Not A Mystery

Here’s a provocative thought, and certainly one that hadn’t occurred to me,

So if your children are supposedly vegetating in front of the television when they watch it for hours, what happens when you show television to vegetables?

Jon Keats, a self-described experimental philosopher, has set up an exhibition in NYC purporting to explore just that question.

Man Down

He’s filmed a travelogue for plants consisting of the Italian sky, complete with jet contrails, and planted (so to speak) a bunch of houseplants in front of a TV running the clip in a loop.

Presumably he picked houseplants because normally they don’t get to travel, and he thought they would be most appreciative of his efforts.

He’s quite straightforward in describing this whole gig as a thought experiment.

What I’m always doing is trying to pose thought experiments in the old-fashioned philosophical way,” he said, “imagining from a radically different perspective circumstances that are very familiar to us, in order to make them unfamiliar and force us to start to pull them apart.

Jon is right when he says old-fashioned, because let’s face it, TV is so last century. We need to get these plants hooked up with on-line shopping and dating, email, and financial planning.

The good news is that if they have pre-existing medical conditions we won’t know what they are, so we can provide health insurance.

I’m assuming they will register to vote … you can probably guess with which party.

Enough said.

Many of us are not quite right in the morning until we get our caffeine buzz going.

But until recently we weren’t packing guns. That’s all changed now.

From the Wall Street Journal we learn that “Starbucks Corp. and some other chain stores in the U.S. are finding themselves caught in the middle of a firearms debate, as gun-control advocates go up against a burgeoning campaign by gun owners to carry holstered pistols in public places.”

Even under normal circumstances your local Starbucks barista has to tread carefully with their strung-out customers first thing in the morning. But now that has been taken to a new level.

The only thing worse than a yuppie upset with how their frappuccino turned out is a yuppie with a gun who’s unhappy with how their frappuccino turned out, says Erik Forman, a Starbucks barista and union member in Minneapolis.

Believe Me, I REQUESTED My Frappuccino With Soy, Not Whole Milk!

Do you feel Chai?

Well … do you punk?

In a week when natural disasters have taken over the headlines you’d think we could contain the man-made ones, at least temporarily.

But no, that’s not happening.

In a staggering display of dysfunction the Senate allowed a single (Republican) lawmaker to

… block[ed] a $10 billion bill that would have extended unemployment benefits and other programs after halting its progress last week. And on Monday, the impact of his blockade started biting, with the expiration of benefits to 100,000 people and the suspension of 41 transportation projects across the country.

So what to make of this?

Republicans Boarded The Train Without Checking It's Destination

It used to be said you could get away with almost anything if you made the trains run on time, but first the Senate needs to figure out how to keep them on the tracks.

Even worse, Senator Bunning didn’t get to see his basketball game.

Pity, that.

I wasn’t always a fan of Paul Krugman, but that was when I still thought El Rusho spoke only the truth. F2U Rio Linda: he doesn’t.

In any event, the New Yorker magazine just published a great profile of Krugman the person, which also sheds light on Krugman the (Nobel Prize winning) economist.

And buried in that article is quote from one of Krugman’s teachers, Evsey Domar, that really got my attention.

Why did some societies have serfs or slaves and others not? …  Evsey Domar [argued] that if peasants are barely surviving there’s no point in enslaving them, because they have nothing to give you, but if good new land becomes available it makes sense to enslave them, because you can skim off the difference between their output and what it takes to keep them alive. Suddenly, a simple story made sense of a huge and baffling swath of reality …

Too Bad About Those Pre-Existing Conditions

This says to me that he who can accurately calculate the economic value of people’s activities can make lots of money, if you are in the right place at the right time.

One of the first great financial applications of these insights was insurance, which began as a way of reducing the risk of traders, as early as 5000 BC in China and 4500 BC in Babylon.

Right place, right time.

Let’s cut away to the present and look at Health Insurance.

Without arguing how we got here; we have an opaque, monopolistic market. Consumers have virtually no quality information, and in practice no choice of insurance providers.

The insurance companies have all the data, information and tools to calculate and guarantee their profitability.

Right place, right time.

Oh, and one other small plus … no accountability.

We always get a kick out of subliminal editorializing in news articles thru the use of photos.

And in this case Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal really has set a new (low) standard in their coverage of the recent Governors Conference.

It appears to me that the WSJ editorial staff selected this picture of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and New York Gov. David Paterson to make them look like Political Caricatures that were drawn by Robert Crumb for an issue of Zap Comix.

This Picture Was Picked To Convey A Message

Of course the WSJ opposes Gov. Schwarzenegger because he’s a Republican that is willing to work constructively with Democrats. And Gov. Paterson is, well, a Democrat.

What surprised me is why the WSJ didn’t go ahead and just finish what they started.

But Why Not Stretch Things Just A Little More?

Last week it was reported that Google is now working on something called Store View.

…they took pictures of the inside of the store, every 6 feet, in all directions. They also took pictures of products. Google Store View will allow people to … click on the door to enter it, all on Google Maps. Then when you enter the store, you can walk through it.

This would be an obvious extension of Google’s Street View, but obvious only in the sense that things which were inconceivable several years we now take for granted.

You probably know about Street View which allows you to (virtually) walk down most streets in the USA and many overseas. Jaw-dropping.

Here’s an example.

