I will be away from the blog until late August/early September. Apologies for the inconvenience.

(Seriously though: I’m teaching a course this semester on ethical issues in the recent health care reform debate. I expect, therefore, to be posting a lot of posts soon that should have 2009 in their date, but don’t.)

My son Oliver wasn’t due until April 5th, but the little rascal managed to sneak himself into the world ahead of schedule on Sunday in an early morning c-section. Both mother and child are recovering well.

How in heaven’s name do people get those little ear bud headphones to stay in their ears? They fall out of mine pretty easily. Are their ears shaped differently from mine? Do they have stickier ear wax? What gives? Truly, this is a mystery to me.

I have always wondered about that.

So purdy . . .

But still alive, in case you were wondering.

I’m also in the middle of Proust’s (almost) 1.5 million word novel series, which is another reason the book reviews have sort of tapered off recently.

I’ll be back!

The first question of a Mensa Quiz I found in a recently published in-flight magazine:

Jerry was buying some candy. He paid 23 cents per caramel, 28 cents per lollipop, and 33 cents per spice drop. Based on this logic, how much will a chocolate bar cost?

My first response was that these so-called geniuses clearly flunked Logic 101. I assumed they wanted an answer of 38 cents, with each item increasing in cost by 5 cents. But obviously no way of thinking classifiable as “logic” would entail this answer.

Turns out they are not asking a question of logic at all, but rather giving something more like a crossword puzzle clue.  (Answer here.) Turns out you need to be a member of the club in order to even understand the question. I wonder, then, how the club got started.

Tom Bissell had a appreciation in the NYT recently of the book length version of a commencement speech by David Foster Wallace that I was complaining about in the comments earlier in the month. Jacob Silverman riffs on the piece here at the Virginia Quarterly. Both spend some time mulling over the apparent removal of an allusion to suicide in the published version of the speech:

It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master.

Bissell writes of the excision:

It is not difficult to understand why. Any mention of self-annihilation in Wallace’s work (and there are many: the patriarch of “Infinite Jest” is a suicide; Wallace’s story “Good Old Neon” is narrated by a suicide) now has a blast radius that obscures everything around it. These are craters that cannot be filled. The glory of the work and the tragedy of the life are relations but not friends, informants but not intimates. Exult in one; weep for the other.

Silverman argues that excising such passages is a mistake.

[Update: As Bissell points out in the comments, he's left a comment at the Virginia Quarterly site clarifying things: The line in question wasn't in the original written version of the speech, on which the book is based.]

[Second Update: Oh, check out the correction to Bissell's piece in the NYT.]

Setting aside the personal tragedy it reminds us of for a moment, I think it’s worth pointing out that the text is better off without the passage because the point it makes is so transparently idiotic. People shoot themselves in the head because (provided you don’t miss, as some people do, unfortunately), it’s the quickest and most painless way to kill yourself with a gun. Where the fuck else are you going to shoot yourself, if you’re going to shoot yourself? Your liver?

I forgot to mention that All About Jazz (New York edition) chose Yoon’s album Imagination as one of the top five vocal releases of 2008 and one of the top five tribute albums of 2008.

If you haven’t bought a copy yet, I suppose it was probably because you couldn’t stop wondering, “Am I really worthy? Do I deserve something this good in my life?” But those aren’t really the right questions. The question is whether you can buy it, and the answer to this question is probably: yes. The physical CD can be purchased here, but the impatient can buy a (DRM-free) digital download of the entire album right here.

(UPDATE: Oh, forgot: Jazz.com listed Imagination as one of the top 50 jazz albums of 2008.)

Oh, and if you’re into solo ukulele (and really, who isn’t?), Yeah Yeah Records is offering free downloads of a great solo uke EP for a limited time.

Ezra Klein is right, the news this morning out of the insurance industry’s bunker is a big deal. They have offered a deal. They will agree to offer insurance to everyone, in exchange for a mandate forcing all to obtain coverage. Ezra explains the logic of current arrangements:

The individual health insurance market, fundamentally, is incoherent: Insurers try to deny coverage to those who want it and to sell to those who don’t. That’s because the most profitable customer for an insurer is one that never gets sick, and the least profitable is one who falls very ill. But that’s not how you want your health insurance market to work. We want sick people to get care. That’s the point.

