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Tuesday, May 23, 2006
The Cato Hypocrisy
I am talking about our incredible penchant for -- and creativity at -- self delusion and rationalization. The lengths that we all go to, in order to convince ourselves that we are the smart ones, virtuous and right... often in complete denial of blatant evidence to the contrary. It is the one magical act that all of us can easily perform, at near genius level.
Elsewhere I talk about the organic mechanisms of reinforcement that make us addicts to this sort of blithe, self-righteous assurance, while dismissing all opponents as vile or stupid strawmen. Indeed, I can step outside myself and watch these very tendencies play out -- the same smug assumption of privileged knowledge and superior perception -- even as I type these words. Well, we are of the same clay. This ecumenical allure tugs at even the wise. Even the shy.
Can we escape the bewitchment of solipsism and seductive self-hypnosis? For millennia, the prescription in every culture was to accept, with utter fealty, whatever mythic system was taught by local authority figures. Parents. Lords. State and church. This method replaced (or overlaid) some individually vain "realities" with shared/consensual ones. But while mantric uniformity helped to maintain peace within some communities, it absolutely guaranteed conflict against others.
Above all, the top aim was to make sure no one asked: "Isn't it just a little suspiciously pat and convenient, that my bunch just happens to be 100% right, and my opponents are so completely deluded?" One nation and culture after another imitated the same obstinacy that we see in countless individual neighbors. A steadfastness that is often portrayed as admirable, even -- especially -- in the face of contrary evidence.
Are we screwed, then? Betrayed by an utterly consistent human character flaw? Doomed to repeat the same patterns over and over, with only minor variations of cult and incantation?
Fortunately, a slim ray of light appeared. Gradually, over time, a completely different approach took shape. Instead of clutching a consensual delusion (to augment your private ones), this new method called upon human beings to adapt their subjective perceptions to evidence. By referring both to objective reality (experiment) and the cross-checking feedback of other people, we can catch a relatively high percentage of our mistakes and misperceptions.
It isn't magical. The process requires deliberate effort, overcoming our own egos, as well as humanity's greatest paradox.
If "criticism is the only known antidote to error" (CITOKATE), then suppression of criticism must be the greatest single cause of error, not only in daily life, but especially among the leaders who have been entrusted with statecraft. Name a nation or time when a society's need for cleansing information and argument did not inherently conflict with the most driving need of leaders and oligarchs - to stifle dissent and maintain confidence in their rule.
Especially their own sense of confident superiority and right-to-rule, whether they were emperors, aristocrats or commissars. This conflict of interest runs so deep, it is very likely biological. Don't all of us descend from the harems of kings, who gained reproductive advantage by seizing and holding unaccountable power?
Despite countless, contradictory definitions we've heard it seems to me that the core endeavor of the Enlightenment Experiment is quite simple -- to find ways out of this trap. To escape the paradox of criticism. All of our great accountability arenas - science, markets, justice and democracy - have their roots in this realization... that no man is trustworthy to declare what's true. As Richard Feynman said - "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool."
Alas, the paradox only gets worse, the higher your IQ! In every walk of life we are surrounded -- especially at all extremes of the hoary/insipid "political spectrum" -- by bright fools who wallow in sanctimonious just-so stories, blithely dismissing contrary evidence, always ignoring the suspiciously pat convenience of just-happening to be oh-so right.
Take for example* the erudite, "freedom-promoting" scholars of the Washington DC Cato Institute -- purported to be the key think tank for studying and propounding principles of libertarianism. Let me zero in on them, because right now they offer a marvelous case study illustrating our problem -- the mountain of rationalizing human nature that we must still overcome.
Why pick on Cato? I mean, other than the fact that they wear they IQs on their sleeves. You see, these passionate and articulate champions of the free market have lately found themselves in a difficult situation. A real bind.
Year after year, members and affiliates have maintained a marvelous high wire act, claiming surficially to be nonpartisan - to find equal fault between "Republicans who oppress freedom of the bedroom and Democrats who oppress freedom of the marketplace." And yet, as donations poured in from well-heeled private sources, a funny thing happened to the production line of scholarly documents and position papers. It veered right.
Oh, occasionally (for credibility's sake) Cato fellows would fire a very general - and very soft - fusillade in favor of abortion rights or against Alaska's pork "Bridge to Nowhere." Still, as the propaganda wheels turned, there appeared to be one guiding principle behind almost every missive produced by the Cato Institute.
We, who style ourselves as the defenders of a free market, shall obsessively and relentlessly ignore the market's greatest enemy. We will never mention or acknowledge the blatant fact that, for 5,000 years, the most deadly foe of free enterprise has always been conspiratorial aristocracy.
Indeed, the Cato Institute has long promoted the worst social, economic and political conflation of modern times. A delusion that Adam Smith warned against. The notion that ownership of capital is the prime correlate with wise market capitalism. A very different concept, fundamentally, than saying that markets are themselves wise at allocating, rewarding or promoting innovative goods and services.
Just scan Cato's sage and scholarly think tank documents propounding upon the inherently superior wisdom of markets. Apparently, "pre-selecting outcomes" is a sin when it is done openly, by a nation's broadly-inclusive and constitutional deliberative process. Even (especially) when it is shown that intergenerational costs cannot be accounted-for without some regulated market tuning, this kind of accounting is dismissed as an impossibly utopian and unachievable, due to the limited knowledge and predictive power of governing bodies.
Point taken. Score one for Hayek. And yet, "pre-selecting outcomes" is somehow portrayed as perfectly okay, when it is performed by much smaller clades of secretively collusive owners, scheming in small groups to allocate resources, labor and capital as capriciously as the feudal lords of any other era. Eras that, though less trammelled by well-meaning social tinkering, somehow managed to be far, far less successful than our own.
Somehow, under those conditions, nobody speaks about "limited knowledge and predictive power." The secrecy that nearly all economists call poisonous to markets, is somehow portrayed as just fine when it is used by a few golf buddies to manipulate those same markets and squeeze out all players who aren't in-the-know.
While the obsolete, ridiculous and long-discredited spectre of socialism continues drawing ire and alarm, the Cato and its allies keep on shrilly pointing at "government" as the sole and inherent foe of enterprise, never allowing attention to drift toward those who (increasingly) control government for their own enrichment. Aristocracies who exercise extreme influence over law and regulation, ensuring that government favors elites, in ways that Adam Smith cogently denounced during his own era.
Take the most recent "Cato's Letter," issued quarterly by the Institute, this time featuring an article by Tucker Carlson (host of MSNBC's The Situation) entitled - "The Decline and Fall of the Republican Party."
Wow. With a title like that , you might think the Catoins have seen the light! That they've realized, at long last, how deeply one of our great parties - and through it, nearly all of our government institutions - is suborned by a narrow cabal of native and foreign elites. That most insatiable subset of aristocrats, imbued with a deep sense of righteous privilege, who have engaged in one of the most reckless campaigns of kleptocratic mismanagement in all of history.
Have the Catoins decided - belatedly - to rise up and help us all deal with the cakocratic fecklessness. The rampant deceit, corruption, willful ignorance, indolence, violence, and anti-scientific dogmatism that has threatened civilization at all levels?
Well... um... not quite.
In fact, the Cato guys pretty much had to issue some kind of denunciation at this point in time. The national wave of revulsion toward today's GOP has risen toward tsunami proportions. The henchman defections that I have long called for are starting to trickle and stream from a myriad cracks in the neocon edifice. Soon, when whistleblowers start feeling safe to emerge, these cracks will grow so wide that Karl Rove will no longer be able to patch his coalition with liberal... oops... I mean generous... dollops of culture war. Under circumstances like these, it is not surprising to see Cato join in, if only to hold onto a little residual relevance.
But the line they are pushing! Ah, that's where things get really cute. Hang on and watch closely. It is better than a streetcorner game of Three Card Monty!
For starters, it seems that the most dogmatic administration in living memory has failed because it was not dogmatic enough.
Oh, but it gets even better. For, according to Tucker Carlson -- the great sin of the Republican Party is that (horrors!) it has sunk down almost to the dissolute, immoral, spendthrift, corrupt and despicable level of Democrats!
Shudder. That low? Mea maxima culpa! If the far right does not renew itself soon, it is in serious danger of drifting down to the level of... liberals.
Talk about blame shifting legerdemain! Didn't I say these guys were bright? Prepare to hear this line more and more, as the political season advances. Let me paraphrase some more.
Yes, the neocons and their fellow travellers have proved to be disgusting, greedy and incompetent. But you must still rationalize holding your nose and continuing to vote for them, because democrats are inherently worse.
Clever, for sure. Only there's a problem with this line. It doesn't match the facts at any level. Not even when you lean upon the insipid crutch of left right cliches. Because the neocons' long road into hell did NOT take them into Democratic territory. In fact, they did it by heading - at warp drive - in diametrically opposite directions.-
-- by massively increasing secrecy in government, rather than reducing it. (The unambiguous trend across the nineties.)-
-- by massively increasing deficit spending, rather than reducing it. (Ditto.)-
-- by massively increasing pork barrel graft, rather than reducing it. (In fairness, the decline of pork in the nineties may have resulted from divided government, with President Clinton forced to co-habitate with the very different (and somewhat lamented) neocons of Newt Gingrich's wave.)-
-- by undermining America's alliances and status in the world in favor of cowboy adventurism, rather than building worldwide consensus and acceptance of mature U.S. leadership.-
-- by rejecting all sources of objective evidence or criticism that might conflict with doctrine, relentlessly undermining both science and the autonomy of skilled professionals, demolishing or repressing advisory panels and suppressing independent thinking in the intelligence and military officer corps.-
-- by crippling the Border Patrol in a blatant effort to emphasize and promote illegal immigration, in preference over legal immigration (the democrats' preference.)-
-- by systematically demolishing government contract-vetting and purchasing procedures, finding every excuse to grant sole-source contracts on the basis of whim or crony connections.
