[What follows is based on memory, not research; apologies if I get a fact or two wrong.] When the Drudge Report filled up its “headline” links with reaction to the Zimmerman trial verdict, I figured that this was more wishful thinking than anything, hoping for riots so as to point to what uncivilized people the Left were.  But they’re not going away.  And I have to admit that, not only do I disagree with the protesters, I’m not even sure... Read more

The (Chicago) Tribune featured another article on lawsuits by unpaid interns, which I’d link to here, but I read the Trib in paper form, and much of the online version is behind a paywall (good for them — I hated paying for content they were otherwise giving away).    But nonetheless, for those who say that unpaid internships are a matter of free choice: I own a business selling widgets — well, artisanal widgets, on etsy.com; I want to hire my unemployed... Read more

Here’s something I haven’t seen discussed anywhere:  I’ve read numerous times that O’care will stifle innovation in healthcare technology.  But to bring healthcare costs down, we need innovation in heathcare delivery and innovation in insurance product design.  My own thought is that staff-model HMOs should have become more mainstream, but Kaiser Permanente, which is a staff-model HMO, is the largest insurer in California (or at least one of the largest), and their costs aren’t exceptionally lower than their competitors.  Nonetheless, I still think that the... Read more

Continuing piecemeal on immigration: The concept of an ongoing guest worker program, or substantially expanded immigration of unskilled workers, bothers me a great deal. Part of it is the supply-and-demand of labor. Supporters of increased immigration of unskilled workers come up with studies claiming that this benefits the economy — the most preposterous was a claim not long ago that, in order for a entrepreneur to build up his/her start-up with high-paying jobs, he/she needs a legion of unskilled workers:... Read more

So the other day I was peeved enough about the consistency of newspaper reporting on the ethnic/racial characteristics of the victim and alleged perpetrator in the Zimmerman trial to gripe to Ann Althouse in an e-mail, thusly: “Martin was black and Zimmerman identifies himself as Hispanic” “This must be in the AP stylebook somewhere, because that sentence, or some variation therof, is found in every single article about the case:  Martin “is” black but Zimmerman only “identifies” as Hispanic.  Can... Read more

I have a lot to say on immigration — but I’m going to do this more piecemeal.  The issue is complex, even though the “send ’em all home” crowd thinks otherwise, and the Gang of 8 and its supporters (including the journalists who inevitably describe the bill as a “delicate compromise”) seem to think they can fix things all in one fell swoop. But I’ll start with this:  yes, illegal immigrants have broken plenty of laws.  They’ve illegally crossed the... Read more

Blogging is a bit of learn-as-you-go.  So far I have 29 page views since re-starting this puppy!  Which I assume means that the “viewers” are not live humans but the result of some kind of webcrawler (fun fact:  that old search engine still exists as a URL “search results by Google Yahoo! search).  But still:  a bit disappointing, since that means, presumably that I won’t be able to tell if I have human readers easily. Read more

So this is not my first attempt at blogging – before I posted the “official” first post, I removed a set of posts from my prior blogging attempt two years ago. Ha! I don’t recall deciding to focus on healthcare, but that’s what all the prior blog posts were nearly all about. And we’re still talking about it! But we’re no closer to a solution. Here’s the deal: the Republicans really just want to go back to the status quo... Read more

Every couple years, I give the blogging game another try – a chance to lay out all my solutions to the problems of the world, “if I were czar,” as Dad would say, to get reactions to them, should I manage to find an audience, or to work them out for myself, should all my readers be imaginary. I’m definitely a geek about politics. Beach reading isn’t the latest Danielle Steele (does she still write?) so much as the “why... Read more