So why do people carry on like this? "There can be only one answer", says Irvine, "we are, as a nation, chucking a full-on, all-screaming, all-door-slamming teenage temper tantrum." Voters and business are like petulant teenagers and the government is like a weak-willed parent desperate for affection.

Irvine’s column was the talk of Twitter this morning. "Fantastic piece on what a pack of whingers Australians are", tweeted Bernard Keane while Aleta describes Irvine as "a breath of sensible in a world of stupid". Trent Driver writes: "Best piece I have read in a long time. Wish you could hear the debate by the teenage girls in my ecos classes. :)"

Others were less convinced. "I don’t understand why people like that Jess Irvine thing" said Jason Wilson. "More pundits telling the people they’re spoilt children."

Liam Hogan commented "three things missing from that piece: price of housing, major city rental vacancy rate, homelessness index." Sarah Toohey from Australians for Affordable Housing agreed, "Nice points Liam. Overall econ good, lots quite comfortable, but some have really difficult lives b/c of hsg."

Arriving just after the ACTU conference, Irvine’s column runs into their campaign on insecure work. Jason Wilson asked: "Haven’t we just heard at the ACTU congress that ppl feel chronically insecure?"

According to the ACTU’s Ged Kearney, millions of Australians are in casual jobs, contract jobs and labour hire work. "On top of low wages, and a lack of conditions like sick leave and holiday pay, there is a huge amount of uncertainty about when and how much people will work."

Matt Cowgill and Keiran McCarron took issue with Irvine’s claim that Australia’s welfare state is bloated. Cowgill wrote: "I disagree that our welfare system is ‘bloated’ (unless you include tax expenditures in your definition)" while McCarron tweeted: "I didn’t read your article. But if you’re calling a welfare system smaller than the US’s "bloated" you’re just politicking."

Irvine isn’t the only one arguing that Australians are complaining too much. The Australian newspaper’s George Megalogenis has pledged a "war on whinging". And that’s just where twitter user truckie is filing the piece, under #waronwhinging. Megalogenis says he might pitch a ‘war on whinging’ show to the ABC. Fake Paul Keating tweets: "if you get a show, @Jess_Irvine is in the stop whinging camp, and lot more photogenic than you".

How aged care reform slipped off the media agenda: “Confronted with a major policy initiative that, while affecting millions, offered little potential for partisanship or prurience, the media was a little flummoxed”. Mr Denmore, The Failed Estate.

The limits of citizen journalism: “Why was new media able to topple governments in Egypt and Tunisia, but sparked new waves of oppression in Syria and Iran?” Alan Knight, Online Journalism.

Could the NYT make money from its scoops? “how much would hedge funds pay to be able to see the NYT’s big investigative stories during the trading day prior to the appearance of the story?” Felix Salmon, Reuters.

How OECD governments generate tax revenues: Stephen Gordon explains with graphs. Worthwhile Canadian Initiative.

That’s not welfare, that’s good policy: Whether we call it welfare or not, the real question is what government spending achieves. Sinclair Davidson, Catallaxy.

Left-Libertarianism and the Ownership of Natural Resources: “our just rights to natural resources entitle each of us to what has come to be called an ‘unconditional basic income’ or, in its non-paternalistic form, an unconditional initial capital grant.” Hillel Steiner, Bleeding Heart Libertarians.

On telling parents to f*** themselves: “I have received many emails from readers which exemplify or reject one or more of the six moral foundations. I recently received the text below, which is the most forceful rejection of the Authority foundation that I have ever read.” Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind.

How Containerization Shaped the Modern World: Celebrate the anniversary of the first containership in 1956 by watching this TED Ed video. Joshua Gans, Digitopoly.

In a speech at the Institute of Economic Affairs, Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey announced the the end of the age of entitlement. He followed up the speech with an interview for the ABC’s Lateline.

At Billablog, Hockey’s speech inspires a song while Patricia at Cafe Whispers pens a poem about Tony Abbott’s Magic Pudding Budget Plan.

Phillip Coorey at the Sydney Morning Herald writes that Hockey’s approach lacks “consistency with much of what the Coalition has said and done more broadly, suggesting there may be an internal struggle going on.”

Hockey told Lateline’s Tony Jones that: “We need to compare ourselves with our Asian neighbours where the entitlements programs of the state are far less than they are in Australia.” Blogger Matt Cowgill did exactly that:

Hockey could eliminate all social spending other than health and old age assistance and we’d still be at 10.1% of GDP, well above Korea, a country he mentions as a benchmark. In other words, even if we scrapped all help for people with disabilities (the support pension as well as in-kind help), got rid of Newstart, stopped spending anything on helping people find work, and eliminated all housing assistance, we’d still be devoting more than our Asian neighbours to social spending. That leaves health care and old age pensions as the only place left to cut to get down to the sort of levels that Hockey identified. The safety net as we know it would be a thing of the past after cuts of that size.

In the United States, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney claims that President Obama has been replacing America’s merit-based society with an Entitlement Society. “We will have created a society that contains a sizable contingent of long-term jobless, dependent on government benefits for survival”, says Romney. “Government dependency can only foster passivity and sloth.”

However a recent analysis by the Center on Budget Policy and Priorities challenges Romney’s view showing “that more than 90 percent of the benefit dollars that entitlement and other mandatory programs spend go to assist people who are elderly, seriously disabled, or members of working households — not to able-bodied, working-age Americans who choose not to work.”

According to Joe Klein at Time, the Romney campaign has had second thoughts about attacking the ‘entitlement society. Apparently “an entitlement society didn’t sound like such a bad deal” writes Klein. “People like entitlements. They may not like entitlements for poor people, but they love Social Security and Medicare.”

Recently Opposition Leader Tony Abbott was asked if the Coalition was planning to cut any welfare programs. “We’re not planning to do any of that. What we want to cut back is wasteful and unnecessary government programs,” he said.

So I thought I’d give it a go: @donattroppo. Let me know what you think.

Free market fairness – an online symposium: "Bleeding Heart Libertarians will be running a symposium on John Tomasi’s new book, Free Market Fairness, from June 11-15, 2012. Scheduled participants include Elizabeth Anderson, Richard Arneson, Samuel Freeman, Deirdre McCloskey, and Will Wilkinson." Matt Zwolinski, Bleeding Heart Libertarians.

Tim Andrews doesn’t want to abolish government: He just wants to shrink it a little. At Menzies House Andrews announces the creation of the Australian Taxpayers’ Alliance, an organisation dedicated to mobilising Australians against high taxes, wasteful spending and crippling red tape.

"Welcome to the anti-carbon-tax alliance", writes Catallaxy commenter Gavin R Putland. "Right-wing astroturfing good. Left-wing astroturfing bad."

