Regulations are good: for our competition

So-called free-marketers are constantly complaining about regulations.  Donald Trump claimed he would get rid of two regulations for every new regulation,.  Gosh, do you think he would drop the regulation of concealed-carry in the White House?  But that is a whole ‘nother subject.

What triggered this little outburst of mine was an article in the Reader Weekly from Wisconsin Public Radio ("Trade Dispute May Have Mixed Results for Wisconsin”).  It contained a story “Wisconsin Lawmakers Consider Sales of Home-Baked Goods Once Again”.  You can find the original story at https://www.wpr.org/wisconsin-lawmakers-consider-sales-home-baked-goods-once-again.

“In previous sessions, food industry advocates have brought up concerns about food safety…”

It would be interesting to know who these “food industry advocates” are and if they have ever complained about government regulations for the safety of their own products.

To be fair, many recall articles do state how a company is working with the government to improve.  After all, good companies are always concerned about their reputation for quality.

Paranormal events

Wisconsin Public Radio's To the Best of Our Knowledge had an hour devoted to ghost stories recently.

One of the sections was on people who think of someone dying at another place and they are proven right.  What too many people don't consider is all the people who thought of someone dying and no such thing had happened.

I woke up one night certain that a friend had died.  This was almost two decades ago and he is still alive.

Too often people are incredulous about some "miracle" but completely ignore all the times the "miracles" didn't happen under similar circumstances.

One of the anecdotes I read long ago was a picture of a shipwreck where survivors were huddled on shore.  Supposedly these survivors had prayed they would reach safety.  The cynic asked about all those who prayed to reach safety but drowned.

Memory and coincidence

Last Thursday I listened to a "To the Best of Our Knowledge" podcast from 2012-06-17.  One of the segments was on the brain.  It was rebroadcast of an interview with David Eagleman, author of "Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain".  One of his points was how we push problems to our sub-conscious and an answer may just pop into our heads later, like after a good night's sleep.

I've often felt this, but one incident after the show really emphasized the truth of this.

I was trying to remember the name of a singer we hosted years ago when she gave a concert in Duluth.  I could even picture one of her albums that we have.  Nada!

Friday night we were on Skype with our son and he was talking about his July visit to Minnesota.  He mentioned that he wanted to attend a concert of his friends, the duo Patchouli.  Bingo! Claudia Schmidt!  She's still performing.

I should reconnect our record player and run through an LP or two of hers.