The Grout Gallery

Tolman Hall, located on the north-western edge of U.C. Berkeley's campus is known for its award-winning architecture, nationally recognized graduate psychology research, and to a somewhat lesser degree, the graffiti in the third-floor men's bathroom. Above the row of urinals are ordinary bathroom tiles. In between the tiles, however, people have penciled in dozens of grout-related puns. As a lover of words (a logophile, if you will), I was amused by the various puns people came up with. Most were fairly unoriginal variations of the word "great," as in Grout Expectations or the Grout Depression. Others spiced it up a bit with things like Groutcho Marx and Potatoes au Groutin. Perhaps the trend started as a student's psychology project that has since taken on a life of its own. However it began, it has given me and countless others something to read while peeing, and for that, I'm thankful.

Loyal A.G. Reader Challenge:

Be forever enshrined in the prestige of Tolman Hall (at least until they remodel the bathrooms)! Submit your pun to the comments section of this post. I will announce the winner on Monday night. The next day I will pencil in the winning pun on an empty line of grout. Entries will be judged on originality, comic-value and overall effect. Bonus points will be awarded for additional incorporation of bathroom themed word-play. All entries must be received by Monday 12/2 at 11:00 PM PST.

That's Not All Folks

There is a lot of excitement right now in the realm of my folk music tastes:

• I just found out that Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson and Ray Price came out with an album called Last of the Breed last March. I don't know how I missed this, but I did.
  

• The season finale of Showtime's Weeds ended with Pete Seeger's rendition of Little Boxes. Seeger popularized the song originally by Malvina Reynolds. The show opened with Reynold's version for the whole first season. The second and third seasons have opened with various artists' renditions of the song. I always wondered why they never
  played Seeger's version (by far the best, and the one I was most familiar with). The answer is now obvious: The producers were saving it for the perfect time. After a delightful episode, the song came on at just the right moment. It made all of the waiting worthwhile.

• Arlo Guthrie's first solo performance in decades, at Zellerbach Hall here in Berkeley, is just months away (April 10). Arlo is the son of the late Woody Guthrie. This is really a once in a lifetime opportunity.
  

Non-Sequiter

Interesting exercise: Imagine re-meeting your oldest friends in a different context than how you actually met. What would you think of them? Would you think they were huge tools? Could you still be friends with them? How many do you think you would have been friends with no matter what the situation in which you had met them? To what extent do friendships/relationships evolve out of circumstances rather than chemistry? Finally, would you still have been friends with me if you first met me while I was looking like this?

A Right to Love?

A pet peeve of mine is the misuse of the word "right," as in, "I have a right to affordable housing," or, "I have a right to a living wage." The word is used so often by politicians, workers and whiners alike that it has almost lost all meaning. I'm not bold enough to give an actual definition of the word, but I will say that it is used far too freely, usually in the context of overblown self-entitlement.

I realize that I'm guaranteed to take a lot of criticism for this statement, but it is essentially the core of my ethics system: No one has a right to a job, or a free education, or free health-care (not even children). Everyone has a right to pursue these things. Everyone has a right not to be denied the pursuit of these things. They are not, however, inherent. They come at the cost of other people. The government takes from Person A, and gives to Person B.

In the same sense, people do not have a right to love. Few would argue that love is any less critical to overall well being than education or health-care, yet no one argues for government enforced subsidization of love, and with good reason. Subsidized love would essentially require an abstract form of rape: forcing those with many friends to give up friends to the loveless undesirables. Even with the aid of Cupid or Love Potion #9, it would be impossible to enforce without clearly breaching inherent rights of all those with the social skills necessary to find love. Services such as education and health-care can be practically redistributed among people. Just because it is practical, however, does not make it ethical. Instead of stealing our friends the government takes our money. For those of you who have a cynical view of money and therefore think my analogy is invalid, I would recommend reading this excerpt from Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. For every dollar the government takes away from an individual, they are taking away some of his/her inherent freedom. With a few exceptions (lighthouses are the only one I can come up with off of the top of my head) taxation is only excusable in the defense of citizen's true rights.

While the analogy between love and existing government programs is not perfect, I think it provides for a fresh perspective on what some taxation really is. I take my rights very seriously, and so should you.

The Simplicity of Hope

Since declaring his candidacy, Barack Obama has made it clear that he wants to move away from the typical campaigning methods that Americans are accustomed to, and generally sick of. Based on his performance tonight at the Bill Graham Civic Center in S.F., I conclude that he has failed in all the important ways, and only succeeded in the most trivial.

