Well, I am going to wing it today, trusting the measured Russ Roberts to do the heavy lifting, as I am determined to get to the hospital lickety-split this morning. Yesterday proved the perfect storm of missing all key events at the hospital: social workers [it isn’t what it sounds, they didn’t find the still or the mangle we were making her turn], physiotherapists, doctors’ rounds, and lunch. How they managed to squeeze all this in between 10:30 and noon is beyond me. People ask me for directions downstairs I have been there for so long, but I had to leave to experience the ongoing miracle of the laying on of hands on my hip. I have thus been playing broken telephone, and the person whispering in my ear is an octogenarian, who while challenged at the best of times, is not experiencing those best of times, and one whom could really use a plucking, a sad reminder of my hirsute future [future, ed.?], so I am going to spare you my lucid prose as I dash, tweezers in hand, to the hospital, to find they fit all that stuff in today before dawn.
I have often touted Professor Roberts’ informative interviews and this one follows along with a sub-theme that is ever present and ignored at one’s peril: why do intelligent people disagree. It also manages to discuss thorny topics calmly, something I much appreciate, and which is only possible when one accepts that one oneself must also be biased and a product of one’s context.
So don’t boil over, or give me the cold shoulder, if you disagree with one or the other of the subjects of the book. We don’t know how things are going to play out and it is beyond interesting to recognize doomsday scenarios as being best sellers, decade after decade.
Paul Sabin of Yale University and author of The Bet talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his book. Sabin uses the bet between Paul Ehrlich and Julian Simon–a bet over whether natural resources are getting scarcer as population grows–as a lens for examining the evolution of the environmental movement and its status today. Sabin considers the successes and failures of the movement and the challenges of having nuanced public policy discussions on issues where both sides have passionate opinions.
I think the future is going to be like the past, except different. Followed by a period of change. Sort of like the weather.
So make the most of it, find some now in your today, and be kind to the people you encounter. And drink fluids, plenty of fluids, until they tell you not to.
Here’s a good smackdown against one of the most incredibly stupid things to ever gain traction in the tortured minds of wingnut conspiracy theorists.
The Snow Conspiracy
The author may have coined a great new acronym: FMS (fucking moron syndrome)
plenty of snark, but the basic message is true. also a problem for Atlanta even more than most cities, is that the city, county, and state governments do not get along because of HYPER partisanship.
no one complained yet so here it goes – last night here reached -14F, -26C.
i don’t have time for your book review yet Xty – maybe later. everyone have a nice balmy Tuesday. 🙂
a nice balmy Tuesday… LOL
Sounds like you’re about to give up all hope that warm weather will ever return. Who could blame you.
I think the hyper-partisanship of Atl politics has been remedied by what is now the complete dysfunctionality of the local, county, state, national, and world’s political “system”. Like 2 pulley’s trying to spin in operate directions… now that the belt is broken it really doesn’t matter.
But, stay tuned to Atlanta because tonight we’re supposed to maybe get hit with some snow or freezing rain. You can bet there will be a major over-reaction to whatever falls after the great fiasco of a couple of weeks ago. Man, was that something to behold.
2 inches of powdery snow and the entire Atlanta metro area was totally gridlocked within an hour. The roads were completely fine, but everybody in Atlanta, including the schools (lol, hey they still call themselves that) all piled into traffic at the same time.
All in a panic… all “frustrated”, in a hurry, and MAN what a lesson many people received. A good ole 24 hour introduction to the great outdoors!!
Nobody died that probably wouldn’t have anyway and a little baby girl named Grace was even born right in the middle of it all. Yep, born without any assistance from a complex dysfunctional man-made system. whodathunkit.
people learned that when the system couldn’t provide, they could actually walk on their own 2 feet. Even if their folder full of disability papers stated that they should never be required to do so… Fat, frustration, fear, cold,… all cured by a good walk!!
One old man walked over 5 miles to home in the middle of the night, falling several times. The next morning, sort of in celebration for his accomplishment, he walked the 5 miles back to his stranded vehicle and drove home later when traffic had cleared.
