Wednesday, May 30, 2007

A grammar lesson

Maybe I should just stop reading leftish webzines late at night, but I came across this little gem:
Richardson also misplayed the candor card. Seven times in the broadcast, he used phrases like "I made a mistake" or "I shouldn't have said that." After six years of an error-ridden Bush administration in which it has taken eons for the president to offer even limited mumbles about any errors, we should applaud candidates who admit mistakes. We should also encourage them to tell us what they've learned from their wrong turns. But there is surely a limit to the number of mistakes you can admit to before it starts to hurt your authority, and Richardson seemed to zip by it.
And I feel I have to parse it, using parsing skills I learned at the EIB Institute of Advanced Conservative Studies. First, in the context given, "we should applaud candidates who admit mistakes" means "we should demand that candidates constantly apologize and grovel for forgiveness." Notice the subtle turn of phrase. "We should also encourage them to tell us what they've learned from their wrong turns" means "they must dance like marionettes on our strings for our amusement as we treat them like first-graders." And finally, "there is surely a limit to the number of mistakes you can admit to before it starts to hurt your authority, and Richardson seemed to zip by it" means "that stuff we said about apologizing, grovelling, and being treated like first-graders - that was meant for Republicans only. Look to Bill Clinton, Richardson, and he will show you the way. Don't ever admit that you were wrong!"

SRS

The stupidity incentive

Economists and conservatives in general often write about incentives, that is, people do what they have an incentive (internal or external) to do, and they do not do what have a disincentive to do. There are usually some of each being weighed, but actually every choice we make and every action we take is based on some perceived good coming of it, or some perceived harm being avoided. "Who cares?" I imagine you're asking. Good question! (Not really, but flattery keeps people reading.)

I was reading an article in a leftish webzine which I believe has much wider readership than this blog, and they wrote that they had started (or made known) a backlash against the new agey power-of-positive-thinking crowd with a good, old-fashioned Be Realistic and Prepare For The Worst article and a mention of a book of the same idea. The article posited that "only people in an affluent, technologically advanced society, packed with fail-safes and conveniences, could be so susceptible to [the positive thinking crowd]'s brand of hubris." The article even mentioned Hurricane Katrina, and how some people assumed that the government had fixed the levees.

My friends, our leftish friends are dangerously close to stumbling upon: the truth that conservatives have been telling them all along! When you have a big, mommy government taking care of everything for everyone, the incentive to be careful and look into things for yourself is reduced precipitously. Why live in a place where hurricanes don't ravage the shoreline? The government will come and save us! Why learn which cars are safer than others? Ralph Nader will protect us from unsafe cars! Why pay attention to what we eat? If it were unhealthy, the government wouldn't let them sell it to us anyway! Why educate our children? The government does that for us with the free public schools!

Nanny government isn't just bad for the economy, it makes millions of Americans fatter, dumber, and lazier.

SRS
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