Doesn't economic growth cause income inequality?

A commenter asks: "Can liberals and conservatives politely agree that the only time an economy can grow is when 'income inequality' is widening?"

Sure. Absolutely. In a hypothetical case where everybody's income was growing 10 percent a year, that 10 percent would add up to a lot more dollars for the rich guy than the poor guy. But a chart depicting their incomes would show more or less the same rate of growth rising in concert with each other, even as the gaps between the lines grew wider. That might eventually produce a problem—but then again, it might not.

That's not really the situation in the United States, though. Here's a chart from the CBO's October report about income inequality.

The 21st through 80th percentiles—essentially, the middle class—barely see their income edge up between 1979 and 2007. The Top 1 Percent? With a brief break for the post-9/11 recession, their income curves sharply, sharply up, diverging from the other lines pretty dramatically. It's true the economy was generally growing during these periods. But it's also true the gains from that growth went almost entirely to the top of the distribution curve. To me, that suggests something is out of whack.

Four job-seekers for every opening

Today’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the number of job openings decreased by 110,000 in October to 3.3 million. The total number of unemployed workers in October was 13.9 million (unemployment is from the Current Population Survey). Therefore the ratio of unemployed workers to job openings was 4.3-to-1 in October, a deterioration from the revised September ratio of 4.1-to-1.

via epi.org

A recession is a crappy way to reduce income inequality

Since I harp on income inequality a bit around here, it's important to take note of this New York Times story today:

The share of income received by the top 1 percent — that potent symbol of inequality — dropped to 17 percent in 2009 from 23 percent in 2007, according to federal tax data. Within the group, average income fell to $957,000 in 2009 from $1.4 million in 2007.

If the Top 1 Percent saw its share of income reduced, that means other groups saw their share of income rise. Good news, right? Well, not really. The same recession that kicked the Top 1 Percent in the teeth did the same thing to everybody else. The median household income has actually dropped in recent years, thanks also in large part to the recession.

The problem with growing income inequality isn't merely that the rich are getting richer. That happens. The problem has been that the rich have gotten richer while everybody else has seen stagnating incomes to go along with increased productivity, and often needed to add a second person in the household working just to keep up.

There are some people who will probably be plenty happy to see the rich become less rich, but not me. I want to see working- and middle-class folks be able to get ahead. A recession-fueled flattening of the economic bell curve isn't really cause for celebration. And as the Times notes, it's probably short-lived anyway—history shows the Top 1 Percent will likely start to pull away again. It probably won't be because a rising tide is lifting all boats. The problem still exists.

Gingrich, sharia, and the fundamentalist mindset

Michael Gerson has a terrific column today about Newt Gingrich's crazy alarmism over sharia law. It needs to be quoted at length:

The Republican front-runner set out his argument about Islamic law in a speech last year to the American Enterprise Institute. The United States’ problem, Gingrich argued, is not primarily terrorism; it is sharia — “the heart of the enemy movement from which the terrorists spring forth.” Sharia law, in his view, is inherently brutal — defined by oppression, stonings and beheadings. Its triumph is pursued not only by violent jihadists but by stealthy ones attending the mosque down the street. “The victory of sharia,” he concludes, “would clearly mean the end of the government Lincoln was describing.”

Who else shares this interpretation of sharia law? Well, totalitarians naturally do. Gingrich joins Iranian clerics, Taliban leaders and Salafists of various stripes in believing that the most authentic expression of sharia law is fundamentalism and despotism.

Other Muslims — many other Muslims — dispute this. The varied traditions of Islamic jurisprudence assign different weights to scripture, tradition, reason and consensus in the interpretation of Islamic law. Some assert it is identical to the cultural and legal practices of 7th-century Arabia, creating a real global danger. But others believe it is a set of transcendent principles of justice separable from its initial cultural expression and binding mainly on the individual. Most Muslims respect Islamic law. But the interpretation of sharia varies greatly from Saudi Arabia to Indonesia to Tanzania to Detroit.

The governing implications of Gingrich’s views are uncharted. Would President Gingrich reaffirm his belief that the most radical form of Islamic law is the most authentic?

