A Stitch in Haste

And what, pray tell, is a "Doggelgaenger"?

Simple: Dog + Doppelgaenger = Doggelgaenger

Behold:


This amazingly pretty lass is the "May" entry in my ASPCA calendar.

Remind you of anyone?


Need more "Wow" factor? The other dog's name is "Ruby."

---

Back in August 2007, a loyal reader in Australia suggested that his dog Sioban might also be a long lost cousin of Diamond:


Also super-adorable, but I think Ruby wins the Doggelgaenger prize. Any dissents?

(Carnivalized at Modulator's Friday Ark.)

A busy week on the gay rights front --

ITEM: New York's highest court declined, though strictly on procedural grounds, to review lower court rulings holding that same-sex marriages validly entered into in other jurisdictions (e.g., Massachusetts, Canada) must be recognized even though the gay couples could not have married in New York itself. The high court may hear the case after further litigation of the case in the lower courts. Despite the seeming contradiction, this "valid there means valid here" practice is actually a long-standing policy in New York (and other states) that has been applied to first-cousin marriages, underage marriages, common law marriages and other circumstances. Nevertheless, it does give further incentive to both advocates and opponents of same-sex marriage, who share an eagerness to ask, "How can this be?" Most recent post here.

ITEM: A California appellate court, meanwhile

has ruled unanimously that a gay Orange County man who mistakenly thought his ex-partner had registered their domestic partnership is entitled to the same protections covering heterosexual spouses who discover that, for whatever reason, their marriage is not valid.

This was not a particularly inspirational case: one partner tried to exploit the other by claiming that the failure to mail in the domestic partnership form nullified the estate planning documents they had drafted at the beginning of their formalized relationship. Still, fair and equal treatment is fair and equal treatment, in dissolution of relationships as well as in their formation. (A reminder, meanwhile, that California faces both an imminent state supreme court ruling on same-sex marriage and a likely bigot amendment.)

ITEM: Every silver lining must have a cloud --

An amendment to the state constitution approved by voters in 2004 to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman also prohibits public employers from providing health care and other benefits to the same sex partners of employees, a divided Michigan Supreme Court ruled today.
...
Jessie Olson, an attorney involved in filing the challenge that was rejected by the court Wednesday, said the ruling leaves Michigan "at the bottom of the barrel. We are the worst of the worst of the worst when it comes to civil rights for same sex couples."

When bigots insist that their "no nothing never" amendments are "only" about "defending traditional marriage," they lie. Most recent post here.

---

MEANWHILE: Although not quite rising to "Larry Craig" status, one of the most rabidly anti-gay bigots in Congress, New York Republican Vito Fossella, has acknowledged that he had an extra-marital affair* that produced a daughter, now 3 years old.

Fossella, now widely expected not to seek re-election,** voted for the Federal Marriage Amendment in 2004, the (identical) Marriage Protection Amendment in 2006, the jurisdiction-stripping Marriage Protection Act of 2004, and a D.C. appropriations amendment that would have banned gays in the District from adopting.

He was certainly "defending traditional..." -- well, traditional something.

*The affair was, incidentally, with an air force lieutenant colonel. File that under "morale and unit cohesion."

**Not for the affair, mind you, but for a DUI arrest in Virginia that will likely result in jail time.

(Via Obsidian Wings.)

--Did global warming cause the Burma cyclone?

--Should the Senate summarily refuse to confirm any more judicial appointees by President Bush? ("[T]he Bush administration and its allies have made a politicized judiciary into an art form.") (But recall this old post.)

--A Special Guest Question: "Why would God, with just 10 things to tell Moses, include jealousy about livestock?"

--Who suggested that not wanting to use PayPal is the functional equivalent of buying heroin? ("We're not allowing people to offer unsafe choices...")

--How can we simultaneously solve both the food price crisis and the mortgage crisis?

"A building has integrity, just like a man — and just as seldom."
--The Fountainhead

Goldilocks and the triplicate permit forms:

John Jessop earned a cult following among his colleagues after his withering comments were leaked in an e-mail which has been sent all round the country.

After being asked to fill in a "design access statement" for a storage shed on a small farm, he wrote: "The density is like on a farm, the social context is a farm in the country, the economic context is farming in the United Kingdom in 2008 (which is not very economic), the opportunities are to store equipment inside rather than the outside, the constraint is the planning system."

