FIRE meets FireFly – free speech on campus.

Very cool. H/T UCA’s Joe Horton.

Still awesome!

The dicator of North Korea has died, according to state-run media. Power will fall to his son, though many believe his uncle will be the power behind the throne. Whether this spurs a civil crisis or a smooth transition to the next dictator-for-life is still to be seen. Until then:

How much of our current debate echoes that of the first party system: the Jeffersonians vs. the Hamiltonians? Walter Russell Mead addressses this question in his timely article, The Age of Hamilton.

As we gear up for 2012 and beyond, American attention is increasingly returning to the oldest battle in our political history: the battle between the Hamiltonians and Jeffersonians that split George Washington’s cabinet down the middle and established our first party system.

Are Newt Gingrich & President Obama both Hamiltonians? And if so, does categorizing them as such paper over too many differences in making the connection?

That fight was essentially over three things that divide us intensely today: the role of the federal government, the nature of the credit system, and the future of the social hierarchy. Alexander Hamilton favored a strong federal government at home and abroad, a centralized credit system similar to the British one with a Bank of the United States acting as our central bank, and believed that the best educated and most widely experienced people in the United States constituted a natural aristocracy and should play the leading role in our politics.

But the center has shifted on most of these questions. The “strong federal government” envisioned by Hamilton is probably the kind of government Ron Paul goes to bet at night dreaming about. The modern economy is much more dynamic and complex than the one Hamilton contended with, and the international system and our role in it as changed dramatically.

Thomas Jefferson disagreed with virtually everything Hamilton believed. He wanted a weak federal government, detested Hamilton’s banking system, and feared that the alliance of a social elite with a powerful government and a strong central bank would turn the US into a European-style aristocratic or monarchical society.

Jefferson’s political views were rooted in an agrarian society composed mostly of individualistic farmers. How relevant is that to the current political debate. Is anyone who doesn’t want to abolish the FED, essentially zero out military spending, and restore state supremacy in the federal/state relationship a Hamiltonian? And even if they are, does that have much relevance as a political category today?

Be sure to read the whole essay to consider how well Meade makes the connection. Personally, while I would buy that much of the political ideology of today evolved from the debate between Hamilton & Jefferson, I’m not sure using those categories provides much analytical leverage in the modern world. D.GOOCH

Last night we had the pleasure of hosting Dr. Donald Boudreaux, a Professor of Economics at George Mason University, for his talk on how economic liberty has affected the middle class. Don’s talk centered on challenging the conventional wisdom that income inequality has grown as the rich have gotten richer while the middle class has stagnated over the last 30+ years. His two primary analytical rebuttals pointed out the fact that the stagnation argument looks at households, but households have gotten smaller over time (which means more income per person), and secondly that the stagnation rested on a particular kind of inflation adjustment (using the consumer price index), but that estimates using other widely accepted inflation adjusters yield radically different estimates on the growth or middle class incomes (ranging from 7% to 43%). Which means the conventional wisdom is dependent on the type of estimator you use. He also pointed out that a modest average increas can hide much more impressive increases at the categorical level (Simpson’s Paradox).

But the best visual he provided in his talk on the growth of the purchasing power of the dollar didn’t involve any complicated statistics. Rather, he took pictures for items for sale in a 1975 Sears catalog and their 1975 price and juxtaposed them with equivalent items from today. On each slide was an estimate of the # of hours a working class person would have to work to buy the product. For example, the color TV from the 75 catalog took 154 hours to earn. It took 11 to earn the flat screen TV today. And note how much more that TV can do today, and how much more reliable (remember TV repairmen?), and with more than 3 channels.

It was a powerful illustration of the argument I thought…and quite ingenious too. How lucky I was to spend a couple of hours in the car with Don one-on-one, taking him to and from Little Rock. A truly edifying experience!

Well, I thought the talk by Skip Rutherford, Dean of the Clinton School of Public Service, went very well, and I found the discussion of Arkansas political history to be quite fascinating. The anecdotes on historical violence (the duels on the state house floor, for example) were particularly interesting. After the talk Skip discussed, from the inside, one of the more momentuous events in Arkansas political history, at least in terms of national security, when the Titan II missle exploded in 1979 here in Arkansas. Apparently the military didn’t know if the warhead would explode along with it. Yikes! There’s a scary thought. But it was a great talk and we had a great turnout. Thanks, again, to Dean Rutherford for that edifying presentation on the stories of Arkansas politics. D.GOOCH

Ah…Turkey Day. Enjoy it! D.GOOCH

Anne McCaffery, author of the Dragonriders of Pern series, has died at the age of 85. The NY Times has the obit. While we didn’t lose Anne as we lost Robert Jordan (to a sudden illness that stole decades of his life and cut short The Wheel of Time series…at least as by Jordan), but still it cuts. Like Jordan’s WOT series, Anne McCaffery will forever be associated with the summers of my youth: at lake Norfolk, curled up under a tree or sitting on a rock next to the lake, and reading The Dragonriders of Pern. She was one of my teachers on life, and I cherish her books to this day. We will not see her like again.

Let the Dragon keen be heard throughout all of Pern and among its fans, Anne McCaffery, the true masterharper of Pern, has gone between. RIP Anne.

D.GOOCH

It is yet again time for a regular entry on this blog, the cornucopia of links and quips on politics and related issues of interest that I have complied over the last week or so. Without further adieu:

Justice Stevens defends his majority opinion in the Kelo v. New London in a Wall Street Journal interview that references the decision as “his most unpopular opinion.” Jonathan Adler and Ilya Somin comment over at the Volokh Conspiracy.

News you can Use: Seven Dumbest Things Students do when Cramming for Exams

Paul Starr of the Post discusses why both Mitt Romney and President Obama face difficulties with health care reform in the 2012 election cycle.

What should law schools teach? The NY Times asks the question and Jonathan Adler comments as well.

Debra Saunders wonders about the absent-minded Energy Secretary Stephen Chu and the growing Solyndra scandal.

George Will reacts to the recent appellate decision upholding Obamacare and the individual mandate as a constitutional exercise of the Commerce Clause in the wake of the USSC taking up the issue for review and wonders: is there no limit on Congress’s powers?

Rich Lowry is down on Herman Cain.

The Washington Examiner isn’t impressed with President Obama’s GOTV efforts.

The Super Committee is looking positively ordinary. Who brought the kryptonite? They have 5 days to act and you can hear crickets chirp. This probably has something to do with one party thinking a supercommittee fail is a win.

UPDATE: The Super Committee declares failure. Now what a/b the automatic cuts? Leon Panetta has warned against them, but Obama has threatened to veto a rescension. Fun, fun times.

The 7 Stupidest Attempts to Reinvent Batman

Hot Air notes a new poll that has Romney and Gingrich in a statistical tie…in New Hampshire?

20 Facts about Monty Python’s Holy Grail that will make you say Ni!

Top 10 Most Overrated Actors/Actresses of All Time according to Ben Shapiro.

How to destroy a television seires post-West Wing

Should we throw them all out?

The National Labor Relations Board Zombie Apocalypse?

A cornacopia of links to the Climategate II e-mail scandal. Who knew science involved making sausage?

20 everyday items if they were designed by Batman.

One of the most important theories of American politics is Downs’ median voter theorem (MVT). But how important is it to “seize” the center in American presidential elections? Thomas Sowell argues not so much.

Another excellent graph from Heritage via Hot Air. D.GOOCH

Offered without editorial comment. D.GOOCH

Cool. D.GOOCH

Fricken Awesome! D.GOOCH

And here is the message Obama and the Democrats are going to hammer from their side in 2012:

OK, so probably not.