Thursday, June 26, 2003
More on the California Recall Effort:
Micky Kaus has posted some thoughts on the recall effort, arguing that while it would be bad if the recall punishes governors for a bad economy they can't help, it's good if it punishes improvident spenders. He writes:
While I worry a bit about the ability of voters to distinguish between budget crises caused by outside forces, and those caused by bad policy, I do remember, from the dawn of my political consciousness, that in the recession of the early ninties, budget disagreements held up legislation for something like two months, during which time state employees were paid with vouchers rather than checks. However, while I do remember the governor, Pete Wilson, losing a lot of popularity, I don't remember a recall effort. So either the political culture has greatly changed in the past ten years, or else we can safely assume that recession will not automatically equal recall.
And on an unrelated note, how on earth does a blogger working for the most powerful software corporation on the planet manage not to have permalinks?
Micky Kaus has posted some thoughts on the recall effort, arguing that while it would be bad if the recall punishes governors for a bad economy they can't help, it's good if it punishes improvident spenders. He writes:
Wouldn't it be a good thing if politicians knew there was a heavy price to pay for this crowd-pleasing irresponsibility--not just an inevitable fiscal crisis that can be put off until after the next election and then forgotten before the election after that, but a swift mid-term hammer that might crush their careers? I tend to think yes.
Under the current system, after all, state legislatures binge with tax cuts and spending during boom times and then go on a harsh budget-cutting, tax-hiking jag when the economy slows. That's exactly the opposite of what you'd want them to do in Keynesian, countercyclical terms. The fiscal drag from all the formerly big-spending states grimly cutting their budgets and raising taxes is currently a big factor nullifying the strenuous efforts of the Fed, Congress, and the White House to pump some life into the economy. In an easy-recall regime, in contrast, states would tend to be model Keynesian citizens, saving up money in rainy day funds during booms and spending that money during busts, avoiding recall-inducing budget crunches at all costs. ...
While I worry a bit about the ability of voters to distinguish between budget crises caused by outside forces, and those caused by bad policy, I do remember, from the dawn of my political consciousness, that in the recession of the early ninties, budget disagreements held up legislation for something like two months, during which time state employees were paid with vouchers rather than checks. However, while I do remember the governor, Pete Wilson, losing a lot of popularity, I don't remember a recall effort. So either the political culture has greatly changed in the past ten years, or else we can safely assume that recession will not automatically equal recall.
And on an unrelated note, how on earth does a blogger working for the most powerful software corporation on the planet manage not to have permalinks?
Tuesday, June 24, 2003
And a Final Note on Holocausts:
Will has suggested, and I concur, that the best chance for a biological holocaust is a virus with a long initial incubation period, but extremely high fatality rate. Something like AIDS, but that would incubate for months, rather than years (that is--the time span could not be long enough to develop a cure during the incubation period). However, the third problem is that for the epidemic to truly take off, the virus would also have to be highly contaigous during the incubation period. This, in my opinion, is the limiting factor. If the virus is to be deadly, it must be extremely harmful in large quantities. But if the virus is to be contaigous, it must be present in the body in reasonable quantities before symptoms manifest. Two hundred years is a long time, so I don't wish to say that this difficulty won't be overcome, nevertheless the problem does seem pretty intractable.
Will has suggested, and I concur, that the best chance for a biological holocaust is a virus with a long initial incubation period, but extremely high fatality rate. Something like AIDS, but that would incubate for months, rather than years (that is--the time span could not be long enough to develop a cure during the incubation period). However, the third problem is that for the epidemic to truly take off, the virus would also have to be highly contaigous during the incubation period. This, in my opinion, is the limiting factor. If the virus is to be deadly, it must be extremely harmful in large quantities. But if the virus is to be contaigous, it must be present in the body in reasonable quantities before symptoms manifest. Two hundred years is a long time, so I don't wish to say that this difficulty won't be overcome, nevertheless the problem does seem pretty intractable.
Volokh for Governor?
Russell Korobkin over at the Conspiracy has suggested that the California recall campaign presents a perfect opportunity for California to elect a Jesse Ventura--that is, someone associated with neither party, and known most particularly for his (or her) reasonableness. The problem here is that every group that usually fails to elect its preferred candidates to statewide office is going to look at this recall effort as the perfect opportunity to get a Green/hardcore liberal/social conservative/libertarian/nonpartisan law professor into the governorship. And unless some candidate emerges as a clear forerunner by some sort of consensus process, too many people are likely to vote to keep Davis in order to prevent an unlikely candidate from getting into office with a small fraction of the votes.
