The worst people in the world
OMFG. This has to be read to be believed (my emphasis, and thanks to J. Smith for the tip):
More educated people think more like economists; in fact, more educated people pretty much have more reasonable views across the board. Furthermore, by a happy coincidence, more educated people are more likely to vote. Once my book gets to policy implications, these facts inspire a number of shocking suggestions:
* Stop trying to “get out the vote” – higher turnout reduces voters’ average competence.
* Give college grads extra votes, as Britain did until 1949.
* Require would-be voters to pass a test of economic literacy.
When he says that voters should be “economically literate,” of course, he means that they should be literate in the economic ideas that he finds valuable. Ignorant populist filth such as Robert Reich and Joe Stiglitz need not apply.
As you would expect, the comments section is chock-full of jewels as well:
How about deporting economically ignorant citizens^?
We could just make the voting process itself a bit harder. Assign candidates 3 digit numbers on one page and require voters to bubble those numbers in 5 pages later. The errors should average out so that this effectively eliminates the dumbest voters. To target education directly, we could give them little math problems. For x, bubble in the first perfect number greater than 4, for y, the first perfect number greater than 28. For the socialist candidate, find the derivate of x^4 using only limits.
Why not a plutocracy? Wealth is correlated with IQ. and wealthy have an interest in raising the country’s wealth.
Our Founding Fathers would be appalled to see a marginal to functionally illiterate person entering the voting booth. A viable democracy may not even be possible if the ignorant can cancel out the vote of a more educated individual. And no, I am not advocating elitism.
No, of course you aren’t.
The problem is not that the less intelligent vote at random. If that were so, their votes would cancel each other out, leaving the cognitive elite in control. The problem is that the less intelligent, being less prosperous, vote themselves other people’s money. Excluding them would have the effect of reducing the size and power of government. The Democrats and others who like big government know this and so would never agree to intelligent democracy.
Does this sort of thinking make me uncontrollably angry? Yes it most certainly does. I’ve done my share of ranting and raving about how gobshite stupid many American voters are, but never in my life have I ever considered a solution that would involve disenfranchising people based on their lack of education. I mean, my God. That an alleged “libertarian” economist would advocate depriving uneducated people of their ability to have a say in how their government operates is disgusting and repugnant beyond all belief. The sort of “freedom” that Caplan advocates is the freedom for educated upper-class and upper-middle-class people to make decisions on behalf of the uneducated poor who, alas, are simply too stupid to know where their interests really lie.
As an educated person who has taken economics and accounting classes in the past, this sort of idea should actually appeal to me; after all, I would stand to benefit from it, and I would have tremendous sway in voting for policies that would make me very wealthy at the expense of others. But because I have this pesky little thing called a “conscience,” I don’t think I could go for it. Others, most notably “libertarian” economists such as Caplan, don’t have that problem. But as my homey Max says, “THEY TEACH THE CHILDREN OF VIRGINIA.” God help us all.
Our Founding Fathers would be appalled to see a marginal to functionally illiterate person entering the voting booth.
or a woman, or a black man!
Our Founding Fathers would be appalled to see a marginal to functionally illiterate person entering the voting booth.
or a woman, or a black man
Which, considering the ways in which education would be handled in regards to women and minorities under the Repub-elites dream system, are functionally the same thing.
Or, Gawdelpus, an…. economist.
The problem is that the less intelligent, being less prosperous, vote themselves other people’s money.
Obviously. The last 30 years have been one entitlement after another and the top bracket is now 99%.
Isn’t this book ultimately against VOTING entirely? If you’re going to pre-select the electorate to support a certain set of policies, why go to the trouble and expense of elections? Just implement the policies and tell everyone to be quiet. And run for cover when V bombs Parliament.
“Our Founding Fathers would be appalled to see a marginal to functionally illiterate person entering the voting booth.”
Indeed. That would be something akin to nominees of that era providing casks of beer at polling places or something appalling like that.
TEST OF ECONOMIC LITERACY
Question 1:
When writing a letter to the CEO of a major American corporation asking for advice on the best countries to use for stashing your vast fortune in an offshore holding account, what is the appropriate form of address?
A) Dear Mr. Knight
B) To the concerns of the CEO
C) Yo Phil!
D) I don’t know, as I’ve never been faced with a situation like this before, and thus allowing me to vote would cause Thomas Jefferson to spin in his grave.
For such a smart economist type guy, this sure is a supremely stupid way of expressing his intelligence.
Moron.
“higher turnout reduces voters’ average competence”
a million monkeys with a million keyboards, indeed.
Here we see a fine specimen of the Chicago school, as epitomized by Milton Friedman. To see the product of this man’s designs, one would have to be able to visualize…oh, say, Chile in the late 1970s-early 1980s. All of the voters Properly Educated; all of the money under the control of the Proper People; all of the proles under the control of the Proper Officers.