I enjoyed listening to 2 cute little gals at Wal-Mart go on and on about their adventure. It was SO cold, and they weren’t sure how far it was, and they walked and walked,… and now.. “giirrrlllll my legs are so sore”. Probably the best thing they’ve ever done!! There were no disclaimers, no safety briefings, nobody to call, just walk or DIE (or so it seemed to many).
“life” in Atlanta. at least for a bit.
Hi DN. a friend of mine lives in Powder Springs GA. he has kept me updated on the ridiculousness. you are probably correct in that the response to this next storm will be way more than enough. 🙂
i had intended to work on my taxes this afternoon, but just thinking about it is giving me a head ache. so instead i’m half-way through your post Xty – i’m reading it.
hope everyone gives it a shot. the topic is “topical” as hell. the world is grey, not black and white!
would you rather be Pollyanna, or the boy who cried wolf? how about neither?
applied to politics, i prefer the choice least likely in hindsight to get me labeled an idiot.
applied to the financial markets, this last “dip” probably was the one to be buying hand over fist, but few of the bugs have any credibility left.
I didn’t get to the end yet because of time constraints and hospital times, but topical indeed. And apparently without rancour. And as to your choice: neither!
And I stick to my point that Professor Roberts can make you appear to be much better read than you are.
Gold is having a rather nice day, speaking of having sold the dip.
1291 … almost interesting.
Okay, I had to check, but I will give you -14F as pretty cold. Hat weather.
i’m back. it got above 0F (-18C), and the sun’s out, so no taxes today
… instead i went on a beer run. for those who have a hard time converting temps, just remember 0C and 32F are at freezing, 100C, and 212F are at boiling. 37C and 99F are normal body temp. and as you can see, degrees in Celcius are roughly twice those in Fahrenheit.
i finished reading the article. it’s what i have been saying all along about everything. i don’t even have a PhD.
the comments are worth reading also – see who gets it, and who doesn’t. Kunstler comments at the end also.
interestingly, and also somewhat on OT, on the way back from the store i had to stop in the middle of the street for two wild turkeys. this in the almost dead center of a city of about 60,000. they must be getting hungry, and i assume people are feeding them. big mistake folks. they are 10 times worse than rabbits in your yard and garden. right Dude?
tunes later. i’m celebrating blowing off the taxman, and this is going to be the last of the brutal cold around here. (or i’m freaking leaving.)
.
When I was a kid, geese were a special treat. As a family we’d drive up toward Horicon just to see them. Driving somewhere to see turkeys wasn’t even an option. And maybe you could see a bald eagle, only maybe, if you went to the Wisconsin River, but otherwise go to Alaska.
Nowdays, geese and turkeys are a nuisance. They are everywhere. And bald eagle sightings are a fairly regular thing.
I count this all as good news, the “nuisance” crack notwithstanding. Some things DO just keep on getting better.
i admit it. i hunted partridge (grouse) illegally once. 4 guys, 4 shotguns, one truck, logging roads, low gear, and i should also mention, no dog. but doing that in the middle of town, in the dead of winter, is surely going to result in arrest, if not injury.
but i really do hope that those turkeys aren’t eating any GMO corn, or God forbid, Cheetos! 😀
fyi, the 200 day on gold currently sits at 1312. I monitor this sort of thing on a weekly closing basis and will let this crew know if I see anything. Maybe, just maybe, our year long nightmare in the metals could be coming to an end soon. But at this time it’s still just a maybe.
Bonds are looking better lately, but I don’t have a buy signal on them yet either. And stocks have pulled themselves back from the brink, and now look ready to try for new highs. They were Jellin’ with Yellen today. Or maybe it was the debt ceiling hike. GOP threw in the towel on hostage demands. 😛
In other words, no change on anything as of yet, but things have been interesting.
i’m going heavy flat and cone top beer cans, tulip bulbs, powerball tickets, and bitcoin.
After listening to a good bit of the interview, The interviewer does seem to be quite a nice fellow.
