A Stitch in Haste

More fuel for the always-burning "Are homeowner associations oppressive?" debate:

Most of the 56 owners in Berkshire E are Orthodox Jews barred for religious reasons from pushing the buttons on their elevator during the Sabbath, which runs from Friday evening to Saturday evening.

They persuaded their board to spend $11,000 to convert the elevator so it automatically stops on each of the four floors during the Sabbath.

But two of the owners, who are also Jewish, are angry their money will be used for a religious accommodation.
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By law, however, everyone who buys in a condo community agrees to submit to the will of the majority.
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Rabbi Pesach Lerner, executive vice president of the National Council of Young Israel, the New York-based organization that coordinates 150 Orthodox synagogues in the country, said the minority must submit to the majority in condos.

You can imagine how I reflexively spasm at phrases like "the will of the majority" and "the minority must submit." And there are of course limits to what a homeowners agreement can authorize, just as there are limits to what any contract can stipulate.

Still, given the strictly voluntary nature of HOAs, it's difficult to sympathize with residents who are shocked, shocked to learn that a nearly 100% orthodox Jewish condo is going to do some orthodox Jewish things that might be just a little too orthodox Jewish to some orthodox Jews who live there. The vote was hardly "theocracy run amok" and was a perfectly permissible use of the association's authority. When they start banning bacon in individual owners' kitchens, let me know.

That's my ruling — any dissents?

Meanwhile:

Last year, the Sun of Baltimore reported a brouhaha over an attempt to convert one of two elevators to a Sabbath elevator. After the board voted 5-3 against it, a Baltimore council member in May introduced a bill to prohibit buildings from adopting rules that deny reasonable accommodation for practicing one's religion. No decision has been made.

That is a completely different issue. The whole point of HOAs is to keep the decision-making strictly private. Why should some activist legislator suddenly decide that outside standards of "reasonableness" should now apply to voluntary private contracts? The standard used to be that a contract must not be unconscionable. Now it need only be "unreasonable" to be void? Unreasonable — to whom? In what context? (Compare and contrast with this post.)

(Via Fark.)

When the last great compendium of anti-libertarian atrocities is finally compiled, "banning aluminum baseball bats" will likely not be anywhere near the top. Point conceded.

But the emasculation of judicial review and the foolhardy reliance upon the purported collective wisdom of legislators, especially local legislators, will surely rank among the top ten:

A judge on Tuesday upheld New York's ban on metal bats in high school baseball games, saying it was not his place to overturn a law that was approved by a local government with the public's safety in mind.

U.S. District Judge John G. Koeltl said there is no clear evidence that metal bats cause more serious injuries than wooden bats but added the City Council is entitled to make the judgment that the risk is too great.
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David A. Ettinger, a lawyer for the challengers, said legislators needed to provide some scientific evidence that the metal bats are unsafe. Manufacturers then could adjust the makeup of metal bats to make them safer than some wooden bats, he said.

Leave for another inning the question of whether laws restricting liberty should always or never be subjected to so-called "strict scrutiny" or "rational basis review" or something in between. Let's concede that, under current jurisprudence, a proscription such as this is subject to the lowest standard of judicial review — "mere rationality."

Fine — so where is that "mere rationality"?

The lawyer for the challengers is exactly right: "Low-level scrutiny" is not, or ought not be, "no scrutiny at all." "Great deference to the legislature" is not, or ought not be, "absolute deference to the legislature."

If the City Council — a gaggle of raw neophytes in the wake of a recent and draconian term limit law — wants to pass bans (i.e., restrict liberty) based on "rational basis review," then perhaps they could be so enlightened as to actually produce a rational basis every now and then?

Not one piece of objective evidence was introduced to support the "conclusion" that metal bats are more dangerous than wood bats. The City Council literally guessed. Their compass was not data and analysis, but warm fuzzy feelings and their belief in their own intuitive superiority.

Judges should defer to this?

This jurisprudential abomination — that legislatures should be allowed to guess when passing laws — is not new in New York State. It was the same sloppy, disingenuous gobbledygook that the state's high court used to deny equal marriage rights to gays:

First, the Legislature could rationally decide that, for the welfare of children, it is more important to promote stability, and to avoid instability, in opposite-sex than in same-sex relationships.*

Translation: The Legislature can guess that straight couples need to be bribed into getting married in a way that gays need not be (don't worry — no one else understands it either). No data whatsoever to support that guess, but so what? Defer at all costs.

The Legislature could find that unstable relationships between people of the opposite sex present a greater danger that children will be born into or grow up in unstable homes than is the case with same-sex couples[.]

"Could find." Not "did find," but "could find." Basic, urgent constitutional questions being decided by guesswork. This is what passes for Twenty-First Century constitutional jurisprudence.

The Legislature could rationally believe that it is better, other things being equal, for children to grow up with both a mother and a father.

Again, a random and wholly undocumented guess is now a "rational basis."

So as you can see, it's not about baseball bats. And it's not even about gay marriage. It's about the very concept, the cancer, of judicial abdication. It's about a broad spectrum of disgraceful decisions enabling disgraceful actions from disgraceful politicians. From a de minimis baseball ban to an historic human rights atrocity. And countless other examples in between.

And not enough spectators crying "Foul!"

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*Hernandez v. Robles, 7 N.Y.3d 338, 855 N.E.2d 1 (N.Y. Ct. App., 2006).

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I hope to have some thoughts about the recent trial court ruling in Iowa, and the litigation in California, over the weekend.

I've skimmed the Iowa ruling, and I can say this upfront: It's everything the New York ruling wasn't but ought to have been.

All politicians are, by definition, moral defectives.

