New on the blogroll: No Credentials

No Credentials is a terrific blog written by Rose Nuñez, a new member of the RINO Coalition.

Eater

The brilliant folks at Curbed, our favorite NYC real estate blog, and the enigmatic but wonderful She Loves NY, have banded together to publish a new blog: Eater.

As you can imagine, it's all about the New York City restaurant scene. And it's already on our blogroll.

Pricey Oil's Path to Your Pocket (BusinessWeek)

BusinessWeek considers the prospect of oil at $100+ a barrel:

There's good news and bad news about superhigh crude prices. First the good news: By the time oil surges past $100 a barrel, the prices of consumer goods will likely have peaked and started dropping. And crude won't hit the century mark tomorrow: The Goldman Sachs report projected that oil prices won't see $105 until 2007.

ALL SQUEEZED OUT. The bad news: If crude costs $100 or more a barrel, gas prices will hit at least $4 a gallon. And prices at the mall will have shot up long before oil reaches the $100 mark, says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Economy.com.

Microsoft Partner Gato

Microsoft Partner Gato
Originally uploaded by enrevanche.

In a recent shipment from the Microsoft Partner Program, the good folks in Redmond sent me an irascible tabby tomcat.

No, wait. They sent me a bunch of software updates, and that's just Mister Gato indulging in his penchant for hanging out in empty boxes.

Check out the Friday Ark at The Modulator, and the Carnival of the Cats, for more bloggers' cats from around the world.

In New Security Move, New York Police to Search Commuters' Bags - New York Times

In New Security Move, New York Police to Search Commuters' Bags - New York Times:

New York City will begin tomorrow morning randomly checking bags at subway stations, commuter railways and on buses, officials announced today in the wake of a second wave of bombings on the London transit system.

The announcement by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly represents a significant ratcheting up of antiterrorism security in the city. Previous efforts have been limited in order to avoid causing delays in a city known for its hustle and the impatience of its denizens.

Since readers of this blog skew New Yorkish and libertarian... y'all might want to leave the .38's and the bags of weed at home. Enough said.

Hat tip: Alert enrevanche (and New York Times) reader Jon T.

John & Genna: 36 Hours in Brookings, South Dakota

We're checking in with John and Genna, who spent yesterday in Brookings, South Dakota.

In yesterday's adventure, John and Genna

• Get themselves invited to a Mexican waiter's birthday party
  
• Visit a chicken farmer with a Ph.D in physics and a love of New Orleans jazz, and
  
• Check out the art museum at South Dakota State University.
  

Stay tuned.

USNews.com: Dueling over derivatives (7/25/05)

USNews.com: Dueling over derivatives (7/25/05):

When a debt downgrade at GM took a bite out of several hedge funds last month, part of the blame fell on their participation in the credit derivatives market, a world of high finance that most investors know little or nothing about and that many simply don't understand. Ignorance, however, may not be bliss.

Credit derivatives are, in essence, insurance policies against the possibility that a corporation will default on its debt. They are traded by large investors like banks, insurance companies, pension funds, and hedge funds. For a premium, one investor assumes some of the default or credit risk in another investor's loan or bond portfolio. But just as many hedge funds do more than hedge, instead opting to take more-aggressive positions, credit derivatives are about more than just managing risk; they are also about speculating on it and trading it.

Warren Buffett is on record as calling complex derivatives "financial weapons of mass destruction."

I'm not a financial expert of any kind, but I did work for about four years for a company that wrote software to trade and manage derivatives portfolios, so I had to learn a little bit about modern capital markets.

In my view, derivatives, even highly complex instruments, are neither a panacea nor a Pandora's box. The key thing to remember is that they help you package different kinds of financial risks up, slice them and dice them and move pieces of them around, but they don't eliminate risk (not by a long shot!), and if you're not very careful the putative cure can wind up being much worse than the disease.

Some very smart businesspeople have gotten very badly burned in complex credit derivatives transactions. If you approach them from the point of view of careful hedging against risk, you will generally do okay; if you're bellying up to the craps table and hoping to hit your point before you roll sevens, well...

