Energy is Eternal Delight

The work of Tony Schwartz on the management of energy is a terrific line of thinking. After all, we all deal with two scarce resources every moment of our lives: time and energy. Schwartz, unlike some who think about personal management, thinks more in terms of energy than in terms of time. This blog provides a good sense of his thinking. Also, I like the idea of naps at work! Really, having a sharp wit about you (think about 2-3 p.m.)is a terrific insight. Yes, I'm better a few hours at full steam than a bunch more hours at 1/2 speed. That's why I never want around a tired doctor. Recommended.

Bombing Libya: The Right Thing?

In another damned if you do, damned if you don't quandary, President Obama decided to go forward with bombing Qaddafi's forces in Libya. Bleeding heart liberalism gone ballistic? Return of the neocon's? Realist blunder? I must say that these issues aren't easy. We get ourselves into some awful pickles. Is this the right choice? I don't know, but lots of writers and bloggers think that they do know.

More on Nuclear Energy & the Japanese Disaster

This post by anthropologist Hugh Gusterson, brought to my attention by Farnum Street, expresses my concerns about nuclear energy. I don't think that we, as a society, really grasp the risks that we run, as this author suggests. We still have a very flawed financial system, and we don't know how to deal with nuclear disasters because we can't predict them very well. On the other hand, nuclear energy is very tempting because it comes as a low carbon price.

Let me hearken back to an earlier post & exchange with follow blogger Frank Robinson. Mr. Robinson gave a very succinct account of the liability issues associated with nuclear energy, including an acknowledgment of the possible application of the principles of strict liability to the nuclear industry. I disagree with him in that I believe that the nuclear energy industry should be subject to strict liability, while he does not. However, I believe that all of this begs a much greater issue: whether born by the public or a private company, can we afford, or are willing willing to afford, the losses that we risk. Let me provide a historic example. Fire, the Promethean gift, has burned down many, many great cities: Chicago, San Francisco, Tokyo, London, to name just a few that pop to mind. These societies bore these losses and recovered. We now have control of fires, at least in our cities, such that we don't think that huge swaths of cities will fall in a fire. But what if we suffered a nuclear accident, if, for instance, Fukushima went even further out of control? What level of destruction--although it may prove silent and virtually invisible--are we willing to suffer? If the potential loss is too great for any one company or insurance scheme, should we as a society allow this risk? I'm not sure where we draw the line, but I don't know if these questions are being asked widely enough. That's one reason I enjoyed the cited post.
Thoughts?

Two Disappointments: The Adjustment Bureau & Unknown

I saw two mediocre movies this weekend:

The Adjustment Bureau with Matt Damon & Emily Blunt. The story comes (to what extent I question) from a Phillip K. Dick story. Frankly, it just didn't work. Guys running around in 1960's era hats, part aliens, part angels. The story was all plot, and not so great on that. Very little in the way of characterization. Damon plays an impulsive politician who goes against the grain of these creatures and their "chairman". No, it just didn't work for me.

Unknown with Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger & January Jones. Let me say that the plot conceit of this would-be thriller has been done recently and much better. Okay, a pair of beautiful women and well-regarded actors can get us in the door, but this does not a worthwhile movie make. Oh, it has the obligatory incredible car chase scenes (which I find a bore anymore; did we ever do better than Steve McQueen's Bullit, anyway?). So pat, so little character. Why did anyone make this movie? I'm pissed and I only spent $5 to see it!

