18th Century politician and sort-of philosopher, Edmund Burke has been getting some mention from conservatives and counter-mention from liberals these days. Cosa Nostradamus does a pretty nice take down of this patron saint of conservatism. A sample:

Burke claimed that Englishmen’s liberties were not created by or won with their own unique individual hearts and minds but came from merely being born English; from tradition and ancient legal documents and not from any new declarations or manifestos based on new realities. Burke was a strict constructionist; a fundamentalist. In his mind, freedom was a gift from the past, not a product of our own labors in the present. And only Englishmen were entitled to English liberties, there being no universal rights of man or connections between men of different nations, according to Burke, or Scalia today.

It was Burke who wrote, “We fear God, we look up with awe to kings; with affection to parliaments; with duty to magistrates; with reverence to priests; and with respect to nobility.” A real boot-licking, cap-doffing, forelock-tugging ass-kisser. And good at it, too.

A jail nurse at the Hancock County Jail was fired following an inmate’s death.

Brian Bales, 36, died Feb. 18 from what an autopsy later showed to be gastrointestinal bleeding. Bales was arrested Feb. 16 and booked into the jail because deputies suspected him of driving under the influence of drugs.

The jail nurse apparently did not consult with an on-call doctor, but had been informed that the inmate had experienced similar symptoms in the past.

Jail medicine is a tough nut to crack. Inmates should certainly get appropriate medical care. But sometimes it’s tough to determine what the appropriate level of care should be. And, because it is an adversarial situation to start with, if anything goes wrong, the second guessing is inevitable. How far should a county go to provide inmates with medical care when necessary and limit liability? Should jails become top-flight medical centers as well? Pay for emergency room visits any time an inmate complains, keeping in mind that, while many inmates are honest, many inmates — and I know this will shock you, dear reader — are not honest and don’t much like being in jail?

I won’t comment much on Obama’s speech. Plenty of others will likely do so at length. But, I wanted to mention that in his closing lines, I was reminded of the St. Crispin’s Day speech from Shakespeare’s Henry V.

Obama:

I know that we haven’t agreed on every issue thus far, and there are surely times in the future when we will part ways. But I also know that every American who is sitting here tonight loves this country and wants it to succeed. That must be the starting point for every debate we have in the coming months, and where we return after those debates are done. That is the foundation on which the American people expect us to build common ground.

And if we do – if we come together and lift this nation from the depths of this crisis; if we put our people back to work and restart the engine of our prosperity; if we confront without fear the challenges of our time and summon that enduring spirit of an America that does not quit, then someday years from now our children can tell their children that this was the time when we performed, in the words that are carved into this very chamber, “something worthy to be remembered.” Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Henry V:

This day is called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say ‘To-morrow is Saint Crispian:’
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.’
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Ouch. Via Sadly, No.

I can’t work up any outrage over the expense of the Governor’s plane ride, dubbed “The Governor’s Very Expensive Plane Ride” by the Indianapolis Star. Mainly, I’m just glad he and those aboard took safety precautions when they made an unscheduled landing after the windshield cracked.

But, the question is, should I get worked up about the trip? Apparently the private plane cost about $1,000 per hour to operate with about 2 hours each way so the Governor could go to a National Governor’s Association meeting. I don’t know if/how much the airplane use cost for the time it would be waiting around between trips. But I did hear an awful lot about what bad people the executives of the automobile companies were because they didn’t fly commercial during these austere times. And, during these times of cutting the budget to the bone, is the National Governor’s Association (and, I believe concurrent appearance on one of the Sunday television shows) really a necessary expense? Probably not. But, like I said, I can’t work up any real emotion over the issue.

Update Paul Ogden offers his thoughts on the matter.

Hedge fund manager and derivatives trader turned CNBC personality, Rick Santelli was the author of a highly publicized rant against Obama’s plan to deal with mortgages. The gist of it was that he didn’t work so hard so that he could foot the bill for his neighbor’s bigger house or extra bathroom that caused his deadbeat neighbor to default, apparently. Said Santelli, “This is America! How many people want to pay for your neighbor’s mortgages that has an extra bathroom and can’t pay their bills?”

He’s right, this America, there is always room for discussion of the philosophical position of “I’ve got mine. Fuck you. It’s better for everybody (especially me) in the long run.” But really, right now, guys in the exotic financial products industry probably want to keep their heads down and shut up. Because whatever bad decisions were made at the ground level, they were magnified hugely by the financial hucksters who bundled the mortgages, removed the risk from the banks and brokers who originated the deals, slapped a AAA gold star on the financial product, and started making leveraged bets on derivative products.

These guys, if they are smart, do not want to draw attention to themselves. There is a lot of ambient anger out there looking for a place to land. Because the “financial industry” is nameless, faceless, and complicated for the “Average American” (including this one), very few individuals have taken too much heat for the economic collapse. But if a guy like Santelli wants to stand up and tell honest folks who got in over their head despite hard work and good intentions that this is all their fault, I just have to say “good luck with that.”

The moral hazard of a homeowner paying a fixed rate mortgage instead of an adjustable rate mortgage just isn’t that worrying to me after reading about how loan originators were able to remove themselves from any real risk for the mortgages they arranged. I could have missed it, but I am not aware of public statements by Santelli about the moral hazard of bank bailouts.

If anyone is going to credibly advance the pure market philosophy in the current climate, it will have to be a pure libertarian walking the talk and unaffiliated with the financial industry. A guy like Santelli is just begging to be tarred and feathered.