Monthly Archives: September 2018

Governance by the Left

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It’s only light bulbs, so who cares?  The Know Betters of the EU care, and the subhead on the Deutsche Welle article at the link says it all.

The sale of halogen lightbulbs is being banned across the EU, as LEDs are touted as greener alternatives. Advocates insist the move will save consumers money in the long run and lead to lower carbon emissions.

If that were true, then LEDs would have no trouble competing in a free market and supplanting halogens quite rapidly and freely.

However.

Ordinary citizens are just too grindingly stupid to be trusted to make the correct decisions.  Irmela Colaco, Energy Efficiency Project Leader for the German environmental group BUND:

It’s high time that the planet and consumers were protected from these power guzzlers[.]

Because consumers are just slack-jawed idiots who cannot protect themselves—or who cannot be trusted to protect themselves in the right way.

This is the Europe our own Leftists want us to emulate.

Some Labor Day Questions

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First published in 2015, I’ve updated it for today.  In an ideal world, I’ll be able to update it again next year, with a more optimistic tone.

The Wall Street Journal asked some questions on Labor Day 2012, and supplied some answers.  Here are some of those questions and answers, which remain as valid this Labor Day.

  • Q: How are America’s workers doing? Not good. Over the past decade, over the ups and downs of the economy, taking inflation into account, the compensation of the typical worker — wages and benefits—basically haven’t risen at all. … The Labor Department recently said that 6.1 million workers in 2009-2011 have lost jobs that they’d had for at least three years. Of those, 45% hadn’t found work as of January 2012. … Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Friday that unemployment is still two percentage points higher than normal….
  • Q: Things ARE getting better, though. The US economy is creating jobs, right? Back in December 2007 when the recession began, there were about two jobless workers for every job opening.  When the economy touched bottom in mid-2009, there were more than six unemployed for every job.  At last count, the BLS says there were 3.4 jobless for every opening.
  • Q: How much of this elevated unemployment is because the unemployed just don’t have the skills that employers are looking for right now?  …the bulk of the evidence is a lot of the unemployment really is the old-fashioned kind: the kind that would go away if the economy was growing at a stronger pace. Mr. Bernanke said as much at the [2012] Jackson Hole conference….

Under the Trump administration, the jobs situation is drastically improved.  The overall unemployment rate is at a historic low.  The black unemployment rate is at a record low.  The Hispanic unemployment rate is near record lows.  The women unemployment rate is near record lows.  Wages are starting to grow.

Happy Labor Day.

Facts-s-s-s

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It burns-s-s-s….

Brown University has come under fire after censoring its own study on transgender youth, which found that social media and friends can influence teenagers to change their gender identity.

After all, the study’s findings might invalidate the perspectives of members of the transgender community.  Can’t have the narrative contradicted.

Here are examples of what its study found, according to the study’s author, Lisa Littman, Assistant Professor of the Practice of Behavioral and Social Sciences at Brown, physician, and author of the study:

The transition often happens after teens use social media and watch online videos about transitioning to another gender.
“In on-line forums, parents have been reporting that their children are experiencing what is described here as ‘rapid-onset gender dysphoria,’ appearing for the first time during puberty or even after its completion[.]
“The onset of gender dysphoria seemed to occur in the context of belonging to a peer group where one, multiple, or even all of the friends have become gender dysphoric and transgender-identified during the same timeframe[.]”

And

The parents [surveyed in the study] described “a process of immersion in social media,” such as binge-watching “transition videos” and excessive use of social media, immediately preceding their child becoming gender dysphoric[.]

And a part of the study’s conclusion:

The research goes on to suggest that teens could be influencing each other to promote certain behaviors through “peer contagion.”

Bess Marcus, School of Public Health Dean at Brown, rationalized the university’s censorship this way:

[The university] has heard from Brown community members expressing concerns that the conclusions of the study could be used to discredit efforts to support transgender youth and invalidate the perspectives of members of the transgender community.
The University and School have always affirmed the importance of academic freedom and the value of rigorous debate informed by research…[all studies] should be debated vigorously.
… At the same time, we believe firmly that it is also incumbent on public health researchers to listen to multiple perspectives and to recognize and articulate the limitations of their work.

But only so long as those multiple perspectives suit the predetermined conclusion.  That’s the critical limitation of any work.

There’s no doubt that gender dysphoria exists.  Understanding it, though, and preventing it or treating it where appropriate are impossible so long as today’s Galileos are to be kept locked away.

On Keeping the Senate Informed

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…to the level Senators deem appropriate.  In a Wall Street Journal article about the fate of the newly negotiated trade agreement between the US and Mexico, there was this plaint from one Senator among others:

Lawmakers from both parties have complained that the Trump administration has broken with precedent by not regularly briefing with Capitol Hill and leaving them largely in the dark about crucial details of the negotiations. “Who knows what’s happening,” said Sen. Bob Corker (R, TN), the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, with a shrug.

That’s all to the good. You guys leak like a sieve, not out of carelessness, but deliberately for personal political gain. And those leaks also often blow up negotiations in progress. But your leaks are more important.

Now the thing will be submitted to you, and you’ll have all the time you need to study it and vote it up or down.

Get over yourselves.