Today I announce that I am switching my party affiliation from Democratic to Republican.

Eight months after the American electorate in their collective wisdom saw fit to install divided government in Washington DC, the investor class seems to be enjoying it more and more.

In this edition, as in all of the CODGOV series, we select volunteers and draftees from the blogosphere and main stream media on the singular topic of government divided between the major parties

The next edition of the Carnival of Divided Government TERTIUS DECIMUS - Special Memorial Day Weekend Fishing Edition, will be cross-posted at Donklephant and at DWSUWF on Memorial Day, May 28, 2007.

Seriously, you have to look at this. Each floor moves independent of one another so the shape is constantly changing. AND, it creates enough wind power to power 10 buildings like it.

WSJ has more:
In a design to be unveiled today in the oil-rich emirate, David Fisher, an Italian-Israeli architect, has dreamed up a 68-story combination [...]

It’s become fashionable to put down Barack Obama, just to compensate for the embarrassing fervor of his fans. But that too can go too far, and today I read something that reminded me what it is about him that genuinely appealed to me before he was a superstar. From an excellent Seattle Times [...]

Are humans innately good, or innately selfish?
That’s a fundamental question when it comes to discussing morality, law and society. If humans are innately selfish, then the only way society functions is by the majority forcing everyone to behave, through tools of social control like government, religion and culture. Without such control, the argument goes, society [...]

Over at my blog, Neomugwump, I am wondering why there is no “Euston Manifesto” on the Right and Center-Right. With conservatism as defined by the President and his allies, there needs to be a gathering of the faithful who can spell out a conservatism that is for things like gay rights, civil liberties, and [...]

Ethicist Peter Singer has an interesting article in the New York Times magazine on charitable giving. It’s largely a discussion of “how much should one give?” and makes the argument that it is perfectly defensible, on moral grounds, to tax the rich more heavily than the poor and to expect them to donate more.
I’ve been [...]

It took me awhile, but I’ve read the entire ISG report.
My detailed thoughts are over at Midtopia. Here at Donklephant I’ll do the executive summary.
There’s nothing earth-shattering in their analysis of the current situation, and nothing paradigm-shifting in their proposed solutions. But both are very solid, very reasonable. I came away with two impressions:
1. The [...]

When our children were little, their grandparents really liked talking “baby talk” to them. I’d watch as supposedly intelligent adults spent hours talking nonsense to unresponsive infants. Both baby and adult seemed to enjoy it.
I hated it.
Why? Because my wife and I were convinced that it stunted brain development. Because of that, and because we [...]

I’ve come up with a couple of out-there ideas — one on the minimum wage, the other on campaign contributions. I don’t pretend they’re realistic; mostly, they’re thought exercises. But I can’t really tell.
I’d appreciate people’s thoughts, but I find I’m actually too embarassed to post them here. So they’re up over at Midtopia.
Be gentle….

A few things to remember….
In 1992, Bill Clinton was elected President ending 12 years of Republican domination of the White House. Once in office, President Clinton ran to the left. The result was the 1994 election which ushered the GOP in control of the Congress for the first time in nearly 50 years.
In [...]

Low hanging fruit are those policies in which the party leaders are closer together than further apart.

I don’t really think so, but after what happened to my family this weekend, I’m beginning to wonder.

NPR had an interesting take on the evolving cashless society this morning, telling the story of a small cafe in Washington, D.C. that has stopped taking cash (you’ll have to click on their audio link to hear the story). The downside? Occasionally upset customers. The upside? No need to make change, no need to worry [...]

Okay, so I’m not sure why we’re suddenly all atwitter about North Korea demonstrating it has nukes, since we’ve credited them with nukes for years.
And there’s a possibility they don’t actually have them.
But assuming they do, it would be churlish not to try to lay out some ideas for a solution.
The blogosphere is abuzz with [...]

(To be read with the preceding post)
When I read this at Jack Whelan’s After the Future, I was surprised by my own reaction: almost everything in me leapt to believe it.
I continue to be amazed at the paranoia that animates the right wing in this country and the way that paranoia creates [...]

Crusader against religion Sam Harris (who, largely through his own tireless efforts, now merits our culture’s coveted prefix “bestselling”) in the L.A. Times:
Perhaps I should establish my liberal bone fides at the outset. I’d like to see taxes raised on the wealthy, drugs decriminalized and homosexuals free to marry. I also think that the Bush [...]

In case any of you despair about the workers who will be supporting you in retirement:
Educational doomsayers are again up in arms at a new adult literacy study showing that less than 5 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it.
The obsessive measurement of long-form literacy is once more [...]