Westphalian Statehood for All!

Quick bits:

Chomsky & Cooperation

Campus Crusade for Cthulhu

I moved the michminnies blog out to michhouse.blogspot.com, since michminnies.icc.coop seems to no longer be holding a web server. All of the old posts are now there. Sosumi.

The NYT reports today that Hurricane Frances may do enough damage at Cape Canaveral that the existing orbiters may be damaged to the point of killing the shuttle program.

1) Hooray for the end of the shuttle program & the end of the space station! More money for basic science!

2) Hooray for locating spaceports in places far away from Hurricanes, like Arizona! Inland, like Heinlein said they should have been.

I flew to Madison last night. Let me mention for the record that the web of quasi-governmental monstrosities that are the reason that we pay such ridiculous taxes in New York really piss me off. In theory, a free market is supposed to be abhor too much government interference. Sure the rationale for public utlities is that there are public goods that just can't be provided by the private sector very easily, due the the inordinate amount of risk. You weigh this against the possible ineffiency of the utilities, or in New York's case, the obvious inefficiencies of inter-agency turf battles.

Most people agree that New York has a quality of life far superior to many other municipalities, narrowly construed in services provided, and perhaps more broadly as well, in attractiveness to potential immigrants and tourists.

Does the inefficiency of these utilities and the vast quantities of money that they inject into the local economy (arguable) or perhaps the redistribution of funds (unjust?) from the nether regions of the state to the city, contribute in some large part to the success of the city?

Would the Reagan Republican's version of this City on a Hill be dramatically different from the Bush Republican/ Johnson Democrat's current version of the city? I think it may.

There was a man from the Continent on the NJ Transit train who was bitterly complaining of the (signifcant) amount he was being charged to go from Penn Station NY to the Newark airport, noting that he could get a round trip air ticket within Europe for under a Hundred Bucks.

The relatively new Airtrain was having problems, with the door not opening to the passenger lounge at the NJ Transit station, and the big map of regional airports and transportation on the wall conveniently ignored the existance of LaGaurdia Airport, to which no Airtrain goes (unlike JFK or Newark).

Petty petty petty.

So Madison's been fun so far. We got swedish pancakes, during my first ever trip to a pancake house. Yumm.

Jeanne's mother pointed out to me that her husband married her while he was in law school. She then asked Jeanne, "When do I get grandchildren?"

Ummm, yeah.

So the Mets...