Quote of the day

Bill [Parcells] did a real good job of hiring good people and collectively bringing them together. We kind of had our own way of doing things. That was a different time; the game was different than what it is now. I think Bill brought together people, I’d say what we all have in common out of that group, is we all like football. You don’t really feel like you’re working. You’re doing something you want to do. You don’t think about the hours or you don’t think about how much more I have to do, you think about doing something because you enjoy doing it. I would say that about all those people. I think that staff worked pretty well together. There was a good amount of respect.--Bill Belichick, on the Giants Superbowl XXV coaching staff

The officials got it right.--John Brenkus

Quote of the day

Blogging frequency has been reduced here, primarily due to job change. I need to get back into a higher consumption rate of reading, but in the meantime, I've given up my hundreds of RSS feeds for a book. Here is an excerpt:

Theoretically, if everyone is completely on the same page and working in lockstep toward the same goals with no sense of confusion, then I suppose a lack of debate might be a good sign.

Quotes of the day

I believe the Federal government has grown out of control, threatening the Rights, Liberties, and Property of the People.  This is being done at the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial level. This is in direct opposition to the Constitution and the Founding Fathers vision for the Federal government.  Because I believe this, today I exercised my right as a Free Citizen, and did not visit the White House. This was not about politics or party, as in my opinion both parties are responsible for the situation we are in as a country. This was about a choice I had to make as an INDIVIDUAL.--Tim Thomas

I already knew what a great athlete Thomas is. I just found out how deeply thoughtful and patriotic a citizen he is, too.--Cav

Photo link here.

South Carolina GOP primary

Both Intrade and Rasmussen have Newt Gingrich to win the SC primary.

I am still waiting for the prediction market and the pollster to differ.

Quotes of the day

It's always been that hot team that had to play it's way into the playoffs ... For me, I'm going with the hot hand, the hot team:  the New York Giants.  Eli's playing great.  Defensively, they've got that great pass rush going again.--Mark Schlereth

If you can beat a supremely motivated Patriots team in New England -- especially this particular Patriots team, which has been lights-out offensively for two solid months and wants nothing more than to end this whole "Baltimore owns you" thing -- without a decent pass rush, a shrewd offensive coordinator, fast linebackers, or a genuinely reliable quarterback that your team totally believes in, then Tebow bless you.--Bill Simmons

Photo links here and here.

Quotes of the day

I feel like I’m playing whack-a-mole.--Scott Sumner

Scott reminds me of Mace Windu.  And now that I think about it, certain Keynesians remind me of droids (ones who obviously fail the Turing Test).--Cav

The SOPA blackout: Wikipedia, Reddit, Mozilla, Google, and many others protest proposed law.32
i  Two new laws proposed by US legislators, the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act, have been attracting a very negative reaction from the web community over the past couple of months, which is today culminating in a day of protests. Aiming to curtail copyright infringement on the web by giving the US government unprecedented new powers, both SOPA and PIPA have been rejected as overreaching and unhelpful laws that cannot coexist with a free and open internet.--Vlad Savov

Image links here and here.

Interview of the day: Robert Kraft on CNBC

Football, politics, business strategy, economy, faith, basically most of what this blog is about:

Same as the old boss; same as it evahhh was

Governor Romney signing his Massachusetts healthcare regime into the world, with Ted Kennedy looking on approvingly.


Photo source, via Peter Suderman.

Quotes of the day

In an establishment like Ditka’s, the namesake is Jehovah: always looked for, seldom found.--Rich Cohen

How did Tom Brady go from Joe Montana to Dave Krieg?--Jeremy Lundblad

You know, each team plays their own defensive scheme against them, whether it’s Buffalo or Kansas City or Pittsburgh or whoever it is. We have our scheme. We’ll take some things from each game that we’ve seen and try to apply it to what we do. We’re not them, they’re not us, we have different players - same thing with Kansas City, Buffalo and all that. There’s certainly a lot to be learned but at the same time, we have our own matchups and we’re different from everybody else.--Bill Belichick

Translation: We're not going to play it the way the Steelers did, but we wouldn't have done that anyway ... Oh, and the Steelers were dumb. ... In basketball parlance, the Steelers packed the paint against someone whose only chance was to hit 3-pointers, which Tebow did.--Tony Massarotti

Mark Twain was as brilliant as Ricky Gervais. People try to give labels and change what it is. But comedy has always been the same.--Eddie Brill

Image link here.

