2018-2019 NCAA Final Four Tournament

I haven’t watched any games, yet, but hopefully I will (although I don’t think there’s free online access, so maybe not). Anyway, I wanted to comment on some officiating for the UCF-Duke game.

The final seconds of Duke’s 77-76 win over UCF!

Zion: 32 PTS, 11 REB, 3 3PT
RJ: 16 PTS, 8 REB, 4 AST
Cam: 13 PTS (5-8 FG)

(Via @marchmadness) pic.twitter.com/hxwzQfNEzk— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) March 24, 2019

Here’s tweet by Fran Fraschilla:

I’m sorry to say this because I appreciate how hard officiating it but, Zion’s last drive was either a charge (I believe it was) or a block but that is NOT a “no call.” Otherwise, it was an incredible game. Congrats to both Duke & UCF.— Fran Fraschilla (@franfraschilla) March 24, 2019

Based on the clip above, I think that’s a good no call. What do you guys think?

Mueller Report

I figured the report deserves a separate thread.

BREAKING: The House Judiciary Committee is told to expect notification by 5pm that the Mueller report has been delivered to Barr— Ellen Nakashima (@nakashimae) March 22, 2019

While we wait for more information, I think the following David Frum piece,
A Special Prosecutor is not the Answer, written in 2017, is worth reading. The gist is that a Special Prosecutor will focus illegal acts that can be prosecuted, and that a president can do a lot of bad things that aren’t crimes. The Trump campaign coordinating with Russia and its cutouts to harm Clinton may not be illegal, or the Special Prosecutor may decide there isn’t enough evidence to prosecute anyone. This does not mean that the coordination is acceptable. What it does mean is that the question is not something for the legal system to answer, but the political one. In my view, the Republicans has hindered the political system from properly functioning. If Clinton had become president and Clinton campaign behaved similarly with regard to Russia, we would be moving towards, if not completing, impeachment. If a future president behaves in a similar manner, impeachment and removal would be justified.

This is probably better:

Continue reading “Mueller Report”

Is Streaming Video/Music Economically Unsustainable?

Jazz critic Ted Gioia has some tweets about how streaming services are “the black hole of the entertainment business.”

I’ve updated my quick and easy guide to streaming economics—the black hole of the entertainment business.https://t.co/7AXsrUgB0E— Ted Gioia (@tedgioia) March 13, 2019

His basic point is that streaming services lose, and continue to lose, a lot of money, and I assume he thinks this won’t change. At the very least, Gioia doesn’t seem to believe that streaming model will be able to support the making of movies, TV shows, and music. Equally dispiriting is the notion that musicians are getting even less revenue from streaming services (less than money they’d get from the traditional recording industry). That really sucks. I really don’t want to pay for a service where the musicians and artists don’t really get far less than they deserve (which, actually seems to have always been the case, but this is going in the wrong direction). Should serious music fans consider purchasing music in a traditional way (e.g., cds, records), and, even better, from the musicians themselves?

Another question: Why can’t artists ever take control of the distribution so that they can receive the majority of the profits?

Christians Don’t Have a Cultural Economy

Dr. Russell Moore, is president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, and he has a podcast, Signposts. I recently listened to one with Timothy Keller, who I believe is a pastor and author. They discussed two topics that I found interesting–moral ecology and a cultural economy. Briefly, moral ecology involves a moral system or environment people operate or grow up within. Keller mentions three components–moral teaching, moral discourse, and moral examples. Studying the Bible, discussing concrete applications in real life, and parents modeling the behavior would all be examples of this, respectively. Keller says that if Christians go to church once a week, but during the rest of the engage in discourse from largely secular sources and/or don’t have individuals modeling a Christian world view, then individuals developing a Christian worldview and character will be almost impossible. (I’m paraphrasing him, so what I’m saying may not accurately reflect his views.)

Keller than briefly mentions cultural economy. Here, he mentions academia, the arts, journalism, and business all working together to produce a certain world view and values. His point is that Christians really don’t have a cultural economy–or at least not a very strong one. There are Christians in academia, the arts, journalism, and business, but do they all produce a strong type of cultural economy?

Here are some questions I’d like to explore:

  • Should there be a strong cultural economy in the U.S.? Continue reading “Christians Don’t Have a Cultural Economy”