Posted 8:24 AM by Marco (0) comments

Yesterday was my birthday, and my inamorata took me to Peacock on the Parkway. I cannot opine on their desserts, because she made a three-layer chocolate cake to die for. And when I brought the remainder into the office, I displayed how lucky I am.

Posted 6:29 PM by Marco (0) comments

The Orwellian overloads at the NYT have sacked even the sports page, writing, "But today, Woods, whose multiethnic background has always been notable in a sport lacking diversity". Lacking diversity? While I prefer to watch sports, I have seen enough golf to know that the major tournaments attract players (if not athletes) from five continents. I also know that Japan was golf-mad, especially during their bubble economy. Would the Times have written that the NBA lacks diversity? Would they have said that world-class table tennis lacks diversity? On the plus side, it is interesting to read that the self-described cablinasian was able to overcome his "multiethnic background" to become "the first black golfer to win the Masters".

Posted 10:06 AM by Marco (0) comments

In this market, "IBM's Earnings Top Expectations As Revenue Is Flat" is a pretty good headline. The N.Y.T., which insists on periods in IBM, apparently agrees. So did the markets.

Posted 4:33 PM by Marco (0) comments

I guess the BBC loves to recycle their stock photographs. Check out the mobile telephone in this article on the keyboard that isn't there.

Posted 4:56 PM by Marco (0) comments

Something in a glass of wine appears to protect people from the most common forms of dementia -- Alzheimer's disease or stroke-cause mental deterioration -- doctors said Monday. "I guess I will need another excuse", Marco said Tuesday.

Posted 9:15 AM by Marco (0) comments

This spot-on letter to the editor notes that politicians can safely take taxpayer money to offend Catholics while they are far more wary of offending others. Similarly, Mayor Bloomberg felt confidant that he could offend Italian-Americans with impunity. Even Slate Magazine knew "I didn't invite them as members of The Sopranos" was a Whopper of the Week, yet the mayor carried through on his threat. Imagine him treating any other group that way. The Times would be able to cut and paste its standard Olympian distain for even the appearance of insensitivity.

Posted 9:09 AM by Marco (0) comments

This year's Nobel Prize in Economics goes to an experimentalist interested in individual behaviour. Economists always consider it newsworthy when they learn that people do not always behave rationally. When people are simultaneously voters, taxpayers, and tax recipients, what are the implications for being generous with other people's money? The lack of virtue in being generous with other people's money is a staple of conservative and libertarian thought, with some libertarians (objectivists HATE when I lump them in with libertarians) questioning generosity as general principle. All forms of government give [other] irrational people control over our money (and more). As we might say in Coffee Talk, discuss. And, while the Nobel science prizes award monumental achievements (often to those with Hopkins connections), and the economics prize usually does, and the literature sometimes does, I agree with Richard Cohen, Michael Kelly, and Tunku Varadarajan that the peace prize is usually awarded too soon, and all too often, to the undeserving. If it took a lifetime to earn a peace prize, maybe the committee would not appear so foolish, so often.