The Bet sounded to me like an apple/oranges argument that was settled by sort of an unrelated bet.
Paul “Henny Penny” Ehrlich, using similar H.P. level reasoning figured that the population of the world would implode if it grew too many. Because he had observed a bunch of butterflies go through what he believed to be just such a prophetic boom/bust cycle. And ‘Hey, Why Not’?? …since the personable Ehrlich wasn’t actually into debating his theory, or considering it’s flaws, but rather enjoyed touring around profiting from it’s espousal. Theater.
Hence, The Bet, which was the intellectual equivalent to flipping a coin to settle the argument of “do you walk to work or take your lunch?”
But apparently it was quite a discussion generator for the folks, back in the day. And no doubt a great inspiration for Al “HP3” Gore, who went above and beyond on all counts. Instead of acorns and dead butterflies, HP3 commissioned official, custom made studies!! And instead of a falling sky, or population decline, HP3 declared- The WHOLE PLANET IS GOING TO BURN!!, (after it melts and floods?… eh didn’t follow the story too closely). But he really cashed in on Global Warming, even though we’re not hearing a lot about it these days… these cold cold never ending cold days.
But anyway, Ehrlich isn’t hard to figure. And the economist- Julian. Anything an economist can do to separate themselves from that worthless herd and get a little notoriety… Whattya say Julian? Julian: “I’LL TAKE IT!!!” It was a win-win all the way.
—
DP, you should see us down here today. It’s about 39 degrees, a light rain, and the streets are bare. We are supposed to get some ice tonight, but anything is going to seem anticlimactic compared to the last one.
I’ve got a few bottles of Dasani left, and picked up an extra cottage cheese on Kroger’s 4 for 5 bucks a while back.. SO Bring on the ICE!! lol
Sporting Group in the Westminster dog show is on RIGHT NOW!!!!
Go Shorthairs!!!
DN – if this keeps up i’ll come down there and teach you how to skeech. it’s skiing by holding onto the bumper just using an old pair of sneakers for your skis.
wtf EO – no live feed? let me know when the wiener dogs are next.
check this out. this kind of storm gets mayors fired even up here…
http://galleries.apps.chicagotribune.com/chi-140102-blizzard-1979-chicago-pictures/#chi-snow2sidestreets-20130312
Sorry, Dachshunds were last night!
The German Shorthair did not win, btw. I would grumble that it’s all fixed, but a GSP did win in 2005. It was awesome. 🙂
the ultimate cowbell. but the stones still did it first.
Isn’t the ‘feels like’ reassuring?
It isn’t necessarily darkest right before dawn, but it sure often is coldest.
It is just something I have noticed with my early mornings – the temperature keeps on dropping until the sun starts to rise – imagine that – and me with a masters degree and all.
At least the feels like is finally colder. Wind can only warm you up so much.
“do you walk to work or take your lunch”
I actually guffawed. Good thing I wasn’t drinking tea at the moment. But yes, profiting by popularizing a theory rather than carrying on like a normal human – religions too – Al Gore always reminded me of one of those Sunday morning television preachers. And he ended up a 100 millionaire I do believe. He partly owned the carbon exchange he had mandated if I recall correctly.
Arggh but integrity is a scarce commodity and one I would choose to invest in!
good morning
Good morning, and finally, we have convergence:
The wife and I sometimes refer to this as “snot-freezing weather”. 😛
A change is imminent though. We are supposed to have 34F tomorrow.
Good hockey. Both goalies tested early (especially ours, harumphhh).
Sending out a Happy Golden Birthday to my old boy Bucker. 12 on the 12th.
Here’s a pic from his puppy days.
Great hockey game. Mark your calendar for feb 20. 😈
Credit to Canada for owning the 3rd period. They stepped up.
Facebook Fraud: Click Farms & Fake Likes
Veeerrrrry interesting video included. Fwiw, I deleted both my facebook account and my twitter account in the past week. It all gives me the creeps. My sister is pissed at me because she lives FB all day every day. Get a life, Sis.
