Posts
1. In my reading today of The Surprising Election and Confirmation of King David, Randall Short says that the History of David's Rise in I Samuel 16-II Samuel 5 was intended to comfort God's suffering people, Israel. (I'm basing this on memory, for I can't find the passage right now.) Moreover, although Randall disagrees with minimalists who deny the existence of King David, he thinks that they've gained some foothold because the History of David's Rise "can be read in light of multiple predicaments of multiple individuals and/or communities of people whom they might be understood as representing" (97). In essence, Randall is saying that the History of David's Rise is not an obvious apology for the Davidic king, for one can read it as having other purposes: to comfort and exhort the suffering.
2. My reading of Henry Hazlitt's Economics in One Lesson was pretty frustrating today, for I didn't understand everything. But that is refreshing because, at least in this chapter, he doesn't repeat his usual predictable supply-side message ad nauseum.
Hazlitt disagrees with a standard line on the government keeping farm prices high. The line goes like this: after farmers harvest their crops, they can sell them really cheaply, because they have lots of them. This gives speculators an opportunity to buy the crops and sell them to us at high prices when there is a scarcity---which comes some time after the harvest. So we might as well encourage farmers right after the harvest to sell the crops at a higher price than they may want, for this prevents speculators from getting a corner on the market and price-gouging.
I didn't understand Hazlitt's rebuttal of this line. He seemed to say that the speculators help the farmer out because they help him make the money he needs to pay for his equipment, or to break even (something like that). He also argued that agricultural prices stay pretty stable.
3. I like Christine O'Donnell because she's an underdog and has some socially-conservative ideas. She's bucking the Republican establishment! But I wonder if Karl Rove has a point when he portrays her as a liar and a nut-case. She has reportedly exaggerated her education, and she also accused a political opponent of being gay (or so I have heard). I like principled people who buck the system. But I dislike Christian hypocrites, who act all self-righteous and dogmatic about how others should live their lives, even as they turn right around and behave in a less-than-Christian (or moral) manner in their own lives.
