart of Glass: Amazing Animation of a Translucent Beating Heart (HT: Neatorama)
25. LOLCat of the Week
more cat pictures
°°°°°°
26. Speech Imagery and Perceptions of Charisma
Does it take a village? Is America a shining city upon a hill? The answer might be yes, according to new research. Two psychologists had an actor make an audio recording of two versions of FDR's famous 1933 inaugural address. The first version was essentially the original, but scrubbed of phrases and references likely to reveal the identity of the speech. The second version took the first version and replaced every word or phrase that evoked imagery with less evocative language. College students were then randomly assigned to hear either the high- or low-imagery version. The version with the original imagery was considered more charismatic, in part because it inspired positive emotions. The use of imagery helped the parts of the speech that discussed problems sound less depressing, and the parts that discussed solutions sound more inspiring.
27. Bill Gates' 2003 flame email about Moviemaker
I decided to download (Moviemaker) and buy the Digital Plus pack ... so I went to Microsoft.com. They have a download place so I went there.
The first 5 times I used the site it timed out while trying to bring up the download page. Then after an 8 second delay I got it to come up.
This site is so slow it is unusable.
It wasn't in the top 5 so I expanded the other 45.
These 45 names are totally confusing. These names make stuff like: C:\Documents and Settings\billg\My Documents\My Pictures seem clear.
28. New and improved? Novelty drives choice behavior -- New research suggests that novelty drives choice behavior in humans, even when the degree of familiarity with an option is completely unrelated to choice outcome. The research, published by Cell Press in the June 26 issue of the journal Neuron, reveals fascinating insights into the brain mechanisms that underlie the tendency to explore, and even value, unfamiliar options.
29. Morbid thoughts whet the appetite -- Can watching TV news or crime shows trigger overeating? According to new research in the Journal of Consumer Research, people who are thinking about their own deaths want to consume more. Authors Naomi Mandel and Dirk Smeesters conducted several experiments in Europe and the United States where participants wrote essays on their feelings about their own deaths. They then checked off items on a grocery list or ate cookies. Consumers who wrote about their own deaths wanted to buy more and ate more than those who wrote about a painful medical procedure (the control group).
30. Doubling of sexually transmitted infections among over-45s in under a decade -- Rates of sexually transmitted infections have doubled among the over 45s in less than a decade, reveals research published ahead of print in the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections. The almost exclusive focus on the sexual health of young people, including in national surveys of sexual behavior, has tended to ignore older age groups, who are also at risk, say the authors.
31. Men share their creative work online more than women -- Men are significantly more likely to share their creative work online than women though both engage in creative activity about equally. With the Internet a major form of participating in popular culture and public discourse, that means men's voices are disproportionately heard. Almost two-thirds of men report posting their work online. Only half of women do. When controlling for digital literacy -- whether perceived or actual - the research shows they post about equally.
32. Was it good for you too? -- The sexual and feminist revolutions were supposed to free women to enjoy casual sex just as men always had. Yet according to Professor Anne Campbell from Durham University in the UK, the negative feelings reported by women after one-night stands suggest that they are not well adapted to fleeting sexual encounters. Her findings are published online in the June issue of Springer's journal, "Human Nature."
33. A Question for Senator Obama
The Tony Perkins clip is great!
"Why Are Conservatives Happier Than Liberals?"
Alternative explanation #2: Ignorance is bliss
Perkins, not surprisingly, proves himself a dumbass.
Obama didn't say "fatherhood begins at conception". Those simply were not his words. Perkins misquotes the single partial sentence that his entire video is based on.
What Obama said was "fathers need to recognize that their responsibility doesn't just end at conception". He wasn't talking about fatherhood, he was talking about the responsibilities fathers have - a very distinctly different idea, for several reasons.
First, it raises the question what fathers are "responsible" for. If those responsibilities "end at conception", then fathers are only "responsible for" supplying the sperm that leads to conception; i.e., that is all it takes to be a father. If fathers are responsible for more than that, for instance for raising and supporting their children, then that is what it takes to be a father - which is obviously Obama's point. But that has nothing to do with "when life begins"; it is entirely about how long and deep a commitment fathers must make to their children - an issue that can be debated irrespective of any particular position on "when life begins".
Second, the minimal definition of fatherhood that Obama mentions (that it is defined by conception only) is the one that Obama rejects, not endorses. Perkins is apparently one of the men Obama was talking to, who have to be reminded that that is not the correct definition of father.