Will a Catoin ever do the correlation - that more actual deregulation of major industries took place during the Carter and Clinton administrations, than was ever proposed during the sum total of the Nixon, Reagan, Bush and Bush tenures? Never. Cognitive dissonance -- an inability to perceive that which conflicts with comfortable assumption -- will keep that from ever happening.
This list could go on and on. But the core point is clear. Tucker Carlson and the other court savants -- nay, courtesans -- of Cato and the right never look to any of these factors. In calling up an image of today's fallen GOP as nearly as bad as democrats, their sole criterion is to wag a finger and make tsk-tsk noises at the hemorrhaging federal deficit, while propounding that these conservatives have failed us, by becoming -- in effect -- liberals.
But even that tunnel-vision selection of a single litmus test fails utterly! Because it rests upon an obsolete cliche, frantically ignoring the Clintonian surpluses of the nineties... along with every other possible way of looking at a sick elephant.
Up to this point, I have been describing truly grotesque hypocrisies, putting shame to any pretense that these Cato guys are "libertarians," let along honest intellects. Their current program -- promoting clever mantras to help keep in power the most outrageously anti-market and anti Enlightenment clade of cacocrats in US history -- beggars any explanation short of complete sellout or frantic rationalization.
Nevertheless, having just colorfully vented my indignant wrath, I must recall that a truly honest man contemplates limitations to the validity of righteous anger. Especially righteous anger. So let me admit that the Catoins do have one policy difference between neocons and liberals that they can legitimately point to with favor -- from a quasi-libertarian perspective.
Tax Cuts. At the surface, one can at least envision why they'd like this Bushite obsession. For although democrats have transformed into the new puritans, calling for budgetary responsibility and fiscal prudence (as well as waste-not notions of efficiency) there is no doubt that they would begin doing this by rescinding some of the cuts that have amounted to flat out gifts to a narrow and increasingly powerful aristocratic class.
Yes, rightists offer reams of arguments for why the rich should get to keep vastly higher fractions of their passive rents (read what Adam Smith said about this!) than any average working stiff may keep from the sweat of his brow. We've all seen these incantations, so I'll not confront them here. Instead, let me counter with a challenge that is far more general, again turning our gaze to the vast majority of human generations:
While you ignore 5,000 years of human history, I look across that time and see a single failure mode that killed nearly every opportunity, almost every chance for fair market competition, every level playing field, every renaissance of freedom and fair play.
That historic foe of enterprise was not socialism or "big government"... though we should stay wary of those newer failure modes. No, across more than fifty centuries, it was nearly always some cabal of privileged owners who gave into a deeply human and completely natural temptation, to use their status and power to cheat. To stop competing and instead crush competitors, often using state power as their favored tool.
Saying this does not make me a socialist or fomenter of class warfare, any more than a physicist who mentions gravity is trying to bind people to the ground! The historical fact that I describe is blatant, irrefutable and absolutely true. Any theory of modern society must take it into account, coming up with imaginative, realistic ways to foster competition and markets without letting the winners thereupon abuse their power and maintain it by cheating.
Do your theories do that? Or do they conveniently always seem to come up with rationalizations for following the Old Road? For flattering and sucking up to new, would-be lords?
Do I expect any kind of answer to this challenge? Of course not. (See my paper on "Disputation Arenas" for an idea about how the very idea of "challenges" may improve the level of argument, in times to come.)
Indeed, at one level, I don't even care. Because the objects of my ire are irrelevant. Because their old-fashioned ways doom them to triviality. And because -- fortunately -- the Enlightenment ain't dead yet. Indeed, it has stronger allies than its enemies can even begin to perceive.
For example, I would wager that a majority of the wealthy in America and the West "get it" far better than those bright suck-ups at Cato do. From Warren Buffett to Paul Allen, from Steve Jobs to Jeff Bezos, the guys who made fortunes through the true delivery of goods, services and capital can see what kind of society made all of their opportunities possible. They realize what the parasitic cacocrats have done to America, and they do not like it one bit.
Like the abused professionals of the officer corps, like those henchmen who are starting to turn whistleblower, like thousands of bright sons and daughters who roil in shame over the selfish shortsightedness of their fathers... these market heroes will step forward when we need them most. They will stand up for a civilization that is not about left and right, after all. Or about insipid rationalizing cliches.
What are markets and enterprise and creativity and freedom really all about? They are about maximizing opportunities for individual human beings to argue and invent and reciprocally-criticize and come up with the solutions that we'll need, in order to cross the next century successfully.
Fortunately, this Enlightenment still has friends. Enough (possibly) that we still have a very good chance of making it.
* For the record, I could as easily have chosen some collection of bright fools on the left. There are so many, you could not shake stick at them all in a century. But this is not the direction where the greatest threat to freedom lies.
** See my own papers on libertarianism, and its potential - still only a glimmer - to serve as a third force in American political life.
47 comments:
Snicker, chortle ... I take Reason Magazine and In These Times to give me a bit of binocular vision, and every once in a while I get spinoff mail. The Cato Institute sent me one of those phony "surveys" that always end "And don't you think it's important enough to GIVE?" with a set of check boxes.
I sent it back with the comment "When you take of the cause of spying on fellow Americans and other civil liberties issues, I'll be interested."
Then, having read up on their glorious namesake, I added "If you believe the picture presented in Plutarch, the Cato you are named for is a classic case of high-functioning autism. I presume you are named for Cato Uticensis."
(BTW - check it out. Even though Plutarch was writing long after the fact. Snicker, chortle, apologies to those with similar wiring.) - 6:30 AM
- Tony Fisk said...
the great sin of the Republican Party is that (horrors!) it has sunk down almost to the dissolute, immoral, spendthrift, corrupt and despicable level of Democrats!
Hmph! Well, that takes care of that backslider Newt Gingrich!
All this sounds suspiciously like a scene setter for another 'Night of the Long Knives' - 7:22 AM
- Mike Huben said...
This will be added to my Criticisms of the Cato Institute web site.
- reason said...
I think that actually perhaps Cato is just a part of more insidious trend - the intellectual mercenary. I posted a rant about this related to Intellectual Property rights on another website - perhaps it would a good starting point for some discussion:
I think this is a much more important than it is given credit. We are increasingly living in a world of winner-takes-all-markets and misuse of intellectual property rights is part of the problem.
I think you need to be clearer on several of the issues here.
1. The difference between basic research and development work. This is where the Libertarian view of this area completely breaks down. It is not possible to reward basic research through the market because in its raw form it has no market value. But it has enormous potential value in applications that can be developed from it. So you have an issue of how to finance necessary infrastructure with all the free-rider problems associated with it.
2. Knowledge does not just have an economic value, it has a social and political value. Having research controlled and directed by economic interests is potentially dangerous. There needs at least to be a process whereby private research can be checked and reproduced in the public sphere (perhaps while respecting private rights).
3. The relationship between value added and reward is extremely uncertain. Many clever people can work hard for a long time and never acchieve anything valuable. Or they may be on the right track but slightly too late (have contributed to somebody else's success). And some rewards can monstrously exceed the value of the work. (Microsoft for instance). Research is like entering a lottery. The logic of this is that like in sports you need some sort of revenue sharing process to keep the grass roots healthy.
4. Research may have value which is not commercially exploitable.
(a) I remember a TV show in Australia called the inventors. One contestant invented a new sort of razor which gave a better shave and allowed razor blades to last much longer than convential razors. The marketing expert said he would be offered lots of money NOT to produce the product as all the money in shaving is in replacement blades. I never saw this product on the market. Draw your own conclusion.
(b) Identifying negative externalities can increase social welfare by allowing regulation or cap and trade control mechanisms. It does not however, make money for the discoverer.
All these considerations make me think the following makes sense:
1. Shorten IP licences
2. Subsidise research
3. Separate functions where possible - manufacturers should not be able to control research institutes either directly or through grants.
4. It may be necessary to licence several manufacturers to ensure competition in product development (see 3).
A thought for an innovative way of financing research. Build a wall between exploiters of research and researchers. Finance ALL research by subscription (perhaps with votes as to which general areas will be researched by contribution). Then rights to use the results of research could be auctioned using already donated research funds (with some time lag) as a pseudo-currency. - 7:37 AM
I'd like permission to print off the section about the Cato Institute and send it to them in their own BRM envelope if they ever again dare send me one of their snarky little "surveys".
- reason said...
mike huben -
your link to Phil Agre's Crisis of Public Reason doesn't work.
It should be http://web.archive.org/web/20010726030451/http://www.indymedia.org/print.php3?article_id=3159 - 8:44 AM
Ever notice that there is no forum or blog to post comments on the Cato website. It's almost as if they don't want to encourage feedback...
- David Brin said...
You folks have permission to quote me, though this rushed screed may bee a bit too passionate and could have used more editing. For example: "Why pick on Cato? I mean, other than the fact that they wear they IQs on their sleeves."
That should have read: "Why pick on Cato? I mean, other than the fact that they wear they IQs on they sleeves."
As for Cato himself, I do quote the guy in EARTH. A virtual prize for whoever comes up with that nugget. It actually is pretty relevant.
There, and some of you thought I had lost my capacity to rant, like Sterling and ilk? Snort! - 9:50 AM
I'm just reading "Infinity's Shore" there's that part (page 99 in paperback edition) where Asx muses about "solipsism". Quite the same main points as the ones featured under "The Paradoxon".
You were preaching that sermon 10 years ago (as many others have for even longer) and still the majority of Americans believes this planet is 6000 years old...
Kinda sad, I guess. - 10:39 AM
The Cato Institute lost all credibility in my eyes over a specific incident some years ago.
At least ten years ago, it was, but I have to backtrack a little more. Well before Cato and their ilk were fighting tooth and nail to deny that greenhouse warming was a problem, they were fighting tooth and nail to deny that depletion of the ozone layer due to pollutants was a problem.
Or, if it was a problem, it would be more economical to simply put on sunscreen and sunglasses rather than force people to replace their freon with costly alternatives.
Again: It was well established amoung the pro-growth anti-regulation crowd that worries about ozone depletion were unwarranted, and anyone who said otherwise was a tree-hugging humanity-hating luddite.
