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I have long been a fan of Don Boudreaux's letters to editors, which he frequently posts on Cafe Hayek. So little written, and yet so much conveyed.

A recent one addresses the income inequality issue:

Who among us sends our children to school or to the playground with admonitions to begrudge classmates or playmates possessing nicer clothing or fancier toys? Who among us counsels our youngsters to form schoolyard coalitions for forcibly confiscating expensive sneakers and video games from 'rich' kids for "redistribution" to poorer kids? Who among us would not scold our children for such envy, and punish them severely if they participated in such thievery?

Children should avoid envy and learn to thrive by producing rather than by taking. The same is true for adults.

It seems Independence days in India generate obscene amounts of search traffic, year after year.

Considering that most of the traffic on this blog comes from search, I did what other bloggers all around are doing. (They won't admit it though.) I included Independence Day in the title to siphon off some traffic. But unlike the others I won't feed you jingoistic rhetoric, do economic analyses or talk about Abhinav Bindra. I shamelessly use this solely as an experiment to see what sort of an impact this has on incoming traffic.

Don't leave sullen-faced though. Now that you are here and didn't find the juice about the Independence Day, you might as well stick around for some time. Explore these pages. Poke around a bit, see if it bites.

You could start off by reading about IndiaTV. They are all the rage nowadays.

Or maybe you would be interested in Mexican Gods enraged by Bollywood, nymphomaniac bankers, or the confusing end to Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na.

Then again, you might be the kind who is turned on only by the likes of Celina Jaitley, Rakhi Sawant, dumb beauty queens, or Savita Bhabhi. (Who, not surprisingly, brings in most of my traffic and therefore deserves a place in this experiment.)

Anyway, Happy Independence Day!

Dear IndiaTV,

We are extremely delighted by your entertaining coverage of all that's happening around, or isn't. The other channels just show politicians shouting or throwing around some bundles of notes. Bah, bloody boring, I say! In fact, the guys at Fly You Fools are so happy with your content that they have made this artwork as a tribute.

Your informative programmes have been helpful to the kids here. Thanks to you, they now know that the world will end after 4 years, that there are Suvarna Machhlis and Jaldaityas in the Himalayan waters and that UFOs are hovering around to attack the earth. Of course, they are scared, but the truth just had to be told.

The footage you show is also stunning. Such awe inspiring graphics and deft camerawork! One would almost think that they are clippings of Hollywood movies like Deep Impact, Armageddon etc..

My neighbour's daughter, Champa, just ran away, to live with her lover, if only for the 4 years that remain. Only after the astrologer on your channel approved the alliance, mind you. The Guru helpfully noted that Rahu and Shani were in the 8th house and since they seemed happy together, they were unlikely to come to Champa's house - the 12th one on Daruwala street. Practical that the couple is, they have also stocked up little rockets. They plan to fire it off into space to attack or communicate with the aliens, as need be. We wish them a happy married life. If only the world wasn't destined to end four years hence, it could have been a long one too. Alas, it is not to be.

I wanted to send this mail at 8 o'clock today and become eligible for all the cosmic goodwill waiting to be bestowed on 08/08/08. But sadly all the auto drivers had gone to see the latest image of Sai Baba that appeared on Mukhiya-ji's wall. So I couldn't make it to the cyber-cafe in time. Well, I take solace in the fact that somewhere in West Central Africa it is 8 p.m as I post this. May the Baba bless us all.

Had met some of your reporters there. Strange though, I had seen them lurking around in the village yesterday night. They had some paint bottles too. I wonder why they were laughing so much.

Anyway, keep up the good work. Continue entertaining us. Thanks.



Regards

Bholaram
(On behalf of all the villagers of Teeveeneleliyahumrajaan)

Finally, I saw 'The Dark Knight' and 'Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na'. Both the movies got me thinking on tangents.

