Potpourri
* Mario Rizzo laments the failure of macroeconomics. An interesting excerpt:
As a member of NYU’s Ph.D. admissions committee for the past fifteen years, I have even seen applicants who apologize for taking “too many” philosophy courses in college. I have seen others remind us that although they have been interested in history and literature, they are fully cognizant of the need to express their ideas in precise mathematical terms.
What of a clearly brilliant student who wants to question (or at least think about) these methodological issues? I had a colleague tell me, informally, that he would probably be a disruptive influence in the first-year classes. I guess it depends on one’s definition of “disruptive.”
I was definitely an influence, and perhaps even a disruptive one (especially when it was just the TA running the class) in my first year at NYU. But was I the clearly brilliant student? We will never know.
* Bob Higgs takes the time to blow up the silly petition about “Fed independence.” Don’t get me wrong, I think this audit-the-Fed movement might end up backfiring, but even so the petition is a bit like saying, “All this public scrutiny over Guantanamo is hampering the torturers’ efforts to spread democracy.”
* David R. Henderson somehow manages to relate Frank Zappa to Friedrich Hayek. I enjoyed both in college. (And I never inhaled while reading Hayek.)
* Speaking of college, here’s an interview with Richard Ebeling, conducted one year after I graduated Hillsdale. I think during my last semester I had three Ebeling classes. The best was when the government shut down under Clinton; Ebeling literally came dancing into the classroom that day. (That wasn’t my senior year, and now that I bring it up, I can’t remember if I actually was in his class or if somebody just told me about it. Anyway, funny stuff.) Wow now the nostalgia train has fully pulled into the station. I also vividly remember how excited all the conservative Hillsdale students were when the Republicans took over Congress. Small government, here we come!
* This news story ran a while ago, but it was just brought to my attention. Here’s the photo of the talk I gave to the Houston Property Rights Association (they supplied the signs and flag):
My favorite excerpt from the news story: “The idea that Hubert Hoover was for limited government was a “complete myth,” Murphy says.” Well it was! Get off my back.