"My Dog is Tom Cruise" (The New Yorker: Shouts and Murmurs)

"My Dog is Tom Cruise" by Noah Baumbach - The New Yorker: Shouts and Murmurs:

I have to tell you, things are good. I am . . . I am . . . Whooo! . . . I am very good. I just returned from a walk and . . . ha! Things. Are. Good. I’ve got a bowl of hard kibble with some soft stuff mixed in. My name’s on the bowl! I am passionate about this lamb-and-rice recipe. What’s been going on? haha! I’m so in love with this bitch! hahaha! I can’t . . . I’m so . . . I can’t restrain myself. hahahahahaha! We met at the park. She was in the run for little dogs . . . ’cause she’s, well . . . ha! She’s petite. And I was over in the big run and . . . I am in love. I can’t be cool. This bitch is . . . I have total respect for her.

Redefining "failure"

From our friends at Reuters:

LONDON (Reuters) - The word 'fail' should be banned from use in British classrooms and replaced with the phrase 'deferred success' to avoid demoralizing pupils, a group of teachers has proposed.

Members of the Professional Association of Teachers (PAT) argue that telling pupils they have failed can put them off learning for life.

A spokesman for the group said it wanted to avoid labeling children. 'We recognize that children do not necessarily achieve success first time,' he said.

'But I recognize that we can't just strike a word from the dictionary,' he said.

The PAT said it would debate the proposal at a conference next week.

In the same vein, perhaps we could suggest "condition of deferred remuneration" instead of "unemployed and broke"; "deferred domicile" for "homeless," and "cognitively-challenged group of psychobabble-spouting idiots" for "Professional Association of Teachers."

If there were ever any doubt that the Church of Self-Esteem has firmly established itself as a reigning piety in the field of education, let it now be removed. God forbid that children should receive an honest evaluation of their work; building up their fragile self-image is FAR more important than preparing them to be thinking, employable adults one day.

The Roberts nomination

I don't know much about John Roberts, yet, and won't comment on the nomination until I've had a chance to do a little reading and research.

I was vastly amused, however, to see that the electronic shit-flinging campaigns, from both sides, have already begun. If you Google "John Roberts," here are the sponsored links that show up. (Clearly, both sides bought up all the relevant URLs for everybody on the short list long in advance.)

Stop John Roberts
He could be the deciding vote to
end a woman's right to choose.
www.naral.org

We Support John Roberts
Join Free, We Match Conservatives!
A Community of Conservative Singles
www.ConservativeMatch.com

Is Roberts a Good Choice?
Should John Roberts become the next
Justice? Vote now!
www.pollingpoint.com

Stop John Roberts
Help stop the nomination of
John Roberts.
www.StopJohnRoberts.com

John Roberts Nominated
Read peoples thoughts about the
Roberts nomination in real time.
www.technorati.com

John roberts
Supreme Court Poll. Respond Now And
You Can Get A Free Laptop Computer
www.my-vote-counts.com

Key 5-4 SCOTUS Rulings:
O'Connor was decisive 5th vote but
her replacement could overturn them
www.savethecourt.org

John Roberts
Find pics, news, movies, interviews
filmography and more at Moviefone
www.Moviefone.com

I think I like the Moviefone link best of all.

Google Moon

Google Moon - Lunar Landing Sites

In honor of the first manned Moon landing, which took place on July 20, 1969, we’ve added some NASA imagery to the Google Maps interface to help you pay your own visit to our celestial neighbor. Happy lunar surfing.

Update: Be sure to zoom all the way in... click the + sign and check out the extreme close-up.

Thrillist is live

Thrillist has gone live.

Thrillist is a free, email-based service catering to guys. Guys who are out of college and not yet married, or are married to disturbingly tolerant women. We're committed to exposing you to New York's most glorious bars, sporting events, services, gadgets and restaurants. Thrillist is not a guide. We're a voice that keeps you plugged into everything in The City that will make your life great -– while keeping in mind that you still need to pay a small portion of your rent, taxes and astronomical gambling debts.

PostSecret

PostSecret is an irresistible site. Here's how it works:

PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail-in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.

The entries on the site range from laugh-out-loud funny to knock-the-wind-out-of-you sad and even shocking, often in the same batch of postcards. They are an amazing little snapshot of the human condition.

The text from three entries in this week's batch (just go to the site, already - the art is at least half the point):

"I am a bulimic feminist."

"I love infomercials."

"I can't poop in foreign countries."

What John did on his summer vacation

John deVille, the Mountain Philosopher, is taking off on a massive month-long roadtrip before school starts back up in the fall (he's a history teacher down in Western North Carolina.)

He's apparently got the blogging bug pretty bad. He's going to be liveblogging the trip as he drives through South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, and DC, here:

John and Genna's Fantastic Adventure (Deadwood to D.C.)

We'll be checking in with him from time to time. Safe travels to you, buddy, and keep it between the ditches.

Here there be RINOs

Another group of RINO Sightings, this time at World Wide Rant.

It's a cantankerous, independent-minded and highly entertaining bunch of bloggage. Check it out when you've got a minute.

(What's a RINO? So glad you asked.)

The Economist looks at social and economic class in America

Degrees of separation | Economist.com:

Most accounts of America's arguments about itself concentrate on divisions within the country: red v blue states, religious v secular voters, the 50-50 nation. This survey takes a different route. It looks at things that Americans have always had in common: mobility (the willingness to up sticks and move); immigration; equality of opportunity; and a love of clubs and voluntary associations (“nothing, in my view, deserves more attention,” wrote Alexis de Tocqueville).

Ideally, all these things work together to create an open, forward-looking society. The restless and ambitious move to the frontier, setting up new industries and opening up new avenues to wealth. More opportunities attract more people, and greater equality of opportunity adds to the supply of wealth-seekers, so social and geographic mobility reinforce one another. A dynamic country attracts immigrants who refresh its stock of ambition. Voluntary associations flourish in the midst of all this activity, making for a stable as well as a dynamic country.

Yet this survey will argue that the cycle no longer works as it did. Some component parts —notably geographical mobility and immigration—continue to whirr merrily. Voluntary associations are reviving, though only after a long period of decline. But disturbingly, there are signs that social mobility is dwindling. The political system, for its part, is adding to social rigidities instead of counteracting them.

The problem is not that America has become less dynamic. Its society continues to grow and change as fast as ever. But traditionally the country has been seen as a melting pot, which after much stirring produces greater integration. Now some of that activity may be causing separation. Has America become a centrifuge?

Stories included in this survey:

• Degrees of separation
  
• Centrifugal forces
  
• The Americano dream
  
• Middle of the class
  
• The glue of society
  
• Motion dismissed
  
• Motion sustained
  
• Audio interview
  

(Hat tip: Metafilter.)

Greenwich Village Idiot for July 17, 2005

The Greenwich Village Idiot presents the Heat Wave Edition (29:32, 20 MB.)

Direct download: July_17_2005_Greenwich_Village_Idiot.mp3 (or subscribe to the podcast feed)

Music includes:

• "(Love Is Like A) Heat Wave," Martha Reeves and the Vandellas - available hundreds of places, but Ultimate Collection is a nice choice


• "Hot Night," Me'Shell Ndegeocello - from Cookie: The Anthropological Mixtape


• "Ring of Fire," Johnny Cash - anthologized everywhere; The Essential Johnny Cash is a nice collection


• "Summer In The City," The Lovin' Spoonful - from, e.g., Summer In The City


• "Too Darn Hot," by Cole Porter, from the musical "Kiss Me, Kate" (sung by Ella Fitzgerald on The Cole Porter Songbook Vol. 1)


• "Up The Ladder To The Roof," The Nylons - from One Size Fits All
  

The Joseph Mitchell article excerpt read aloud is printed in My Ears Are Bent, a collection of Mitchell's early newspaper writing. The definitive collection of Mitchell's writing for The New Yorker is Up in the Old Hotel.