A few weeks ago I was reading a news article that contained a picture of a house in New York City. The particular subject isn’t important, but because my interest was tweaked, I decided to see to see if I could find the same house in Google’s Street View.

Here’s the original picture, which I’m sure required a photographer at some point to suit up and drive to the actual location of the townhouse.

Original Newspaper Picture of Townhouse

After only about 10 minutes of fiddling around with Street View and virtually walking up and down streets in the neighborhood I found what I believe is the same house. Keep in mind that I do this while sitting in my study in California, sipping a cup of coffee.

The Same Townhouse Found In Street View

So, two points: [1] the technology is absolutely amazing, [2] if the article was written today no photographer would have to actually go out to the scene.

And then I have to ask myself, ‘What View is Google going to introduce next?’ Keep in mind that Google has not given a very high priority to privacy lately, as evidenced by their botched introduction of Google Buzz.

So with this much technology, and no particular concerns about privacy, is it too much of a stretch for us to imagine Google solving part of our Health Care crisis by doing some Free Health Care Screening?

And that service would be called … Google Colonoscopy View.

Much More Photogenic Than A Colonoscopy

One problem with our continuing health care debate is a lack of pretty graphs to explain complicated issues.

Where is Ross Perot when you need him?

Say what you want about the European model of heath care, but you have to concede that they are way ahead of us when it comes to pretty pictures.

Take this recent graph from The Economist for example. It purports to explain the role of private insurance within developed countries that also have government sponsored plans.

Are His Red Or Blue?

And what conclusions can we draw from this gorgeous graph?

A study by the Boston Consulting Group concludes that countries relying mainly on insurance—such as France, Germany and the Netherlands—provide better care than those, like Britain, Italy and Spain, that are chiefly funded by taxes and which spend less on health care as a proportion of GDP.

I don’t for a second take these results as a given, but with a graph like that who can argue?

We could easily one-up the Euro-Quants by creating a graph like this for our individual states. Then we could color some of the balls red and some of the balls blue.

And oh, what headlines we’d have then…

It’s now been a week since Valentine’s Day, which is a reasonable ‘cooling off’ period. So I shouldn’t get in trouble with the Valentine Police over this item.

This breaking news story from The Onion News Network is hysterical. Make sure to listen to the words, since the images are a tad distracting.

The subject is a Slut Spill on an Los Angeles Freeway.

Notice to family viewers, this video is rated R.

Remember, It's Very Green

We can’t embed this video, but that’s OK, we wouldn’t want it resident on the blog since we are G-Rated.

But you can click here to go to Onion’s site and watch.

I have to wonder when they will come up with a technique to Recycle Sluts.

Schadenfreude is a kind of personal term.

It’s what you feel when someone like Eliot Spitzer stumbles.

But how do I feel when an entire industry gets what it deserves?

Today the UK Guardian reported that,

Vodafone boss Vittorio Colao has warned mobile phone executives about Google’s growing power in the online advertising and search market, which he claims could damage consumer choice.

Right. The Telecom industry which has been a pioneer in upholding consumer choice is concerned.

These are the same Dickheads who lock you into multi-year contracts, cripple mobile phone operating systems, and charge outrageous rates for text messaging.

Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch.

Go Google!

Of course Leslie is my Real Valentine.

But in the world of Runner-Ups, I have to nominate my favorites.

Even though it’s Don’t Ask and Don’t Tell, I can’t hold back, my Guys are Ben and Hank.

Pucker Up, These Guys Saved Our Bacon

After reading “On the Brink: Inside the Race to Stop the Collapse of the Global Financial System” by Hank Paulson and “In FED We Trust: Ben Bernanke’s War on the Great Panic” about Ben Bernake, I consider myself pretty well informed on our Financial Crisis.

And my conclusion is that without these guys we wouldn’t be having any love at all this Valentine’s Day.

So Let’s Kiss – Kiss while we can.

Valentine’s Day is Leslie’s favorite day of the year, so it’s also my favorite day of the year.

Absolutely. I heart Valentine’s Day.

Last night we watched “New York, I Love You”, which I can recommend for The Big Day.

The especially good news for you procrastinators is that the film can be streamed instantly from Netflix, and thereby save your sorry tush right up to the last minute.

You’re welcome.

More Surprises Than A Box Of Chocolates

The film is definitely not your typical RomCom (Romantic Comedy), consisting instead of

… a montage of segments that are really collages showcasing many different cinematic styles, with separate directors, writers, actors, and all flowing together seamlessly with overlap between segments.

Of the various segments my favorite was the very first, with Hayden Christensen and Andy Garcia in dueling magician/thief roles. (To actually appreciate all aspects of their scene you have to watch it twice because you won’t get the first 30 seconds until you’ve seen it thru.)

The funniest segment had to be with Ethan Hawke trying to pickup Maggie Q, which then sets you up for another scene much later in the film that builds upon theirs. By the way Ethan Hawke starred in Before Sunrise and its sequel After Sunset which are alternative 5 star real RomComs if you want something more conventional.

There are many other dishes in this meal, and while everyone won’t love them all, there are enough tasty treats to make this a keeper.

Leslie and I gave it 5 stars.

And by the way, if you want to really get into the Valentine’s Day Spirit now’s the time to jump over to Leslie’s blog where she is capturing Hearts and Minds.