David Frum, always interesting, had a long interview. A highlight:
So, when I think about the economic reforms I want to see, the social reforms, the foreign policy reforms, you need to reaffirm, in a very competitive world, the greatness and power of the United States. But second, it’s an example of how you need to not allow decisions about the future to be clouded by remembrances of the way things used to be. Maybe it was a better and easier world when the United States and its traditional European allies produced half of the world’s output, but that world is gone. No matter how much you wish it wasn’t gone, it’s gone. In politics, you have to make your plans based on facts as they are. On a whole range of political issues, I think we have to have the firmness and the future-mindedness to say that we’re going to deal with the world as we find it.
He gives some examples about how things will be changing—Europe’s decline, India’s probable rise—but you really should read the whole thing.
Hubbard posted this at 12:32 PM EDT on Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008 as Amer-I-Can!, I have seen the future. . .
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I’ve been arguing for some time that Hillary Clinton, for all her flaws, is a stronger general election candidate than Barack Obama will be against McCain. Now comes a poll [link in PDF (H/T)] that backs me. Obama leads McCain 46 to 44; Clinton leads 50 to 41.
First, Obama has now had to repudiate Wright—too little too late, I think. The campaign’s internal polling numbers must have been absolutely appalling given that in repudiating Wright, Obama more or less had to make hash of his big speech on race relations. Second, key Democrats, most notably Mike Easley, Democratic Governor of North Carolina, are swinging Clinton’s way. I think she might pull it out. Despite Charlie Cook’s assertion that she’s losing the superdelegates, I think they’ll start moving towards Clinton again; the supers hate losing more than they hate her. Should Clinton win North Carolina—with it’s large black population and many well-educated whites in the Research Triangle region, it would once have been natural Obama territory—I think we might start hearing calls for Obama to pull out.
Joe Scarborough might have been right that we’ll face a Clinton-McCain match up. And Clinton would be favored to win. Well, if nothing else, we’ll get Bill Clinton jokes again.
Hubbard posted this at 4:33 PM EDT on Tuesday, April 29th, 2008 as Audacity of Hype, I have seen the future. . .
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Bryan Caplan and Mark Steyn are betting. First, Caplan:
Here’s an especially specific claim in Mark Steyn’s America Alone:
The U.S. government’s National Intelligence Council is predicting that the EU will collapse by 2020. I think that’s a rather cautious estimate myself. Ever since September 11, I’ve been gloomily predicting that within the next couple of election cycles the internal contradictions of the EU will manifest themselves in the usual way.
I smell a bet. I propose the following terms to Steyn (or up to any three other people):
If any current EU member with a population over 10 million people in 2007 officially withdraws from the EU before January 1, 2020, I will pay you $100. Otherwise, you owe me $100.
Steyn accepted:
Throwing caution and my children’s college fees to the wind, I’ve recklessly taken [Caplan’s] bet . . . . Hey, why not make it a grand? A hundred bucks’ll barely buy you a falafel at the Tour d’Argent in the Paris of 2020.
I’m inclined to side with Steyn on this one. The EU usually loses whenever it faces actual voters in a referendum.
What I expect to happen is that states will start ignoring EU dictates, and eventually someone will decide that dealing with a super-nanny-state isn’t worth the effort, and will withdraw. If I had to guess which nation would be contrary enough to pull out, I’d say Italy.
Hubbard posted this at 6:39 PM EDT on Saturday, April 26th, 2008 as Europa Universalis, I have seen the future. . .
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If scientists take this no further than helping the blind to see, I will be terribly disappointed. I want x-ray and infrared visions, and the ability to zoom. Perhaps also the ability to network my eyes with others. Science has already let me down by letting us get to 2008 without flying cars; I hope they don’t now further disappoint by restricting bionic eye research to letting the blind see the visible spectrum.
Apollo posted this at 2:26 PM EDT on Tuesday, April 22nd, 2008 as Science & Evolution, Brave New Worlds, I have seen the future. . .
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Jonathan Last, of The Weekly Standard, makes the case that Hillary Clinton is a stronger general election candidate than Barack Obama:
[W]hile Obama might lead McCain in theoretical matchups, Clinton can make the case that her voting coalition will be more formidable in the general election.
Obama’s support comes in large part from reliably Republican states such as Idaho, Utah, Georgia and South Carolina. Democrats have no chance in those states come November. Meanwhile, Clinton will have won at least eight of the 11 largest states, including must-win battleground states such as Florida and Ohio (and Pennsylvania).
Remember, too, that Obama’s coalition is composed of more reliably Democratic base voters: African Americans, voters making over $100,000, and young voters. These are groups that Democratic candidates carry most easily. If Clinton is the nominee, she can take these groups for granted.
By contrast, Clinton’s coalition — women, older voters, whites making less than $50,000, Catholics, Hispanics — would be McCain swing voters in a race against Obama. Obama hasn’t been successful in wooing those voters yet, so it’s unclear why anyone would believe he will finally carry them (and then defend them from a very appealing McCain) in November.
In other words, if you look at the underlying fundamentals of the race, and not just the theoretical polls, Clinton can make a strong case that she is the candidate better suited to challenging McCain and winning the White House.
I’ve long been skeptical that McCain would fare well against Clinton, although it looks like Joe Scarborough’s prediction may yet come true.
Let’s take a quick look at median voter theory: namely, that in a two-way race the candidate who wins the median voter wins the election. In the general election, the median voter in America is going to be white (whites are an overwhelming majority) and probably female (women vote in larger numbers than men). I think Last is right. Hillary Clinton is better positioned than Obama at appealing to voters in the middle, despite all of the religious revival aspect of the Obama campaign.
Hubbard posted this at 9:47 AM EDT on Thursday, March 13th, 2008 as Audacity of Hype, I have seen the future. . .
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I’ve never understood why we criminalize selling something that can be given away for free. Derb seems to agree, complete with a bonus geek reference:
Prostitution, like drug trafficking, is one of those zones where libertarianism bumps up against the realities of human nature.
To a lover of liberty, it’s hard to see why a woman shouldn’t sell her favors if she wants to. Trouble is, weak or dimwitted women end up in near-slavery to unscrupulous men, and I think there’s a legitimate public interest in not letting that happen.
The best private sector solution would be a guild system, like the geishas had in old Japan. There’d be entry standards for the guild. Women would have to pass exams, and have some entertainment skills other than the obvious ones. The guild would police itself, expelling miscreants. Freelancing outside the guild could be under strong social disapproval, even made illegal.
Firefly fans will get my drift.
Now if you’ve ever looked at The Smoking Gun you know that most prostitutes don’t look like Inara Sera - we should do something about this.
**UPDATE**
I’ll be in my bunk.
Jamie posted this at 4:29 PM EDT on Tuesday, March 11th, 2008 as Nerdom, I have seen the future. . .
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