Charlie Rangel is of course no exception:

He's been chairman for only eight months, but already Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) is more than daydreaming about what his official Ways and Means Committee portrait will look like. He knows one thing: It'll be top of the line.

In perhaps the most thorough and earnest letter ever written on the subject of a member of Congress's portrait, Rangel's campaign attorney sent a letter to the Federal Election Commission asking permission to use either campaign or leadership political action committee money to pay for the chairman's grand portrait.
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So serious is Rangel about his portrait that he consulted an "art broker for eight museum-quality portrait artists" who advised that the cost is "consistent with other top portrait artists." Although the broker's Web site lists a base range of $30,000 to $50,000, "the estimated cost of $64,500 for Representative Rangel's portrait reflects a three-quarter body length size, important details and a custom frame," the letter said.

I don't care whether the $64,500 comes from taxpayer money, PAC money or lobbyist money. I don't care whether it goes to an independent artist, to a relative of Rangel's or to a business partner of a business partner of his.

The point is not how "untainted" the money may or may not be. The point is that this miserable, decrepit twerp feels a need to spend so much money on his own narcissistic vanity in the first place. Couldn't he settle for a well-done photograph? Wouldn't that be a case study in "leading by example"?

Such is the psychopathology of one of our leading "dedicated public servants." Spare no expense on a portrait that probably no one but he himself will ever look at.

And this is, lest we forget, the same politician who insists that we need a draft -- to inculcate proper selfless values ("shared sacrifice" were his exact words) in our nation's youth.

Sometimes you can just choke on the hypocrisy.

More than one Republican senator are calling for Larry Craig to resign:

Several Republicans called for Mr. Craig to resign, among them Senators John McCain of Arizona and Norm Coleman of Minnesota and Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan.

"My position is that when you plead guilty to a crime, you shouldn't serve," Mr. McCain said in an interview on CNN. "That's not a moral stand. That's not holier-than-thou. It's just a factual situation."

Mr. Coleman issued a statement saying Mr. Craig had pleaded guilty to "a crime involving conduct unbecoming a senator," adding, "He should resign."

McCain, Coleman et al are of course correct — Craig should resign. That's not the point.

The points are:

1. McCain's befuddled insistence that his is not "a moral stand" makes no sense. Of course it's a moral stand: "If you were moral, then you would resign." Would McCain feel better if we switched to the preferred radical social conservative term: "values"? "If you had traditional family values, then you would resign..."? (Hat tip to Hodak Value for this observation.)

2. Far more importantly: How is it intellectually consistent for sitting senators to call for another senator to resign for misconduct, but not to initiate proceedings to expel such a senator?

Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member. (Article I, Section 5)

The indignant senators don't need to just "hope" that Craig "does the right thing." They can kick him out. Finding 67 senators who agree might be pragmatically impossible, but so were, e.g., the federal bigot amendment and the flag desecration amendment. But the (Republican-controlled) Senate went through the motions anyway — because it was (supposedly) the "moral" thing to do.

Incidentally, speaking of Senate votes that were doomed to fail, McCain voted to impeach Bill Clinton. If a strictly symbolic vote was appropriate to expel one pervert in high office, then why not another? The double-standard becomes even more laughable given that Craig actually pleaded guilty to a crime — a crime of moral turpitude. Clinton, though an admitted defiler of the Oval Office, had no comparable criminal record — he "only" committed a constitutional misdemeanor. So which lecher more deserved a formal, constitutional removal from office: the one with a criminal record or the one without?

(Make no mistake: I believed then and believe now that Clinton should have been convicted in the Senate and removed from office. But surely Craig's status is more deserving of constitutional removal from office than even Clinton's sickening acts.)

McCain, Coleman and their cabal should — forgive me — either foot-tap or get off the toilet. If Craig should go, then kick him out.

More thoughts at QuizLaw, InterstateQ, Box Turtle Bulletin, John Steele Gordon.

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The audio of Craig's post-arrest interrogation available here.

Q: What's the scariest thing about this video?


A: The fact that Lauren Caitlin Upton — a/k/a Miss South Carolina 2007, d/b/a Miss Teen USA 2007 contestant — can vote. That's right: she's 18.

She can vote for politicians. She can vote for school board members and local judges. She can vote on bigot amendments, bond initiatives and other referenda.

And this notion: that "democracy" (i.e., empowering the Uptons of this country) should trump libertarianism (i.e., disempowering the Uptons of this country and the moral defectives they vote into office), is the dominant political philosophy in this country today.

Absolutely terrifying.

(Via Web Pen.)

In case you're wondering, qua financial voyeurs, whether Leona Helmsley really did "leave $12 million to her dog," here's some pop law for you.

--There's no such thing as including a pet in a will; an animal of course cannot own property and therefore cannot inherit property.

--What you can do is establish an "honorary trust," in which an administrator is designated to spend part of the money in a certain non-charitable way (e.g., for the pets).

--In New York State (where Helmsley's will is being probated), "for the pets" is in fact the only permitted use of an honorary trust. The funds must revert back to the estate within 21 years or when all the animals have died. NY EPTL 7.8-1

--But: "A court may reduce the amount of the property transferred if it determines that amount substantially exceeds the amount required for the intended use." Does $12 million "substantially exceed the amount required"?

--As for disinheriting two of her grandchildren, more power to her. Generally speaking, anyone can disinherit any relative — even minor children, to some extent — with one glaring exception: One cannot completely disinherit a spouse. The law (generally) requires that a lawful spouse receive at least a portion of an estate. This rule — called "elective share" — varies from state from state; in New York it's basically one-third of the assets.

Yet another way that gays are disadvantaged in states without marriage equality (not to mention intestacy laws generally, which are specifically meant to protect spouses and to spare couples the expense of drafting a will).