Richard Overy: 1939: Countdown to War

This is my year (or more) of reading "big history", the long-terms trends that have marked the world. However, the narrative of microscopic history still holds a strong lure for me. In the hands of a capable historian, such as Richard Overy, the work can prove eye-opening. In this short book (only 124 pages of text), Overy shows how both sides to some degree stumbled into the war. Hitler, Overy concludes, expected Britain and France to back down over Poland. When they came into the war, changing it from a regional war to a European war (to to some extent a world war), Hitler was surprised and shaken. We are reminded that Hitler, for all of the magnitude of his evil, was a mere mortal, a political actor on the international and national stage. He had gambled and won during earlier crises, but here he was forced to lay a larger bet than either he or his military wished to place. Also, as Overy points out, Hitler wasn't planning to "conquer the world". This is the stuff of later Allied propaganda and a mis-reading of his intentions. He did, of course, have his eye on "living room" (sorry, I'm not going to try to spell the German) in the east, and he did assume that his Nazi regime would someday enter into a show down with the Soviet Union (which of course did happen, and Hitler lost). Overy also provdies a sympathetic portrait of Neville Chamberlain, who bears to burden of Munich, but who, in the end, led his nation into war.

The leaders involved all recalled the history of 1914 at the outbreak of the Great War. Each tried not to make the same mistakes. Nevertheless, a whole new conflagration broke out. Does this show, as Emerson suggested, that "events are in the saddle and ride mankind"? Overy thinks that the actions of individuals in the crucial days leading up the the full outbreak of war could have made a difference, and this always remains an intriguing question. The see-saw back and forth in historical judgment between free will and determinism, the great issue of Tolstoy and his critics, remains a challenge, with one side scoring a strike, and then the other counter-punching with gusto. This is, perhaps, why good history remains so intriguing. But rather than ending on my peroation, let me quote Overy, who says this better than me, and with more authority:

However large or long-term the forces making for war, there was a moment when those forces had to be confronted and harsh decisions taken by the principal historical actors involved. In the story of those dramatic days immediately before the outbreak of war, much still stood in the balance. Great events generate their own dynamic and their own internal history. The outbreak of war now sees a natural consequence of the international crisis provide principally by Hitler's Germany. What follows is intended to show that nothing in history is evitable. The stage dialogue between system and actors is at the heart of the historical narrative. Events themselves can be both cause and consequence, none more so than the events that led Europe to war seventy years ago. (From the Preface, x).

Energy & Frankenstein

This is a very brief but thoughtful essay on the perils of our energy regime. Last summer we had the Gulf oil spill and now we have the Japanese nuclear disaster. Are we digging our selves a hole that we can't dig out of, or at least that will trap us--in terms of health and wealth--for decades? The Frankenstein myth should still hold some resonance for us. Again, I have to point to Thomas Homer-Dixon and his The Ingenuity Gap as a prophet about these issues. Of course, let me be clear: I'm not a Luddite. I really, really enjoy my electronics. Life would be much poorer with electricity. However, we'd better think of some very good answers to our energy future or we're in for more and more problems.

On the other hand, Frank Robinson at the Rational Optimist points out that nothing is risk free, that we've not had very many deaths from nuclear power, and that we need nuclear power if we're going to reduce carbon emissions. All very valid points. Here's the question that is not answered: can the nuclear industry operate under tort standards of conduct? Should nuclear power adhere to strict liability standards (I say "yes", and I think that may be the current law). If the industry can't live with that standard; if they can't provide that degree of protection; if that can't pay the level of damages that they might cause, then should we use this source of energy? How much in damages might we be talking about? I don't know, but how much did BP pay for its Gulf clean-up? Tough issues.

Great Tip for Reading Blogs

This site, Readability.com, provides a great service if you read blogs. It converts pages into much more readable formats (thus the name). I highly recommend it. You can get it free, or for $5/month you can save and archive. A very useful tool if you read blogs.

Garry Wills on All Things Shining (Or Not)

I noted this book here. Now Garry Wills weighs in, and he's having none of it. While I found the book had some merit, Will really finds it lacking. They talk Homer & St. Augustine, and you don't venture into this territory without the classicist Wills to deal with, and deal with them he does. I must agree that their idea of being taken up or in by "the gods" strikes me as an uncertain thing, as there are many false gods out there. And sports as the equivalent of deep religious practice? I don't think so either.