So. Fast forward a bit. There was a long, hot summer in L.A., and lots of worries about . . . ozone pollution. The ground level stuff produced by automobile exhaust that turned smog into a breathing hazard.
A news program had a debate about imposing driving restrictions. On the anti-restriction side was a self-confident weenie from the Cato Institute. He flatly stated that cutting down on ozone pollution would ultimately be counter-productive, because that extra ozone was required to repair the damage to the ozone layer. He sneered at the hypocricy of environmentalists who were, out of fear of a little smog, threatening the lives of thousands with exposure UV radiation.
What a jackass!
I didn't have to wait until the Bush administration to know these guys were full of it. Their stand on environmental issues clearly shows them for what they are: A bunch of self-deluded, brown-nosing, lackeys of the rich and powerful. - 10:43 AM
- Mitchell J. Freedman said...
There was of course an element of the Left that used to defend the Soviet Union as "actually existing socialism." David, you have nailed the Right version with their backhanded support for "actually existing capitialism," which, as usual, turns out to be crony capitalism, with the emphasis on crony.
The older I get, the more I understand that FDR and Alexander Hamilton had far more in common than Herbert Croly ever imagined. It is about nation building and nation sustaining--and most DC conservatives and liberals have no real understanding of either. - 11:01 AM
- Rob Perkins said...
Ozone at ground level is poisonous to life. In the upper atmosphere, it serves a purpose most think is useful to the environment. I can't remember exactly but I think it has something to do with filtering UV energy.
So I guess to answer Tangent's question, those who want the ozone layer replenished do not want it manufactured on the ground, for the dual reason that it's a hazerdous substance on the ground and because it encourages noone to stop or reduce emitting pollutants.
That, and it's probably prohibitively expensive. One or more of the three, take your pick. - 1:00 PM
Bravo, Reason!
I've known for a long time that more pure research was needed. Once upon a time, universities were the cradle of much pure research. Nowadays, research grants are coming with strings attached, and often they are for applied research, with a particular result or product in mind. - 2:06 PM
- Kevin Crady said...
Dr. Brin:
Regarding "disputation arenas," have you heard of Team Syntegrity? It is a method of non-hierarchical decision-making invented by Stafford Beer and explained in detail in his book "Beyond Dispute: The Invention of Team Syntegrity"
TS organizes a group of people into an icosahedral structure (as opposed to the usual top-down pyramids) and employs a set of specified protocols to insure that ideas and information will "reverberate" around the structure.
Links: http://www.syntegritygroup.com/synteg.html
http://www.phrontis.com/PhroDownLoads/Outline%20of%20Syntegration%20Process.pdf (a good short overview, pdf file) - 3:24 PM
- lightning said...
I have some problems with the conventional version of "ozone depletion". I'm not saying it's wrong -- I just don't understand it. However, my understanding is that the problem is that the chlorine from freon- type chemicals acts as a catalyst to destroy ozone. Ship up some more ozone, the chlorine would just break it down.
As to Cato, I lost interest in them when I realized that I could predict their conclusions *exactly*, just by reading the title of the report. - 3:29 PM
- David Brin said...
Stefan, great thoughts! Tho I would only say that "the rich and powerful" is much less helpful a generalization than "troglodytic, klepto-plutocrats."
The former would perforce encompass - unfairly I believe - Warren Buffett and Steven Spielberg and Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs and a zillion others who still stand for all that is wondrous about enterprise capitalism. We need terminology that excludes them from the enemy caste or being lumpied with the Rmurdochs and r'oils and others who fiercely wage total war against the enlightenment, with the clear agenda of restoring feudal ways.
If for no other reason than "we" are more likely to win if a whole lot of powerful rich guys are on our side!
Tangent, there is a HUGE difference between Ozone in the stratosphere and near the ground. They are entirely different, generated in different ways, and have almost no overlap or cross-feed. Down here it is a toxin. Up there, it is a blessing. Cars don't make the stuff that's up there.
Rik. Thanks for the citokate... only I have received TONS of requests to quote this. So phtltltltltltltltl! ;-)
(Hey, I make complex arguments, flattering some people out there that they actually have complex minds. My specialty is fresh perspectives. This job ain't easy. You wanna take over?)
Reason, we must constantly look for clues to what is really going on. Take the true backers of the neokleps. Now, at one level, you might think RMurdoch was a principal nonilluminatti, because of his relentlessly centered vestment in the anti-enlightenment. But this research issue is puzzling. Ahy would he push so much of an anti-science slant?
The r'oils, on the other hand. Their agenda is not so much a re-feudalization of the West as its utter destruction. To that end, quashing science is paramount. Hence, by examining the symptoms carefully, we can derive tentative diagnosis of the true master class behind it all.
Ah, paranoia! ;-)
PT Galt, thanks for the link. Syntegrity looks fascinating. My initial response is that it's clever and possibly useful, and yet it is clearly aimed at synergistic consensus-building. On the other hand, my disputation arenas are completely unabashed in seeking to become the Fifth Accountability Arena, emphasizing the creative power of regulated competition. You simply cannot argue that markets, science, democracy and justice courts are not incredibly good at this...
...though democracy needs better days. soon. - 4:48 PM
- Tony Fisk said...
The ozone layer is dynamic: continually breaking down and being built up by lightning discharges in thunderstorms (it's at about the same altitude as the top of anvils) It serves to block hard UV radiation (ground level ozone is too thin and dispersed to achieve this)
The humble CFC (an otherwise harmless and useful chemical) acts as a persistent and *very* efficient catalyst to break down ozone. Through an unfortunate (or maybe not) series of interactions involving polar weather systems, it tends to get concentrated in polar regions and in winter produces the ozone 'holes' over the arctic and antarctic, which then break up in spring.
The issues of ozone depletion were being investigated as early as the mid seventies (I know for a fact that CSIRO were looking at it back then). The antarctic ozone hole was first noted in the early eighties. Montreal accord was in 1987. HAving lived with the prospect for years, I can remember being grimly amused at the backflip Clinton did wrt the Accord when the arctic hole was discovered! (at least he was able to backflip!!)
I suspect that the way in which ozone depletion has occurred has been fortunate in that it presented a more clear and present danger than the vague graphs of average global temperature trends.
Denialists have variously claimed that
a) it was all a plot to replace a widespread unpatented chemical with one that is patented, and:
b) all that CFC was coming from Mt Erebus anyway (which didn't explain the arctic hole!)
The CFC levels seem to have stabilised and are now diminishing. The holes are closing For this reason, it looks like the widespread die offs and blindness from UV is one Earth prediction that won't be coming true (thank goodness!) - 5:20 PM
- Tony Fisk said...
BTW David, I've just noticed Jamais Cascio is playing with futurist axes in the same way as you have been with political axes. The two systems look like they complement each other.
Great fact-dump, Tony!
I don't know why it didn't post, but earlier I made an entry along these lines:
When I was a wee lad, I saw an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man in which saboteurs were trying to destroy a rocket launching a load of chemicals designed to heal the ozone layer.
The saboteurs: Aliens, in league with Bigfoot. Who was a sort of shaggy bionic android.
Does this mean that the Cato Institute is in league with evil aliens? - 5:38 PM
another fun ozone fact:
Ice crystals at the poles provide a surface for the catalytic reaction involving chlorine and ozone. This greatly increases the reaction rate. - 8:23 PM
- David Brin said...
Sorry Rob, this won't work.
1. I know very well what ozone is.
2. Our ozone down here is almost completely unrelated to stratospheric ozone. Made differently. One source does not supply the other.
3. I doubt very much that your idea scales. Yes, ozone is a trace gas in the stratosphere... but the stratosphere is vast! We are probably talking about many millions of tons. Indeed, the rocket exhaust will probably do more harm than any cargo could do good.
4. I am no chemist, but I'll bet if you squeeze ozone very hard (into a tank) you'll get either a big explosion or a whole lot of just plain oxygen. Or both.
Not to say I am against modernist-engineering meddling! Or at least experiments. e.g. spreading fine powder nutrients across the 90% of the oceans that are "desert"... nearly void of life for lack of upwelling partciles to feed phytoplankton.
Some pacific islands are running experiments to BOTH create new fisheries and fight global warming. I am bemused by the objections of some activists. Exactly what's the harm in these experiments?
In any event, we are drifting afield. - 1:52 AM
Interesting topic.
I blame the celebrities.
Many more Americans know the name of Paris Hilton's dog than know who runs, say, Halliburton.
It's almost as if the kleptocrats invented Tom Cruise & Co. as an information shield they can hide behind...
Pay no attention to the billions we're looting...
Look over there!
Brangelina's about to give birth!
As for Cato, I agree completely, but they aren't as hard to contact as some have said.
Most of them have blogs, too.
Here's one of them (with commnets):
There are more. - 3:26 AM
- reason said...
It is great to have somebody notice me. Sometimes I think I am just too tangential. Unless you seemingly directly attack somebody nobody notices.
My (late) father was scientist and he was very concerned about how management of science was being taken over by accountants who he saw were oriented in a way inimical to the process of science. He grew up in culture of a very open network devoted to solving problems and seeking truth, and saw commercialisation destroying it. I'm not saying science shouldn't be subject to revisions as to its cost effectiveness, but the value of science is not just its commercial value. Very often the most important discoveries are chance sidelines anyway, so the target orientation of commercial management can be counterproductive. - 6:03 AM
Nice essay Dr. Brin. Important issues as usual.
The New Republic editors are calling for congressional investigations and say pretty much what you have been saying for a while:
The Hill Needs a Subpoena-Happy Democratic Majority
Also, from the meme-front, I will be spreading the CITOKATE meme to 80,000 subscribers of an online newsletter put out by Quality Digest in my new bi-monthly column entitled "The Six Sigma Heretic." The article goes out next month. - 9:44 AM
It's not the celebrities, Anonymous.
It's the celebrity industry.
The fact that we seem to be wired to be curious about celebrities doesn't help.
Celebrities are like Hot Pockets or Little Debbie snack cakes:
Anybody with an ounce of sense knows they're no good for you, or are at the least an empty distraction, but a large portion of the populace are utter suckers for them.