For Discussion: My adoption contract for Diamond specifically requires that she, qua chattel, revert back to the ASPCA if I cannot care for her for any reason — which of course would include my death. My family is aware of this. So I have no need to set up an honorary trust for her. Anyone out there have one for their pets? Anyone considering establishing one?

I've had to leave the following comment, or something similar, at three blogs and in an email, so I might as well post it here:

Yes it is a proper function of government to criminalize Larry Craig's conduct. Those who disagree are, based on what I've read, wilfully omitting key facts:

--Like how Craig peered into the stall through the door crack to the point where the sergeant could see that he had blue eyes.

--Like how Craig intentionally and offensively touched the sergeant's foot. In another context that could be called "battery."

--Like how Craig intentionally and offensively reached into the sergeant's stall with his hand, to the point where he could see Craig's wedding ring. In another context that could be called "assault."

--Like how there is no duty for someone in a toilet stall to indicate non-consent. I should not have to say to a leering pervert, "Go away. I'm not interested." (Compare: Does leaving my front door unlocked constitute "consent to be burglarized"?)

--Like how the "interference with privacy" charge was not "thrown out" but was dismissed as part of the plea bargain. Had Craig pleaded Not Guilty, then he would have indeed gone to trial on the Peeping Tom charge, not just the lesser Disorderly Conduct charge that is now on his record.

Bottom line: Craig was not "arrested for foot-tapping." It's inaccurate and disingenuous to suggest otherwise.

If the purest expression of libertarianism is the "right to be let alone," then surely that includes "while in a toilet stall." And if there is such a right, then there is at least some police power to guard that right.

Where every commentator I've read has been spot on, meanwhile, is in asking why the airport didn't just hire a porter or steward to monitor the restrooms. Why a sting operation, even given the apparent history of lewd conduct there? A quest for fines? Anti-gay bigotry? This is a vital question that ought to be asked — and answered. In that I think we are all in agreement. I raised a similar question in my first post on the subject.

One of the classic attempts to debunk libertarianism on reductio ad absurdum grounds (or, relatedly, to conflate it with anarchism), is the hypothetical question: "Would you privatize the fire department?"

Well, now that you mention it:

A private fire crew dispatched by a national insurance company that caters to wealthy clients is guarding 22 high-end homes threatened by the Castle Rock Fire, a blaze that has forced the evacuation of hundreds of million-dollar homes west of Ketchum [Idaho].

The crew will protect only homes insured by AIG Private Client Group, an insurance company that offers "loss-prevention services" to its wealthiest customers. A truck and two-man crew sent by AIG from Montana arrived in Ketchum about 2 p.m. Wednesday to start dousing properties with Phos-Chek, the same fire retardant dropped from U.S. Forest Service aircraft.

"We're not going out there to fight the fire," said Dorothy Sarna, vice president and national director of risk-management services and loss prevention for the New York-based company. "We're out there to protect our clients."
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The private crew has been granted access to areas closed to residents, but not all officials with public fire agencies were thrilled by the sight of the truck scooting through a smoky web of government fire crews. ... Nevertheless, the crew has Forest Service blessing.

Of course, this is not "firefighting" any more than installing a smoke detector is "firefighting."

And most libertarians have no problem with public provision of firefighting services anyway, for the simple reason that a fire has negative externalities -- fires spread. It's not a question of, "Why should I pay for my neighbor's fire?" but rather, "Why should my neighbor's fire be allowed to destroy my property too?"

Meanwhile, I would not object to a system where those who proximately benefit from taxpayer-funded fire departments are sent a bill (i.e., a user fee) after the fact. Much like convicted criminals being billed for their prison cells. But I can see the counterargument that such a system would be double-billing. Or is it? In any event, I consider it a marginal issue at best -- a thought experiment. What about you?

(Via Fark.)

Virginia is for whom?

Lawyers clashed Monday over the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority's ability to raise millions to fix local roads and upgrade public transportation.
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Opponents of the bill say this isn't the way to fund transit. They argue that the Virginia Constitution bars the authority from levying taxes.
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"The general assembly can do anything it is not prohibited from doing and it's not prohibited in this case," said Deputy Attorney General Francis Ferguson, who supported Broaddus' arguments Monday.

Abstracting away from the issue at hand (to me, public authorities are merely tools -- and like all tools they can be used properly or improperly), note the blanket pronouncement by the Virginia government: We have unenumerated powers and only enumerated restrictions. Not the other way around -- which, at least theoretically, is how the federal government is supposed to operate.

And this is, to some, the "glory" of federalism: Anything goes, as long as it's at the state or local level.

If that kind of federalism is considered a relative of libertarianism, then somebody should demand a paternity test.

Remember: States do not have rights. Only individuals have rights. States have powers -- powers that they can and do abuse.

(Via Tax Policy Blog.)

I have no horse in the race (i.e., by states) to be first or close to first in the 2008 primaries.

So I can only scratch my head in befuddlement at this story:

The Democratic National Committee sought to seize control of its unraveling nominating process yesterday, rejecting pleas from state party leaders and cracking down on Florida for scheduling a Jan. 29 presidential primary.

The DNC's rules and bylaws committee, which enforces party rules, voted yesterday morning to strip Florida of all its delegates to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver — the harshest penalty at its disposal.
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Donna Brazile, a member of the rules committee who argued for a swift and harsh punishment for Florida, said states' desire to be more relevant in the nominating process does not excuse violations of rules intended to make the system fair for everyone.
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Under the caucus alternative proposed yesterday, voters could still go to the polls on Jan. 29 to express their preferences for a presidential nominee, but the results would be ceremonial, much like the results of the Republican straw poll held in Ames, Iowa, this month.

