TII greatest hits links.

Education, the gas tax, high speed rail, killing astronauts—it’s the greatest hits here at TII. Same thing we do every night, Pinky.

• Guess what percentage of Americans have graduated college. Go on, guess.

The answer is the second number: 36.2%, 10.5%, 53.3%

Now guess what that number was for all under-30 year olds in 2000 (so, more recently). 16.8%. That’s astounding, right?

• Is there anyone in the world with a higher (%annoying • %right) metric? Tom Friedman says “Real Men Tax Gas.“ We can send thousands of our sons overseas to die but we’re not willing to take a tough political stand at home for a good thing.

• More from Paul Davies on a one-way trip to Mars. The twist at the end is that it could be done with an international consortium of space agencies for the sake of producing an integrating project (like European economic integration). Moreover, as I’ve written before, an international Mars outpost would keep nationality confined to this planet—because what good could come of spreading it throughout the solar system?

• Here’s a report from America 2050 on the potential expansion of the national high speed rail network [pdf]. Cities are ranked by various indicators of their need for high speed rail—GDP, local transportation systems, and so on—to provide a tentative road map for expansion of the network.

• Obama’s FCC moves ahead to formalize net neutrality! A major step in the right direction for protecting consumers and small businesses that will go unnoticed and unheralded.

• Somebody name a cat PAVE PAWS. Do it now.

a.j.m.

Filed under: Various , friedman, gas tax, high speed rail, mars

Plane pron.

Old aircraft could be so gorgeous. This is the IAR-80, a Romanian fighter from World War II, cribbed from the marvelous xplanes.tumblr.com. I’ve been working my way through all the xplanes archive, and it’s just fascinating. (Did you know Romania made fighters? Wikipedia says it was competitive with the Hawker Hurricane and the Spitfire [the designer of which, when told of the name the RAF had chosen, said it was "just the sort of bloody silly name they would choose”—and which was, frankly, quite the looker itself].)

a.j.m.

Filed under: Various

You’re never too hot—

The previous post, as well as recent facebook events, conspire to make me realize that I have a bit of a pet peeve: when people say ‘man, it’s hot. How about that global warming?’ You may be kidding, but I can’t tell that—and the chances are good you’re not. And even if you are kidding, the chances are even better that you’re in earshot of someone who does believe that you can detect the century-long trend of global warming with your fair skin. It’s particularly disingenuous to make the complaint when we’re in one of the coolest Julys on record. (And thank god.)

Remember: you’re never too hot to sound like an uncritical consumer of junk science.

Filed under: Various , get off my lawn

Quick reads.

David Leonhardt had another excellent column in the Times this week, in which he makes the unimpeachable case that the health care plan currently under consideration is a pretty poor substitute for a solution. As always, I learned a great deal I didn’t know before. For example, yeah, that does sound like a good place to start—

Reform will need to attack the piecemeal system in numerous ways. Among the most promising, which Mr. Obama has resisted, is a limit on tax subsidies for the costliest health insurance plans. This limit would give households and employers a reason to become smarter shoppers.

Secondly, by now you’ve probably seen the image below, but I’m of the opinion we can’t look at it enough. The Guardian published the photo this morning, which had been classified by the Bush administration but was released two weeks ago by his successor. There are more, nearly as dramatic, here. With the usual caveat that global warming is a macro-trend that is unfolding over the course of the century and can’t necessarily be diagnosed from one year to the next, these are nevertheless striking—if only because of the sheer dishonesty and cynicism required to classify them.

Third, without extolling how he makes the argument, or making a habit of linking to cranks, you have to agree that Bill Maher is on the right track with his New Rule: Not everything in America has to make a profit.

Filed under: Various

Japan turnover coming?

Taro Aso’s decision today to dissolve parliament and call general elections at the end of next month may mark the most significant event in Japanese politics in half a century, opening the way for an election that might allow the socially liberal Democratic Party (DPJ) to install their own prime minister for the first time. Aso is already coming under intense pressure to resign his leadership of LDP, which puts him in the position of having to hold on or have LDP enter a crucial election with their fifth leader in two years. DPJ leaders, meanwhile, have introduced no-confidence measures which are expected to pass in the DPJ-controlled upper house, halting business there, and fail in the LDP-controlled lower house.