And under a section headed Context Analysis, he said: "The use is compatible with a farm because it is a farm building."

"It is located where it is because it is in the most convenient place, being on the farm and near the farmhouse."
...
"It can not be lower because nothing could be stored in it. It is not made any higher because that would be silly."

But since when did being "silly" stop a planning bureaucrat?

The notion that a farmer needs anybody's permission to build a farming shed on his farming land to store his farming equipment that he uses to earn his farming income shows how far the half-sibling notions of "zoning" and "environmental impact statements" have corrupted what used to be a rationally based concern for negative externalities. In the past, such reviews were cursory, common sense inquiries. Today? Yes, we the central planners have graciously allowed you to call your land a "farm," but that obviously did not mean that we would also allow you to "do farming" on it. We'll get back to you on that after we review your design access statement...

Other gems omitted from the media account:

--"Landscaping: The applicant and pervious [sic] occupants have spent a long time, probably more than a thousand years, making the countryside around the house look like farmland so that everyone can enjoy the pretty English countryside."

--"Access: There is an airport at Bristol which can be accessed by driving your tractor along the road. This gives direct access to warm sunny places all over the world."

--"Appearance: It looks like a typical modern agricultural shed in green profiled metal sheeting because that is what it is, and a great architect once said, 'Buildings should look like what they are'."

Methinks Mr. Jessop has read The Fountainhead.

Kip's Law: Every advocate of central planning always — always — envisions himself as the central planner.

Original 3-page document PDF here. (Via Fark.)

Fascinating case study in theocratic majoritarianism versus secular libertarianism:

In a 7-1 majority vote Monday night the Charles Town [West Virginia] City Council decided to institute a moment of silent prayer, thus abolishing the decades-long tradition of reciting the Christian-specific Lord's prayer before the beginning of each meeting.
...
Charles Town Mayor Peggy Smith, who did not vote on the issue, said she was disappointed in the council's decision but understood why it was made. "I understand why they did what they did after listening to legal advice. We cannot place the citizens in jeopardy with a lawsuit. So I do understand their vote but it doesn't make me happy about it," Smith said.
...
[Geraldine] Willingham, who cast the dissenting vote [and] described Charles Town as a "Christian town" at the council's last meeting, was not pleased by the council's decision to do away with the recitation of the Lord's prayer.

"I think it's a sad day for Charles Town where we cannot start our council meetings off with the Lord's prayer all because of one negative person. That's my comment," Willingham said after Monday's meeting.

Some hasty stitches:

--The "one negative person" was a Jew, not an atheist. Of course, to most hillbilly Christians like Willingham, there's little point in distinguishing between Jews, atheists, agnostics, whatever -- they're all equally un-American and all equally devoid of First Amendment protection (not to mention equally hellbound). Stated differently, there are still people -- elected leaders -- who actually believe, in the Twenty-First Century, that there can be such a thing as a "Christian town" in what was once known as the "land of the free."

--Based on the media account, it appears that the theocrats couldn't even be bothered to engage in the wink-wink of calling their new invocation a "moment of silence" rather than a "silent prayer." The simple, uncomplicated First Amendment notion that maybe, just maybe, a city council chamber ought not be used as a church is simply incomprehensible to these "dedicated public servants."

--Speaking of which, note that these theocrats did not stop their flagrantly unconstitutional* practice out of any moral epiphany. They stopped the practice because their lawyers told them to. That's better than nothing, I suppose, but it's hardly praiseworthy.

(Via Religion Clause.)

---

Elsewhere:

Conservative Christian leaders who believe the word "evangelical" has lost its religious meaning plan to release a starkly self-critical document saying the movement has become too political and has diminished the Gospel through its approach to the culture wars.

The statement, called "An Evangelical Manifesto," condemns Christians on the right and left for using faith to express political views without regard to the truth of the Bible, according to a draft of the document obtained Friday by The Associated Press.
...
Richard Land, head of the public policy arm for the Southern Baptist Convention, said through a spokeswoman that he has not seen the document and was not asked to sign it.

James Dobson, the influential founder of Focus on the Family, a Christian group in Colorado Springs, Colorado, did not sign the document, said Gary Schneeberger, a Dobson spokesman.

This is similar to the observation that too many secular Muslims in the U.S. and Europe and not doing enough to "take back Islam" from extremists who spawn terrorism and violent intolerance in the name of a supposed "Religion of Peace."

