Wednesday, December 15. 2010
 Readers know that we are fans of SureFire military and tactical flashlights. They are useful for blinding and illuminating a bad guy, or for illuminating a distant detail - or for finding a fox, beaver or owl at night.
The problem with them has been that the battery drain has been so fast that they were not useful for any regular flashlight use (for which they were not designed anyway - they were first designed to incapacitate and illuminate a human target).
They have now come out with a line of LED flashlights, some of which may not meet the same tactical specs but which have a longer battery life, and still should not be used in anybody's face unless you wish to disable them. A MagLite on steroids.
Also, Insty informs us that Amazon has deals on knives. Practical knives, not the fancy ones. Except when boarding a plane, a guy needs a knife in the pocket.
Tuesday, December 14. 2010
Our view tends to be that "bipartisans" and "moderates" are simply those who approve of slow socialism by mistaking goo-goo nursery school sentimentality for opinion and principles.
Stacy McCain gets it: The Fierce Fury of the Angry Mob of Impassioned Bipartisan Moderates. He begins:
Few things are more predictable than this: Whenever Republicans are on the upswing — whenever conservatives are on fire with enthusiasm, proclaiming their core principles and clearly on the winning side of important issues — the mainstream media will devote enormous coverage to an alleged groundswell of discontented moderates whose demands for “bipartisanship” and “civility” are accompanied by condemnation of “divisiveness” and complaints that “extremists” are ignoring the vast majority of independent “centrist” voters.
Monday, December 13. 2010
My brunch at Petrossian yesterday was blini with Beluga, smoked Salmon Eggs Benedict, and Pear Tart, with a Bloody Mary first, and then some champagne. A fine day on the town with my in-laws who love my kids more than words can tell. Some pics - don't know who those guys are at the door in the rain, but they did not enter and were not properly dressed anyway.
Carnegie Hall has some exterior renovations going on.
They almost tore down Carnegie Hall in 1960:
A major question is, what are the effects of the Virginia federal district court ruling that the individual mandate within ObamaCare (officially titled PPACA) is unconstitutional?
For now, and even if the Virginia ruling is eventually sustained by the US Supreme Court, the effects are relatively minor. The ruling took a conservative stance on severance, allowing the rest of the law to stand. The impact of the individual mandate on the other parts of the PPACA, although arguably substantial, is actually weak.
However, revealed are, once again, several of the serious failings of the PPACA, which if implemented can mean far higher insurance premiums and, perhaps, the implosion of the private insurance industry – and individual choice -- in near the condition it is today.
The Ruling: Section 1501 of PPACA mandates that individuals purchase medical insurance or face penalties via the IRS. The Va federal judge finds this goes well beyond any previous extension of the Constitution by requiring a behavior that otherwise wouldn’t occur, commenting that the possible extensions of federal power would then be endless. Two other federal district courts did find this constitutional. Other challenges are in process of first hearing, most notably the one in Florida federal district court brought by 20 states and expected to get a favorable ruling, as well as appeals of preliminary judgments elsewhere. The Virginia judge did not grant an injunction on the individual mandate, as he expects the Supreme Court to deal with it before it becomes effective.
Severance: A severance clause in a law holds that if any part is found unlawful, the rest of the law will stand. This clause was removed from PPACA by its drafters. PPACA supporters and most lawyers didn’t think any of PPACA would be found unconstitutional. But, the Virginia judge took a conservative stance toward severance, “the time-honored rule to sever with circumspection…Accordingly, the Court will sever only Section 1501 and directly-dependent provisions which make specific reference to Section 1501.”
A pdf search of PPACA finds no other such key provisions. The Obama administration argued that many other provisions of PPACA are seriously impacted but although implicit in the crafting of PPACA such language is not in PPACA.
Continue reading "Virginia, Severance & Section 1501"
 Everybody's talking about Bedbug infestations these days. Somebody recently told me that they had their house checked for bedbugs, but the exterminator only found Carpet Bugs.
I thought Carpet Bugs were mythical.
Pic is Carpet Beetle and beetle larva.
Saturday, December 11. 2010
 While the rest of the world was shopping or wrestling with fir trees or hunting, the Mrs. and I slipped in to see Dawn Treader.
All 20 theaters at our megaplex were empty this afternoon. If you haven't read this book in the Narnia series, you should. It's sort of a Christian version of Jason and the Golden Fleece tale with the theme of spiritual warfare and redemption.
