Inspired by James Taranto (scroll down to "Maybe We Should Call It a Bye-Ku"):

Haughty French looking
Brain was seared in Vietnam
Taxes need raising

In other news, I have to take issue with Taranto's posts (here, here, here and here) concerning Terri Schiavo. Taranto correctly points out that Schiavo is not brain dead, but consistently misses (or, given his intelligence, chooses to miss) the point, which is that Mrs. Schiavo, were she competent, could elect not to receive any treatment, and could also elect to refuse nutrition. Since she is not competent, the law provides that she can still act through a proxy such as a guardian. Without any written evidence of her desires, in the form of a living will, the parties (her husband on the one hand and her parents - and apparently Jeb Bush - on the other) are reduced to arguing about what Taranto dismisses as "secondhand reports of offhand comments."

First, it is not clear that the reports are secondhand or that the comments were offhand. Personally, I would not lightly make a comment like "I would not want to live like that" or "Don't let me live like that".

Second, even if it is true that these are "secondhand reports of offhand comments", no one is claiming that this is the best possible evidence, but it is evidence. And I have seen no reports of comments leaning the other way.

Third, and most importantly, Taranto is clearly wrong when he tries to argue (here) that the absence of a living will by Mrs. Schiavo should doom her to continued existence in an "undead" persistent vegetative state. Yes, her desires would presumably be clear if expressed in a living will. Unfortunately, not many twenty five year olds (Schiavo's age when she was last competent) have them. No one has any real desire to think about the possibility of being in Schiavo's situation. It most frequently comes up when discussing your Last Will and Testament, when the subject of ones death is already on the table. Not too many twenty five year olds have discussed estate planning.

The absence of a living will creates no presumption one way or the other as to a person's desire to continue, commence, withdraw or withhold medical treatment or procedures such as feeding tubes. Florida law (and every other law permitting living wills with which I am familiar) states that where there is no living will, a proxy will be appointed from a ranked list of classes of people, and that proxy may make health care decisions:

Any health care decision made under this part must be based on the proxy's informed consent and on the decision the proxy reasonably believes the patient would have made under the circumstances. If there is no indication of what the patient would have chosen, the proxy may consider the patient's best interest in deciding that proposed treatments are to be withheld or that treatments currently in effect are to be withdrawn.

Florida Statutes, Title XLIV, Chapter 765, Section 401, emphasis added.

In the Schiavo case, even according Taranto, there is an indication of what his wife would have chosen. The issue of the weight to be accorded to that indication was settled by the Florida Legislature in the statute. It is given controlling weight.

As near as I can tell without being actually involved in representing one of the parties, the best medical evidence available is that Mrs.Schiavo, while not dead, is gone, and she won't be coming back. Her husband and her parents both have my sympathy. For their sakes, I wish it were not so.

But it is so, and the parties simply have to deal with both the situation and the law as they find it, not as they would wish it to be.

 
I came across this post on AMCGLtd.com via Instantman.

Newsweek reports that even Saddam did a better job than Dubya in restoring post conflict electricity. Excerpts from the article:

Some CPA officials concede privately that the problem stems from the lack of preparation before the war. “It always comes back to the same thing: no plan,” says one CPA staffer.

And:

Iraqis like to point out that after the 1991 war, Saddam restored the badly destroyed electric grid in only three months.

You get the idea. There's no plan, we're losing the peace, Bush is a failure, yada yada yada.

So a "lowly blogger sitting in Northern Virginia with little more than Google and a good memory for stories" does a little fact checking and comes up with the goods: Saddam restored electricity selectively to reward his pals and punish his enemies. Since the pals were in Baghdad and the rest of the Sunni Triangle, that's where the juice flowed. The US is taking a different route, restoring power throughout the nation "fairly." I'm not sure how they are choosing which part of the grid to work on, but clearly it isn't based on political favoritism (since the Sunni Triangle would be completely blacked out for the next twenty years if that were the case).

OK, nothing unusual about that so far, but then I read in the comments:

"... does this mean that you will now go through all other "outlandish" articles looking for the historical inaccuracies? And when you find these written atrocities will you highlight the mistakes that are within the article? If so, then why didn't you start back when the repubs were showing all those ads about the amazing lies that Gore was doing? And does this mean we can expect a balanced "lie detector" with the upcoming elections and ads coming from both sides?

"Besides, good job in taking away from the remaining parts of the article. You know, the areas where they are talking about the no-bid contracts going to certain companies and the corners cut to make that happen."

