RSS

J. Goodrich

J. Goodrich is a recovering economist and the sole proprietor of the political blog Echidne of the Snakes. She also blogs for TAPPED.

Recent Articles

BLONDECTOMY

J. GoodrichFeb 06, 2007

BLONDECTOMY. Mayor Gavin Newsom checked into a San Francisco hospital last night for an emergency blondectomy. Just kidding. But Newsom has stated that he is going to enter rehabilitation for alcoholism. In that he follows in the large footsteps of many other politicians who have been caught (for the lack of a better term) red-handed, doing something they shouldn't have done. Whether alcohol use played a role in these political scandals might not even matter that much.

CORPORATE WELFARE

J. GoodrichFeb 05, 2007

CORPORATE WELFARE. The 1990s may have succeeded in making welfare for the poor a dirty term but corporate welfare is still thriving. Matthew Yglesias makes a good point about its recent explosion under the Bush administration:

THE OBAMA MESSIAH WATCH

J. GoodrichFeb 01, 2007

THE OBAMA MESSIAH WATCH. Timothy Noah of Slate is planning to make this a regular feature:

I therefore inaugurate the Obama Messiah Watch, which will periodically highlight gratuitously adoring biographical details that appear in newspaper, television, and magazine profiles of this otherworldly presence in our midst.

What a wonderful idea! I'm sure that Noah had a similar Messiah Watch feature about John McCain. You know, the maverick. The last honest man. The man Noah described like this:

MOLLY IVINS, RIP.

J. GoodrichFeb 01, 2007

MOLLY IVINS, RIP. She wrote beautifully, making something very difficult look deceptively easy: the combination of intelligence with guts and humor and compassion. She wrote with an earthy enjoyment and love of all humankind, including its follies, and she wrote with the courage to make any point she felt needed making, and the courage to make it as simply as possible. For all this she will be missed.

--J. Goodrich

THE RICH AREN'T THAT MUCH HAPPIER.

J. GoodrichJan 26, 2007

THE RICH AREN'T THAT MUCH HAPPIER. So says Tyler Cowen in a New York Times opinion piece which argues that income inequality in the United States isn't such a bad thing, really. Cowen presents many arguments but the one I want to highlight here is the idea that inequality in happiness is not as great as inequality in income, and, my friends, it is happiness that really counts! Cowen states:

Pages