But perhaps they see the writing on the wall, and know that at some point, they will face legislation enjoining them to adopt “guarantee issue.” Hell, even the vast majority of Republicans voted for a recent bill prohibiting insurance companies from “discriminating” against customers whose genetic tests indicate future health problems. But in order to cover the costs of insuring those who have been traditionally denied coverage precisely because covering them would be expensive, the insurers say they’ll need healthy people to buy insurance. That way when the risky get sick, the premiums of the healthy can be used to pay for their treatment. As Donald G. Hamm Jr., president of Assurant Health, puts it,

In the individual market, people can choose whether or not to apply for coverage,” Mr. Hamm said in an interview. “If they know they can obtain coverage at any time, many will wait until they get sick to apply for it. That increases the price for everyone.

But Ezra is on to Mr. Hamm:

The question is not whether they’ll offer to sell coverage at all, but at what price? Selling insurance products that no one can afford may mean you’re not technically denying people access to insurance, but it doesn’t guarantee accessibility, which is a necessary precondition for a universal system. For that, you need “community rating,” which would force insurers to offer coverage at the same price to everyone, spreading risk equally and ensuring that coverage is no less affordable for the sick than the well.

Actually, even community rating is insufficient. Community rated plans are designed to lower the insurance costs faced by high risk individuals by requiring that any particular health plan’s premium be priced to reflect the population’s average anticipated individual health care costs. While such regulations are well-meaning— high risk individuals will not be charged more than low risk individuals for the same level of coverage—adverse selection can remain a problem. Unless there are also government restrictions on the levels of coverage in the available plans, especially on whether there is a robust minimum that every plan must provide, low-risk individuals may choose bare bones plans that would benefit medium- and high-risk persons little. When this happens, plans providing a robust level of health care will attract only those individuals with higher risks, and this will drive up premiums and drive away healthier buyers interested in cheaper plans. So even if everyone is charged the same price for a community rated plan, the plans providing robust coverage will be avoided by the healthy, thus making them more expensive for those who will actually want them. This leads to premiums that still significantly reflect health status even when community rating regulations are in effect. Here’s one recent NBER working paper on the issue.

So what we need is a mandate, community rating, and legislation establishing a robust minimum that each health care plan must satisfy. Only then will low-risk individuals actually subsidize the care that high-risk individuals need.

Unfortunately, the problem is not solved even then, since general health costs are growing unsustainably. But that is a problem we can discuss another day.

A friend is getting married next year in New Zealand. While she already has a celebrant in mind, she thought she’d check out the country’s list of official celebrants, in part to see if anyone she knows is one. She then noticed that only one of them seemed to have a website, so she thought she’d take a look. And there, amidst a sea of quite normal sample vows that Geoffrey Vine has used in the past, is this:

THE COLLARING

Celebrant: This is a special day with a twofold purpose. In addition to exchanging vows and rings, AAA is going to place his collar on XXX as a symbol of their bond as Master and submissive.

CCC presents the studded leather collar to celebrant

Celebrant: A collar is not a thing to be taken lightly.  It is an outward symbol of a way of life, the ownership and guidance of one person by another.  In this, the Master undertakes to protect, guide and nurture the submissive, who in turn pledges herself to Him with all her being.  This is a bond of love, trust and honour.  As submission is the greatest gift, Dominance is the greatest responsibility, for without one, the other cannot be.

XXX kneels

Celebrant: XXX, do you of your own free will take AAA’s collar? Will you fulfill His needs, serve His pleasures and meet His wishes, acceding in all things to Him?

XXX responds

Celebrant: AAA, do you accept XXX as your submissive? Will you treasure her gift, tempering power with duty, keeping her wellbeing first in your heart?

AAA responds

Celebrant hands the collar to AAA

AAA places the collar on XXX. AAA then helps XXX stand and they kiss.

XXX will then pour mead into the chalice.

Celebrant: Let this cup of mead be a symbol of the cup of life. As you share this one cup, may life be that much sweeter because you share it; may the past you have put behind you seem less bitter because of it.

XXX kneels and offers the cup to AAA, who drinks and then offers the cup to XXX, who drinks. XXX hands the cup back to celebrant and AAA helps XXX to her feet.

Celebrant: AAA and XXX, you have made the important step of making public, in front of these people, your full commitment to one another for the rest of your days.