Some hasty stitches:

--Brazile's comment is the most disconnected-from-reality gobbledygook I've read today (and I've read a lot today). There is nothing presumptively "fair" or "unfair" about a state party scheduling its primary before, after, or concurrent with another state's. This has nothing to do with "fairness" and everything to do with party bosses (like, um, Brazile herself) flexing their muscle.

--Remember always that political parties are an entirely extra-constitutional concept. They have no (legitimate) powers, no (legitimate) rights and no (legitimate) claims on the government, the election process or any voter who does not voluntarily (and masochistically) subject himself to party membership.

--A corollary: No taxpayer money should ever, under any circumstances, go to a political party or to subsidize the activities of political parties.

--Another corollary: No bureaucratic position should ever, under any circumstances, be legislatively allocated to a political party (e.g., positions on both the SEC and FCC are, by law, "split" between the two parties).

--What was I saying about how "political parties are an entirely extra-constitutional concept"?

Complaints are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public and personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority. However anxiously we may wish that these complaints had no foundation, the evidence, of known facts will not permit us to deny that they are in some degree true.

The Framers may not have found the perfect cure for factions in our Constitution. But they certainly diagnosed the disease correctly.

Meanwhile, the best way to undermine the two-party system is by not being part of it.

More thoughts at PoliBlog.

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*UPDATE: The Republican Party bosses have just announced that they're following suit.

The poorest state in the Union is also the fattest.

Has Malthus leapfrogged Marx yet on the list of "most wrong thinkers" in the history of thought?

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Note: "Poorest" = lowest per capita income based on 2000 Census.

I'm not the first to notice this, but it bears repeating:

--Back when banks and other "greedy capitalist bastards" refused to loan money to poor people in poor neighborhoods, they were damned by politicians and bureaucrats for "redlining."

--Now that banks and other "greedy capitalist bastards" are indeed loaning money to poor people in poor neighborhoods, they are being damned by politicians and bureaucrats for "predatory lending."

Is it possible that maybe, just maybe, the problem is with the politicians and bureaucrats and not with the banks and other "greedy capitalist bastards"?

Either way, expect taxpayers to be the truly innocent victims.

Faced with a possible tidal wave of home foreclosures beginning this fall, Democrats and Republicans are battling over a philosophical question with huge practical implications: should the government ride to the rescue?
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Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, chairman of the Joint Economic Committee, has proposed that the government distribute $300 million to nonprofit groups that could advise families on how to refinance or renegotiate their mortgages. The Senate recently included $100 million for such programs in a spending bill for HUD.

Another idea, being considered by Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, would give bankruptcy judges the ability to revise mortgage contracts, much as they already do when sorting out payments to other kinds of creditors.

Schumer is a socialist whiner who screeches his radical liberal indignation over this travesty or that every weekend via press release. This is nothing new.

But could you imagine the chilling effect on mortgage lending if banks were suddenly told that, in the event of default, their mortgages (i.e., their liens on the properties) were in fact nothing of the kind, but just another smile-and-handshake IOU backed only by whatever recovery a judge might feel was appropriate? Does Durbin not understand the underlying, and all-important, distinction between secured versus unsecured debt, and the potentially devastating implications of blurring or eradicating that distinction?

Or is he, like Schumer, simply doing what politicians do best: telling simpletons what they want to hear, reality notwithstanding?

Two more hasty stitches on the Larry Craig incident:

1. I wondered how long it would take for some people, most likely my fellow libertarians, to ask whether Craig's conduct should in fact be a crime.

The first example I've seen comes from Citizen Crain:

Craig then "tapped his foot," reported Karsnia, who "recognized this as a signal by those who wish to engage in lewd conduct." I'll leave it to you whether there might be one or two or 13 more innocent explanations for such behavior.

Finally, Craig's foot tapping crept over into Karsnia's stall and even made contact with Karsnia's foot. Craig then swiped his hand a few times under the stall divider, enough that Karsnia could see his fingers and even his gold wedding ring — a point Karsnia made sure to include in his report.

Based on this and this alone, Craig was arrested for lewd conduct. Now I'll admit to being much more naive than Sgt. Karsnia about the etiquette of toilet sex, but exactly how was this lewd? Strange? Yes. Annoying? Absolutely. Lewd? Explain that to me again.

Sorry, no. Intentionally (such things cannot happen unintentionally) touching the foot of the person in the toilet stall next to you and reaching underneath the divider are, by any denotation, "lewd" acts. They are also (assuming an innocent private person is in the next stall), a properly proscribable act. If the purest definition of libertarianism is "the right to be let alone," then surely there is a right to be let alone in a toilet stall.

There is also, of course, no evidence of entrapment.

What would be legitimate concerns, which I hope do get raised subsequent to this story, are these precedent questions:

--Is it a proper, or wise, expenditure of law enforcement resources and taxpayer money to have undercover officers sitting in airport restrooms waiting to be cruised by self-loathing gays? Or are the terrorists hiding and plotting in the toilet stalls now?

--Is it proper to combat an offense that, as a matter of simple logistics, can only be committed by gays? I suppose straights can be lewd elsewhere in an airport, but is casing the restrooms per se discriminatory?

More thoughts at Bilerico.

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2. Craig suggests that we ignore that guilty plea behind the curtain:

I should have had the advice of counsel in resolving this matter. In hindsight, I should not have pled guilty. I was trying to handle this matter myself quickly and expeditiously.

Just one problem with that: Pleading guilty when you know you're not is potential perjury —

Before the court accepts a plea of guilty to any offense punishable upon conviction by incarceration, any plea agreement shall be explained in open court. The defendant shall then be questioned by the court or counsel in substance as follows:
...
6. Whether the defendant understands the nature of the offense charged.

7. Whether the defendant believes that what the defendant did constitutes the offense to which the defendant is pleading guilty.

The court with the assistance of counsel, if any, shall then elicit sufficient facts from the defendant to determine whether there is a factual basis for all elements of the offense to which the defendant is pleading guilty.

--Minn. R. Crim. Proc. 15.02

It is possible, indeed likely, that Craig was not under oath at the plea hearing, since he was charged with only a misdemeanor. Still, lying in court is lying in court: Out of the sexual pervert frying pan and into the moral defective fire is an improvement?

Incidentally, lack of counsel would certainly be grounds to withdraw the plea, at least for a while. If Craig decided after the fact that he instead wanted his day in court, he could still have gotten it. Perhaps not now, after so much time has expired. But he could have. I suspect, however, that we will not see such self-vindicating efforts from the guilty-pleading senator.

The plea document is here.

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Finally, a summary of Craig's self-loathing bigot votes here.

Here's a video for those of you who like to note the increasingly recurring issue of "police don't like it when you videotape them" —


It's not entirely clear what's going on, but apparently the videographer ("Zak") was not the driver of the vehicle. He was clearly not disruptive, was not interfering with the traffic stop and was at a distance of perhaps 20 yards.

Yet the officer, upon seeing the video camera:

--demanded his ID (a constitutional violation in and of itself)

--arrested him for a trumped up "public intoxication" or "disorderly conduct" charge.

Make of it what you will.

UPDATE: The arrestee, Zak George, has posted a follow-up video with more details.

Gays! Public Bathrooms! Lewdness!

Republican!:

Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho was arrested by a plainclothes police officer investigating complaints of lewd conduct in a men's restroom at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, according to a report just issued by Roll Call.
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In October 2006, Craig's office publicly denied allegations that he was a homosexual made by a gay activist website, calling it "completely ridiculous" with "no basis in fact."

Craig may be a closeted homosexual. But he is an out and proud Republican:

Goal Three: Defend and strengthen the traditional values of the American family.

Perhaps he should have focused a bit more on Goal Seven.

Need more irony: He chaired the Senate Republican Policy Committee for several years. Remind me again what the Republican policy on gays and public morals is?

Need still more irony? He's up for re-election in 2008. Or, more correctly, his Senate career ends in 2008.

More thoughts, and highlights from Craig's self-loathing voting record on gay rights, at Obsidian Wings.

To review: Amtrak receives approximately one billion dollars in taxpayer money each year, every year. Because passenger rail is "necessary" — especially the lines that people don't actually use enough (i.e., don't actually need enough) for the railroad to turn a profit.

Yesterday I met a friend at Foxwoods Casino. My plan had been to take a commuter train (also taxpayer subsidized, of course) from New York City to New Haven, Connecticut, then connect by Greyhound Bus to the casino.

My friend, who was on a schedule, instead suggested that I take Amtrak to New London, Connecticut, one station stop past New Haven (Amtrak and the commuter line run on the same track). That way, he could pick me up at the train station and we could drive together to Foxwoods, giving us a bit more time based on the train schedules.

But that extra hour or so came with a price:


There was a bizarrely long line at Penn Station for 8am on a Sunday morning. No concern to me, however: I had reserved my ticket online days earlier and just needed to make my way to a ticket kiosk.


Amtrak's entire computer system was down. Had been for two days.

So, with no guidance being offered by any Amtrak representatives, I did what everyone else did: got on the line.


Is having three trains leave at exactly the same time, with or without working computers, a public good?

After the minutes passed faster than people through the line, as 9am approached, word finally spread (but not by any initiative from Amtrak employees), that folks like me, with a reservation (and a computer printout to prove it), could in fact just board the train. Thirty minutes on a line for nothing. Is that a public good? Is that a "vital national asset"?

One more detail: The conductor indicated that this same phenomenon occurs almost every weekend, and that Amtrak's computer system cost $40 million. Must be from Diebold.

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Incidentally:

New York to New Haven by commuter rail:
70 miles, $14, 20 cents per mile.

New York to New London by Amtrak:
109 miles, $66, 60 cents per mile.

Or, if you prefer,

New Haven to New London by Amtrak:
39 miles, $52, 133 cents per mile.

(Of course, both services are taxpayer-subsidized, so the math is a bit fuzzy. But the point remains: Amtrak is "vital" — why?)

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Irony:


In strictly meaningless terms, Amtrak is indeed a "private" entity (but with its own police force?), and its facilities are indeed "private property." All the more reason for indignation over its one billion dollar annual taxpayer subsidy. (See also, "Corporation for Public Broadcasting.")

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Red alert!


I was afraid to stay too long, lest I be declared a public use and seized by eminent domain.

A commenter at a previous post is confused:

From where I sit, a private bureaucrat gets money be denying service, whereas a public one gets support for giving service...

This is the cornerstone of the most radical, Michael Moore style socialized medicine: the insistence that "insurance companies only make money by denying claims."

This is, of course, utter nonsense.

Consider:

--Does a restaurateur make money by "denying people food," or by satisfying his diners?

--Does a lawyer make money by not showing up in court, or by satisfying her clients?

--Does an auto insurance company make money by denying claims, to the point where customers cancel their policies in disgust and retain a competitor? Or do they make money by satisfying customers? (Exhibit A.)

--Does a manufacturer make money by selling dangerous wares as cheaply as possibly — to the point of risking negative publicity (not to mention lawsuits), or by satisfying customers — even when that means a higher price for higher safety? (Exhibit B.)

Meanwhile, what enterprise is making money by denying claims? That's right: Medicare.

