Deane’s Personal Blog

“For an American, I’ve traveled to Europe a lot. Since my first trip to Stockholm in 2010, I’ve probably been in Europe …25 times? I went six times in 2023 alone (two of those trips were one week apart). I’ve been to a majority of the major cities. I think Madrid is the largest city I haven’t…”

“As I write this, America is embroiled in the Ukrainian impeachment crisis. The claim is that Donald Trump withheld military aid to Ukraine in exchange for a political favor – he wanted them to investigate Joe Biden’s son, who is (or was) likely to be Trump’s democratic opponent in the 2020…”

“I’m a terrible eater. I generally eat too much, only to be partially saved by very good gym habits. I’ve been actively trying to cut back my caloric intake. While counting calories get a bad rap, the fact remains that most people in The First World consume far too many calories daily. Left to my…”

“I’m reading The Secret World: A History of Intelligence , which is the history of espionage around the world. It’s a magisterial work – some 800 pages. I’m struggling with it, and here’s why: it’s basically a collection of episodes and anecdotes. Each chapter is about some country or intelligence…”

“I heard something that resonated with me the other day (I forget where I heard this): Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly. This, of course, is a play on this common saying: Anything worth doing is worth doing well. But, rather than making fun of an earnest, feel-good aphorism, what the…”

“At its absolute core, the difference between conservatives and liberals seems to boil down to one thing: liberals believe that society can be fixed by grand architecture, while conservatives believe it can only be fixed by individual action. Call it the difference between ‘top-down’ and…”

“I have a theory: the U.S. economy requires a significant number of Americans to be stupid with money. If we ever all got our crap together and started managing our personal budgets responsibly, the economy might fall apart. Consider this article from Bloomberg this morning: Americans Can’t Help…”

“Reading a book called Rise of the Robots about the increasing role of automation in our lives. The author takes a bit of a detour in the chapter on health care to discuss how the markets are broken. I’m not sure how related to automation this is, but he makes this interesting point: …every other…”

“I read a book recently called Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts . The book was just okay, but it contained a chilling story that I don’t want to forget. The book was written by a motivational speaker, and a master of the story and anecdote. We apparently volunteered in the Third World, and…”

“An adjective which seems to related originally to colors: Varied in appearance or color; marked with patches or spots of different colors; varied; diversified; diverse. It seems to just be another way to state ‘varied,’ perhaps with more emphasis on a series of discrete states or gradients. Found…”

“I quit Facebook about a month ago. I still have an account because I need it for work – a surprising number of business comes in through Facebook, and I maintain 3-4 Facebook Messenger conversations on any given day. However, I stopped posting updates back in November and even went to the trouble…”

“Racial Bias, Even When We Have Good Intentions : A good (bad?) roll up of studies which show that embedded, perhaps subconscious racism is alive and well. When doctors were shown patient histories and asked to make judgments about heart disease, they were much less likely to recommend cardiac…”

“My reading goal in 2014 was 52 books (one per week). I ended up reading 66 (and counting). My tentative goal for 2015 is to read all of Shakespeare’s 38 plays. I started early with The Merchant of Venice . I read the text first – it’s quite short, but slow, slow going. Shakespeare being…”

“My mother died five years ago. I was 38 when she died, an adult with kids of my own. My oldest was a teenager. Since then, I’ve watched my son graduate high school and start his second year of college. Watching one of your children leave the house is a sobering experience. You have moments of panic…”

“I just finished ‘ Brave New World ,’ a novel written in 1932 that describes the ‘perfection’ of society through science. Parallel to the advancement of science, ‘Brave New World’ deals with the retardation of creativity and individuality. Humans in a civilized society are expected to fit in….”

“There’s a constant debate in this country about the appropriate size, scope and strength of government. This debate has raged since all the country was founded and shows no signs of letting up. Conservatives think all forms of government should be smaller in scope. And while Liberals don’t…”

“One of the defining characteristics of your political view is how you think a government should balance charity against personal responsibility. Charity is the government giving aid in the form of social programs for the economically challenged: welfare, food stamps, Medicaid, mortgage debt relief,…”

“One would hope that politicians always act in ways which they think will directly benefit the country. But, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they do things that actually go against their better judgment. Sometimes they do this in a specific situation, and sometimes they just adopt long-term…”

“We’ve talked a bit about the ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’ labels, but you might be wondering why they matter. Indeed, why wouldn’t a politician just eschew labels and say ‘I’ll do what’s best for the country in all situations’? Wouldn’t that be great? The problem is that politicians have to get…”