American Idol isn't the disease, it is a symptom.
The cure is growing up as a society. That probably won't be easy or much fun. - 10:55 AM
You write:
"The lengths that we all go to, in order to convince ourselves that we are the smart ones, virtuous and right... often in complete denial of blatant evidence to the contrary. It is the one magical act that all of us can easily perform, at near genius level. "
Think maybe this applies to your rant here?
Your point seems to be that Cato does not take seriously the possibility of collusion by big capital to manipulate the system. You write:
"the Cato and its allies keep on shrilly pointing at "government" as the sole and inherent foe of enterprise, never allowing attention to drift toward those who (increasingly) control government for their own enrichment. Aristocracies who exercise extreme influence over law and regulation, ensuring that government favors elites, in ways that Adam Smith cogently denounced during his own era."
You ignore one of the main rationales against state planning and intereference in the markets which is that big corporate interests have always liked close contact with the government and the ability to gain favorable trade consessions for themselves at the expense of the broad population. These are the mercantilist policies that Adam Smith wrote against. Large companies and entrenched interests can spend millions dollars lobbying for some favorable regulations that will gain several times their investment in benefit while costing consumers a small additional charge. The public will always lose therefore when it comes to state economic planning (remember the movie "The Aviator" where it was the CEO of TWA that wanted to nationalize the airline industry?). The only way the consumer can get a fair shake is to ensure that companies have to compete fairly in the marketplace. Sure the Cato Institute is not infallible in its policy proscriptions, but most of their solutions are worth looking at and certainly positions on which thoughtful people can disagree without resorting the sort of smear tactics exhibited here. - 1:36 PM
What is the celebrity industry but the "circus" half of bread and circuses?
The kleptocrats standard...feed and entertain the people and you can rob the country blind.
What I hadn't imagined is a third part of that old formula...a large part of the population that actually craves the jackboot of government pressing down on its throat...
The past few years have brought this group into the light, though. In all my reading of history, I'd never thought people wanted to live under a repressive government.
Live and learn. - 2:58 PM
- David Brin said...
aw now Steve. Stop skimming and start reading. There were PLENTY of references to my self-awareness of the irony... that the planet's chief railer against self-righteous indignation-addiction is clearly an indignation junky himself?
Um... duh? I get no points for self-aware irony and honesty? Oh, like YOU'VE done better, putting your own trips in perspective? ;-)
As for the rest of what you said... again, duh? You SAY that I ignore things that I very very clearly addressed. Of course Adam Smith warned against govt being abused and used as a tool for market-warping! Um... isn't that PRECISELY what I was saying?
Nevertheless, govt ALSO serves at the principal tool for market tuning, SO THAT such abuses can be minimized. Laissez-faire has a 5,000 year utter and complete record of absolute failure, compared to the liberal and open regulated markets, that spurred the vast cornucopia we all gre up in.
I happen to agree with reducing regulation! (Me heap big libertarian, eh?) But Carter-Clinton deregulated VASTLY more industries than Reagan-Bush-Bush ever PROPOSED! A clear fact that you just gloss over without perceiving. I wonder why?
The trick about using govt as a beneficial market tuner, without it becoming a manipulated rent-generating engine for elites, is to keep it all above board, honest, reciprocal, unbiased... while maintaining relentless pressure for regulation to be minimized to its level of best efficiency and transparent effectiveness. THAT should be the job of libertarianism...
... and not railing at a scarecrow called BIG GOVERNMENT, using tirades to eliminate all regulations that the kleptos DON'T want, but defending every privilege they do want to keep.
Hey, always look at WHO THE BIG WINNERS ARE! Your reflex is to defend the blatant and obvious cheaters... and your reason is.......?
STefan, you are right as usual. We adore entertainers because we are the world's first adolescent civilization.
Earlier child cultures lived in constat terror and reflexively worshipped warriors who might save their lives. We live in teen-like illusions of safety and immortality, hence we worship those who rescue us from what teens fear most. Not death, but boredom. Hence entertainers.
Who would adults admire? Hey, I am willing to step forward and fill the role, if you adults want. ;-) - 3:47 PM
I think the biggest problem is the kleptocrats steal the money first and then use part of it to fight off anyone trying to stop them.
For instance:
Who owns Iraq's oil?
125 billion bbls of proved reserves.
25 million Iraqis.
At $70/bbl, less a couple bucks for extraction and, say $10 profit, means each Iraq should own the future revenue from 5000 bbls of oil at a minimum of $50 bbl.
In otherwords, each Iraqi family of 4 should be millionaires.
But they aren't.
You can actually measure the amount of the kleptocrats greed in Iraq:
The $1,000,000 in oil wealth should produce at least $50,000 year in income for each Iraqi family (higher than the U.S. average).
Instead, the average Iraqi family is living on about $2000/ year.
Where did the rest go?
Into the kleptocrats pockets... - 4:47 PM
Clarification note:
The 9:44 a.m. post by Steve was me. The 1:36 a.m. post was some other Steve.
(Note to self - sign up on blogger...) - 11:12 PM
- jbmoore said...
Righteous anger is an oxymoron. All anger has pain underneath it. An Enlightened individual recognises that the unenlightened cannot be other than what they are. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. The deluded will continue to delude themselves until their suffering is so great that they can't continue the rationalization or belief. In other words, reality trumps perception and/or delusion eventually.
- Ben Tilly said...
This comment is for tangent to explain ozone to him.
What ozone does is block a lot of hard radiation that otherwise would cause cancer, etc. Unfortunately you need a lot of ozone between you and the Sun to block any significant amount of radiation. Also unfortunately, ozone is unstable, poisonous, etc. Enough ozone to make a difference in the bottom layer of the atmosphere is enough to cause serious health problems. And ozone created here has a tendancy to sink rather than rise.
Therefore creating ozone at ground level doesn't help. You get suffer side effects, and you can't create enough to be worthwhile.
Creating it in the stratosphere is better, but it still doesn't help much. The problem is that ozone is unstable - it is constantly being created and destroyed. Therefore if you stick a bunch up there, it will disappear on its own fairly quickly (through the reaction 2O3 -> 3O2). Besides, we'd need to put a lot up there to match what is created naturally (eg from lightning). And creating ozone takes energy.
Now you might think, "We can find substances that destroy ozone, why can't we find some that create it?" Unfortunately that's impossible because of basic principles of chemistry. Any reaction that can create ozone can also run backwards and destroy it as well. And since turning ozone into regular oxygen is an exothermic reaction, unless you are actively putting energy into the system, the ozone destroying reaction is going to be a lot more eager to run than the ozone creating one. - 1:01 AM
- David Brin said...
jbmoore, I really can't find much in your statement to agree with, except that power corrupts. Otherwise, geez!
Our human ability to delude ourselves is huge and therfore must have conferred reproductive advantages. One clear advantage is confidence. A great many righteous people are not in misery! They are having a VERY good time! (See http://www.davidbrin.com/addiction.html) Moreover the utter confidence in their own virtue gives many of them great power to pursue goals with passion and energy.
(Indeed, such righteousness can be RIGHT! e.g. Churchill rallying the West against the Nazis.)
Moreover, women, when surveyed about the most attractive features in a male, seldom cite physical traits first. Confidence is usually first, followed by status/respect in the community. Both of which are bolstered by deeply believing in yourself.
Moreover, if you can tell yourself grand lies it certainly helps in persuading others to believe the same crap... or the same wonderful ideas...
True, deep wrath and anger can kill you inside. But I don't believe I was speaking much to anger, per se. It has a venn overlap with indignation, but no more than half, probably much less. - 3:03 AM
- reason said...
I think Steve (him of the anti-government fundamentalist slant) should be clear on a couple of concepts. A market is by definition regulated. That is there is a set of rules that define ethical behaviour in a market without which a market would disintegrate. There is however a difference between good regulation and bad regulation. Good regulation tends to define results but not methods. It tends to favour competition and encourage free entry to markets. It will where possible internalise externalities so they are represented in the markets and not only in the political or legal system. (Good regulation will reduce the cost of torts for instance).
The other concept that is important is to see the market as a tool (towards social welfare - it is a political argument as to exactly what that means) not an end in itself. That means what is good for the market is not of itself necessarily good. It is good only if the outcome is good (however we want to define good). I think markets can work well - but it is clearly observable that they don't always. I don't buy the argument that they have never been tried. We have had a rather unsucessful 25 year experiment in trickle down, now. It reminds of the christianists - "christianity has not tried and failed it has never been tried"! If only we were purer! Bullshit! - 3:19 AM
I don't have much hope that the "new" wealthy will behave any differently than the "old" wealthy.
Take Paul Allen, for example.
He talked the people of Seattle into building a new, $420 million stadium for his football team, even though they still owed $127 million on the old stadium.
Part of the deal was that he would open the books of his team to public scutiny, but now that he has his stadium, he is refusing...secrecy must be maintained...or he might lose some money.
Meet the new rich, same as the old rich. - 4:43 AM
reason had said: "It reminds of the christianists - 'christianity has not tried and failed it has never been tried'! If only we were purer! Bullshit!"
The actual quote is from G. K. Chesterton: "Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried." Even accounting for the humor in that statement, I don't agree with it. Christianity is easy. It requires trust rather than purity or sacrifice. But self-righteousness is as enticing as indignation, and so, like the Pharisees of Jesus's time, many Christians replace truth and trust with excuses for self-righteousness.
On to other quotes. Robert Heinlein, in the Notebooks of Lazarus Long, said, "Man is not a rational animal; man is a rationalizing animal." I suspect that rationalization is such a common human trait because it is a side effect of the survival trait of being able to make quick decisions. No-one has time to think every matter through logically: we must all jump to conclusions occasionally. Then when wise people have time to think or to consult with others, they review their decisions in practical criticism.
