12 May 2010

Potpourri

Potpourri 3 Comments

* Hinkle calls off the Mann-hunt due to Climategate. (I agree, and HT2 Jerry Taylor.)

* Richard Ebeling sends an interesting email to Robert Wenzel about Machlup’s perspective on booms, back in the 1930s. (BTW, do you wish you could see Richard Ebeling give a fascinating talk in a fun city? Hmm, if only some entrepreneurs would cater to that desire…)

* Von Pepe sends this story of a $540 million suit against the NYPD.

* I liked Arnold Kling’s approach in this blog post, though some of his commenters raised legitimate criticisms.

* A great WSJ piece from Gerald O’Driscoll, who is an extremely interesting and sharp guy. (He mostly hangs out in the comments at ThinkMarkets, except of course when he’s lighting it up on the pages of the WSJ.) The only quibble I have is that I don’t think Austrians should keep saying that Mises predicted communism would fall, and that he was proven right 70 years later. Mises said socialism couldn’t calculate from Day One. I think it miscontrues his argument to say it was an empirical claim about the ability of a socialist regime to stay in power.

* Bryan Caplan has a neat suggestion for different weight classes in prisons. The added benefit is that it would make people watch what they eat! I would be nervous to go to prison right now, but holy cow if I were housed with all the convicts in my weight class from around the country?! I would have to perfect my Barack Obama impression pronto.

3 Responses to “Potpourri”

  1. David R. Henderson says:

    Bob, I don’t get the Barack Obama reference. Am I dense or are you being way too subtle?

    • bobmurphy says:

      Probably both. I’m saying that if I went to prison, I would have to be a “funny white boy” real fast. So if I had a really good Barack Obama impression, I think I could get by without having to violate my pacifist principles.

  2. Political Catechism says:

    Wow, what a radical. Without congressmen like Bryan Caplan, I doubt the future of mankind would be anything less than precarious. Bryan Caplan rEVOLution!