Ruminations - 12mar2008

George Rebane

TV is changing.  It is merging with the internet, or is the internet merging with TV.  It doesn’t matter, with broadband connectivity that is not mediated by government, content will follow the eyeballs.  Take at look at this new service www.hulu.com .

Global Warming: No Urgent Danger; No Quick Fix   With a nod to Russ Steele’s (NC Media Watch) tireless efforts to educate us all on the follies of anthropogenic global warming, this piece from Cato is worth a read.

In "Global Warming: No Urgent Danger, No Quick Fix" Cato senior fellow Patrick Michaels writes: "Let's get real and give the politically incorrect answers to global warming's inconvenient questions. Global warming is real, but it does not portend immediate disaster, and there's currently no suite of technologies that can do much about it. The obvious solution is to forgo costs today on ineffective attempts to stop it, and to save our money for investment in future technologies and inevitable adaptation.          

Finally, I was amused to see how the few Spitzer defenders are positioning themselves now that the Great Eastern Moralist has been caught with his hand up a strange woman’s skirt, albeit one that was bought and paid for.  With the scandal less than 48 hours old, we are already told that it is time for New York and country to “move on and put this behind us”.  Holy cow! the tires from the screeching halt to this political poster boy’s career are still smoking, and now we need to move on?  If this guy had been Republican, we’d be just starting to sharpen the knives for an extended butcher job.

As Mike McDaniel and I pointed out in the SESF report on affordable housing, government’s meddling in the housing markets has been a disaster for low-income Americans.  “Affordable housing” is a political definition at odds with what builders want to build and people are willing to pay.  If the community needs low cost housing (defined by the market) then let the builders, lenders, and buyers decide on the products that will serve.  Finally, it seems that Grass Valley’s social engineers are beginning to rethink the damage they have done to this community’s housing market with their 20% “affordable housing” requirement.  Last night’s city council meeting showed a crack in that façade; now they have to figure how they can back out with political hides intact – ‘peace with honor’.

Comments

[Scott Obermuller]

Gee - Thanks for reminding me of the Perseverence Mine Project. I remember clearly at the time it was being planned, that I didn't make enough money to qualify to apply. I did, of course, make enough to pay federal, state, and local property taxes. As the houses were finished, it was a wondrous sight to see the happy families move in with all their vehicles, ski boats and toys that I could only dream of owning. And yes, I also remember the residents of said development later crying about the fact that they were being shut out of the booming rise in home values. Their claims that they were not properly informed about the restrictions on their ability to sell for full market value was pure hog wash. I had only a passing interest in the details and yet from one newspaper article I fully understood the trade-off the owners had made when they entered into the Faustian bargain of "affordable housing". Local and state governments have no desire whatever for "low cost" housing. It is clearly in their financial interest to make sure the housing stock is as high a value as possible and then create tax payer funded programs to pay for the structures that house those who can't or won't pay the full amount. Any individual who tries to construct a "low cost" home for themselves will find the government standing firmly in the way.

[Jeff Pelline]

Here's a review of hulu, which isn't too impressive when it comes to depth:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120536878662632121.html?mod=hps_us_inside_today

(registration required)