Quick links, cheap shots, bon mots….
This is a hilarious two minute deleted scene from the movie Knocked Up. Warning: vulgar. Here’s the Asian doctor’s MySpace page with add’l clips.
From a fascinating article (not online) in the Sept 1 New Yorker about what retail stores are doing to combat shoplifters (who stole about $40 billion worth of merchandise in 2006), there’s this golden nugget:
Men shopping alone and carrying any kind of bag always draw a second look from agents because it’s assumed that most men will go shopping only when dragged by a wife or girlfriend.
Indeed. Let the gender-profiling begin….
Will Wilkinson excerpts common red state/blue state political myths:
Myth: The rich vote based on economics, the poor vote “God, guns, and gays.”
Fact: Church attendance predicts Republican voting much more among rich than poor.Myth: Democrats are the party of the poor, Republicans are the party of the rich.
Fact: Rich people are getting richer in Democratic states. Incomes at the lower end have been increasing faster in Republican states.Myth: Class divisions in voting are less in America than in European countries, which are sharply divided between left and right.
Fact: Rich and poor differ more strongly in their voting pattern in the United States than in most European countries.Myth: Religion is particularly divisive in American politics.
Fact: Religious and secular voters differ no more in America than in France, Germany, Sweden, and many other European countries.
The problem in the airline industry is not that we have too little regulation, it’s that we have too much. I argued a couple months ago that the best way to improve the U.S. domestic flying experience would be to open up domestic routes to foreign carriers. Felix Salmon mentions the same, and points out that the data for total number of people who are flying is still going up. As I’ve said, current chaos and oil prices notwithstanding, I’m still betting big on the airline industry over the next 50 years.
David Zetland on the difference between risk and uncertainty:
Risk is something that you can quantify in terms of probabilities, while uncertainty is something that you cannot.
More links over at my delicious bookmarks page….
My favorite example of gender profiling comes from the signs posted in every laundry room on campus, reminding students to use as little detergent as possible. Its title boldly declares: “Dad yells ‘check the oil,’ Mom yells ‘check the soap!'”
The Student Taskforce for Environmental Partnership: truly a progressive organization.