David Brooks on Ike & Obama

David Brooks makes an interesting comparison of Obama to Kennedy and to Eisenhower. Brooks notes their two most important speeches: Kennedy's inaugural and Ike's farewell. Of the two, I think that Ike's speech may prove--or already has proved--the more enduring of the two. Check it out here.

Is Obama cautious? Vacillating? Wise? Fearful? It's very hard to say from these seats. However, I agree that normally we want to err on the side of caution.

Dan Pink on Teacher Incentives

Just a short note: money isn't everything. No, teachers and the rest of us can't do without it, and it sure can help in many cases, but sometimes it's just not the full motivator. See Pink's book Drive for a fuller account of how traditional economic incentives don't tell the whole story. This is just another example.

The Genie: Capitalism & Human Values by Frank S. Robinson

Fellow blogger Frank Robinson has posted a link to a spirited and well-argued defense of capitalism that he published (link above). Robinson makes what I consider a Churchillian argument. As Churchill is reported to have said about democracy--"it's the worst form of government, except when compared to all of the others"--so Robinson seems to be arguing for capitalism. (Side note: I prefer the term "market economy" to "capitalism" because of the strong emotional valance "capitalism" holds in some quarters, left and right, but this is a small quibble.) Robinson readily admits the shortcomings of capitalism, but it has brought us untold wealth. It has not brought us heaven on earth, but we should not expect it to do so. By the way, neither has any other form of economy, socialism, mercantilism, or the agricultural society that dominated humankind up until about 225 years ago. Compare yourself the the most powerful and wealthiest persons in history and it's likely that you enjoy a higher standard of life than any such person. A Vanderbilt, a Rothschild (19th century version), not to mention a Napoleon, any king, a caesar: all pale compared to the standard of life and wealth that the average American enjoys today, albeit without all of the social prestige. Do you want social prestige or a medical system that can treat you and a car or jet to travel rather than a horse and buggy?

So is there anything to further to ponder? The genie of capitalism, or more broadly the fruits of capitalism, economic growth, has given us a whole new way of life, full of opportunities and brave new worlds. But can we control this genie? Having unleashed the genie of unprecedented economic growth in the last 225 years or so, can we continue to live with it? As Ian Morris discusses in The Why the West Rules, we can imagine at least two very different scenarios of the future that might play out: one "nightfall" and the other, "the singularity". Which scenario will likely play out? Or will we continue to muddle through? I question whether we can continue to dump growing amounts of carbon into our atmosphere with impunity. I'd begun to think that nuclear energy might be an answer, but now the catastrophe in Japan demonstrates how the best laid plans can not anticipate all of the threats. (Fire, by the way, posed similar threats and wrecked havoc on earlier civilizations on a huge scale, but not on a scale for area and duration that compares to nuclear catastrophes.) As I'm of an age to recall Three Mile Island (not really so bad), Chernobyl (really bad), and "The China Syndrome" (scary and kind of relevant to what's happening here), I can't rest easy with this situation.

Considering the perspectives of Thomas Homer-Dixon, I wonder if we've developed an ingenuity gap that we may not prove able to bridge, or that our energy needs, the lifeblood of any human group, have grown too large and chaotic to manage and continue. During the the first 40 or so years of my life, I feared the genie of atomic weaponry, which seems to be back in the bottle, but really it's only resting in silos--we hope. Can we control the fruits of modernity and capitalism, such as atomic energy? The problem stems from the fact that we as a species haven't changed all that much since leaving the savannas of Africa about 100,000 years ago. We still have most of the same instincts and biases, the same perspectives and limitations. We've come a long way, but have we come far enough?

Can we continue to grow in knowledge and power? Can we continue to grow something that we call "the economy"? I hope so, but we should be considering how we can tame this genie lest it get the better of us.

