July 2013 Sites

Supreme court, Bail-in: 

U.S. asks new limit on Texas vote laws (ScotusBlog)

• The Obama administration, in a sweeping assault on the state of Texas’s history on minorities’ right to vote, asked a federal court in San Antonio on Thursday to impose a ten-year mandate on the state to get official clearance in Washington before it could change any election law or procedure.  In addition, the filing in a three-judge district court suggested that such a mandate beyond ten years should be considered if biased conditions continue. (The main filing, a twenty-eight-page document, is here.

• Justice Department Will Ask Court To Reinstate Voting Rights Act In Texas (ThinkProgress) 

 White people believe the justice system is color blind. Black people really don’t. (Wahington Post)

• Poli-Sci Perspective is a weekly Wonkblog feature in which Georgetown University’s Dan Hopkins and George Washington University’s Danny Hayes and John Sides offer an empirical perspective on the issues dominating Washington. In this edition, Sides interviews political scientists Jon Hurwitz and Mark Peffley about their book [Justice in America: The Separate Realities of Blacks and Whites] on how blacks and whites perceive the criminal justice system, and what it implies for Trayvon Martin’s death, George Zimmerman’s acquittal, and the aftermath. The transcript below has been lightly edited. For past posts in the series, head here.

The Dubious Math Behind Stop and Frisk (Atlantic)

• Yesterday Ray Kelly took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to defend NYPD's Stop and Frisk tactics and its indiscriminate spying on Muslim communities: 

John Paul Stevens: The Court & the Right to Vote: A Dissent (Brad DeLong)

Statistics on Congress Data on the U.S. Congress – A Joint Effort from (Brookings and the American Enterprise Institute)

• Data on our first branch of government – in the election and composition of its membership as well as its formal procedure, such as the use of the filibuster, informal norms, party structure and staff. This dataset also documents the increasing polarization of Congress and the demographics of those who serve in the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives. 

Procrastination (You are Not So Smart)

• The Misconception: You procrastinate because you are lazy and can’t manage your time well.
• The Truth: Procrastination is fueled by weakness in the face of impulse and a failure to think about thinking.

'Crack baby' study ends with unexpected but clear result (Philla)

Feb 2013 sites

2/11/2013

Long Hours, Low Pay [from Tim Smith (Political Irony)]
     It is almost as if someone was purposely overworking teachers and paying them very little. But only in the good old USA.

The Myth of “Saudi America”  By Raymond T. Pierrehumbert (Slate)

     Straight talk from geologists about our new era of oil abundance.

How The Sequester's Budget Cuts Will Devastate Already-Battered Programs:
     Food safety, Aviation safety, Women, Infants, and Children programs, Early Childhood Education, Disaster relief, Health research, and Law enforcement

Jan 2013 Sites

Jan 2013 Sites

• Extend Your Phone’s Battery Life – 3 Apps That Lead To a Longer Lasting Battery [Android]

• An Insurance Company With an Army 
• The Dwindling Deficit 
• Paul Ryan Throws $1.5 Trillion In Spending Cuts Down The Memory Hole: ‘We’ve Yet To Get Anything’ 
• No, Global Warming Hasn't Stopped

• What Nate Silver Gets Wrong, newyorker.com by Gary Marcus And Ernest Davis
  
• The Sophisticated Objection To Emissions Reductions (points to Cass Sunstein)
  
• America's Real Criminal Element: Lead New research finds Pb is the hidden villain behind violent crime, lower IQs, and even the ADHD epidemic. And fixing the problem is a lot cheaper than doing nothing.
• Let’s Give Up on the Constitution, December 30, 2012
• Ethics
•  When is it ethical to kill somone? -- Philosopher David Edmonds  (expert on “trolleyology”) discusses the five books that have had the greatest influence on his work
• Utilitarianism is the view that you should do that which produces the most happiness or wellbeing. It’s a version of consequentialism, which is the view that you should do that which produces the best consequences – utilitarianism says that what matters most about those consequences is happiness.
1. Peter Singer’s Practical Ethics
2. Thomas Nagel’s Mortal Questions
3. Utilitarianism: For and Against, Bernard Williams
4. Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons
5. Janet Radcliffe Richards, The Sceptical Feminist
• Rationality of War: ebook by William Spaniel and interview (Best of Mind Your Decisions, 2012)

• The Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever (and How to Solve It) --> [PDF]
• "Three gods A, B, and C are called, in some order, True, False, and Random. 
• True always speaks truly, False always speaks falsely, but whether Random speaks truly or falsely is a completely random matter. 
• Your task is to determine the identities of A, B, and C by asking three yes-no questions; each question must be put to exactly one god
• The gods understand English, but will answer all questions in their own language in which the words for 'yes' and 'no' are 'da' and 'ja', in some order. You do not know which word means which."

• AntiFragility --  Nassim Nicholas Taleb
• Understanding is a poor substitute for convexity (antifragility) -- Nassim Nicholas Taleb
• Fragile Enough To Fail -- In his new book, Nassim Taleb argues for "antifragility" because "the opposite of fragile is something that actually gains from disorder." He elaborates in an interview with Linda Geddes:

The Essential Guide To Dim Sum -- Know exactly how to order thanks to this breakdown of 24 dishes, including photos and Chinese pronunciation.

6 Reasons Joseph Stiglitz and Other Top Economists Think Means-Testing Medicare & Social Security Is a Destructive Idea, -- Means-testing is a back-door strategy for taking away benefits earned by hard-working Americans. -- Floor vs Net