A poor showing in the Tokyo municipal election is thought to have precipitated the decision, but certain influential outlets online have offered more tawdry explanations.

Filed under: Various , DPJ, Japan, LDP, taro aso

An unsuitable G8 wardrobe.

Will Boehlke, internet king of classic style, is fond of saying—rightly, I think—that the best dressed men will leave a strong impression of being impeccably dressed without standing out. Perhaps this is no more appropriate than in professional Washington or in political affairs. That having been said, how does the following strike you?

(This from the New York Times..)

What were you thinking?

I think Medvedev comes out on top. The three button is outdated, but he has properly left the top button undone, which can look very fine—and even contemporary—in slightly heavier worsteds and flannels. The slacks drape well, and he’s chosen what is either a dark charcoal or a midnight blue, either of which is superior to black black black. Stay classy, pols. Don’t choke laughing too hard, guys.

Filed under: Various , g8, medvedev, style, taro aso

An exceptional year for music.

This is a diversion from our normal fare here (of which I concede there has not been much), but I wanted to take a moment to make a bold conjecture: 2009 is shaping up to be the best year for music in recent memory, better even perhaps than 2005.

For those who haven’t been following, or whose taste normally follows other paths, the first four months have already produced at least four albums of real brilliance: (with a track from each)

• Antony & the Johnson’s The Crying Light (2)

• Grizzly Bear’s Veckatimest (2)

• Dan Deacon’s Bromst, (1) and now

• The Dirty Projectors’ Bitte Orca (4).

This is on top of solid offerings from Fever Ray, Whitetree, Julie Doiron, Mountains, Hudson Mohawke, Mount Kimbie, the Dark was the Night compilation, Animal Collective, Hauschka, and others.

It’s such an exciting time.

Filed under: Various

Look.

I’m not saying I’m not totally impressed by an attempt to revolutionize how we find data quickly by building a system that can calculate that data based on human knowledge of fundamental physical and social trends rather than finding the answer that someone else has calculated already, like Google; (I am.) I’m not saying that I don’t have enormous confidence in Stephen Wolfram; (I do.) and I’m certainly not saying I know the first thing about programming. (I don’t.)

I’m just saying: what harm could it do?

Filed under: Various , Wolfram, WolframAlpha, xkcd

TII says VOTE

A recurring theme of this page is to try to wrap our heads around the effects of living in a system of government that is inherently myopic—that is, one that is unable to properly value future possibilities, or consider delayed effects of present actions. In a country that labors under the weight of incredibly powerful constituencies for the elderly, agriculture, Israel, big businesses of all stripes, the cultivation of the youth vote could not be more important. A youth constituency should value science and infrastructure investment, environmental health, fiscal conservatism, education, a stable and peaceful world. A youth constituency, despite vast differences on other issues, should have reason to put the country’s future first. 

There is some good indication that Obama has helped to galvanize young voters—’In South Carolina, 18- to 29-year-olds accounted for 14% of voters, up from 9% in 2004. And in Iowa, young voter turnout rose 135% from the previous presidential primary.’ This this small thing could help set this country on firmer ground. 

If you’re young and you breathe, get out the vote.

Fight for the future.

Filed under: Domestic, Various , Obama, time, youth

Fox news on the geopolitics of milkshakes.

Draiiiiiiiinnnnaaggge! More in-depth analysis from the—you hate to hear it, but this page is nothing if not scrupulously honest—quite fetching Nancy Pfotenhauer.

Cuba? China? Venezuela? Florida? Sounds like a threat to me!

I really do believe that in this respect, international theory can wage the broader war for how we think about and conduct our politics. That every undergraduate course includes multiple alternatives to realism and encourages the next leaders of the world to contrast these perspectives with one another on an equal footing can’t be meaningless. We really do have an enormous responsibility when we teach.

—a.j. mount

Filed under: Various , Eli, you boy.