To the extent that these non-political Evangelical leaders make noise against the radical anti-Christians in their midst -- especially Dobson (who, recall, is not a credentialed cleric in any church) -- I can only say, "praise be unto them."

(Via Wall of Separation.)

---

*Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783 (1983) (Inapplicability of First Amendment to opening a legislative session with a prayer presupposes that "there is no indication that the prayer opportunity has been exploited to proselytize or advance any one, or to disparage any other, faith or belief.") Note that I of course consider Marsh wrongly decided in that all legislative prayer sessions ought to be deemed facially unconstitutional, and not just those that are both openly and notoriously sectarian and unambiguously hostile to non-Christians -- as the Lord's Prayer unarguably is.)

When word first started to emerge that a major cyclone had hit Burma, the first thought of many of us was, "Here we go again..."

"Again" not only in the context of the natural disaster, but also in the context of the authoritarian disaster:

The death toll from Cyclone Nargis, the deadliest in Asia since 1991, rose to nearly 22,500 with an additional 41,000 missing, even as Myanmar's leaders continued to refuse entry to U.S. disaster response teams.
...
The disaster's scale has drawn a rare acceptance of outside help from Myanmar's generals, who spurned such approaches in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

The ever-escalating death toll from the cyclone continues to be "new news." The paranoid insanity of Burma's military dictatorship is not, as I chronicled after the Boxing Day Tsunami in a piece originally published 16 February 2005:

---

Slate has a Bush-bash piece on Burma essentially asking why we are not effecting regime change in what has been described as the second worst dictatorship in the world.

Nobody in Washington loses sleep over Burma policy. Burma isn't a vital oil supplier like Saudi Arabia, we don't do much trade with Burma as we do with China, and there are no al-Qaida operatives to kill and capture as in Pakistan. Our hard interests in curbing Burma's massive opium production, preventing Burma from becoming a full-fledged Chinese satellite state, and tapping its modest oil and gas reserves are low priorities. Washington is happy to apply economic sanctions on Burma in the name of high-minded principles because those interests are small in comparison to the magnitude of human rights abuses in the country. And, oh yeah, we have other regional headaches, like figuring out what to do with North Korea.

This seems to me to be a case of wanting it both ways — the U.S. is wrong on regime change because we do it at all, and it's also wrong because we don't do it enough? Go figure.

Anyway, I found it utterly stupefying that such a piece could have not one word about the current, and far more important, scandal regarding the international community and Burma — the ludicrous "official" tsunami casualty count of 90 — not 90,000, but 90.

Leave it to a self-described "grassroots" newspaper (and Canadians, no less!) to do the real reporting:

Refusing all international aid, Burma's authorities have not let any international monitors enter its borders, even to assess the damage.
...
The [Burmese junta] SPCD has [a] reputation for downplaying disaster, and for keeping stringent control over outbound media.

Condemned by critics for outlawing fax machines, censoring television broadcasts and taking prisoners of conscience, Burma has been called the most information-starved country on earth. One example involved an attack on the convoy of Nobel Peace Laureate and democratic opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, during her brief release from house arrest in 2003. Eyewitnesses estimated some 60 dead in the ensuing clash, while the SPDC reported only four.
...
On August 8, 1988, at the height of three-weeks of carnage, junta soldiers opened fire on thousands of unarmed demonstrators in the streets of Yangon. Reporting some 500 dead ... the massacre of 8-8-88 is believed by ambassadorial staffs that witnessed it to have claimed over 10,000 lives — more, that is, than Tiananmen Square.

They claimed 500 dead, it likely turned out to be over 10,000. That's a factor of 20, which would imply not 90 tsunami casualties, but 1,800 — and if you're going to lie by a factor of 20, then why not 200 or whatever number suits your dictatorial fancy?

Not to be a Broken Window type, but the tsunami provided a unique opportunity to make some real progress in ending the Burmese nightmare. The international political community, and the international charitable community, are dropping the ball. Which doesn't stop fools from laying it all at the United States' doorstep.

How very sad.

(I sincerely hope this does not become a regular feature here.)

One of the first industries the looters went after in Atlas Shrugged was, of course, oil.

And who is better at looting than politicians?

U.S. Rep. Paul Kanjorski said it's time for America to stand up to the big oil companies and shout out, "We've had enough."