No Joshua, finding an "inaccuracy" (spin, mistake or lie, it doesn't matter, just call it like you see it) and writing a blog post on it is not an undertaking to critically review any statement by anyone anywhere anytime. If you want to criticize Bush campaign ads (three years after the election!), be my guest. You've got a blog. Use it.

The fact is that someone found an "inaccuracy" in an old media publication. You either want to defend that publication or you simply can't stand having Dubya look like anything other than a complete failure. Either way, a blogger's failure to also criticize the people you want criticized does not make the Newsweek story any more accurate.

The only failure here (besides Newsweek's) is yours. If you think the guy's post on the story is inaccurate or misleading, show me why you think so. Sarcastic references to completely irrelevant matters such as the 2001 election or portions of the article that the blogger was not commenting on just don't make it anymore.

Heres a clue: This is the NEW media.

 
"Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety nine percent perspiration." - Thomas Edison

"A lot of that perspiration comes from figuring out which inspirations to ignore." - Steven Den Beste

 
Via Andrew Sullivan:

...[A] year from now, the last desperate card in the hands of the anti-Americanists will be not that Iraq is democratic, but that it is democratic solely through the agency of the United States — a fate worse than remaining indigenously murderous and totalitarian. Victor Davis Hanson

 
Tales from the Gage household.
6:45 pm:
(ring)(ring)
CG: Hello?
Voice: Hello, my name is _________ and I am calling to see if you are interested in refinancing your ...
CG: I am not interested, thank you.
(hang up)
(ring)(ring)
CG: Hello?
Same Voice: Was there some reason that you hung up on me ...
CG: Uhh, yeah. It was a while back, so I'm not sure I remember correctly, but I'm pretty sure it was because I'm not interested. Thank you.
(hang up)
(ring)(ring)
CG (stupidly answering the damn phone): Hello?
Same Voice: Don't do that again.
CG (annoyed): I AM NOT FUCKING INTERESTED, DIPSHIT. DON'T CALL ME AGAIN. DO YOU UNDERSTAND? THANK YOU!
(hang up)
(ring)(ring)
CG: Look, even if you don't mind wasting my time, are you so stupid that you don't realize that you're wasting yours? I mean, I'm pretty sure the words "I'm not interested" would give a normally intelligent salesman a hint. Oh, and by the way, it hasn't changed in the last fifteen seconds.
(hang up)

That had to be the dumbest telephone solicitor I have ever received a call from. He even listened to my last rant.

 
Fritz Schranck discusses the well documented fact that lower income people contribute disproportionately to government revenues by playing state lotteries. Fritz' comment that purchasing a lottery ticket is a voluntary action by adults who are apparently relatively well informed about the nature of their bet is well taken, and I cannot disagree more with the "critics" who consider state run lotteries just one more exploitation of the financially challenged.

But Fritz left out the best part. Part of the reason that New Jersey, at least, adopted the lottery was to displace organized crime. One major reason behind the move by New Jersey into gambling was that it would cut off a source of funding for the mob. And my guess (without any research whatsoever) is that state lotteries have been somewhere between moderately and wildly successful in this regard. Organized crime just doesn't appear to be in the numbers racket any more. So in addition to providing the state with a substantial alternate revenue source to replace the lottery the "critics" would ban, those same "critics" should should also have to explain how they are going to prevent a renaissance of the mob's numbers game, and why it is so much better for a poor person to place a bet with organized crime than to place that same bet with the governor of the state.

This is one area in which the nanny state is powerless to protect us from ourselves. It appears that people in general, and poor people in particular, are going to gamble. The only question about which there can be any debate is who the bookie is.

 
Somewhere, George Santayana just has to be smiling.

It was Santayana who wrote "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." That was in 1905, the last time the Cubs won the Series.

And by God, there it is, plain as the nose on your face: An absolutely amazing example of Santayana's observation.

The troops returning home are worried. “We’ve lost the peace,” men tell you. “We can’t make it stick.”

On ... [the regime], which plunged the ...[area] into its misery, falls the blame for its own plight and the plight of ... [the region]. But if this winter proves worse even than the war years, blame will fall on the victor nations.

Forgive me the Dowdified elipses, but those quotes could have been taken from any one of a number of current stories in mainstream newspapers and magazines. They weren't. They are from two stories in Life magazine dated January, 1946, one by novelist John Dos Passos and the other introducing the Dos Passos article.