I may yet delete this gross, but captivating in-a-cheesy-80s-oeuvre music slideshow

If I get 3 comments to remove it, it shall be done.

Still needs work, there's a "St. Elmo" artifact, and an "Eagles" reference that each should be reworked.

One of the reasons why I'm a libertarian

comes from my experience with financial regulators. They are totally out of their depth, not understanding where risk really lies because the essential information simply can't be grasped by flying in and looking and talking to people for 2 weeks. I have never worked in a financial firm where I felt I understood what was really going on for at least a couple years. They fill out reports conceived by someone ten years ago that would have caught last decade's big error, and come back next year.--Eric Falkenstein

Me, too.--Cav

Quotes of the day

Despite its remarkable contribution, The General Theory is an obscure book. I'm not sure that even Keynes himself knew completely what he really meant.--Greg Mankiw

... note that Keynesians think $97B was created via this spending and taxes this year, which is why they love government spending regardless of what it is spent upon. But if they issued $100B in bonds to create this 'new demand', where would that $100B have have gone otherwise? I don't think this makes sense in general equilibrium; money is never 'idle' unless it is under your mattress. I guess if you could caricature the two views: one thinks supply creates its own demand, the other that demand creates its own supply.--Eric Falkenstein

The issue is not that Krugman changed his mind (I’ve done that plenty, Alex too). The issue is that Krugman a) regularly demonizes his opponents, including those who hold Krugman’s old positions, and b) doesn’t work very hard to produce the strongest possible case against his arguments. Krugman’s response shows that he has changed his mind on debt, and explained why, but Heritage has not. It’s an “I am better than they are” response. That is beside the point, which is about elevating the views of others not oneself. The need to show all the time that one is better or more right than the others is itself harmful to depth, and responding with “but I really am better than them” is just falling into the trap again.
...
How about writing a NYRB essay that lays out the short-run negative output gradient to austerity, presents why austerity is considered a serious option nonetheless, discusses catch-up and bounce back effects and their relevant time horizons, analyzes what kinds of policies are actually possible in a 17 (27) nation collective, engages with the best public choice arguments (including Buchanan and Wagner) on a serious level, ponders the merits and demerits of worst case thinking, and ruminates on the nature of leadership in a way which shows some tussling with Thucydides and Churchill? Surely that is within Krugman’s capabilities and if it still comes out Keynesian or left-wing, great, at least someone will have seen those arguments through. Such an essay would stand a far greater chance of influencing me, or other serious readers, or for that matter President Obama. We should hold Krugman to the very high standard of actually expecting that he produce such work. Not many others are capable of it.
...
There is a kind of hallelujah chorus for Krugman on some of the left-wing economics blogs. The funny thing is, it’s hurting Krugman most of all.--Tyler Cowen

Really, what do you do with a guy who insults fellow economists, while admitting in writing that he doesn't even read the opeds and blog posts that are the cause for his insults (let alone their actual academic work, where ideas can be documented and defended)? He often doesn't even link or name the articles he's criticizing so his readers can decide for themselves!--John Cochrane

Sure, the top 10 [macroeconomists] make a good living, but no one else does, as companies and municipalities don't need macroeconomists any more than they need sociologists.--Eric Falkenstein