“When discussing labels like ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal,’ it needs to be acknowledged that there are different contexts in which they apply. People can be both conservative and liberal at the same time, about different things. There are three major contexts in which you might apply these labels:…”

“I’m reading more now than at any time in my life. I set a 2014 goal of one book per week (52 in all), and as of the second week in November, I’m at 58. Additionally, I’ve been keeping track of my reading at Goodreads , and I try to write a short review of each book when I finish it. This has the…”

“What can get mystifying about politics is that opposing politicians can have such different opinions about political issues. It seems like they can never agree about what to do about a given situation even though both sides are presented with the same facts. A large part of politics is about…”

“Your personal political philosophy is highly influenced by how you view the way individuals relate to their larger community. For example: Conservatives view the individual as the prime mover. The individual is the engine of the economy and the engine of the community as a whole. Liberals view the…”

“Almost everybody has heard of ‘The 10,000 Hour Rule,’ which says it takes 10,000 hours of practice to master anything. I actually read the original study (PDF) last year. But I’ve often wondered about the limits of this theory. Does there exist people who simply will never master something, no…”

“I own 25% of Blend Interactive , which is a significant percentage. This chunk of ownership binds me to this company, in the sense that I see the company as a sort of extension of myself in many ways. I’m not a minor owner – I’m a significant part of the day-to-day operations, and my input goes a…”

“I was thinking about marketing this week while I was on a trip, and two things occurred to me that I find distasteful about the discipline. I’m not claiming all marketing is like this, but I’d call it a majority, certainly. Marketing is often about lying. A lot of marketing is simply overstating…”

“As human beings, we chronically suffer from what I call ‘Gratifying Narrative Syndrome,’ or a desire to confirm narratives that we find emotionally or psychologically gratifying. You see these all the time – stories and paradigms that click with us for some reason, and that we very much want to be…”

“I’m not an economist, but I’m fairly confident in a couple of economic principles. Inflation tells us that when there’s more money chasing the same amount of goods, prices will go up. Supply and demand tell us that when demand increases, prices will also go up. I read an article ( How the ‘creative…”

“I enjoyed this article about the myth of water intake: You Don’t Need 8 Glasses Of Water A Day . This idea has been floating around for decades: you must drink more water – specifically eight glasses per day. This threshold appears to be a long-standing medical myth. It’s not even clear where it…”

“Here’s an article which has reinforced a paradigm that I think gets ignored too often by the environmentally conscious: when considering an optional you find lacking, always consider the alternative or the default, and weigh the option against that . Because, no matter how much you don’t like…”

“When I was in my first political science class at Augie , I remember the first paragraph of the text tried to define ‘politics.' It went something like this: Politics is what happens when people are forced to live together. This is true, but the base definition is even deeper. I’m convinced that…”

“I loved this profile of Phil Hartman written by Jack Handey , who was an SNL writer for decades (and the source of the infamous, ‘ Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey ’). He could do any accent. He could play menacing or frightened He could basically do it all. You’d hand him the ball and he’d punch it…”

“I saw two animated statistical graphics recently that reinforced and sharpened a belief that I’ve had lurking in my head for years. Links to the graphics are below (I would embed, but they’d both be useless unless full-size): Percentage of adults with less than a high school diploma (1970-2012)…”

“In college, I took Journalism 101 (actually 110; Augie’s numbering scheme is weird), which I just loved. I maintain it was the best class I took in college, and the one that has provided me more practical value than anything else I took. In it, I learned about the gatekeeper effect , which is the…”

“ This video was shown at a Rotary lunch by the president of the local technical school. It lays out a solid (and entertaining) case that college isn’t for everyone, and you shouldn’t go ‘just to go.’ ”

“This New York Times article has introduced me to something I didn’t know existed: litigation financing. Lawsuits are expensive, and investors will fund your legal fees if they think you can win, and then take a cut of the proceeds. Wall St. Bankrolls Ex-Executive as He Sues Over A.I.G. Bailout The…”

“Another note from Jeff Speck’s book : risk homeostasis, or risk compensation . Risk compensation is a theory which suggests that people typically adjust their behavior in response to the perceived level of risk, becoming more careful where they sense greater risk and less careful if they feel more…”

“I’m reading Walkable City , by Jeff Speck (who recently spoke at the Plain Green Conference , part of which I attended). In it, he talks of ‘induced demand,’ which he says is the thing that everyone in city planning understands but doesn’t talk about. Basically, if you build it, they will come. He…”