How racist do you have to be to get fired from the National Review Online? After years of offensive commentary NRO’s John Derbyshire finally stepped over the line with a piece on black white relations in Taki’s Magazine. Cutting Derbyshire loose, NRO’s Rich Lowry wrote that the piece was "so outlandish it constitutes a kind of letter of resignation".

What effect with this public shaming have? Not much according to David Sessions at The American Scene: "those who think Derbyshire-type thoughts, the episode only confirms the alternative-universe narrative that truth-telling white people are always victims of political correctness."

Competitive victimhood: "Nowadays whenever a political group is accused of unjustly harming another group, it will invariably play some kind of victim card" Eric Horowitz, Peer-reviewed by my Neurons.

Political difference inhibits empathy: A new study shows how political difference inhibits empathy. As Will Wilkinson puts it: "It turns out politics not only makes us stupid. It also makes us callous."

Journalists side with their employers: "I’m convinced that so much of the reactionary response to attempts to make journalism more democratically responsive – like Finkelstein – stem from a paranoid, Luddite and protectionist urge among employees of mainstream media companies to keep non-tithed operatives off their front lawn." Mr Denmore, The Failed Estate.

The human penis is a puzzler, no bones about it: Unlike humans, the males in most mammal species have a bone in their penis. At the Conversation Lauren Reid asks why.

Innovation and inequality: What effect do now products and technologies have on inequality? Robin Hanson, Overcoming Bias.

An annoying parable: Is the classroom a good model for the economy? Glen Fuller thinks not.

Friedman’s classical liberalism: According to Milton Friedman "Government has done a lot of good. And the implication certainly seems to be that government has done good in ways that the market on its own could not have done. For Friedman, that’s good enough. For Rand, Rothbard and Nozick, of course, it wouldn’t be." Matt Zwolinski, Bleeding Heart Libertarians.

Conservatives aren’t getting crazier: "Conservatism is not getting crazier, and it’s not going away, either. It’s just getting more powerful." Rick Perlstein, Rolling Stone.

You think Twitter’s annoying now? "Going forwards, all of us are going to find Twitter increasingly annoying. The company has been in hyper-growth mode up until now, getting to its current astonishing scale. But it’s now getting serious about making money, which means selling us, the users, to people willing to pay lots of money to work their way into our timelines one way or another." Felix Salmon.

Gov 2.0 – Get it or go: "As Malcolm [Turnbull] points out Gov 2.0 is also about a change in the mindset of public servants. This raises an interesting question. What about those public servants who don’t change their mindset because they don’t want to ‘get it’? If they are holding back Gov 2.0 then should they be retired?" Steve Davies, Ozloop.

If, rolling in a big cyclical surplus, a government were to cut income taxes, that may not immediately send the budget into deficit. But when the cycle turns, tax receipts drop, unemployment benefits rise, the tax cut will still be there and reversing it will cause much more political pain than delivering the cut derived political joy. The same is true with increases to benefits or indeed to new benefits – if these are funded from cyclical surpluses then they may be contributing to a long-term structural deficit.

Turnbull suggests that a sovereign wealth fund could help discipline government decision making and encourage governments to use temporary surpluses for long term economic gain rather than short term political advantage through things like "unsustainable tax cuts" or "infrastructure projects in marginal seats".

Turnbull’s reference to "unsustainable tax cuts" prompted this response from Catallaxy’s Sinclair Davidson: "There is no such thing as unsustainable tax cuts, only unsustainable spending." But according to Turnbull: "That is quite wrong."

See over the fold for links to the full debate including posts by Davidson, Turnbull, Terry McCrann and Andrew Bolt.

A fund to guard against Canberra’s frailty: "When a cabinet is presented with a surplus it is sorely tempted to spend it on some or all of the following: tax cuts, hand outs to politically important interest groups, infrastructure (often in marginal seats) and of course at the same time with lots of money sloshing through the doors it is very hard to persuade ministers to cut the costs in their own departments." Malcolm Turnbull, Business Spectator.

Tax cuts are not government spending: "There is no such thing as unsustainable tax cuts, only unsustainable spending. People can save for themselves and their own children – they don’t need government for that." Sinclair Davidson, Catallaxy (with comment by Malcolm Turnbull).

Government must live within its means: "Cutting taxes, cutting spending, reducing regulation; frankly getting out of the way and letting the private sector generate wealth and opportunity must be a first order objective of any government." Sinclair Davidson, The Drum.

What’s this about “unsustainable” tax cuts? "Professor Sinclair Davidson is rightly suspicious about a Liberal frontbencher who can be so inherently sceptical about returning taxes to the people." Andrew Bolt, Herald Sun.

The missing ingredient in any new sovereign wealth fund is . . . wealth: "Turnbull’s in the wrong party. His instincts are all, all, collectivist. And controlling – of your money." Terry McCrann, Herald Sun.

Dumb slogans vs rational debate on sovereign wealth funds – or the peculiar case of Terry McCrann: "The slogan advanced by Sinclair Davidson and Terry McCrann is “there is no such thing as unsustainable tax cuts” (slogans apparently being the new medium for serious political debate). But if we take it seriously, then we are arguing tax cuts which resulted in the Australian Government being unable to pay wages to soldiers would not be unsustainable." Malcolm Turnbull.

Malcolm strikes back: "When Malcolm Turnbull has cut taxes so much that government is struggling to cover military salaries we’ll talk again. I’ll happily admit to being wrong." Sinclair Davidson, Catallaxy.

With help from celebrities like Rihanna, Sean Combs, Alec Baldwin and Zooey Deschanel, Invisible Children gathered more than more than 329,000 Twitter followers and more than 2 million Facebook fans in support of their KONY 2012 campaign. Here’s the video, links to some of the controversy it generated, and some background.

White Mans Burden? "There’s … something inherently misleading, naive, maybe even dangerous, about the idea of rescuing children or saving of Africa. It’s often not an accidental choice of words, even if it’s unwitting. It hints uncomfortably of the White Man’s Burden." Chris Blattman.

Commodifying misery: "If there was a prize for the NGO who best commodifies white man’s burden on the African continent, and more specifically in Uganda, Invisible Children would win." Siena Anstis.

Invisible Children’s campaign of infamy: "To call the campaign a misrepresentation is an understatement. While it draws attention to the fact that Kony, indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in 2005, is still on the loose, it’s portrayal of his alleged crimes in Northern Uganda are from a bygone era." Angelo Opi-aiya Izama.

Stop Kony, yes. But don’t stop asking questions: "I understand the anger and resentment at Invisible Children’s approach, which with its paternalism has unpleasant echoes of colonialism. I will admit to being perturbed by its apparent top-down prescriptiveness, when so much diligent work is already being done at Northern Uganda’s grassroots. On the other hand, I am very happy – relieved, more than anything – that Invisible Children have raised worldwide awareness of this issue." Musa Okwonga, The Independent.