It would take me an hour to write a half-decent review, so I'll just say that it is faithful to the book, and the special effects do not overwhelm the story. I passed on the 3-D glasses. There is no sex, good clean righteous violence, and neither the name of God or Christ are mentioned once. Eustace is good. Aslan seems a tamer God than usual.
You don't get to see heaven, but Reepicheep travels there at the end.
So, guess where I spent Election Eve?
In the Tea Party Ballroom in Washington, D.C.
That's ol' Doc, the party hound.
A few days before I was giving 5-minute lectures at an energy expo on the perils of Cap & Trade and scaring the holy bajeepers out of everybody.
A few days before that I attended Jon Stewart's inspiring "Let's Save America From The Racist Homophobic Teabaggers" rally. Luckily, I still had my love beads from the 60's so I fit right in.
More on all that later.
 Bird Dog raised the question of transferring vinyl record albums to CD a while back, and an excellent question it is. While most old albums have been put on disc, certainly not all have. And the impracticality of keeping a record player hanging around is obvious — and that's assuming that slick new 'home entertainment center' you just bought even has a 'Phono In' jack to begin with.
Why would it?
And there are 'custom' albums that were never commercially pressed, like the old 'pirated' releases of the Dead, Dylan, et al, as well as albums cut in private studios.
And yes, those old vinyl albums of yours are disintegrating as we speak. From a modern, digital perspective, they simply couldn't have picked a worse, more fragile medium for long-term data storage. In all fairness, though, I suppose it beats using tin foil cylinders.
Below the fold I'll elaborate on the two common methods to transfer albums to CD, as well as the pitfalls of each, including one interesting problem using the 'automatic' method that people usually don't think about until it's too late.
Continue reading "Doc's Computin' Tips: Copying records to CD"
 Saw a Hermit Thrush hopping around my shrubs yesterday. Unmistakable with his chestnut tail and spotted breast. A few years ago I had one over-winter here. He would roost each night under a bush next to my chimney.
They are the only Thrush which winters in North America (unless you count Robins, which are in the Thrush family).
I am not being an internet hermit this season. We hit two very nice Christmas parties last night, another one tonight, and tomorrow we are taking my in-laws to a nice lunch and a show down in NYC. (Gwynnie always tells me I need to get out more, so I do.)
Friday, December 10. 2010
The 1920s Christmas pics on this site are great fun. Some can be embiggened, with wonderful detail. (I don't know how to enable embiggening on our site.)
I notice that Santa did not seem to use wrapping paper back then.
At Insty. One quote that he quotes:
...approximately 60 percent of the increase in the number of college graduates from 1992 to 2008 worked in jobs that the BLS considers relatively low skilled—occupations where many participants have only high school diplomas and often even less. Only a minority of the increment in our nation’s stock of college graduates is filling jobs historically considered as requiring a bachelor’s degree or more.
The error is in considering a BA as job training. It is not. It is a paper credential for sure, but I am not sure it makes sense to view it as an investment. America needs more gunsmiths and plumbers and software developers and small business creators, not more BAs in Anthropology.
A skilled gunsmith makes more money than any anthropologist - if income is what one wants. My gunsmith charges $170/hr for metal work, a bit less for wood work, and leads a fun, interesting, and adventurous life and gets to meet and befriend all sorts of fascinating people (like me). My local digital equipment repairman charges $175/hr. Scholarly types go to college for spoon-fed intellectual nurturing and development, but I am not convinced that those things "pay off" very much in a financial way - especially nowadays, when anybody can go to college. There are plenty of schools eager to accept a fat check from anybody who can sign their name.
"Twenty years of school and then they put you on the day shift..."
When people are curious and want to learn everything, they will do it with or without a BA, and they will never quit doing it until they die even if they never make a penny from it. Real learners never quit reading and learning and trying new thoughts. It's easy to identify real scholars - after they finish whatever formal schooling they do.
Thursday, December 9. 2010
States and government employee unions are united to hide the true extent of the cost of pension promises, and the impacts on other basic government services. Leading Republican congressmen have introduced legislation to shine light on these costs.
The Pew Center On The States reported last February that:
$1 trillion. That’s the gap at the end of fiscal year 2008 between the $2.35 trillion states had set aside to pay for employees’ retirement benefits and the $3.35 trillion price tag of those promises.