The whole race also presents some very interesting questions of voting strategy that would be perfect for a game theorist to tackle. Suppose that I am a voter with strong centerist tendencies (actually, you don't really have to suppose this) who dislikes Gray Davis and whose first choice candidate would be an independent of the sort Korobkin proposes. However, my first priority is to avoid having either a far right or far left candidate gain office. How should I vote? The problem is that the answer to this question seems strongly dependent upon who seems most likely to replace Davis. If the race is going clearly to a strong social conservative, then I should probably vote to keep Davis. If the race is going clearly to a moderate candidate, then I should probably vote for my preferred candidate. But what if the race is close? Furthermore, in such a situation, if polled I would call myself undecided, since I would be waiting to see how the polls swing at the last minute. But since a lot of people would be making a similar calculation, accurate polling data will be difficult to obtain. And, if I wanted to influence the choices other voters make so as to maximize the chances of the election of a non-Davis moderate, how should I answer a polling question?
Anyone want to tackle this?
Russell Korobkin over at the Conspiracy has suggested that the California recall campaign presents a perfect opportunity for California to elect a Jesse Ventura--that is, someone associated with neither party, and known most particularly for his (or her) reasonableness. The problem here is that every group that usually fails to elect its preferred candidates to statewide office is going to look at this recall effort as the perfect opportunity to get a Green/hardcore liberal/social conservative/libertarian/nonpartisan law professor into the governorship. And unless some candidate emerges as a clear forerunner by some sort of consensus process, too many people are likely to vote to keep Davis in order to prevent an unlikely candidate from getting into office with a small fraction of the votes.
The whole race also presents some very interesting questions of voting strategy that would be perfect for a game theorist to tackle. Suppose that I am a voter with strong centerist tendencies (actually, you don't really have to suppose this) who dislikes Gray Davis and whose first choice candidate would be an independent of the sort Korobkin proposes. However, my first priority is to avoid having either a far right or far left candidate gain office. How should I vote? The problem is that the answer to this question seems strongly dependent upon who seems most likely to replace Davis. If the race is going clearly to a strong social conservative, then I should probably vote to keep Davis. If the race is going clearly to a moderate candidate, then I should probably vote for my preferred candidate. But what if the race is close? Furthermore, in such a situation, if polled I would call myself undecided, since I would be waiting to see how the polls swing at the last minute. But since a lot of people would be making a similar calculation, accurate polling data will be difficult to obtain. And, if I wanted to influence the choices other voters make so as to maximize the chances of the election of a non-Davis moderate, how should I answer a polling question?
Anyone want to tackle this?
Whiteness Studies
Amanda has provided a hurried, though persuasive, defense of the substantive nature of whiteness studies. Having once taken a class on kitsch, I can hardly disagree with her claims without looking like the worst sort of hypocrite. Nevertheless, I don't think that the question at hand is whether or not the concept of whiteness is complex enough to merit study, but rather how much study it merits, and how widely it should be taught.
In my ideal world, everyone who wanted to would be able to find a job studying whatever obscure questions they happened to find interesting or important. However, the world is not like this, so that in choosing to support one kind of academic inquiry, one has to consider not just if the inquiry is important in itself, but if there are not other, more important, inquiries that should be supported instead. Consider the phrase Amanda pointed out--"Free, white and twenty-one." The word white may be freighted, but so also are the words free, and twenty-one. Why does freedom here have such a cherished place? Why not virtue, wisdom, or even encumbrances? Obligations, after all, though limiting freedom, can be signs of maturity and ability to handle responsibility. Similarly, why is twenty-one the age of privilege? Why not puberty, or marriage, two other popular choices? Of the three words, white sticks out as the one no longer unquestionably valued. Yet given that the gulf between childhood and adulthood, and the fervor of our pursuit of freedom have both only increased since the Jacksonian Era, shouldn't these be the values that receive our strictest scrutiny? Yet when was the last time you saw a course on adulthood studies? And how much does this answer have to do with objective complexity of the question, as opposed to intellectual fad?