Joseph Kony is not in Uganda (and other complicated things): "It would be great to get rid of Kony. He and his forces have left a path of abductions and mass murder in their wake for over 20 years. But let’s get two things straight: 1) Joseph Kony is not in Uganda and hasn’t been for 6 years; 2) the LRA now numbers at most in the hundreds, and while it is still causing immense suffering, it is unclear how millions of well-meaning but misinformed people are going to help deal with the more complicated reality. " Michael Wilkerson, Foreign Policy.

Bursting bubbles: "So, now I’m in a bit of a quandary. I’m worried that the real reason I went to seek out the downsides of the Kony 2012 phenomenon was simply because I’m a snob who enjoys bursting people’s bubbles, and because I find the promotional film they made for it embarrassingly produced. What a horrible reason that would be to ignore a charity." Alex Miller, Vice.

Talking with Kony: "I had set out to find a monster, but Kony turned out to be a rather pathetic, frightened man." Matthew Green.

An Insider’s Portrait of Joseph Kony: "It is difficult to overstate Mr. Kony’s exaggerated style of public weirdness and calculated ferocity." CJ Chivers, At War, The New York Times.

Obama Takes on the LRA: "During the past decade, U.S.-based activists concerned about the LRA have successfully, if quietly, pressured the George W. Bush and Obama administrations to take a side in the fight between the LRA and the Ugandan government. Among the most influential of advocacy groups focusing specifically on the LRA are the Enough project, the Resolve campaign, the Canadian-based group GuluWalk, and the media-oriented group Invisible Children." Mareike Schomerus, Tim Allen, and Koen Vlassenroot, Foreign Affairs.

2011 – Obama Sends U.S. Forces to Help African Troops Confront Lord’s Resistance Army: "President Barack Obama has authorized the deployment to central Africa of 100 combat-equipped U.S. forces whose mission is to help regional forces fight the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army and its leader, Joseph Kony." Cheryl Pellerin, US Africa Command (Oct 14, 2011).

2011 – Limbaugh Defends Lord’s Resistance Army: "Apparently sensing an opportunity to tarnish President Obama’s standing with listeners who were unaware of the suffering caused by the African rebels who call themselves the Lord’s Resistance Army, Rush Limbaugh responded to the president’s deployment of 100 military advisers to combat the group in central Africa on Friday in a segment of his radio show headlined, “Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians." Robert Mackey, The Lede, New York Times.

2006 – Childhood’s End: "The Acholi people of northern Uganda, who are the chief sufferers in all this, have to suffer everything twice. Their children are murdered or abducted and enslaved and then come back to murder and abduct and enslave even more children. Yet if the Ugandan Army were allowed to use extreme measures to destroy the L.R.A., the victims would be … Acholi children again." Christopher Hitchens, Vanity Fair.

Forget about ideas, says Bob Carr: In the Financial Review, incoming foreign minister Bob Carr argues that parties of the left are exhausted because they’ve fulfilled their mission and achieved most of their major goals. But according to Carr the problem is not a lack of bold new ideas. To succeed, leaders should forget about theory and improvise. That is how Labor has succeeded in the past.

More ideology! In the UK, Pete Redford takes the opposite view. At the LSE’s Politics and Policy blog he writes:

New Labour provided us with years of policy rather than ideology; for us to be successful again the party needs faith in its ideology and to break free from the New Labour belief that abandoning principles is necessary for power. Ed Miliband’s belief that Labour is not intellectually confident is an unfortunate truth. Not since Hugh Gaitskell and Anthony Crosland has the party had a clear ideological view and it now falls upon us to give an ideology back to the party.

Along with University of Liverpool academic Kevin Hickson, Redford argues that Labour needs an alternative to the Blairite agenda being pushed by people like David Miliband.

Last month David Miliband attacked a recent article by Hickson and former deputy leader Roy Hattersley that argued Labour needed a coherent and consistent philosophy. According to Hickson and Hattersley, New Labour placed too much faith in markets and accepted the conservative idea that the state should be drastically reduced.

Reassurance Labour: David Miliband dismissed this call for ideological renewal as an exercise in feel-good politics. "It is what I shall call Reassurance Labour", he wrote. "Reassurance about our purpose, our relevance, our position, even our morals. Reassurance Labour feels good. But feeling good is not the same as doing good – and it gets in the way when it stops us rethinking our ideas to meet the challenges of the time."

Hattersley hit back in the Guardian arguing:

State action is vital to the achievement of a more equal society. It is the most efficient mechanism for the redistribution of power and wealth, and it enables a genuinely egalitarian government to destroy the institutions of inequality and replace them with systems which unite rather than divide the nation.

Meanwhile at Larvatus Prodeo … Guy Beres suggests that: "the Rudd and Gillard Labor Governments have dipped quite a bit into ‘Reassurance Labour’ economics, pursuing interventionist tax policies on climate change and mining, and betting the farm on the success of the National Broadband Network project."

Too much ‘light on the hill’ rhetoric, says Carr: While British social democrats like Redford invoke the work of theoretical thinkers like Tony Crosland, Carr argues that ideological debate is futile. Other responses to the crisis of social democracy are not much better. In the Financial Review he writes:

Nobody knows what “social inclusion” means and I am getting weary of attempts to invoke Prime Minister Ben Chifley’s “light on the hill”, more being made of it than Chifley ever intended. Education is elevated as the answer to every social problem, as if nobody has ever tried it.

Wayne Swan vs the malefactors of great wealth: In the Monthly, Treasurer Wayne Swan argues for a more equal Australia: "It’s not just about putting dollars in people’s pockets, but about building a better society; a society that creates wealth and spreads opportunity, a society that lifts up the worst-off and gives everyone a decent shot at a decent life." According to Swan, this vision is threatened by the increasing power of vested interests. He singled out mining magnates Andrew Forrest, Clive Palmer and Gina Rinehart claiming that Rinhart had enlisted the help of media figures like Andrew Bolt, Alan Jones and Ray Hadley.

Right wing bloggers scoff: Andrew Bolt mocks Swan’s claims asking: "Which individuals ‘mobilised’ all the conservatives and ‘shock jocks’ and when did that order go out? Was there a secret conference? Are Jews, Freemasons or Opus Dei involved?" At Catallaxy, Judith Sloan dismisses Swan’s article as "unsubstantiated hyperbole and prejudiced mumbo-jumbo."

The continuing crisis of social democracy: "No, Labor and social democracy in Australia are not dead yet but both are struggling." Wayne Swan, 2002.