Kanjorski, D-Nanticoke, was in town Monday to announce his introduction of House Resolution 5800, the Consumer Reasonable Energy Price Protection Act of 2008. The bill, introduced on the House floor April 15, would allow the federal government to tax windfall oil and gas profits resulting from historically high oil and gas prices that average Americans struggle to afford, he said.

Kanjorski said industries yield windfall profits when earnings exceed what a Reasonable Profits Board determines is rational, as laid out in the legislation.

Rational profits? As determined by a Reasonable Profits Board? Would Hugo Chavez or Robert Mugabe be eligible to serve on it? (If not, then perhaps Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey, is available.)

The futility of pointing out, "reasonable to whom, by what standard" is not lost on me. The impermeability of the blood-brain barrier between politicians and reasonableness is common knowledge.

Also not lost on me is the futility of pointing out, yet again, that "big" oil companies actually consist of numerous small shareholders, either directly as individuals and households (such as those that the "reasonable" Representative Kanjorski putatively serves), or indirectly — as employees (whose pension funds own oil company stock), small business owners (who retirement accounts include index funds that include such stock), students (whose college endowment funds own such stock) or anyone else who indirectly benefits from "obscene" oil company profits.

Equally futile would, I suppose, be asking where one goes to apply for a seat on the Reasonable Taxation Board:


(Click to enlarge.)

Via Tax Policy Blog.

(For the uninitiated, Directive 10-289 here.)

Some defenders of a tort reform program implemented in Texas since 1995 try to pull a fast one:

Savings from reduced damages awarded by juries and fewer lawsuits filed against large businesses since the mid-'90s has created a climate in which medical and insurance companies can expand, the study states. Across Texas, the reforms have resulted in nearly $113 billion in additional annual spending, almost 500,000 new jobs and $2.6 billion a year in increased state budget resources.

As I commented over at Kevin, M.D., where I saw this sleight-of-hand:

Um, no.

This is what economists call the Broken Window Fallacy.

You are only seeing the macroeconomic benefits achieved (for insurance companies and defendants). You are not seeing the macroeconomic benefits foregone (for affected plaintiffs).

The additional money meritorious plaintiffs would have received but for tort reform would also have "stimulated the economy" in one form or another.

The net effects may tilt one way or the other -- there's little way to know for sure. But evaluating a policy -- any policy -- based only on the gross effects ("what is seen") while ignoring the offsets ("what is not seen") is an fundamental logical error.

Unfortunately, it is a fundamental logical error that permeates almost every aspect of American factional politics -- including health care policy generally and tort reform specifically.

I am fully aware that Texas was a unique situation in which fundamental legal injustices were reportedly occurring against malpractice and product liability defendants in civil lawsuits. Point conceded. But tort reform for the sake of better legal outcomes (i.e., more "fair and just" outcomes) is altogether different from tort reform for the sake of economic growth. That way madness lies.

Access to the Bastiat-betraying report here. My old chain on asbestos liability here; on Vioxx liability here.

There are certain axioms, certain fundamental pillars, upon which this blog is based. One is that all politicians are, by definition, moral defectives. Another is the ubiquitousness of the Politics of the Warm Fuzzy Feeling. Another is Kip's Law.

Yet another — one you have seen repeatedly here — is that the laws of economics are no more subject to repeal by a legislature than are the laws of physics.

Perhaps it's time to add a flying buttress to that last pillar: No truth, including economic truth, can ever be "elitist" —

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Sunday dismissed the "elite opinion" of economists who criticized her gas tax proposal, using a term that has dogged rival Barack Obama in recent weeks.
...
"I'm not going to put my lot in with economists," Clinton said when asked to name an economist who backed her proposal.

"We've got to get out of this mind-set where somehow elite opinion is always on the side of doing things that really disadvantage the vast majority of Americans," said Clinton, a former first lady who would be the first woman president.

When Clinton or a member of her family becomes sick or injured, does she rely on "elite" physicians for care? If she becomes president, will she dismiss the "elite" pilots who fly Air Force One? Why does she need Air Force One at all — the only thing stopping people from flying around like Superman are the "disadvantageous" views of "elite" physicists.

Economics does admittedly lie in a twilight zone between the metaphysical certitudes of the hard sciences and the subjective gobbledygook of the humanities. Point conceded.

