Obama and the Post Office - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. - Mises Institute

Obama and the Post Office - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. - Mises Institute: "Writing in The State and Revolution in 1917, Vladimir Lenin summed up the economic aim of socialism as follows: 'To organize the whole economy on the lines of the postal service….' "

"A student raised a question about the government's provision of health services and its impact on private services.

How can a private company compete against the government? My answer is that if the private insurance companies are providing a good bargain, and if the public option has to be self-sustaining, meaning that taxpayers aren't subsidizing it, but it has to run on charging premiums and providing good services, and a good network of doctors, just like private insurers do, then I think private insurers should be able to compete.

They do it all the time. If you think about it, UPS and Fed-Ex are doing just fine. It's the post office that's always having problems … there is nothing inevitable about this somehow destroying the private marketplace. As long as it is not set up where the government is being subsidized by the taxpayers so that even if they are providing a good deal, we keep having to pony up more and more money.

Now, these comments are nothing short of incredible. The post office has been on the loser list for many decades. Most recently, it has been included on the GAO's high-risk list, increasing its debt to $10.2 billion and incurring a cash shortfall of $1 billion."

What Black Parents Are Still Telling Their Children | Nat Hentoff | Cato Institute: Commentary

What Black Parents Are Still Telling Their Children | Nat Hentoff | Cato Institute: Commentary: "In Nassau, along with 30 hours of training on cultural diversity in the police academy, a much more enduring practice is 'data collection program that requires officers to note the race and ethnicity of motorists they stop on the road.'

Detective Lt. Kevin Smith adds that this data is periodically studied to determine if the police department engages in racial profiling.

Furthermore – and I hope other police departments will take notice – Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy told Newsday: 'Last year, for the first time, we completed a pilot program where we collected statistics to help identify a baseline for traffic stops and to red-flag officers who differed significantly from peers when making these stops.'

What then? 'We shared,' said Levy, 'these data with individuals who were above the norm, sought an explanation, and then possibly referred those individuals for additional training.'

This postgraduate education for police officers, if extended nationally and to police on the streets as well, could eventually lead to fewer war stories among black males about the humiliation, and worse, of 'driving while black.'"

Inhumanity of the Minimum Wage - Paul Poirot - Mises Institute

Inhumanity of the Minimum Wage - Paul Poirot - Mises Institute: "If a minimum wage is set high enough to have any effect, that effect must be a closing of the market to those persons least capable of earning a living. For the minimum wage denies such persons the right to offer their services for what they are worth. The law says in effect, 'If you are not worth the legal minimum wage, you are not worth anything.'

This, of course, is arbitrariness of the very worst kind. It is difficult to visualize a greater injustice than this among supposedly civilized human beings — the strong ganging up to deprive the weak of their limited means of helping themselves.

Setting a minimum wage, below which no man may sell his services, is like setting a floor price for potatoes. The higher the floor price, the less demand there will be for potatoes. Those growers of potatoes who are least skilled in the arts of production will have been forced out of the market arbitrarily. And so will those buyers who can least afford to pay the price for potatoes."

What to Do About Pre-existing Conditions | John H. Cochrane | Cato Institute: Commentary

What to Do About Pre-existing Conditions | John H. Cochrane | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Health care and insurance are service-oriented, retail businesses. There is only one way to reduce costs in such a business: intense competition for every customer. The idea that the federal government can reduce costs by negotiating harder or telling businesses what to do is a triumph of hope over centuries of experience."

"But what about pre-existing conditions?

A truly effective insurance policy would combine coverage for this year's expenses with the right to buy insurance in the future at a set price. Today, employer-based group coverage provides the former but, crucially, not the latter. A "guaranteed renewable" individual insurance contract is the simplest way to deliver both. Once you sign up, you can keep insurance for life, and your premiums do not rise if you get sicker. Term life insurance, for example, is fully guaranteed renewable. Individual health insurance is mostly so. And insurers are getting more creative. UnitedHealth now lets you buy the right to future insurance—insurance against developing a pre-existing condition.

These market solutions can be refined. Insurance policies could separate current insurance and the right to buy future insurance. Then, if you are temporarily covered by an employer, you could keep the pre-existing-condition protection."