EO – this kind of thing is pervasive. again, one of the things at the last place that was so friggin disgusting. but, yes, and sorry, for i probably am “holier than thou!” so ultimately trust is destroyed, and the internet is rendered useless. Xty – your word of the day is profound. but keep reading…
i am watching this right now. please give it a shot. we have been lied to for a very long time. our way of life, the ‘western’ way, is not the only way. and it is failing dramatically right now. but there is hope. a different way, the real way, is already known. change will come – it is only a matter of time. to me, this film touched on the idea of the grand ‘awakening’, ascension, good and evil, and so much more. no, i haven’t smoked anything today.
just feeling a little pensive, and really tired of being lied to top down, bottom up in this fascist culture… especially as i continue to blow off doing my taxes. why can’t enough people just refuse to pay? good question.
http://www.iamthedoc.com/thefilm/
i love all you guys. thank you for all you do. 🙂 🙂 🙂 ❗ ❗ ❗
here’s a little more marketing. read this summary…
http://www.iamthedoc.com/thefilm/
I can’t do the links … so I will stick with the lighter side – Bucker’s fur looks like liquid chocolate, and may he enjoy his golden years!
I fell asleep watching the dog show – it is so fascinating for so many reasons, fashion, culture, trotting styles for handlers, and then there are all the dogs of course. I often think the winning breed is a fix. The year the Bernese Mountain dog won was very suspect. I assume you have seen Best in Show. If not, hilarious. It turns out they didn’t use a script. Spent 6 months getting together in character and then just filmed the whole thing.
I was going to comment the other day that I am really glad we are not using likes for comments it is bad for one’s character to go back and see how liked one’s comments were – and yes, the shoe fits and I didn’t like its style.
Won my battle with the hospital and they are not going to discharge mum. I know you guys have issues, but honest to goodness, the doctor who was going to sign mum’s discharge papers had never seen mum or me. Strangely, when I got to this little point, she did appear, was extremely charming and had changed her mind about discharging mum and has recategorized her. Didn’t exactly take responsibility but it was close. We have been fighting this same problem for 10 months, and each point of contact with the health care system has been slightly more critical. Family doctor twice or thrice, specialist once, emergency by car, and finally emergency by ambulance. I told them the next vehicle in that list is a hearse. And then I ask, are you sending mum home to die, which would be okay, but they say, no no no, they are going to make her better. And then I suggest this is a good environment for that task, not my house, which by their own criteria is not safe for mum until she can go up one flight of stairs, assisted.
And now a new doctor has appeared and mum can stay until she is better or we find rehab or a convalescent home. Boy that was difficult – but I do tend to eventually explain things to people such that they fall into line. Mum safe and warm. Xty happy. Too bad there isn’t a bar in this hospital!
here is a link to that movie on you tube, or you can watch it using Netflix.
i liked your song of the day Xty. my favorite video clip from that movie is no longer available. do you remember, “but these amps go to 11.”?
yes – your point taken too – “likes” also encourage group think. they can be gamed. they can become incentive for egotistical reasons, and not what’s best for the site. they can be used as “MOPE”. what else? luckily i never really sought fame that way. i always thought it was weird to try to become popular, while anonymous. there is something f’d up with that. hey you guys know how i am. what you see is what you get, so just bugger off! (love that saying, but my fake accent stinks.)
i am proud of you Xty. you should write a ‘how to’ book on how to receive your government mandate. 🙂
two or three more cold days here, and then it’s tee shirts and shorts. it will be above the freezing point. i might just shovel a spot in the yard big enough for my grill, a cooler, and a lawn chair.
oh DN – saw that Atlanta is pretty much shut down. but this time, no one is on the roads at all. i’ll let you tell it when you get back.
?
I just tried twice to post a comment w/ a picture and nothing happened. Reminds me of Curly- “I tried to think but nothin’ happened”.
Let’s see what happens this time.