“A friend and I were discussing fun the other day. Specifically, what do we do for fun? We’re both in our early 40s with young kids (him, 3 and 5; me, 12 and 9). We were lamenting the fact that we have very few hobbies and don’t really do much for pure fun anymore. I’ve been thinking that the…”

“Once, when I was in the military, I was doing a PT with the Marines. I was 19-year-old gym rat at the time, never far from my copy of Muscle and Fitness , and I thought it wise to explain to the drill sergeant that sit-ups were inefficient. They used too much of the hip erector muscles, not the…”

“I don’t believe in traffic cameras. These are the contraptions that take a picture of cars that speed or run red lights, then send the owner a ticket in the mail. These things need to end. I’m not opposed to them because of privacy concerns. I’m not on a high horse about too much government….”

“I enjoyed this post and agree with it in large part. Why I am a Beautiful Christian Democrat At some point – the 1964 Republican Convention, say some – the Republican Party established itself as the Christian face of American politics. What followed was a general ostracizing of Christian Democrats,…”

“The Neal Boortz Commencement Speech : This supposed commencement speech by Neal Boortz is incendiary as hell, but I appreciated for articulating a point that I find very true: the difference between a focus on the group and a focus on the individual. Liberals feel that their favored groups, have…”

“In any driving course, when learning how to recover from a skid, the instructor will always hammer the same thing into you: ‘Look where you want to go because you tend to go where you look.’ it’s good advice, and I can vouch that it works ( seriously ). The same thing is true of your self-image,…”

“Unpacking The Invisible Knapsack (PDF) : If you see left-wing conspiracies everywhere, then best to stay far away from this essay. it’s a discussion about the generally unacknowledged racial privilege given to whites, written by a professor Al Wellesley who has also examined the gender privileges…”

“I just finished Ron Paul ‘s book Liberty Defined . it’s a collection of essays on ‘50 essential issues that affect our freedom.’ There’s everything from Abortion to Zionism (yes, it’s in alphabetical order), with all sorts of other stuff in between – the CIA, torture, moral hazard, envy, unions,…”

“The Overjustification Effect : This is a good distillation of what motivates us, and why money isn’t always a good motivator. According to the research, in modern America the average income required to be happy day-to-day, to experience ‘emotional well being’ is about $75,000 a year. According to…”

“I’m learning the difference between the statutory tax rate and the effective tax rate. it’s an important distinction. The statutory tax rate is the tax imposed by law (by ‘statute,’ hence the name). This is expressed as some percentage. The effective tax rate is what percentage of our income we…”

“Americans don’t really want spending cuts : This article is brutally honest, in two places. First, this is an important point to note: Any truly meaningful debt reduction plan must include Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Why? For the same reason criminals rob banks: That’s where the money…”

“I try to give all political opinions a fair shake, but there is one conservative assertion that just makes me hang my head with embarrassment. This is the assertion that cutting taxes actually increases government revenues. No, it doesn’t. Not at the present rate of taxation, anyway. And now I have…”

“Okay, it’s time to commit to my next fitness goal. Here it is – At the age of 40, I intend to pass the U.S. Army Ranger entrance exam. This is the physical fitness test you have to pass to be considered for Ranger School . (Keep in mind that this just means you might get to go to the training…”

“Economic Inequality and Political Representation : Here’s some light reading for the weekend. I examine the differential responsiveness of U.S. senators to the preferences of wealthy, middle-class, and poor constituents. My analysis includes broad summary measures of senators ‘ voting behavior as…”

“I find this really interesting. Bush explains 9/11 classroom reaction Former President George W. Bush says what some people took as his apparent lack of reaction to the first news of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks was actually a conscious decision on his part to project an aura of calm in a crisis….”

“I love ‘ The Incredibles .’ it’s one of my favorite movies, and when it’s on, I drop everything and glue myself to the couch. I tried to figure out why I love this movie so much, and I came up with a number of reasons: I love the story of Mr. Incredible’s rebirth. He’s living a boring, everyday…”

“I’ve been thinking a quite a bit lately about consequences, and how today’s society tries to qualify everything – ‘well, I know it was against the rules, BUT…’ Brigham Young University recently dismissed a star player from their basketball team. Brandon Davies was kicked off the team because he…”

“Here are two things I’ve learned: Any mention of the term ‘white pride’ automatically means you’re a racist. Try to have a ‘straight pride’ parade, and you’re automatically labeled a homophobe. I’ve wondered about this phenomenon for a long time, and I’ve come to this conclusion: it’s considered…”

