I had a fleeting moment of deep joy the other day. Dsquared had mentioned the RCP (this being the British RCP, not the butt of Scott McLemee’s jokes) in some comments thread, and, via the Virtual Stoa, I saw that spiked-online are described as British Conservatives at What is Liberalism?

The RCP was, for a while, the coolest group on the left. They were so cool that people like me couldn’t even speak to them. They wore clothes that even I could see were hip as hip could be. They were all tall, and dark, and good-looking. They were also articulate (all, I gather now, having been to the University of Kent — scroll down), and there was a rumour that the SWP had banned its members from attending RCP events, for fear of losing grips on them. The group is now defunct not, as with so many others, because it collapsed, but because it members became converted to the joys of capitalism en masse, and created a journal called Living Marxism (devoted to promoting libertarian capitalism and downplaying the atrocities of the Milosevic regime), the descendent of which is spiked-online.

Anyway, I digress. Why the deep joy?

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The “Rousseau Association/Association Rousseau”:http://www.rousseauassociation.org/default.htm , which is a very fine bunch of scholars and a nice crowd of human beings, has “a new website”:http://www.rousseauassociation.org/default.htm thanks to Zev Trachtenberg at the University of Oklahoma. It is still in development but when finished it should be an important resource and marks a distinct improvement on the last version. Visitors can dowload works by Rousseau, follow links to other sites of interest, browse a selection of images and even “listen to some of the music”:http://www.rousseauassociation.org/aboutRousseau/musicalWorks.htm Jean-Jacques composed. (Full disclosure, I’m currently VP of the Association.)

A new “comic series”:http://accstudios.com/f/synopsis1.htm looks to be a must-buy (Preview available “here”:http://accstudios.com/f/comicpreview_page_covera.htm):

bq. America’s future has become an Orwellian nightmare of ultra-liberalism. Beginning with the Gore Presidency, the government has become increasingly dominated by liberal extremists. In 2004, Muslim terrorists stopped viewing the weakened American government as a threat; instead they set their sites on their true enemies, vocal American conservatives. On one dark day, in 2006, many conservative voices went forever silent at the hands of terrorist assassins. Those which survived joined forces and formed a powerful covert conservative organization called “The Freedom of Information League”, aka F.O.I.L. The F.O.I.L. Organization is forced underground by the “Coulter Laws” of 2007; these hate speech legislations have made right-wing talk shows, and conservative-slanted media, illegal. … Rupert Murdoch’s decision to defy the “Coulter Laws” hate speech legislations, has bankrupted News Corporation. George Soros has bought all of News Corps assets and changed its name to Liberty International Broadcasting. LIB’s networks have flourished and circle the globe with a series of satellites beaming liberal & U.N. propaganda worldwide. The New York City faction of F.O.I.L. is lead by Sean Hannity, G. Gordon Liddy and Oliver North, each uniquely endowed with special abilities devised by a bio mechanical engineer affectionately nicknamed “Oscar”. F.O.I.L. is soon to be joined by a young man named Reagan McGee.

Meanwhile, a mechanically enhanced Glenn Reynolds is presumably heading up F.O.I.L’s Tennessee branch.

via “Jesse Walker”:http://www.reason.com/hitandrun/2005/08/but_will_we_eve.shtml at Hit and Run (whose post has one of the most disturbing titles I’ve ever seen).

I recently criticized the New Republic, so I should point out that this week’s cover story is really very good. It collects the most forceful criticisms of the Bush Administration’s anti-terrorism program, and puts them into a larger framework. Scoblic argues that the Administration’s focus on regime change led them to target Iraq in large part because it was the least painful to overthrow. At the same time, their logic led them to de-emphasize, or even sabotage, efforts to reduce the threat from Iran and North Korea.

Unfortunately, regime change was not only the administration’s preferred end in Iraq, but its preferred means everywhere else, as well. If negotiating with evil regimes equals appeasement, then diplomacy to resolve rogue-state nuclear threats is out of the question. But, aside from military action, conservatism suggests few courses of action, and, with the bulk of our combat forces tied up in Iraq, forcible regime change was not an option in North Korea or Iran. So, not only did conservatism lead us to war against a nation that was not threatening us, it paralyzed us from dealing with those nations that were.

I don’t see that the faults that Scoblic identifies are endemic to conservatism as such- I could imagine a very different course, pre- and post-9/11, under a different Republican President- but it’s still worth the cover price. The critique of Bush’s approach to North Korea is especially maddening.

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Today and tomorrow, I’m guestblogging at Steve Clemons’ “Washington Note”:http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/. It seems to be a somewhat different crowd of readers and commenters than here at CT – more policy wonks than academics. Normal service will be resumed shortly (and I may cross-post one or two posts in the meantime).

I’ve just wheeled the latest issue of Imprints (8:3) to the post office and it will shortly be sent out to subscribers. Having just done this, I’ve noticed there’s *a typo on the cover* Crossland for Crosland — aargh!! Still, if you can get past that there’s a great deal of interest inside:

bq. * An interview with Joseph Raz
* Philip Bielby on equality and vulnerability in biomedical research
* Kevin Hickson on revisionism from Crosland to New Labour

and reviews by — cue drumroll — Crooked Timber stalwarts Harry Brighouse and Kieran Healy of, respectively, Anne Alstott’s “No Exit: What Parents Owe Their Children and What Society Owes Parents”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195162366/junius-20 and Eric Klinenberg’s “Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0226443221/junius-20 . Kieran’s long-awaited “review was pre-published here on CT”:https://crookedtimber.org/2005/03/22/hot-in-the-city/ .

