Bits and Pieces - August 8, 2011

I've got another project I'll be spending a lot of time on for the immediate future. You will hear when it is ready. I have a number of posts I'd like to write, but they will have to wait.

In the meanwhile, some quotes.

Gershom Gorenberg:

When people pour out into the streets in these numbers it is very exciting, but it also means that representative democracy has broken down. No one actually has any scenario for how these protests could bring to power a government committed to a more equal distribution of wealth, to schools for everyone, to health care that everyone can afford, to the end of hiring everyone but the CEO as a temp worker.

RIP Mark Hatfield, once Republican Senator from Oregon:

Is there no ethical dimension to our decision, our conscious decision, to add more and more weapons to our stockpiles, while millions of people in our own country have no roof over their heads, when we cannot fund our war on drugs? Is there no ethical dimension to the violent examples we are setting for our children? Is there no ethical dimensions to the definition of national security that we are passing on to the developing nations of the world, where arsenals are now as bloated as the bellies of the Third World's children?

Economics of Contempt:

To say that S&P analysts aren’t the sharpest tools in the drawer is a massive understatement.