Reform Congress...

Here's the conclusion of an excellent opinion piece in today's Wall Street Journal:

I've learned from local, state and national political experience that the only solution to entrenched corruption is sudden and relentless reform. Sudden because our permanent political class is adept at changing the subject to divert the public's attention—and we can no longer afford to be indifferent to this system of graft when our country is going bankrupt. Reform must be relentless because fighting corruption is like a game of whack-a-mole. You knock it down in one area only to see it pop up in another.

What are the solutions? We need reform that provides real transparency. Congress should be subject to the Freedom of Information Act like everyone else. We need more detailed financial disclosure reports, and members should submit reports much more often than once a year. All stock transactions above $5,000 should be disclosed within five days.

We need equality under the law. From now on, laws that apply to the private sector must apply to Congress, including whistleblower, conflict-of-interest and insider-trading laws. Trading on nonpublic government information should be illegal both for those who pass on the information and those who trade on it. (This should close the loophole of the blind trusts that aren't really blind because they're managed by family members or friends.)

No more sweetheart land deals with campaign contributors. No gifts of IPO shares. No trading of stocks related to committee assignments. No earmarks where the congressman receives a direct benefit. No accepting campaign contributions while Congress is in session. No lobbyists as family members, and no transitioning into a lobbying career after leaving office. No more revolving door, ever.

This call for real reform must transcend political parties. The grass-roots movements of the right and the left should embrace this. The tea party's mission has always been opposition to waste and crony capitalism, and the Occupy protesters must realize that Washington politicians have been "Occupying Wall Street" long before anyone pitched a tent in Zuccotti Park.

The author is Sarah Palin...

FTL Confirmed?

The OPERA team has re-run their experiment that measured time-in-flight of neutrinos as faster than light (FTL).  This time they used shorter pulses (removing one area of uncertainty in the original experiment) and did a better statistical analysis.  Result: FTL time-in-flight confirmed. 

This doesn't mean there's general agreement that physics is broken.  But it is one (unexpected by most) step in that direction.

Wow!

Economics of Solar Power...

Megan McArdle (by far my favorite economics blogger) has a nice piece up about the economics of solar power, answering the question “Should we be bullish on solar?”  She covers something that most discussions miss: the “whole system” costs of solar, especially the battery problem...

Nitobe Memorial Garden...

In Vancouver, British Columia, Canada.  Gorgeous!  Via BPOD...

Jamul Indian Casino...

Lakes Entertainment's latest quarterly report is out, and it looks much like the last few.  They've recognized another $800k in “impairment losses” (definition below) related to the Jamul casino project, and are still using the same “we haven't given up quite yet” language when talking about it...

Impairment Loss: A special, nonrecurring charge taken to write down an asset with an overstated book value. Generally an asset is considered to be value-impaired when its book value exceeds the future net cash flows expected to be received from its use. An impairment write-down reduces an overstated book value to fair value.

Five Sweet Little Old Ladies...

Via my mom:

Sitting on the side of the road waiting to catch speeding drivers, a Massachusetts state trooper sees a car puttering along at 24 mph. He thinks to himself, "This driver is as dangerous as a speeder!" So he turns on his lights and pulls the driver over.

Approaching the car, he notices that there are five elderly ladies - two in the front seat, and three in the back, wide-eyed and white as ghosts. The driver, obviously confused, says to him, "Officer, I don't understand. I was going the exact speed limit. What seems to be the problem?"

The trooper, trying to contain a chuckle, explains to her that "24" was the Route number, not the speed limit. A bit embarrassed, the woman grinned and thanked the officer for pointing out her error.

"But before you go, Ma'am, I have to ask, "is everyone in this car OK? These women seem awfully shaken."

"Oh, they'll be all right in a minute, officer. We just got off Route 128."

And yes, it's entirely plausible that my mom was one of them...

Banksia grandis...

An Australian native, from BPOD, of course...

