Quotations

Quote of the Day

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Richard Fernandez:

If you had to name ten things “which changed everything” in the last 2 decades nearly all the good stuff will have crept out of woodwork from the inner pages while all the bad stuff was parading above the fold. You can even think of the inner pages as being in an endless war with the front page, in an unending battle between the ordinary working stiff and the self-important leaders. The working stiff makes and the self-important leader taxes and wastes. Booms happen when the regular Joe can temporarily outpace the great men and the years of the locust occur when the opposite is true.

This is a nice post that touches a number of important themes about progress and how people perceive it. Worth reading.

Quote of the Day

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“Amazon stunned investors by posting a profit.”

Quote of the Day

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From the newsletter of a condominium association in Washington, DC:

No-Smoking Policy
 
Please remember no smoking in common areas (hallways, stairways, parking areas, walkways, and recreational areas). Smoking is permitted only on sidewalks bordering city streets.

Quote of the Day

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Richard Fernandez:

How they must have laughed as they watched Susan Rice go on all the talk shows blaming it on some Los Angeles film-maker. They were probably in stitches while viewing the paid advertisements shown in Pakistan blaming the whole thing on amateurs posting on YouTube. It must have opened their eyes to see how the Washington press corps swallowed it hook, line and sinker, like hayseeds from the sticks. That forced a re-evaluation of everything.
 
And then they knew: they had his number. They had the administration dialed in. They understood exactly what they were dealing with. The Iranians too must have been watching from the sidelines and concluded what Nemetsov understood. As did Putin. Here was a man with no core; whose only value was to protect the precious image of himself, because image was all there was.
 
And at that moment the wolves, heretofore only circling on the periphery, as if by mutual consent advanced. They understood. They knew. And the man at the center of the closing circle has been busy throwing ever larger pieces of raw meat them to keep them away. But the wolves are no longer to be denied and the circle is tightening.

Mike Lotus Spoke to the University of Chicago Law School Federalist Society Student Chapter on February 3, 2015 About “America 3.0 and the Future of the Legal Profession”

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UChicago law school

Huge thanks to the University of Chicago Law School Federalist Society Student Chapter on Tuesday, who invited me to speak to their group on February 3, 2015. I previously spoke at the Booth School of Business, which was also a thrill. I am most grateful for the opportunity to speak at the University of Chicago, my undergraduate alma mater.

The event was well-attended. I attribute this in part to the drawing power of the free buffet of Indian food, and not exclusively to the appeal of the speaker. The students were attentive and asked good questions. I understand that audio of the talk will be available at some point. I will post a link when it is available.

My topic was “America 3.0 and the Future of the Legal Profession”.

First I spoke about some of the themes from America 3.0: Rebooting American Prosperity in the 21st Century, Why America’s Greatest Days are Yet to Come, which I coauthored with James C. Bennett. I discussed the cultural foundations of American prosperity and freedom, the role of our legal profession in American history, in particular in adapting to technological changes, I then discussed some of the major technological changes which are now sweeping our nation and the world. I said that some of them will be general purpose technologies which will cause changes on the scale of the steam engine, railroads or computing itself.

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