Obama ran on the stage with the energy of a rock star. The first word out of his mouth, if I heard correctly, was, "Yo!" followed by a series of "Eh!"'s and a comment about how "pumped up" the crowd seemed. My problem is not that his word choices were too unorthodox for my conservative tastes. This kind of language actually seems to be more and more common among candidates of both parties. My problem lies with the fact that at its core, hipper diction is just another form of demagoguery. Interestingly, I think I've even heard Mitt Romney use ebonics more effectively.

Obama's vague, promise-filled rhetoric and unremarkable speaking style reminded me of a mix between a 1920's stump speech (gimme that ol' time bureaucracy!) and a Junior High student council election (7-Up in all of the drinking fountains!). I recognize that this speech format is primarily for fund-raising and rallying purposes, but I expected Obama to live up to his promises and escape the suffocating confines of the campaigning format here, tonight. I would guess that Obama did not pick up nor lose any votes tonight with his overblown talk of change. He can do no wrong in the eyes of those already enamored with his simplistic idealism, or rather those who just passionately hate George W. Bush. Those opposed, myself included, were further repulsed by the realization that Obama is actually even more of a big government liberal than we expected. Lastly, the undecided democratic voters were given no substance nor overwhelming sense of confidence in the man.

At least he raised money, even if it was not entirely honestly. I made a "donation" of $15 expecting that it was the only way to see him speak (surely a most noble and edifying pursuit), when in fact no ticket was actually necessary to get in the door.

I'd like to stress again that I would not blame Obama for using the usual campaigning tricks if he did not emphasize a departure from them as a core of his platform, just as I would not have criticized John Kerry for his military record in Vietnam had he not shown up to the DNC "reporting for duty." Politicians use certain tactics for a reason--even though they will be accused of pandering, muck-raking etc. This is excusable as long as the politician does not pretend to be something he's not.

It's a shame that Obama could not be what he promises as a campaigner. Even though I could never overcome my political differences with him, I would at least respect him for trying to change a system that annoys the hell out of just about everybody.

Donations, Nominations, Complications and Frustrations

Tomorrow night Barack Obama is speaking in San Francisco at 6:30 at the Bill Graham Civic Center. It may be my only opportunity to see him this election cycle, so I decided to take advantage of it and buy a ticket to the event. Yes, the ticket is the equivalent of a $15 donation to a Obama, and yes, I am now officially a donor of the Democratic party. However, I quickly counteracted the donation with a larger donation of $25 (out of pocket) to Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani.

Perhaps I will post later in more depth about my reasons for supporting Giuliani. I will admit that one of the largest factors is the unofficial sponsorship of George Will, who said, "His 8 years as mayor of New York City were the most successful episode of Conservative governance in this country in the last 50 years." Giuliani's official website displays the quote prominently on its donation page. This has to be one of the best individual campaigning devices I have ever seen. Any conservative with a familiarity and respect for columnist George Will will automatically be more inclined to support Giuliani after reading the quote. It certainly worked on me.

Friedman Makes a Mistake?

My first exposure to the ideas of Milton Friedman came when I was 13 years old at summer camp. My dad mailed me a quote relating government spending to gift-giving. The gist was that when you spend your own money on a gift for yourself, you spend thriftily and choose wisely. When you spend someone else's money on a gift for yourself, you are less careful about how much you spend, but still careful about the choice of gift. When you spend someone else's money on a gift for someone else, you are careless with both the amount you spend and the gift you choose. The final scenario represents the government spending other people's money (taxes) on programs not intended for citizens. This explains why so much wasteful spending occurs in Washington.

At that moment, I became a capitalist. The ideas made pure sense. Ever since, I've held Friedman as the gold-standard of a modern intellectual: brilliant but easy to understand. However, the way he outlines his ideas in layman's terms has lead some to criticize him for oversimplifying complex concepts. Much to my sadness, I encountered an example of oversimplification in a quote attributed to Friedman. The quote goes, "If a tax cut increases government revenues, you haven't cut taxes enough." Assuming that Friedman has faith in the Laffer curve, a basic model generally used to defend tax-cuts, he has overlooked the basic format of the model itself.