See, military dictatorship’s a feature, not a bug.
Why not a plutocracy? Wealth is correlated with IQ. and wealthy have an interest in raising the country’s wealth
Holy.
Fucking.
God.
This is the guy that makes me sorry that I’m the kind, non-armed communist. Because good God, does that kind of thinking just make me want to execute the enemy of the proleteriat.
Is that Steven Fry back in his days at Footlights College (Young Ones)?
That’s Steven Fry, Emma Thompson, Hugh Laurie and… that other guy. Somebody important, I think.
Furthermore, only old money should get the vote. New money is sooooooo trashy.
That post and its comments are what the people around me in boarding school were pretty much like, except for the token minorities brought in for the football team. It doesn’t even piss me off, it just makes me weirdly nostalgic.
For such a smart economist type guy, this sure is a supremely stupid way of expressing his intelligence.
“The height of intelligence is to be able to conceal it.”
La Rochefoucauld
This is the guy that makes me sorry that I’m the kind, non-armed communist. Because good God, does that kind of thinking just make me want to execute the enemy of the proleteriat.
you know what that kind of thinking makes me do? it makes me want to scream Rapportez la guillotine! in the village square.
What is irrational or unintelligent about voting to give yourself more of other people’s money? If you believe that people act in their own interest, and should, then this seems perfectly rational and intelligent to me. Which is why large corporations bundle campaign contributions in order to do precisely that.
People who vote in order to maintain the Pareto-optimal purity of an economic system because they believe that this will lead it to grow the fastest, regardless of whether they themselves benefit at all: now that is altruistic, irrational behavior.
the fucker’s a cockhair away from advocating eugenics.
Actually, if they refuse the uneducated the vote, that pretty much takes the Bible Belt out of the equation, ensuring sweeping Democratic victories for decades to come.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5in09EwYV0
Because it’s Friday. And it just feels right. Yippee-kai-yay, motherfucker.
If economic literacy really is a problem among the voting public – and I’m more than willing to accept that it is – why not put some effort into, oh I don’t know, educating the public about the basics. It’s not all that complicated, really. Thousands of hungover freshmen pass classes in it each year.
I swear…it’s not perfect, so we might as well chunk the whole thing, no need to bother trying. And the guy’s a libertarian. Well, blow me down.
nice Young Omes references.
The last guy is Ben Elton
If the educational quality of some voters doesn’t meet his high standards, isn’t the only possible option to keep those people from voting? What alternative could there be? Alas, there is none.
Actually, reading the comments I’m almost relieved. The underlying racism is slowly coming to the fore in the rhetoric.
This is all Bell Curve code for no vote for blacks and mexicans, basically.
Oh woe, Matt T. beat me to the punch. Only less sarcastically, which may be a plus or minus, depending on who’s doing the accounting.
But the problem with educating the uneducated, tig my boy, is that they often becom educated in the wrong way
So you can’t count on them to vote the intelligent, i.e. proper, Republican way.
TEST OF ECONOMIC LITERACY
Question 1:
When writing a letter to the CEO of a major American corporation asking for advice on the best countries to use for stashing your vast fortune in an offshore holding account, what is the appropriate form of address?
A) Dear Mr. Knight
B) To the concerns of the CEO
C) Yo Phil!
D) I don’t know, as I’ve never been faced with a situation like this before, and thus allowing me to vote would cause Thomas Jefferson to spin in his grave.
He he.
MATH SECTION
Question 1:
If Stuart has three semesters left at the Philips Exeter Academy in which to raise his GPA to a 2.3 in order to meet the legacy standards at Yale, and Jill must stable her roan and miss three riding sessions during her tour of Tuscany and portions of Switzerland … how much should one tip the valet at Per Se in midtown, provided he isn’t too impudent or unpresentable?
Looking at their pictures, I’m surprised they didn’t advocate extra votes for virgins. Ace would own his own Congressional district!
Ooh! No, wait. I know that one.
Um…
Flat tax?
To target education directly, we could give them little math problems. For x, bubble in the first perfect number greater than 4, for y, the first perfect number greater than 28. For the socialist candidate, find the derivate of x^4 using only limits.
I laugh. Ha ha. If he were serious about determining intelligence, all those problems would be written in Greek. And not that demotic crap, either.
TEST OF ECONOMIC LITERACY
A portion of the answer key:
“Microeconomics” refers to: How dare you question me.
The universal franchise isn’t about achieving the “best” results. It’s about legitimacy.
Shorter Brian Caplan:
The Rich voting to take money from the poor = Democracy in Action!
The poor voting to take money from the rich = The Ruin of Democracy!
Friggin shite for brains. I am seriously considering pursuing a graduate degree in economics. When people ask me why, I tell them it is because so many economists are idiots, I feel it is my duty to become one and raise the mean IQ by a few points.
College grads should get extra votes?
