And Then Moving Back To Beer and the Eternal "What's Good" Debate . . .

More thought-provoking ruminations from Jeff at Beervana.

The Guiness post he refers to, which contains the Velveeta comment from Patrick Emerson, is here. I took my own stupid stab at this here. But here's an entry that links back to the origins of the "good in relation to price" commentary from Jeff and Patrick. (By the way, apparently Patrick also has a separate beer economics blog.) (WHERE do people get their energy? And may I have some of it?)

Every "group," by the way, has its running debate about what's "good" and what's not.

Eg, writers will debate the meaning of "good writing" all the way to the pearly gates: Is a "good" writer one who creates lush, evocative strings of words, even if those strings of words don't produce a particularly compelling narrative? Or is a "good writer" one who produces rolloping great stories? (Yes, I made up the word "rolloping." It sounds good.)

Eg, frankly, J.K. Rowling wouldn't know evocative prose if it smacked her in the face, but, yowza! she can keep the reader's eye glued to the page with her plots and pacing. (If you're curious, by the way: I fall into the "good story" camp. Nuthin' I hate more than some "writer" who is in love with his/her own "voice" and whose characters are boring and plots non-existent.) (It's why I like Anthony Trollope: by god, he could craft lush, evocative strings of words, AND his characters and plots are addictive.)

(And I have to wonder: is it possible for me to post a blog entry without yammering on and on and on???????????)

What's Obama Doing?

Leading. It's what leaders do. No surprise, most people don't recognize it because most adult Americans have never experienced serious presidential leadership. Last time it happened, sadly, was during the Reagan years. (Also sadly . . . .) (No. I was not a fan.)

President Obama is moving quickly (or trying to do so) and tackling short-term problems: He's facing the enemy at the gates. But he's also engaging in the second, and perhaps more important task, of a good leader: Trying to figure out how and why the enemy got there in the first place, and thus trying to prevent it from happening again.

Put another way, he's tackling the immediate issues, while taking the long view of the big picture. He's leading.

Go, Barack.

Urgh. Soundtrack In My Head: Grateful Dead

Presumably because of all the links I tracked down and added to today's edition of First Draft Follies, I now have "Truckin'" playing an endless loop in my brain and cannot. get. rid. of. it. "Living on reds, Vitamin C, and cocaine..."

Random Rant, Econ 101, and Antidotes for Nausea

Silly me. Somehow I thought the troops would rally 'round the president. No. Instead, we've been subjected to a week of senators and representatives strutting around the capital building playing "Mine's Bigger."

Which I wouldn't mind, except -- Rome is collapsing while they're busy comparing dicks/clits/facelifts/whatever.... I belive that most people who run for "high office" start their careers with good intentions. (*1)

But then they get comfy and get used to the free health insurance and the gym and the drivers and the other perks and pretty soon they forget why they went there in the first place. Which is why there oughta be term limits for both House and Senate. (*2)

But I digress. Point is: someone needs to be thinking beyond dick-size and where the next cocktail party is.

For an antidote to your nausea, and some clear thinking/writing on the disaster that is our economy, some Sunday-morning reading:

This from Matthew Yglesias. Tyler Cowen's response.

Lots of ponderings from Patrick Emerson, but this in particular.

And then of course there's always Krugman.

(Yes, the internet improves our lives. Ten years ago, it would have been tough to find so much accessible clear thinking on such difficult topics.) (Gee, I hope the electrical grid holds up under the weight of so many internet connections, and that somehow we can figure out how to make high-speed internet affordable for everyone because clearly digital communication/debate and digital information creation/gathering/access are The Way We Live Now. (*3))

(Oh. Wait. That would require the House and Senate to stop dicking around and do something and . . . . ) (Oh. Never mind.)

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*1: There are, of course, exceptions. I'm pretty sure Palin, for example, only wants to sit in the Senate because it's good for her, not for her constituents. I'm not picking on her, mind you; there are plenty of Palin-types out there. But she's the only obvious example I can think of at the moment.

*2: For more information on term limits, see here, here, and here.

*3: Nod to my second-favorite Anthony Trollope novel. If you can't bring yourself to wade through it (it runs about a thousand pages), at least watch the BBC production, which is spectacular.

More Good Commentary On Twitter . . . Keep This Up and I May Be Convinced

Who knew? Now David weighs in again (see his comments in this entry) -- with even more insight into how/why Twitter might, er, actually have some social value.

Urgh. Am I gonna be forced out of the Age of the Dinosaur?

And speaking of which, today I received a book I'd ordered from Amazon. It's an obscure monograph -- won't even bore you with the title -- and I bought it because I need to read it for research and the university library doesn't own it and I'm trying not to burden that library with my research needs. (*1)

And I opened the box and looked at the book, whose contents are, again, of interest to only a minuscule number of people -- and thought "Good lord. If ever there was a book that ought to have entered life as an e-book only, this is it." This is a new book, published in 2008. And it feels positively dinosauric that paper and ink and gas (to ship from the printer to a warehouse) were expended on this obscure creation, that only a tiny number of people will read, when it all could have been rendered digitally. And for less money. Sigh.

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*1: Because I'm not a faculty member or student there. Yes, I could have asked the library to order it through interlibrary loan, but that would cost each library money.

Twittering = Abbreviated Blogging? In Which Case . . . .

So David Nygren commented on my latest observation about Twitter, and I posted a reply to his comment, indulging in a bit of self-mockery about the nature of my potential tweets. As in: my life's so damn dull no one would WANT to read my twits (or tweets or whatever they're called.) (Question: do twits twit? And smart people tweet?)

And then it hit me: ACK! Twittering is nothing more than another version of blogging, right?

So . . . I don't need Twittering. I'm already inflicting my banal life (and no doubt more banal brain) on the world, only in far more excruciating detail than I would in a tweet. Hmmmm...... Let she who is without sin throw the first tweet, er, stone.