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Michael Barone has nice news that affects us all. Pickerhead thinks we all need some good news.
… there’s good news here. The number of traffic fatalities is going down—down 2 percent from 2005 to 2006. The relevant figure here is the number of traffic fatalities per 1 million miles driven. In 2006, that number was 1.42, the lowest number in American history, according to NHTSA’s 2006 Traffic Safety Annual Assessment. …
… There were 37,819 traffic fatalities, nearly 90 percent of the 2006 figure, as long ago as 1937, and the rate per million miles of travel was 14.00, nearly 10 times the rate for 2006. The peak years for traffic fatalities were 1969, 1972, and 1973, with 55,043, 55,600, and 55,096. But a lot more people were driving then than in 1937, and the fatalities per million miles driven had fallen to 5.18, 4.41, and 4.20, respectively. Now it’s down to 1.42 per million miles driven—a huge change. …
Thomas Sowell with an interesting take on Bob Novak’s new book.
Many, if not most, college commencement addresses are essentially special interest advertising.
Politicians, political activists, judges and bureaucrats tell the graduating students how it is nobler to go into “public service” — that is, to become a politician, political activist, judge or bureaucrat, instead of going into the private sector and producing goods and services that people want enough to spend their own money for them. …
… Parents who want to counteract politically correct commencement speeches — often after four years of politically correct indoctrination on campus — might include among the things they give their graduate a new book titled “The Prince of Darkness” by columnist Robert Novak.
This book gives Novak’s eyewitness accounts of the numerous Washington politicians and bureaucrats he has dealt with as a journalist for more than half a century.
There is no way you can come away from this book thinking that there is something nobler about “public service,” as it actually exists, rather than the pretty picture painted by those who want to puff themselves up as members of a high-toned profession. …
… While older people with much experience in life may be better able to appreciate this outstanding book, it should be especially valuable to the young in presenting a realistic and three-dimensional picture of the world.
They can get a lot of enlightenment from a prince of darkness.
Robert Samuelson’s Newsweek column highlights an issue our corrupt political class and it’s entourage in DC won’t address.
If you haven’t noticed, the major presidential candidates—Republican and Democratic—are dodging one of the thorniest problems they’d face if elected: the huge budget costs of aging baby boomers. In last week’s CNN/YouTube debate, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson cleverly deflected the issue. “The best solution,” he said, “is a bipartisan effort to fix it.” Brilliant. There’s already a bipartisan consensus: do nothing. No one plugs cutting retirement benefits or raising taxes, the obvious choices.
End of story? Not exactly. There’s also a less-noticed cause for the neglect. Washington’s vaunted think tanks—citadels for public intellectuals both liberal and conservative—have tiptoed around the problem. Ideally, think tanks expand the public conversation by saying things too controversial for politicians to say on their own. Here, they’ve abdicated that role.
The aging of America is not just a population change or, as a budget problem, an accounting exercise. It involves a profound transformation of the nature of government: commitments to the older population are slowly overwhelming other public goals; the national government is becoming mainly an income-transfer mechanism from younger workers to older retirees. …
Speaking of corruption, John Fund writes on the good news about Ted Stevens, the man who probably did more to cost the GOP the congress than any other of the creeps we have sent to Washington.
Perhaps the entire Alaskan Congressional delegation should be quarantined before it spends our tax dollars again or has one more questionable relationship with the state’s pork barrel-industrial complex. GOP Senator Ted Stevens, who has spent 39 years in Congress raiding the federal Treasury on behalf of Alaska, has long dismissed complaints about his questionable investments and ties to shady lobbyists as jealousy over his ability to make his state No. 1 in federal pork. (He brought in over $1000 worth for every resident last year.) But yesterday, the raid that was in the news was the one on Senator Stevens’ house near Anchorage by FBI and IRS agents.