And also, even if one were to claim that Obama was making a distinction between "mere biological" fatherhood and "real" fatherhood - such that biological fatherhood does begin at conception, only a knucklehead could imagine he meant that literally or that it supports some imaginary notion of the moral personhood of the zygote. Again, Obama did not say, as Perkins claims, that fatherhood "begins at conception"; he said (the responsibility associated with) fatherhood does not end there. That implies that those responsibilities could have predated conception - that fatherhood may actually begin before conception and then ends at that point. (To put that another way, if supplying sperm is all it takes to be a father, then fatherhood takes place before conception, pregnancy, or childbirth - which is ridiculous.) That is an absurdity that even pro-lifers have not yet committed - but which Perkins endorses by imagining that that is what Obama literally meant. Obviously, Obama was using ironic language to underscore the absurdity of the point that he was rejecting - a claim that Perkins gullibly latches on to, approves of, and further claims (falsely) that Obama also endorses. It's all too easy to laugh at the right wing's consistent incomprehension of both logic and irony - and Tony Perkins is one good reason why.
So, in the short space of 30 seconds, Perkins has: (1) quoted Obama incompletely and out of context; (2) grossly misquoted even the simple and unambiguous partial sentence that he did attempt to respond to; (3) misconstrued the actual point of that simple statement, confusing the basic but logically distinct concepts of "fatherhood" and "the responsibilities of fatherhood" even when the latter phrase was used explicitly (note that Perkins substitutes the former for the latter in his false quotation); (4) claimed Obama had endorsed a point that he not only had not made but in fact clearly rejected; (5) based that false claim on a literal reading of, and belief in, an obviously ironic statement that, by its absurdity, should have been immediately recognizable as not intended literally, and (6) demonstrated not the slightest comprehension of his own falsehoods, failures of logic, and basic confusion over simple and ordinary turns of phrasing. Thanks, Tony, for once more confirming all my suspicions!
Thanks a lot! I checked your "timewaster"..... and my morning went away!
Alternative explanation #2: Ignorance is bliss
Looks like the study controlled for "demographics and thoughtfulness", which you would have known if you had, you know, actually read the article rather than toss out a thoughtless comment that serves mainly to highlight your own ignorance.
Kevin, perhaps Obama is saying that the responsibilities of fathers do not end at conception, because a responsible father, if he cannot support a child, should help his unborn child's mother schedule an appointment with an abortion clinic; drive her to the clinic; wait with her in the waiting room; hold her hand as their unborn child is aborted; and pay for the procedure.
Again, Obama did not say, as Perkins claims, that fatherhood "begins at conception"; he said (the responsibility associated with) fatherhood does not end there. That implies that those responsibilities could have predated conception - that fatherhood may actually begin before conception and then ends at that point. (To put that another way, if supplying sperm is all it takes to be a father, then fatherhood takes place before conception, pregnancy, or childbirth - which is ridiculous.) That is an absurdity that even pro-lifers have not yet committed - but which Perkins endorses by imagining that that is what Obama literally meant.
I'll have to listen to the clip when I get home but from what I'm reading it sounds like yet again pro-lifers are missing the boat. Does it not occur to anyone that one of the reasons women get abortions is due to the insecurity they feel from unreliable men? It would seem to follow that if men took fatherhood more seriously they would:
1. Reduce the number of times unwanted pregnancies by being more careful.
2. Encourage more women to feel economically, socially and emotionally safe in bringing a pregnancy to term.
If pro-lifers were actually serious about saving lives you'd figure they should applaud Obama's speech on fatherhood while reserving the right to disagree with him about abortions legality. It would seem, though, that many pro-lifers are more than happy to keep shoveling coal in the bottem deck of the GOP ship as it takes on water.
"Looks like the study controlled for "demographics and thoughtfulness", which you would have known if you had, you know, actually read the article rather than toss out a thoughtless comment that serves mainly to highlight your own ignorance."
My comment was intended to be viewed in the context of Joe's even more ignorant alternative explanation, which if you need reminding, was:
"Alternate explanation: Lack of covetousness makes one happier."
So, liberals are covetous. That seems about as supportable as, say, asserting that conservatives are ignorant.
Now do you get it, ucfengr? Sheesh.
robski So, liberals are covetous. That seems about as supportable as, say, asserting that conservatives are ignorant.
There is one group of people whose most consistent mantra is that it's not fair that some people have way too much money and that it's their duty to take it from them and give it to those of us who don't have as much. Obama even said as much awhile back when he said that it's not about whether or not increasing taxes will hurt the economy--it's about fairness. Only the intentionally ignorant can miss the fact that the most common tactic of the liberal left politician is stirring up envy among the "havenots." Envy and covetousness have become acceptable among liberal Democrats
"Tax cuts for the rich."
"The rich get richer and the poor get poorer."