Refer to graph: If taxes originate at level t1, well above the optimum revenue-generating value t*, and are lowered to level t2, overall revenue has been increased. However, an additional tax-cut would not further raise revenue as Friedman suggests, but would continue to depart from the optimal level. Unless Friedman assumes that all tax-cuts are perpetrated slowly and continuously (and it is impossible to instate tax-cuts in such a manner), his claim is inaccurate.Maybe I am wrong to criticize Friedman on such a technical matter. His claim is true for the entire right half of the curve. Also, I don't believe that the U.S. has operated at a level to the left of the optimum in recent years (who's ready for a second gilded age??). Nor do we have to worry about taxing too little with the way this congress is spending. President Bush is also responsible.

My recent wave of interest in Milton Friedman stems from this post from Cafe Hayek. Follow the link to video of Friedman being interviewed by Phil Donahue. Needless to say, Donahue gets owned.

The Perils of Choice

I have always taken for granted that more choice is always preferable to less. The virtue of choice is not only an integral part of my of my political views, but also obviously beneficial to my material wants. The wider variety of clothing styles, television shows, and music that are available, the greater the chance that I will find something of interest. I've been skeptical of those who say that people would be better off with fewer choices, to make their decision-making process simpler. Yesterday, however, while shopping for a shirt at Buffalo Exchange on Telegraph, my theory of choice as unequivocally desirable was put to the test.

Several shirts on one rack alone looked good; no one was head and shoulders above the others, though. Once I had about four shirts in mind, each consequent shirt was subject to much more scrutiny. I looked at the price tag of one and saw that it was $22, twice as much as the others and only marginally nicer. Instead of being put-off that the shirt was more expensive and thus not an option, I was relieved to have narrowed my decision.

This seems to conflicts with one of the general assumptions of economics that people are rational. In theory, my reaction to the higher price was entirely irrational. Why should a consumer wish to see a higher price on a desirable good under any circumstance? How can mental "tricks" overpower rationality in seeking contentment.

However, it can be argued that my actions were, in fact, rational. If I can assign a price-value to NOT having to make a decision about 5 shirts but rather just 4 shirts, then I can weigh opportunity benefit against opportunity cost. Let's suppose that the marginal opportunity benefit of the $22 shirt vs. the $11 shirts is actually just $2 (that is, I value the more expensive shirt by only $2 more than the cheaper ones). Let's also suppose that the marginal opportunity cost of making a more difficult decision is $3 (it pains me $3 worth to have a tougher decision). From these suppositions we find that marginal cost exceeds marginal benefit by $1. Therefore, my response to the more expensive shirt was entirely rational.

Years of Our Lives

Today in my Reading and Comp. class, a reference was made to a 34-year-old man. I thought to myself how intriguing the age 34 is. 34-year-olds are probably the most nondescript and likely the least discriminated-against age group. They are still moderately attractive (that is, those who ever were in the first place) but no longer prone to the stupidity of youth. They are physically healthy but beyond their athletic prime. It is the extraordinary averageness that makes this age such a rare subject of conversation, even though people near this age dominate most industries and facets of life. The actual median age of people in the United States is 35, but that sounds a bit too land-marky, and 34 is close enough.

I quickly developed a sort of mini-fascination with my picture of an archetypal 34-year-old. I wanted to paint him (yes, in my head it was a him), write about him (done), and explore what has been left untouched for so long. Then I turned to other ages that I feel are also underrepresented in our culture:

• 19-month-olds (Still cute, but no new tricks lately.)
• 48-year-olds (17 years since start of career, 17 years until retirement.)
  
• 59-year-olds (Have you ever pictured yourself at 59? Don't.)
  
• 109-year-olds (Next centennial not for another 91 years.)

If you happen to know anyone in this age range, tell them that you appreciate them, and that every year counts equally.

My Aims

I'm starting this blog, largely as an experiment, in the hopes that it could possibly turn into a more permanent fixture in my daily routine. I plan to differentiate this from my past "online journal" by focusing posts less on personal goings-ons and more on topics of personal interest.

Lately I have had an increasing number of urges to write down my various mental tangents. Until now, I couldn't think of a good format for documenting these mini-essays of sorts. My primary influence in starting this blog was Tyler Cowen, of MarginalRevolution.com (linked at the bottom of page). He is a professor of economics at George Mason University, but blogs on a wide variety of topics, including music, sociology and technology, generally with an added angle of economics. Credit is also due to my friends to the north, at Lewis and Clark, Chris Macleod and Mac Pogue (pomegranatepony.blogspot.com). I figure if those asshats can start a blog, anyone can.

Maybe it's wishful thinking but I hope some of you might subscribe to this as a feed and check in frequently. My goal is to post every time I have an urge to play Tetris, which is often, so check in daily! Comment too, let's a discussion going.