Andrew Bacevich: Washington Rules: America's Path to Permanent War

I finished listening to this extended essay on the history of American foreign policy since the beginning of the Cold War. The short summary that I might use: Ike was right. Bacevich, a retired military officer turned IR professor, provides an extended tour over the time span following the Second World War, when the U.S. decided to extend its military presence throughout most of the world, to our current entanglements in Iraq & Afghanistan. The view is not a pretty one. Viet Nam, CIA dirty tricks, the pretty crazy thinking of Curtis LeMay (the first head of SAC), the Iraq and Afghanistan fiascoes. Ike did warn us about this in his farewell speech, but he did little during his administration to stop the ideology and cabal of interests that established these Washington Rules that came to dominate our thinking about foreign involvements. This is a bracing and well-written critique. What I would like now from Bacevich is an alternative way of seeing and acting in the world. This is bad, but what can serve us better? I despair that we can change our current mentality, but perhaps we can, eventually. Perhaps circumstances will limit our willingness to enter into foreign ventures. But we have to have an alternative vision to counter-act the current Washington Rules, and I don't think that we get that from this book. It's a start, not a finish.

Joshua Foer: Moonwalking with Einstein

I finished this delightful, fun book. As I believe I mentioned in an earlier blog post, the book was condensed into a NYT Magazine article a couple of weeks ago, and I couldn't resist the book. If you've read much about memory before, I don't know that you'd learn much new. But if you agree with St. Augustine that sedi anima est in memoria ("the seat of the mind is in the memory"), then you realize that remembering is no small thing. Of course, different events or sources of information have different degrees of inherent memorability and value, so we can pick and choose to some degree. But what we are as persons is in some sense simply the sum of our history, our memory. Some of this history is genetic, some personal, what happened to me from infancy until now. Well, this books goes more to issues of remembering information, but even in this age of instant computers, having knowledge in one's head has value that we can't off-load onto computer disc. The review that I've linked to provides a fair assessment of the book, so you can determine if you'd like it.

Memorizing Poetry

I've been getting back into memorizing poetry after earlier bouts, and the linked article is a nice encouragement, plus reading Moonwalking with Einstein. I have some chunks of poetry and verse that I carry around in my head from earlier forays into this area. I think more and more it is valuable, as an older form of reading such as the lectio divina, we "chew" and contemplate the words, something that you have to do in the process of memorizing.

I also like this article because I howled in protest at the demand that we memorize the funeral oration in Julius Caesar for 10th grade English class. One classmate (who will remain unnamed, but I've kept in touch with her over the years) positively reveled in the assignment. I think I resisted because I thought it too much work. Well, another folly of my youth!

So far:
1. The opening stanza of Eliot's Four Quartets ("Time present and time past. . ..")
2. The closing stanza ("We shall not cease from exploration . . . and the fire and the rose are one")
3. Prospero's speech in the Tempest (Be cheerful sir, . . . and our little life is rounded with a sleep")
4. Macbeth's speech (already had this one)("Out, out, brief candle. . . ")

In tap: George Herbert, Gerald Manley Hopkins, more Shakespeare (of course)(some Henry V portions I know pretty well), and John Donne (the love poems, although I'll never match the voice that Richard Burton gives them).

Suggestions?

Tony Schwartz's List of 30 We Need More of & 30 We Need Less of

This list strikes me as hitting on some very worthwhile points. Not comprehensive, not definitive, but useful. I will use it as a means of support for weeding the garden of my mind. Suggestions for further inclusions?

Ash Wednesday: The T. S. Eliot Poem

As most of Elliot, enigmatic and evocative. Something to ponder for the Lenten season.

Gary Taubes Meets Dr. Oz

An interesting post from Gary Taubes about his recent taping with Dr. Oz. Insightful about TV, conventional wisdom (CW), science, and a terrific summary of what Taubes is about from his friend Bob Kaplan. Go the the end of the Taubes post to see Kaplan's very interesting summary. This is something to read as you consider any Fat Tuesday binge (like your truly).

