The last book I finished was Charlie Stross’s The Family Trade. Spoilers: ( . . more . . )
In The War of the Worlds, the Martians’ principal weapon is a heat-ray. In Robinson’s RGB Mars, at one point the badguys use a heat-ray against Martians.
In the last chapter of A Canticle for Leibowitz, a priest makes a pun:
“Onerem accipisne?” [Do you accept the burden?]
“Honorem accipio.” [I accept the honor.]
In classical Latin, onus ‘burden’ is neuter, so the accusative is onus not onerem. Even a dead language, it seems, changes at least a little bit during the future dark ages.
April 20: Oops, I misremembered. The first priest’s line is tibine imponemus oneri? [Shall we impose the burden on thee?] — where ‘burden’ is instrumental, not accusative.
Wodehouse, the next generation: a fan’s delightful movie concept
Bryan Caplan: The Idea Trap: why bad economic policy is so rarely repealed
Institute for Justice: The 25 Best Friends of Property Rights: amicus briefs in support of petitioners in Kelo v. New London
On a private mailing list someone wrote:
having just seen the 1951 Britisher version of the Dickens Christmas Carol, it struck me that free marketeers should really live in Dickensian England and try work their way out from the bottom.
I thought of writing a rant about Dickens’s sins, but a better approach presented itself:
FYI
1838: Oliver Twist
1843: A Christmas Carol
1846: repeal of the Corn Laws — commonly cited as the first triumph of the free trade movement