Greek Protestors Burn Banks, Kill Three

Things are getting out of hand in Greece. I really hope they don't have a revolution. The government is so ineffective, corrupt and choking of the economy, the people rightfully have no confidence in their leaders. Given the sentiments of the mob, any strong man is likely to be a confiscatory leftist. Not good for those of us who own things there.

Representative Democracy

It's a great way to make policy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfCRyLlyqJI

Hawking on Aliens

Stephen Hawking thinks we need to be afraid of Aliens:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100426/ts_afp/scienceastronomyextraterrestrialhawking

His theory is that aliens might be resource-scavenging nomads who have exhausted their home planet. This is nothing but silly speculation, in my view. A certain amount of risk aversion seems sensible when it comes to superior intelligences. But if aliens have figured out how to use and preserve enough energy to travel many light years from home, it seems doubtful that Earth would have natural resources so precious they need to kill us to take them. Perhaps they will have a biological need for something only our planet (as opposed to one of the lifeless planets in the galaxy) has in abundance, but that would really be hitting a parlay.

Of course, aliens might view humans as a budding threat or a nuisance. Historically, we haven't exactly shown ourselves to be good neighbors to our fellow humans. An alien civilization might decide to wipe us out much like we do to fire ant hills and termite mounds.

Greece

I'm an amateur at macroecon, but it would seem like it is in the interest of the entire EU to monetize some of Greece's debt rather than allowing it to default. A default would seriously muck up the balance sheets of the big European banks, who presumably would get bailed out, them being "too big to fail" and all. And devaluation of the Euro resulting from a monetary bail out would be good for the other countries who are in trouble. Of course, politically, it's easier for German leaders to sell a bail out of a German bank than to sell a bailout to the spendthrift Greeks themselves. And Germany doesn't want the Euro devalued.

This crisis makes me question the viability of the EU structure. Leaving fiscal policy to the member states, while monetary policy is controlled centrally, seems like a recipe for disaster. Greece is to the EU what California is to the US, only worse, because the different cultures and language make Greece even less sympathetic to other Europeans than Californians are to other Americans.

I'm sure the European elites were hoping to centralize fiscal policy eventually, but it's looking like the problems caused by divergent fiscal policies might break up the EU monetary union instead.

My family has a lot of assets in Greece, and we frequently visit, so I hope that things there don't get too out of hand. A return to the Drachma would be wonderful for us.

Kings and Queens

I follow Mencius Moldbug's blog. Although he's a bit of a rambling and disorganized writer, his diagnosis of the problems with American democracy is pretty good once you wade through to the key insights. His solution though, establishing a new monarchy, leaves a lot to be desired. I was reminded of that by this piece linked to by Instapundit this morning. A judicial minarchy may be hard to maintain because of the tendency all governments have to aggrandize their power, but I'd prefer that to absolute rule by one person and his or her cronies. Obviously, I've never experienced monarchy, but the things I read make me wonder how different it really was from today's elite-captured "democracy."

The Facebook Divorce Announcement

Have now had an old friend and a neighbor recently announce their divorce to the world by changing their Facebook status from married to single. It's a disturbing reminder that relationships are fluid and temporary. It also raises etiquette questions. Are you supposed to comment on the status notification? Next time you see them in person, are you supposed to ask or should you pretend like you didn't notice and wait for them to bring it up? I'm taking the latter approach because there is less potential for disaster.

Anarchists?

Why do radical leftists call themselves "anarchists?" They don't really want anarchy, they want an authoritarian government that shares their policies. Hardcore capitalism is simply the absence of government intervention in the economy, and the so-called anarchists are really anti-anarchists. They want lots of government intervention in the economy and forcible redistribution. Maybe they just mean that they believe in using criminal and violent means to achieve their objective. That just makes them thugs and criminals though, not anarchists. I would love to know how the term came to be used in a self-descriptive way by militant authoritarians.

Inaugural

Just going to use this to air my unorthodoxy. Anonymously, separate from my professional world, so it can't hurt my bottom line. Will be about anything I am thinking about and not necessarily proofread.