That last sentence, to me, is key. Gingrich, as a converted Catholic, can't really be said to be a "fundamentalist" in the sense that many Americans use the term. But he's clearly tied into America's fundamentalist mindset. And it seems to me that the people most alarmed about the imposition of a radical form of sharia law in America are, like Gingrich, tied into that fundamentalist mindset. They mock and hold contempt for Christian religious moderates and believe that a more austere form of the religion is true—and they transfer that worldview onto Islam, scaring themselves half to death in the process.

The problem is that, while threats do exist, it doesn't actually paint a realistic view of the world we live in, or Islam as it's practiced by many Americans. Gingrich's alarmism isn't just offensive as a matter of demagoguery—it's also scary because it reveals an apocalyptic worldview that seems dangerous in the hands of a national leader.

Millionaires and food stamps, revisited

Back in October, I issued a challenge:

But how many millionaires are gaming the system to get food stamps? I'm guessing maybe ... this guy. Maybe there are a few others out there. But I'll pull a number out of my posterior and guess that 99.99 percent of all food stamp recipients are not millionaires. And I defy anyone to prove otherwise.

The New York Times tries to get an answer today, and doesn't really come up with a number:

Department of Agriculture officials dismissed the notion of millionaire food stamp recipients. “Federal law is clear,” said Aaron Lavallee, a spokesman for the department. “The program is intended for households with income not exceeding 130 percent of poverty.”

Among the 46 million Americans who receive the assistance — roughly one in seven Americans — few seem to be millionaires.

That's not entirely satisfying, because we don't know how few are millionaires—even if we can surmise, as the Times does, that precious few are. But maybe we can extrapolate from the unemployment insurance numbers:

From 2005 to 2009, millionaires collected over $74 million in unemployment benefits, according to an estimate by Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, who has paired with Senator Mark Udall, Democrat of Colorado, to push to end the practice.

According to Mr. Coburn’s office, the Internal Revenue Service reported that 2,362 millionaires collected a total of $20,799,000 in unemployment benefits in 2009; 18 people with an adjusted gross income of $10,000,000 or more received an average of $12,333 in jobless benefits for a total of $222,000.

Now, we know that more than 20 million Americans collected unemployment insurance in 2009. If I'm doing the math correctly—never my strong suit—that means that roughly 1 percent of 1 percent of unemployment insurance beneficiaries were millionaires.

Now, unemployment insurance is linked to one's employment status—no matter how much you make, you're eligible if you lose your job. Food stamps are linked to your income: Which means it's probably very much harder to get such benefits if you're a millionaire. Republicans can produce the occasional anecdote, but I feel comfortable sticking with my assertion that 99.99 percent of all food stamp recipients are not millionaires.

None of which would be worth mentioning, except that Republicans are using the specter of millionaires receiving poor-people entitlements as justification to start to trim the safety net. It's "welfare queens" all over again, and it's dishonest.

National Review's disingenuous editorial on gay rights

National Review's editors aren't happy with the Obama Administration's new efforts to protect gay rights abroad:

Support for human rights has a place in foreign policy, albeit a subordinate one. Among those rights, certainly, is the right of homosexuals to be free from violent attacks and other draconian punishments. As Clinton rightly notes, if there are fundamental rights at all (and the foundational premise of this republic is that there are) then they “are not conferred by the government,” but ours “because we are human.” The secretary then goes on to claim that human rights and gay rights are “one and the same,” which we suppose is true insofar as the latter collapses into the former. What we don’t understand is how Clinton’s view — that being human vests us with certain rights — entails or even is compatible with a second set of rights that one enjoys by virtue of being homosexual. When Clinton says, “It is a violation of human rights when people are beaten or killed because of their sexual orientation,” no recourse is required to a gay right. The words “because of their sexual orientation” are superfluous. When she says that the horrors of “corrective” rape against women who are suspected of being homosexual are violations of a right, to what right could she be referring besides the right not to be raped, simpliciter?

Which makes a certain amount of sense on its own. It doesn't make sense in light of National Review's longtime efforts to call attention to Christian persecution abroad. Here's a typical example from earlier this year:

The Arab Spring has not been kind to Egypt’s Christian minority. Over the weekend, Muslims apparently incited by Islamist hardliners again terrorized Coptic Christians, in what is now a pattern of attacks against them and their churches. Possibly the Islamists are jockeying for political power in this transitional period, or even trying to immediately effect a religious cleansing similar to the one that has happened in Iraq.