James Zogby on Arabs & the U.S.

Mr. Zogby, of polling fame, spoke today @ the Iowa City Foreign Relations Council about Arab-U.S. relations as he discussed them in the book I've lined to. His main points:

1. We don't listen--as a nation, as leaders, and as a people--to Arab voices. (The same could be said, as he noted, for individuals and concerning other groups.)

2. Most Arabs care about what we care about: jobs, family, education, health care, etc. Most are not oil sheiks or terrorists. We have a very skewed view.

3. Many, like Newt Gingrich (specifically mentioned), speak with authoritatively but know really nothing. Perceptions don't match realities.

4. At the beginning of the Iraq War 11% of Americans could find Iraq on a map. Now 36% can find it. Wow.

Fine talk, and he seems like an astute and thoughtful fellow.

Sleep More Important than Food

Tony Schwartz via the terrific blog site Farnum Street. If learning is the key to improving--along with mindful practice--and since sleep is key to learning, this all makes sense. Now quite reading this & go to sleep!

Chirs Coyne & the Middle East & U.S. Foreign Policy

Coyne, another from those blog-crazy folks @ GMU, makes some good points:
1. We didn't predict what would happen in the Middle East, this outbreak of popular dissatisfaction. How good can anyone be at this, or is just the government poor at it? (I think most everyone. Societies and history are complex.)
2. Why do we say we're all about democracy and then give big dollars to dictators? Maybe we should just tell the truth: we want them for strategic allies, or their better than a feared alternative. Look how well that worked in Iran.

Geoge Will on Republican Craziness

I used the think that George Will had some independence of thought, and then I came to think that he'd simply turned into an crank, so for some time now I haven't read him. However, with this article I have to give him a shout-out. He calls on the carpet Mike Huckabee and Newt Gingrich for their false and deceitful statements about Obama and his upbringing. How sad that person considered (by some) to be viable candidates for the presidency in the Republican Party would be either so duplicitous or so stupid as to say these things. Neither alternative is attractive. Thanks, Will, for speaking some truth the power. I hope that the other candidates that he mentions have some character and integrity. Heaven knows that candidates for high office don't increase in integrity along the way, so they'd better start with a huge supply before then begin their journey.

Tyler Cowen on Fiscal Irresponsibility

Speaking of Tyler Cowen, his article in the NYT today is interesting. First, I agree with him. Two, he cites James Buchanan, someone I vaguely remember hearing about in an undergraduate course on taxation and government finance (and in which I got a B grade and I'm not sure at all what I learned). Anyway, since then Buchanan won a Nobel in economics, and his work on "public choice" seems very interesting. But back to the point: do democracies spend too much--almost always? I does seem that Keynes's insight has been badly abused. We should only run deficits in times of real need, not endemically, as we have mostly since WWII. However, to cut now is perhaps to risk jolting a delicate economy with a shock that it can't very well withstand. In fact, to hell with "the economy". Remember, we should really be concerned about people, living human beings will families to feed and bills to pay. I think that we have to make some very tough choices indeed.

Cowen expands on his argument & brings in some comment from his spot @ Marginal Revolution.

Seth Roberts on Tyler Cowen's The Great Stagnation

Seth Roberts has posted (and will post) some comments on Tyler Cowen's The Great Stagnation, which I read recently. Both the original by Cowen & Roberts comments to date are very worthwhile. Cowen argues that we've picked the "low hanging fruit" and therefore we may see some degree of economic stagnation in the U.S. for the foreseeable future. Roberts follows up with the pertinent comments, including citing one of his favorites, Jane Jacobs. Interesting and thought-provoking stuff.
I posted a comment on down the line, citing one of my favorites, Thomas Homer-Dixon, who covers similar territory.

