As IF Times

link Internet Reception Reaches Summit of Mount Everest.

It’s just not the same.  When Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay accomplished the conquest back in 1953, it was considered one of the most serious challenges to the obstacles of nature by man.  After all, Edmund did get knighted for the deed and Tenzig, well, he got a mention in a George Clooney movie decades later.

According to historical records, the pair attained the summit at 11:53 am local time on May 29th of that year.  To more finely illustrate how far we’ve come since 1953, it actually took until June the 2nd, days later before news got to the Queen of England.  For this feat, Edmund was knighted and henceforth became known as Sir Edmund.  Although these two climbers were not the first to climb Everest, they were the first to mount the summit successfully.  Over the years, 1300 some odd others have replicated the feat and now we hear that Internet connectivity is now available there.  Is nothing sacred?

There are rumors now that the mayor of Vancouver, Gregor The Green is proposing a plan to construct a bicycle path on the south face in order to accomodate the day trippers.  While the cost is nominally not excessive given the venue, the associated add ons are apparently cost issues.  Things such as recycling containers every 20 feet in elevation can add up when there’s 28,000 feet to cover.   As well,  daycare stations for moms who want to make the trip add unexpected costs to the construction.    Some of this will be privately funded by enterprises that spring up selling sweaters, buttons and memorabilia on the way to the top. 

But once you get to the top, a panoramic view awaits and there is a post next to which you can stand for the kodak moment commemorating your arrival.  And now, you can tweet or announce on Facebook that you’ve followed in Sir Edmund’s steps.  Oh the humanity.

link The Blast.

This link is great.  An elegantly simple rebuttal to economic idiots who claim that destruction is actually stimulative to economies.  Just goes to show that even Nobel prize winners are wrong, no matter how much notoriety they get.

Anyone who has been involved in running an enterprise, no matter how small, will understand the broken windows analogy as it applies to their operation.  Excessive taxes, surcharges, levies, fees, permits and restrictions of all sorts thrust upon them by governments at all levels are broken windows that suck productivity from an enterprise.  The next time a distinguished academic tries to foist an Utopian business model upon the public, someone should check their business background.  Have they ever even run even a lemonade stand?  Even if the business was a failure, that would be far more useful experience than sucking at the nipple of a government job, or horrors, a career academic. 

Imagine if Sir Edmund Hilary decided to use the directions of Harvard cartographers   instead of Tenzing Norgay, the experienced Sherpa guide, in his quest to scale Mt. Everest.  He’d be famous today only to his family who’d remember him as crazy Uncle Edmund who tried to climb a mountain with a just a light jacket and some trail mix.

People who are pushing the redistributive agenda today are no different than a sherpa guide that counsels you to keep following the the trail down into the valley because eventually you will reach the summit.  Maybe the best idea is to pay them only upon arrival.