Coptic Christians in the Imbaba district of Cairo report that on Saturday night they were assaulted by Muslims who looted and burned St. Mina’s Church and the Church of the Virgin Mary and attempted to burn St. Mary and St. Abanob Church. The press has reported that, according to the Copts, twelve people were killed. According to the Egyptian interior ministry, which habitually downplays or ignores attacks against Christians, possibly six victims were Christian and six were Muslim. More than a hundred people were injured, as Copts fought back with sticks and stones.

By National Review's logic today, we shouldn't really care so much that Christians were the victims of those attacks in Egypt; isn't it bad enough and criminal enough that anybody was beaten or attacked? Who cares what the motivating factors were?

I don't excuse the religious persecution, by the way. I find it repugnant and contemptible, just as I find it repugnant that gays are targeted for beatings and rapes and murder. But National Review isn't really in a position to suggest, with a straight face, that we should focus on behaviors to the exclusion of motivations.

Mitt Romney is rich? So is Obama

Over at The Philly Post, my column this morning is about how I don't really care about Mitt Romney's attempted $10,000 bet with Rick Perry:

The fact that our presidential candidates are rich isn’t a big deal. The fact that Mitt Romney wants to make a $10,000 bet isn’t a big deal. The fact that Romney and Newt and Perry all the rest of them want to govern the country on behalf of the rich—that’s the big deal. The fact that they want to do so at a time of skyrocketing income inequality is a big deal.

Instead of having a forthright discussion about those issues, though, we’re forced to sit through a kind of minstrel show where rich candidate after rich candidate after rich candidate pretends to be a “regular guy” with the “common touch.” And it has nothing to do with whether or not that candidate would be a good president.

Obama is among the rich candidates, incidentally, and Republicans are just as interested in tarnishing him with a silver spoon. To wit, take Andrew Malcom's column in today's Investor's Business Daily, which takes the Obamas to task for all their ... Christmas decorating:

The extravagance of 2011's decorations, however, are striking given the widespread joblessness, pale economic growth, home foreclosures and grim outlook for 2012, not to mention the incumbent president's historically low approval rating heading into his reelection bid.

How simple, politically astute, symbolically helpful and cost-effective it would have been for the Obamas this year to say that in sympathy with so many struggling countrymen, they were curtailing holiday decorations to match the sacrifices of others.

How tedious. I could get into all the ways that White House Christmas decorating isn't just about the family occupying the White House, but serves as part of the national celebration, but ... meh. How tedious.

Obama is comfortable. Romney is comfortable. There is no likely candidate for president who isn't far and away richer than the rest of us. So who cares? The question is: Who do you trust to govern on behalf of your interests? Net worth makes little difference in answering that question.

On writing about religion

Some people like writing. Others like having written. Me? I like having written without giving offense to people I love and respect.

By that standard, my musings in "Tim Tebow's ostentatious faith" and "Tebow, revisited" have been flaming disasters, with responses from my Christian friends generally ranging from stern disagreement to angry chastisement. The common theme in those responses: That (perhaps) I'd let antipathy to Christianity cloud my judgment.

The estimable William Voegelli weighed in with the least-angry but still-pointed variation on this theme: "If your point is that we would be better off rediscovering the value and satisfactions of reticence, I'm on board. If you're singling out Tebow because fundamentalist Christianity gives you the heebie-jeebies, I'm not." Privately, a close friend suggested (in not-so-many words) that I'd made a shtick out of being a big-city agnostic who was once a small-town Christian.

I didn't sleep much, or well, last night. It's quite a thing to have produced as intense a reaction as that.

But having examined my conscience, let me say this, unreservedly: Christianity doesn't give me the heebie-jeebies.