For example, before the Iraq war President Bush and many other world leaders had already decided that Saddam Hussein must have hidden weapons of mass destruction. If you recall Secretary of State Colin Powell's presentation to the UN, he showed unconvincing little tidbits of evidence of Saddam Hussein's weapons program. Unconvincing except to those who were already convinced. Those people were asking, "Where are the weapons?" and "How well are they hidden?" rather than "Are there weapons?" The evidence answered those questions and looked good to them. And when it came time for the Bush administration to review their conclusions and apply practical criticism, they didn't. They liked being right, even when it was only in their own minds, and would not risk finding themselves wrong, even when it was the truth.
David Brin said, "...then suppression of criticism must be the greatest single cause of error,..." Mathematically, it is not the cause of the error but a multiplier of the error. If someone is lucky enough to be right the first time, lack of criticism won't cause any problems. However, if someone has made some mistakes, lack of criticism can let little errors grow into big problems.
David Brin also said, "...it is very likely biological. Don't all of us descend from the harems of kings, who gained reproductive advantage by seizing and holding unaccountable power?" I have doubts about that. In some cultures, wasn't one of the first acts of a new king to kill all his relatives who had any claim on his throne? That really undermines his father's reproductive advantage in having a harem.
Erin Schram - 5:45 AM
Once upon a time, the word "Liberal" denoted a movement for much smaller government, less economic regulation. The classical liberals were indeed liberals in the modern sense: concerned with social problems, income inequality, etc. Much has been forgotten. Old fashioned liberals have been pushed into an uneasy alliance with the Right contra the socialists.
There still exists a free-market Left, small though it may be. See
* www.progress.org
* www.freeliberal.com
* www.holisticpolitics.org
For example, if you are concerned about the excessive concentration of corporate power, see Shrinking the Corporations. There, you will find ways by which our current regulatory and tax system encourages bigness, and incremental steps to reverse the process.
Or, if you are concerned about the wealth gap, see The Balance of Wealth and Wealth to the Working Class
Finally, the problem of global warming can be attacked much more simply and effectively. See Stop Global Warming for a plan that reduces carbon emissions as it simplifies the tax code. - 5:56 AM
Once upon a time, the word "Liberal" denoted a movement for much smaller government, less economic regulation. The classical liberals were indeed liberals in the modern sense: concerned with social problems, income inequality, etc. Much has been forgotten.
Indeed. The main thing that has been forgotten is why the Liberals gave that up. Shrinking government and economic regulation was a very good idea when you had systems of serfdom, and in which the nobility and the church didn't pay tax - but the peasants did. (I could go on to name many more such examples).
However, the Liberals of the 19th century saw exactly where that path lead. The Irish Potatoe Famine, various other famines (mostly in India and other colonies), the Congo Free State, Company Stores, Company Towns, and it culminated in the US in the Great Depression. (I could give many other examples).
Having smashed the existing power base to such an extent that it wasn't actively holding down the poor, something was needed to counteract the murderous fluctuations of a Libertarian economy - and that was provided by reorganising the system in such a way that it disproportionately helped the disadvantage. Probably the leading Liberal of this wave was John Maynard Keynes.
(Oh, and almost every word of that rant about the Cato Institute applies to Britain's Adam Smith Institute - which is unsurprising when you look at just how many leading lights in one are also in the other. (The Adam Smith Institute are currently furious because our Labour PM is claiming Adam Smith as left wing)). - 12:15 PM
The Adam Smith Institute are currently furious because our Labour PM is claiming Adam Smith as left wing
My mistake. Gordon Brown isn't Prime Minister yet - he's still Chancellor of the Exchequer. - 12:17 PM
Joke of the day on the Adam Smith Institute homepage:
Q: What is the one thing that all men at singles bars have in common?
A: They're all married.
I think Dr. Brin is being too hard on the Catoites and their ilk.
Unless they're far dumber than we think, they know very well that they're hypocrites.
What's worse, judging by how poorly the Cato-backed Republican plan to loot Social Security faired last year, they're now hypocrites that nobody pays any attention to.
Working at Cato these days is the intellectual equivalent of working in a Tijuana Donkey Show...that nobody comes to see. - 5:10 PM
You said:
"Moreover, women, when surveyed about the most attractive features in a male, seldom cite physical traits first. Confidence is usually first, followed by status/respect in the community. Both of which are bolstered by deeply believing in yourself."
What a smart woman wants is a man who can laugh at himself. Any normal, decent man makes plenty of little mistakes. If a man can't laugh at himself, he is a danger to his woman -- and probably to his community, too. - 1:56 PM
First of all, I would love to see where you found *ANY* Cato publication commenting on abortion: they never, ever comment on that because it is outside the scope of their work. That was the first clue that this was a clueless barrage of criticism.
Second, for Patricia Mathews: umm, *no*, Cato is not named for Cato Uticensis, which you would know if you had actually ever looked at the website. It is named after Cato's Letters, as it says in the (surprise surprise) "About" section: "The Institute is named for Cato's Letters, a series of libertarian pamphlets that helped lay the philosophical foundation for the American Revolution."
Further, your equally uninformed comment that Cato is uninterested in Civil Liberties issues: what rock are you hiding under? Not only does Cato Institute analyst Jim Harper write on this stuff for a living, he runs another site on the side: http://www.privacilla.org/
Radley Balko, who recently left Cato for Reason magazine, wrote frequently on the horrific effects of a WOD (War On Drugs, for the clueless) gone mad, esp. with regards to no-knock raids.
and "reason": Cato analysts as "intellectual mercenaries"??? Oh my, that's rich! Do you have a clue how very little policy analysts are paid? They do it because they are passionate about their work. And to "anonymous" at 9:18am: Oh, gee, Cato doesn't give you somewhere to post feedback on their website! Didja ever think that maybe, just maybe, might be because that means hiring someone to moderate the comments?! And non-profits have to be pretty darn careful about the money they put out. You all have some whack ideas on how much money floats around think-tanks! No, I don't work for Cato, but for the sake of anyone else who may stumble across this collection of ridiculous commentary, someone had to at least poke the bubble of your paranoid delusions. - 3:35 PM
I'm curious as to your "ownership of capital" comment, the one Adam Smith supposedly warned us about. I'd like to hear more on that. I'm no philosopher, just an economics undergraduate, but it seems to me that ownership of capital is not as important as the ability to freely exchange it. However, doesn't that implicitly imply that there would be ownership?
- Per Kurowski said...
Please! While you are busy leaving Iraq
http://perkurowski.blogspot.com/ - 1:00 PM
Strategy for Cato reform:
The next time you receive a fundraising appeal from Cato, simply seal the postage-paid return envelope and return it empty. When the empty envelopes pile up, they will start to figure it out. Fundraising operations hate empty envelopes. When they start coming in from their house list mailings, they will know they have a big problem. - 4:03 PM
tl;dr but right on the money.
I only want to add this:
Adam Smith was replaced by Ayn Rand as the patron Saint of the libertarian ideal.
Smith was against mercantilism & for public healthcare, roads, transportation, & other social infrastructures.
tl;dr but right on the money.
I only want to add this:
Adam Smith was replaced by Ayn Rand as the patron Saint of the libertarian ideal.
Smith was against mercantilism & for public healthcare, roads, transportation, & other social infrastructures.


text:
Silky leaf print and Linen Pillow cover. Linear yarn detail hand stitched to order in our studio. Back side matches front for pattern continuity. Choose prefered stitching detail color at time of order, to match your interior. Produced from up-cycled materials in our Brooklyn NY studio. High quality metal zipper closure for durability. Pillow insert not included.
*Allow 3-5 days for production as this item is hand stitched in our Brooklyn studio.
Colors include: Black and White
Professional dry cleaning recommended if laundering required
Pillow cover hand crafted in Brooklyn NY
Project No. 6:
Reduce textile waste and pollution:
All products in this series are composed entirely of in house liability materials, or locally sourced dead stock. The objective of Project No. 6 is to focus on what we refer to as 'designing with purpose' in an effort to reduce textile waste. Rather than the industry norm of storing excessive quantities of over stock raw materials every season, this project utilizes only raw materials that have already been produced down to the lining and zipper. This practice not only reduces textile waste, but also pollution and water waste. Our team has to design smarter to create these beautiful limited run or one of a kind products.
Quality in relation to sustainability:
Sustainability is not as simple as eco conscious material sourcing. Although an important aspect, the most eco friendly materials poorly executed into a product that isn't built to last, is not sustainable. Hand crafting a quality product that can be cherished for years to come reduces textile waste in our landfills. This initiative is reflected from quality craftsmanship to durable metal zippers.
Smarter packaging:
This effort of up-cycling extends into our packaging. The industry standard of shipping products in plastic flat pack bags will hopefully be a thing of the past very soon. With the objective of Project No. 6 focusing on reduction of textile waste by designing with purpose, our team chose to extend beyond our recycled paper packaging. All products from Project No. 6 are packaged in a tote shopper or dust bag, hand crafted in our Brooklyn studio, utilizing up-cycled materials. Our expectation is that this unique packaging initiative will allow customers to repurpose these dust bags and shopper totes.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Featured News - Current News - Archived News - News Categories
Niagara Pioneer Soccer League reports it will hold walk-in registration for its house league on Saturday, March 23, from 10 a.m. to noon at the Youngstown Red Brick School Village Center, 240 Lockport St.
The house league is open to boys ages 3 to 14 and girls ages 3 to 17. The season runs from May 14 to July 22, with games played Mondays and Thursdays from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at Fort Niagara State Park, Youngstown. Sign-up cost is $40 per player.
For more information, visit http://www.niagarapioneer.com.


text:
Press Releases
The Online Apparel Market Continues to Shift in a COVID-19 World, But Last Year Saw Healthy Growth
Let's Talk About It
Creating a More Diverse and Inclusive Screen Printing Industry
LET'S TALK About It: Part 3 discusses how four screen printers have employed people with disabilities, why you should consider doing the same, the resources that are available, and more. Watch the live webinar, held August 16, moderated by Adrienne Palmer, editor-in-chief, Screen Printing magazine, with panelists Ali Banholzer, Amber Massey, Ryan Moor, and Jed Seifert. The multi-part series is hosted exclusively by ROQ.US and U.N.I.T.E Together. Let's Talk About It: Part 1 focused on Black, female screen printers and can be watched here; Part 2 focused on the LGBTQ+ community and can be watched here.