Why does it matter? Because every dollar spent to reduce the unfunded retirement liability cannot be used for education, public safety and other needs. Ultimately, taxpayers could face higher taxes or cuts in essential public services.
Actually, the gap may be closer to $3-trillion, as this National Bureau of Economic Research study lays out. In April, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) study reported a $3.04-trillion shortfall in funding. The AEI recommended that pensions must disclose greater detail regarding investment risk and pension plans should reform their accounting methods to include the market value of plan liabilities. Then, legislators could have a better idea of how to reform and plan.
Continue reading "Republican Pension Reform Vs The States And Unions"
Wednesday, December 8. 2010
 From Powerline's Scott in a piece of the above title, mainly about Obamacare:
The economic "rights" asserted by Roosevelt in his second Bill of Rights differ and conflict with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They are claims on the liberty of others. If I have a right to medical care, you must have a corresponding duty to supply it. If I have a right to a decent home, you must have a duty to provide it.
The argument for the welfare state belongs in the same family as "the arguments that kings have made for enslaving the people in all ages of the world. You will find that all the arguments in favor of king-craft were of this class; they always bestrode the necks of the people, not that they wanted to do it, but because the people were better off for being ridden." That's Lincoln again.
Lincoln memorably derided the underlying principle as "the same old serpent that says you work and I eat, you toil and I will enjoy the fruits of it."
It's too late now, but I'd like to see an experiment in which one state in the US would operate under the Constitution as it is written. See how it works out. See who would go there (me, for one) and see who would flee limited government power.
Tuesday, December 7. 2010
 Praising the Puritans, at First Things (h/t, AVI). Lawler begins:
There’s little less fashionable today than praising the Puritans, especially for their egalitarian political idealism, their promotion of genuinely humane and liberating learning, and their capacity for enjoyment and human happiness. Praising the Puritans is especially difficult for us because even most of our Protestants have abandoned them. When a European calls us Puritanical we don’t say, “yes, thanks a lot, you’re right.” Instead, we either deny it, saying we’re way beyond those days. Or we admit it, saying that, “yes, we should be less capitalistic, less repressed, and more free thinking, just like you.” But the truth is that the Puritans remain the chief source of the American difference—our ability to live freely and prosperously without unduly slighting the longings of our souls. It’s the Puritans’ idealism that made and even makes Americans civilized.
Read the whole thing. I do not know how, or whether, immigrants to the US can, or have been able to, or even want to, learn the code. I sure hope they can.
Picture is Jonathan Edwards, a member of the Maggie's Farm pantheon. You would not know from the prissy portrait, but he loved to have fun.
Monday, December 6. 2010
My sons and I were at the pancake breakfast last Saturday morning at Camp Pendleton paid for by Congressman Darrell Issa’s Family Foundation to gather toys and contributions for Homefront San Diego. Issa’s Family Foundation is matching all contributions. Homefront San Diego has no overhead and no payroll. Every cent of tax-deductible contributions directly benefits the lower enlisted active duty military families in the San Diego area. Just go to the Homefront site and make your contribution to those who serve.
As a former Marine Sergeant, of course I enjoyed who worked the line serving us Saturday morning, though they serve us every day.
Continue reading "Those Who Serve"
Sunday, December 5. 2010
A fairly serious essay by Prof. Bertonneau at Brussels titled A Lesson for Our Time in Three Late-Antique Narratives: Satyricon, The Golden Ass, and Confessions. One quote from this literary jeremiad:
Everyone has vices. Most people manage to overcome the worst of their viciousness. It therefore requires a mighty labor not to see the so-called explanations of vice as mere excuses – indeed, as lame excuses – for irredentism and indulgence. The claim of personal helplessness is the creed of people who like their vices and who will on no account reform themselves. These non-explanations nevertheless have wide currency, but so also do the indifferent notion that the self is a “logocentric” illusion and the relativistic opinion that to flout a stricture is morally equal to observing it. The political religions of the Twentieth Century all relied on – and indeed mandated – these views as part of the ‘correct” view of existence. Socialism generically predicates its own inevitability and it then necessarily also predicates the emptiness of individual determination or action. Radical restructuring of society comes upon us inevitably, the vanguard always argues; and restructuring is justified because there are whole classes of victims whose misery is supposedly not of their own making, but has impinged on them from an outside beyond the control of the afflicted. In its less acute form of the multicultural welfare state, socialism insists that victim-groups not only cannot help themselves but that they cannot actually be reformed and that it is the duty of everyone else, first, to refrain from any condemnation of counterproductive behaviors and, then, to subsidize the pathological consequences of those behaviors.