Just before the credits roll in JTYJN the camera pans on to an old guy waiting(outside an airport) holding a board with 'Mr.Godot' written on it. Which is interesting because 'Waiting for Godot' is a play by Samuel Beckett. The play has two guys waiting for a Mr.Godot in vain. Does the filmmaker, at the happy end of a romantic film, want to convey that waiting for Love is just useless? Bleak, no? Well, maybe he just wants to convey that a long wait is often necessary.

But since these are not topics I am comfortable with, we move on to TDK:

In the movie, Joker puts bombs on two ferries with the respective remotes on the other ferry. Each ferry could save itself by detonating the bomb on the other ferry. Failing which he would explode both the bombs. In this situation it is quite clear what the players should do. Logically, each ferry had to press the button and destroy the other ferry, before they themselves are blown apart. Incidentally the ferries had humans on them, who typically use emotion to make decisions. They preferred being dead rather than live with blood on their hands. But since this is a Batman movie after all, the dark knight comes, stops the Joker and saves the day. Conversely, since this is not a Bollywood movie, he doesn't get the woman.

Though there is no dilemma here, it is interesting to see how it is not one. Also, it always helps if you know what to say to the cops, when you and your dealer are rounded up.

The classic 'Prisoner's Dilemma' is defined as:

Two suspects are arrested by the police. The police have insufficient evidence for a conviction, and, having separated both prisoners, visit each of them to offer the same deal. If one testifies ("defects") for the prosecution against the other and the other remains silent, the betrayer goes free and the silent accomplice receives the full 10-year sentence. If both remain silent, both prisoners are sentenced to only six months in jail for a minor charge. If each betrays the other, each receives a five-year sentence. Each prisoner must choose to betray the other or to remain silent. Each one is assured that the other would not know about the betrayal before the end of the investigation. How should the prisoners act?

The payoff matrix:

Which in ‘win-lose’ terminology looks like this:

While in the situation at hand, which is not a dilemma, the payoff matrix becomes:

And therefore:

Contrary to the classic dilemma, if both the players choose not to hurt the other, they both lose. There is no incentive for co-operation, which is why they should have pressed the buttons, just as soon as they got it. They depended too much on the Batman, which is a foolproof strategy in the movies. The real world consequences are ill researched for now.

Anyway, keep watching movies and getting high. Just don't get busted!

P.S. Check out the external links in the Wiki article for more fascinating reads. Especially, the Bowerbird’s dilemma!

Image by Getty Images via Daylife
"RIP George Carlin. It was wonderful having you around," I tweeted, when I got the sad news. But, the man himself wouldn't have believed in rest, much less in heaven or hell. He being an atheist and all. "Yo worms, here I come," he probably said.

I haven't seen or read as much of Carlin as I would like to. The first that I saw of him was in a clip about atheism from the stage show-'You are all deceased'(Transcript). He has been going on about that long before Dawkins & Co. came out, so to speak. This clip became a sleeper hit on the LAN, inspiring more downloads. Those were the times when Jenna Jameson lost the LAN popularity race.

So incisive was the speech that I know of agnostics who tip-toed onto our side. Though some devouts merely felt around for their popped eyeballs, clicked it back on and left, humming the 'Gayatri Mantra', some were moved. They cried with an abandon that comes with revelation. Like my uncle's old friend, who wept incontrollably after taking a swig for a first time at his retirement party. "Why didn't I try this before? Hic! Mary is bloody brilliant. Sob," he said, wiping his cheek.

Carlin was not just about rebuking religion and everyone around. It was social commentary, at its best. Inspite of his bad tongue and godlessness, which is viewed with tremedous distrust in America, he inspired a whole bunch of comics(Jerry Seinfeld remembers).

As Joe Pesci picks him up and flies away to, er, wherever he flies away to, it would probably be appropriate to leave you with one of his jokes. A gay one at that, given the latest fad of having pride parades in India.

Catholics are against abortions.
Catholics are against homosexuals.
But, I can't think of anyone who has less abortions than homosexuals! -- George Carlin

P.S. Here's the last interview Carlin gave if anyone is interested.