Archive for the ‘Sites’ Category
Waste of water
I grew up in Dimona, a little town in the middle of Israel’s desert. One of the most common definitions of desert is the lack of rain, and the line is being drawn at the 200 MM of rain per year. You can imagine the effect that a storm, like today’s storm, that drops about 3.5” of rain (875 MM) in one hour has on me. I had to drive to work today and couldn’t stop wondering about the amazing waste of water… 
Tap water is good for you, unless you are part of the city bureaucracy
Do you remember the ad campaign the city of NY launched recently to convinced everybody the tap water are safe and worth using? Apparently this does not include the only place where such recommendation is appropriate - the city administration! And while the $700,000 from taxpayer money are being spent on questionable campaign, an additional $3 million are being spent buying bottled water for city workers.
As Mayor Bloomberg spouts on about the beauty of tap water, many city workers will be drinking the bottled variety - $3 million worth over three years, the Daily News has learned.
Bloomberg plans to shell out the big bucks as part of a city contract with Nestle Waters North America, distributor of Poland Spring and Deer Park, records show.
The $3 million is for water delivery and cooler rentals between this year and 2010.
And that doesn’t even count the $110,000 city officials already spent this year on 630,000 single-serving bottles of Poland Spring, according to the Department of Citywide Administrative Services.
Cancel both and its a nice small saving from the city budget.
Go see it
If you are in New York this summer, make sure that you are going to see Frost/Nixon - it is theater at its best. I have no intention to write a review here, more qualified people already did. I’ll just add that the play, and the excellent acting, not only portraying an historical event, one that has only nostalgic importance, but it is relevant and important today.
Evil shortcut
On the way home today, listening to the radio, I learned that Columbia University official proposing the use of eminent domain by the city to support the university’s expansion plan. The university official had the audacity to argue that the eminent domain is justified because the university expansion will benefit the public.
It is unfortunate that the such honorable institution, and one of the biggest land lords in NYC, is using its influence to harness the city to force people out of their property to its own benefit. Unlike some of the worried residence, I have no problem with the university’s expansion plan. However I see only one moral way it can happen - if the university will be able to convince the current owners to sell their property. The only fair price is the price agreed in an non-coerced negotiation, not under the guns of the government.
I wrote in the past about the Halpers, and argued that the claim of the "good of the public" is almost always being used to rob one from what is rightfully his. This case is no different.
Amazing
I was in a safari in Kenya several times, and loved every moment. This amazing video, although wasn’t taken in Kenya, makes me want to pack and go again as soon as possible. It is relatively long clip but it is worth watching it to the end, it has several twists.
(via room 404)
Tags: Nature Trips Africa Nature
Confusing but positive development
This article in the Wall Street Journal left me somewhat confused:
BERLIN — Europe’s major economies are competing with one another to cut corporate taxes as they fight to attract and keep investment, fueling a trend that has taken Europe’s corporate-tax rates below those of other regions.
Nominal tax rates on corporate income in the European Union average 26%, compared with 30% in the Asian-Pacific region and nearly 40% in the U.S. The latest moves by European governments suggest business taxes in the EU will fall further in coming years.
Firstly - if the European countries recognize the benefits of reducing and simplifying the tax code why not making the jump toward flat-tax rate.
Secondly, and more interesting for me, is the question why not doing the same for non-corporations? if the purpose of taxes in mainly social-democrat Europe is to redistribute wealth, isn’t cutting taxes for the people who are suppose to be the greatest beneficiaries of the tax collected?
I guess this is a typical case of ideology meets reality, and since the progress is overall positive I shouldn’t complaint too much. Now we need to wait for the effect to get across the ocean…
Nice winter day
Observation
Working on Presidents day is a very lonely activity.
Walking in the empty streets around wall street, trying to get a decent coffee - and no, starbucks doesn’t sell decent coffee - feels aerie. And no, I couldn’t find any decent coffee shop open.
Technorati Tags: Presidents day - working - coffee shop
Not only trans-fat
NY City council was very busy baning, or at least trying to ban, many things last year:
* Trans-fats.
* Aluminum baseball bats.
* The purchase of tobacco by 18- to 20-year-olds.
* Foie gras.
* Pedicabs in parks.
* New fast-food restaurants (but only in poor neighborhoods).
* Lobbyists from the floor of council chambers.
* Lobbying city agencies after working at the same agency.
* Vehicles in Central and Prospect parks.
* Cell phones in upscale restaurants.
* The sale of pork products made in a processing plant in Tar Heel, N.C., because of a unionization dispute.
* Mail-order pharmaceutical plans.
* Candy-flavored cigarettes.
* Gas-station operators adjusting prices more than once daily.
* Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.
* Wal-Mart.
busy year for the nanny state.
Technorati Tags: Big Government - NYC - Libertarianism - Trans Fat
Why are they leaving?
We moved down to North Carolina on February 28th. Early in the morning we packed everyone and everything into our Honda Odyssey with the U-haul on the back and started down the road. 2 Adults, 3 kids, 1 4 week old infant, 2 dogs and 500 miles to go.
Since I linked to the Barron’s story about the great migration I notices more and more people fleeing NY and moving to the south. In the small company where I’m working alone more than 10 people moved to the south in the last year. And what I observed in my immediate surrounding is actual a very large phenomena:
From 2000 through 2004, a net 1.3 million people moved out of states with taxes on ordinary income and into those without such taxes, says Richard Vedder, an economics professor at Ohio University. While climate clearly has played a role in the moves—the destinations are often in the Sunbelt—many of the low-tax states posting gains aren’t generally considered dream spots: Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee and Wyoming.
"It’s a stealth migration, and it’s one of the biggest, most significant yet least recognized movements of the population in American history," says Vedder. "People are voting with their feet to say that taxes do matter."
But it isn’t only taxes, or even the general high cost of living that accompanies the high taxes, it is the underline of intrusive government that:
Is there any doubt that the infantilization of adults is one of the defining characteristics of contemporary politics?
And adults people do not like being treated as infantile, where the government dictates wheat should they eat, smoke or charge for rent - and they don’t like that at the end of limiting their freedom they need to pay the very high bill. And it is sad but truth that:
New York used to pride itself on being the toughest city in the world. After passing the first municipal ban on trans fat in the United States, it has just become one of the most annoying.
Technorati Tags: Libertarianism - NYC - Trans Fat Ban - Population Migration