THE ITALIAN JOB. It always seemed likely that the Bush administration's practice of kidnapping people off the streets of Europe in order to have them shipped abroad for torture was carried out with at least the tacit consent of some of the relevant governments. But in democracies, governments change. And with Italy now under a center-left government, the investigation into the fate of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr is moving forward to include the arrests of two Italian military intelligence officers who supposedly worked with the CIA in abducting Nasr. Warrants, meanwhile, are still in effect for about two dozen Americans for their activities.
Economists always like to talk about the ideal situation of perfectly competitive markets. This is the world in which there are vast numbers of buyers and sellers so that no individual buyer or seller can affect the price. In this world, every producer is a price taker. This means that the price is set by the market, and they can sell as much as they want to produce at the prevailing market price.
In the real world, this is not an accurate description of most markets, which have a relatively limited number of sellers. The one market that does seem to fit the competitive story reasonably well is agriculture. Farmers see a price in the market for corn, wheat, soybeans, etc. and they can sell as much as they choose at this price.
THE BLIND (QUOTES) LEADING THE BLIND (PRESS). If you want to know how political journalism came to be in the state it's in -- c.f. "prone" -- and, therefore, how the present administration came to run merrily amuck, look no further than the following paragraph from Saturday's Washington Post, in which various West Wing moles 'n trolls try to make Hamden chicken salad out of that which our fathers told us one could not make chicken salad. To wit:
The New York Times editorial page went a bit overboard in its anti-Bush tirade on the budget deficit. The basic point, that the Bush administration deficits are too large, is on the mark. (By the way, they could better make this point using the gross deficit [4.0 percent of GDP], which includes the money borrowed from Social Security, or better yet, just report the change in the ratio of gross debt to GDP.)
ON OBJECTIVITY. Wow, a bunch of youngjournalists who don't believe in objectivity. I dunno, I'm going to have to side withMike here. I rather like the idea of objectivity in reporting, by which I mean approaching the world with questions and letting the answers you get shape the story you write, rather than seeking only those facts that you can fit into a pre-conceived narrative.
JUST POSTED ON TAP ONLINE: DIVIDED WE STAND. The Democrats' problem is at once simple and, perhaps, impossible to solve, according to Terence Samuel. Theirs is the party that says we're all in this together. But who still believes that?
IDEOLOGY IN AMERICA. Thinking about Matt's post on ideological outlets, this is the sort of thing that's long been attractive to me. I really do think we need less "objective" news and more slanted, but transparent, coverage. The bias you know is better than the bias you don't. But one thing that worries me: A bunch of partisan outlets would be a problem. There's nothing honest or constant about their opinions, and so the whole advantage of knowing their beliefs evaporates when the beliefs become inconvenient and change.
OY. Here we go again. Abu Ghraib, Haditha, and this:
Five U.S. Army soldiers are being investigated for allegedly raping a young woman, then killing her and three members of her family in Iraq, a U.S. military official said Friday.
The soldiers also allegedly burned the body of the woman they are accused of assaulting in the March incident, the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case....
TIME OUT OF MIND. So, just to take a clear stand against the rising tide of overt Young
Fogeyhood around these parts, I wear baseball caps, okay? My current one comes from Three Chimneys Farm in Kentucky. I wear them for comfort and for style, and because several centuries of Hibernian breeding left me with skin that is well-nigh translucent. I also wear them so that, when I read something like this, I have something handy I can throw across the room besides the obvious cursewords.