OK, figured it out- it was my error. I grabbed the right picture but from the wrong folder and it wasn’t the resized version. So big it caused a time out. So here goes again:
EO mentioned bald eagles and I was fortunate to see one on my walk today. Third sighting this winter. First 21 years we lived here saw a grand total of one. Now have 7 the last 5 years. According to DNR there are 3 nesting pairs in my county as well as 3 each in EO’s and DP’s counties, with a total of 1337 pairs statewide as of 2012. That’s a nice improvement from 1962 when there were only 25 pairs in the state amidst the DDT debacle.
About 350 yards away, our horse shed for perspective.
hey, we are back on topic. look at how little has changed in 50 years…
“Within a couple of years of publication, Carson and Kennedy were both dead, she after a long struggle with cancer, the malaise of the modern world. But first she was excoriated by the chemical industry, which unleashed a public relations campaign that echoes today’s tribal political confrontations over global warming. Monsanto commissioned a parody of Silent Spring, called Desolate Year, evoking a hungry world overrun by bugs. With the recent Bay of Pigs debacle and a fear of Soviet missiles ringing in the ears of the US public, the chemical company Velsicol suggested that Carson was part of a Communist plot to ruin the US food supply chain.”
one of many ironies that escaped the wing-nuts at the time was that the symbol of their great country was on the road to extinction.
http://www.theglobalmail.org/feature/ddt-was-so-safe-you-could-eat-it-and-other-killer-myths-of-modern-technology/387/
this article is a must read!
off topic again. read the fourth comment. yup, Elmer, you are definitely cooking with gas now. but you also are way to kind to a certain shill…
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=5673441815180854503&postID=4762728990402648220&isPopup=true
finding lots of good stuff tonight…
http://www.examiner.com/article/pennsylvania-judge-sentenced-to-28-years-prison-for-selling-teens-to-prisons
deregulate, privatize, deregulate, privatize, say it with me, keep saying it, until your eyes glaze. then go vote.
looks like i killed the thread. just to make sure…
Da Bears need a player of his ability. Whichever team drafts him will sell a ton of jerseys with his number to the lgbt community.
Too bad his father is not open-minded enough to fully accept his son’s reality. He was quoted as saying he didn’t want his grandchildren to be brought up in that lifestyle. Dumb ass.
my favorite part of it is where he points out the obvious contradictions. my opinion, being libertarian, and knowing what it means, is let the kid play. it is none of my business what goes on in his private life. but in reality, he probably won’t go in the first round, unless some team out of desperation decides to be “progressive”. i could see Chicago, or even Detroit taking the chance!
here’s some more hypocrisy. so much for that “liberal media bias”. if the fact that 6 companies own 95% of the US media isn’t enough to make one question the validity of that tired rhetoric, maybe this will. wake up folks, it’s all about the money, specifically the one percents, not yours…
http://pando.com/2014/02/12/the-wolf-of-sesame-street-revealing-the-secret-corruption-inside-pbss-news-division/
long article, sorry. this is near the end. another right wing talking point blown to hell.
(liberal media bias)
“A billionaire political activist like Arnold exerting financial – and thus ideological – control over PBS news programming is the culmination of a larger campaign by ideological and corporate interests to politicize public broadcasting. As Pando’s Yasha Levine and others have documented, on National Public Radio that campaign has involved the radio network promoting politically skewed coverage of political front groups and corporate interests that are now permitted to finance NPR’s journalism. That trend shows no sign of abating under NPR’s new CEO, who came to the job after a career as a financial-industry lobbyist, Republican Party benefactor and board member of corporate-financed conservative think tanks.
On PBS, the campaign has been even more intense. During fights over funding for public broadcasting during the Bush era, one FCC official told the Washington Post that under withering pressure from conservative ideologues and corporate special interests, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting became “engaged in a systematic effort not just to sanitize the truth, but to impose a right-wing agenda on PBS.”
In recent years, this campaign has seen public television stations ignore PBS’s own rules about editorial control and pre-ordained conclusions. Indeed, stations across the country have started airing programming from wealthy ultraconservative foundations and corporate interests looking to promote their political messages through the PBS brand.