"I'll take 10% of those oil company profits." Hillary Clinton
It is not covetousness to expect that those who benefit disproportionately from our system to contribute disproportionately to maintain it. If I wanted it for myself, that would be covetousness. I don't need it (like many liberals, I'm quite comfortable, thank you), but I recognize that there are members of our society who do.
It's funny how conservatives can play up to bigots of all stripes and retain great evangelical support, but when liberals want to help those less fortunate we hear cries of "class warfare" and "covetous".
jd, I am sure that you can find many examples of covetous liberals. Do you doubt that I can find as many examples of ignorant conservatives?
jd, I am sure that you can find many examples of covetous liberals. Do you doubt that I can find as many examples of ignorant conservatives?
I said intentionally ignorant. Most of us conservatives are just garden variety ignorant.
Ah, but Robski, you do want it for yourself. If you had it for yourself, granted you would give it to the poor and not spend it on a yacht, but you want to take control of the use of the money from its owner and assume that control yourself, which is exactly the same thing as wanting the money.
So it is covetousness.
Conservatives, kind of by definition, want to conserve things. That is, they see that we have some things that are worth saving. Liberals, in contrast, tend to see that we have some things that need fixing.
Both positions have some truth (and both positions, at the moment, offer policies that seem to me to have significant flaws). But in terms of happiness, we should not be surprised that the conservatives - the "glass is half full" people - are happier than the "glass is half empty" liberals.
That's some pretty bizarre logic, pentamom. I do not wish to take possession of the money, nor do I wish to unilaterally determine where it goes. I do want my voice to be heard as to what is taken from whom and whither it goes, as I am sure we all do. I only want my right to have a say and hope that enough others agree with me.
How can I covet that I do not wish to have?
Robski, Pentamom's logic is on point. Yours is the bizarre one.
What matters is that you wish to have a disproportionate say in the disposition of your wealthier neighbor's assets--not whether you want that say to be unilateral or multilateral; what matters is that you want your wealhier neighbor to have less unilateral control over the disposition of his own resources than your less wealthy neighbor has over hers.
Inviting the rest of us to take part in your legislative raiding party doesn't take your enterprise outside the realm of thievery.
The older I get the more I find that listening to or reading leftwingers discuss taxes and economic inequality makes me feel like I need to take a bath. They never seem to feel any shame over wanting to sieze other people's stuff in their grubby, undeserving mitts.
Also, your "[h]ow can I covet that I do not wish to have" is almost cute, but--wow--very stupid. Control is one of the most long-recognized elements of property. You must be a victim of public schooling.
"What matters is that you wish to have a disproportionate say in the disposition of your wealthier neighbor's assets..."
I never said I wanted a disproportionate say. You invented that part to make me a better target for your fit of pique.
"Control is one of the most long-recognized elements of property."
You aren't paying attention; I do not seek control. I merely vote and hope that a majority of the population shares my tax philosophy. Control remains where it is now, with the government.
"You must be a victim of public schooling."
This speaks volumes about your mindset. Perhaps you could do with some public schooling yourself.
"I never said I wanted a disproportionate say. You invented that part to make me a better target for your fit of pique."
You didn't say it. It flows unavoidably from what you said. If you want your wealthier neighbor to be taxed at a higher rate than your poorer neighbor, you (and every other voter) will have a disproportionate say in the disposition of your wealthier neighbor's resources. To the degree that he loses unilateral control over his assets, you (or your proxy in the form of a legislator) gain it. You seek less control over your poorer neighbor's resources than you want over those of your wealthier neighbor. Therein lies the disproportionality.
"You aren't paying attention; I do not seek control. I merely vote and hope that a majority of the population shares my tax philosophy. Control remains where it is now, with the government."
Words won't help you here; the facts are plain. Legislators act as proxies for the people. Legislators are accountable to the people and they act in the people's name. Indirect, multilateral control through a legislator is still control.
"This speaks volumes about your mindset. Perhaps you could do with some public schooling yourself."
It sure does. I went to public school from elementary through high school. Graduated with honors, too. I've been recovering ever since. I hate public education. It served me very poorly.
But I suspect what you meant by your remark is that I'm a child of privilege. Wrong. I have a lower middle class background.
I'm not grateful to leftists for their condescending efforts at improving my life and the lives of others similarly situated. If you simply minded your own business, instead of molesting us with your race and class theories and manipulating us as pawns in your schemes of moral self-aggrandizement, we'd be better off.
Improving our lot in life isn't your responsibility. Leave us alone, please.
Almost everybody is "greedy," and that "almost" definitely doesn't fall along income or political boundaries. Multimillionaires just have more to be greedy about.