[Rex Ryan] kind of looks like Mario Batali.--Jason Gay, channeling Eli Manning

The vitriol toward [Josh] McDaniels has always surprised me. ... OK, he lost. Lots of coaches lose and get fired. But the overriding sentiment is that McDaniels destroyed the franchise, setting it back for years. On Sunday, the quarterback, record-setting receiver, third receiver and two starting offensive linemen came from the 2010 draft that McDaniels oversaw. The quarterback he picked and was ridiculed for is 8-4 and saved your season and just knocked the defending conference champ out of the playoffs and has your team in the final eight of the NFL. ... your disdain for McDaniels is irrational. He needed a strong GM, never got one, blew a bunch of draft picks and lost most of his games. That we know. Can you tell me if, say, Raheem Morris or Eric Mangini or Todd Haley, other coaches who got jobs in 2009, got the Denver job you'd be better off now? I can guarantee you none of them would have taken Tim Tebow in the first round.--Peter King

He’s a big dude, a strong guy. I know we talked about it, but I didn’t realize. He’s just a physical guy, his stature, just a big guy. I’ve seen some big guys over the years, but he’s probably one of the biggest and toughest, probably one of the strongest, that I’ve faced.--Vince Wilfork, 4 time All-Pro and Pro Bowl (325 lb) defensive lineman

[Nick] Saban walked off, escorted by three police officers. A couple of miles away, on Bourbon Street, the party raged, an army of drunken fans from Muscle Shoals and Dotham and Birmingham no doubt crooning along to ill-advised Skynyrd covers. Meanwhile, the coach did a neat bunny hop onto the back of a golf cart, hair slicked back in a Gatorade pompadour, and his wife sat next to him, and off he went, no doubt thinking fastidious thoughts. ... Saban adhered to his own process, measured and cautious; he lost when it didn't matter, and won when it did, and he did so with five field goals and one garbage-time touchdown. You may not like him, but you have to respect that, in a sport driven by misplaced emotion, the man always knows when to carry an umbrella. He will be remembered as the greatest coach of this era because he won a number of big games in the sort of methodical fashion that makes them very easy to forget. And maybe, when you think about it, the only way to end this season was with a frustrating anticlimax.--Michael Weinreb

On January 1, 1991, the federal excise tax on beer doubled, and the tax rates on wine and liquor increased as well. These changes are larger than the typical state-level changes that have been used to study the effect of price on alcohol abuse and its consequences. ... A conservative estimate is that the federal tax reduced injury deaths by 4.7%, or almost 7,000, in 1991.--Philip J. Cook, Christine Piette Durrance

Photo links here, here, here and here.

Happy Birthday, Fischer Black

A typical quote of his:

In the end, a theory is accepted not because it is confirmed by conventional empirical tests, but because researchers persuade one another that the theory is correct and relevant.

I find this relevant to faith (which is also required where confirmation by conventional empirical tests are unavailable). One could also say:

In the end, a theology is accepted not because it is confirmed by conventional empirical tests, but because theologians persuade one another that the theory is correct and relevant.

(NOTE: His actual birthday is tomorrow, but I may not get to the blog then).

How can the same paper that complains about

this:

publish this?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Via Glenn Reynolds.

Well that explains a lot

Megan McArdle does some clear thinking:

So far, none of the people who have urged me to recognize Krugman's superior analytic abilities on the grounds that he called the housing bubble, have changed their minds and agreed with me when I informed them that I "called" it even earlier than their sage.  Nor have they switched their allegiance to The Economist, which has been quite sharp about Krugman in its time.

I get the feeling that Krugman himself rather encourages this touching faith in his unusual forecasting abilities, and more generally, the notion that the only reason he is such a flaming jerk to economists he disagrees with is that they really are, every one of them, too stupid to count to twenty with their shoes on.  His latest response to Marginal Revolution is a case in point:

I plead innocent. I only treat people as mendacious idiots if they are mendacious idiots.

Seriously: I have some big disagreements with Ken Rogoff, but if you use the little search box up there on the upper right and enter "Rogoff" I think you'll find that I have always treated him with respect. On the other hand, enter "Heritage" and you'll find me pretty scornful -- but with very good reason! And I always document what I'm saying.

This is true, as far as it goes: in my recollection, he always has been pretty respectful to Ken Rogoff.