The idea that health insurance companies are somehow different from other insurance companies, that they somehow rake in the money upfront and then spend all day figuring out ways to keep it, reflects a fundamental disconnect from reality: Insurance companies — health care or otherwise — pay their claims first (or do their best to estimate them), and then calculate the premium schedule that will cover those claims. Competition, meanwhile, prevents them for charging much more than that.

If you think, however, that health insurance profits are "too high," then perhaps the problem is not with premiums but with the competitive, or anti-competitive, landscape that spawns those premiums. If the current tax code imbalance — a throwback from Second World War wage & price controls — were abolished, if your employer could just pay to you the money it currently pays "for you," and if you could choose your health insurer as easily as you could choose you auto insurer, life insurer or homeowners insurer, then maybe those "excessive profits" that give Michael Moore such hypertension might come down a bit.

--Which government agency edits the most Wikipedia entries?

--How many tax returns must a same-sex couple in a California domestic partnership prepare? Does such paperwork qualify as "separate but equal"?

--Who's a winner at Nixon Peabody? (Hint: Not their intellectual property department.)

--Should demonstrating knowledge of horse racing be a requirement for naturalized citizenship? Would your answer change if it were Australian citizenship "mateship"?

--"Diet forks"? ("Shorter and dulled teeth inhibiting user from grasping larger pieces of food at any one time.") Will it be sold with Diet Water?

(Pretend you don't already know the answer...)

Which Republican presidential candidate said the following in a radio interview with a radical theocrat bigot:

Q: Do you believe [homosexuality] is a sin?

A: I'm not as judgmental about that probably because of my medical background, so I don't see it in those simplistic terms; I think it's a complex issue to decide whether it's sin or other problems with the way people are born. It's to me too complex to give an answer as simple as that.

Whether "being gay is a sin" is a complex issue? Too complex for a hyper-educated Twenty-First Century American to answer?

Q: We'll try to stop anyone from getting in the military who is a homosexual, who is an adulterer, who is a fornicator, and then other categories that indicate a character flaw. Why we shouldn't try to do that?"

A: Looking it in protecting the military if they are going to perform the services, and they are imperfect -- because we're all imperfect and we all sin. If a heterosexual or homosexual sins, that to me is the category of dealing with their own soul. Since we cannot have only perfect people going in the military I want to separate the two because I don't want to know the heterosexual flaws, nor the homosexual flaws and that's why I got in some trouble with some of the civil libertarians because I don't have any problem with Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Because I don't think that, for the practicality of running a military, I'd just as soon not know every serious thing that any heterosexual or homosexual did, and those flaws have to do with all our flaws because each and everyone one of us has those imperfections.

Wanting to serve openly is a "homosexual flaw"? Openly being in a committed monogamous same-sex relationship is a "serious flaw"? Military policy -- all government policy -- should be crafted based on subjective, factional notions of "sin" and not on objective standards of conduct and competency? (Oh, and he got into some trouble with "the civil libertarians" and not "my fellow civil libertarians"?)

Stepping back a bit, note how the candidate carefully crafts his answers to suit his interviewer and audience (one observer: "he weasel-words his way around this landmine and that one, instead of just saying what he thinks"). What rational basis would anyone have to conclude that this is a man of principle and not just another moral defective politician?

Answer here.

This week's YouTuber was selected by Diamond, based on the second half of the video.

The first half played no role whatsoever in the selection process:


Perhaps we should enlist AeternusPulvia in the great "libertarians v. dogfighting laws" debate.

Diamond, meanwhile, will be spending today and tonight at the animal care assistants kennel while I meet a friend at Foxwoods. I might blog on the train, or maybe not. So new posts may be sparse for a day or two.

My work is two blocks from St. Patrick's Cathedral in midtown Manhattan.

On my way to work Friday morning, I found Fifth Avenue closed off even to pedestrians.

I soon realized what was going on:


The firefighters were in formation eight men deep for three full city blocks, with more arriving by the moment.






Beat cops were also standing at attention. I even saw two sailors quietly take up ranks behind the firefighters.




You think you're over it, that it's finally "all in the past." Then suddenly you realize that you're not over it, and that it will not be "all in the past" any time soon.

More demands that the Fed, among others, "just do something" —

The past few weeks have exposed a giant crack in modern financial architecture, created by the youthful wizards and endorsed as a diversifying positive by central bankers present and past. While the newborn derivatives may hedge individual, institutional and sector risk, they cannot hedge liquidity risk. In fact, the inherent leverage that accompanies derivative creation may foster systemic risk when information is unavailable or delayed. Only the central banks can solve this, with their own liquidity infusions and perhaps a series of rate cuts.

"Liquidity risk" is a fancy name for a phenomenon that most people understand perfectly well. It simply means that in some circumstances you need to wait before paper worth becomes tangible worth. Examples include:

• "I can sell my house for $300,000 — just not tomorrow."



• "The value of a 401(k) account is essentially zero before you reach age 59 1/2."



• "How can you have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat?"

"Liquidity" is a good (or, if you prefer, "providing liquidity" is a service). It has a market (several actually), with supply and demand curves and market-clearing rates. If the demand for liquidity goes up, or the supply goes down, then the price charged for liquidity goes up. It's just sophomore economics. "Youthful wizards" have nothing to do with it.

Which begs the question: why should fluctuations — even major ones — in "just another market" imply mandatory intervention by central bankers, or by any other part of government? People make money and lose money in markets all the time — the liquidity market is no exception. If the "youthful wizards" — and the not-so-youthful senior Wall Street executives who hire them — miscalculated, then so what? Too bad so sad.

But that cuts both ways. If a speculator thinks he can use the liquidity market (i.e., make easy money) by purchasing 20 undeveloped lots in Las Vegas but turns out to be wrong, then so what? Too bad so sad. (Again, and this is important: The spike in foreclosures is not Mr. & Mrs. Bluecollar being kicked out of their single-family home; it's Mrs. & Mr. Infomercial failing to flip their 20 "no money down" speculative properties. That's one investor, twenty foreclosures, zero homelessness.)