The view from America: "the plot has thickened like barbie sauce and Liberal Party leader Tony Abbott is the happiest man in Australia." Aaron Goldstein, The Spectacle Blog.

Gillard government a policy free zone: "Now that the Rudd agenda has mostly been passed or abandoned, Gillard has no policies whatsoever, a point I made some time ago." John Quiggin.

Policy isn’t Labor’s problem: "alone of Australian institutions the ALP conducts no systemic training for its personnel, no mentoring, no coaching, no management of high potential talent. And we pay the price with spokespeople thrust into jobs with no preparation and no support or guidance. Good cases are lost because nobody can articulate them, our debating prowess has leached from the organization." Bob Carr, Thoughtlines.

What does it mean for women in politics? "my greater concern is that Gillard’s particularly choppy time in leadership will be remembered by the Australian people and taken as representative of what things are like when a woman is in charge – and that as a result, our second woman Prime Minister will be a long time coming." Chloe Angyal , Feministing.

For the good of the party? Comments on the Kevin Connects blog:

"Stick it to the caucus … POWER TO THE PEOPLE"

"Just a thought, why dont you form your own party?, you at least have 30 serving politicians by your side and no faceless men!!"

"abandon the challenge and go independant! You will be savaged by your colleagues but you are now anyway."

"MMM the speach is full of ‘I’. I have my doubts about K Rudd. He seems to have narcissistic tendencies, despite sound policies and an intellectual mind."

Huh? Alison Caddick’s editorial in Arena.

What leadership challenge? "The US Presidential election is the most important we will have this year anywhere on the planet, and may in the long run affect us in Australia even more than any election we might contrive to have ourselves." Steve Kates, Catallaxy.

Updates …

That’s not a leadership battle: "compared with the bone crushing, rugby style of Australia’s governing Labor Party; the GOP proceedings seem like a game of touch football by comparison." Aaron Goldstein, The American Spectator.

Zombie-Rudd: "This is like Julius Caesar, reinterpreted as a Zombie flick." J Murph, Twitter.

Robot vs Zombie: "Robot overlord goads zombie army to attack. Most faeries wonder what fuss is about. Wish they’d all just get on with improving the kingdom." Argumentalist, Twitter.

Lucky us! "Rudd-Gillard debacle sign of Australia’s privilege: countries don’t allow themselves such diversions unless things are going v well." Alain de Botton‏, Twitter.

Investing in people: "I watched the great Ford River Rouge plant in Detroit, which once employed 44,000 workers, be reduced to rubble. I drove along ten mile of the Mongahela River near Youngstown and saw the skeletons of steel mills, surrounded by tires and rotting lumber …" Mark Naison, With a Brooklyn Accent.

Monsanto’s plastic House of the Future: "Legend has it that the planned one-day demolition of the House of Future ended up taking two weeks as the wrecking ball just bounced off the exterior. Workers painstakingly cut the house into pieces with hacksaws." Yesterland.

Data is the new plastics: There’s a shortage of people with data and analytical skills, says Steve at the Small Business Labs blog. Young people should get into data.

Erik Brynjolfsson on Big Data: "There is a fundamental change underway in the way that companies make decisions. Instead of relying on a leader’s gut instincts, an increasing number of companies are embracing a new method that involves data-based analytics." MIT Sloan Experts.

What does technology look like in an age of abundance? "Has truly radical innovation been forever replaced by incremental innovation that makes our lives easier, but not fundamentally different, from the way it was twenty years ago?" Dominic Basulto, Big Think.

What’s all the fuss – it’s a toasted cheese sandwich: Everyone‘s talking about Jonathan Kaplan‘s new grilled cheese sandwich chain, The Melt. It’s the chain’s use of QR codes that’s generating the most excitement. According to Ben Parr at Mashable:

The Melt allows diners to order their meals via their mobile phones. Placing an order on your phone creates a QR code that you can then swipe in the store. Once swiped, your order appears on the “Order Board” and your grilled cheese is placed in a propriety grill with a built-in microwave. Kaplan’s goal is to go from swipe to grilled cheese in two minutes or less.

So what about the sandwiches? Apparently they’re ok but not great.

Who is Noah Smith’s favourite conservative? "I am a liberal, but I believe we desperately need a relevant, functioning conservative movement. We need a conservative movement that is focused on making the government more effective, not smaller." Noah Smith, Noahpinion.

Somebody should tell John Singleton: "The Workers’ Party is systematically ruining this country. They are making it impossible for industry to compete, deliberately raising production costs and diminishing our ability to pay our way in the world." Steve Kates, Catallaxy.

The trouble with saving teenage poems: "My biggest fear is that someone will find them after I have died and wrongly assume that I kept my poetry because I was so proud of it. They may even then decide that a fitting tribute would be to read these poems at my funeral." Blue Milk.

Earlier the Daily Mail enraged readers by reporting the study’s findings. The Guardian’s Charlie Brooker called it a deliberate act of trolling. In the US, Live Science ran the story provoking scorn and ridicule in conservative forums like Free Republic.

It started with a paper by Gordon Hodson and Michael A. Busseri in Psychological Science: ‘Bright Minds and Dark Attitudes Lower Cognitive Ability Predicts Greater Prejudice Through Right-Wing Ideology and Low Intergroup Contact’ (pdf). The researchers conclude:

Our synthesis demonstrates that cognitive ability plays a substantial role not only in predicting prejudice, but also in predicting its potential precursors: right-wing ideologies and authoritarian value systems, which can perpetuate social inequality by emphasizing the maintenance of the status quo, and a lack of contact and experience with out-groups.

Here’s a few of the online responses to the paper and the debate that followed.

Low IQ & conservative beliefs linked to prejudice: "There’s no gentle way to put it: People who give in to racism and prejudice may simply be dumb, according to a new study that is bound to stir public controversy." Stephanie Pappas, Live Science.

Conservatism is linked to low intelligence; but the real idiots are the progressives letting it win: "There is plenty of research showing that low general intelligence in childhood predicts greater prejudice towards people of different ethnicity or sexuality in adulthood. Open-mindedness, flexibility, trust in other people: all these require certain cognitive abilities. Understanding and accepting others – particularly ‘different’ others – requires an enhanced capacity for abstract thinking." George Monbiot.

George Monbiot’s worst-ever Guardian column – and that’s saying something! "The first thing to be said about this supposedly definitive piece of research – Moonbat calls it ‘embarrassingly robust’– is that the authors, Gordon Hodson and Michael A Busseri, rely to a great extent on a measure of intelligence that has been discredited." Toby Young, The Telegraph.

Monbiot is aping old Right-wing elitists: "It was traditionally the authoritarian wing of the Right which wrote off its opponents effectively as retards, claiming that their ‘base motives’ would infect and destroy proper politics." Brendan O’Neill, The Telegraph.