“A bunch of Democratic senators are on the the run from Wisconsin so they don’t have to vote on what appears to be a union-busting bill sponsored by the governor. According to this CNN article , this isn’t the first time Democrats have done this: The catch-me-if-you-can tactic was pioneered by Texas…”

“My 9-year-old daughter Gabrielle was making our bed yesterday. It’s her only chore. She has to do it every weekday. When it was done, it was horrible. The bedspread was all askew, the pillows were a mess, etc. She had totally phoned it in. Now, I’m not anal-retentive by any means, but, at the same…”

“Here’s an amazingly interesting article about the possible future of health care. This is an actual, practical manifestation of the ‘let’s make health care more efficient’ pipe dream. Lower Costs and Better Care for Neediest Patients ( Atul Gawande is a great author. I loved his book, The Checklist…”

“The NFL’s Rooney Rule is ridiculous. It says that teams have to interview minority coaches for open coaching positions. This leads to ridiculous situations like this : Another indicator [that the 49ers have hired Jim Harbaugh] is that the 49ers are rapidly trying to interview Oakland OC Hugh…”

“This is a really interesting point in a really interesting article. Over the last few decades (and someone would say since the 60s), the Republican party has become the ‘Christian’ party in politics. Walking Away From Church During the 1980s, the public face of American religion turned sharply…”

“I’ve been following this case for about a month now. It’s a good demonstration of how cutting health case costs is going to be harder than it seems. Case against Blue Cross shows difficulty of cutting health costs You see, if you cut costs – even in ways unrelated to patient care, like becoming…”

“Craig Wilson points out that people need to put stuff in perspective before they start complaining too much. I was reminded of this the other day when I listened to all those folks on that stranded cruise ship off the coast of Mexico. The ship had a fire and lost its power. No air conditioning. No…”

“We were driving out towards the middle of the state this weekend for my son’s soccer tournament. it’s harvest time, so the farms were pretty active. My wife started asking me about the crops planted in fields…and I was embarrassed to admit I didn’t know much about them. So, I did a little research…”

“This is such a loaded phrase: ‘Tax cuts for the wealthy.’ Every election season, it’s thrown around like a weapon. And it’s never questioned – it’s constantly accepted as patently bad, even downright evil. If any politician had anything anything to do with ‘tax cuts for the wealthy,’ they should be…”

“Student loan debt exceeds credit card debt in USA : I think the student loan bubble is the next one to burst: Total student loan debt exceeds total credit card debt in this country, with $850 billion outstanding […] […] With tuition far outpacing inflation for the past 20 years, student borrowing…”

“(This post is going to make some people hate me. I’m sorry for this in advance.) I’ve come to some peace about climate change. I wasn’t obsessing about it before, but I do think about it quite a bit. The debate rages over the source of climate change – is it something we’re doing, or something…”

“Why Are the Bush Tax Cuts Expiring in the First Place? : Here’s why Bush’s tax cuts are set to expire – the income tax cuts and the estate tax cuts. If Republicans love their tax cuts so much, why didn’t they enact them for perpetuity? Because they didn’t have enough votes, thanks to an obscure…”

“I get annoyed when people ‘applaud’ the Supreme Court for decisions, or vice-versa. John Thune just did it on Facebook: I applaud the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling in McDonald v. Chicago. The decision affirms that Second Amendment protection for individuals’ right to bear arms also extends to…”

“ Here’s a song I’ve sung to the girls since they were babies. They have it memorized, and were singing it back to me this morning. It’s sung to the chorus of ‘O Solo Mio ( audio ). The endings of all the lines are greatly exaggerated, which I suspect is the part they like the most. ”

“Marriage is a bundle. It is, all at once, a contract, a romance, and a spiritual institution. But I don’t think it’s going to stay this way. Marriage is actually three structures, layered on top of one another. As it’s most basic level, marriage is a contract . When you get married, you are…”

“So Annie and I went and saw David Copperfield tonight at the Washington Pavilion . It was a good show. I honestly couldn’t figure out a lot of the tricks. As with many magicians, a lot of the show revolves around random people in the audience. He had some neat methods to pick these people. You…”

“I drive a 1997 Jeep Grand Cherokee . it’s a weird story about how I came to be driving this vehicle, but suffice it to say that I love it. I’d like to drive it until the wheels fall off. The only drawback? Gas mileage. It gets about 13 mpg. I thought perhaps something was wrong with it, but I went…”

