George Will on the debt crisis:

He writes:

[Rick Santorum] is, of course, correct that America's debt crisis is, at bottom, symptomatic of a failure of self-control, a fundamental moral failing.

A moral failing! Not due to central bank decisions. It's a moral failing, which curiously was most pronounced in those countries with lax financial regulation.


posted by Quiddity at 2/03/2011 03:20:00 AM

David Frum asks: (emp add)

Why Aren’t The Unemployed Protesting Here?


Jon Stewart has some fun with Fox News personalities like Glenn Beck who worry that “we might become Egypt.” Yes silly obviously. But behind the silliness is a serious question: Isn’t the most remarkable thing about the US in 2011 precisely the absence of protest by the unemployed and foreclosed? Here we’ve gone through the most protracted economic crisis since World War II – in many ways the most severe crisis – a crisis directly attributable to terrible business decisions supported by government policies bought-and-paid-for by powerful financial interests – a crisis out of which so many of the authors have escaped unscathed (unlike say 1929-33) and indeed richer than before. And yet … the only populist movement the country has seen is a movement of the right, in defense of the existing rules and arrangements? I can think of many explanations, and yet at a deeper level I remain baffled. I expected otherwise.

Good question. I have no idea.

The bolded text (above) sounds pretty leftists. What's with Frum these days?


posted by Quiddity at 2/02/2011 08:22:00 PM

Best thing I've read about Facebook in months:

At Salon, there is a story about someone who had to deal with a Facebook account that was masquerading as the real one for the author. In the comment thread was this:

Somehow, after dealing with Facebook for nearly a year, I'm horrified but not surprised. It is one of the most slapdash programs I've ever used, poorly constructed, indifferently presented and yes, maddeningly anonymous.

How many times have you opened a FB page and seen text boxes overlapping photos, or words broken incorrectly or broken links? Last evening I had to rewrite an entire FB post after navigating away from the page momentarily to spell check a name. When I came back I discovered the last 45 minutes of work had disappeared. If the staff doesn't care about details like that, how can you expect them to follow up on important elements like privacy? Particularly when the staffers apparently value their privacy over ours?

I'd almost bet that now that FB's backers have gotten their ridiculous $50B valuation, the staff will simply put the whole machine into neutral and let it coast to its demise. It's only a matter of time before someone comes along and realizes, "This program really sucks!"

The comment touches upon one aspect of Facebook that doesn't get much attention: It's poorly designed.

The user interface is cramped and good luck trying to find anything from a few weeks ago. It's much less capable than a blog, which can support rich text format, neat image insertion, substantial text, cross-linking, etc.

Facebook has a role, but it's limited to displaying what's happening now, now, now!! And in an appreviated manner.

It's perfect for the under-100 IQ crowd.


posted by Quiddity at 2/02/2011 07:19:00 PM