Back in your old neighborhood
Sarah and I went to see Wilco on Saturday at the beautiful Chicago Auditorium. Jeff Tweedy and company put on a great show for the hometown crowd. If you're not familiar with Wilco check out their albums "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" and "Being There."

Free Markets and Freedom
Milton Friedman, the greatest economist in a generation, passed away last week. A Nobel Prize winner and a fervent supporter of freedom, Friedman argued that capitalism was essential to personal liberty. He used logic and numbers to take on socialism in all its forms and through his influence with Nixon, Reagan, and Bush 41, had an incredible impact on our society and economy. Friedman made a major contribution to the fall of the Soviet Union. To learn more about Friedman read '"Capitalism and Freedom" for the long version, Ben Stein's column for the short.

Conservatives care
Liberals are quick to characterize conservatives as uncaring towards the needy. This is because conservatives resist both forced wealth redistribution and government entitlement programs. However a new book, "Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Conservatism," by social economist, philanthropy expert and liberal Arthur C. Brooks demonstrates that conservatives give more and volunteer more than liberals irrespective of income. Liberals talk more, conservatives do more.
Conservatives understand that government is not very effective or efficient with its programs. Private organizations usually can't get away with poor performance. They must compete with other charities for donations. The government has no competition, thus little motivation to perform. Who actually thinks the government would do better than Habitat for Humanity at providing for those in need of better housing?
I don't doubt that liberals care. I just think they are more interested in showing they care than actually seeing results. Example: they care more about tax rates (punishing the rich) than tax revenues. Bush's tax cuts stimulated the economy, leading to increased tax revenues. Despite this fact, the left continues to demonizes anyone in favor of lower taxes.
Face the facts liberals: conservatives care. We just have different (and I would argue, better) ways to care for our neighbors.

One bright spot
Sorry for my lack of postings lately. I have been slacking for two reasons: my depression over the election results and being very busy with work. Anyway, a source for optimism: Michigan's Proposal 2 - the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative - passed with 58% of the vote despite being dramatically underfunded compared to the opposition (see great article from National Review Online). The proposal makes state-sponsored affirmative action unconstitutional in hiring and admisssions. One might argue it already was unlawful under the 14th amendment of the U.S. constitution, the Equal Protections Clause, which states: "no state shall... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Affirmative action denies the equal rights of one person to favor another. Of course this is a sticky political issue because the preferred group tends to be African-Americans and the groups suffering discrimination are whites and Asians. Proponents of afffirmative action argue that diversity is so important that more capable candidates should be bypassed for less capable candidates with a more desirable skin color.
This is especially problematic for college admissions. The University of Michigan won one and lost one in its Supreme Court battle to keep its affirmative action admission policies. Gratz v. Bollinger challenged U of M's undergraduate admissions policy of giving 20 points to any minority. A perfect ACT would not earn an applicant that many points. The Court ruled that this was unconstitutional because the affirmative action program was not "narrowly tailored." In Grutter v. Bollinger the Court ruled (basically) that the U of M law school could factor in race as long as they kept secret how big a role race played. U of M has already promised legal action against the proposition and the will of the people.
Discrimination based on race is wrong. Whether you are white or black, it feels no different to be passed up for a job, promotion, or college admission because of your race.
The people of Michigan may have re-elected a liberal Canadian who thinks macroeconomics comes in a box from Kraft foods, but at least they got one thing right.

Who would the terrorists vote for?
No need to theorize, they've told us. Hmm, I wonder which party emboldens the terrorists? They say W creates more terrorists because killing them makes them angry. The Democrats make them think they can win.

ABC News: Global warming coverage should not have balance.
ABC News reporter Bill Blakemore has decided that his personal assessment of the science around global warming and our impending doom has eliminated the need for "balance" in media coverage on this issue. Obviously, the American people are too stupid to hear both sides of the argument and decide for themselves. Blakemore and his ilk would silence skeptics of the liberal global warming fanatics because a study funded by Teresa Heinz Kerry is clearly more credible than one funded by industry. And they wonder why Fox is dominating news.
Also, check out these massive global warming taxes proposed in the UK. Does anyone think this sort of thing is far behind if Democrats can seize power?

Minimum wage = minimum jobs
Several states have ballot initiatives proposing an increase to the state's minimum wage (see National Review column). Aside from being a blatant attempt to increase turnout among low-income (aka Democratic) voters, this is part of the larger liberal class envy strategy. They argue people are entitled to a "living wage" and only greedy, corporate types with no sympathy for the poor would oppose increasing the minimum wage. Here's the other side of the story, what Howard Dean considers "economists' mumbo-jumbo":

With the exception of the minimum wage, the market typically sets wages in our country, home to the greatest economy the world has ever seen. Messing with market dynamics causes inefficiency in the economy, lowering its productivity. Who cares? Just fat cats right? Wrong. Raising the minimum wage hurts low income workers in two ways. First, cost of living rises, hurting low income workers the most. For example, if WalMart is forced to increase spending on health insurance or wages, their prices must go up. The poor are hurt the most by higher prices for groceries and basic necessities. Second, when the price of a good or service goes up, the demand for that good or service typically goes down. For example, if Little Caesar's has to pay its employees $8 an hour instead of $6, they will have to raise the price of their $6 Hot N Ready pizza. Say the current demand per store is 100 per day. At $8 per pizza, demand may drop to, let's say 70 per day. People will be more likely to stay home and have gross Red Baron pizza. That means 30 fewer pizzas need to be made and the manager at Little Caesar's will need fewer employees each night. This all translates into fewer jobs for low-income (unskilled) workers.

Strong employment numbers (like what we're seeing now) benefit the unskilled. Employers are forced by the market to offer better wages in order to compete for workers. If workers want more, they can acquire skills and become more valuable to a company (as this former Little Caesar's employee did). Let the market work for the good of everyone. If you want to help the poor, pay attention to the economists' mumbo-jumbo or you may end up hurting instead.

I was born in a crossfire hurricane
The Rolling Stones came to town last night to play Soldier Field. Great show, despite the bitter cold. The Stones played for 2 1/2 hours. Keith Richards singing "You Got the Silver" while Ron Wood played acoustic with a slide was one of the highlights for me. Mick Jagger was his usual self: non-stop, ridiculous dancing. 90 year olds should not be able to shake their hips like that. Here's the best Stones albums, in my humble opinion: Let It Bleed, Exile on Main Street, and Sticky Fingers.

Flintcraws and Saddlecocks
As shocking as this may be to some, I've become aware that some people have not seen the Royal Tenenbaums, one of the greatest movies of all time and the inspiration for the title of this blog. To fill you in, Owen Wilson plays an author just attaining celebrity for his best selling book. At a reading in front of a crowded room he uses a few of my favorite made up words to conclude with this ridiculous passage: "The crickets and the rust-beetles scuttled among the nettles of the sage thicket. 'Vámonos, amigos,' he whispered, and threw the busted leather flintcraw over the loose weave of the saddlecock. And they rode on in the friscalating dusklight."

Speechless
Apparently the first amendment applies only to those criticizing the Bush administration. A liberal judge in Seattle has shut down a talk radio show because of the hosts’ opposition to a liberal ballot initiative. The rationale? Their words, since they are on radio, should be recognized as campaign contributions and are equal to spending money on the campaign. Let’s all thank John McCain once again for campaign finance reform and his assault on political free speech. George Will writes that this may be what would happen to talk radio under a Democrat run national government. Don't forget to register to vote.