random thoughts and thoroughbred selections

Thursday, July 03, 2003

StrongBad answers your email

You know, this reminds me a bit of maybe "Space Ghost Coast to Coast" in its tone and sense of humor. Check out Strongbad.

[>>]posted at 12:58 PM by BG - click to email
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Things my girlfriend and I have argued about

I've been visiting Mil's site for quite some time now. Big fan. I also bought his book, which was reasonably entertaining as well. But not nearly as much as his website.

[>>]posted at 12:12 PM by BG - click to email
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Die spambots

Nothing to see here folks, just killing spambots as they circulate the net.

[>>]posted at 12:10 PM by BG - click to email
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Abolish Marriage - Let's really get the government out of our bedrooms. By Michael�Kinsley: "We can add gay marriage to the short list of controversies�abortion, affirmative action, the death penalty�that are so frozen and ritualistic that debates about them are more like Kabuki performances than intellectual exercises."

Great article. I guess you can file me under the ideal that people should be allowed to pretty much do anything they want to themselves or another consenting adult, as long as it doesn't do injury or cause burden to me or other unwilling parties. And I think Kinsley makes a great deal of sense with his idea to "privatize" marriage. Look, the reason this is even an issue is because the government chooses to sanction marriages between a man and a woman, being exclusionary towards others. Doesn't it make sense to have the government NOT endorse any sort of marriage? The financial/legal burden of the marriage relationship could be endorsed by the government in this regard: If two or more consenting adults agree to form a contractual partnership, defining terms of that partnership up front, then all the sticky problems of - say, a rich old gay man without a will who dies and his life partner has no claim to any estate - those problems go away. Legally any two or more adults can enter into any sort of legal partnership they want.

What's to prevent the legal aspects and ties to what we consider marriage to be considerations if adults sign contracts together? You privatize marriage, and you remove any and all government endorsement from marriage. Conservative Christians can be free to believe that, because the bible may or may not say so, their marriage is the only true kind, but gays and even polygamists can consider themselves married if they have that mutual consent.

[>>]posted at 8:58 AM by BG - click to email
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No Help Wanted for Help-Wanted - A tribute to the Help-Wanted Index, the economic gauge that shouldn't work but does. By Daniel�Gross: "There's an inverse relationship between unemployment and job vacancies, known as the Beveridge Curve, after the British economist who described it. The curve thus predicts that periods of comparatively low-volume advertising would coincide with high unemployment, and periods of comparatively high-volume advertising would coincide with low unemployment. (This paper has a good description and representation of the Beveridge Curve.) "

See, and this is why I should have been in economics. It's all common sense. When there are a lot of want ads, there aren't a lot of unemployed people to fill those jobs. When there aren't a lot of want ads, there are many people looking for a good opportunity. A guy named Beveridge comes up with a common sense theory, proves it true, and has his name attached to an economic descriptor for years to come. That's legacy. This is why I should have been an economist.

[>>]posted at 8:44 AM by BG - click to email
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The Onion | Bush Asks Congress For $30 Billion To Help Fight War On Criticism

Man, I love The Onion. I also love the new Google Toolbar, which lets me link to articles on the web as I'm surfing and post them here. Good stuff.

[>>]posted at 8:31 AM by BG - click to email
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