(yay, we’re back despite the WordPress voodoo! Thanks to the hubby who’s a fearless internet master!)
Last week was a good week and a bad week. Yes, we had a historic presidential victory that should have made me happier than it really did. Unfortunately, at the same time as Barack Obama was gaining speed cross the electoral college, Prop 8 was losing in California. A prop that defines a marriage as a union between one man and one woman. A prop that retroactively invalidates 16,000 marriages registered in the state of California since June. A prop that cuts basic human right to the significant minority in our country. A prop that commanded the largest ever donation amount for a state election.
While I am happy for the president elect, he’s yet to prove that his inspiring rethorics is going to translate into specific actions. The passing of Prop 8 had very real, sizable effect on the lives of people in the state. I am sad and angered at the rejoicing of its proponents.
They say they’re protecting traditional marriage. Newsbreak: 200 years ago, slavery was traditional and a lot of otherwise intelligent and kind people believed it was acceptible.
This week I was ’selected by my airline for special security screening’ - and was totally cool with it. I went through the screening twice in fact, due to being stuck in Chicago over two days. As a frequent traveler with oft changing plans, I’m surprised this doesn’t happen more often. And for the record, I am happy to comply with the screening, and in fact, I’ve registered with Clear, which required a significant amount of personal data and a background check, just to more easily get through security. While I’m usually very wary of the “I’ve got nothing to hide” slippery slope, when it comes to my 2 to 4 times weekly air travel, I’m willing to give a little to get a little. I’m a good guy, and want to see air travel secure, not just feeling secure.
So, why was I ’selected by my airline for special security screening’? Well, I was on a one way ticket, changed departure airports, and changed flights twice in one day. All for very good reasons - there was bad weather in the Midwest, needed to switch departure airports, couldn’t make the hoped for flight, etc, etc. This sort of thing happens when there is bad weather. This sort of thing exposes the weaknesses in the rules based systems implemented to select individuals for special security screening. When I went through security at O’Hare, just while I was in line at just one of many x-ray machines there were 4 other people waiting for ’special’ security screening. And you know why? Because the day before 80% of the flights were canceled and hundreds of people were re-booked. The rules based system that has been implemented clearly takes in to account too few attributes to be useful and results in far too many false positives (and likely too many false negatives). For example - I flew out on a multi leg one way ticket (on the same airline) since I didn’t know from where I’d be heading home. How about the frequency with which I fly. How about the fact I bought my tickets with an AMEX registered to a Fortune 500 company. How about the weather, and booking and changing through AMEX travel services. There are dozens of other attributes, and most would seem to point to stranded to business traveler rather than nefarious guy.
I work in fraud prevention, where pattern recognition and model building are critical to our success, and with the quality of models implemented for this special screening, well, I’d be out of business. If we really want something useful, let’s bring some meaningful attributes to the models and reduce the false positives. That’s all I’m saying, let’s apply some better models.
Seems like sort of a strange news day. Get a message that the Senate has managed to find time to (not specifically) put down the the citizen’s group MoveOn but did not manage to support the troops and their families, and also did not manage to restore habeas corpus. This is by far the worst part. We need to restore habeas corpus and the right to due process. We are on a slippery slope, and it’s time for a change.
Here’s a blog post from the The Economist that is usually one of my favorite periodicals. However, in this particular case the argument is based more on the political spin than true free-market considerations. Feel free to browse through the comments and guess which one is mine.
Unless you’re finely in tune with the International Olympic Committee’s shenanigans, you probably don’t know that this week in Guatemala a decision will be announced on the host of 2014 Winter Olympics.
The motherland is in the running with a Southern resort city of Sochi as a contender. You heard it right– a city on a southern border of Russia with winter temperatures rarely falling past freezing point wants to host Winter Olympics. Yes, the Caucasus mountains are right nearby but most of the areas that can be used for slopes happen to be in a nature reserve. No problem for the willing! The grandiose proposal aims to cut down trees in the reserve and demolish people’s houses to build the Olympic village.
In light of this potential controversy, Russian greens decided to protest in Moscow. Since the motherland is not exactly huge on freedom of speech, they had to obtain a permit first. The asked for a protest permit for 15 (!) people and described the goal of their action as “call President Putin to stop the destruction of Sochi National Park and Caucasus Nature Preserve”– almost surprisingly, a persmission was granted.
