Camacho - Trump 2024!

[1] My kids' primary school: first names all 'round - teachers and students. The principal: yes, we've got all the usual problems here, but we think that respect is earned; it's not about the name we use.

[2] separately (not at my kids' school) beginning to suspect that 'cool' (first names...) male teachers may be more at risk of 'dating' students.

that stalked the whole trailer - slow burn

Professional economist here (hence, perceived as right wing) who began studying economics due to concern about climate change (hence, perceived as left wing).

[1] The classic statement of when markets 'work' is the 'first fundamental theorem of welfare economics'.

[2] 'work' in this sense means 'leads to a Pareto-optimal outcome', which means an outcome in which no one can be made better off without making someone worse off. This is a low standard: an outcome in which I have everything is Pareto-optimal.

[3] the conditions for the welfare theorems are generally not satisfied in practice. Here, as alluded to in the ad, carbon emissions are 'externalities': if an oil company sells you gas, which you then use, both of you are better off, because you're assumed to have taken into account the effects of your exchange, and decided to proceed; other parties have not, so may be worse off.

[4] in general, failure of the welfare theorem conditions isn't enough to make the case for government intervention: the outcome may still be 'constrained' efficient - meaning that, given the inherent constraints in the problem (e.g. asymmetric information), the market outcome is Pareto efficient.

[5] again, even if it is, you may not like the particular constrained efficient outcome the market yields (e.g. I get everything).

[6] in the case of externalities, the theory is pretty well established - if we want efficient outcomes, we need to align the private and social costs. There are two basic market-based tools for doing that: quantity tools (e.g. carbon permits) and price tools (e.g. carbon taxes). Which performs better depends on the sort of market imperfections.

[7] obviously, we will never have a perfect estimate of the efficient price or quantity of carbon to emit in a given year. Equally obviously, to me at least, this is a classic case of an externality with a well developed body of theory pointing in the direction of some level of controls.

[8] in my experience: people familiar with the economic theory tend not to be 'pro-market' or 'anti-market': they tend to want to understand how the market can be used to deliver societal objectives and, when it can't, how to correct its imperfections.

Interplanetary trolley problem now that we've changed its course

I am fond of Melissa Hunter's Adult Wednesday Addams series (visible on YT). Its delivery seems a bit more morbid.

Fox in socks on box on Knox

I could be tempted to watch a new _Star Wars_ film if all the Jedi scenes were like this.

Wow. There seem to be a lot of things wrong with that technique: I watched it thinking, "what would I have done differently?" Answer: he saved the child, in real time, without the benefit of hindsight, without any experience; I haven't.

I was impressed by how quickly the ground crew went from running from the crashing Hindenburg to running back to it.

briefer intro to extreme unicycling: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkppaV-gQXU

so sheep are backwards waterdrops? that was beautiful.

US politics is pretty competitive: if these two are the front-runners, it's because they appeal to a constituency. Thus, the GOP is sending its best, in the sense of being best attuned to large groups of voters. That's my real fear.

Herodotus (book VII) recounts Xerxes sending a scout to spy on the Spartan expeditionary force holding Thermopylae. The scout, ignored by the Spartans, returns to Persian lines, and reports that the Spartans - badly outnumbered - where combing their hair.

I've never understood what that looked like. I may now.

I'm a bit slow on the uptake: I've only just remembered that, in Russian, its name would be Pravda.