-
Reflexions on booze, or Scotch, delicious scotch
It turns out I like to drink, and I have expensive tastes. And I'm vacationing in Tokyo in May. As a cost-cutting gimmick to spare some cash for Japan, I decided to cease all purchases of alcohol in the month of January. I haven't kept a spreadsheet, but I'm pretty sure I've saved at least $200 from doing this (successfully so far, and only three ( Read more... ) -
a new beginning
Dear readers,
I've decided to suspend this blog and begin anew at quittingprovidence.blogspot.comI think blogspot (or Blogger, whatever it wants to call itself) is a more robust blogging platform. And most people I kept in touch with via livejournal have stopped writing. Maybe if I ever feel like blogging about my personal life again I'll come ( Read more... ) -
Yglesias and nukes
Matt Yglesias has written two annoying posts about nuclear power. His thrust is that conservatives are hypocritical for supporting nuclear power, nuclear power plants require subsidization due to large initial capital investment and long time horizons. And of course, conservatives are passionate about free markets, so how could they support nuclear ( Read more... ) -
good and silly environmentalism
I just finished reading Whole Earth Discipline, by Stewart Brand, of Whole Earth Catalog fame. The gist of the book can be found in his TED talk, Rethinking Green. An environmentalist, his book is about positions some environmentalists hold that they need to reconsider. In his talk he covers urbanization, nuclear power, and genetic engineering, all ( Read more... ) -
"It isn't God who hates fags. It's Michael Bloomberg."
The normally liberal writers of Slate have gotten themselves worked up over the ascendant liberal enthusiasm for food policing and other paternalisms. The article is primarily about taxing sugary soda. As a raging Tenther of a libertarian I find this idea ... mostly unobjectionable. I more or less agree with Matt Yglesias on this: you have to raise ( Read more... ) -
time-evolving states of nature
I've been meaning to blog about this sort of thing ever since I read Hayek's Constitution of Liberty, but a recent post by Jim Manzi on a paradox of libertarianism inspired me to sit down and write it. That and a new resolve to not be such a lazy blogger ( Read more... ) -
where are the crazy liberals?
On a note related to the last post, I was trying to think of crazy or irresponsible leftists who are still mainstream enough to have a wide audience. These are people respectable liberals should more or less ignore. Don't buy their books, listen to their shows, or link to their writing. Of course you have to do a bit of reading to learn they're not ( Read more... ) -
they're not all crazy!
Last week, via the Google Reader, I shared Matt Welch's article about the more strident reactions to some of the crazier conservative elements at health care town hall meetings. Welch argued that evocations of widespread and growing violent racist (and also nazi) sentiment from middle America are harmful exaggerations. I thought this was ( Read more... ) -
vegetarianism
For the past couple weeks I have practiced pescetarianism. The primary reason is environmental: meat, especially beef, is highly carbon-intensive. If you want to lessen your carbon footprint, the easiest, most effective way to do so is almost certainly to reduce your meat intake ( Read more... )