"How do we know insurers will honor such contracts? What about the stories of insurers who drop customers when they get sick? A competitive market is the best consumer protection. A car insurer that doesn't pay claims quickly loses customers and goes out of business. And courts do still enforce contracts."

DiceWars Corral

I like to play DiceWars and today I was able to make a corral -- I took all spaces except I left 1 space for each computer player.

State by state average of CO2 emissions per KWH produced

D.C. has by far the highest (3.6) pounds of CO2 produced per KWH so if they don't have the political will to fix that why should we think they have the political will to actually pass a climate bill that is helpful?

Data from http://www.sterlingplanet.com/content/State_Electricity_and_Emissions_Rates.pdf

Auto Dealers Paid for Just 2 Percent of 'Clunkers' Claims, Congressman Says - Political News - FOXNews.com

Auto Dealers Paid for Just 2 Percent of 'Clunkers' Claims, Congressman Says - Political News - FOXNews.com: "In the letter, Sestak said only 2 percent of claims have been paid and that four of every five applications have been 'rejected for minor oversight.'"

Not surprising for a government-run program.

How 10 digits will end privacy as we know it | Security - CNET News

How 10 digits will end privacy as we know it | Security - CNET News: "A study of 1990 U.S. Census data revealed that 87 percent of the people in the United States were uniquely identifiable with just three pieces of information (PDF): five-digit ZIP code, gender, and date of birth. Internet surfers today spew considerably more information than that."

"Database dossiers, too, carry surprising amounts of identifying information, even when specifically anonymized for privacy. Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin last year studied a set of movie-rating profiles from about 500,000 unnamed Netflix subscribers (PDF).
Knowing just a little about a subscriber--say, six to eight movie preferences, the type of thing you might post on a social-networking site--the researchers found that they could pick out your anonymous Netflix profile, if you had one in the set."

"Scientists at ETH Zurich recently showed how to identify microchips uniquely using radio waves (PDF)--and consequently to see through the disguise of pseudonyms. Their experiments showed that thanks to manufacturing variations, microchips, laptop Wi-Fi cards, and other devices can't help but emit physical "fingerprints"--essentially God-given serial numbers."

Gov. Jim Doyle won't seek re-election - Jonathan Martin - POLITICO.com

Gov. Jim Doyle won't seek re-election - Jonathan Martin - POLITICO.com: "With Doyle retiring, a slew of Wisconsin Democrats are likely to consider the race. That list is topped by Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton, who has already indicated she would run if Doyle does not and who would be the state’s first female governor.

By next year, though, Lawton may be running as an incumbent.

In addition to Lawton, other potential Democratic gubernatorial candidates include Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, Rep. Ron Kind and state Sen. Joe Erpenbach."

Social-networking ban for sex offenders: Bad call? | Safe and Secure - CNET News

Social-networking ban for sex offenders: Bad call? | Safe and Secure - CNET News: "If the law had no negative consequences, I would give it a pass. After all, who cares about the rights of people who have been convicted of sex offenses? Well, I do. Not because I think they're wonderful people but because it's in all of our interest that, if they're not in prison, they be integrated into society to the extent that they can function and be able to find and hold appropriate jobs. Keeping these individuals away from the very types of sites that can help them in their careers is counterproductive to the goal of rehabilitating them."

"Not everyone on every state sex offender list is a danger to children." ... "Citing a report from Human Rights Watch, the article says 'at least five states required men to register if they were caught visiting prostitutes. At least 13 required it for urinating in public (in two of those states, only if a child was present). No fewer than 29 states required registration for teenagers who had consensual sex with another teenager. And 32 states registered flashers and streakers.'"

"Another reason to question this law is that it can lead to more than one false sense of security. To begin with, the most dangerous sex offenders aren't necessarily the ones who are registered but the many who haven't yet been caught and convicted. And if we focus exclusively on predation, we're likely to lose track of the most dangerous aspects of youth online behavior, which are mostly either kid on kid--such as bullying, harassment, and impersonation--or self-imposed risks such as sexting or posting information that could be embarrassing later in life."