Actually, that’s a good idea. I would prefer to have well-educated people making the kinds of life and death decisions that a true world leader must make. After all, isn’t President Bush a college gra…..
Awwwwww, DAMMIT!
Nevermind.
The universal franchise isn’t about achieving the “best� results.
Proof’s in the pudding.
Some clichés are just perfect.
But if we eliminate the non-college educated, illiterate, and economically backward voters, don’t we like … hate to say it … eliminate the base of the Republican Party? Aren’t us pinko, faggot, college-educated type, with a clue, likely to be the last voters standing? I assure you, I can fake my way through the Uncle Milton Friedman National Electorate Examination of Economic Competency. I kinda doubt that the unemployed couple with yellow ribbon stickers all over their jalopy, down the street from me, would survive the cut.
Just sayin’.
p.s. Do I have to pay extra for the Young Ones references or are they included in my subscription?
I think my initial reaction was a little rash. Upon reflection, the only problem I see with our fine friends at econolog is that they stop short of the goal line. Let’s face it, the lifeblood of democracy is intelligent discourse on civic issues. If people are unable to contribute to that basic conversation–and there is little question that strict adherence to free-market dogma is the sole indicator (other than wealth) of intelligence–then what use are they? Wouldn’t it just save a lot of time and money to put them in their own little homelands or camps. Sure, let the rabble out to do the roustabout chores of society, but why let them intermingle with the smart volk? How can they enjoy the pleasures of society when they cannot partake in the responsibility of its management?
But if we eliminate the non-college educated, illiterate, and economically backward voters, don’t we like … hate to say it … eliminate the base of the Republican Party?
There may be something to this, but remember, there are also a whole lot of employed, educated people who consistently vote republican. Sometimes I think its more your worldview than your education level.
They was just jokin’:
True. But in the end this is easier (2+ / 0-)
Recommended by: BlueEngineerInOhio, Mr X
than real discussion. I see the same thing at conservative blogs. They will take the most whacky and/or manipulatable quotes and ideas from liberals and make the same kind of feel-good arguments.
It’s a shame too. In the case of Bryan Caplan at EconLog, he wrote a very provocative and interesting book about irrational voting.
The prescriptions in that link are not really serious. As is stated below those ideas, they are more thought experiments to get people thinking about the real topic: irrational biases in voters.
[http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/6/15/134136/734]
Libertarians and economists. You’re guaranteed two things with 95% of them: (1) they’re wrong about whatever they’re saying or predicting, and (2) they’re absolutely convinced of their own intellectual superiority, despite being wrong about what they’re saying or predicting.
Don’t get me wrong, I hear getting into graduate school in economics is tough. You have to be able to read graphs and do statistical analysis using, you know, numbers and stuff. In Japan, that gets you into 7th grade. But here in the U.S., that apparently qualifies you to be one of the self -chosen intellectual elite that get to run the country.
psst, billy: your girl. But yes, I see your point. Hence the cute little math problems on polls! And why even bother with the education (which poor people can get for free how freaking uncapitalistic is that!) when you can just make it so easy to get the right vote from those uneducated folks with a wee tweaking!
e.g.
*x=2 – Republican
*4x^2 – 0.005X + 3 – Democrat
*prove that x^n + y^n = z^n has no non-zero integer solutions for x, y and z when n > 2 – Socialist
Shorter Elimi-blog:
Whomever disagrees with me needs to be disenfranchised.
Actually, that should be “Shorter Republican Party”
Neville Chute, author of “On The Beach”, wrote a “near-future” novel in which the “intelligentsia” of a socialist Great Britain immigrate en masse to Australia. It seems that in Chute’s 1980’s downunder wonderland, the value of one’s vote increased in relation to one’s level of education.
Of course when Chute wrote “The Big Wet”, over 80% of Australian university students were graduates of elite private schools, since the public education system was designed to stream working class kids into trade schools.
One of the most nauseating reads ever…
I’m pretty sure those first two comments are sarcastic. After all, this book has been ridiculed by liberals for a few weeks now, and this guy is such a crackpot it’s more tempting for reasonable people to make fun of him than it would be for his fans to defend him.
Here’s one review of the book:
http://www.chrishayes.org/articles/whos-afraid-democracy/
and I think I saw a take-down in the NYTimes as well.
Why not a plutocracy? Wealth is correlated with IQ. and wealthy have an interest in raising the country’s wealth
This has got to be sarcasm, because it very neatly sums up the proposal in terms that make it difficult to agree with.
If it isn’t, I’m going to start reading the Onion for my daily news, because the line is completely gone.
That book does sound like crap, Bargal20.
For a good Sci-fi takedown of libertarianism, try “Anarchaos” by Curt Clark a.k.a. Donald Westlake.
It continues to amaze and frighten me (even after all these years) how stupid, impudent, and utterly psychopathic some of these “educated” people are. Really, I find it astounding that they are capable of arranging words into recognizable English sentences.
