Tuesday Miscellany

The holidays approach. Not much time for blogging, and not much bloggable information out there. Personal responsibility took another step back: Canada ruled that fat people must get a free extra plane ticket and Citibank got more money. I can live with the fat person decision, but I'm not sure I can live with the Citibank one. I noticed that the President-elect said we're in an "historic" economic crisis. He might be taking a lead from FDR's playbook: Make things sound even grimmer than they are, so everyone gives you a free hand to do whatever you want (I read Crisis and Leviathan--the book referenced in the link--and Higgs presents facts and citations to back up everything he says; it was published by Oxford University Press). With a little luck, Obama will be able to saddle America with programs for the next 100 years, just like FDR did with social security.