A few months ago biologist Steven Pinker released a paper (Article 1, Article 2) and a book claiming that despite 9/11, Rwanda, and other such events, violence is actually declining in the world. He rebukes the myth of the ‘noble […]
Howard Ahmanson
Suburbs Up, Exurbs Down: California in 2010-11
I had the fortune recently to stumble on the California Department of Finance’s estimates of population change in California during the period July 1, 2010 – July 1- 2011. This is distinct from the Federal census, which tried to establish […]
How to do Deficit Spending or The Trouble with Keynesianism
The prescriptions of John Maynard Keynes have been controversial since his time: the idea of deficit spending for “priming the pump,” the idea of the “paradox of thrift,” and others that seemed to go contrary to traditional financial virtues. Many […]
Devil’s Punchbowl to Salvation Mountain, Part 3
After two nights we left the Abbey, but started out originally in what might appear to be the “wrong” direction, because we were headed up to Devil’s Punchbowl, a bowl of spectacular pink rocks wedged against the very foot of […]
San Miguel to Valyermo, Part 2
So we left San Miguel, initially on the same road that we had entered the town on, but then taking a different road toward Parkfield. The road ascended up a canyon that looked like the one we had descended, came […]
The Poor and Cars
I am as much in favor of a good public transport system as anyone, but it will, for the foreseeable future, be only a partial solution to our transportation needs. In particular, neither the poor nor the rest of us […]
Occupy and the Teachers Unions
The goals of the Occupy movement are mystifying enough as it is without their apparently accepting the teachers’ unions in their ranks. While admittedly teachers are not among the 1%, they are certainly not among the “least of these,” and […]
San Francisco to San Miguel, Part I
In the month of September, 2010, I had the privilege of going with some friends on a road trip the length of the San Andreas Fault, from San Francisco to the Salton Sea. September is not the most aesthetically beautiful […]
Some Points on Housing
Recently The Weekly Standard ran an article by Ike Brannon and Benjamin Gitis suggesting that the mortgage deduction was no longer so important as it had been in the past, and recommending instead a program in Wisconsin called WHEDA, which stands […]
9/11, Ten Years Later
When the 9/11 attacks happened, ten years ago, we knew that we didn’t like it. But we in the Western World were forced to think about the delicate question of, if we were against this, what were we for? Were […]