Here's my dirty little secret: You can take the man out of the church, but you can't really take the church out of the man. I know that 30 years of immersion in Christian circles—particularly among Mennonites—still shapes both me and my worldview. And though I've been frank about my own fall from faith, I've also felt a deep desire that (in the words of Paul writing to the Romans) I "not cause my brother to stumble." I've never wanted to undermine anybody else's faith: They have their journeys and I have mine. The idea of evangelical agnosticism is kind of silly if you think about it, anyway, and I've not had much use for the fundamentalist atheism of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens.

There's a "but" coming, however.

I also don't believe that religion or Christianity are necessarily unmitigated forces for good, nor above critique. Just this week, Rick Perry released an ad that I believe to be a shining example of Christian chauvinism. It's not his faith that offends me; it's the political and societal implications of how he wields that faith that I find frightening and objectionable. I think it's possible to criticize that without being anti-Christian. But I also understand that if you're a conservative Christian, such criticism might look anti-Christian to you. To some extent, then, I have to offer my critiques in (er) good faith and let the chips fall where they may.

So what does any of this have to do with Tim Tebow, you may be asking. He's just a guy who is public about his faith, right? It's not like he's running for president or anything. Fair point. Why does an athlete deserve my critique?

Well, for one thing: Tebow's big news. His faith is big news, and controversial. Seems worthy of discussing in an op-ed column, then.

But let me tell a personal story. A number of years back, I was walking down Massachusetts Street in Lawrence, Kan. A church had gathered at one corner—as it often did weekly during early summer evenings—and one man stood atop a planter, shouting a hellfire-and-brimstone sermon at traffic and passerby. This was when I was still immersed in faith and church, but I stopped and chatted with one of the leaders. And what I told him was this: If the church was trying to win converts to Christ—it was—then the planter sermons were a bad idea. They were alienating far more people than they were attracting; the result being that by the church's own lights it was pushing more people away from Christ (and thus possibly condemning them to hell) than it was saving. This seemed alarming to me. It didn't seem to bother the street preachers.

In other words: What I say now is pretty much precisely the thing I was saying when I was a Christian.

Obviously, I'm not a man of faith anymore, so maybe I'm not the best person to counsel Tim Tebow about the effectiveness of his ministry. But if you look not-terribly-closely at what I wrote, some of the main thrusts were A) the Christ that Tebow worships seems to urge modesty in one's public displays of faith and B) evangelizing the way Tebow does might be counterproductive. I didn't tell Christians to shut up; in fact, I proclaimed that idea "undesirable." Given that I'm not a Christian, it seems likely that I was perceived as using Scripture to try to stifle Christians. I can see how it would look that way. From my perspective? I was evaluating Tebow by the standards of the Scripture he claims to adhere to. When you are so very public about your faith, that is going to happen. And it's often going to be people with a real antipathy to the faith doing the evaluating.

It legitimately grieves me that my Christian friends would perceive me as attacking their faith. I'm not sure what to do about that without forfeiting my option to write about issues involving Christianity—a bad idea in a still-quite-religious nation.

But I wrote in a provocative tone. And I provoked. I accept that some of my friends found that hurtful. I can't say I won't do it again. I will, however, be mindful.

How much money makes you rich?

Americans say they would need to earn a median of $150,000 a year to consider themselves rich. However, 30% say less than $100,000 would be enough, including 18% who would consider themselves rich if they made less than $60,000 a year. On the other hand, 15% say they would need to earn at least $1 million per year before thinking of themselves as rich.

via gallup.com

This should actually vary from region to region—the amount of money I'd need to be comfortable in my Kansas hometown is probably a lot less than what I'd use here in Philadelphia. Nonetheless, $150,000 isn't a crazy number: It's three times the median household income in America. That's not not rich, at the very least.

Tebowing, revisited

I revise and expand my comments about Tim Tebow for this week's Scripps Howard column:

You know who would love to see Tim Tebow take it down a notch? Jesus.

At least, that's what the Bible seems to suggest in the sixth chapter of Matthew. That's where Jesus talks to his followers about prayer, and warns them against ostentatious displays: "And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

Tim Tebow is, by all accounts, a man of great and genuine faith so perhaps he knows better than Jesus how to properly worship Jesus.

That seems unlikely, however.

Taken to its logical end, though, we would ask Christians to shut up about their faith entirely and stick it in a deep, dark hole. That's both unlikely and undesirable. Faith cannot, ultimately, be silenced.