January, 1946. That's about six months after V-E Day.

The complete quote that I altered to make my point:

"On Germany, which plunged the Continent into its misery, falls the blame for its own plight and the plight of all Europe. But if this winter proves worse even than the war years, blame will fall on the victor nations. "

A question for those Senators who voted to convert half of the reconstruction aid into a loan: Did the Marshall Plan involve any loans?

From Jessica's Well, via the prof.

 
Another attack in the Middle East. This one was in Gaza. This one was aimed at us.

GAZA CITY (CNN) -- A bomb went off underneath a convoy carrying U.S. diplomats in Gaza Wednesday, killing three American members of a security detail and injuring another in an unprecedented attack, U.S. officials said.

...

The convoy was carrying U.S. Embassy officials to Gaza to interview Palestinian students who have applied for Fulbright scholarships in the United States, Kurtzer said.

...

A senior U.S. State Department official said the convoy had just entered Gaza through the Erez Checkpoint and was traveling a commonly known route often used by U.S. diplomats.

According to the State Department, a roadside bomb was triggered immediately after the Palestinian police cars in the convoy passed by, hitting the second U.S. vehicle that followed.

(Emphasis added.) So they waited for the Palestinians to pass and triggered the bomb under the car carrying the Americans.

An Associated Press correspondent at the scene reported seeing a gray wire leading from the bomb crater to a small concrete building nearby. He said an on/off switch was attached to the wire. ...

So they watched and waited for the Palestinians to pass and triggered the bomb under the car carrying the Americans.

No group has claimed responsibility. Two Palestinian militant groups -- Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad -- told news agencies they had nothing to do with the bombing.

Well, no one said they were stupid in a tactical sense. Strategic issues are another matter altogether. I think it might finally be getting through to the Palestinians that it is no longer open season on Americans. Even if (as I stongly suspect) they are lying about their culpability.

The attack was believed to be the first aimed at Americans since the beginning of the current Palestinian uprising, now in its third year.

Kurtzer said the Palestinian Authority had been asked to arrest those responsible.

Don't hold your breath.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei strongly condemned the attack, offered his condolences, and promised an investigation.

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat also offered his condolences and condemned the attack.

Nice words. Again. No action. Again.

"These people were here to help us," Erakat insisted, saying an attack on what he described as U.S. monitors was not in the interest of the Palestinian people. "I don't think this was a deliberate attack against the Americans.

Let's see. They watched and waited for the Palestinians to get safely by and triggered the bomb under a vehicle they undoubtedly knew to be carrying Americans, maybe even John Wolf, described below as "U.S. special envoy to the Middle East." But this was not an attack on Americans. Oh, and the Palestinian government is cool with blowing up cars passing through Gaza as long as said cars are only occupied by Jews. Why are there still people who believe that this government is itself not a terrorist organization?

"We offer to have an immediate, joint Palestinian-American investigation committee to investigate the matter," Erakat said.

Why do I think that no investigation is necessary, that they know damn well who did it and won't shoot the SOB (or send him to us) because Arafat and the factions he controls don't want to?

John Wolf, special U.S. envoy to the Middle East, was not in the country at the time of the attack despite media reports that said he was in the convoy, the embassy said.

A little bit out of order within the story, but they watched and waited for the Palestinians to pass and triggered the bomb under the car they thought would be carrying an American of ambassadorial rank. But this was not an attack on Americans.

Erakat said the Americans were in Gaza as part of the U.S.-backed "road map" for peace in the region.

The road map -- a plan put forth by the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations -- calls for an end to "violence and terrorism" and envisions an independent Palestine existing side-by-side with Israel by 2005.

Let's try that one again. The roadmap calls for the immediate and unconditional cessation of violence (without the scare quotes) by the Palestinians, dismantling of the Palestinian terror organizations, Palestinian political reform, drafting a Palestinian constitution, and free, fair and open elections under that constitution, with supportive measures and security cooperation by Israel. (Phase One) Anyone see any of those things happen yet? No? So we don't get to Phase II, do we?

Dore Gold, a senior adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, also offered condolences, noting that Israelis "understand exactly the kind of grief this terrible, terrible terrorism causes."

"Clearly these attacks are motivated by the same anti-Western, anti-American feelings that unite all these forces in the Middle East," he said.

Gold said "this attack would never have occurred" if the Palestinian Authority had cracked down on terrorist groups.

