I’ve said before that for-profit insurance is an awful idea. Companies that run insurance pools have incentives to keep as much money in the pool as possible at all times, because it is off of that money that they make their profits. In practice, that can mean delaying or denying legitimate claims, forbidding eligibility of even modestly at-risk participants, and partitioning insurance pools in ways that are sub-optimal from the perspective of the consumers. This basic fact is true of all kinds of insurance: health, car, life, home, etc. But the AIG crisis points out another basic fact of for-profit insurance: companies trying to maximize their profit margins often participate in much riskier behavior than is in their consumers’ best interests.
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I’m a big fan of scrabble. But one thing I’m not a big fan of is the pseudo words that have made their way into the scrabble dictionary. These words take a lot of the fun out of the game, and make it more about memorizing lists of obscure words (not even knowing the definitions for the most part) than strategic play. So, now there’s a furor among expert scrabble players about some new words that have been added to the scrabble dictionary. For example “za” which is apparently slang for pizza (has anybody ever heard somebody ask for some ‘za’ and mean pizza?).
Veteran players say this cheapens the worth of high point tiles and changes the dynamics of the game too much. They want Hasbro to change the value of the tiles to reflect the new words that make those tiles easier to use. Other players say that the new players should just adapt and get better at using the new words. I have a better idea – drop these non-words from the scrabble dictionary.
Seriously, nobody likes to play against folks who put down qi (alternative spelling of ki, the spiritual force in some eastern religions – yeah, that’s really in the scrabble dictionary). Its just cheap, and it violates the spirit of the game. Hasbro ought to go back through and eliminate all of these fake words that have been added in the past few editions. In the meantime, when I play scrabble, I only use the websters dictionary.
The new, and already embattled, GOP Chairman Michael Steele just put his foot in a hornet’s nest. In an interview with GQ Magazine, Steele seemed to take a pro-choice position:
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I would like to start by stating my fervent opposition to the new ban on ice cream that conservative pundits are advocating. Prohibition didn’t work with alcohol, and it won’t work with ice cream. The ice cream industry is a boon to the American economy, generating nearly $20 billion dollars in taxable sales, directly employing thousands, and indirectly employing many in the dairy industry through increased demand for milk. Not to mention the cultural and hedonic benefits. Even Ronald Reagan – the conservative icon – recognized the value of ice cream: in 1984 president Reagan designated the third Sunday of July as National Ice Cream Day. So, how dare the conservative pundits try to advocate an end to ice cream? How dare they!?!
Well… uh… actually… they don’t. So far as I can tell, no mainstream conservative pundit has actually advocated a ban on ice cream. The closest one can find is when the “American Conservative Daily”, concerned about illegal immigrants operating ice cream trucks, articulated an ice cream truck ban policy as a crack down. Clearly, it would be stretching things to suggest that all conservatives are opposed to ice cream. But why should that stop me from railing against them on those grounds? After all, conservative pundits seem to have no qualms about using the same strategy against the liberals.
Today, for the 3rd time this week, I heard a conservative talking head lambasting liberals over a supposed resurrection of the fairness doctrine. The fairness doctrine is a rule by which media are required to broadcast opinions across the political spectrum, is an assault on free speech, and it would be a travesty if it were revived. The thing is… nobody is actually in favor of it. In fact, Obama has repeatedly and publicly stated his opposition.
So far as I can tell, the closest any mainstream liberal has come to endorsing the fairness doctrine is that a bill to outlaw the fairness doctrine isn’t making it to the floor of the house. First off, since nobody is in favor of the doctrine, the bill is just political posturing. Second, there are important things that should be taking up house time… things like the budget, the economy, energy policy, homeland security, etc. So, ignoring political posturing in favor of important issues hardly seems to be a loud endorsement of the fairness principle.
There are a lot of legitimate issues to gripe about regarding the current administration. But those are often subtle, and complicated, and hard to get the base riled up about. So, in the absence of any legitimate galvanizing issues, just make them up! Remember, the important thing isn’t to move the country forward, its to make the other party look bad even if to do so you have to adopt a doctrine of unfair characterization of their positions…
The EPA has just proposed a rule that would require medium and large companies in a variety of industries to report their emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants. This would allow the EPA to better track who is polluting and where. It’s a fabulous idea. It’s such a wonderful, not to mention obvious, idea that you have to wonder why we haven’t been doing this all along.
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