But an economic truth such as, "all resources are scarce and must somehow be rationed" is closer to a physics-based law of conservation than to a humanities-based pronouncement that "everyone has a right to..." An economic truth such as, "people respond to incentives" is closer to a physics-based "for every action..." than to a humanities-based "from each according to..." A graph containing a supply and demand curve — and the distortions government policies impose on them — is closer to a Grand Unified Theory than to a piece of indecipherable "abstract art."

To call economists "elitist" is to call economics "elitist" — which is also to call science, logic and reason "elitist."

More thoughts from — heck, too many people to cite.

Obsidian Wings, critiquing John McCain's health care not-quite-reform not-quite-proposal, relays an anecdote:

Shirley Giarde of Walla Walla, Wash., was not prepared when her husband, Raymond, suddenly developed congestive heart failure last year and needed a pacemaker and defibrillator. Because his job did not provide health benefits, she has covered them both through a policy for the self-employed, which she obtained as the proprietor of a bridal and formal-wear store, the Purple Parasol.

But when Raymond had his medical problems, Ms. Giarde discovered that her insurance would cover only $22,000, leaving them with about $100,000 in unpaid hospital bills.

Even though the hospital agreed to reduce that debt to about $50,000, Ms. Giarde is still struggling to pay it — in part because the poor economy has meant slumping sales at the Purple Parasol. Her husband, now disabled and unable to work, will not qualify for Medicare for another year, and she cannot afford the $758 a month it would cost to enroll him in a state-run insurance plan for individuals who cannot find private insurance.

To which I relayed a comment:

Perhaps the problem isn't so much with health insurance as with Ms. Giarde's "Purple Parasol" business model. If her business can't produce enough income for her to pay her bills, then she's in the wrong business.

Debate a "right to health care" all you like, but don't claim that there is a right to run an unprofitable, sub-mediocre business and then get taxpayer-extracted health insurance on top of that.

P.S. What exactly was the back story of Mr. Giarde taking a job with no health benefits in the first place? Because I have no doubt that there was in fact a back story.

It's bad enough seeing starving (i.e., crappy) artists demand — and receive — forced taxpayer purchase of their "art" through public funding. Are we now to see the equivalent of forced consumption of bridal gowns (among countless other services) from inadequately profitable (i.e., badly run) bridal shops (among countless other services), through the money laundering socialist concept known as "universal health insurance"?

I hate it when the last thing I read at night is something mind-bogglingly stupid:

A suspected pipe bomb exploded at the federal courthouse in downtown San Diego early this morning, shattering a glass entryway and damaging the lobby, authorities said. No injuries were reported.
...
"It's too early to tell if it's terrorism-related," [FBI spokesman Darrell] Foxworth said. "It does not appear to be right now."

Huh? How can "bomb + courthouse" not equal "terrorism"?

News flash for the FBI: Anyone with a bomb and a target is a terrorist. End of discussion.

Good night.

And who, you might be wondering, is Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey?

She holds the prestigious position of "random interviewee on the street" — and now seeks the higher office of your mommy:

The thought of taxing a Big Mac or a Wendy's burger came up at a New Jersey Hospital Association meeting where Gov. Jon S. Corzine was asked if it could be an option to help fund struggling hospitals. At the meeting, he reportedly called it a "constructive suggestion."

A spokesperson for the governor, however, told CBS 2 on Wednesday: "The governor is open to reasonable solutions to help solve our financing problems, but there are no plans for any fast food tax."
...
"I think this country has gone too much in the direction of fast and unhealthy food, and if people are taxed they may terminate that and turn toward more healthy foods," said West Orange resident Maureen Felix.

Of course, why anyone should give any kind of a damn what Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey, thinks about whether fast food (defined how? by whom?) should be taxed (to what extent? with revenues deployed how?) — or about anything else, for that matter — remains unanswered. As does the precedent question of what basis a free society has in the first place for using taxation to control behavior rather than solely to raise revenue to fund legitimate public goods.

Because to nanny-staters, no such reason is required. Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey, has an opinion, damn it. The fact that her opinion is baseless, uncorroborated, un-American, anti-freedom — not to mention mind-bogglingly stupid — in no way changes the fact that Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey, has an opinion, damn it. What right do you have to mock it? And, more importantly, what right does a politician have to ignore it?

She is, after all, Ms. Maureen Felix of West Orange, New Jersey!

Kip's Law: Every advocate of central planning always — always — envisions himself as the central planner.

Via Fark. More thoughts at QandO.