He got that last one right. How long do we have to wait until we hear that the failure to award those scholarships (because the people who were going to award them are dead) is evidence of Amerikkkka's racist bias in favor of those Jews?

 
For those of you wondering why we went to Iraq:

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 13 — Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, announced on Monday it would hold its first elections to choose municipal councils in what is widely seen as the first concrete political reform in the Gulf Arab state.

THE ANNOUNCEMENT by the cabinet followed increased demands by reformists, intellectuals and academics on de facto ruler Crown Prince Abdullah to allow wider political participation, elections and freedom of expression in the conservative kingdom.

“The council of ministers decided to widen participation of citizens in running local affairs through elections by activating municipal councils, with half the members of each council being elected," the state news agency SPA said.

The kingdom, under the dynastic rule of the house of Saud since it was founded, has an appointed advisory Shura Council but had never had elections for public office at any level.

Is this move toward popular elections enough? No. Does it mean that Saudi Arabia (or the Middle East in general) is about to become a secular democracy? No. But its a start and a start is one whole helluva lot better than nothing. Left out of the story: Are women permitted to vote? To run for the positions open?

I think the House of Saud is going to find (over the course of years, if not decades) that half measures like this one lead to increased, not decreased, demands for more freedom and political and economic self determination. The Chinese are currently discovering this, and are reacting by attempting to censor the internet. Talk about hopeless tasks.

Would anyone care to speculate whether the "reformists, intellectuals and academics" would have been able to demand anything at all of Adullah without 150,000 US troops next door? How about some speculation on how likely a development like this would without a nascent democracy next door being installed by those 150,000 US troops?

 
With apologies to the Little Red Hen:

“Who will help me find these terrorists?” asked the United States.

"Not I," said the French. "If we help the United States, it will become too powerful and we cannot allow that."

"Not I," said the Germans. "The United States has not yet asked itself why it is so hated around the world."

"Not I," said the Belgians. "Americans who defend themselves are automatically committing war crimes and we cannot participate in such things."

"Not I, said NATO. "The purpose of this alliance is for the United States to spend money defending Europe under the wise tutelage of our superior European intellects, so as to enable Europe to spend its own money building dysfunctional welfare states."

"Not I," said the Security Council. "The purpose of this organization is to take huge sums of money from the United States while providing legitimacy to the world's dictators and avoiding, as much as possible, doing anything which might conceivably benefit the United States."

"I will," said the British. "Our cousins have been brutally murdered and need our help."

"I will," said the Australians. "The same people who attacked the United States also attacked us."

"I will," said the Poles. "We know what it is like to live under regimes such as the Taliban and Saddam Hussein."

“Then the British, Australians, Poles and I will find them ourselves,” said the United States.


“Who will help me catch these terrorists?” asked the United States.

"Not I," said the French. "Americans who are not dying in large numbers to save us from the Germans are simply obnoxious and deserve no help."

"Not I," said the Germans. "Our government faces an election and the only way it can stay in power is to blame America for all of the troubles in the world."

"Not I," said the Belgians. "Now you see the price you pay for failing to agree to prostrate yourselves before the environmental altar of the Kyoto Protocol."

"Not I, said NATO. "We cannot participate with anyone other than Bill Clinton in committing warlike acts."

"Not I," said the Security Council. "We are presently much too busy attempting to resolve whether the Commission on Human Rights should be chaired by Libya or Cuba."

"I will," said the British.

"I will," said the Australians.

"I will," said the Poles.

“Then the British, Australians, Poles and I will catch them ourselves,” said the United States.


“Who will help me prevent these terrorists from attacking me again?” asked the United States.

"Not I," said the French. "The United States is led by a country bumpkin who is a tool of the Jews living in that shitty little country."

"Not I," said the Germans. "You simply cannot take members of an army which attacked you and place them in a prison in a far away land without affording them all of the rights of the very same criminal justice system they are sworn to destroy. You are as bad as they are."

"Not I," said the Belgians. "The United States refuses to explore the possiblity of immediate and unconditional surrender to all of the terrorists demands, and therefore is unworthy of our assistance."

"Not I, said NATO. "It might come to pass that a soldier or airman other than an American might be injured or killed if we were to participate."

"Not I," said the Security Council. "We have not yet exhausted our supply of resolute frowns and cannot consider more serious consequences for repeated violations of the resolutions we adopted over the last decade until no one in the world is capable of at least sternly speaking to the admitted miscreants."

"I will," said the British.