Press Releases1 month ago
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text:
Two New Jersey men have admitted their roles in a tax refund fraud scheme that federal authorities say cheated the government out of more than $12 million.
New Jersey's U.S. attorney says 53-year-old Bennie Haynes of Dayton and 50-year-old Manuel Rodriguez of New Brunswick pleaded guilty Monday to multiple charges.
They were among 14 people charged in a scheme to file false tax returns and divert refund checks. Haynes, a former U.S. Postal Service carrier, admitted to providing addresses from his mail route for use in the scheme.
Court documents show Rodriguez obtained cash from the refunds.
Authorities say the scheme was one of the largest of its kind ever uncovered. There were more than 8,000 fraudulent U.S. income tax returns filed, seeking more than $65 million in refunds.


text:
BOWLING GREEN- Following a huge success on February 18th, 2013, where HB 1045 passed committee 7-4, Colorado's Anti-NDAA bill a faces a possible defeat on the House floor.
HB 1045 is designed to counter the indefinite detention provisions, sections 1021 and 1022, of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act. These sections authorize the indefinite military detention, without charge or trial, of anyone who commits a "belligerent act," or is suspected of terrorism, and violate over 13 provisions of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. the law has also been condemned by retired members of the Armed Forces, a current U.S. Congressman, Federal Judge Katherine B. Forrest, conservative pundit Rush Limbaugh, and the American Civil Liberties Union.
HB 1045 would restore the protections in the Bill of Rights for the people of Colorado, prohibit any person in the state from being indefinitely detained, and prohibit any person from applying the "laws of war" including detention and execution, in Colorado.
Now, according our sources, Rep. Bob Gardner will attempt to crush the bill on the House floor. Rep. Gardner will attempt to kill the liberty of the people of Colorado, to violate his oath to the Constitution both as a representative and as a veteran of the United States Air Force, and allow the President of the United States to detain, and even execute, any person in Colorado.
Colorado, you have have awakened the sleeping giant. Now, We the People will respond.
According to our sources, we almost have the votes needed to pass. HB 1045 is scheduled for a vote on Monday, February 25th. If we bring enough pressure to Colorado this weekend, if we flood the inboxes, phone lines, and desks of these representatives with phone calls and emails, we can win this state back for liberty.
With your help, we won huge victories in Indiana, Montana, and Arizona. now, it's time to bring that pressure to the Evergreen State.
You are the special forces, let's take back Colorado for liberty.
Pick one, two, three or ten of these representatives and send a call and an email to thank them for supporting HB 1045 and protecting the civil liberties of the people of Colorado! (This will help secure them as supporters):
(We encourage anyone out of state to DEFINITELY still call and email, without mentioning the state you are calling from. Your support is crucial.)
-Perry Buck (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2907
-Dominick Moreno (D): email@example.com 303-8662964
-Joe Salazar (D): email@example.com 303-866-2918
-Steve Lebsock (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2931
-Lori Saine (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2906
-Brian DelGrosso (R): email@example.com 303-866-2947
-Mark Waller (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-5523
-Clarice Navarro-Ratzalf (R): email@example.com 303-866-2905
-Tim Dore (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2398
-Frank McNulty (R): email@example.com 303-866-2936
-Libby Szabo (R): email@example.com 303-866-2962
-Spencer Swalm (R): email@example.com 303-866-5510
-Chris Holbert (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2933
-Carole Murray (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2948
-Kevin Priola (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2912
-Kathleen Conti (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2953
-Ray Scott (R): email@example.com 303-866-3068
-Jeanne Labuda (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2966
-Ed Vigil (R): email@example.com 303-866-2916
-Diane Mitschbush (D): email@example.com 303-866-2923
-Claire Levy (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2578
-Bob Rankin (R): email@example.com 303-866-2949
-James Wilson (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2747
-Lois Landgraf (R): email@example.com 303-866-2946
-Janak Joshi (R): email@example.com 303-866-2937
-Jerry Sonnenberg (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-3706
-Don Coram (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2955
-Speaker Mark Ferrandino (D): email@example.com 303-866-2346
-Polly Lawrence (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2935
Call these undecided representatives and tell them to honor their oath and support HB 1045!
We encourage anyone out of state to DEFINITELY still call and email, without mentioning the state you are calling from.
-Amy Stephens (R): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2924
-Cheri Gerou (R): email@example.com 303-866-2582
-Paul Rosenthal (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2910
-Pete Lee (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2932
-Daniel Kagan (D): firstname.lastname@example.com 303-866-2921
-Max Tyler (D): email@example.com 303-866-2951
-Angela Williams (D): email@example.com 303-866-2909
On a final note, if you are a veteran of the U.S. Armed Forces anyhere in the world, please contact Rep. Bob Gardner and tell him why you support HB 1045 and oppose the NDAA as a veteran:
Rep. Bob Gardner
Phone: 303-866-2191
Email: email@example.com
This could be the final stand for HB 1045. Let's show the world what we can do.
Dan Johnson
Founder, PANDA
People Against the NDAA


text:
Election Polling Places: What You Need To Know For Phoenix Elections. The way Phoenicians vote during elections has changed, and for the better. 26 Polling Places have been implemented within the Valley in order to make voting more convenient and flexible, according to the City of Phoenix's website.
Over the years, voting via mail increased as confusion became widespread regarding the 128 polling places and how inconvenient and confusing they were. Voters could only vote at one specific location, and they had to be there at specific times. This became too much of a hassle, so voters began submitting their ballots via mail, adding themselves to the Permanent Early Voting List (PEVL) to avoid said inconvenience.
So, the City Council approved the Voting Center plan in order to prevent voter confusion and to promote an easier, hassle-free way of voting.
According to the City of Phoenix website, Election Voting Centers benefits include:
- Ease of Voting: Voters can vote at any of the 26 Voting Centers convenient to them. Voters can replace or drop-off an early ballot at any Early Voting or Voting Center location.
- Multiple Days: Voting Centers will be open for several days, listed below.
- Improved Sites, Service and Support: Voting Centers will be located on main streets and transit routes.
- Reduced Need for Provisional Ballots: Voters who do not vote their early ballot will not have to vote a provisional ballot at a Voting Center because the early ballot can be cancelled.
- Cost Savings: It is estimated this process will decrease election costs by approximately $250,000.
When are the Polling Places open?
Saturday, August 27, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Monday, August 29, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Tuesday, August 30 (Election Day), 6 a.m. – 7 p.m.
Key dates to remember:
August 4: Early Ballot mailing begins and Early Voting starts at Phoenix City Hall
August 13 and August 20: Early Voting sites will be open throughout the city
August 19: Last day to request an early ballot by mail
August 26: Last day for on site Early Voting at Phoenix City Hall
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Read about Props 1 & 2 from an earlier post on AZNow.Biz.[/stextbox]
Polling Places Locations & Directions |
Goelet A.C. Beuf Community/Sr. Ctr.
3435 W. Pinnacle Peak Rd. |
Golden Gate Community Center
1625 N. 39th Ave. |
Deer Valley Community Center
2001 W. Wahalla Ln. |
LDS Church
3102 N. 18th Ave. |
Fireside at Desert Ridge Comm. Ctr.
3775 E. Lone Cactus Dr. |
Burton Barr Central Library
1221 N. Central Ave. |
Palmcroft Baptist Church
15825 N. 35th Ave. |
Devonshire Senior Center
2802 E. Devonshire Ave. |
Unity of Phoenix Church
1500 E. Greenway Pkwy. |
Memorial Presbyterian Church
4141 E. Thomas Rd. |
Paradise Valley Community/Sr. Ctr.
17402 N. 40th St. |
Phoenix City Hall
200 W. Washington St. |
Hampton Inn & Suites
16620 N. Scottsdale Rd. |
Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church
1401 E. Jefferson St. |
Mesquite Branch Library
4525 E. Paradise Village Pkwy. North |
Grace Walk Community Church
7840 W. Lower Buckeye Rd. |
Sunnyslope Community Center
802 E. Vogel Ave. |
City Clerk Dept. Customer Service Ctr.
2640 S. 22nd Ave. |
Manzanita Senior Center
3581 W. Northern Ave. |
Broadway Heritage Neighborhood Res. Ctr.
2405 E. Broadway Rd. |
North Phoenix Baptist Church
5757 N. Central Ave. |
South Mountain Community/Sr. Ctr.
212 E. Alta Vista Rd. |
Desert West Community Center
6501 W. Virginia Ave. |
Cesar Chavez Branch Library
3635 W. Baseline Rd. |
Maryvale Community Center
4420 N. 51st Ave. |
Pecos Community/Sr. Center
17010 S. 48th St. |


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Intermediate Clouds and Atmosphere Word Search
When you find a word, click on the first (or last) letter and hold down the mouse button. Drag the cursor to the last (or first) letter and release.
Words can be horizontal or diagonal, forwards or backwards. So have fun and good hunting! Try our Beginner or Advanced levels for variety...
Tell me more about these words that have to do with clouds and the atmosphere: rain , atmosphere , nitrogen , stratus , clouds , weather , layer , exosphere , ozone , noctilucent , AIM


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Zombie Crashes Wedding Engagement Photo Shoot [PICTURES]
Engagement pictures traditionally bring to mind all sorts of romantic things. An idyllic setting? Naturally. Loving looks between the happy couple? Of course. A life-and-death struggle with a flesh-eating zombie? Er, not so much.
In Juliana Park and Ben Lee's engagement photos, the couple don't just grin and smooch for the camera, they battle an undead corpse with a machete and shovel.
The photos, which were taken by Los Angeles photographer Amanda Rynda and posted online last week, went viral after being picked up by Reddit and have made the couple something of an internet sensation.
Scroll down to view the carnage:
[via io9]


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1. Bill Murray walks into a bar...