Amazing Voyager 2...

Over thirty years old, and a bazillion miles past Pluto – and yet we can still talk to it and control it.  It's an awesome and under-appreciated technological accomplishment...

Maps...

xkcd has an excellent post today on various map projections, and what your preferences say about you...

Hello Faddah, Hello Mama...

IowaHawk strikes again with a theme song for Occupy Wall Street.  Sample stanza:

We are saving
This whole nation
With some squad car
Defecation
We went marching
in Zucotti 
And got applauded by the Nazi Party

WTF, China?

China is building very strange things in its deserts, and nobody seems to know why...

Historical Unemployment...

A very nice graphical “heat map” that the WSJ keeps updated...

Hydrogen alpha Sun...

Our sun, as seen in hydrogen alpha light.  Gorgeous.  Click to enlarge.  From APOD, of course...

Time-Lapse Movie of the Earth, from the ISS...

Awesome.  The aurora borealis and lightning strikes are particularly beautiful and interesting...

Shameful?

This guy – a law professor! – thinks it's shameful that someone solicited in the University for care packages to be sent to our soldiers overseas.

Personally, I think it's shameful that an academic institution (Suffolk University law school, in this case) allows someone with that attitude to indoctrinate our youth.

Morning Walk...

This morning's walk was glorious...  A sharp scent of sage was in the air, a consequence, I think, of our rains a couple days ago.  The ground is damp, and new growth is springing up all around.  The moon was high in the sky, just over Orion's head.  It's brightess washed out all but the brightest stars.  Jupiter hung over the western horizon.  I couldn't make out the Milky Way at all; the sky was just too bright.  The moonlight was more than bright enough to walk confidently by.  It cast sharp shadows; the pine tree shadows I walked through were particualrly lovely, reminding me of the shadows cast by lights on the Christmas tree.

The dogs, of course, know none of this.  The three field spaniels were agog over the smells exposed by the soils dampness.  They ran to and fro, in random directions but with huge energy.  This morning they found nothing to focus on.  They were like canine vacuum cleaners, zooming around sucking in all the joyous odors.  They were clearly very happy dogs.  Race, on the other hand, noticed none of this.  All he had eyes for was his pine cone.  As usual, he repeatedly laid it in my path so that I would walk over it and kick it.  This is how he gets his joy: chasing a kicked pine cone.  He runs it down, snags it in his jaws, then lifts his head high in sheer joy as he scampers about for 30 seconds or so of victory laps that take him all over the yard.  Then he comes back and lays his pine cone down again.

Another morning out in the chaparral...

Cocaine Prices vs. Crime Rates...

An interesting piece by Llewellyn Hinkes-Jones explores the idea that lower cocaine prices on the street are the cause for the declining rate of violent crime in the U.S. over the past 15 years or so.

I have no idea whether that notion has any merit.  However, inadvertently the article makes many points that bolster the case for legalizing drugs like cocaine.  One of the consequences of making such a high-demand item (as evidenced by the price people are willing to pay for it) illegal is that people will finance their desire by committing crimes – property crimes and violent crimes.  This country saw that during Prohibition, and rolled it back.  I, along with many others, believe we should do the same thing with other illegal drugs.  There's nothing special about alcohol, which manifestly has the same sorts of undesirable impacts on people and society that the illegal drugs do...

Free Programming Resources...

A nice list...

He Is A Second Dirac, Only This Time Human...

That's a quote by Dr. Eugene Wigner, taken from J. Robert Oppenheimer's letter of recommendation for Richard Feynmann.  The letter is addressed to Professor Birge at U.C. Berkeley.  The letter is reproduced below, but do click to read the whole story...

Bicycle Wheel, Reinvented...

The noise would make me crazy, but it's an interesting concept.  It reminds me of the old Lunar Rover design.  I'll bet if you put a layer of tire material on the outside of the thing, the noise wouldn't be so bad...