"I will," said the Australians.

"I will," said the Poles.

“Then the British, Australians, Poles and I will prevent them ourselves,” said the United States.


"Who can I pay to provide services to the Afghani and Iraqi people and to build the thngs they need?" asked the United States.

The line immediately formed on the right.

 
I just read an article on Kobe Bryant, and it brought to mind something that's been bothering me for a while.

For quite some time, there has been a rule (law or custom, I don't know which) under which the victim's name is never published. The purpose of keeping a rape victim's name out of the papers is to protect her from the stigma attached (wrongly, in my judgment) to having been raped.

OK, fine. There shouldn't be a stigma attached to having been attacked, but in the real world, there is. Some people will think that she is lying. Others will believe that she had it coming or led the guy on or something. No matter what the evidence is, there are those in this world who will blame the victim. And of course, regardless of what actually happened, she is claiming she had sex with the guy and the "damaged goods" crowd is still with us, even though in smaller numbers than in the past.

My question is, what about the man? Prior to conviction, he is innocent. Isn't he entitled to the same consideration given to the alleged victim? Isn't there a stigma attached to being accused of rape? Are there not people in the world who will think that he is lying, regardless of what the evidence shows? Aren't there people who will believe that the SOB escaped conviction as a result of prosecutorial error, slick defense lawyers, stupid juries, unfair judges or medieval laws? Just as some will blame the victim, others will blame the supposed perpetrator.

So why is there no prohibition on publishing the guy's name before the trial? I don't care about post trial publicity if there is a conviction. The conviction establishes that he did it. That makes him an asshole, at best, and undeserving of any consideration in this regard. But before trial (and post trial as well, if there is an acquittal), he is just as deserving of protection as the alleged victim is.

The double standard involved creates a perverse incentive for an unscrupulous female. Assume for a minute that woman A wants to shake down male celebrity B. Because she gets to hide (at least temporarily) behind the barrier of the publishing ban, and he does not, an unfair advantage exists. The celebrity accused pays the price (as Bryant is now paying) in terms of horrendous publicity and possibly cancelled endorsements, appearances or even careers, not to mention high priced defense lawyers. And, even under the best circumstances, only the two people actually involved know what really happened. Practically by definition they were alone at the critical time. The rest of us have no clue until the trial. Sure, there can be physical injuries, but no one except the two participants knows how they came about. So there is a huge incentive to the celebrity to avoid the whole mess by paying the woman to go away, regardless of what happened.

Come to think of it, you don't even need a celebrity defendant. Can you say Tawana Brawley?

To eliminate the problem, all you have to do is to avoid publication of both names, not just hers.

Sauce for the goose ...

 
So today is the big day on the Left Coast. Recall day in Collyvornia.

Regardless of the outcome of the vote, I think California politics will suffer from this for a long time. And maybe other states as well, if there are similar provisions in their laws. (The US Constitution thankfully has no analogous provisions. Short of death or resignation, you either impeach and convict the office holder or he serves his full term.)

As I understand it, the recall provisions have been part of the California Constitution for almost 100 years, and that recall petition drives have been mounted about three or four times since then, all of which, except the current one, were unsuccessful in obtaining the required number of signatures. For the foreseeable future, I think every California governor will at least have to deal with a recall petition, and quite possibly a recall vote (given the numbers required).

There are a couple of reasons for that conclusion.

First, the math involved. For a recall petition to be placed on the ballot, the petition must be signed by twelve percent of the number of people who voted in the previous election (spread out over a minimum number of counties). That means that unless the candidate achieves a Cuban (or pre-war Iraqi) type majority, just the people who voted against him can easily trigger a ballot vote.

Next, technology. Gathering those petition signatures used to be a huge task. Damn near impossible to do in any reasonable amount of time in a large state like California. Not anymore. Now we've been shown how its done.

And last but not least, revenge. The justification for the next recall will be"They started it." And, true enough, "they" did. (I had nothing to do with it. Really!) What one thinks of the motives behind the current recall (stealing an election or ousting an incompetent) will be completely irrelevant to the next, since the people in favor of the current recall will oppose the next one. Not that this is much of a justification. It doesn't even work too well on the playground, at least after the adults arrive.

So when James Taranto mourns the passing into history of the Gray Davis recall, I am pretty sure he is being a tad premature.

The recall provisions in the California Constitution seem alot like nuclear weapons to me. It is better to have them then not to have them. They are convenient to rattle every once in a while when things get really bad. But using them will have ugly consequences for decades.