Read the whole thing. It's a good reminder about those three classic texts, too, which we all read before we had the age on us to really appreciate what the authors were talking about.
Non-technical education is wasted on the young, because they are too interested in questions about themselves than in the big questions. These books were not written for adolescents.
Friday, December 3. 2010
 I think she is a celeb, and if she runs for office, she'll be a celeb candidate. Obama was a celeb candidate, and we see how that worked out. We live in a world of non-serious, lens-lice celebs who take themselves all too seriously, and I don't like that.
Furthermore, I refuse to get all tingly about any pol. I tend not to think very highly of pols, as a class, and I tend to be suspicious of any pol's seductive talents because it is so often a substitute for substance.
It's been explained to us here that Presidential candidates are just figureheads of vast, sprawling political parties and power and money interests. The candidate is "the talent," as they say in show biz and in the sports biz. I take that into account, and I know that in our TV and YouTube age, this applies to politicians much more than it used to.
This is not to say that I do not like Sarah. I do like her, and she's clearly a colorful figure and an exciting spokesperson for many people. I'd hunt or fish with her anytime.
My thoughts are in reference to Potemra: Rumblings of Discontent — on Palin
A Ghostwritten Psychiatric Book Hints at a Much Larger Problem: The Story That Is . . . and Isn't Told in Psychiatric Textbooks
Today, Psychiatry contains two camps: The psychopharmacologist "Biological Psychiatrists," and what I can only term "Whole person" Psychiatry. I practice the latter - or try to.
What makes my life difficult is that, with the growing dominance of the Pharmacology shrinks, "best practices" become redefined in favor of medicine treatments. We do have remarkable medicines nowadays but they do not really "fix" anything and, in my experience, are widely over-used.
I will get to the DSM personality disorder flap when I get the chance. Since I think the DSM is sort of silly anyway, it's hard for me to get excited about the topic.
Thursday, December 2. 2010
This gives a fairly good idea of what it's like, in Yankeeland. Lots of brush-busting, little shooting. Hunting isn't shopping - it's off-road hiking with dog. The shotgun is mostly a burden. You just hope to have a chance to use it - and not splatter your pal with birdshot. (We have all done that once or twice. It's important to apologize. Most guys don't care much, unless you hit their dog. It's best to let low birds go.)
It's riverboat European travel. Maggie's recommends. It's a hassle-free way to travel, and boats are just plain fun. It's not grande luxe by limousine Liberal standards (ie each room does not have its own hot tub or bar - so John Kerry wouldn't like it), but it's plenty comfortable enough for any normal American Republican. Friendly, too, and great local food.
We loved travelling with them.
Most of the arguments are weak from proponents and opponents of the Pentagon study on repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.
Defense Secretary Gates argues that if repeal is not now then the intrusions by the courts into military discipline would be more disruptive. However, he fails to mention the failure of this administration’s Justice Department to vigorously defend DADT, the Congressionally-passed law, and that activist courts will continue to undermine many aspects of the Pentagon leadership’s supposedly well-laid plans.
Joint Chiefs Chairman Mullen argues that repeal is both the American thing to do and that better leadership within the military will make it work. Simply, the military’s essential warrior culture is different than for civilian or corporate or non-military federal employees. Yes, according to the Pentagon’s survey, there is less resistance among non-combat troops, but they are the tail, and should not, must not wag the dog. It’s the teeth that count for the military’s effectiveness. Further, it’s hard to resist recalling the Pentagon’s mistaken assumptions and severe errors in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mullen, also, suggests that the greater discipline within combat units will offset the greater, majority, resistance to repeal.
Mullens defends his attitude toward the combat troops’ resistance by saying he has led troops and cares about them deeply. No doubt he cares, but he has never been a “grunt” nor led ground combat units. Mullens’ disregard of the impact on retention of today’s warriors and recruitment of tomorrow’s is simply disgraceful, even if the actual impact is lower than the troops themselves say, and will not be offset, under any scenario, by liberals, libertarians or gays enlisting or serving in combat units. There is also the claim that the relative youth of combat troops makes their views less worthy of mature judgment. Guess what Mullens, combat troops are necessarily younger. According to the data file sent to me by the Defense Manpower Data Center, through January 31, 2010, of the 250-thousand active and reserve Marines deployed to Iraq, 66% of the active duty and 57% of the reservists were age 24 or under. They were mature enough to judge whether to enlist to risk their lives.