If there are anecdotal cases of institutions engaging in false advertising, deceptive accounting, manipulating the legally incompetent, then fine — pursue them with the full force of the law. But the mere fact that many otherwise competent people, including financial professionals, happened to make very bad decisions is no claim check on the Fed, Congress, or taxpayers' wallets.

More:

The ultimate solution must not emanate from the Fed but from the White House. Fiscal, not monetary, policy should be the preferred remedy. In the early 1990s the government absorbed the bad debts of the failing savings and loan industry. Why is it possible to rescue corrupt S&L buccaneers yet 2 million homeowners must be thrown to the wolves today? If we can bail out Chrysler, why can't we support American homeowners?

The savings & loan industry was a mutant creation of the post-Glass-Steagall, pre-Gramm-Leach-Bliley financial omni-regulatory state. Those "corrupt S&L buccaneers" were spawned by government, much like the "corrupt lobbyist buccaneers" of today. The S&L crisis, meanwhile, was the direct result of incompetent central planners changing the rules for financial institutions post facto and making the S&L industry, which they themselves created, non-viable and doomed to collapse. It was completely avoidable before government changed the rules and completely unavoidable after government changed the rules. Chrysler, meanwhile, is the perfect case study of why government should never bail out failing corporations — did it end up doing any good?

And, one more time: "American homeowners" aren't the ones suffering; speculators and their financiers are. In another context these are the same people dismissed by central planner wannabes as "greedy capitalist bastards." Now suddenly they're helpless victims in need of a dole check underwritten by the financier of last resort: the innocent taxpayer who had absolutely nothing to do with this mess. Go figure.

Similar thoughts at EconLog.

--Is the National Weather Service a legitimate public good?

--A federal database of porn stars?

--Suspended from school for "drawing" (i.e., sketching) a (laser) gun? (Compare to this.)

--What is rapidly becoming the single most important factor in retirement planning? (Hint: "___ concerns will no longer take a back seat to returns if the capital gains ___ doubles...")

--Got bacn?

Another Sharia-shaman regime is at it again:

Iranian police have closed more than 20 barbers' shops in the capital Tehran.

The authorities say the barbers were encouraging un-Islamic behaviour by offering Western hairstyles, tattooing and also eyebrow-plucking for men.

Police say they have inspected more than 700 shops during a two-week crackdown in the city.

The move is part of an annual campaign against what is known locally as bad hijab, or un-Islamic clothing, that this year is also targeting men.

What can you say to these barbarian goatherders -- except: "Pluck you!"

---

On the other hand.

A health care socialist plays the Sicko card and calls for universal Medicare in the New England Journal of Medicine:

But rather than give her antibiotics, the doctor calls her insurer, whose physician-gatekeeper tells him that Mychelle is not covered at the hospital and must be taken to another facility. The doctor repeatedly says that Mychelle needs care, and he is repeatedly told that she must be transferred first. Finally, nearly 3 hours after arriving at the hospital, wracked by seizures, Mychelle is taken to the approved facility. She dies 15 minutes later.

Assuming it really happened that way, is there any rational basis to believe that similar, if not worse, nightmares would not occur under socialized medicine?

Who honestly expects that there would be fewer Mychelles under a regime of "bureaucrat-gatekeepers" than with "physician-gatekeepers"?

More:

Sicko may well be remembered as our generation's Silent Spring or The Jungle — propaganda, in the best sense of the word, that pricks our collective conscience about problems that are hidden in plain sight.

I love that phrase: "propaganda, in the best sense of the word." That sums up nicely the mindset of most health care socialists: Lying in the pursuit of what (you think) is honorable is also honorable? This is a component of "enlightened" public policy? These are the same sort of people who hate Bush for lying about Iraq? Go figure. (See here regarding the "noble" propaganda of Silent Sprint. And people do realize, I hope, that The Jungle was not just fiction but fantasy.)

Finally:

Medicare, our country's most popular and successful public insurance plan, covers everyone older than 65 and people with disabilities[.]

What kind of volitional cognitive dissonance does it require (by a physician, no less) to call Medicare — which is going hopelessly bankrupt — "most successful"? Simply amazing. (Compare with this post on whether Social Security has been a "success.")

(Via Kevin, M.D.)

The teachers ueber-union, the National Education Association, is poised to spend three million dollars -- three million dollars -- to defeat a school voucher plan in Utah.

Because they care so much about the kids, as reflected by their expensive tactics to preserve the permanent jobs of their members -- at least some of whom are undeniably incompetent or semi-competent. And don't leave out their collaborators: the zero-value-added administrators and educrats.

To the NEA, fighting parent empowerment is apparently a better way to spend money (by the way: whose money?) "for the kids" than, say, buying three million dollars worth of textbooks or lab equipment, or endowing student scholarships and teaching fellowships. Go figure -- but be sure your figuring add up to three million dollars.

Has there ever been a better example of the agency-principal problem than that of teachers and their union bosses?

(Via Cato@Liberty.)

---

On the other hand:

Parents for Choice in Education, which promotes vouchers in Utah, is sponsoring a telephone survey that links voucher opponents with advocates of same-sex unions.

Did I mention this was Utah?

Bill Lee, a Sandy resident, earlier this week received a call he described as "pretty nasty stuff." He took notes about a portion of the survey he said asks how someone's vote would be affected knowing the same group that opposes vouchers, the "liberal national teachers' union," supports same-sex unions along with higher taxes. Parents for Choice declined to release the survey questions.

The ghost of Rove haunts us still: When in doubt, play the bigotry card.