I knew I saved this for something:
That an alleged “libertarian� economist would advocate depriving uneducated people of their ability to have a say in how their government operates is disgusting and repugnant beyond all belief.
Quite right. A genuinely libertarian economist would restrict the number of votes and make them a tradable commodity. The more you care about your government, the more votes you buy.
Oh, he’s from George Mason. That explains a lot.
But… But… BUT!
Does Paris Hilton get to vote!!!!!!
The universal franchise isn’t about achieving the “best� results. It’s about legitimacy.
Ah. That would be why these little bastards have such a grievance against it, then.
He’s advocating the deportation of Fox News viewers.
This reminds me of something I heard on Car Talk – (somethin’ us latte sippin, liberal elites listen to)
It concerns the question of why higher paid people are always dumbasses.
since
Time = Money
and
Knowledge = Power
and
Power=Work/Time
therefore (via the transitive property)
Knowledge = Work/Money
then, solve for Money
KM = W
Money = Work/Knowledge
notice, then, as Knowledge decreases, for the same amount of Work, Money increases. Conversely, as Knowledge approaches infinity, and Work stays the same, Money approaches Zero.
Oy, reading this crap makes me wish ol’ “Cappie” Caplan would successfully complete the penultimate event of the “Upper Class Twit of the Year” competition.
Oy, reading this crap makes me wish ol’ “Cappie� Caplan would successfully complete the penultimate event of the “Upper Class Twit of the Year� competition.
Taking the bras off the debutantes?
I think he meant the last event.
Economics being one of the only areas of academia where “conservative” political leanings rule the day, I find it ironic how these people respond with: “You should have to be educated to vote! Everyone who disagrees with us must be a moron!”
While in every other area of study regarding human society, where wingnuttery is shown to be the barren intellectual wasteland that it is, these people want to discredit anyone smarter than them by accusing them of a “liberal bias.” ‘Cuz education only serves to pollute peoples’ good conservative minds with liberal propoganda.
I had this conversation with some pompous kid from my sister’s community college yesterday. He was whining about how all the textbooks are written by liberals, and that is the only reason why the stuff that comes out of his mouth sounds like utter made-up shite.
It takes a special kind of narcicism to say, “everybody who is an actual expert about this topic disagrees with me” and with no sense of shame say “they must be biased!” rather than “I must be utterly braindead.”
Only loosely related to the topic at hand, but I have been waiting to unload that rant for like 14 hours. Now I can rest.
How embarrasing.
Thanks athiest. I’ve got to get out and walk the vocab more often. Getting lazy in my old age.
Of course I meant “ultimate”.
D. Aristophanes: Hah, nice try with the trick question. Everyone knows that Per Se has no valet parking (it’s on the second floor of a mall — really), so you have to take your limo there. Your driver, of course, is on salary, and gets no tip. (Although christmas bonuses are of course another discussion.)
Two days ago Caplan solved the relationship between poverty and crime. From his post entitled “Why Do the Poor Commit More Crimes?”:
Emphases his.
Actually, reading the comments I’m almost relieved. The underlying racism is slowly coming to the fore in the rhetoric.
This is all Bell Curve code for no vote for blacks and mexicans, basically.
Just like the last time there was a literacy test for voting. I think the term was “Jim Crow.”
The idea that people with more education should get more votes isn’t new. In modern times it goes back at least to John Stuart Mill, in Chapter 8 of Considerations on Representative Government. He also argues against letting people vote if they’re illiterate or too poor to pay taxes.
It’s both kind of amusing and kind of sad that a lot of my Intro to American Government students will strenuously argue that ignorant people shouldn’t be encouraged (or even allowed) to vote and then display a level of ignorance that would immediately disenfranchise them.
Not to even mention how they’re gonna deal with us uneducated, angry disenfranchised dummies with guns. Lends a whole new meaning to the old “Ballots or Bullets” dillema…
mikey
Worship of Jesus or of Allah ultimately makes more sense, in my mind, than worship of “Rationality”.
It is, in a sense, hilarious how the very argument that the ignorant shouldn’t be allowed to vote in this country at once proves the person arguing for it to be woefully ignorant, and therefore easily eliminated under their own argument.
I mean, even “we have to invade another country to protect ourselves from foreign threats” takes a LITTLE while to understand what complete bollocks it is.
Not to even mention how they’re gonna deal with us uneducated, angry disenfranchised dummies with guns.
They’ll just hypnotize them with their superior mentalicious brainiosity.
If Caplan or one of the twits in his commentariat were to get it the bloody hell over with and shoot themselves, we could declare a winner and be done with it.
If he wants to eliminate stupid people from voting then how about starting with the 30% of the U.S. electorate who still think things are going well in Iraq. Ooops there goes the Republican vote………..
