1. Despite all the news last year about NPR's alleged Liberal bias, NPR's fantastic economics reporting is one of the major influences in my life that keeps me grounded in Conservatism. See this story, or this one, or this one, or this one for a taste of what I mean.
2. Apple, Google, and Facebook's schemes for world domination include eliminating the middleman in the form of phone carriers and credit card companies. Their many free texting and talk apps are eating away at phone carriers' lucrative SMS and voice business, turning carriers into dumb wire companies like your internet service provider. In fact, Apple even attempted to bypass carriers altogether by creating an independent voice network powered by WiFi. Google is doing the same thing to credit card companies by enabling customers to use their phones as wallets. Once people are used to paying for things with their phones, it will be simpler and easier to use Google's payment and coupon products instead of credit cards and Groupon. As for Apple, mom and pop stores around the country are already using iPads as cash registers; just wait till you can wave your iPhone at one to pay. Apple will own both sides of millions of transactions.
3. I spend a lot of time on this blog writing about big ideas, but there are rumors that big ideas are dying. Neal Gabler argues in the New York Times that no one thinks any more (a common sentiment of folks his age throughout history), and Wired's Timothy Ferris counters that ideas aren't gone, just the "celebration of big, pretentious ideas untethered to facts."
4. The idea that Conservatives inherently do not care about the poor is a myth. Though I hesitate to play partisan politics (as the article I am going to link to unfortunately does), there is a decent amount of evidence that people who identify themselves as Conservative donate more of their time and money to both public and private charities than those who do not. This is also true of people who identify themselves as religious, possibly because empathy alone is a poor motivator for positive social change.
5. Can we just be honest for a second: politicians do not create jobs. Entrepreneurs create jobs. Sure politicians can make things more or less difficult for entrepreneurs, but saying that's the same thing as job creation is like saying you created a vase by not smashing it with a hammer. One of my favorite lines from The West Wing was from a Republican presidential candidate (saying what no Republican presidential candidate could ever say) when asked how many jobs he would create as president: "None. In fact, I'll cut jobs. I will reduce the number of jobs in the federal government. Now I know I'm supposed to tell you that my tax cuts are supposed to stimulate the economy and therefore create jobs. But entrepreneurs create jobs."
6. I'm convinced: should I ever have children, I will strive to praise their effort, not their intelligence.
Image: zetson
Excellent blog and I plan to read each and every article you linked.
ReplyDeleteWhere is Arnold Vinick when you really need him?
So glad you liked it. We could sure use Vinick now.
Delete