Here’s the first draft of my Hugos preview. Comments much appreciated.

Thanks to all who contributed. Australian readers can see the final product in Friday’s Financial Review

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I’m gradually making my way back to Tucson from Australia. Free advice: if you can avoid taking a flight across the Pacific oecean with a small child suffering from a cold and teething pain, go right ahead and avoid it. I am presently at an undisclosed location in the Pacific Northwest. Outside the hotel is a little plaza. A band has been playing Christian rock music to a small crowd. Lots of terrible, low-quality, saccharine power ballad stuff, complete with sexualized double-talk. (“There was a man in my room last night … ” Guess who it was.) Like Creed on valium. Hard to imagine, I know. They just closed out the show with a version of “I’m a Believer.” By far the liveliest song they’ve played, but with the lyrics changed. (“Then I saw _his_ face,” etc.) I suppose _something_ has to counterbalance the fact that a large chunk of the best music ever written is Christian music.

Inspired by Chris’ posts about PledgeBank, I decided to set one up myself [password: running]. The silly part about mine is that my pledge has no collective action problem since one person making a decision to take on the action would achieve its intended goal, which is to add some additional exercise to one’s life. Nonetheless, I was intrigued by the service so I gave it a try.

My pledge has to do with training to run a 5K. I have been meaning to take on running, but have never had the necessary enthusiasm. I thought if I had a group of people training at the same time that would offer the inspiration I am lacking. I thought a dozen people training together – not in any geographical proximity per se – would do the trick.

I sent the pledge around to friends a few weeks ago. I have “only” gotten five to sign up. I need six more and the deadline is tomorrow. It’s not that my friends are lazy. It’s actually the opposite. So many of my friends are already running marathons (no joke!) that this pledge is irrelevant for them. I thought I’d see if any CT readers have been contemplating such an exercise regime and wanted to come on board. Any takers?

I’ve decided to do a pre-announcement review of the candidates for the 2005 Hugo Award for best novel. I’ll post a draft before too long, I hope.

But one vision of the future disturbs me. I was reading Charles Stross’ Iron Sunrise (a strong contender, but I liked his Singularity Sky better), set in the 24th century, and he introduces a character who had inherited the masthead of The Times and announced his profession as “warblogger”.

I don’t really suppose our little virtual community is going to last a thousand years, or even 300, but just in case, can’t we find some way to agree on a better name than “blogger”?

I recently traded in a 2000 Toyota 4-Runner to buy a new Prius. It’s great. My gas mileage tripled – over its 1500 miles so far, it has averaged around 50 mpg. The sight-lines take a little getting used to – or maybe it’s just the adjustment after climbing down from an SUV – but it handles well and I’ve had no problem with power. I’m very happy with it and its “super ultra low emissions.”

It will also be nice to claim a tax credit next April. However, starting next year, a provision of the new Energy Bill will cap at 60,000 per company the number of hybrids that can claim a credit. “This year alone, Toyota projects it will sell 140,000 hybrids.”

During the two quarters immediately after the cars and trucks of the automakers become ineligible for the full credit, buyers would receive 50 percent of the credit. The next two quarters after that, the credit is 25 percent. The credit is phased out entirely at the end of the fifth full quarter after the automaker sells 60,000 hybrids or advanced diesels.

“By capping the credit, Congress has limited the incentives available to companies that have been at the forefront of hybrid technology” – namely, Toyota and Honda. Way to get those incentives right, guys!

Meanwhile, Toyota is taking full advantage of its remaining incentives. The new Lexus hybrid uses its additional electric power not to increase its gas mileage, which in real world conditions stays exactly the same as its gas-powered equivalent, but to boost its horsepower. (However, the additional power seems to be largely offset by the increased weight of the hybrid system.) And, yes, it still does qualify for the tax incentive – up to the 60,000 cut-off, of course.

From the back of a packet of “Hans All-Natural Chicken and Apple Sausages”:http://hansallnatural.com/dir/products/itempage.aspx?ItemID=34, I discover the artistic urge that led to the creation of these distinguished offal tubes.

bq. While touring alluring ocean fronts and majestic alpine passages, an epiphany occurred to Hans: create organic sausages as natural as the glistening of the snow and as genuine as the sunset’s glow.

Not quite up there with the “European bake shop”:http://www.kieranhealy.org/blog/archives/000159.html, but a noble ambition nonetheless.

These two image collections don’t have to constitute a time sink depending on when you are able to tear yourself away from them.

• The Zoom Quilt
• People staring at screens of people staring at screens of people staring at screens of…

I recently made a one-night trip from Houston to Chicago with very little notice. I managed to save almost $200 off of the lowest-price plane ticket by adding a hotel room at a Super 8 outside of Gary, IN, which I didn’t use.

A quick look at Travelocity shows me that it was no fluke- for brief trips with very little notice, it’s much cheaper to book a flight to Chicago if you book a room at a Super 8 at the same time. At the time that I originally wrote this post, Delta would sell a flight from Houston to Chicago for $616 without a hotel room, $340 with. If I needed to leave tomorrow, I could buy a ticket on American for $606 without a hotel room, or $350 with.

How does this make sense? I can imagine that, all other things being equal, it would be worth a few bucks to an underutilized hotel to boost its occupancy rates. They might gain a customer for the future. However, even if the hotel in question incurred no costs at all for a housing a guest, I see no way that the hotel could derive $200+ worth of benefit. I must be missing something obvious, but I can’t figure out what.