BEER AND CIRCUSES. The cover of the fall Directory of Classes at Northern Illinois University featured pictures from on and around the football field. The football team has been playing well thus far. Alas, some of the fans have been behaving like, well, Illinois sports fans. [Associate Athletic Director Robert] "Collins went on to say NIU has received complaints about its fans dating back to the Toledo and Bowling Green football games last year, and more recently this year with the Maryland and Iowa State games."

BACK TO POLITICS. Fox News reporting that Rush Limbaugh has resigned his football post at ESPN, presumably to restrict his opinions of affirmative action to his call-in show.

VANGUARDISM, AND TRADEOFFS. Atlantic Blog notes the difficulty of an advocate presuming to speak for all members of the class the advocate presumes to speak for, and notes the tradeoffs open trade brings. The opportunity for a seller to sell at a higher world price, absent tariff barriers implies the obligation for a buyer to buy at the higher world price, which means a loss to a buyer. The general equilibrium effect is frequently, however, the opportunity for the buyer to buy something else from somewhere else at a lower world price, suggesting a benefit to consumers from trade liberalization, but a benefit different from the one claimed here.

QUOTE OF THE DAY. "What you get here -- as with any blog -- is my idiosyncratic selection of things that interest me, as I have time to note them, with my own idiosyncratic comments." That's Insta Pundit. Those are House Rules here, too.

FIGURE AND GROUND. The latest from the SCSU Scholars suggests a very differing view of university administrators from the view upon which I base this post and my preceding posts linked therein. Evidently there is more of the evolution of the normal schools to research universities than meets the eye. A dean with no home department? That's a new one to me ... Northern Illinois University deans have home departments, and external hires come with presumptive tenure in those departments. A "professional administrator" with no collegiate experience? Involved with curriculum? Rare around here. Sounds like there would be fewer administrators at St. Cloud to send back to the classroom in lieu of hiring more adjuncts from Minnetonka or to efficiently term-limit them.

WAYNE'S WORLD ON THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI. No, not a new joint venture of Paramount with Cedar Fair. Rather, it's a Fisking of the latest course proposals from the Blob. I trust that someone on the university curriculum committee is checking that "pro-active strategies for change" includes teaching the times tables and notes that any formulation including the words "x + issues" signals a content-free zone. (It's probably expecting too much now for anybody to point out that "masculinity" evolved over five thousand years of trial and error, and to "redefine" it in light of the past twenty or thirty years of fashionable thinking is presumptuous.)

SEPARATING EQUILIBRIUM. Apt. 11d has more thoughts on the ideas in this post (which I have revised and extended a bit since last night.) Professor Laura's five points, and Crooked Timber's proposal to change the business culture are pointing to the same problem, which I refer to as the one-size-fits-all path to promotion. To be sure, people who are willing to commit themselves to that path are going to be the people who wind up going places (albeit with some late-in-life buyer's remorse?) but to be equally sure, those businesses that expect everybody to get on that treadmill are themselves suffering losses. (To what extent does the common business complaint, even during this curious recovery, that skilled workers are hard to find or retain reflect burnout in addition to my usual suspect, the deficient schooling entry level workers get? I don't know. I haven't even worked out the separating equilibrium yet.) People who stop out (for any reason -- minding the kids doesn't have to be the only one) and never get back in represent output and insight irretrievably lost. That's the basis for my assertion toward the end of that long post that there are gains from trade in finding alternatives to the treadmill, none of which need imply a lesser status for the workers so employed.

BURNING A HOLE IN YOUR POCKET? Speaking of Metra, Wisconsin officials are now considering using some $91 million to further develop plans to restore the Chicago and North Western extend Metra Rail service from Kenosha (the anomaly of an Illinois commuter train turning in Wisconsin arises because the incremental cost of building a terminal at Winthrop Harbor, the last stop in Illinois, exceeds the costs of using the existing terminal in Kenosha) through Racine, Oak Creek, South Milwaukee, Cudahy, and Allis into Milwaukee. It remains to be seen how much more of the original $250 millions will be dissipated in rent-seeking.

FIRST SINCE THE BUFFALO NICKEL? Will it be explorers and Native Americans, or America's Dairyland, on the reverse of the Wisconsin quarter?UPDATE: It's America's Dairyland, by popular request. View the three finalists.

AMUSING REACTION. Thus does Curmudgeonly Clerk, who kindly refers to these pages as "appealingly themed," characterize this. Welcome aboard, and stay around. The sand house is particularly comfortable on winter days.

ON STRIKE, SHUT IT DOWN. The second and third excerpts from David Maraniss's new They Marched into Sunlight: War and Peace, Vietnam and America, October 1967 (details or compare prices) are now online.

THE WAR AT HOME. Paul Krugman (registration required) returns from vacation. Viking Pundit commits a flagrant act of journalism. Hoy Story provides additional background information.

WE'VE GOT THE VERMEER QUARTET. Newmark's Door is unimpressed with Joe Queenan's boosterism (registration required.) Queenan, alas, missed the point, snarking at Pittsburgh. As good as the Coney Island Cyclone is, Kennywood is a much better amusement park than Coney Island.

Queenan, tellingly, limits his snarking to Pittsburgh, the Capital Region of North Carolina, and other soft targets. Let's do some serious comparisons. Consider his put-down Stamford for its commuter train access to Manhattan. Imagine gales of laughter. Metra on a bad day is better than Metro-North on a good day. Allowing for easy access, Greater DeKalb (read: Chicago) beats New York for economics departments, orchestras, art (what is the most famous painting in the United States?), baseball stadiums, swimmable beaches, financial markets, and freight trains. (There is also direct rapid-transit access to the Loop from three airports, and a New York-style shuttle bus connection at a fourth, should you wish to fact-check me on the ground.)

SEMINAR MANAGEMENT. Semi-Daily Journal on the taxonomy of seminar overheads. (Scroll up, there's more.)

ARGUMENTAM AD MISERICORDIAM. Cold Spring Shops' favorite college administrator, Peter Wood, offers some suggestions for high school seniors who might have to write a diversity essay as part of their university applications. (Hat tip: grateful-not-to-be-applying-to-university Betsy's Page.)

IRAQ AND BIO-WEAPONS? Blaster's Blog reviews some history. (Via The American Mind.)

GETTING THE INSTITUTIONS RIGHT. Each Iraqi a shareholder in the oil company, suggests Marginal Revolution

KOHLER FIELD? Sorry, Chicago, from the air that place just doesn't make it. On the field, Packers score the first 17 points (a new Bear record for first-quarter futility) and go on to win 38-23.

BURT RUTAN IS AT IT AGAIN. Insta Pundit space blogging points here.

NO TILT-A-WHIRL FOR HER EITHER. The Chicago Tribune's Dawn Turner-Trice (registration required) is done with roller coasters. She looks younger than the Superintendent, although she has given birth to children. The Superintendent intends to keep riding roller coasters (perhaps not always the tallest or fastest ones, but the best ones aren't always the tallest, or the fastest, or the newest) as long as he's capable of walking up the ramps.