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Here’s one of the biggest political problems we have in this country (and many others) especially at the national level, but I’ve seldom if ever heard it discussed:

We never try anything out just to see if it works.

Every candidate in every important race has to commit herself or himself to certain measures or modes and then fight for them, tooth and nail, to get elected. So whether it’s raising or lowering taxes, trying different ways to reduce the need for welfare, whatever, nobody can just choose what seems like the best possibility and give it a shot for four or five years to see how it works. Everybody has to come into office or power with a set of declared decisions, and then since any failure will be ruthlessly attacked by the opposition, whatever results those declared policies yield will have to be defended even beyond the bonds of reason.

That is a TERRIBLE way to run anything, whether ant colony, company, or country.

Our daughter, currently asleep in her room upstairs, is turning thirteen in about twenty minutes and I’m just thinking how wonderful it is to have been part of her childhood years. In good part because of her and her brother, they’ve been my happiest adult years. She’s a buddy and an intellectual companion and she’s got a wicked sense of humor. We’re lucky to have her.

I am really irritated by how few of my friends’ posts I see. Whatever this algorithm is FB is using, it algosucks. Absolutely nothing against my frequent-posting friends, but everything else disappears.

I love my profile picture today. “I’m called Little Toadycup, sweet Little Toadycup…” I just can’t get enough Undertoad.

Just finished recording a podcast — the Big Book Show with Adam Curry. What a good guy. And a reader! May he live forever and sire many literate children. Anyway, it was fun. Keep an eye out for it and you can see what I look like just as I’m finishing my coffee in the morning. Then you can look away quickly.

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I’m in bad shape. I’m thinking of trying to do fiction on the internet again. Worse, I’m thinking of doing it for free. If I even start mumbling about anything like that in public, please smack me. I’m counting on you.

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There may be oversimplifications here — any discussion of economics will usually contain some — but there is a great deal of truth, too. Tax cuts for the wealthy simply do not work. The wealthy spend a great deal of time promoting them, but you know if they’d ever had a huge economic success with them, you’d be hearing about it all the time. And that isn’t just me, that’s most economists saying that, too.

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Saw Wreck-It Ralph. Kids love it. Deb and I liked it too — a lot of fun, and good voice-casting.

Sports note: The NFL is going to have to get its act together on forward progress or whatever they call it now. These days, the defense can hold ball carriers up for several seconds, punching at the ball, after the runner’s progress has stopped, just by keeping them from getting a knee on the ground. That’s wrong, stupid, and dangerous, because it turns tackling into trying to keep the runner from getting to the ground as they get gang-jumped, and some offensive player’s going to get his knee shredded. Not to mention how many helmets are flying off, in part because of this.

I’m not exactly sure why, but I love this picture I just stumbled across. Can anyone out there name this fine actress?

Offered without comment. No, actually, it’s pretty funny, and definitely counts as silly.

SNL: Mokiki
clipnation.com

Made me smile. I think it’s called “Schadenfreude”. Actually, you ARE looking a little saggy in the jowels, GenX…

Why Doesn’t MTV Play Music Videos Anymore?

Happy Veterans Day, or Armistice Day as was. We need to find a better way to solve our problems than forcing young men and women to fight with each other to the death. But today is for remembering those who have already answered the call.

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Amplifying on an earlier theme:

“My best friend, he shoots water rats and feeds them to his geese.”

I am having a Gimme Shelter interlude. Feel free to come in and out. I won’t notice because I’m just digging the vintage jams.

I listen to a lot of music with polyrhythms and samples, so I kind of take things at face value. I just listened to an entire nine-minute Roni Size track which was really, really complex, and only when it had finished did I realize that my Safari window had been playing ESPN at low volume the whole time — theme music, commercials, interviews, an entire extra layer I’d been assuming was part of the song. It actually worked pretty well with the drum and bass stuff.

Come back after you’ve dealt with the bats, little man. THEN you can talk.

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