Transport Blog

Patrick Crozier argues facts are not as important as beliefs.

Celebrating Frederick Douglass

Timothy Sandefur has a post celebrating the life of Frederick Douglass.

Incumbents Suck

Justin Logan gives his top 10 reasons to vote against Bush.

Quote:

The problem with Kerry is he’s just your average sleazeball politician. I can’t even get angry with him for railing about the “Special Interests.” No, I’m angry at the American people and my fellow Democrats for buying this crap. I’m angry at us. Can you imagine believing someone parading around in those suits, having married an heiress worth well over a hundred million, living in a Georgetown mansion with umpteen bedrooms is an enemy of the “Special Interests”? He is the “Special Interests.” You’d have to be an imbecile not to see that.

-Roger L. Simon

CDs are loss leaders

Tyler Cowen has a post on CDs as loss leaders. Tyler Cowen cites this as a partal reason behind Tower Records bankruptcy. Quote:

Loss leader CDs push music in a more mainstream direction. The impulse buy is for the TV, the musical purchase is planned, which favors established stars with new releases. Sudden impulse buys of unknown musical products, by definition, do not bring people into the store. In essence consumers have decided they would rather bundle hit musical releases with TV sets and computers (the Best Buy model), than with more obscure musical releases (the Tower model).

Allegedly This is A Post

Julian Sanchez has some thoughts on the use of the word allegedly

Link via Jim Henley

Industrial Production Rose 0.8 Percent

The AP reports that Industrial Production Rose 0.8 Percent in January.

The low culture interview: Stanley Bostitch Model B440 stapler

Low Culture has an interview with a stapler

link via The Blueprint

FOXNews.com - Views - Straight Talk - Retiring Senator Stood Up for Principles

Radley Balko celebrates Retiring Senator Peter Firzgerald. Fitzgerald is one of the few Senators willing to stand up against pork, even in his own state.

Catchers Make Bad Managers

Dave Pinto looks at the stats and finds that catchers tend to make bad managers in baseball.

The $pree of The Union: Notes

The Heritage Foundation has the numbers on Bush's Budget spending increases. For those that think the spending is just related to defense and so justified the document contains this sentence: "Excluding defense and 9/11-related costs, discretionary spending increased 16 percent, from $340 billion to $395 billion."


Link via PrestoPundit

Down With Paperless Bathrooms

Matt Welch takes on the paperless bathrooms.

Boycott MTV For Moral Reasons?

Glenn Reynolds links to a website called BoycottMTV.com Personally, I have a lot of problems with MTV but the smut does not seem to be the worst problems. To quote Glen Reynolds "Heck, I'd settle for them actually showing music videos again."

Fact-Checking President Bush

Joshua Claybourn takes Bush to task for some clear misstakes that Bush made during his Meet the Press appearance.

The Sound Of The Neptunes and Timbaland

Sasha Frere-Jones has a great article in the New York Times explaining how The Neptunes and Timbaland make the beats that run pop music.

Answers To Five Questions Up

DJ Spicerack advocates voting for clark and what we need to do to save hip-hop. B-Psycho speculates how we can subvert the political system and what Republicans can do to get black people to vote for them.

Quote of The Day

"...Politics rarely throws up anyone that appeals to me culturally. The choice is usually between some glad-handing B-school jackass and some other guy whose nickname has been 'Senator' since he was in prep school. Well, where's the candidate for people of my ilk, who've spent our whole lives making fun of the brownnosing twerps who run for student government? " -Gene Healy

Resist The Draft

DRAFT RESISTANCE.org is a website devoted to encouraging people to avoid registering for the draft. The draft could become a possibility with the increasing problem of the military having trouble reaching recruitment levels and is having to resort to stop-loss programs more and more to get soldiers to re-enlist.

Vote For Yourself! Seriously

Libertarian Rant makes the suggestion that Libertarians need to write-in themselves. The argument goes that if each one of us votes for ourselves we are recognizing the power and importance of the individual. Libertarian Rant proposes the self write-in as the better alternative for libertarians than voting for the Libertarian Party. I don't buy the argument. Voting for the Libertarian Party candidate at least sends a message to the population. Voting for oneself may be revolutionary but I do not think it accomplishes much.

Is Mel Gibson A Holocaust Denier?

David Bernstein speculates as to whether Mel Gibson is a Holocaust denier.

Urban Legends Reference Pages: Crime (Super Bull Sunday)

Have you ever heard that mor incidents of domestic violence occur on Super Bowl Sunday than on any other day? Well according to snopes.com it is false.

Five Questions

Five Questions
Continued from here,

1. You and KRS-ONE for an afternoon. Recording studio or shooting
range?
I'd have to say the recording studio. Partly because I would like to learn more about the process of musical recording. Partly because I would like to ask KRS-ONE some cool questions.

2. Is there any point in voting for the Libertarian candidate for
president this year?
For all practical purposes, a vote for a Libertarian Presidential candidate is a wasted vote. But in the same manner every vote that goes to any candidate that does not win an election is a wasted vote. A vote for the Libertarian Party is not a complete waste because it will show their is somewhat of a protest to Bush's policies. I can not let Bush realize their is no objection to what he is doing from a libertarian or even a conservative candidate so I will vote for the Libertarian Party candidate for President. There is a point to voting for the Libertarian candidate and it is show we want change.

3. Why did you go down to the Caribbean for such a long time?

In college, I was really lazy and did not appreciate what I had so I never bothered to study or turn papers in on time. This was stupid and incompetent of me but that was what I did. I decided it was best for me to take a break from college and do something. I had a friend in St. Barth's, one of the French West Indies, who raised chickens so I decided to go work with him for a few months.

4. What's the best live show you've seen?
The Zulu Nation 30th anniversary Concert from November. The concert had the likes of The Soul Sonic Force, The Jungle Brothers, Busy Bee and KRS-ONE performing plus a whole host of rap superstars coming on stage to free-style.

5. When are you visiting Colorado?
I don't know. It's a long drive from New York.

THE RULES

1. Leave a comment, saying you want to be interviewed.
2. I will respond; I'll ask you five questions.
3. You'll update your journal with my five questions, and your five answers.
4. You'll include this explanation.
5. You'll ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.

Notice, you don't have to send $20 to the name at the top of the list.

pop (at least until i find a better name)

Shout out to Aaron Wherry for perma-linking me. Go check out his blog.

Herald.com - Your Miami Everything Guide

If we are judging Presidential candidates by how well they flip pancakes. Herald.com - Then Wesley Clark is not prepared to be President.

Sui Generis - The utterly new sounds of Dizzee Rascal, Britain's rising superstar. By Sasha Frere-Jones

Sasha Frere-Jones has a piece on Dizzee Rascal over at Slate.com. Their was one quote in the article that really took me by suprise:

The respected critic Simon Reynolds has called Dizzee "the best MC that Britain has ever produced, period."

From what I have heard from Dizzee so far I am not convinced of his status of best British MC ever. Can we write off Slick Rick's crown so quickly? I assume the argument is that Slick Rick is an "American MC." But if Slick Rick was really an American he would not had to spend time in an immigration center facing deportation.