It may seem like an odd thing for an historian to say, but there is such a thing as too much remembering. One has only to consider an area like the Balkans, where ethnic feuds are nursed by holidays commemorating thousand year old military defeats to see that contra the advocates of whiteness studies, a bit of selective amnesia concerning this country's racist past is not necessarily such a bad thing to have. If we really wish to move beyond race, is the right way to do so by training college students and scholars to analyze everything in terms of race? When all you have is a hammer, screws look a lot like nails. Given the natural tendency of academics to expand their specialties, the very existence of whiteness studies is a temptation to find more and more phenomena to explain in terms of race, thereby increasing the perception of the prominence of race in American life, which in turn increases its actual importance. Knowing that race is an artificial historical construct is hardly an antidote to this cycle. The Constitution, after all, is an artificial historical construct, but is this a persuasive argument that it should properly be irrelevant to modern American life? All knowledge is constructed in some way or another, and the process by which this occurs is fascinating. (I certainly better think it's fascinating, since as an intellectual historian I am proposing to study the construction of knowledge for a living.) But much as we intellectuals would like to deny it, we do not live in an ivory tower, and thus it seems important to ask what effect our studies will have on society as a whole. If the effect is positive, this is good. If the effect is neutral, then we should learn to live on a pittance. But if there is reason to believe that the effect is negative, then it is not sufficient to retreat into our tower of inherent fascination for defense.
Anyways, I would be interested to hear an argument for why whiteness studies are not just interesting but also a good idea.
Amanda has provided a hurried, though persuasive, defense of the substantive nature of whiteness studies. Having once taken a class on kitsch, I can hardly disagree with her claims without looking like the worst sort of hypocrite. Nevertheless, I don't think that the question at hand is whether or not the concept of whiteness is complex enough to merit study, but rather how much study it merits, and how widely it should be taught.
In my ideal world, everyone who wanted to would be able to find a job studying whatever obscure questions they happened to find interesting or important. However, the world is not like this, so that in choosing to support one kind of academic inquiry, one has to consider not just if the inquiry is important in itself, but if there are not other, more important, inquiries that should be supported instead. Consider the phrase Amanda pointed out--"Free, white and twenty-one." The word white may be freighted, but so also are the words free, and twenty-one. Why does freedom here have such a cherished place? Why not virtue, wisdom, or even encumbrances? Obligations, after all, though limiting freedom, can be signs of maturity and ability to handle responsibility. Similarly, why is twenty-one the age of privilege? Why not puberty, or marriage, two other popular choices? Of the three words, white sticks out as the one no longer unquestionably valued. Yet given that the gulf between childhood and adulthood, and the fervor of our pursuit of freedom have both only increased since the Jacksonian Era, shouldn't these be the values that receive our strictest scrutiny? Yet when was the last time you saw a course on adulthood studies? And how much does this answer have to do with objective complexity of the question, as opposed to intellectual fad?
It may seem like an odd thing for an historian to say, but there is such a thing as too much remembering. One has only to consider an area like the Balkans, where ethnic feuds are nursed by holidays commemorating thousand year old military defeats to see that contra the advocates of whiteness studies, a bit of selective amnesia concerning this country's racist past is not necessarily such a bad thing to have. If we really wish to move beyond race, is the right way to do so by training college students and scholars to analyze everything in terms of race? When all you have is a hammer, screws look a lot like nails. Given the natural tendency of academics to expand their specialties, the very existence of whiteness studies is a temptation to find more and more phenomena to explain in terms of race, thereby increasing the perception of the prominence of race in American life, which in turn increases its actual importance. Knowing that race is an artificial historical construct is hardly an antidote to this cycle. The Constitution, after all, is an artificial historical construct, but is this a persuasive argument that it should properly be irrelevant to modern American life? All knowledge is constructed in some way or another, and the process by which this occurs is fascinating. (I certainly better think it's fascinating, since as an intellectual historian I am proposing to study the construction of knowledge for a living.) But much as we intellectuals would like to deny it, we do not live in an ivory tower, and thus it seems important to ask what effect our studies will have on society as a whole. If the effect is positive, this is good. If the effect is neutral, then we should learn to live on a pittance. But if there is reason to believe that the effect is negative, then it is not sufficient to retreat into our tower of inherent fascination for defense.