The Ace of Spades
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIBOvTovppM&NR=1
Footlights College v Scumbag College
How about we restrict the franchise to people who believe in democracy? That’s at least as reasonable as limiting it to people with degrees. Then these fuckers would be SOL.
People who have biased beliefs about practical matters, and/or exercise poor impulse control, are likely to screw up their lives across the board.
This is easily dismissable when you consider that people with poor impulse control (in other words, risk-takers) make up the majority of successful entrepeneurs.
D. Aristophanes: Hah, nice try with the trick question.
Two dozen votes for Doctor Memory! Negative-50 votes for the rest of you uneducated peasants!
I vote — har har — that we restrict the franchise to people who can tie their cocks in a knot or hang ten pound weights from their labia.
That was parody, right? Right?
Then these fuckers would be SOL.
I would totally throw their tea in a bay. Dressing up as an Indian is out though: not very sensitive.
D. Aristophanes:
Well played, but can you tell me who holds the record for the world’s biggest bottom-burp?
Wonderful comments on EconLog. Reintroducing property qualifications for voters, invading and annexing Mexico, deporting “the more socialist people”… these guys are just bubbling over with bold new solutions to today’s vexing problems.
The idea that there’d be violent blowback if anyone actually tried to carry out any of this crap simply doesn’t enter their happy little libertarian brains.
I’m all over it man- I had an ancestor who took part in that. It’s like a blood imperative. The point of doing it in costume escapes me, but I guess the equivalent today, also not very sensitive, would be to dress up like Mexican immigrants. I’m sure a bunch of white guys in ponchos, sombreros and brown shoe polish would look at least as convincing as those colonial fruitcakes did with their feathers and “war” paint.
Absolutely beyond belief!! These are the “elitist academics” who are going to destroy our once tolerable nation, not some pointy-headed pseudo-Marxist teaching queer literary theory to 20 students a semester. (Not that there’s anything wrong w/ that.)
And just what sort of higher education qualifies you? Do Oral Roberts, Liberty & Regent grads get more votes than Ivy Leaguers? If you have an A. A. do you just get half a vote?
tb- There was actually an established history of “white Indians” committing civil disobedience as far back as 1768. Often the costume would be as little as a feather in the hair. Some went entirely without. If you really want to know more there’s a text called Playing Indian by Philip Deloria. (Got the date from it.) Goes way beyond that era in its focus but has good info on why. Partially it allowed friendly local officials to avoid responding, partially it might have represented some psychological urge for chthonic roots for the then forming American identity.
Why not a plutocracy? Wealth is correlated with IQ. and wealthy have an interest in raising the country’s wealth.
yeah, for THEMSELVES!
I always love how converstaions with ‘libertarians” always asume that they will be on ‘haves’ side, and they can finally move out of that trailer park, get the cheerleader, and have crimefighting superpowers.
The ‘haves’ is a very exclusive club, if you aint in yet, you aint gonna GET in when the Top Down Revoultion comes.
Well played, but can you tell me who holds the record for the world’s biggest bottom-burp?
Rick – Britain!
At least, that was the answer in the early eighties. These days I think the world’s stupidest bottom-burp might be Jonah Goldberg.
Q: Well played, but can you tell me who holds the record for the world’s biggest bottom-burp?
A: Guards! Arrest this insolent fellow!
The ‘haves’ is a very exclusive club, if you aint in yet, you aint gonna GET in when the Top Down Revoultion comes.
Loot! What if we Loot? Can we get in if we LOOT??
A LOT! We can Loot a LOT!! How ’bout that?
mikey
Omg, have you seen Caplan’s page? It’s the web design from hell.
This poster is from the 1930’s, and promotes the Nazi monthly Neues Volk (New People}, the organ of the party’s racial office. The text reads: “This genetically ill person will cost our people’s community 60,000 marks over his lifetime. Citizens, that is your money. Read Neues Volk, the monthly of the racial policy office of the NSDAP.”
Shorter Nazis: “Poor and sick people are stealing your money!!”
Shorter Library of Economics and Freedom: “Ditto!!”
http://bp3.blogger.com/_6-IIXAF5HOE/RnNAFEfizMI/AAAAAAAAAWw/33XO3teXb4I/s1600-h/neuesvolk.jpg
Caplan’s arguments are nothing more than what eugenic theory would look like if it were applied solely to economics. He may not call for sterilization now, but I daresay he’d support such a move – no doubt with the full blessing of his compatriots, all of whom (by some fluke) would be eligible to vote in his brave new world.
I find it really interesting just how many of Caplan’s sycophants dropped by and added to the stupidity with their own attempts at erudite argumentation: “Let’s curtail immigration and deport socialists. Hurah!�
Most people would see that kind of government as illegitimate; and this would, among other things, erode respect for certain institutions – e.g., the military – that rely heavily on the very folks Caplan would disenfranchise.
I don’t think these guys thought their cunning plan all the way through.
Why not a plutocracy?