For many years, the most popular line being peddled about Bill Murray was that he was a recluse. After Ghostbusters he became picky about his roles, taking years off between films; he never went to red-carpet events and rarely did interviews; he replaced his agent and PR with an automated phone line that he rarely listened to, leading to him losing roles simply because nobody could get hold of him; and when they did get his attention, directors would have to fax their precious scripts to his local office supply store. That said, Murray was no recluse. From 2007 onwards, he began turning his public appearances into a kind of performance art; a Marina Abramovic for liquored-up hipsters. He drunkenly crashed a stolen golf cart in Stockholm; he attended a student party in St Andrews, and did the washing up; he dived behind the bar at a film festival and served drinks with the Wu-Tang Clan; an entire website - billmurraystory.com - is devoted to tales of him crashing karaoke parties, joining kick-abouts in the park, and appearing from nowhere in restaurants to steal chips from a plate, before departing with the words 'No one will ever believe you.' It's notable that none of these stories portray Murray in a bad light: he pays for drinks, keeps his hands to himself, and is sociable to a fault. He even kept his cool when a guest at a Brooklyn Halloween party accused him of 'making bad life choices' (this was 2008, the year of Murray's second divorce). Rather than throw a movie-star tantrum, Murray simply had another dance, politely thanked his host and left.
2. The human special effect
After the New York premiere of Hyde Park on Hudson, Murray and the film-makers took questions from the audience. The film stars Murray as the crippled US president Franklin D Roosevelt, and one scene shows FDR swimming, his horribly wizened legs dangling under the water. According to US GQ, one audience member wondered how the special effects department had managed to make the limbs look so hideous. As the giggling from the stage quickly made apparent, no special effects were involved. Murray let the laughter die down. "That," he said after a long pause, "is acting."
3. The reason he made Garfield
Even bearing in mind his contrary nature and love of peculiar left-turns, Murray's 2004 decision to follow his Oscar-nominated role in Lost in Translation by voicing the comic-strip cat in his first CGI outing (tagline: "Get ready for frisky business") caught many by surprise. This, remember, was a man who had previously turned down the Buzz Lightyear part in Toy Story. What was he thinking? The answer came six years later, via an interview with GQ. Murray revealed that he read the first few pages of the Garfield script, written by a Joel Coen; he recognised the name from films like Fargo, Raising Arizona and The Big Lebowski, and said yes. When the time came to record his part, confronted with lines that 'got worse and worse', he asked to see the film. "Who did this?" he raged to himself. "What the f--- was Coen thinking?" Then he was told: the name on the script was Joel Cohen, not Coen. In 2006 Murray made Garfield 2: A Tale of Two Kitties; so far, no explanation.
4. The Lost in Translation enigma
It's one of modern cinema's great unanswered questions: what, exactly, does Bill Murray whisper to Scarlett Johansson as they part ways at the end of Lost in Translation? Murray was left to adlib the line by Sofia Coppola and has never divulged what he said, despite being asked countless times. But his best answer so far was given to a man who spotted him boarding a ferry in Martha's Vineyard and called out, "Bill, what'd ya say to her?" Just as the ferry's foghorn blasted out, Murray began moving his lips and gesticulating 'like I was saying something really sincere'. It got a huge laugh. (Audio enhancement has since indicated that the line is "I have to be leaving, but I won't let that come between us, OK?")
5. Cutting Chevy Chase down to size
In 1977, Murray replaced Chevy Chase in the cast of Saturday Night Live. Though widely loathed by all he left behind in order to become a film star ("scumbag" and "asshole" being the more polite terms used to describe him), Chase returned to guest host the show. After a whole week of snippy remarks and perceived snubs between the two, Murray and Chase came to blows minutes before recording began. As recounted in the book Live From New York, Chase compared Murray's acne-marked face to the surface of the moon; Murray in turn implied that Chase was incapable of satisfying his wife in bed. After the pair were pulled apart by fellow cast members, a 'foaming at the mouth' Murray delivered what could be the most perfect put-down of all time: 'Medium talent!'
Credit: AP IMAGES
6. The Road House calls
No matter where he is, and no matter the time of day, Murray's best friend Mitch Glazer will often pick up the phone to hear the following words: "Hi, Kelly's having sex with Patrick Swayze right now." Glazer is married to the actress Kelly Lynch, who was ravished against a wall by Swayze in the late-night TV staple Road House. Whenever he stumbles across it, Lynch told AV Club last year, Murray waits for that scene and calls his friend. Or, if Murray himself is unavailable, one of his brothers will call instead. 'It was funny the first dozen or so times,' Glazer lamented recently.
7. Baseball's 'Director of Fun'
An avid sports fan, Murray is the co-owner of several minor-league baseball teams. At the Charleston RiverDogs, he also has the title 'Director of Fun'. It's a position Murray takes very seriously. One employee remembers his first meeting with the new boss: 'He just walks in and he said, "What's the deal with this lighting in here?" Then he said, "We're going to put some pink gel lighting in here, to soften the mood".' Then he turned around and walked away.' Last year Murray attended a RiverDogs game that was stopped by rain; instead of baseball, the crowd were treated to the sight of Murray joyfully skidding and belly-flopping all over the tarpaulin.
Credit: Rex Features
8. The deaf assistant
During the production of Groundhog Day, Murray was going through his first divorce, even crankier than usual, and prone to disappearing for hours at a time. To ease 'communication' between the star, director Harold Ramis and the studio, Murray was asked to hire a personal assistant. His solution was to employ an assistant who was profoundly deaf and spoke only in sign language, which nobody else on set - including Murray - could speak. As Ramis told Entertainment Weekly: "Bill said, 'Don't worry, I'm going to learn sign language.' And I think it was so inconvenient that in a couple weeks, he gave that up. That's anti-communication, you know? Let's not talk."


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Youngsee Micro Beads Rings for Nano Ring Hair Extensions 200 Beads Per Bag
- Size: 5mm*3mm*3mm,Outer diameter*Inner diameter*height
- Color: Black,brown, blonde.
- Advantages: Designed to fit nano ring hair extensions.Remove and replace old micro beads to reuse hair extensions.
How to Choose Hair Length?
Do you know how to choose the length of hair extensions? The image below shows the before and after of wearing hair extensions and the conversion between inches and centimeters. If you don't know which size is right for you, you can refer to the picture below.
There are some real pictures after choosing the correct length.
Find your Perfect Shade
- Take some photos of your own hair. Photos must be without filters, avoid taking pictures in direct sunlight. It's good to have a back view of your hair and make sure it's down.
- Send us the picture and wait for our customer service to reply you your color matching as soon as possible! (email: email@example.com)
Free Shipping
All orders ship same day if placed before 9 p.m. EST Monday - Friday unless there is a shipping address error or stockout, we will contact you immediately at that time. We never ship during weekends or holidays. Besides we need a few hours to process you order and the shipment. When shipped, orders will take a few hours to update tracking. You will get a shipping confirmation once shipped.
Youngsee Hair shipping method is DHL, FedEx or USPS. We will choose the appropriate way to express according to your region. The delivery time is 3-6 business days via Fedex and DHL, 10-15 business days via USPS.
We will ship your order without charging extra shipping fee. We will ship your order on the SAME/NEXT working day of payment receipt. To process your order quickly and correctly, please provide us with your full right delivery address including postcode/zip code, county/province name. Please also remember to leave your contact number and email address.
Your order will be DISPATCHED on the same working day, provided that the order is placed before 3.00 pm (Saturday, Sunday and Holidays are not classed as working days).
All items are sent out with the chosen postal service on the next working day of payment receipt. Delivery is not possible on a Saturday, Sunday or Holiday. All prices include package and postage charges.
If you have any urgent need please call us on +8613034571891/+8617862813017.
After your order has shipped: The delivery address may not be changed. Some items are not available for special/next day delivery, they are specified in the products description.
Return Policy
We accept order cancellation before the product is shipped or produced. If the order is cancelled you will get a full refund. We cannot cancel the order if the product is already shipped out. We will help you with the return after you receive the hair.
Returns (if applicable)
We accept return on products. Customers have the right to apply for return within 60 days after the receipt.
To be eligible for a return, your item must be unused and in the same condition that you received it. It must also be in the original packaging. To complete your return, we require a receipt or proof of purchase. Please do not send your purchase back to the manufacturer.
Customers will only be charged once at most for shipping costs (this includes returns); For all returns due to no fault of ours, a 5% re-stocking fee will apply and you will be responsible for the shipping cost.
※Custom Lengths are final sale and are not eligible for returns or exchanges. We recommend ordering Swatches to see the colours in person if you are unsure about the colour before paying for a custom length.
※Clearance products are not returned or exchanged, because it is already a zero profit sale, please understand
Refunds (if applicable)
Once your return is received and inspected, we will send you an email to notify you that we have received your returned item. We will also notify you of the approval or rejection of your refund. If you are approved, then your refund will be processed, and a credit will automatically be applied to your credit card or original method of payment, within a certain amount of days.
Late or missing refunds (if applicable)
If you haven't received a refund yet, first check your bank account again.
Then contact your credit card company, it may take some time before your refund is officially posted. Next, contact your bank. There is often some processing time before a refund is posted. If you've done all of this and you still have not received your refund yet, please contact us at firstname.lastname@example.com.
Please contact our Customer service at email@example.com to get the returned address.
What is Virgin Hair?
- Virgin hair is directly taken from the human head and does not undergo any chemical alteration or cleansing process. It has to be 100% pure.
- It cannot have gone through any kind of chemical processing, so when you purchase this hair, it has not been permed, bleached, blow-dried, gone through any other chemical processing.
- It's from one single donor, so each bundle you buy should be from the same donors(the donor could be Indian, Malaysian, Brazilian, etc). This has not been exposed to any kinds of harsh agents and the cuticles all still have to be intact and running in the same direction.
Virgin Hair VS. Remy Hair
Why is my hair getting tangled?
Your hair tangle due to dryness, oil & dirt build-up, saltwater, and not combing (wide tooth comb) out your hair daily.
