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Paul Brandon

Paul Brandon's picture
Mankato, MN
Commenter for
5 years 22 weeks

Recent Comments

Posted on 06/14/13 at 09:30 am in response to Want proof that NSA snooping thwarts terror plots? Stand by, senator says

Two guys are walking down the street in New Hampshire.
One of them is snapping his fingers.
_The other asks "why are you doing that"?
"To keep the tigers away".
_"I never saw a tiger in New Hampshire".
"See, it works!"

It will be interesting to see if the plotz foiled include any that didn't involve NSA provocateurs.

Posted on 06/13/13 at 12:01 pm in response to Times profile devastates Anthony Weiner

get him elected!

Posted on 06/12/13 at 10:49 am in response to Selling Star Tribune to Koch some day 'could happen,' chairman says

The STrib is a private business, not a public service, so its first obligation is to it's shareholders.
And, I believe that newspapers get more income from advertising than from circulation, although advertising rates are tied to circulation.
So, it is not surprising that the STrib takes into account what makes its income sources happy. Unbiased reporting (and more to the point, editorializing) would be expected only if all viewpoints were equally represented among its income...

Posted on 06/12/13 at 06:49 pm in response to Selling Star Tribune to Koch some day 'could happen,' chairman says

You've stated the problem well.
Now, how do we solve it
(get American businesses to behave on some basis other than their short term profit)?
Their long term interest is certainly consonant with a healthy society, but people tend to be biased towards short term outcomes (there's a substantial literature on this).
So, how do we bridge the gap between short term and long term outcomes, beyond talking at people?

Posted on 06/13/13 at 03:16 pm in response to Selling Star Tribune to Koch some day 'could happen,' chairman says

on the Koch boys and others, see
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/12/dark-money-politics/?ref...

Note: churning.
The Koches spend a lot more money on politics than their direct contributions would imply.

Posted on 06/11/13 at 07:47 pm in response to Some in MNO 'exodus' took leaves or left before lockout

will now have two chamber orchestras.
I've long been a fan of the SPCO; it's nice to see that the MSO is moving to the same format.

Posted on 06/11/13 at 06:47 pm in response to It’s not the swing states, it’s the three swung states

But nothing new to say.

Posted on 06/10/13 at 02:21 pm in response to Can America have another great president?

Neither Lincoln or FDR were universally regarded as great presidents during their (admittedly short) lifetimes. It took time to provide the context to properly evaluate their achievements.
The same is true today. We may know more trivia about serving presidents now than we did 70 years ago, but I'm not sure we're in a position to put this into a historical context. We need to see the long term consequences of their actions.

Posted on 06/10/13 at 08:56 pm in response to Can America have another great president?

But it does allow him to put down an insurrection and enforce the law.
Agreed that it certainly looked like a war, but legally it wasn't.
Remember, we haven't legally been at war since 1945.

Posted on 06/10/13 at 09:02 pm in response to Can America have another great president?

Does not mean admirable -- just very large in some sense.
Alexander, Charlemagne, Peter, Catherine, William were great in the sense of their impact on events. Individuals labeled 'the Good' are quite a different bag.
'Ronnie the Great' certainly had a great (but certainly not good) effect on the U.S. economy and polity.