“I’ve become awfully smitten with the TNT series Leverage . it’s a dramedy about a team of five con artists who play Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and powerful and returning money to those they’ve wronged (‘we provide… leverage ,’ Timothy Hutton says in the title sequence). I figured out why I…”

“So, I saw Avatar the other night. I was finally prompted to go because it’s coming out on DVD in about a month, so I figured this was my last chance to catch it in the theater. Alec came with me, though he had already seen it. I was mildly disappointed that I couldn’t see it in 3D – that version…”

“I don’t want to get too political, but Here’s my feeling on the process Congress is going through right now to get this health care bill passed. This is a huge bill, both in raw dollars and in the way it will change the relationship of the citizen to the state. it’s probably one of the most…”

“I’m more than a little amazed that I stumbled on this article. A divided island: the forces working against Haiti: For years, I have wondered about this very question: why has the Dominican Republic done fairly well, while Haiti is a trainwreck, given that they share the same island? Last year I…”

“I just got done reading ‘Casino Royale’ for the third or fourth time. This is the original novel , from 1953. It was the first James Bond novel, written by Ian Fleming from his estate in Jamaica. There are four excerpts I always remember about the book. I often page through to find them, so I…”

“Gate F11 at O’Hare is epic. If you fly United from Chicago to any one of dozens of smaller Midwest destinations (Sioux Falls included), you’ve been here. It has six sub-gates, A through F. You descend down an escalator into it from Terminal F above. It’s kind of like Dante’s Inferno. it’s about 10…”

“Do You Have These Core Human Skills? : I’ve really enjoyed this list of ‘core human skills.’ These are actual skills that make you a more effective human being. (More effective at what is an important question – it seems to be biases towards professional success.) Click through to read deeper…”

“I had lunch yesterday about noon. Somewhere around 2 p.m., I started to get intense abdominal pain – it was a burning/pressure-type pain high in my abdomen, just under my sternum. Eight hours later, I was on an operating table getting my appendix removed. About ten hours after that, I sit here, in…”

“Very off topic: Why I won’t be at my high school reunion : This was a hard post to read, because I identified so closely with it. This guy is faced with his 25th high school reunion. High school was not easy for him. I’m can’t even pretend that I wasn’t an easy target, or that I didn’t respond in a…”

“The O’Reilly Procedure : Ebert writes about a pet peeve of mine – political commentators, both on the right and the left. They drive me nuts. Ebert discusses Bill O’Reilly in particular. Understand that Ebert is a self-admitted liberal, but his points hold true for about anyone. I am not interested…”

“How Safeway Is Cutting Health-Care Costs : Here’s an interesting article about what the supermarket chain Safeway is doing about health care costs. First, they start with an important point: the only way to curb health care costs in this country is for us all to get healthier. Health-care spending…”

“I kept hearing about Susan Boyle being ‘Scottish.’ Then I was reading the Wikipedia page on Bonnie Tyler and she was described as ‘Welsh.’ I was confused. Weren’t these people British? I consulted my buddy Chris for assistance. Britain comprises three major geopolitical areas: England, Wales, and…”

“This is brutal article, which, if accurate, is a damning indictment of the business of medicine. The Cost Conundrum The writer (a physician himself) went to McAllen, Texas, which has the highest cost of medical spending in the country, to find out why medical care is so expensive. The bottom line…”

“A sobering summary of how hard it is to be poor , and why it’s so hard to break out of poverty. You don’t have a car to get to a supermarket, much less to Costco or Trader Joe’s, where the middle class goes to save money. You don’t have three hours to take the bus. So you buy groceries at the…”

“I’ve been reading the Wikipedia article about Kwame Kilpatrick , the disgraced mayor of Detroit. I’m honestly wondering if there has been a more blatantly corrupt and dishonest politician in recent history. This guy was just unbelievable. I’ll give you the top level summary of what has been an…”

“Javon Walker recently had surgery outside of the Raiders organization, which is a big no-no. Your team paid good money for your body, so you don’t do anything without prior approval. This article sheds some light on the relationship between players and their team doctors. Many veteran players feel…”

“A showdown is looming on American Idol which I think is going to be pretty interesting to watch. The top two contenders – the two I firmly believe will fight it out in the last episode – could not be more opposed in terms of lifestyle. We have… Danny Gokey , a widowed church music director from…”

“I worked at Hardees in high school – back in the 80s. Hardees is a fast-food chain specific to the Midwest, I think. At the time, I didn’t recognize how high-quality the food was. I don’t whether this still holds true, but let me give you a couple examples of how good the food really was. We got a…”