Anyways, I would be interested to hear an argument for why whiteness studies are not just interesting but also a good idea.
For Those of You Tired of Law Blogging...
...Here's some California politics. In a long and honorable tradition in California politics, a millionaire with political pretentions is attempting to buy himself a better office, in this case by spearheading a recall effort against California's massively unpopular current governor, Gray Davis. For those of you unfamiliar with California politics, Gray Davis is a Democrat whose only political skill seems to be a noteworthy talent for making his opponent seem slimy enough that a nonentity with a creepy resemblance to a ventriloquist's dummy seems like a better choice for office. Much as I dislike the man, I certainly have to give him credit for the sheer brilliance of his campaign strategy in the last election. During the primaries, (in which he was runnning unopposed) he paid for ads painting the moderate Republican candidate as not conservative enough. Then, once the more conservative candidate won in the primaries, he spent massive amounts of money depicting his opponent as somewhere to the right of those who think that our nation's troubles began when we abolished monarchy. Davis is more than an especially smarmy politician, he's also a lousy governor. While admittedly the state's economic downturn is not his fault, his response to the energy shortage several summers ago, along with his generally free-spending ways have done much to exacerbate the current budget crisis. Furthermore, the solution he proposes is mindless benefit cutting combined with massive tax increases. What the state really needs at this points is someone with either enough political capital or enough willingness to become massively unpopular to force the state legislature to cut the pork from the state budget. Gray Davis has neither of these characteristics.
The NY Times and Salon have both recently published articles highly critical of the recall effort. Both try to paint the recall effort as another example of Republicans trampling the democratic process. While I'm not going to defend Republicans generally, this attitude shows a certain lack of understanding for California politics, which have always favored direct democracy over party politics. One has only to consider the strong support for the proposition several years ago to put a "none of the above" option on the ballet to realize that Californians dislike being confronted with a choice between two candidates--bad and worse. Having been given that choice in the last election, it's not Republican machinations but genuine popular dissatisfaction that has truly lent impetus to the calls for a do-over.
Granted, there is a serious problem with the recall process. If the recall succeeds, the candidate with the plurality of votes becomes governor--there is no limit on the number of candidates, and no runoff. The result is that the percentage of the vote needed to secure the governorship is disturbingly small. Thus, if the effort is to succeed (as I hope it will) someone acceptable to a majority of Californians will have to gain a clear lead in the poles, such that voters can feel secure that the replacement will be better than the current governer. While Darrell Issa, who is supporting the recall effort, doesn't fit the bill, there is plenty of time for better candidates to appear should the recall measure make the ballot.
Unfortunately, the chances of this happening seem depressingly small. Democrats will most likely end up standing by their man, and Republicans will once again field a candidate too socially conservative to be acceptable to California voters, instead hoping once again that Gray Davis will seem evil enough to make an anti-abortion governor seem benign. Salon seems to think this is all part of some vast right wing conspiracy to bring back the Regan years, but quite frankly I wish there really were such a conspiracy, on the grounds that they at least might be able to provide the state with an electable alternative to Davis. In reality, it's all about the money. Davis' solution to the fiscal crisis is to scare voters with spectors of schools closing and jails letting prisoners out early in order to push through a massive tax increase. Republicans, obviously, favor massive spending cuts, preferably to whatever entitlement programs they can axe. I'm not particularly fond of either solution, but after a decade of improvident spending, I'm inclined to let the Republicans do their best (or worst) to reverse the trend.
...Here's some California politics. In a long and honorable tradition in California politics, a millionaire with political pretentions is attempting to buy himself a better office, in this case by spearheading a recall effort against California's massively unpopular current governor, Gray Davis. For those of you unfamiliar with California politics, Gray Davis is a Democrat whose only political skill seems to be a noteworthy talent for making his opponent seem slimy enough that a nonentity with a creepy resemblance to a ventriloquist's dummy seems like a better choice for office. Much as I dislike the man, I certainly have to give him credit for the sheer brilliance of his campaign strategy in the last election. During the primaries, (in which he was runnning unopposed) he paid for ads painting the moderate Republican candidate as not conservative enough. Then, once the more conservative candidate won in the primaries, he spent massive amounts of money depicting his opponent as somewhere to the right of those who think that our nation's troubles began when we abolished monarchy. Davis is more than an especially smarmy politician, he's also a lousy governor. While admittedly the state's economic downturn is not his fault, his response to the energy shortage several summers ago, along with his generally free-spending ways have done much to exacerbate the current budget crisis. Furthermore, the solution he proposes is mindless benefit cutting combined with massive tax increases. What the state really needs at this points is someone with either enough political capital or enough willingness to become massively unpopular to force the state legislature to cut the pork from the state budget. Gray Davis has neither of these characteristics.