 
Cap'n Den Beste has written a number of times on the "tragedy of the commons". Now a reader writes to him discussing the problem and doesn't buy the example of sheep on the commons. A better "real life" example illustrating the problem of the tragedy of the commons in today's world where all of the sheep are in Australia and New Zealand:

Ten houses are on the shores of a lake. Each house has a cesspool that drains into the lake and the lake is therefore polluted enough to prevent swimming and fishing. With the lake polluted, each house is worth $100,000. With the lake cleaned up, each house would be worth $125,000. To clean up the lake, at least six householders have to spend $5,000 each on plumbing.

Without the intervention of some outside force (ie: government), no one will install the plumbing required to clean up the lake. At best, each householder makes a rational decision to wait for five others to install the plumbing first. That way, when the sixth householder spends his $5K, he is assured of a $25K return. Householders one through five spend their $5K with no assured return. Of course, each of the ten householders also wants to be one of the four holdouts who spend nothing and get the $25K return anyway.

The generalization is: the sum of a series of rational decisions can be an irrational outcome. This can happen literally anywhere. It even occurs in government.

Assume a legislature is divided politically into three groups of equal size (Groups 1, 2 and 3), and that, on a particular issue, there are three available choices (Choices A, B and C). Assume further that each political group orders its preferences among the available choices as follows:

Group 1 prefers A over B and B over C
Group 2 prefers C over A and A over B
Group 3 prefers B over C and C over A

If all three alternatives are presented for a vote at one time, there is no majority and no plurality for any one alternative.

If the three alternatives are presented for a vote one pair at time, the outcome is determined by the order of presentation.

In a contest between alternatives A and B, Groups 1 and 2 vote for A, so A survives to face alternative C.

In a subsequent contest between alternatives A and C, Groups 2 and 3 vote for C, so C wins and is presumably enacted into law.

But change the order of the presentation and you get the following:

In a contest between alternatives B and C, Groups 1 and 3 vote for B, so B survives to face alternative A.

In a subsequent contest between alternatives B and A , Groups 1 and 2 vote for A, so A wins and is enacted into law.

The change in the order of the presentation of the alternatives changed the outcome. The order of presentation has nothing to do with anyone's preferences, much less the merits of the issue. Having the outcome determined by a factor like order of presentation is irrational, but each group ordered its priorities rationally and voted rationally on those preferences.

For those of you with a mathematical bent, the problem can be described as an impossible equation:

A > B > C > A

In the (increasingly) dim recesses of my memory, I recall that someone once researched the issue and found that the problem had occurred on at least a few identifiable occasions on the record in Congress over the last two hundred years. And, of course, there are vastly greater possibilities of it having happened off the record as well, for example within administrative agencies.

For those of you foolish enough to want to know more, pick up a book on game theory. As I recall, the one I used in college (way too old) was by William (?) Riker and was, oddly enough, entitled "Game Theory". But since I can't find either Riker or the book in the Library of Congress catalogue, I must be either searching or remembering incorrectly.

The above examples illustrate Arrow's Theorem. The subject also encompases other problems and quirks concerning how choices are made in the public policy arena. While driving through the midwest in the late 40s, someone (Arrow?) noticed that, in each town large enough to have both a Sears and a JC Penney, the stores were located on opposite corners in the center of town, from which he theorized that each organization was locating itself at a geographical point which minimized the distance between itself and its potential customers, thus maximizing the number of potential customers, who were assumed to treat the two stores identically and buy from the closer one. Arrow or whoever applied that observation to political parties. The opinions held by the population on a given issue will be distributed along a bell curve. Each political party will adopt a position it hopes is closer to the center if that curve so as to maximize the parties appeal to voters.

And we can't forget the ever popular the Prisoner's Dilemma. Two people accused of jointly participating in the same crime are arrested and interrogated separately. Each is offered the following choice: If the prisoner confesses and agrees to testify against his partner, he will receive a sentence of 3 years, while his non-confessing partner gets 15 years based on that testimony. Each accused criminal knows that if neither confesses, neither will be convicted, and that if they both confess, they will both get 10 years. Unless there is some reason for the prisoners to trust each other, the likely outcome is that they both confess and the aggregate sentence is maximized. This is the reason that organized crime presents such a problem for law enforcement.

By the way, you can thank a certain Iowa housewife for this post. Memorial link indeed. The reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.