Dr. Kurt Harris, M.D. & PaNu

In my post yesterday about the Nightline segment, I should have also given a shout-out to Dr. Kurt Harris. First of all, he's a UI grad as both an undergraduate and from medical school, so of course this speaks well of him! But more importantly, he, too, provides a rich and thoughtful resource in his blog about nutrition and health. Each of the persons that I normally mention in this realm has a slightly different take on what is best, but a couple of really regular and standard points stand out: grains and sugars (especially fructose in high doses) will be the death of us. Really, the death of us. Dr. Harris is another excellent resource for this perspective. Check out his "Get Started" link, which is short and to the point.

P.S. The "PaNu" should be pronounced "pay new", but I lack the diacritical marking for a long "a". He's shortening "paleo nutrition".

Krugman on Trains: We Love 'Em

There seems to be an argument that we Americans don't and shouldn't like the idea of trains. BS! Krugman makes the practical arguments in his usual deft & slyly ironic manner. I've been infatuated by trains since I was a youngster. I rode in the engine of a train between Shenandoah and Essex courtesy of connections of my grandfather. (This places the trip no later than 1959, the year that he died.) Since then I've always loved to travel by train. It was great having a train connection between Champaign and Chicago, and traveling on the TGV from Paris to Geneva--wow! A truly sweet ride! Also, we enjoyed a fun family vacation traveling via Amtrack from Galesburg (IL) to San Francisco, on the Yosemite, LA, and Santa Fe, before completing the loop back to Galesburg. The trip was a wonderful site seeing tour. Iowa Guru & I are supporting the effort to get train service between IC & Chicago, but things are dicey, as Brandstad and the Republicans don't seem to like the idea. Let's hope (and write) that they change their minds.

Two more points:
1. A short Krugman follow-up post: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/trains-planes-and-automobiles/

2. Planes, alas, used to seem quite fun and an adventure, but this is no longer so.

Fountain of Youth? Maybe Exercise

Some good news. Some evidence, laboratory testing on mice, that exercise deters aging. In my experience, exercise keeps me feeling better. Will it help me to live longer? Maybe, but mostly, I want to enjoy whatever time I have. Besides, I enjoy exercise. I don't do painful, boring stuff. Today I played basketball. Crazy? Maybe, but I impressed myself. I'm not what I was, but I still can do a good deal. I shoot very well (if not guarded too closely by some young buck) and I pass extremely well (if you go the bucket, I get you the ball). Anyway, it feels good (although a bit sore tonight). Well, here's to the mice & me!

Art De Vany, Robb Wolff, and the Cave Man Life

Only network television could take a really cutting edge and interesting perspective like that held by De Vany & Wolff and turn it into something cutesy. On the other hand, while I didn't learn anything really new in this piece, I hope that others will. I think De Vany, Wolff, along with Sisson, Cordain, Taubes, and our own local Dr. Terry Wahls, are really on to something very important. While I am not a perfect convert (I confess to a birthday celebration cupcake today), and therefore my sinfulness notwithstanding, I think that this way of living--eating "paleo" or "primal" and working out this way--really is the right way to go. I've become more diligent in my adherence to these principles, and as a result, I'm looking better (Iowa Guru says so, it's not just my usual vanity) and feeling better.

I might also note that despite all of the cuteness and lack of substance contained in this segment, the authors that I list above all provide very well researched and considered proof supporting their positions. De Vany, for instance, a retired economics professor, uses his knowledge of complex systems and economics models to understand the human body. Taubes is a science writer from Harvard, Stanford, and Columbia. Of course, these degrees don't guaranty that he's correct, but he's not ignorant. (However, I think that he is mostly correct.) The others have similarly impressive credentials, and most importantly, commitment to seeking what is true and useful.

Okay, I gotta go home & eat me some meat (or fish) & greens!

Bryan Caplan on Amy Chua on Markets & Democracy: Not Always a Great Couple?

Very nerdy.