Why not an aristarchy? I’ll be Empress: I think that’s only fair, don’t you?
Wealth is correlated with IQ.
Ding! Sorry, dude, you’re awash with wrongity there: wealth is correlated with how wealthy your parents were.
and wealthy have an interest in raising the country’s wealth
Sadly, No! The wealthy have an interest in raising only their own wealth. Look to those countries that are full of dirt-poor peasants ruled by three immensely rich buggers with 17 houses and their own fleet of chocolate limousines: they don’t seem all that concerned about raising the wealth of the country. Then look to relatively egalitarian societies like Sweden that also happen to be quite bloody well-off on average: what happened there? I mean, since they don’t possess a few wealthy bastards to ‘raise the country’s wealth’ for them? Was it an accident? Did they all just have a rummage down the back of the couch? Clearly they have a better couch than mine, at least in the “provision of national wealth” respect.
Now that‘s a political movement worth getting behind: Better Couches For Everyone!
And to add my token of esteem for both the Footlights College and Upper Class Twit Of The Year sketches: “I’ve got a Porsche…it’s not an automatic.”
Lesley, if I were Empress I’d hang anyone who created a web page that disturbing. Human eyes were not meant to be subjected to such ghastly sights.
Mind you, the man has a tiny smidgeon of sense, in picking Farewell My Concubine as one of his favourite films. Although he sullies this by immediately thereafter lauding John Woo, director of “We got lotsa guns, so we’re real men” kinda films (apparently, Reservoir Dogs was based on one of Woo’s films, and in fact The Worm Tarantino is a big fan of Hong Kong film. Said fandom apparently extends to stealing from HK outrageously and never giving credit).
Some Guy said,
June 15, 2007 at 22:11
Actually, if they refuse the uneducated the vote, that pretty much takes the Bible Belt out of the equation, ensuring sweeping Democratic victories for decades to come.
Exactly what I thought. This fucker actually thinks that more educated people vote Republican. Some people just need to feel like they are better than others.
Qetesh, your highness, much as I normally find your every word to be royal and divine, I have to challenge you on Woo. He shows men firing guns in slow motion, usually with lots of breaking glass. That means it’s artistic.
Umm. Dammit. I really LIKE Reservoir Dogs. I hate being the dumb one. Dammit…
mikey
I like The Monkees. Nothing wrong with rip-offs.
The amount of poverty and suffering required for the emergence of a Rockefeller, and the amount of depravity that the accumulation of a fortune of such magnitude entails, are left out of the picture, and it is not always possible to make the people in general see this. – Ernesto Che Guevara
Yeah, a lot of Tarantino’s stuff scans like a xerox of a copy but if you watch him interviewed he actually does give credit to the HK and Japanese filmmakers he idolizes/borrows from. He may be a twit, but he’s not that kind of twit.
And Reservoir Dogs is a great flick. Its just a caper picture, not the ZOMG THE MOST CONTROVERSIAL CUTTING EDGE THING EVAR!!11!!! that a lot of dipshits and morons claimed it was when it was released.
I like Reservoir Dogs, too, mikey. It’s actually more watchable than the little bit of Woo I’ve seen, which consists of MTV style jump cuts every half second when it’s violent and long, meaningful looks when no one is dying.
I think of RD as the raunchiest comedy I’ve ever seen, tho.
Something Glenn Greenwald often repeats, which I find quite true, is that it is nearly impossible to lampoon and satirize the right-wing because no matter how hard you try they’ll say something that puts your satire to shame.
Actually, hate to burst your bubble guys, but if you just take voters with college degrees as a group, they vote majority Republican.
voting Republican for prez:
http://www.electionstudies.org/nesguide/2ndtable/t9a_1_2.htm
voting Democratic for prez:
http://www.electionstudies.org/nesguide/2ndtable/t9a_1_1.htm
I think if you select just grad-school students/degree earners then you might get a democratic constituency. But the just high school/college votes overwhelmingly republican. Democratic party has long been the representatives of the lower class, and wingnuts know this.
I think their “sound economic thinking” tends to be the modern form of the rain dance. What passes as sound economic thinking for conservatives dictates complete obeisance to “free markets”. Free markets demand that we ship our jobs oversees. We can then purchase these cheaper goods by borrowing money at usurious rates. Clearly that is sound economic policy.
As they say…
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
I love Mr. Woo’s films. Great and uplifiting cinema that screams “even if you can dodge bullets, life sucks without corneas!”
RandomObserver
My phrase for that is “Their reality has lapped our satire.”
Amazing, innit?
“Intelligent democracy.” That was my favorite phrase. It’s like “intelligent design.” In both cases perfectly nice, respectable words are put together to take the place of “crackpot idea.” By the end of the ’08 election cycle “intelligent” will be code for “kook”…or “willfully dickheaded.” Either way, people will be running for cover from the word. Thankfully I’m a stupid man and inherently keep the word at bay.