Opponents of repeal make some other weak arguments.
The focus of the Pentagon survey is criticized for not asking “should” repeal occur, and the methodology for relying upon a less than 30% voluntary response. The Pentagon is correct to argue that “should” is properly a Congressional issue and the survey provides useful info on the “how” and “impacts.” There are some weaknesses in the survey report, as in any, but neither crippling nor ignoring most of the impacts. The response, the Pentagon says, has been adjusted for representativeness. There’s no reason to doubt that, except the adjustments are not provided to make that conclusive. Further, analyses of voluntary responses in polling show that those with the strongest views have higher response rates, so – pro and con – there’s again little reason to believe that those with the strongest views were not represented. But, it is unknown whether the responses from combat troops were more than from non-combat, before the adjustments.
Another criticism of the Pentagon report and the media reporting of it is that there are actually relatively few who see the problems or impacts as positive. The bulk of responses to many questions are in the category of positive-and-negative, which the report and media reports group with the positive. The report says that the analysis of cross-tabs, reactions to other questions, justifies these in-the-middle repliers being grouped with the positive. However, that analysis detail is not included in the report, and the report does not allocate to positive or negative based on such an analysis. There’s important distinctions and weightings that deserve more depth and understanding. Perhaps the report authors’ judgment is correct, but that remains to be seen. Opponents should be demanding the report’s detail data-analysis. Aside from this, an important refinement of the already published data, the critics of the report’s methodology and conclusions are on weak ground.
The move to repeal DADT right now is criticized as a political move by the President’s Democratic Party, before their Congressional numbers shrink in January. That is so, and that is what Congress is, political. Opponents of immediate repeal can and will use their means to block it being forced through now, or can reverse a repeal in January.
In short, there are too many serious issues to be better understood by and detailed to the Congress, and for all Americans, than in the report or from its supporters statements so far. A few days to digest the report and a few days of Congressional hearings are grossly inadequate.
Tomorrow we hear from the service chiefs, a little closer to operational realities, who as the New York Times reports "All have expressed reluctance about repeal." After them, there are more to hear from. Congress adjourns next week, and there simply isn't enough time for a sufficiently informed and prudently considered vote.
P.S.: Paul Mirengoff at Powerline does an excellent job of Separating Facts From Spin in the Pentagon's DADT Report. Among other things, one of the report's two chief authors never served in the military and is an active liberal and Obama supporter. Opinions abound despite empirical data to the contrary.
Update: Military Chiefs Recommend Keeping DADT For Now
I have been neglecting my Fallacy portfolio here at Maggie's for quite a while. My bad.
Category Error is not a complex notion, but it was formulated in a somewhat complex way by the brilliant Gilbert Ryle in his classic work, The Concept of Mind (this via Wiki):
The term "category-mistake" was introduced by Gilbert Ryle in his book The Concept of Mind (1949) to remove what he argued to be a confusion over the nature of mind born from Cartesian metaphysics. Ryle alleged that it was a mistake to treat the mind as an object made of an immaterial substance because predications of substance are not meaningful for a collection of dispositions and capacities.
Specifically, the phrase is introduced in chapter 1, section 2. The first example he gives is of a visitor to Oxford. The visitor, upon viewing the colleges and library, reportedly inquired “But where is the University?"[1] The visitor's mistake is presuming that a University is part of the category "units of physical infrastructure" or some such thing, rather than the category "institutions", say, which are far more abstract and complex conglomerations of buildings, people, procedures, and so on.
Ryle's second example is of a child witnessing the march-past of a division. After having had battalions, batteries, squadrons, etc. pointed out, the child asks when is the division going to appear. 'The march-past was not a parade of battalions, batteries, squadrons and a division; it was a parade of the battalions, batteries and squadrons of a division.' (Ryle's italics)
His third example is of a foreigner being shown a cricket match. After being pointed out batsmen, bowlers and fielders, the foreigner asks: 'who is left to contribute the famous element of team-spirit?'
He goes on to argue that the Cartesian dualism of mind and body rests on a category-mistake.