For instance, on the political front, there has been the “Free Markets Series” promoting right-wing icons like scion Steve Forbes, Cato scholar John Allison, and author Ayn Rand. Championing archconservative economic ideology, the show is financed by the John Templeton Foundation, whose namesake was a billionaire Wall Street investor and which is run by a financier of right-wing political causes. According to the program’s website, in 2012 alone the Free Market Series “was telecast on PBS affiliates 20,722 times, over 249 stations, across 43 states and 129 markets, including nine of the top ten Nielsen markets.”
Yes indeed, the ice and storm (now melted) were much worse, but after the previous reality check, the roads remained empty.
Xty- it does often get colder right before sunrise. Before the actual sunrise the Sun’s rays are already shining through the atmosphere above you. And that atmosphere is usually colder than the ground temperature. (about 2 degrees Celsius per 1000 feet if I remember correctly)
So, when the Sun’s rays warm the upper atmosphere, it forces that colder air down to where you are. Varying conditions can prevent this phenomenon, but it is frequent.
More frequent than not it seemed when I was on the perimeter before Sunrise.
As for the Gold chart, it’s not what it does (up or down)… the big story is going to be when the world finds out the charts are as faked as a Bernie Madoff monthly statement. THEN we’ll see some action. For now, this is all theater, imo.
Funny that even people who don’t like what is going on with the charts are just as willfully oblivious to the fakeness as a CNBC prompter reader.
I spent years in a Network Enterprise Operations center. Designing many data gathering, data feed, and data display visuals. Just like the silver/gold charts.
Knowing what to look for in a faked chart, I have more than documented the fakeness of the silver/gold chart. Well past any degree of evidence that they are legit.
But it’s like Santa Claus, nobody wants to hear that it’s not real.
HFT Algos.. Seriously? That must be a huge industry right… tons of programmers, managers, HR?? Probably even courses offered on just such a thing right? .. Nope.
That HFT Algos run 90% of all the trades, including metals??… that only exists on the CNBC HFT Algo “implied” infomercials, and from those who repeat it.
The silver and gold chart are controlled by apps. They operate in a Gameware environment, like “Call of Duty” or some such.
The Bernie Madoff moment that lies ahead is going to be one for the books. The markets aren’t manipulated by unbalanced trading, it’s a hoax. Man, is that going to be a shocker for the “Manipulated vs Not Manipulated” crowd to find out they were both duped.
weather, meteorology, military, the fake metals market… this is making me hungry!!
And they just opened a new Steak n’ Shake here in Douglasville, is life good or what?!?
Whether the gold charts are faked or not (I’m agnostic on the question), the gains or losses that result, especially when levered out by derivative plays like miners, are very, very real.
I know the story about how you should just count ounces, ignore the noise, and wait for gold to be your lifeboat in times of trouble. I used to put some stock in that, but I just don’t anymore.
Supposedly, gold has maintained it’s purchasing power for thousands of years. Maybe it has, but I don’t have thousands of years. Gold can spend a lifetime over or under valued in terms of purchasing power.
DN, do they have a lot of Waffle Houses by you? Man, I love those, but we have none in these parts. I could eat that good salty ham all day. It’s been a long time… 😥
something for everyone-
Xty, just recorded Best in Show per your reco.
DN, Lucky you, Steak n’ Shake. I have to lower my standards and enter the cesspool of Illinois for my fix.
EO, those are two really good lookin boys you posted yesterday. Don’t know where the one got his looks, but I’m thinkin the other one with glasses got his looks from the maternal side. 😛
DP, I think I have finally perfected my cornbread recipe. I’ll bring it, what would you pair with it?
Pete, You must have gotten some weather too. We’re all in the same boat this winter.
if the cesspool i live in is closer, we have a Steak and Shake.
yeah, but they both look the the mailman.
venison chile over posole.
two more cold nights, and then
just in case you are having a bad day Xty. one of my favorite Canuck bands. to better days ahead! 🙂
DUDE. the area that i’m in avoided most of the super heavy duty nasty crap and we got mostly rain which suited me just fine…thanks for asking. old ec tune for the cause