Very interesting stats, cokane. What can I say, I’m a poll smoker.
I find most interesting that it utterly and completely blow the “Republicans are REAL Americans” meme out of the water, HMS Hood style, considering that “unskilled” and “Blue Collar” workers consistently vote Dem. I’d be interested to know what “professionals” means.
Farmers either have no clue what they want, or they simply jump on whoever tells them what they want to hear.
The key to this theoretical is what standard is set to define “educated”. If we go by weather or not there is a college degree, yeah, you’re right. However, I think we can all agree that simply having a degree (or not) does not indicate anything about one’s intelligence. Read: “Art Major”, for example.*
If we go by something a little more substantive, like the national SOL tests, then I stand by my earlier claims of Bible Belt being gunned to hell. The trick would be what impact this would have on the Electoral College system. Places like Missouri would have a very hard time getting a sufficient number of votes for a real election. If I recall right, the current system in place is that each state gets the same number of votes as they have representation in Congress, 2 for the senate, X for House.
Switching this system from “population” to “allowed voters” would throw everything to hell and gone. The numbers would have to be redrawn, simply because of their unbalanced representation. The entire election would probably be carried by whoever got CA, NY, MA, and maybe TX. Yes, those are major states now, but their importance over, say, Nebraska, would render campaigning anywhere else a waste of money. You would effectively disenfranchise half the population simply due to geography.
But, hey, blacks and beaners wouldn’t be able to vote, so it’s a compromise, right?
if I were Empress I’d hang anyone who created a web page that disturbing. Human eyes were not meant to be subjected to such ghastly sights.
Qetesh, the only thing missing is a tacky animated gif or two. Flaming torches or a rolling bloodshot eyeball.
I give him kudos for liking Amores Perres…
The link to his ‘Jokes About Communism’ page doesn’t work. Damn.
Now, If I decided not to pass the poll test, then I would be immune to taxation for the rest of the year, correct? I mean, no representation, …
And the voting class would take up the entire burden of public finances?
These elitist assholes voted en masse for George Bush. Twice. ‘Nuff said.
I’m a bit late to the thread, but just wanted to say thanks to bargal20 for mentioning In the Wet by Nevile Shute. I read it when I was about 12 or 13 and it was perhaps one of the books that influenced my political development most — though not, of course, in the way Shute would have hoped. The multi-vote idea appalled me so much I became a committed one-person-one-vote person, despite going on later in life to become a PhD economist and thus the sort of person who would get lots of votes in Caplan’s system.
I can say with some authority that jerks like Caplan never had to apply their theories in the messy real world of policymaking. Real policy economists would never end up with a world-view like that, even if they started with one, not if they are any good.
I’m curious – is the thing about British graduates getting extra votes before 1949 actually true? I’m British and I’d never heard of it, and Googling only produces references to Caplan’s book.
J.
loved this one from the comments:
I’ll confess a philosophical bias I have here. I spent about 18 years of my productive life in defense and the defense industry, working towards the demise of the old Soviet Union. I didn’t spend that time and effort helping to enable the deconstruction of the Berlin Wall, only to see it re-constructed on our southern border. The thought of that turns my stomach. As a practical matter, I’d rather see the U.S. invade and annex Mexico as the 51st state, so the cross-border labor traffic would no longer be considered ‘illegal’ immigration. It would be far less costly than the current or proposed policies/enforcement and far less abhorrent than that fence.
Mexico, 51st state, just classic. Shows there is a serious drug problem out there!
Intelligence not linked to wealth, according to US study
This reminds me of this book, which my mother bought for me after I graduated from college. I am proud to say I remain a yuffie (though technically, I suppose, being middle-aged and living in the suburbs makes me a masfie instead).
[…] Sadly, No reports on a US economist and academic, Bryan Caplan, who’s come out of the closet as a plutocrat and advocate of aristocracy. His suggestion that the grant of voting rights should require an economc literacy test prompted this comment: D. Aristophanes said, […]
Oho, trick question. Per Se is in Columbus Circle — i.e., across the border dividing Midtown and the Upper West Side.
Phil Ochs knew how to deal with these people.
Wish I could find a video of his live version of this for y’all.
Seriously, though – this is the sort of shit that drives otherwise rational, democracy loving socialists to start doing field-stripping drills with their rifles.
I’d be interested to know what “professionals� means.
Typically, white collar workers in a licensed or certified profession: doctors, lawyers, accountants, architects, engineers, pilots, professors, etc.
On a related topic I’ve always thought that, if folks are going to insist on English as the official language of the US, then there ought to be a serious exam in English grammar, spelling, usage and composition that those seeking high elective or bureaucratic office would be required to pass or they wouldn’t be able to take office. If this had only been in place in 2000 we might have saved ourselves a lot of trouble and the world a lot of lives!