The NY Times and Salon have both recently published articles highly critical of the recall effort. Both try to paint the recall effort as another example of Republicans trampling the democratic process. While I'm not going to defend Republicans generally, this attitude shows a certain lack of understanding for California politics, which have always favored direct democracy over party politics. One has only to consider the strong support for the proposition several years ago to put a "none of the above" option on the ballet to realize that Californians dislike being confronted with a choice between two candidates--bad and worse. Having been given that choice in the last election, it's not Republican machinations but genuine popular dissatisfaction that has truly lent impetus to the calls for a do-over.
Granted, there is a serious problem with the recall process. If the recall succeeds, the candidate with the plurality of votes becomes governor--there is no limit on the number of candidates, and no runoff. The result is that the percentage of the vote needed to secure the governorship is disturbingly small. Thus, if the effort is to succeed (as I hope it will) someone acceptable to a majority of Californians will have to gain a clear lead in the poles, such that voters can feel secure that the replacement will be better than the current governer. While Darrell Issa, who is supporting the recall effort, doesn't fit the bill, there is plenty of time for better candidates to appear should the recall measure make the ballot.
Unfortunately, the chances of this happening seem depressingly small. Democrats will most likely end up standing by their man, and Republicans will once again field a candidate too socially conservative to be acceptable to California voters, instead hoping once again that Gray Davis will seem evil enough to make an anti-abortion governor seem benign. Salon seems to think this is all part of some vast right wing conspiracy to bring back the Regan years, but quite frankly I wish there really were such a conspiracy, on the grounds that they at least might be able to provide the state with an electable alternative to Davis. In reality, it's all about the money. Davis' solution to the fiscal crisis is to scare voters with spectors of schools closing and jails letting prisoners out early in order to push through a massive tax increase. Republicans, obviously, favor massive spending cuts, preferably to whatever entitlement programs they can axe. I'm not particularly fond of either solution, but after a decade of improvident spending, I'm inclined to let the Republicans do their best (or worst) to reverse the trend.
Saturday, June 21, 2003
More Fame:
Several days ago, Will pointed out this fame question (who from the twentieth century is most likely to be famous in 7000 AD), and I'm now ready to submit my entry. The key to historical survival, I believe, is the existence of a self-perpetuating group of people who feel obligated to preserve your memory, i.e. a religious following. The pharaohs may have built massive monuments, but it is Moses who is today known everywhere by name. Therefore, my prediction is writer and Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. He may be a punchline in this century, but how many first century Romans took that Jesus guy seriously?
And on a side note, I disagree with Will's prediction of a nuclear or biological holocaust within the next two hundred years. Global nuclear war would require a true madman with a massive arsenal at his disposal, a state of affairs that seems unlikely. As to a biological disaster, the bubonic plague only managed to wipe out a third of the population of Europe in an age when not just antibiotics, but basic sanitation, were unknown, and that didn't stop the flowering of the Renaissance a century later.
Several days ago, Will pointed out this fame question (who from the twentieth century is most likely to be famous in 7000 AD), and I'm now ready to submit my entry. The key to historical survival, I believe, is the existence of a self-perpetuating group of people who feel obligated to preserve your memory, i.e. a religious following. The pharaohs may have built massive monuments, but it is Moses who is today known everywhere by name. Therefore, my prediction is writer and Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. He may be a punchline in this century, but how many first century Romans took that Jesus guy seriously?
And on a side note, I disagree with Will's prediction of a nuclear or biological holocaust within the next two hundred years. Global nuclear war would require a true madman with a massive arsenal at his disposal, a state of affairs that seems unlikely. As to a biological disaster, the bubonic plague only managed to wipe out a third of the population of Europe in an age when not just antibiotics, but basic sanitation, were unknown, and that didn't stop the flowering of the Renaissance a century later.