Leftists don’t know what conservatism is: "What is going on of course is that Leftist psychologists swallow hook line and sinker of Leftist propaganda about conservatives. They believe that conservatives really are as Leftist propaganda describes them. It would appear that they never bother to talk to any actual conservatives to find out what they really think." John J Ray, A Western Heart.

This sort of research is essential and insightful: "We need to understand the patterns of cognitive variation, whether it be intelligence or personality, which may result in differences of opinion. At the end of the day no opinions may change, but one may be able to construct a crisper argument when taking into account the genuine roots of one’s political opponents viewpoints, rather than your own ill-informed caricature." Razib Khan, Gene Expression.

Truly, statistics can ‘prove’ anything: "What makes the study ludicrous, even ignoring the biases, manipulations, and qualifications just outlined, by the authors’ own admission the direct effect size for ‘g’ on ‘racism’ is only -0.01 for men and 0.02 for women. Utterly trivial; close enough to no effect to be no effect, their results statistically “significant” only because of the massive sample size." William M Briggs.

Why libertarians need to talk with the left and how to do it: "Between Left and Right, the reality remains that the Left is still closer to our ideals. They are more likely to agree with our social liberalism and foreign policy even though they are economic interventionists." James Peron, Moorfield Storey Blog.

Men who argue with goats: They love a good argument at Menzies House.

… or with Cory Bernardi: "Throughout history it has been demonstrated that any government that becomes too big eventually is forced to accrue a level of debt that cannot be sustained." Cory Bernardi.

The biggest government in the world? "The Congressional Budget Office report … says that annual deficits will remain in the $1 trillion range for the next several years if Bush-era tax cuts slated to expire in December are extended, as commonly assumed." NBC Politics.

So what about the Nordics? "If heavy taxation has harmful economic effects, why have Denmark and Sweden performed similarly to the United States during a period of several decades in which their taxes were much higher than America’s?" Lane Kenworthy.

In praise of private equity: "The difficult truth that virtually no politician is prepared to acknowledge is that the road to job creation runs through job destruction." Reihan Salam.

The introvert’s lament: Social butterflies are annoying. Overdressed Anarchist.

Op shopping: Justin Campbell finds a copy of Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose in an op shop. "I quickly grabbed hold of the book and guarded it in case someone else wanted to buy it", he writes. "The bewildered shopkeeper seemed surprised at my excitement."

The fate of Mrs Petrov’s lost shoe: Apparently Sir Les Paterson has it.

Australia Day from afar: "One of the most surprising things for me to experience out of Australia was people saying–even in the American South!–Australia’s really racist, isn’t it?" Queen Emily, Hoyden About Town.

Drunks draped in flags: "the path that took us here is a complex one. Music festivals, drinking binges, the crystallisation of fears and resentments, the navel gazing over Identity, all that is part of the road, as well as politicians." Kim, Larvatus Prodeo.

The view from Menzies House: Tim Andrews celebrates Australia Day with a whinge about lefties and "self-appointed intellectual elites".

Be as Australian as you want to be: "Let us be frank: anti-racist prejudice is the worst kind of prejudice at all. It denies freedom of expression; it denies freedom of conscience; and most heinous of all, it denies courage." Ben Pobjie.

John Passant reports on the tent embassy protest: "Soon about 200 of the demonstrators moved from the Tent Embassy commemoration to the café to tell Abbott what they thought of him …" En Passant.

Steve Kates on the protests: "I must tell you my disgust is unbounded. We tend not to jail such people, but that is in the way of more fool us than anything." Catallaxy.

Missing the story: The press gallery "shine the light almost exclusively on the confected battle between tweedle dee and tweedle dum – the figureheads at the top of decaying political parties that everyone outside the inbred Canberra vortex can see are just shells of organisations pretending to believe in something beyond power itself." Mr Denmore, The Failed Estate.

Michael loves Heather: "She’s a saint. A princess. A fairy queen. A beautiful, kind, intelligent. imaginative, brave young woman with a wicked sense of humour and a shipload of empathy." Michael Stuchbery gets married.

One year on: "How do you grieve for someone who hurt you profoundly, repeatedly, and tore your family apart? Who was also deeply intelligent, cursed with mental illness, incredibly funny, and when he could be, loving?" Imogen, raw/roar.

What’s So Special about America’s 1%? "If we’re all embedded in a fundamentally unjust, exploitative global economic structure, it’s hard to see why the American 1% should be especially salient." Will Wilkinson, The Moral Sciences Club.

Social justice … Tea Party style: "A common trope for conservative policy intellectuals is that they want to ‘means test’ the welfare state – reduce its availability for those with high wealth and income and focus it on those with the least wealth and income. But the Tea Party base wants the opposite – they are opposed to a welfare state for the poor, young people, undocumented workers and other groups they think are undeserving." Mike Konczal, Rortybomb.

Dogs against Romney: Why is everyone talking about Mitt Romney’s dog?

Blog readers survey: Peter Chen is conducting a survey of blog readers. You can find the survey here: Australian Blog Readers Study (via Andrew Norton).

Left-wing Paulbots are go! Left-wingers, greens and progressives should be supporting Ron Paul‘s bid for the Republican nomination, writes Leichhardt Greens Councillor, Daniel Kogoy.

Ron Paul on the "whole global warming terrorism" thing: In 2009 Paul said that the Copenhagen treaty on climate change "can’t help the economy. It has to hurt the economy and it can’t possibly help the environment because they’re totally off track on that. It might turn out to be one of the biggest hoaxes of all history, this whole global warming terrorism that they’ve been using, but we’ll have to just wait and see, but it cannot be helpful. It’s going to hurt everybody.” He made similar comments in an interview with Fox Business (at 7:00).

Industry subsidies and political tribalism: At current levels, subsidies to the car industry are third-order, writes John Quiggin. So why all the fuss? "It’s taken for granted on the cultural right that some technologies and industries (nuclear power, oil, finance) are good and others (wind energy, electric cars, Hollywood) are evil – essentially a mirror image of what they think we on the left think. For people who are supposed to believe in the free market, this is a big problem."

There’s a margin in error: "Like advertising, journalism now is mostly about constructing a version of the truth that suits a chosen market. It’s about making an impact and attracting eyeballs and building a brand. And the greatest shame of it all is that a gullible public buys it." Mr Denmore, The Failed Estate.

Voting is about values not interests: "It isn’t rational to vote for your economic interests. It isn’t rational in the economist’s sense to vote at all. Why not, because your individual vote doesn’t count." The Philosopher’s Beard.