Plato is reputed to have said “If I wished to punish a Republic, I would have it ruled by philosophers.” I’ve always remembered this because it was in my student newspaper in college when I was enrolled in Philosophy 101 and had to read, of course, Plato.
Wait a minute. Didn’t Plato advocate a philosopher king for his ideal state? I’ve never heard of that quotation.
The key to this: Bryan Caplan is Ben Elton, or, even worse, the Footlights College character he played. Do images work in comments?
Bryan Caplan:
Ben Elton:
James, I think Caplan is referring to the University constituencies, abolished for Westminster elections in the Representation of the People Act 1948.
OK, images are stripped from comments. Caplan’s photo is at the original link; this is the Ben Elton one.
Shit, they’ve started deleting comments over there. “False e-mail address” indeed.
“I think we should attack the lower classes, first blowing up their houses, and then, when they run, screaming, into the street, mowing them down with machine guns. I know my views aren’t popular, but I have never courted popularity.” — Monty Python’s Flying Circus, the “Bryan Caplan” sketch
Lesley: Omg, have you seen Caplan’s page? It’s the web design from hell.
I say he should not be allowed to exercise his freedom of speech on the internet until he passes an HTML proficiency test.
Snorghagen said:
“The idea that there’d be violent blowback if anyone actually tried to carry out any of this crap simply doesn’t enter their happy little libertarian brains.�
That’s why most libertarians are “minarchists�; the one thing the state SHOULD indeed MUST do is protect their property from all inevitable communist revolutionaries, anarchist terrorists and crime that a libertarian society would cause. Of course, all that violence and such would merely be a sign of the inherent irrationality of the lower orders, justifying their poverty and repression.
No, it would never dawn on our libertarian friends that someone might try to cut off the hand taking food out of his/her mouth. It would certainly never dawn on them that such a course would be not only completely rational, but also entirely predictable.
I think if you select just grad-school students/degree earners then you might get a democratic constituency. But the just high school/college votes overwhelmingly republican. Democratic party has long been the representatives of the lower class, and wingnuts know this.
Thank you cokane, that’s what I was thinking, but I didn’t have anything solid. We progressives/leftists/liberals fool ourselves if we think that the people voting against us are all poor and religious.
Rather, we ought to emulate the socialists and try to communicate more with people who really are poor, or working class- the people who are hurt worst by the ultra-rightist policies of the current Republican party. In that way we would increase our message’s reach- which is what we desperately need.
Oh boy, I get to geek out on Plato a little.
I don’t know the quote in question, but it’s probably from Diogenes Laertius, and of dubious origin. Famous quotes are often questionable like that. Lincoln didn’t actually say “you can fool some of the people some of the time but not all of the people all of the time” or anything similar, for example.
If Plato said any such thing he more likely said “sophists” than “philosophers”.
Yes, the Republic of the text Republic is ruled by the gold souled philosopher king. No, in my not humble or common opinion, one should not take this as a Platonic political manifesto. The much debated seventh letter of Plato shows him telling the followers of his dead friend Dion not to attempt to establish a Platonic Republic in Syracuse. (The debate centers on the fact that Plato himself had previously gone to Syracuse to try and educate its boy tyrant in philosophy, with little true success. Some argue this means Plato tried to begin a Republic, in response I ask where the expulsion of all the adults from Syracuse was suggested.)
The minority, but growing, view is that Republic is not a political text but an introductory work in dialectics. The ‘ideal’ republic is not instituted as a solution to the problems of three types of government in ancient Greece, but is the original form of government which the imperfections of man eventually devolve into the then modern forms, in the text itself. There are other intertextual clues from Socrates, and there are later works which provided a much more detailed, and realistic, idea of how to apply philosophical learning to political considerations, such as Statesman. (Which, not coincidentally, is another text in dialectic, and not of the introductory bifrucatory type. Things often divide into more than two parts.)
N that’s my brief and unnecessary Plato geek-out.
Friggin shite for brains. I am seriously considering pursuing a graduate degree in economics. When people ask me why, I tell them it is because so many economists are idiots, I feel it is my duty to become one and raise the mean IQ by a few points.
I actually did that. Got a graduate degree in economics, I mean; unfortunately, there are just so many idiots in the field that I wasn’t able to budge the mean IQ by very muuch at all.
What gets me about economists is that so many of them will, in casual conversation, freely acknowledge that the underlying assumptions upon which so much economic theory is founded are fundamentally flawed (everyone behaves perfectly rationally, everyone has instant access to identical, perfectly accurate information, no exit or entry costs, etc.) – and then immediately go out and conduct some research that is explicitly based upon that faulty foundation.
That’s why I chose a different field for my Ph.D. work.
Don’t get me wrong, I hear getting into graduate school in economics is tough.
It wasn’t where I went to school.
I assume everybody here knows the desert-island joke where the punchline is the economist saying, “Assume a can opener… “