Hey there, folks!   Much discussion has been taking place about the late "Liberal Lion" Senator Edward M. (Ted or Teddy) Kennedy in the wake of his recent passing due to brain cancer that, after a long, tough fight against, eventually took the Senator's life.  Although Senator Ted Kennedy's passing supposedly signifies the end of an era, there is one aspect of this era that, for me, has not come to an end;  my love for many of the movies and much of the music of the 1960's, most notably, the venerable golden oldie-but-great movie/musical classic, West Side Story.

The topic below was originally posted on my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal.

The topic below was originally posted in my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal .

So we went to Barnes and Noble the other day, and I'm sitting on the ground in the children's section with my 8-month old baby looking for a book to read to him. I take my eye off him for a minute or two and when I look back he's reached into one of the lower shelves, pulled off a Spongebob paperback, and is chewing on it. It's one of those cheapo books, with the pages only slightly thicker than newspaper, so by the time I notice we're the proud soon-to-be owners of this $3.99 treasure.

The Black Swan , by Nassim Nicholas Taleb is an engaging book about an important topic. However, if a reader who is familiar with the topic(s) will not find any new ideas.

Movies:

Today, I’ve decided to take a break from the rough-and-tumble world of domestic and international politics and write different kind of essay; on movies.

I went to see “Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy” at the Woods Hole Film Festival this weekend. It is billed as a mockumentary/reality/documentary hybrid, and is basically a film about making a documentary about Global Warming.

The Kentucky Derby yesterday produced both triumph and tragedy, as favorite Big Brown won going away despite beginning the race in the outside position, and then the second-place filly Eight Belles broke down after the finish and had to be euthanized. In honor of the Derby and the beginning of Triple Crown season, we take a look this week at favorite children's books involving horses.

Film Review: The Reflecting Pool

Joel S. Hirschhorn

Whether you see yourself as a truth seeker, patriotic American, independent thinker or voter, or just someone with bad memories of 9/11, you should make an effort to view The Reflecting Pool, a new independent movie. It is not about 9/11. It is about the credibility of the official government story about 9/11. Though a drama, it is based on meticulously researched facts about 9/11 as revealed in the bonus material on the DVD.

Hey there, folks!! Can you stand yet another diary about my alltime favorite film, West Side Story? Anyway, here goes:

For any of you who are interested, the Marginal Revolution Book Forum is now on the last chapter.

See here .

You may recall that this last chapter was the one cited in some recent discussions here about resources, the environment and innovation.

Thought you might like to know and read about it from someone far smarter than me. :) Enjoy.

Without a doubt, one of the most fascinating and disheartening chapters in The Logic of Life is chapter 6 on "Rational Racism".

A test was done at the University of VA. Students signed up and were paid to be part of the experiment, which was done via a faceless web based interface. They were divided in two groups. Employers and Employees. The employees were randomly assigned colors: Green or Purple. The experiment was done in 3 phases.

I always thought the ethanol fuel concept was a boondoggle--something the farm lobby pursued to increase the sale price of corn. Now it turns out I was wrong, and this is one thing I am happy to be wrong about. Here is new book that I predict will have a major impact on the way energy is produced.
Energy Victory

Robert Reich's latest book, Supercapitalism , has been on the back of mind for some time since it came out. Every time I'd go in Borders, I'd always grab it and skim through parts of it with the intention of buying it. Well, I finally got it the other day and am about to plow through it.

Loosely based on the Shakespeare play, "Romeo & Juliet", West Side Story is a beautiful movie musical classic set on the pulsating, finger-snapping West Side of 1960's Manhattan. It entails the development of love and romance amid conflict between two warrning street gangs: the Euro-American Jets and the newly-arrived Puerto Rican Sharks.

The Jets claim their turf with a tough, macho bravado, determined to drive off the Sharks, who're also vying for a small piece of the turf that both gangs must share. A melee breaks out on the playground, which is broken up by Schrank and Krupke.

I wasn't really happy with my review of the book. I found it clunky and lacking a lot of what I wanted to say. Not that I'm about to rewrite it, but after reading a negative review of a negative review of the book , I left a a comment that somewhat complements my first post on it.

Well, I just finished Krugman's little manifesto. A strange book...at times thought provoking, at times vapid and infuriating and always very partisan Democratic and very, very liberal.

(Promoted by Ender, good stuff, thanks John!)
The Mises Institute, today, put up the intro from the book Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt. This is the second economics book I ever read. The first was a portable professor series intro from B&N. No contest. This book taught me so much in a short time. The link above is to the 50th Anniversary edition. The more widely printed version, which I have (with more reviews) is the the 1988 edition . It's also available in audio and can be downloaded online in mp3 format.

Ender mentioned an interest in learning more . As luck would have it, I checked my Google Reader a little while ago and it showed a new entry at Mises: An excerpt from Econ in One Lesson. After posting it to his comment, I decided it warranted a blog entry. I'll let others FP it if they feel it should be.

I am currently reading Paul Krugman's new book The Conscience of a Liberal. Low and Behold, so is Tyler Cowen . I think the book is a worthy read (so far). And it's thankfully a more thoughtful book than I was expecting. But, even though I'm only a couple of chapters into it, the book's theme is clear:

Dr. Tyler Cowen, economist, author and professor at George Mason University, has finally reviewed "The Shock Doctrine" by Naomi Klein. He finished the book before I did.

I have a bad habit of reading two books at the same time. I started Shock Doctrine, though I said wouldn't, before I totally finished Giving by Bill Clinton. Bill's was a good light read BTW. Just skim a little faster through all the personal stories. :)