Yes, I think it does. But... I think, therefore I post things at Maggie's Farm. From another site, here's a simple formulation of this common and basic fallacy:
These fallacies occur because the author mistakenly assumes that the whole is nothing more than the sum of its parts. However, things joined together may have different properties as a whole than any of them do separately. The following fallacies are category errors:
- Composition (Because the parts have a property, the whole is said to have that property)
- Division (Because the whole has a property, the parts are said to have that property)
Give us some solid examples. I don't have time think up some good ones today. Duty before pleasure.
A quote from the good piece I linked this morning, Can environmentalism be saved from itself?
Before they were sucked into the giant vortex of global warming, environmentalists did useful things. They protested against massive Third World dams that would ruin both natural and human habitats. They warned about invasive species and diseases that could tear through our forests and wreck our water systems. They fought for national parks and greenbelts and protected areas. They talked about the big things too – such as how the world could feed another three billion people without destroying all the rain forests and running out of water. They believed in conservation – conserving this beautiful planet of ours from the worst of human despoliation – rather than false claims to scientific certainty about the future, unenforceable treaties and radical utopian social reform.
I agree with all that. Furthermore, we non-politically-driven conservation types usually did the work ourselves - without asking governments and powers to do it. We even bought machines to restore filled-in and drained marshes (and even helped to undo Saddam Hussein's destruction of Iraq's vast marshes, which he did to eliminate those too-independent Marsh Arabs who wanted to be left alone).
For one example, Ducks Unlimited. Something like 12 million acres of wildlife habitat under protection now in the US, Canada (and some in Mexico), done with private donations. (59 million acres "influenced and conserved" - that includes things like farmlands operated in habitat-compatible ways supervised and assisted by DU). While warmist bureaucrats party in Cancun and try to figure out how to control the world, DU works to raise money and protect habitat from development and degradation every day.
Maggie's Farm supports DU.
Here's one guide to a prayerful Advent this year.
I find that guides help me with this, and with many other things.
That's Fra Angelico's (aka Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, aka Guido di Pietro) Adoration of the Magi. When you're in Florence, take the bus ride 20 minutes up the hill to Fiesole and see his little chapel and monastery. It's an active convent now, so they might not let you in. Our thanks to the BD art fiend and art-finder pupette (now Wall-Streeter but still art-finder) who turned us on to that chapel.
BTW, we think it's more fun to stay in the pastoral hills of old Etruscan Fiesole when visiting Florence. The bus runs until late, it's a quick cheap one-Euro ride, you get to ride with the locals, and the views are great. On our last visit, I think we only needed to use a cab once. Our pupette's Georgetown abroad semester was out of the old Rockefeller villa in Fiesole. Cool place. I should revisit those pics one of these days.
Wednesday, December 1. 2010
 Unlike Leninism, Socialism, Marxism, Keynesianism, capitalism is not a theory. I may be naive to think that this is an important point. Capitalism is just what humans naturally and practically do to survive, to exchange things, and to try to thrive, when they are left in peace by Power. It's win-win transactions in which people get what they want without killing or otherwise using force against eachother. That's all it is - a benign and highly productive aspect of human nature.
Those Wyoming obsidians found on Long Island, NY, a few years ago in a buried Indian cache tell it all. I try to imagine the capitalist transactions involved, from wampum to beaver pelts to who knows what other currencies, all the way across the USA. Whether the item is obsidian chips or Italian credit-default swaps, it's all the same: if you want it, compensate the owner.
Adam Smith did not invent capitalism (or even use the term - yes, it was Marx who made it an "ism") - he just tried to explain what energetic and creative people do when they can do it peacefully, and by free choice.
Unless our kids take some real economics courses, or open a lemonade stand and figure out how the lemons got to them, or discuss real life with their parents, they won't get it at all. They are too insulated from reality nowadays, due to the prosperity of trade and capitalism.
At Wkly Std, More Adam Smith, Please . . .and less Barbara Ehrenreich.
In Socialist fantasies, I sometimes think they imagine that money and wealth come from Daddy. That's probably why the college kids like it.
Editor note: Re obsidian arrowheads, just Google the topic to find out how many people are knapping arrowheads, knife blades, and spearheads these days - for fun and profit. That's called capitalism, hard at work on the obsidian trade even today. Even real Indians are doing it to get into the game.
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