The Great Gatsby Curve: Alan Krueger calls it the ‘Great Gatsby curve’ — the finding that countries that have more inequality across households also have more persistence in income from one generation to the next. As Matthew Yglesias points out, that’s bad news for Republican claims that America doesn’t need to redistribute income because it’s the land of equal opportunity and upward mobility.

Hands up if you want downward mobility: "Someone in society is going to end up doing crappy jobs," writes Megan McArdle, "because trash needs to be hauled and Alzheimer’s patients need to have their diapers changed. The primary job of a middle class parent is to ensure that their children are not those people."

Technological change and economic growth : Steve Kates picks a fight with a ‘socialist’ blogger who claims that free markets drive technological change and generate wealth. “Gimme a break" he says, "It is free markets that drive tech change and generate wealth. But it is not ‘tech change’ as such, but entrepreneurs, those people, like Mitt Romney, who do the driving and if they succeed, end up very wealthy. To present it as ‘tech change’ means that rubbish like the NBN or batts in the belfry might get counted."

Mobile phones and the price of fish: Mobile phones are transforming the way people in countries like India do business. In a 2007 paper economist Robert Jensen explained how access to mobile telecommunications allowed fishermen in Kerala to get the best prices for their catch.

"My mother died in 1976. Is she all right?" Kerryn Goldsworthy visits the supermarket.

The missing liberals: Why is there no liberal party? Because there are so few people who support both economic and social liberal causes, says Andrew Norton. Andrew cites data from the 2010 Australian Election Survey.

Dr Watson vs Dr Ludd: With access to huge databases, expert systems will soon be able to diagnose illness better than doctors, says Alex Tabarrok. Not everyone is convinced.

Penalty rate claims hard to swallow: "To believe that Mr Calombaris would open his restaurants on Sundays only to have them run at a loss is to believe that he’s running some sort of altruistic quasi-charity, an impression he attempts to give by suggesting that he opens on Sundays for reasons of ‘tourism’." Matt Cowgill.

Game of thrones: Greg Jericho is tired of reading about leadership challenges.

Adult content? "I can never understand how it’s ok to see images of a woman with breasts larger than her head, but a tasteful picture of something so natural as breastfeeding is ‘offensive’ to those same people." The Happy Sorceress on the Dave Dorman controversy (via Blue Milk).

Why Boardwalk Empire is more like cinema than tv: "In recent years, television shows have increasingly adopted cinematic tropes. Some of these can be found in current television series, nevertheless Boardwalk Empire is the pinnacle of this trend." I Heart the Talkies.

Equality means never having to drink warm beer: LG’s new ‘blast chiller’ compartment can cool a can of beer in five minutes. But to get this feature you have to buy a fridge that costs more that $2,500. Even super-rich people don’t buy refrigerators by the dozen so according to Matthew Yglesias that means "the incentive to invest money in developing even better appliances is relatively muted." He suggests that rising middle class incomes would encourage appliance makers to introduce more of these kinds of features.

Fairness on a budget: Britain’s Attlee government of 1945-51 built the modern welfare state and delivered greater income equality even though it inherited a debt to GDP ratio three times today’s level, writes Chris Dillow. So why is it so hard to implement egalitarian policies today?

How to win a Republican primary: "To survive a Republican debate you are required to hold the incoherent view that the budget should be balanced immediately, taxes cut dramatically, and the major categories of spending (the military, Social Security, Medicare) left largely intact. There is no way to make these numbers add up, and the candidates do not try, relying instead on focus-group tested denunciations of Obama and abstract hostility to the ways of Washington." Jacob Weisberg, Slate.

Are traditional media institutions worth saving? In an age of internet-enabled networks, should established media institutions be allowed to wither away? Dean Starkman says no. Gary Sauer-Thompson isn’t convinced: "Most journalism takes the form of infotainment or partisan political commentary; operates within narrow intellectual boundaries; favours ‘he said she said’ analysis; avoids public policy issues; and doesn’t even bother with facts anymore. Honestly, not much public-interest reporting is produced in Australia’s existing media institutions."

Mr Denmore’s 12-step program for junk media junkies in 2012: Stop watching Q&A, turn off the Insiders, ignore the polls and spend more time at the pub. But what about Andrew Bolt?

Justice without borders: Does justice require rich countries to redistribute resources to poor ones? At Oz Conservative Mark Richardson discusses Kok-Chor Tan’s book, Toleration, Diversity and Global Justice.

What if poor people don’t like money? According to Greg Mankiw: "one reason that people differ in their incomes is that some people care more about having a high income than others." In a post about Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow, Bryan Caplan argues that "Leftist outrage over income inequality is therefore deeply misguided." Why? because when you think of low-income people as losers: "you’re falsely assuming that we’re all racing for the same finish line: material success."

Upwards redistribution: "People are inclined to give much more legitimacy to market outcomes than policy outcomes engineered by governments. That is why there is a whole industry devoted to convincing people that the upward redistribution of income over the last three decades, which has given the bulk of economic gains to the One Percent, is really just the result of the natural workings of the market." Dean Baker, CEPR.

Peter Martin’s pursuit of power: Peter Martin discovers an Australian-style powerpoint in Argentina. Argentina is one of a handful of countries (including China) that use the same plug design as Australia.

Missing link is taking a vacation. See you next year!

The destruction of the tea: What did the original tea party patriots stand for? Alfred F. Young looks at the history behind the Boston Tea Party.

Are Slaves Growing Your Fair Trade Cotton? Matthew Yglesias links to a story about child labour on ‘fair trade’ farms in Burkina Faso by Cam Simpson at Bloomberg. According to Yglesias, it’s not just about poor monitoring of a fair trade program, there’s also a link between organic certification and forced labour: "organic agriculture is less capital-intensive and thus more labor-intensive than conventional agriculture, so paying a premium for organic cotton creates an extra incentive to add forced labor into the production mix."

How do rich countries lift up the poor? The answer is something no politician wants to hear — transfer payments. According to Lane Kenworthy, countries that kept transfers rising in line with GDP did better than those that indexed payments to prices. In an article for Pathways magazine he argues that "we shouldn’t pretend that paid work is a realistic route to guaranteeing rising incomes for everyone."

If women do the spending, does it matter that they don’t do the earning? It’s no secret that women earn less than men. But according the the Philosopher’s Beard, women are in charge of most household discretionary spending. "It would seem that a full gender justice analysis of the economy should include not only how gender relates to the composition of household income, but also how household consumption is gendered."

Santa’s other helper: Nice children get presents but what happens to naughty children? According to Michael the Researcher, Santa has a demonic helper who beats naughty children with a swtich and carries them off in sack. In some places he is known as Krampus, in others. Knecht Ruprecht. "My Mother went to a Bavarian all-girl school in Augsburg in the mid-to-late 1940s", writes Michael, "and she remembers when Knecht Ruprecht came into the classroom and took a naughty girl away, kicking and screaming the entire time."