Make sure to wash & condition your hair at least once a week, twice a week is better. Use hydrating drops or consult your stylist for more help.
Generally, we recommend 100g-150g for a full head. If you want thicker hair, around 200g will do. In addition, you can also match different hair extensions, such as topper & clip ins &halo hair.
Expedited Express Delivery (Free over $99) usually takes 3-6 business days, Ordinary Express Delivery (USPS) usually takes 10-15 business days.
Checking More questions & answers on FAQ Page.
No. Hair extensions won't damage our own Hair if we use proper care and professional installation techniques. there are plenty of alternatives that are great for hair and won't do any harm.
Please let us know by contacting us at firstname.lastname@example.com first. Then we will help you to replace.


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April 12, 2012
French professor to give lecture on medieval literature and art today
Robert Clark, associate professor of modern languages, will give the seventh bi-annual Signatures lecture of the department of modern languages at 4 p.m. today in the Hemisphere Room of Hale Library. His lecture is titled "The Myth of Host Desecration in Medieval Aragon and Paris."
Accusations of host desecration – the assault on a consecrated communion wafer – abound in medieval Europe and constitute one of the more unfortunate chapters in Christian-Jewish relations. This presentation will focus on a few manifestations of host desecration as expressed in art and drama and as recorded in the archives. Contextualization of these episodes will allow us to see more clearly how this pan-European phenomenon was deployed in Paris and Aragon to address local anxieties over the integrity of the Christian communities when confronted with their Jewish Other.


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Domtar Nominated for Five Pulp & Paper International 2011 Awards
More kudos for PAPERbecause and the Domtar Paper Trail
Oct 18, 2011 1:00 PM ET
(3BL Media / theCSRfeed) Montreal - October 18, 2011 - Domtar Corporation(NYSE: UFS) (TSX: UFS) has been nominated in five categories at the upcoming Pulp and Paper International (PPI) Awards 2011, including Environmental Strategy of the Year and Promotional Campaign of the Year - Environmental Message. The company was also shortlisted for Business Strategy of the Year, Efficiency Improvements of the Year (Domtar's Kamloops Mill), and Mill Manager of the Year (Domtar's Johnsonburg Mill Manager, Tom Detwiler).
These nominations cap off a string of honours in 2011 for Domtar's PAPERbecause advocacy campaign in particular, including a Positively Print Award from the GraphicArts Show Company (GASC), Best in Show at the ACE Awards, Best of Category in the Business Marketing Association's B2 Awards, recognition from both the Association of Independent Creative Editors and the Printing Industry of the Carolinas, and a NAMMU 2010 Environmental Award. The PPI Environmental Strategy of the Year nomination, meanwhile, stems from the company's development of an online tool called the Domtar Paper Trail that creates personalized customer reports of the environmental and socio-economic impacts of specific paper grade purchases. "We'd like to thank PPI for these tremendous honors," said Lewis Fix, Domtar's Vice President of Sustainable Business and Brand Management. "Domtar launched PAPERbecause to support our customers and suppliers in demonstrating how valuable paper is to society, and in fact how environmentally sustainable it is. We also feel it's our obligation to be transparent by telling the great stories of where our paper comes from and the impact it has – that's what the Paper Trail is all about. Advocating for responsible paper use and reporting on the environmental and socio-economic impacts of our products go hand in hand for us." "The PPI Awards are now in their third year, and the quality and quantity of the entries is better than ever," said Mark Rushton, Editor of PPI magazine and Chairman of the jury for the PPI Awards 2011. "We've received more entries from all parts of the globe this year from USA to China, and Europe to South America. Making the shortlist is a fantastic achievement." The PPI Awards are organized by RISI, the leading information provider for the global forest products industry. They are the industry's only global awards that honor leadership, vision, innovation and strategic accomplishments. Winners will be named on November 15th at an event in Brussels, Belgium that overlaps with RISI's European Paper Week. DOMT17791


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How to Rank Well in Google Products Search & a Big List of Places to Get Reviews
The author's views are entirely their own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz.
Hello, my name is Tom, you've seen me guest blog here before but today I'm blogging and ill. So I'm going to dispense with the usual chit-chat approach and lay out the facts. Some of you may even like it that way! Shame on you. Still, here's the content.
Google Base aka Google Shopping aka Google Products
What do you know about Google Base? If you're running a site which sells something, you should be paying attention to Google Base because it's the service which underpins various vertical search portals from Google, including Google Products.
In case you're not familiar with Google Products and what they look like, let me give you an example:
See how Apple can't even rank top of Google for the phrase 'buy iphone'? Those 3 links above them are pulled from Google Shopping results. So having your products ranking highly in Google Shopping/Products/Base is clearly a good thing. But how do you get good rankings in this arcane Google offshoot? Is it all about pagerank?
Major Ranking Factors For Google Products
Below I present to you a list of the major ranking factors in Google Products, in no particular order. I've not done enough research to determine which are more important than others:
Having your keyphrases placed strategically in your title tag can help you rank, just like with regular SEO.
If you sell a product cheaper than your competition, you stand a better chance of ranking higher than places which sell it more expensively. Capitalism ftw.
Having a well-thought-out and keyphrase rich description is important. As far as I can see, Google doesn't crawl the URLs you submit to them for any ranking factors - they take all the information from your data submission, so a description can help you rank for long-tail phrases which you can't cover in your title tag.
Data stuffing is so the new keyword stuffing. What do I mean by data-stuffing? Well, in Google Base you have the options to upload data for all kinds of fields. Only the bare minimum are essential, and most are optional. In my experience, however, I've seen that adding more data-fields helps you rank higher and for more varied queries.
Fresh Data
This is actually a ranking factor which Google recommend to get higher rankings, so it would be remiss of me to not include it in this list!! Fresh data, as in updating your feed as often as possible or setting the scheduler to crawl your feed frequently, helps both your rankings and the accuracy of your data. Since Google doesn't crawl your pages, it's important to ensure your feed is up to date with the latest descriptions, prices and names.
Positive Reviews
Notice how I've not included pagerank (or mR) on this list? That's because I'm not sure how important it is to have a trusted domain in the traditional SEO-sense. More importantly, I think, is having a trusted domain in the traditional sense of the word. How does Google measure that? With reviews. Getting positive reviews for your site helps a lot with Google Local, and it's the same principle for Google Base. Although I've not listed these tips in order of importance, I think this is definitely one of the strongest ranking factors, particularly for competitive queries. So, to help you out with your Google Base rankings, I've listed below all of the sites which Google permits as review sites for use in Google Base. Before I list them though, I should point out that there's one site which Google seems to favour above all others for trusted reviews. There'll be no prizes for guessing who it is.... Yep, Google Checkout.
In my experience and research, Google Checkout reviews seem to count for more than reviews left on 3rd party sites. This does seem to make sense since these reviews are presumably more trusted by Google (since it controls the spam filtering and authentication) than 3rd party reviews. That said, it does mean you have to have Google Checkout enabled to profit from them!
An interesting aside here: it's not something I've tested, but if I were building a ranking algorithm based on reviews, I would make the raw number of reviews count as a ranking factor, positive or negative. Why? Because this signifies trust and brand awareness. The more people that are leaving reviews about you, the bigger your brand is. Given Google's shift towards brands recently, I wouldn't be surprised if this was a factor so bear this in mind when getting reviews.
Anyway, if you can't get Google Checkout reviews, try some of the sites on this list (separated by US and UK sites, as they're different!).
US Google Base Review Sites
UK Google Base Review Sites
From analysis of the top sites across many different searches, these are the sites which Google is reporting as trusted review sites. I've reviewed over 50 Google Products searches and probably at least 100 domains, and this is a list of all the review sites listed. There are probably others but they're either very small sites or aren't particularly trusted. These are the major ones.
There are plenty of ways of gaining reviews for your site, and I'm not going to go into detail on them here, but David Mihm has a solid post on getting local reviews and the process is exactly the same for products. Check it out, he links out to some great sources there too.
In conclusion, if you're selling something, you should definitely be investing some time in Google Base as it can bring some great results pretty quickly.
Random Musing: by the way, while researching Google Base, I noticed that you can submit all kinds of stuff to them, from jobs to recipes to events to cars. As far as I can see, most of these uploads won't net you much benefit, but I think it can only be a matter of time before we see Google Base results ranking in the main results for job queries, events and all manner of other queries. How long before getting reviews for your site becomes an integral part of the SEO process?


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Dave Kinsey in the Absolut Blank campaign
Dave Kinsey, solo show
Sept 5-7, 2013
Opening: Thurs, Sept 5th (6-9pm)
@FFDG, San Francisco
Preview inquiries: info(at)ffdg.net
San Francisco, CA -- FFDG is pleased to present Los Angeles based painter Dave Kinsey in his second solo show with the gallery featuring new mixed media paintings and wood sculptural works. A small selection of canvas paintings will be surrounded by 30 smaller 8" x 10" black and white chipboard paintings and a selection of rarely produced handcrafted wooden sculptures. An opening reception for this short-run show is scheduled for Friday, September 5th (6-9pm). Beer and wine will be available.
Dave Kinsey (born 1971, Pittsburgh, PA) is an American contemporary artist and designer who lives and works in Los Angeles and Three Rivers, California. He's known for his emotionally charged paintings and murals, as well as high-visibility logos and advertising campaigns, including the ubiquitous DC Shoes logo, The Black-Eyed Peas Elephunk album icon, N.E.R.D. "brain", Epitaph Records identity and, most recently, his work with the international Absolut Blank campaign. He was named one of the 100 most influential artists of the decade in 2012 by Complex magazine. On the design side, Kinsey currently owns and runs the design studio and brand BLK/MRKT. A founding member in 1997 with Shepard Fairey and Phillip DeWolff, he later became sole owner in 2003 and co-owner in 2004. BLK/MRKT Gallery (later Kinsey/DesForges) was introduced in Los Angeles in 2001, moving in 2003 to the Culver City Art District. Kinsey also runs BLK/MRKT Editions which produces fine art prints and the lifestyle brand BLK/MRKT.