Above you are the stars, below you are the stones. As time passes, remember only this: like a star should your love be constant. Like a stone should your love be firm. Be close, yet not too close. Possess one another, yet be understanding. Have patience each with the other, for storms will come but they will go just as quickly. Be free in giving affection and warmth. Make love often, and be sensuous to one another. Have no fear, and let not the ways or words of the unenlightened give you unease.

Go from this place in joy and in peace and may the spirit of all life travel with you throughout your days together.

CLOSING MUSIC (Nothing Else Matters – Metallica)

I realize that tea leaf-reading ill befits a serious blog like this one, but I couldn’t resist. You see, for an Obama Presidency that may–may–mark the decisive turn away from the philosophy of the Reagan revolution that many say began with this, this item is a welcome harbinger:

An air traffic controllers group says it has become the first union to represent workers at the Guantánamo Bay Navy base in Cuba. The Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization says it will represent eight employees who direct flights at the Caribbean outpost. Ron Taylor, president of the group, said the vote was its first organizing campaign victory outside the United States. The Guantánamo workers are employed by Midwest Air Traffic Control Service of Overland Park, Kan.

Also, persuant to my last post, Robert Kuttner does his best to talk me down.

But I may be—call me crazy, call me an optimist, we have reality on our side. Events are going to drive this, and he’s either going to rise to the occasion or he’s going to fail. And I think he’s a very smart, very decent guy who doesn’t want to fail. And unlike certain recent presidents, he’s also very intelligent. And I don’t think this is going to be a man who’s going to be steered by his staff. At all the key meetings, the meetings were run by Obama himself. And it’s going to be—I don’t think the die is yet cast. I think this is still a very fluid moment. I’m unnerved by the people he’s appointing. There are deep structural forces that we’ve talked about that put so much power in the hands of Wall Street, that push him in that direction. But this is one of those moments when things could change, if we get counterweights on the part of organizing at the grassroots.

NYT:

A jogger was attacked by a rabid fox, ran a mile with the animal’s jaws clamped on her arm and then drove herself to a hospital, the authorities said. The Yavapai County sheriff’s office said the woman told deputies that she was on a trail near Prescott on Monday when the fox attacked and bit her foot. The woman said that she grabbed the fox by the neck when it went for her leg but that it bit her arm. The woman wanted the animal tested for rabies so she ran a mile to her car with the fox still biting her arm, then pried the animal off and tossed it in her trunk and drove to the Prescott hospital. The sheriff’s office said the fox later bit an animal-control officer. He and the woman are both receiving rabies vaccinations.

I just love that the writer describes her as “tossing” the fox in the trunk, as if it were a picnic blanket.

Sadly, there’s no way of settling this question, but I’m willing to bet that yesterday’s election resulted in more gallons of tears-wept-in-joy than any other in American history.

Yglesias, on the willingness of the media to call the McCain campaign on some of its nastier and stupider tricks:

It’s the infrastructure, stupid. Organizations like Think Progress, TPM Media, The Huffington Post, Media Matters, and Progressive Accountability have ensured that there are dozens of people working, every day, to shoot down bogus storylines and to highlight especially egregious behavior. And those institutions are connected to a vast web of individual or small-group blogs that together form a sea in which long-existing progressive publications like The American Prospect, Mother Jones, The Nation, and The Washington Monthly all swim, all reaching much broader audiences than they could in their strictly print days. New, more progressive columnists with ties to those institutions like Harold Meyerson and Paul Krugman have joined The Washington Post and New York Times op-ed pages. Television programs open to progressive ideas hosted by Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow have appeared on cable.

To make a long story short, the Obama-McCain matchup is taking place in a very different media context from the Kerry-Bush matchup in 2004. And Kerry-Bush happened in a very different context than Gore-Bush in 2000. And I think it’s no coincidence that as progressive infrastructure gets bigger and stronger, it gets harder and harder for conservative media strategies to work. The press’s all-out war against Gore galvanized people and have created institutions designed to fight back against that kind of garbage.

Yes.

If you’re American and you’re looking for somewhere to park a little bit of extra cash, you might consider donating to one of the organizations Yglesias mentions. They’re going to be absolutely essential going forward, as the right-wing slime machine kicks into high gear. Everything feels wonderful today, but I suspect it won’t be long before the Clinton/Gore years look sane and balanced in comparison.