But most of us have learned to live with boundaries -- to avoid thrusting our religion into arenas where it is unexpected or unwelcome. If you make a big sale at work, for example, you're unlikely to bend on knee in front of co-workers and customers to start giving thanks to God.

That would make them uncomfortable, and would be kind of rude as a result. Rudeness, in turn, makes few converts and conversions seem to be the point of Tebow's enterprise. Why be counterproductive? Tim Tebow, then, is the NFL equivalent of the telemarketer calling at dinner. He's free to make the call, but no one should be surprised if many of us are turned off by the salesman and his pitch.

Ben suggests that "Tebowing should be more emulated than scorned" in his take. You'll have to click the link to read the whole thing.

GOP rhetoric doesn't even have to make sense anymore

So the GOP, as expected, is blocking President Obama's nominee to lead the new consumer protection bureau. Republicans want changes to the structure of the bureau, basically to make it toothless. That doesn't sound great, though, so here's how they're playing it:

“We’re not going to let the president put another unelected czar in place, unaccountable to the American people,”said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.).

But the whole point of Senate confirmation is that the appointee is anything but an "unelected czar" operating without accountability: They're accountable to the Senate. McConnell's rhetoric suggests that every cabinet member and every judicial nominee is somehow illegitimate. If that's the case, then McConnell and the Republicans believe we should tear down our form of government and raise something new in its place.

But I don't think that's the case. I think they're just cynical.

Federalist 58: Filibusters suck

It's true that when America adopted its Constitution, the Founders who wrote the Federalist Papers didn't put much—any—effort into defending the filibuster tactic that is so widely used in today's Senate. Why? Well, the Constitution itself didn't mention the filibuster: That's something the Senate decided, on its own, to allow in the rules.

Still, while reading Federalist 58, it's pretty easy to see what the Founders would've thought about the filibuster: They wouldn't have liked it. We can surmise as much when James Madison grapples with whether the Constitution should've required much more than a quorum for the House of Representatives to vote on weighty matters. Madison didn't like the burden that would create. Why? It would enable a minority of Congressmen to block legislation simply by not showing up:

It has been said that more than a majority ought to have been required for a quorum; and in particular cases, if not in all, more than a majority of a quorum for a decision. That some advantages might have resulted from such a precaution, cannot be denied. It might have been an additional shield to some particular interests, and another obstacle generally to hasty and partial measures. But these considerations are outweighed by the inconveniences in the opposite scale. In all cases where justice or the general good might require new laws to be passed, or active measures to be pursued, the fundamental principle of free government would be reversed. It would be no longer the majority that would rule: the power would be transferred to the minority. Were the defensive privilege limited to particular cases, an interested minority might take advantage of it to screen themselves from equitable sacrifices to the general weal, or, in particular emergencies, to extort unreasonable indulgences.

Some of my conservative friends defend the filibuster as a minority legislative defense against the tyranny of the majority. But it's pretty clear the Founders—or at least Madison—weren't interested in giving the minority the power to block legislation, seeing it as a reversal of "the fundamental principle of free government."

Combine this with Federalist 22, in which Alexander Hamilton railed against the idea that two-thirds of Americans would "submit their interests to the management and disposal of one third"—roughly the ratio needed for the Senate to sustain a filibuster—and it's sure seems clear the practice is both undemocratic and a betrayal of the Founders' vision.

A conservative friend says I may modify my position on this when I read further into the Federalists. Right now, though, the filibuster isn't really faring well.

What caused Pearl Harbor? Flappers and jazz.

Victor Davis Hanson, National Review's "classical historian" in residence, idly speculates why Admiral Yammamoto planned the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor:

But it may be just as likely that Yamamoto’s earlier years in the United States, at Harvard in particular, rather than convincing him of the futility of attacking such an industrial colossus had encouraged his prejudices that Western society, especially in its Roaring Twenties excesses, was decadent and lacked the martial steel for an eventual war with the Japanese.