When Bad Sex Work Drives out the Good: Many sex workers are victims of human trafficking, writes Marina Adshade. And a new study provides "very good evidence that legalization of prostitution increases human trafficking". Blue Milk also addresses the issue of sex work, provoking an extended conversation in the comments thread.

Obama’s Wonderfully Wrongheaded Speech: The Overdressed Anarchist hasn’t been won over by Obama’s Osawatomie speech. "If the President were serious about sending a message about equality, his Administration would be knocking on Wall Street’s door, SWAT teams in the rear", he writes.

Why the occupiers love Lincoln : When Obama attacked the Wall Street plutocracy he took cover behind Theodore Roosevelt. When Roosevelt attacked the plutocracy he took cover behind Abraham Lincoln. "Want to know what the Occupy Movement is all about? " asks Bejamin Gorman, "Abraham Lincoln knew 150 years ago." Read Lincoln’s First Annual Message from 1861 and you’ll understand why.

Robert Audi and the Separation of Church and State: According to liberal democrats, states must govern on the basis of principles all citizens accept. Religious principles are notoriously controversial so liberal democrats often argue that governments should avoid relying on religious reasons when making policy. Hence the commitment to the separation of church and state and the requirement that citizens bracket off their religious commitments when they take part in public life. But is idea that politics and religion should be kept separate noncontroversial? At New Books in Philosophy Robert Talisse interviews Robert Audi about his new book: Democratic Authority and the Separation of Church and State.

News isn’t the problem, it’s the advertising markets that are broken: By denying newspapers access to the old sources of advertising revenue the internet has thrown the news business into turmoil. So why is everyone so focused on how news is produced and distributed? According to Joshua Gans,"what we are seeing may not necessarily have anything to do with how news is produced per se but instead the mechanics of the supposedly unseemly advertising side of the equation."

Bank Tellers and ATMs: President Obama keeps saying that ATM are putting bank tellers out of work. Matthew Yglesias isn’t convinced.

Why journalists need Twitter : Often maligned as quick chat for empty headed gossips, Twitter can play a valuable role in news gathering and reporting writes Alan Knight.

The surplus fetish: The "notion that we will be eternally damned in the fires of fiscal hell unless government revenues exceed spending by even a dollar" is a ridiculous idea, says Mr Denmore. But by trying to look like a fiscal tough guy, Wayne Swan has boxed himself into a corner.

Bob Carr is wrong about welfare: Australia’s means-tested welfare system keeps spending down and allows governments to retire debt, says Bob Carr. But Carr is confused says Matt Cowgill. "The ability to pay down debt is obviously a function of both spending and taxes".

A linguistic tax: English is fast becoming Europe’s dominant language says Philippe Van Parijs. In his new book Linguistic Justice for Europe and for the World, he argues that native English speakers share the benefits of a common language without having to meet the costs. A tax on Anglophone countries would reduce this unfairness. Ingrid Robeyns has started an online reading group at Spongia.

Occupy and the mirage of democratic consensus: "The intransigence of the Occupy movement suggests an unwillingness among its numbers to take seriously the fact of pluralism, and the corollary impossibility of consensus, which makes majoritarian democratic procedures necessary in the first place." Will Wilkinson.

Better schools won’t save the American Dream: Early childhood not schooling holds the key reducing the academic achievement gap, writes Sean Reardon in the Boston Review. The article is part of series: Occupy the Future, that includes contributions from Kenneth Arrow, Rob Reich and others.

The meaning of merit : A meritocracy rewards the hardworking and the virtuous writes Luigi Zingales. But at the Monkey Cage Andrew Gelman disagrees: "In a meritocracy, you can be as hardworking as John Kruk or as virtuous as Kobe Bryant and you’ll still get ahead—-if you have the talent and achievement. Throwing in ‘hardworking’ and ‘virtuous’ seems to me to an attempt (unconscious, I expect) to retroactively assign moral standing to the winners in an economic race."

Poking fun at mummy blogs: Parodies of mummy blogs make Blue Milk laugh, but …

White Ribbon Day: "In an afternoon in Montreal on December 6th 1989, a man massacred 14 of his female classmates. From this horrific action, a nation was brought to the forefront of an issue that had been severely underreported for too long."Lip Magazine.

"White Ribbon Day promotes change by highlighting the positive role that men can play. It encourages all men across the world to take an active stance against violence against women. This Friday, 25 November, is White Ribbon Day, a day when men say it is not okay to use violence against women, when men speak out to change the attitudes and behaviours which allow violence against women to occur and when taking action to address violence against women is celebrated, supported and encouraged." Andrew Leigh.

Louis Althusser and socialist strategy: "Althusser’s career ended in a squalid tragedy when, under the influence of a mental illness that had grown more intense over the years, he strangled his wife, Hélène." Lenin’s Tomb.

Issue of Violence Divides Occupy Protesters: "Is there a place for violence in the Occupy movement?" asks Sayre Quevedo at Turnstyle.

Violence and disruptive power: "We understand the sheepishness about speaking of violence in social movements" writes Lenin in a post on Occupy and disruptive power. "It is not a comforting or politically sympathetic thought that popular violence has been productive; that without it, unjust systems would not have been overturned."

Martin Luther King and non-violent protest: "When is violence justified as a response to manifest and apparently immovable injustice? My answer, with Martin Luther King is: Never, or almost never." John Quiggin.

Pepper spray parodies: When the Lieutenant John Pike used pepper spray against protesters at University of California, Davis, photos of the incident quickly became raw material for satirists. Shane Greenstein at Digitopoly. and tigtog at Hoyden about town have more.

Structural Violence and the US health care system: "The subjective violence of a personal attack, of war, terrorism, or torture is easy to see and to condemn. Structural violence is less visible, more subtle and therefore harder to critique and change. The structural violence of the health-care system in the United States violates distributive justice." Valerie Elverton Dixon, God’s Politics.

Put it up to eleven: "The entire media is shouting ALL the time because they’re worried that if they pull back on their Tube Screamers their highly compressed copy won’t be heard over all the other sources of distraction", says Mr Denmore.

We reject your demand for demands: The Occupy movement’s lack of demands is a strength, writes Tad Tietze. And at the Brookings Institution, Elisabeth Jacobs agrees: "Occupy Wall Street’s lack of explicit demands is smart movement politics for the time being, advantageous for the movement itself and for savvy politicians alike. For a month-old movement with solid popular support, OWS’s demand-free stance makes good sense."

Presidential hopeful Rick Perry has policies… but he can’t remember what they are.

