Newmark's Door

"How the FBI Undercounts Armed Citizen Responders to Mass Killers, and Media Play Along"

Reason #2 billion and 7 why you should be very skeptical of the major legacy media.

"How to Fix American Capitalism"

"End insider privileges by renewing the freedoms to build, to work, to sell, and to learn."

By noted Harvard economist Edward Glaeser.

"The Inflation Reduction Act Deserves Our Condemnation"

I'm old enough to remember when there used to committee hearings and at least some debate about spending bills. Not so much anymore.

Huge bills containing hundreds or even thousands of pages of print where the devil in the details can be hidden from the minions are far too common. Bills joining and including several unrelated issues seldom make sense. It seems more like a wish list of things that would never get through the process on their own suddenly become more reasonable when coupled with other unimpressive ideas. Most of the large spending bills being passed in Washington deserve our condemnation.

"Pandemic failures expose problems of the administrative state"

I would hope--think?--so.

"Republicans could change government the way they changed the courts"

Megan McArdle:

Unless your professional mistakes could cause severe injury or financial ruin, you shouldn’t need a license to work, and unless your government job is a highly technical specialty, it shouldn’t require a college diploma or advanced degree. 

I enthusiastically agree with one big caveat. She's doesn't detail how those college degrees became the gatekeepers: Griggs v. Duke Power. And if firms stopped seeking them, she doesn't explain what would take their place.

"See inside California's newest $1.7 million prefab tiny home village erected to help ease Santa Barbara's homelessness crisis"

Maybe a good start.

"Alabama Football: Seven stunning Nick Saban and Crimson Tide records"

I think it will be a long time before anybody comes close to matching the record of "Nick Satan".

"17 Iconic Restaurant Foods That Ship Nationwide"

It's amazing what foods these days you can have shipped to your door.

Related: "The Best Food From Every State That Ships Nationwide".

"Bill Russell : Working with Red Auerbach"

The Greatest Team Athlete Ever--played in 16 championships, won 14, actual MVP for most--discusses his friendship with Celtics coach Red Auerbach.

"The Summer Jam: The forgotten festival that was actually bigger than Woodstock"

"Forgotten," sure: I was  a rising high school senior then but until a few weeks ago I had never heard of it. Supposedly 600,000 folks attended. Just the Allman Brothers, The Band,  and the Grateful Dead.

Here is a soundboard of the Dead's set (3+ hours). Here's The Band's set (nearly 4 hours).

See also "Bigger Than Woodstock: Remembering Summer Jam At Watkins Glen" and "Summer Jam at Watkins Glen".

"Can’t You Hear Me Knocking"

The Stones, live from London, June 25th, 2022.

Yeah, they don't sound quite as good as they did: Keith and Mick were both 78 and Charlie is gone. But like the crack about the talking dog, the interesting thing isn't that he doesn't know how to say much, it's that he can talk at all.

"The Rolling Stones’ musical director Chuck Leavell: ‘Mick Jagger must be from another planet’"

Not a bad resume: the Allman Brothers, Train, and 40 years with the Stones. (Also worked with Aretha and Clapton.)

"What’s the biggest one hit wonder on Spotify?"

Also one-hit wonders by genre.

"Nobody likes self-checkout. Here's why it's everywhere"

Well, "nobody" is an exaggeration. And when confronted with how much higher their grocery bills would be without them, I don't doubt some of those currently opposed would change their minds.

Related: "Everyone Hates Self-Checkout Except For Me".

"24/7 stream of the greatest TV show ever made!!"

This is weird. This site plays Seinfeld episodes--I haven't checked, but it seems likely, as stated--24/7. You can't fast forward. You can't choose the episode. You can just . . . watch. 

(Which given it's Seinfeld, you could do a whole lot worse.)

"How dogs can understand English and even smell your emotions"

Dog trainer Andrea Arden:

Dogs, we’re their whole life[.] [They’re] very well equipped to learn a lot about who we are and what we want from them.

"The Rise and Fall of the Bank Robbery Capital of the World"

An article I read referred to Los Angeles as "the bank robbery capital of the world". I thought: Really? Why? After a few seconds with Google, I answered my questions.

"Dark Matter Doesn't Exist"

I don't know any of the science, but it has seemed to me that the search for "dark matter" is, at this point, similar to the failed search for the ether.

" Wandering the web stacks to improve your information diet"

Suggestions for how to find useful, interesting stuff on the Net.

"The world's biggest ship docked in the UK yesterday, carrying 24 THOUSAND containers of consumer stuff"

Picture.

"Are Generic Drugs as Good as Name Brand?"

This piece raises the same issue that I heard about a long time ago in graduate school: the active ingredients should be the same, but the so-called inactive ingredients--"binders, fillers, detergents, dyes, antioxidants, and sugars"--can differ and those differences might well be important.

"There's No Such Thing As Congestion. There's Just Government."

Zero prices tend to do that.

"There Was a Huge ‘Mistake’ in the 2020 Census . . . Guess Which Party It Favored?"

An easy question to answer.

"Political correctness can lead to cognitive exhaustion, according to new research"

Hell, yes. I know that it exhausts me.

(I make no brief for the "study" cited.)

"Unsafe At Any Speed? Electric Cars Keep Catching Fire"

It does seem that way, but a careful, formal analysis would be welcome.

Kind of related: "Be Honest About What EVs Can and Cannot Do".

"SF Chronicle tries to blame Walgreens for Chesa Boudin's failures"

"But after noting how badly things are going, they reverse course and advise people to stop blaming the liberal policies of Boudin and the city government in general for the large number of drug overdose deaths. Instead, they’re blaming Walgreens. Yes, you read that correctly. The chain of pharmacies (which are robbed so often in the San Francisco area that several of them have closed down and moved away) is to blame for all of the drug addicts overdosing in the streets. You really can’t make this stuff up."

"The New Founders America Needs"

A diagnosis of our current problems and a ringing call for constructive change by Bari Weiss.