The probe of the senator’s ties to the oil-services company Veco is connected to a probe of Alaska Rep. Don Young, the former chairman of the House Transportation Committee. He and Mr. Stevens are being investigated to see if they took bribes, illegal gratuities or unreported gifts. Two former top executives of Veco have pleaded guilty to bribery.
Another political figure under investigation is Ben Stevens, the senator’s son, who retired from the legislature last year just before federal agents raided his office. …
The Captain has a great post on partisanship. It grows out of a WaPo analysis of who votes with their party the most often. Of the top 20 positions in the house and senate, 19 went to one party – the Dems.
Both parties like to blame the other for failing to exercise independence in Congress. Their supporters blame the members of the opposite side for excessive partisanship which keeps Washington DC from accomplishing anything for the people. The Washington Post decided to take a look at the 110th Congress to see which party exercises the most partisanship — and the Democrats win the prize. …
… Democrats — They put the party in partisanship!
Ed Morrissey also posts on the optimistic Times piece from yesterday. We liked that story so much we’ll get the bloggers’ take on it today.
Power Line’s take is here too.
… These are basically the same observations that most visitors to Iraq have made lately. Yet, some think this piece is significant, because of who wrote it–two liberals from Brookings–and the fact that it appeared in the Times. We discussed the column on the radio with Bill Bennett this morning, and he is of that view.
Maybe so. My fear, though, is that the leadership of the Democratic Party sees progress on the ground in Iraq as bad news, not good. I think many Congressional Democrats are committed to defeat, for political and ideological reasons. If so, they won’t be swayed by this kind of report. It could help, of course, if voters perceive progress in Iraq and hold politicians accountable if they fail to sustain it. But not many rank and file voters, either Democrat or Republican, read the op-ed pages of the Times.
As if on cue, The Dem House Majority Whip says a positive report from Petraeus “would be a big problem for us.” Power Line has the details.
… As significant as what Clyburn said is the way he said it. According to Clyburn, a strongly positive report by Petraeus would be “a real big problem for us.” Clyburn’s candor may be commendable, but it’s unfortunate that the Dems regard strongly positive news from Iraq as a problem.
Contentions’ take on Eliot.
… Predictions that the scandal will force Spitzer from office are probably off the mark (unless Spitzer is caught lying about what he knew and when), but there’s no doubt the governor is badly damaged, and that his presidential aspirations are for the moment in tatters. The best thing he can do now for himself, and for the people of New York, is to return to the reform agenda he was elected to implement. More likely, though, we can anticipate another three years of a badly-damaged governor’s limping along, while Albany continues to legislate the Empire State’s decline.
Roger Simon thinks about Edwards.
A post on Politico reminded me of why I find John Edwards one of the most shallow politicians of our era. And not just because of the hair. Or even the 28,000 square foot house when he yammers on about the two Americas.
My problem is that it’s “all about him.” Sure, politicians are narcissistic by nature, but Edwards takes it to a special level. …
Adam Smith reminds us it’s Milton Friedman’s birthday today.
Wall Street Journal celebrates too.
Today, in cities across America, events are being held to celebrate the ideas, vision and influence of the late, great economist and Nobel prize-winner Milton Friedman. This would have been his 95th birthday.
The occasion gives us a chance to look back on many of the questions Friedman contemplated during the course of his productive career. In particular, why do people in some countries prosper, while those in other countries live in poverty? Is it luck? Is it something that their governments do? Or perhaps it’s something that their governments don’t do?
Friedman knew that the answers depended on the extent to which governments supported personal freedom, political freedom and economic freedom. And thanks to his advocacy, many countries around the world have come to see the connection between freedom and prosperity. …
Discover Mag thinks maybe sun is not so bad.
James Lileks with a Bleat post on ocean cruises.
… The sight of the fellow passengers was quite remarkable; if you could sum it up, you’d have to say this is a boat full of small whales looking to catch sight of a larger one. Everyone waddles to and fro, slowly, panting with the effort of transporting the stored energy of previous meals to the location of the next one. …