Now, there's no reason to actually produce any evidence in support of this theory, but it's fun to play with. "Of course we can beat the Americans! With General Jay Gatsby misguidedly leading the troops, there's no way we can't win! Twenty-three skidoo indeed! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Of course, it might just be that Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor because the Japanese wanted to expand their control over Pacific island resources, and the American fleet stood in the way. You don't have to have contempt for your rival's character to want what he's keeping from you. It helps, but it's not a requirement. Without offering any evidence to support his argument, it sure appears that Hanson is engaging in an age-old "blame America" argument.

I know: I'm the one who wrote earlier today that we need to let Pearl Harbor not be such an urgent memory. But we're obviously going to remember it still. It would be nice if we didn't mis-remember it in order to make political arguments about our present-day policy.

Rick Perry takes on Obama's 'war on religion'

“I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m a Christian,” the Texas governor says in the spot. “But you don’t have to be in the pew every Sunday to know that there’s something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military, but our kids can’t openly celebrate Christmas or pray in school. As president, I’ll end Obama’s war on religion, and I’ll fight against liberal attacks on our religious heritage.”

via washingtonpost.com

But everybody can openly celebrate Christmas! They can pray in school! They just can't require that the school force everybody to do so. Obama's "war on religion"—to the extent that the president has even been part of these culture wars, which isn't much—only means that Christians don't have a privileged position in forcing the rest of society to observe their rituals.

Not that I expect to persuade anybody. There's a variety of Christian who believes that if they're not allowed to dominate society, they're being persecuted. These folks vote Republican.

It's probably a good thing Pearl Harbor is fading into history

On this 70th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack, there seems to be a great deal of hand-wringing that the event is soon to no longer be part of our collective living memory. Today's New York Times story is pretty typical of the angst:

The fact that this moment was inevitable has made this no less a difficult year for the survivors, some of whom are concerned that the event that defined their lives will soon be just another chapter in a history book, with no one left to go to schools and Rotary Club luncheons to offer a firsthand testimony of that day. As it is, speaking engagements by survivors like Mr. Kerr — who said he would miss church services on Sunday to commemorate the attack — can be discouraging affairs.

“I was talking in a school two years ago, and I was being introduced by a male teacher, and he said, ‘Mr. Kerr will be talking about Pearl Harbor,’ ” said Mr. Kerr. “And one of these little girls said, ‘Pearl Harbor? Who is she?’

“Can you imagine?” he said.

Well, yeah, I can imagine. I don't have any idea how old this girl was, but it's entirely conceivable—even probable—that Pearl Harbor took place before her grandparents were born. This isn't just history to today's elemetary school students: It's ancient history. Put it this way: If you were in elementary school 30 years ago—as I was—how much did you know and understand about World War I? I was a kid when this "Cheers" episode came out, and I remember being astonished as a child that there were any veterans of that war left.

This isn't a call to let Pearl Harbor slip from our collective memories. "Those who forget the lessons of history are doomed etc." But it's probably not a bad thing to let that memory become a little less urgent. There are plenty of cultures around the globe which harbor grudges from wars and battles that took place centuries upon centuries ago—those memories have remained urgent, often with the result that those cultures have a hard time moving into the future: They're too busy clinging to the past. There are still people who hate the Japanese because of Pearl Harbor. What a wasted, useless emotion.

And there are some folks who use their observance of the anniversary as a kind of "more American than thou" proclamation, a cudgel against those who don't keep the flame burning quite as bright. I guess I don't have much patience for that.

The longer our country and culture survive, the more battles we'll have under our belt. They'll be and seem incredibly life-shattering at the time. But we can remember them without living with them as part of our present, and we probably should: It's probably healthiest that we eventually let the old battles go. I salute the survivors of Pearl Harbor, but it's not a sin to let the memory fade, just a bit, as they fade away.

Stay-at-home dadding: Turns out I'm a trendsetter

You wouldn't know it from Fitler Square, where I'm often the lone daddy in a sea of mommies and nannies, but it turns out that stay-at-home dadding is increasingly common:

Among fathers with a wife in the workforce, 32 percent were a regular source of care for their children under age 15, up from 26 percent in 2002, the U.S. Census Bureau reported today. Among these fathers with preschool-age children, one in five fathers was the primary caregiver, meaning their child spent more time in their care than any other type of arrangement.