Caplan provides a brief description of Chua's World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability. Chua argues that while ethnic minorities often are economic leaders in a society, and are thereby subject to resentment, they benefit most from market reforms.However, because of resentment, they suffer when majority voters promote punitive policies toward them. Caplan challenges her assumptions. However, either way, its a brief reminder that markets and democracy isn't all sweetness and light when it roles in. Think of the North African nations: whither will they go? (I don't know if they have much in the way of ethnic minorities, however.) Thought-provoking.

Joshua Foer on Memory

Rating: Moderately nerdy (although Iowa Guru would consider it really nerdy).

Joshua Foer published the above cited article in the NYT Magazine that heralds the publication of this book Moonwalking with Einstein, which is set to come out in a couple of days. The topic of memory and mnemonic devices has fascinated me for decades. From Harry Lorayne and Jerry Lucas's book to the work of Francis Yates (The Art of Memory), this intrigues me. As I sit here, I have a pretty good memory of what I've read and learned. I can recall narratives and facts for work pretty well, at least when a case is active. As for history, I think that I have a pretty good memory. Why so? I think that I like to make sense of things. One of my earliest memories (and I kid you not about this), when we lived on Pioneer Avenue (i.e., before 3rd grade), I wanted to know who came first, the Kaiser or Hitler? (Maybe this really is very nerdy.) Anyway, I think that I really have a sense of narrative as a explanatory and mnemonic device. Well, anyway, learning to memorize more has some interest, and, as I'm sure Foer discusses in his book (as well as the article, which seems a lead in for the book), it is a fascinating tale of its own. Thus, my interest. On the other hand, Iowa Guru can testify to very many instances of very bad memory!

If you want to get a further sense of Foer's project and book, Amazon has both a interview and a brief video interview. I'm looking forward to the book.

Paul Krugman on the Myth of Useless Bureaucrats

Have private contractors that take over government functions done such a great job? Krugman says "no", and from what I know, I agree. Think of the private juvenile detention center with the corrupt judges, Blackwater, etc. Come to think of it,are government workers any less skillful & efficient than private sector workers? One wonders.

Perhaps the most important point Krugman makes: the same proposition told over and over again becomes "true" regardless of any factual accuracy to support it. Remember: you must keep your crap detector on 24/7! (Thank you, Neil Postman.)

Easterly on Growth, Poverty & Aid

Nerd Alert!

Another podcast that I enjoy is Russ Roberts's EconTalk, which comes out weekly, and has done so since at least 2007. Roberts takes about 1 hour to discuss a topic of interest with economists, political scientists, and others with similar interests about topics in economics and public affairs. The discussion led by Roberts is always interesting, and even when Roberts disagrees with the perspective or contention offered by his guest, he doesn't get on a high horse or simply toot his own horn. He lets his guest talk. Roberts is a part of the blog-crazy economics department at George Mason University, which, I must say, as a group, probably does more to promote and stimulate thinking about economics and public affairs than any other group that I know. For instance, Tyler Cowan and Alex Tarrock's Marginal Revolution comes out of GMU.

Now the podcast: William Easterly of NYU is a major critic of the traditional development aid regime that includes the IMF, the World Bank, Jeffrey Sachs, Bono, and so on. Easterly worked at the World Bank, so he's seen things from the inside. His main contention: aid hasn't worked for several reasons. These reasons include a lack of feedback (market mechanism) to measure success and need; lack of standards, institutions and culture for economic development in the recipient countries; bureaucratic imperatives of the providers that trump the needs of recipients; and corruption among governments receiving or administering aid. Easterly doesn't want to cut billions loose just to fend for themselves or starve. He does recognize gains. He believes, however, that small scale, direct giving (to projects and not necessarily governments) works best.

It's a thought-provoking discussion, and I know that his books have attracted a lot of interest because they attack the reigning paradigm (of which Jeff Sachs is seen as the current intellectual champion). Having read Sachs, this provides another important perspective. The problems are real, and how we address them can prove a matter of life and death, not to mention poverty, disease, and limited life for millions around the world.