(Via Americans United.)

---

FUN FACT: Apparently the Mormon Church does not endow or operate elementary or secondary schools the way that, e.g., the Roman Catholic Church does. Then again, since Mormons pretty much run the government throughout Utah, is it surprising that Utah Mormons generally find their public schools to be satisfactory? More importantly: Do non-Mormons?

Now available at the YouTube page.

August 17, 2007, episode: Rove resigns, Iran, Elvis. And a prediction!

Yet another warm-fuzzy-feeling ban by New York City's hack politicians:

Councilman Bill de Blasio, Democrat of Brooklyn, ... is introducing a bill in the City Council today to ... prohibit the use of polystyrene by City agencies and food establishments. Mr. de Blasio [wants] the school system to switch to either reusable plastic trays or trays that are biodegradable.
...
Mr. de Blasio's bill would also include a ban on Styrofoam "to-go" containers used by city restaurants and delis. The bill states that "no owner, operator or employee of a food establishment shall place, wrap, or otherwise package food or beverages in packaging made of polystyrene foam or offer for sale food or beverages packed in such material."

The story also notes, gratuitously, that polystyrene (i.e., "styrofoam") is "petroleum-based."

Three hasty stitches:

--Why does Councilman de Blasio hate the poor? If restaurants and delis use polystyrene "clam shell" containers, then it's probably because it's cheaper for them to do so. "Greedy capitalist bastards" and all that. Force them to use more expensive inputs, and prices will go up (or other nasty effects will result — maybe some establishments will lay off employees; maybe some will shut down altogether). In any case, seeing only the benefits of a ban, but not the costs, is policy (and intellectual) incompetence, pure and simple.

--The "biodegradable" argument is an increasingly popular fallacy. Nothing decomposes in a landfill! The cure for the ills of pollution is, um, not to pollute. Take care of that, and the "biodegradability" question becomes moot. (Incidentally, how is a non-toxic material that never decomposes "worse" than a substance that decomposes into potentially toxic components?)

--Another increasingly popular fallacy is the "Damn Arabs!" canard — that anything "petroleum-based" is enriching OPEC, destabilizing the Middle East, financing al Qaeda, etc. As one commenter correctly debunks:

Yes, they are petrochemical, but they are produced as the byproduct of other processes, and so eliminating them is not likely to have a lot of impact on oil imports.

As I would often ask my freshman economics students: What determines the price of wood — the demand for housing lumber or the demand for toothpicks? So too with plastic and the price of oil.

To activist legislators, there will always be the next "evil" to ban; the next "misbehavior" to curtail; the next "market failure" to tax; the next rent-seeker to reward; the next ego-trip to bask in.

Who cleans up the pollution of runaway government?

(Note: The question of whether the City Council can or should ban foam trays in public schools or from cafeterias in government buildings is a slightly different question. There the issue is the city's fiduciary duty to taxpayers to keep operating expenses as low as is reasonably possible. Playing "Who's morally superior?" with other people's tax money is per se morally inferior (something, incidentally, that the health care socialists can't seem to fathom).

One of the reasons I dismiss calls for replacing the federal income tax with a federal sales tax is because such proposals are founded on several false premises. See my previous post.

Among the most glaring of these faulty assumptions is that the Politics of Pull and the Politics of the Warm Fuzzy Feeling wouldn't permeate a federal sales tax the exact same way they infect state sales taxes.

Who seriously believes that federal politicians and bureaucrats would, for example, allow diapers to be taxed? Or college tuition? Or an appendectomy? Or the interest on your mortgage (your bank "sold you" financial services, so -- I am not making this up -- the sales price, which is the interest you pay the bank, would get "sales taxed" as well, at least under one proposal).

In New York State, soda (even diet soda) is taxed but iced tea isn't. Frozen chicken is not taxed but heated chicken is. Basketball shoes are not taxed but golf shoes are. And so on.

So the IRS would not "disappear" under a federal sales tax -- it would continue to do exactly what it does today: issue regulations and interpretations. Much like state finance departments do when implementing and enforcing their sales taxes.

One example: the brainiacs in Tennessee:

Laundering or dry cleaning of tangible personal property is a taxable service in Tennessee. Thus, charges for bathing animals are subject to sales tax while charges for grooming are not taxable.

Are you getting all this down?

Persons providing animal grooming services who have been making a single charge that includes both the bathing and grooming of an animal have two options:

--Separately itemize the charge for bathing from grooming and apply sales tax to the charge for the bathing portion of the invoice, or

--Continue to make a single charge for both bathing and grooming, and apply tax to the total charge on the invoice.

Don't worry -- there's only 39 more pages of such minutiae that the Tennessee government expects people -- not accountants, not business owners, but everybody -- to know and abide by.

I'm sure that Congress and the IRS would do a far better job with a federal sales tax. Just look at their exemplary track record with the Internal Revenue Code -- all 16,485 pages of it.

It's quite simple really: Take care of tax rates, and tax simplification will take care of itself.

(Via Tax Policy Blog.)

We pause briefly from blogging about Islam to blog about -- well, about Islam et al:

Hundreds of people held an anti-gay protest in Uganda's capital Tuesday, denouncing what they called an "immoral" lifestyle and demanding the deportation of an American journalist writing about gay rights in the deeply conservative country.
...
Last week, [Katherine] Roubos covered a news conference in Kampala where Uganda's gay community spoke out publicly for the first time. The participants wore masks to hide their identities for fear of recrimination, but asked for Ugandans to respect their rights and allow them to live in dignity.

Demonstrators at Tuesday's event, organized by a coalition of Christian, Muslim and Bahai groups, accused Roubos of advocating for gay rights in the country.

Look on the bright si