I'm lucky, in that my career and skills make it possible for me to earn money while staying at home with my son. It's an economic no-brainer on one hand: Child care is frickin' expensive, and my staying home while writing subtracts that cost from our burdens while still letting me make enough money to pay the rent.

And I'm also lucky that I get to spend so much time around my son during his formative years. My dad was a hard worker: When I was young he was in college and worked full-time, and after he graduated he was on the road a lot; I got plenty of fathering, believe me, and everything he did was in the service of supporting his family. But I also know that I've had more of a chance to watch my son grow than he—or, really, all but a few men of his generation—ever did. There's a tradeoff: I'm not getting rich or skyrocketing to the top of my profession right now. Often, though, I wake up these days with my 3-year-old son climbing into bed with me and throwing his arms around my neck. It's a privilege to receive that and earn money, I realize. I might as well enjoy it.

A death blow for printed magazines

News from the United States Postal Service:

Unprecedented cuts by the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service will slow first-class delivery next spring and, for the first time in 40 years, eliminate the chance for stamped letters to arrive the next day. 

The estimated $3 billion in reductions, to be announced in broader detail later Monday, are part of a wide-ranging effort by the Postal Service to quickly trim costs and avert bankruptcy. They could slow everything from check payments to Netflix's DVDs-by-mail, add costs to mail-order prescription drugs, and threaten the existence of newspapers and time-sensitive magazines delivered by postal carrier to far-flung suburban and rural communities.

According to the story, periodicals could take up to nine days to reach their destination through the mail. Which should pretty much destroy printed magazine subscriptions.

Maybe not all of them: If you subscribe to one of those Home and Garden magazines, it probably doesn't make much difference when you get them. But if you read something even a little time-sensitive—The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Time, etc.—you're running out of reasons to stick with print. Digital subscriptions will keep you up to date just fine.

Tim Tebow's ostentatious faith

National Review's Mario Loyola tries to get to the bottom of why Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow annoys people so much, and concludes: "People aren’t upset at Tebow’s God talk. They’re upset that he might actually believe it."

Meh. Tim Tebow doesn't bother me one way or another, though I admit to finding his success this season rather fascinating. (And I'm not really a football guy.) Nonetheless, when I see his ostentatious displays of faith on the field, I'm reminded of some old gospel verses: 

5 “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 6 But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. 7 And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

Guy named Jesus supposedly said that. But I'm sure Tim Tebow knows better.

(Photo from Tebowing.com)

Buskers are not the problem at Washington Square Park in New York

In New York, the city is busting buskers for violating an obscure rule against "vending" near monuments:

The department’s rule, one of many put in place a year ago, was intended to control commerce in the busiest parks. Under the city’s definition, vending covers not only those peddling photographs and ankle bracelets, but also performers who solicit donations. 

The rule attracted little notice at first. But the enforcement in Washington Square Park in the past two months has generated summonses ranging from $250 to $1,000.

I've actually spent a little time in Washington Square Park, and if there's a "commerce" problem there, it really isn't the buskers: It's all the open-air drug dealing. There's nothing subtle about it. And there's something both misguided and embarrassing about a municipal government that would focus on cracking down on folk singers and mimes while leaving the dealers relatively undisturbed. Seems to me the latter pose the far greater threat to the quality of life in the park and neighborhood.

Siri is just a crappy doctor

My PhillyMag editor Erica Palan loves her new iPhone 4S, but she's not worried that Siri won't point her to the nearest abortion doctor:

When I asked Siri where I could get a Pap smear nearby, she didn’t understand. She was similarly confused when I asked her where I could get a mammogram, a colonoscopy and a prostate exam. Also, when I told her I had a broken hand, she asked for an email address instead of recommending hospitals or doctors. When I asked for advice for my bunion, she responded, “I don’t know what you mean by Bunyon. [sic]” After wondering who could fix my toothache, Siri asked me to provide a contact name. She’s not pro-life. She’s just not a very good medical professional. 

Siri doesn’t know how to correlate the names of specific medical procedures to nearby results. Ask Siri where the nearest Planned Parenthood is and she instantaneously provides addresses. She also suggested 16 gynecologists in my area. Ask her for an emergency dentist and she serves up search results within seconds.