More information about Joseph Mitchell:

• Joe Mitchell - Biography from North Carolina Writers Network
  


• "Joe Mitchell's Secret" - excerpt from Mark Singer's Character Studies: Encounters with the Curiously Obsessed


• Joseph Mitchell's obituary (May 26, 1996)


• Internet Movie Database: Joe Gould's Secret
  

Enough gazpacho to feed your family and most of the neighbors--ingredients list only; for the instructions, you'll have to listen to the podcast:

• 6 pounds of dead-ripe Jersey tomatoes
  
• 3 pounds of cucumbers, peeled
  
• 3 pounds of young tender onions
  
• 3-4 large sweet peppers
  
• Fresh parsley and/or chives
  
• Fresh garlic
  
• Juice of four to six large lemons and/or some red wine vinegar
  
• Olive oil
  
• Coarse salt
  
• Freshly ground black pepper
  
• Tomato or V-8 Juice
  
• Tabasco sauce

How do we stop the suicide bombers?

Harvard professor Niall Ferguson, writing in The Sunday Telegraph (London), gets it in one, as they say over there:

[T]he problem today is not immigration per se; it is the fact that a pernicious ideology has been allowed to infiltrate Europe's immigrant communities. And that has happened because we have blindly allowed our country to be a haven for fanatics.

He has a few examples in mind.

'The whole Arab world was dangerous for me,' the Egyptian Islamist, Yasser El-Sirri, was recently quoted as saying. In Egypt, he has been convicted and sentenced in absentia three times over: to 25 years of hard labour for smuggling armed terrorists into the country; to 15 years for aiding Islamic dissidents; and to death for plotting to assassinate the prime minister. Where does he now reside? In London, where he is Director of the Islamic Observation Centre.

"If al-Qaeda indeed carried out this act, it is a great victory for it," declared Dr Hani al-Siba'i in an interview on the al Jazeera satellite television channel the day after the London bombings. "It rubbed the noses of the world's eight most powerful countries in the mud." He went on to say that it was legitimate for al-Qaeda to target civilians because "the term 'civilians' does not exist in Islamic religious law in the modern Western sense. People are either of Dar al-Harb [the domain of war, meaning territory ruled by non-Muslims] or not."

And where are you most likely to bump into Dr al-Siba'i? Why, in London, where he is the Director of the al-Maqreze Centre for Historical Studies.

Sunday Telegraph: If they pass the 'cricket test', how do we stop the suicide bombers? (July 17, 2005).

Wretchard the Cat introduces himself

Wretchard, the brainy and insightful proprietor of The Belmont Club, whisks off the cloak of anonymity and introduces himself after being cited in the Times of London:

My name is Richard Fernandez, of Filipino birth and Australian citizenship. My interest in history probably began at Harvard, from which I graduated with a Masters in Public Policy. Wretchard is the name of an imaginary cat, the symbol of that entire race of stoic, yet somewhat foolish creatures. Belmont is the name of a suburb I roomed in while at Cambridge, Mass.

You know, I'd always wondered about the name of that blog.

Day in and day out, Wretchard's blog is one of the best reads on the Net.

Personal Offshoring

Personal offshoring has been done before - it was good form in the Russian Tsar's court to send shirts to Paris to be laundered - but what was once the the preserve of big business is now available for the individual. A combination of the internet and the universal acceptability of credit cards means that although you might not need a call centre, there are an increasing number of things that can be moved offshore that would otherwise be prohibitively expensive or outside one's skillset.

The first is computer code. The idea of hiring a programmer to make that little widget you are desperate for might seem decadent, but it is very good value for money and remarkably easy. I needed a selection of little programs to do things with my email. But I'd never had the time, or the patience, to write them myself. After a visit to RentACoder.com, I was able to file a request for bids from programmers around the world.

Guardian Unlimited | Online | Ben Hammersley: Swift and offshore

Hat tip: Kottke.