As planned, the protesters, mostly college students, showed up on the Triumph Square and four of them proceeded to pretend to ski across it. They were then going to award a gold metal to the “skier” wearing Putin’s mask. No shouting, no beating anybody, no setting things on fire. You probably know where this is all going by now– yep, Putin mask was thrown off the face and the “athletes” themselves tossed into a police truck. The rest of the protesters enjoyed just a few extra minutes of walking around with their posters– a representative of administration has appeared and signed an annulment of the protest permit.
PS. I feel a need to start offsetting the negative coverage I am giving my own country on this blog (which is caused by my strong disagreement with the government.) Next up is something about the most beautiful city in the world– my hometown
UPDATE: Sochi did in fact get elected to host the 2014 Olympics. Let’s see how it all unfolds.
There is a new album out raising money for the situation in Darfur, which is one of the poorly known political conflicts that the US doesn’t see fit to care about (note, they don’t have much oil).
I’m not completely in love with Instant Karma, but there are some good tracks on here. My favorite at the moment is Working Class Hero done by Green Day:
While the overall compilation is good, there aren’t a lot of standouts beyond the Green Day track, the rest are good, but not standout great. I wish Imagine from A Perfect Circle’s Emotive were in there. Tori Amos does some great ones as well. I think this could have been a totally stand out album, but as it is, it turned out entirely fine. I think it is worth it for the Green Day, U2 and REM tracks.
“A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a rule whom they consider god-fearing and pious [and] less easily move against him.”
So, reading through Digg, I came across this interesting this if there are problems with original).
In essence, there is a bit of controversy at MSP over the cab drivers and some refusing to accept certain passengers.
“We’ve had several posts about the Muslim cab drivers at Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport, and their refusal to accept passengers carrying alcohol and blind people with guide dogs, at the urging of the Muslim Brotherhood front group calling itself the Muslim American Society.”
In essence, a number of the cabbies out of MSP are Muslim - and that’s cool, but some seem to be becoming very strict and a bit imposing with some bits of their beliefs, to the point of refusing passengers - which means refusing $ believe it or not. But, the religion part, that’s not what’s interesting to me, what is interesting to me is the asymmetry of the information available to the buyers of transportation services. Looking at the article, there is a big to-do about the response from the MAC, public hearings and so forth. I think most readers will recognize this, but there is a huge expense; direct, transaction, and opportunity cost, among more I probably haven’t thought of. It appears the MAC is looking to impose penalties on these drivers.
Here is a much more simple solution, at least for Minnesota: require the drivers to indicate if they enforce Shari’a on the outside of their cab, and specify the requirements to ride. Those passengers who are able/willing to meet the requirements will hop in the cab, those who can’t will move to the next. Additionally, demand will drive the enforcement of these religious requirements. I may have too much faith in free markets, but I think it would work well, and there would be enough strictly observant Muslim cabs to serve the demand for very strict observance, and the rest of the drivers will become more flexible. Passengers will also have the option to change their behavior if they want a cheaper ride - a non-Muslim who happens to follow the right rules can probably get a cheaper ride home - there is likely greater supply than demand. There is also a deal for those of us who don’t care (either ideologically or business travel) about the driver’s beliefs.
It all adds up to information and utility. It is Econ 101; there are some people who receive utility out of following certain rules/requirements, there are others who don’t - and there is some equilibrium of suppliers of strict transportation requirements and consumers who find utility in it. The trick is, provide the demand with the information. If we provide the consumers with enough information to know which cabs they can get in (based on both the drivers’ and the passengers’ requirements) - probably directly on the cab, everyone is better off. The passenger doesn’t get turned down and the rates will be set appropriately (probably by the tip since the fare is set)
All the econ rambling aside, I take a taxi home from the airport all the time, and I have never had a driver who was less than polite and kind. I’ve had a few who weren’t the best drivers, but always polite and honest (unlike the cabbies in Thailand BTW). So, it’s Friday night, and I’m tired, but hopefully the point is clear - there is no need for specific regulation of anyone’s freedoms, we just need to insist on full disclosure and the market will handle the rest. At least in theory.
, but there are some good tracks on here. My favorite at the moment is Working Class Hero done by Green Day:
