Roman Polanski

I have no idea who Roman Polanski is, or why the media cares so much about him being arrested.


I am rather surprised by the treatment this whole thing is getting though. Usually I am very libertarian on the subject of under age sex. I don't see how a thirty year old having sex with a fifteen year old is any worse than two fifteen year olds going at it. At least the thirty year old has a chance of being able to support any kids produced. I just don't see how the consentual actions of post-puberty individuals are any of the government's business.

Usually this opinion puts me out on the political fringe. In this case though a thirteen year old was drugged, and pretty clearly wasn't willingly going along with the sex. In my book this is a good reason for him to be spending a long time in jail. I don't even see how this case falls into the grey area of maybe he deserves a second chance. Who cares if he did whatever it was that made him famous? Lock him up and demonstrate no one is above the law.

11 Prizes

The Economics Nobel Prize was given out. It went to two Americans. By my count Americans earned 11 of the 13 prizes given out this year. So much for the death of America. We might have a general population who supports a larger alternative medicine section in Boarders than a medicine section, and who are absolutely convinced the relative position of the planets and the stars have a special deep significance that applies to only them; but they somehow manage to co-exist with the best scientists in the world.

One of the most interesting lines of scientific research in recent years has been Calorie restriction and its effect on aging. The New York Times Magazine has an interesting article about clinical studies on the subject this week.

Of particular interest is how they got people to endure a diet consisting of 25% less calories than they typically ate:

Most of the recipes seem to steer participants toward foods that are nutrient-rich but low in calories, or what dieticians refer to as “low in energy density.” A number of recent experiments — notably by Barbara Rolls at Penn State — demonstrated that humans tend to eat a consistent weight of food from day to day, but not necessarily a consistent number of calories. For the Calerie study, this has proved a useful tool in the defense against hunger. By building a diet around foods with a low-energy density, especially vegetables, fruits and soups, participants can conceivably ingest the same weight of food as they might on a regular diet while taking in fewer calories... Roberts said she didn’t think anyone would be successful by reducing portion size. “If you don’t change your diet to a high-satiety diet, you will be hungry, and you will fail,” she told me. A high-satiety diet, she said, was bound to be a healthful diet with a lot of vegetables, fruits and insoluble fiber — the kind found in some breakfast cereals, like Fiber One — that her research indicates has a unique effect in helping calorie-restriction subjects feel fuller, probably because they activate certain receptors in the lower intestine. Roberts added, “If people are doing this on their own and succeeding, well, I’d be surprised if they’re eating a lot of Hostess Twinkies.”

i didn't really believe this technique for a long time, but Jamie sounds like she lost a ton of weight on this Diet, and if these people are losing thirty plus pounds on it than there must be something to it.

Boosting home prices

The more I think about it, the more I am convinced home prices have a long ways to fall. They are just not low enough yet. Prices are currently 41% higher than they were in 2000. At the same time income has not increased at all and unemployment has doubled. Where are people going to get the extra money to afford that? Spend less on energy than 2000? Health Care? Education? This seems way less likely than a continued drop in home prices.

It is true prices have stagnated recently but this is just the government wasting tax payer money. Without the 8,000 dollars for first time buyers, or the FHA insuring low down payment loans, prices would still be falling. Even all this effort hasn't completely stopped the decline, and the best they can really hope for until inflation eats up the last 40%. More likely is a 3-10 year period of slowly declining prices. The larger part of the decline is over though so nothing so dramatic as the past two years can be expected.

One depressing thing is how poorly the people in power seem to understand the problem. Prices will fall. People simply cannot afford these homes. Therefore any government involvement should center around keeping as many people in their homes as possible while bringing prices to reasonable levels as quickly as possible. Instead they seem to be trying to find more suckers willing to over-pay and prop up prices. Inevitably many, if not most, of these people will find they cannot afford the home and go into foreclosure. Resulting in the same declining prices they tried to avoid.

Rape gets rarer

I have made a big deal about the decrease in the number of murders over the past decade. This has been impressive, but I have mostly ignored other crimes. The drop in the number of rapes is even more impressive, they just hit a twenty year low, and the rate is probably the lowest in history.

Relative to Murder it has been getting easier and easier to convict rapists before they strike again. DNA evidence has made convictions possible when it just wouldn't have been possible in the past.

It should also be noted that pornography did not lead to the often predicted spike in sex crimes. If anything would be rapists have chosen to stay home and watch porn instead.

Big Homes

The low end of housing in CA is rapidly getting into line. Median household income in LA is about $54 000 a year. The median home price this past month was 329 000. Still a bit over six times median income, but LA has nice weather and beaches. Prices relative to income will always be a bit high. This number may drop a bit, but since it is coming down from a high of over a half million a year it has probably already done the majority of its dropping. Even if prices stop at 200k, which is quite plausible as the median was 210 000 a decade ago, more of the drop is behind than ahead.


One problem though. The high end of the market still isn't selling. There are way more million dollar homes than there are families with incomes to really be able to afford them. So the high end of the market is just sitting waiting for buyers that simply don't exist. Watching this issue resolve itself should be quite exciting for me. Homes slowly coming closer and closer to what I can afford.

I think the best hope I have in this market is to do things old school. Buy a typical starter home, three bedroom two bath rather far inland something in the $250 000-300 000 range using a 20% down payment and a 20 year mortgage. The sort of home everyone owned in 1950. Then do everything I can to pay off the mortgage as quickly as possible. I would imagine that I could do so in a decade if I have a working wife, and still in twenty if I was using just my salary. As soon as the place is payed off, sell it and upgrade to something about $200 000 more expensive. Repeat as necessary.

I like this plan because in the long run it results in far less interest payments. It is just too easy to get in over your head in mortgage payments. If you never get too large of one than that is a ton of money you are not paying interest on. In the long term that ends up putting me in a much nicer home, I just got to sit through a few decades of low end ones... Still a great step up from a studio apartment though.

Jaguar Article

I saw a rather unusual article about a Jaguar on the New York Times. Not the cat, the car. Anyways, they were talking about a guy who has driven his 1968 E type for 38 years keeping it in reasonable condition.


The part that caught my attention most was the mileage. A whopping... Drum roll please... 185 000 miles!

Wow, if I could keep my car running that long it would put this car to shame. My car is 32 years newer, with 45 000 more miles on it... Now if I could just dig myself out of debt and make my car look as nice as his does. Or for that matter get my car to run six months without needing a major repair.