"It is not covetousness to expect that those who benefit disproportionately from our system to contribute disproportionately to maintain it."
Sure sure, I'm all for progressive taxation kind of like the system we have now, but the people who get all of that money definitely contribute greatly. "Disproportionately" is ill-defined, perhaps even a misnomer.
For one, roughly 2% of the population scores ENTJ from the Myers-Briggs test, and far less are actually extremely well at conducting business and scoring deals. If anybody could do their jobs, they'd certainly get less money and there would be more of those jobs.
Secondly, why hire somebody for millions if his work only brings in you hundreds of thousands in revenue? Answer: you don't. CEO's can bring in hundreds of millions for companies, which translates into benefits for stockholders and customers. That's why they get paid tens of millions. It makes no sense for any profit-maximizing firm to do something that has a higher marginal cost than marginal revenue, as economists put it.
The reason I support a progressive tax-- and perhaps why you should-- is not because they "benefit disproportionately" or whatever that means. That's just damn hard to prove and it implies that progressive taxes are only forms of punishment, which leads to all sorts of straw men. IMO the best reason for a progressive tax is because every dollar added to a millionaire's wealth adds less to society's total utility (see: John Stuart Mill) than every dollar added to a poor person's wealth. The less we take from the poor, the better. The more we give to the poor to a reasonable degree, the better.
Heck, considering how little the lowest two/three quintiles actually contribute to total federal government revenue, it's a shame that we tax them at all. Lower government spending by 20%; get rid of all federal taxes on the lowest three quintiles, and "smooth out" the effective tax rate curve for the 4th quintile: You'd probably decrease the deficit!
Robski jd, I am sure that you can find many examples of covetous liberals. Do you doubt that I can find as many examples of ignorant conservatives?
I can't believe I let this one slip by the first time. It's probably because the point it makes is so trite. However, the assumption is so typically liberal, i.e., that there is moral equivalence between two things which are blatantly incomparable--in this case, covetousness and ignorance. There is no moral dimension at all with ignorance. It becomes immoral when the ignorance is intentional, as when liberals ignore the obvious class envy which the democrat party uses to drum up hatred for those Rich Republicans.
I'm going to assume that Robski knows that covetousness and ignorance are not comparable but that he just chose ignore it.
jd, why do you comment without examining the comment thread? The only basis upon which I compare them is that neither is a desirable trait of a flattering term. Allow me to recap so you can fully appreciate your criticism's lack of relevance.
1. Joe attributes the relative unhappines of liberals to covetousness.
2. I, playing devil's advocate, suggest ignorance as the reason for conservatives' relative happiness.
3. You and some other intellectual giants try to defend Joe's characterization of liberals as covetous with no success and at the expense of common sense.
4. You, inexplicably sensing a missed opportunity, suddenly decide that my retort to Joe suggests moral equivalence between covetousness and ignorance.
I thought my explanation to ucfengr made it clear that my original comment (#2), "Alternative explanation #2: Ignorance is bliss", was meant to point out the ridiculousness of Joe's knee-jerk attack on liberals.
I only compare the two characteristics in terms of their supportability, as my comment #8 makes perfectly clear to even the least perceptive reader. Reading non sequitur assumptions into the comments of others does not enhance your stature as a commenter.
To summarize: Comment #10 should be viewed in the context of comments #2 and #8, and comment #2 should, as I pointed out to ucfengr, be viewed in the context of the comment that provoked it.
Evangelicals are all about context when they try to defend their scriptures, and rightly so, but some are not so assiduous with regard to context when they argue with their ideological opponents.
The first "of" should be an "or".
sorry, Robski, but common sense plays no role in your defense of your comments. It's blatantly obvious that the democrat liberal mantra is to demonize the rich using envy. You can't and won't admit it. You are intentionally ignorant--an immoral stance.
"It's blatantly obvious that the democrat liberal mantra is to demonize the rich using envy."
Even if that is true or partly true, it hardly justifies accusing liberals in general of covetousness. Conservative republicans are happy to appeal to bigotry, hatred and greed to garner financial support and votes, but that doesn't mean conservatives in general are greedy bigots.
Many of them are, of course, or the strategy would not be so effective. Nor would the strategy work unless so many conservatives were dupes like you.
There is no circle in hell for dupes. But there's a big nasty circle rather far down in the inferno for the covetous, since it's the sin that leads to all the others. You might be in danger, since you seem unable to recognize it.
In all seriousness, envy is a problem for all of us, but only one party uses it as their mantra.
Where are the circles of Hell discussed in your book of fables?
Aren't you worried about what Allah has in store for you?
I can't believe you played the hell card; I actually laughed out loud. I don't buy into your delusions.