But allow me to suggest--gently, gently!--that this might not be quite the whole story.  For those of Krugman's readers who are not familiar with Ken Rogoff's oeuvre beyond what they have read of it on Paul Krugman's blog, it's worth noting that Ken Rogoff has not, in the past, been shy about shredding Nobel Prizewinners who made the mistake of going all Defcon 1 in Professor Rogoff's vicinity.  And that it's generally agreed that the last time this happened, he got by far the better of the argument.

Paul Krugman is a brilliant man with a very fine memory.  Though this angle probably eludes most of his readers, I doubt it's eluded him.

Quotes of the day

Economics blogs are ... “dim sum for the mind.”--Alex Tabarrok

We are mistaking high resolution and portability as an advancement of culture.--Rick Brookstaber

... we notice the monetary shocks that make us poorer much more than we notice the real shocks that make us richer.--Scott Sumner

Our economic system’s collapse may not seem as exciting as melting ice caps, but people really aren’t going to like it — at least, according to computer models.--Frank J. Fleming

... redistributionist government ... is inherently regressive: It tends to distribute power and money to the strong, including itself.--George Will

The table is set for the Patriots to be in the Super Bowl. A Bronco team comes to town that you already handled Dec. 18, on their home turf. So the chances of getting by Denver are good. I ask you this: Which QB scares you -- Joe Flacco or T.J. Yates? I say neither. Not only is it there for the Patriots to win this week, but if they don't make the Super Bowl, I'd be very disappointed.--Tedy Bruschi

New Hampshire GOP primary

Both Intrade and Rasmussen have predicted a Romney victory.

Hoping for a tighter race soon.

Tim Tebow to Demarius Thomas made for an exciting and shortest ever playoff overtime

in NFL history.  I'm happy for them, Coach Fox, GM John Elway and the rest of the team.

Trent Dilfer made a great point a few minutes ago.  He asked, "Who drafted these guys (meaning Thomas and Tebow)?"

Well, the answer is Josh McDaniels, who will be waiting for them on the opposite sidelines next Saturday night, as he is back with the New England Patriots.

Interesting times, indeed.

Photo links here and here.

UPDATE:  Had to add this cover:

UPDATE: Gets better, Tebow is quoted as saying:

I guess [Tom Brady]’s a prophet, I don’t know.

UPDATE: Jon Acuff weighs in with:

Tebow threw for 316 yards. Hellooooo John 3:16 comparisons.

UPDATE: Tony Massarotti says:

Say this for the irresistible Mr. Tebow: the Steelers dared him to beat them deep - and beat them he did. Prior to yesterday, the mighty Pittsburgh defense had surrendered two pass plays all season of at least 40 yards. Yesterday, the Steelers allowed four, culminating in an 80-yard strike from Tebow to Demaryius Thomas that ended Pittsburgh's season on the first play of overtime.

Swamped

with work for the next week.

I hope to get back into a better rhythm soon.

Quotes of the day: New England Patriots edition

... defensive passing yards allowed don’t tell the whole story, particularly when a team’s offense is as prolific as New England’s. Consider that the four teams that have allowed the most passing yards this season are the Packers, Patriots, New York Giants and New Orleans Saints, four division champions with a combined 50-14 record.--John Parolin

Statistics are like a bikini. What they present is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.--Aaron Levenstein

After losing to the Giants to fall to 5-3, the Patriots ran off a string of eight straight wins to get to 13-3 and grab the AFC’s first seed heading into this week’s opening round bye. Following that Giants loss, Bill Belichick cut ties with Albert Haynesworth, one of his notable off-season pickups. So yes, the Pats haven’t lost since Big Al got the gate. Might there be a correlation between the winning streak and Albert’s departure? ... For what it’s worth, Tampa, who picked up Haynesworth, went 0-for-Albert. They didn’t win a single game since picking him up off waivers.--Rap Sheet

Some statistics present something vital.--Cav

Image links here and here:

Intrade vs. Rasmussen

Four years ago, I tracked the head-to-head predictiveness of the Intrade futures market as compared to the Zogby pollster.

This election year, I will compare Intrade to Rasmussen.  Both have Romney taking Iowa tomorrow.