Winds of change reach London, Ontario

Joe Fontana, who was my MPP (member of provincial parliament) when I was teaching at Western Ontario and living in London, Ontario, is London's new mayor.

I used to get a lot of junk mail from Joe, explaining to me how much fun he was having spending other people's money. The "liberal" in "liberal party" in Canada means liberal with other people's money (and having a good time, and maybe a bit of corruption, but all in the pursuit of fun for those on the inside and their pals).

I have to say, though, that old Joe is almost surely an improvement over the woman he replaced, Anne Marie DiCicco, who had been the mayor since before I decamped for Maryland. Anne has had some problems with her husband, whom she imported from Texas. Anne Marie was, in turn, more or less a continuation of the dreaded dragon lady Diane Haskett, for whom the mayor's office was mainly an opportunity for her to publicly act out her unhappy obsession with strip clubs, massage parlors and homosexuals.

So, I say, good luck Joe! Let the party begin.

Hat tip: Todd Stinebrickner

Police gone wild at Western Ontario

Congrats to Todd Stinebrickner

Todd's paper, joint with his father Ralph, got into the top tier of the BE Press journals and won the Arrow prize in Economics and Policy as well.

It is a cool paper; I remain mystified by its failure to get into AER, QJE or JPE.

Joel Fried

My former colleague Joel Fried passed on earlier this year. Joel was one of the many senior faculty at UWO whose encouragement, good humor and lively intellectual activities made it such an amazing place to start my career.

Sad news, indeed.