Thursday, June 19, 2003
Summertime:
Posting has been pretty much nonexistent lately due to finals, parental visits, and the advent of the first decent weather in Chicago in what seems like forever. Unfortunately, the light trend will probably continue as I face moving, travelling, and even warmer weather. So, in order to beat the summer blogging doldrums, I invite my readers to email me their questions. If it's not lewd, crude, or requiring actual research, I'll answer it here on the blog. Enquiries about theories of absolutist government are particiularly welcome.
Posting has been pretty much nonexistent lately due to finals, parental visits, and the advent of the first decent weather in Chicago in what seems like forever. Unfortunately, the light trend will probably continue as I face moving, travelling, and even warmer weather. So, in order to beat the summer blogging doldrums, I invite my readers to email me their questions. If it's not lewd, crude, or requiring actual research, I'll answer it here on the blog. Enquiries about theories of absolutist government are particiularly welcome.
Wednesday, June 11, 2003
Communicado:
Light posting, perhaps. But light packages, no. This man, folks, mailed home roughly a billion boxes filled with what I can only assume were cannonballs or large pieces of heavy artillery. These alleged "boxes" of so-called "books" were large enough to form a pillar in the middle of his room. Pity not this man.
Light posting, perhaps. But light packages, no. This man, folks, mailed home roughly a billion boxes filled with what I can only assume were cannonballs or large pieces of heavy artillery. These alleged "boxes" of so-called "books" were large enough to form a pillar in the middle of his room. Pity not this man.
Tuesday, June 10, 2003
Finally:
Surely this will put an end to all the bickering in the Middle East. It's about time we had some good news from over there.
Surely this will put an end to all the bickering in the Middle East. It's about time we had some good news from over there.
Monday, June 09, 2003
Not Responsible for Acts of Hruggek:
I demand to know - why is it impossible to find any fuzzy d20s (the kind that dangle on one's rear view mirrow) for the gamer nerd in all of us?
I demand to know - why is it impossible to find any fuzzy d20s (the kind that dangle on one's rear view mirrow) for the gamer nerd in all of us?
Sunday, June 08, 2003
Feeding Frenzy:
First of all, I thought I'd try to get in the habit of titling my blogs (it makes me feel very... hip). Anyway... let's see.
Now, I don't remember the exact numbers, but I believe sharks can detect one part blood in roughly a gazillion parts water, and they will go into a frenzy, during which they may even bite themselves. I thought I might attempt to incite such fury by posing the following questions:
What separates a romantic relationship from an exclusive 'friends with benefits'-style relationship?
Imagine a situation in which a couple has had intercourse, and - as a result - the female half of the couple is pregnant. Does the woman have the irrefutable right to choose whether to have an abortion? If she wants an abortion, but the man wants the child, is his part in the process ignored?
And what if we just got rid of Chinese people? Would that be such a bad thing?
All right, all right, one of those questions is purely in jest. Guess which one and you win my respect!
First of all, I thought I'd try to get in the habit of titling my blogs (it makes me feel very... hip). Anyway... let's see.
Now, I don't remember the exact numbers, but I believe sharks can detect one part blood in roughly a gazillion parts water, and they will go into a frenzy, during which they may even bite themselves. I thought I might attempt to incite such fury by posing the following questions:
What separates a romantic relationship from an exclusive 'friends with benefits'-style relationship?
Imagine a situation in which a couple has had intercourse, and - as a result - the female half of the couple is pregnant. Does the woman have the irrefutable right to choose whether to have an abortion? If she wants an abortion, but the man wants the child, is his part in the process ignored?
And what if we just got rid of Chinese people? Would that be such a bad thing?
All right, all right, one of those questions is purely in jest. Guess which one and you win my respect!
Well. Let me try this one more time. This blog represents many viewpoints, and as such, it is only fitting that it have one member of the uneducated, unopinionated viewpoint. I know, I know, it sounds too good to be true. But it is so. I know little, and I feel strongly about even less.
However, I will do my best to contribute somehow. I felt like a return to blogging, and the other blog I have a part in has given new meaning to the term 'run amok.' And with the inexplicably warm welcome I receive every time I make some minuscule post here, how could I refuse?
However, I will do my best to contribute somehow. I felt like a return to blogging, and the other blog I have a part in has given new meaning to the term 'run amok.' And with the inexplicably warm welcome I receive every time I make some minuscule post here, how could I refuse?