The right-wing hive-mind? At Larvatus Prodeo, commenter Rob wonders about the flood of comments on issues like climate change and refugees. They "have a consistent right wing bias ie the commentators are consistently right wing through and through but yet seemingly they will only let their views be known on about 3 or 4 topics." Something "very planned is obviously going on", says Rob.

A vast right-wing conspiracy? "In the United States of America there is evidence that the right have to hire people to pretend to be right-wing commenters in order to keep up with the genuine enthusiasm and activism of the left in on-line media." Blue Milk (see also: Craigslist ad for right-wing commenters draws suspicion and a few giggles, National Post).

Immigration Restrictions as Affirmative Action: "Conservatives usually think that ‘oppressed minorities’ should spend a lot less time complaining about unfair treatment and a lot more time improving their skills and work ethic. Fair point, but the same holds for native-born Americans who complain that immigrants are taking their jobs." Bryan Caplan at Econlog.

McRib arbitrage: American econo-bloggers are fascinated by the comings and goings of McDonald’s McRib sandwich. It starts with this post by Willy Staley at the Awl. Matthew Yglesias and Alex Tabarrok join in.

What did they miss? "Ironically, the topic for today’s lecture is the distribution of income, including the growing gap between the top 1 percent and the bottom 99 percent", writes Greg Mankiw.

Are you in Australia’s top 1 percent? "According to the ATO’s tax statistics, if you earned $248 192 or more in 2008-09, you were part of the top 1%", writes Matt Cowgill.

Conservatives and freedom: "The Tea Party alliance between libertarians and conservatives gives the misleading impression that conservatives care about individual freedom", writes the Philosopher’s Beard.

Why Will Wilkinson isn’t a liberal: "I’ve come to accept … that diffuse cultural forces, such as racism or sexism or nationalism or intergenerational poverty, can deprive an individual of her rightful liberty without any single person doing anything to violate her basic rights. This takes me a long way toward standard liberalism. But I find that my gut nevertheless leans right on issues of personal responsibility." Will Wilkinson at the Moral Sciences Club.

Keeping the state out of your bedroom: Libertarians say they want to keep the state out of your bedroom. John Quiggin doesn’t believe them.

Lying to ourselves: According to psychologists, "self-deception evolved so that we can effortlessly tell lies without getting caught." And that’s a good thing, says Chris Campbell.

Tim Blair on vegetarianism : Back in 2008 Tim Blair linked to a story claiming "Scientists have discovered that going veggie could be bad for your brain – with those on a meat-free diet six times more likely to suffer brain shrinkage." Sandy Szwarc wasn’t convinced.

Scientists explain Tim Blair: "You would think we would admire do-gooders who are truly motivated by morals, values and beliefs. But you would be wrong. Recent research compares the attitudes of meat eaters to vegetarians. Meat eaters don’t really like vegetarians. We think they judge us. So we make fun of them." Rita Handrich, The Jury Room.

Irrationality virus spreads to Australia: The Australian conservative movement is becoming infected by an irrationality virus, writes Harry Clarke. It’s "a development which threatens both its intellectual viability and our future."

Bringing back tram conductors: The Greens want to bring back Melbourne’s tram conductors. But Alan Davies at the Melbourne Urbanist is unconvinced: "I don’t know why nominally progressive people are so infatuated with this issue. In my opinion, spending $60 million p.a. on improving outer suburban bus services would achieve a lot more environmentally and socially than providing conductors for relatively privileged inner city and inner suburban tram travellers."

Can you get things done without making people hate you? How assertive should managers be? According to recent post at Psyblog, "people who are low in assertiveness get less things done but people very high in assertiveness are socially insufferable". The sweet spot is somewhere in between.

Battle of the think tanks: "Australia’s most prolific and influential think tanks will duke it out over whose ideology and vision for the future should prevail" at an event hosted by Thought Broker on Saturday November 12. Via Andrew Norton.

Creative destruction: Most ideas in business are bad ideas, says Karl Smith. So "what you need is a process that destroys as many bad ideas as possible, leaving the rare good idea to prosper." That process is the market.

Is this what you want for your daughter? A US senate candidate offers some advice to wives. Be "a lady in the living room and a whore in the bedroom". What does that mean? Marina Adshade spells it out.

Is inequality stifling innovation? "Perhaps we’re not having much innovation because our median incomes aren’t growing fast enough", suggests Matthew Yglesias.

Equality of opportunity? US Senator Paul Ryan believes in equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome — the idea that "justice is done when we level the playing field at the starting line, and rewards are proportionate to merit and effort." But a belief in equality of opportunity and strident opposition to redistribution just doesn’t make sense, argues Matthew Yglesias.

Rawls and the protesters: Philosopher John Rawls would make a "perfect intellectual touchstone" for the Occupy Wall Street protests, writes Steven Mazie in the New York Times. But according to Will Wilkinson, Mazie is peddling a watered down version of Rawls’ philosophy.

Arguing about libertarianism: Libertarians insist their philosophy is founded on the value of liberty. But they’re wrong, says T.M. Scanlon. Scanlon leads of the Boston Review’s forum on libertarianism and liberty. Brad DeLong and Will Wilkinson respond.

A feminist spokeswoman for Generation X? Matt Honan says Generation X hasn’t had a real voice since Axl Rose got fat. Mindy says she "wouldn’t kick him out of bed, unless he was nasty to the cat." But how about a feminist voice for Generation X, she asks. Any suggestions?

The New Atheists are nuts: The "the hostility of militant atheists to religion borders on madness", says David Berreby.

Advertising is exploitation: When businesses like Facebook sell our personal information to third parties, "Things that we find valuable are being stripped away from us without our consent or adequate compensation". The Philosopher’s Beard wants a new property rights regime.

The value of work: Work is about more than just income, argues Peter Shergold. So when not-for-profits look at the impact of their welfare to work programs, they should look beyond income to things like improvements in health, improved family stability, and longer term intergenerational impacts.

Why do highly educated American women have more children? According to a recent US study, there’s a U-shaped relationship between a woman’s education and her total lifetime fertility. The reason is inequality. The real incomes of low paid workers has fallen significantly since the 1970s. And as Marina Adshade explains :

This fall in wages of unskilled workers combined with an increase in the wages paid to the highly educate has meant that women with more education can now afford to buy on the market the services that other mothers (and presumably fathers) have to supply themselves.

Does inequality drive political polarisation? The correlation between the share of income earned by the top one percent and polarisation in US politics is staggering writes Erik Voeten. Voeten links to Polarized America, a new book by Nolan McCarty, Keith T. Poole and Howard Rosenthal.

Economists are out-blogging political scientists: Economic blogs support serious discussion about economic research. Political science blogs most just publicise political science research, argues John Sides.