tfl: The Flatiron Life

Without Garfield he has just gone insane, but it is hilarious. This is my latest feed subscription.

If you are trying to come here to work hard to feed your babies, you should be welcomed with open arms. So says Dick Armey.

(HT: The Agitator)

Ever had a moment where you felt the need to express your happiness with someone’s good fortune, but “congratulations” just didn’t quite seem right? Well I introduce to you “felicitations”.

I am retroactively offended by all of the “congratulations” I received upon our engagement. The nerve of some people. Humph.

Greg Mankiw quotes a story of a woman in the U.K. who has been prevented from buying more healthcare. He then poses a great question,

This kind of situation is likely to arise more over time. Technological advance is making state-of-the-art health care increasingly expensive. In any kind of national health system, some treatments will, by simple cost-benefit calculation, be deemed too expensive to provide to all citizens. But does that mean those of above-average income should be excluded as well? Should they lose basic benefits if they choose to pay for these marginal services with their own money?

If you say yes to this last question, as the U.K. health service has, here is a related one: Should a parent who hires an after-school tutor for his child be barred from sending the child to the public schools?

Jonah had his 2 month checkup this week, here is his update.

Age: 11 wks
Weight: 11 lb 6 oz
Height: 23 1/4 in
Head Circumference: 40 3/4 cm (I hope that is cm and not in.)

What did Dr. Ramadan say about Jonah? Well, he is still the smartest baby ever for his age. She thinks he will be on the earlier side of the development ranges. She sees that Jonah wants to move and wants to talk, but this development step is frustrating him. She encouraged us to do lots of belly time, even though he hates it.

Then the sadness came, when we converted Jonah from a free rider to a member of the herd.

Jonah needed 5 vaccines. He had the oral Rotavirus vaccine; and was stuck with DPaT, HIB, Prevnar, and Polio vaccines. 2 injections per hip, poor guy. He did not like it, so I hope the heard is happy.

This morning, my cousin and favorite childhood playmate, Rachel, forwarded me this story from NPR’s Morning Edition about the association of play with toys and the importance of unstructured, imaginative play. This was fantastic timing. Earlier, as I put Jonah on his “tummy time mat,” I had been thinking about how silly it probably is in the grand scheme of things. What are the odds that without his brightly colored surfboard mat, Jonah would fail to crawl? It’s probably a little early to be too worried about Jonah’s imaginative development, but this story suggests that toys actually crowd out important opportunities for children to “self-structure,” hindering their emotional and intellectual development.

It just so happens that Rachel and I played pretend like nobody’s business. You really haven’t played unless you’ve created some piano bench horses and played “international horseback travelers with passports.” Hours of fun. Don’t tell my mother, but this is where I do start to worry that Jonah will have less space and freedom to play pretend as a city kid. Is my concern justified or silly?

The only thing The Tomaws are doing today to celebrate is a lot of petting. We call today George Washington Tomaw’s birthday; so the cat is very happy.

I don’t think most Americans do anything more than look at cars and mattresses today. So I ask, what should we do. What would be a fitting tribute to our first President? If we are to embrace the myth of a holiday for all presidents, what should we do to honor the institution?

Update: Zach points to Radley Balko. I think if we just remember this point it will be all the honor Washington would want.

It doesn’t take a great man to collect and wield power. All men do that, and always have. It takes a great man to resist the trappings of high office, and the urge to inflict his vision on everyone else. It’s strange how we celebrate our overthrow of the British monarchy each July, and regularly pat ourselves on the back for our system of checks and balances, yet then turn around and celebrate the men who have most behaved like tyrants, and done all in their might to circumvent the restrictions the Constitution puts on their powers.

As we enter into one of the great mattress discount holidays, let us not forget that this is actually a celebration of Washington’s Birthday.

One of the warnings the only President to not have party affiliation gave us in his farewell address was about the perils of factions.

Liberty … is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction … and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyments of the rights of person and property.

(Note: There is no such Federal holiday called President’s Day. But there was legislation called Uniform Monday Holiday Act, which I posit made us all forget why we are having 3-day weekends.)

Anton at work passes this brilliant Easter Egg along. Oh, might not be safe for work if someone is always looking over your shoulder, who is easily offended, and reads Russian.

Check out http://home.corbina.ru/, a Russian ISP/Telecom.
Wait about a minute, until little buttons appear at the bottom and to the left of the guy in the flash.
Then drag the left most button to the right most button.
Easter Egg begins, The caption says ‘Mmm… what a connection!”

(The title of the post should be in Russian but it is being lost somewhere in the internals along the way. The anglicized version is pronounced po-tr-ya-sa-you-she, try saying that just one time fast.)

Ben Joravsky has another of his great articles on how taxes work in Cook County.

Daley controls that. He does so because in our infinite wisdom, we voters have made it clear that we’re comfortable with a relatively benign brand of tyranny where one man controls everything. And I mean everything. Through board appointments and endorsements of elected officials, the mayor oversees the schools, parks, city services, and even to an extent the county—he virtually handpicked Todd Stroger to be president, and his brother John is chairman of the board’s finance committee. And of course he controls the city’s budget.

Nothing new. He Honor is trying to hide the fact that he is the reason taxes are going up.

Joravsky details some amazing increases. (We got our tax bills for the first half, last week.) I thought our taxes are high, but some people have had amazing increases in iffy hoods.

He closes with what is a sad truth about how statist culture changes people.

I used to think that once average Chicagoans got hit with big tax hikes they’d finally rise up against their leaders. But now I’m starting to think they’re too bewildered to fight back. As some aldermen are always telling me, if you keep the people dumb, they’re easier to control. In this respect, Mayor Daley’s press conference on assessments was a step in the right direction.