Sunday morning reading - September 20, 2009

“The reason he could not get an answer to this very simple question is that it is stupid.”

In the WaPost, there was Ezra Klein trolling along with “What level of spending on health care was optimal for innovation?”  Then Warren pounced:

The very problem is that when government runs computers or health care, innovation is seen as a cost.  Klein, by asking the question in this way, is betraying exactly what is fundamentally wrong with a single-payer system.  The single-payer tends to think in terms of trying to deliver the current value proposition (i.e., the 2009 level of health care technology) as cheaply as possible.  The problem is that in 2039, it will still be focused on delivering the 2009-level of health care technology.  For the government — a new drug, a new procedure, a new test — these are all incremental costs, to be avoided.  Klein just wants a number he can plug into budget projections to say, “see, innovation is covered...”

Command-and-control “innovation” may work, but it is hostile to the unpredictable: The outliers that nurture the revolutionary. • 1800 words


“...from toothbrushes to eyeglasses to condoms to stethoscopes to syringes to blood pressure monitors to hospital beds to artificial heart valves to pacemakers to advanced diagnostic equipment.”

And it seems the Senate Democrats think that one way to encourage innovation is to impose what amounts to a gross revenue tax on the medical device industry:

In the case of my own mid-sized company, the tax would be the equivalent of a roughly 20% surcharge on our net income (in all likelihood raising our economic tax rate well above 50%) or 50% of our research and development budget, depending on how you want to look at it.

Who needs those eeevil profits?  Erm... you do. • 1250 words


“I think we would significantly advance the understanding of what happened and help policymakers address the root causes of the financial and economic crisis.”

Looking back:  Keith Hennessey has 20 Questions for the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission.  Lessons learned? (via: IP) • 20 Questions, 1200 words


“‘These methodologies do not help reduce risk in financial markets. What they do is provide investors and lenders with a rationale for taking on even more risk.’”

Looking ahead:  “Nemo Paradise” on the strange new actors in today’s markets (updated):

Where the market ecology once comprised a few instruments separated by wide gulfs of uncharted savanna, there is now a teeming megastructure with many highly complex organisms – all of which relate to each other in some way or another, either insignificantly or to a very high degree...

The beasts are about to start bumping into each other, and there’s no telling what the outcomes might be.

He says we’ll understand more- when it’s all over.  Gee, that’s comforting!. • 1000 words


“We now take up the long abdicated duty to rouse our fellow citizens and actively wrest [back] the power and the liberties that have been progressively talked, cajoled, threatened, wheedled, and extorted from us...”

The Reclamation of Independence:

We reclaim our independence from...

...the tyranny of ‘Political Correctness’.
...your victimhood.
...the myth of ...diversity at the cost of excellence.
...the contempt of our citizenship.

...and that’s just the first four articles.  Read the whole thing, and contrast with Ric’s 15 ideas (linked last week).  HT: Nathan • 7 articles, 2800 words


“Just a couple of days ago there was a lengthy piece in the Washington Post about how the White House was trying to come up with a coherent strategy for dealing with the opposition.  Fascinatingly, not a single one involved simply ‘responding to the arguments.’”

“Gagdad Bob” looks at why Obama’s opponents are racists. Or, more accurately, why the Obama-ites characterize their opponents as racists.

This was one of the things that most caught Tocqueville's attention, that is, the spontaneous emergence of civil society, of people taking care of one another.  When the state takes over this function, it not only diminishes the domain of the [collective-spiritual], but replaces it with... the fascist/socialist space of the magical collective, impervious to the light of reason.

Enlightening. • 1400 words


“No rational person, black or white or yellow, will, for the foreseeable future, allow themselves to be played that egregiously again.”

Meanwhile, “Velociman” sees dire implications for the future:

...The casual, insulting, provocative, hateful, dishonest, and desperate aspersions of racism cast by this fellow and his lot have left a significant portion of the populace feeling quite betrayed.  These quick, cheap potshots for short term gain will leave bruises upon the body politic for two generations...

The 55% of the populace who disagrees with his health care plan includes, obviously, a shitload of Obama voters.  For breaking ranks with Obama over a fucking policy difference this man is willing to slander and tar people who just voted for him with the ultimate insult...

I hope his predictions are wrong; I fear they may be right. • 547 words


So, are you a racist?  Find the answer, in the Obama Criticism Flow Chart. (HT: Dan Collins)

And finally, one-day-at-the-office from Crankylitprof.


See everyone at the BlogMeet.   There will be a quiz.

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