October 11, 2007

Solve building capacity and instructional time issues

Posted by Hal Young at 9:52 PM

A high school in Bergen County, NJ, regained valuable classroom time by scheduling a single lunch period, serving one thousand students in a cafeteria that seats three hundred. CBS showed pictures of students eating on (proven) filthy floors.

And they though NASCAR was dirty. Try school lunch in New Jersey.

(HT: Drudge)

Linkable Entry

Re: Skeptical

Posted by Hal Young at 2:02 PM

Maybe you can clearly recognize Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the video?

Linkable Entry

I'm even more skeptical

Posted by Jon Sanders at 1:42 PM

---

NEW YORK (AP) — Columbia University has refused to turn over security videotape that could help identify who hung a noose on a black professor's office door, police said Thursday.

Investigators began asking on Wednesday for tapes from cameras in the building, but have been rebuffed by administrators, said Paul Browne, the New York Police Department's top spokesman.

He said police will have to get a court order to force the school to provide video they believe could crack the case.

---

Now why would they not want to give police video evidence of who hung the noose outside the professor's office?

Linkable Entry

Free trade is just awful

Posted by George Leef at 12:24 AM

At least according to Vermont's socialist senator Bernie Sanders, in a Wall Street Journal piece he wrote last week.

As expected, he drew deadly counter-battery fire from people who understand the consequences of coercive interference with peaceful human action. Here are two from friends of mine:

LETTERS
A Senator's Obtuseness Regarding Economics
If Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) really thinks trade causes poverty, he should encourage the Vermont legislature to erect high tariff barriers against goods from the other 49 states ("Free Trade Treaties Mean Impoverishment," Letters to the Editor, Oct. 4). Or perhaps he can organize a "boycott Vermont" campaign and encourage companies to refuse to sell goods and services to Vermonters.

Just think, if the citizens of Vermont no longer face competition from outside the state, they could open up auto plants and steel mills, reopen shuttered textile factories, and cultivate every acre of open space and forest land with crops. Using Sen. Sanders's flawed logic -- he also claims free trade has been a bane to Mexico, but a boon to China -- this would be a windfall for the state. But the more probable outcome, at least if 99% of economists who have ever lived are right, is that the standard of living of Vermonters would plummet. But at least they would then be closer to the vaunted goal of equality that Sen. Sanders seems to cherish more than freedom, consumer choice, and wealth creation.

Roger R. Ream
Washington

Sen. Sanders asserts that Mexico's "agricultural sector has been decimated by cheap exports from American agribusiness." To the contrary, Mexico's agricultural markets have been roiled by high corn prices caused by our subsidy-fueled demand for ethanol. Earlier this year, the Mexican government imposed price controls on tortillas because of sharp price increases caused by American corn demand.

To give the senator his due, he's correct that Carlos Slim's billions are obscene. However, since he's such a careful reader of Mary O'Grady's columns, he should know that Mr. Slim's wealth is not symptomatic of "the kind of economic development championed" by her. Indeed, in a Jan. 28, 2005, column, Ms. O'Grady describes Carlos Slim as the beneficiary of "mind-boggling privileges."

E. Frank Stephenson
Chairman
Department of Economics
Berry College
Mount Berry, Ga.

Linkable Entry

Washington Crowd Scared of NASCAR fans?

Posted by Michael Moore at 10:30 AM

It seems that someone has put the word out to Congressional staffers that they need to be vaccinated before heading to a NASCAR race, what a farce to the people who are die-hard NASCAR fans.  If you have ever been to a Race, you know that most of the fans have enough alcohol in their bodies to kill germs.  I think they are scared they might have to sit next to a guy like this:

Linkable Entry

No one knows when the Berlin Wall will come down

Posted by Joseph Coletti at 09:03 AM

Chris DeMuth, president of AEI, announced his resignation to the world this morning with an essay on think tanks. The headline on this post is DeMuth's slogan.

(HT: K-Swan)

Linkable Entry

Growth CAN be stopped

Posted by Joseph Coletti at 08:29 AM

Much of the discussion in the Triangle over schools, roads, and growth in general starts from the same premise -- that growth in the region is inevitable. That is simply not true. Just ask your neighbors who moved here from New Jersey or New York. Bad policies can stop growth and even reverse it. This realization is what led Cary voters to elect Ernie McAlister and Mike Joyce in 2003 over Glen Lang and Harold Weinbrecht. Cary's growth since then has been mostly organic within the town's borders - before that the city grew through annexation, which drives up costs as the distance over which services have to be provided increases.

Many of my friends used to live in Cary but are headed south to Apex, Holly Springs, and unincorporated areas to the south. Governments need to pay attention to their noncustomers as much as to their customers.

Using tax dollars to build parking garages for private developers is never a good idea, nor is it smart to impose excessive impact fees on developers. The Laffer Curve exists for local governments, too.

People have not moved to North Carolina at the same rate as they have moved to Florida, Georgia, or Virginia. Our incomes have also not increased as rapidly. Growth in population and income slowed throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and 200s. People in Michigan thought that growth couldn't be stopped after two terms of John Engler, but the state is now in its own lonely recession.

Our newly elected officials should remember that they have a mandate from at most 14 percent of eligible voters, because 80 percent or more stayed home -- many not even aware that there were elections on Tuesday. But that's another topic.

Linkable Entry

<< Last Entry