Richard Rider and Richard Carson answer another burning question today: Is bringing in federal subsidies for insurance in fire prone areas -- on top of what the state already gives -- "three shades of crazy or an important step toward rationalizing fire risk in Southern California?"

Carson gives a nuanced answer using four principles. Here's a sample:

The first is ironclad: Fire insurance should not be subsidized by the government.

The second principle is that fire insurance needs to be available to homes that were already built before the current round of fires.

Rider disagrees with the latter, explaining:

Of all the things that government does, legislated risk management (primarily reflected in government insurance programs) is the one area that government almost always does wrong.

Read the full exchange and join the discussion here.

Wired Editor Chris Anderson just acted upon the fantasy of long-suffering MSM muckety-mucks everywhere, by publishing a list of unwanted e-mailers on his personal site for purposes of public shaming. Make sure to read the comments for robust counter-arguments.... (Link via Fishbowl LA.)

Blogger David Ehrenstein performs last rites for Barack Obama's "relevance to gay and lesbian African Americans":

Now a gospel star may have driven a wedge between Obama and his gay supporters and roiled others as well. For, by putting McClurkin in the spotlight, Obama has broken black America's 11th Commandment: "Don't talk about it in front of the white people!"

Environmentalist Andrea Kavanagh finds a National Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies Coalition very fishy, and Rollins College professor Paolo Spadoni advises the While House that if it wants to free Cuba, it "should stop pandering to a shrinking group of Cuban American hard-liners and start listening to that world he claims to represent." Sharon Browne, Linda Chavez and Ward Connerly condemn a Caltrans plan to "use race, ethnicity and gender when awarding contracts under the federal highway program. What are the agency and the governor up to?"

The editorial board shakes its scandalized head at the news that State Department officials, apparently acting without authority, promised Blackwater USA contractors immunity; and plays down the significance of class-action attorney William S. Lerach's guilty plea. In the wake of a new report on healthcare in South L.A., the board states its case on King-Harbor Hospital:

To be clear: We do not trust the county to run this hospital, and we will oppose, as anyone should, any recommendation that would involve the county in its future management. But we will insist, and others should as well, that the county find alternative ways to care for a population whose needs are so profound.

Readers react to Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky's Op-Ed on dividing Jerusalem. "In reality," writes George Epstein, "giving up a part of Jerusalem will not solve the problem, nor will removing settlements from the West Bank." George Saade reframes the idea: "It's not about 'dividing' Jerusalem; it's about sharing it."

Rick Perlstein did not much care for my column of yesterday criticizing people like him and Naomi Klein for bemoaning the existence of private, supplemental fire protection. He brings up some interesting viewpoints worth further discussion.

First, a refresher on my Perlstein citation:

You would think that the cheap availability of potent fire retardant, and the creation of supplementary firefighting capability -- with costs borne entirely by the homeowners who choose to live in fire zones, instead of everyday taxpayers -- would be a cause for at least mild enthusiasm. Instead, it was greeted with howls of class warfare.

Liberal journalist/historian Rick Perlstein called it "a sickening indication about how the conservative mania for privatization is beginning to create two Americas: One that is protected from fires, and one that is not." (Never mind that no one within shouting distance of power or influence is calling for the privatization of fire departments.)

Now, a sampling from Perlstein's counter-argument, which comes under the headline "Solidarity in Flames":

Libertarian Matt Welch doesn't get it. He really doesn't get it. [...]

In so doing, he reveals how far down conservative ideology has fallen in grasping the most basic facts of collective security. In case Welch hasn't noticed, fires spread. Laying down fire-proof rings around islands of individual private properties does not stop fires from spreading; they'll just go around the island. Now, if every house was provided with Phos-Check (sic), the fires would not be able to spread. Everyone (and not just those with an extra $995 lying around, which is not "paltry" to someone living paycheck to paycheck) benefits. There would be no wildfire.

Before getting to the second half of Perlstein's complaint, I'll jump in and make a few relevant points:
1) Yes indeed, fires do spread (pretty rich for an east coaster to give a SoCal native a lecture on the local ecology, BTW), but the majority of homes that burn do so because of stray individual embers carried by the wind, not a raging wall of fire. In part, that's because firefighters Phos-Chek the hell out of endangered neighborhoods. During mandatory evacuations, the only people who can defend against embers are the limited number of available firefighters (the ranks of whom do not, for dumb bureaucratic reasons, include all the available firefighting talent from nearby military bases), homeowners who refuse to evacuate ... and a handful of AIG firefighting crews. AIG adds to the net firefighting capacity, and saved non-covered houses during the recent fires. If Perlstein indeed wants to provide every fire-zone home with $1,000 worth of Phos-Chek, well, good on him. Though something tells me that the same people who object to the rich having extra fire protection will squawk even louder when millionaire hillside dwellers get tens of millions in subsidized fire retardant every year.

Also, there is no fire-retardant valhalla in which "there would be no wildfire."

2) While I appreciate the "paycheck to paycheck" sentiment, that really, truly does not accurately describe the vast majority of people who live in Southern California's most fire-vulnerable areas. Recall that AIG's hated insurance, according to the L.A. Times, "is offered only to homeowners in California's most affluent ZIP Codes." (This itself is technically inaccurate -- the insurance is not available at such tony addresses as Palos Verdes Peninsula [90274], Manhattan Beach [90266], San Francisco [94123] and San Jose [95120].) It's a neat trick to begrudge the rich in one breath, and then imagine in the next that their next-door neighbors are living paycheck to paycheck. Recall, too, that one of Mike Davis' great critiques about letting Malibu burn was that the city had way too many fire stations compared to the poor folk in the flats. So if we don't want the rich to get more public assistance, and we don't want the rich to get more private assistance, what is it that we really want here?

Also, I said "lousy," not "paltry," though either can fairly describe the comparative and available cost for a SoCal canyon dweller to provide his/her own personal protection against certain catastrophe. For more disproportionate response, read on!

Richard Feldman spent much of the 1980s and 1990s lobbying for gun owners and manufacturers, working first as a regional political director for and consultant to the National Rifle Association, then as executive director of the American Shooting Sports Council. But he had a bitter falling out with top NRA lobbyists when the ASSC -- which represented manufacturers and retailers -- struck a deal with the Clinton administration to voluntarily add child-safety locks to their products. Now he's promoting a juicy tell-all book -- "Ricochet: Confessions of a Gun Lobbyist" -- replete with details on how the gun lobby works. He stopped by the Times today to chat about his experiences and his thoughts on the right way to combat gun violence (hint: it's not more stringent gun control laws). Here are some edited excerpts from his conversation with Jon Healey and Tim Cavanaugh:

The debate over whether Robert Goulet should get a lung becomes moot, as the rafters-shivering singer dies at Cedars-Sinai. Information and slideshow here.

In round two of this week's Dust-Up, Richard Rider and Richard Carson square off over the differences between local and federal responses to the fires in San Diego.

For Rider, "the real issue is where the coordination and planning did NOT improve — the timely use of Navy, Marine and National Guard air assets":

It's popular to blame just the bureaucrats. But the truth is that the real responsibility rests with Gov. Schwarzenegger, San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders and especially our San Diego County Board of Supervisors. They were ill-prepared to move quickly to get the air assets active. They were too busy holding press conferences and patting themselves on the back.

Indeed, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article, State Assemblyman Todd Spitzer, who represents parts of Orange County, said 24 hours after the fires started that "San Diego was eligible for air support and [local officials] didn't even know it."

Carson contends:

I could not agree with you more that (a) the federal response was disastrously slow; and that (b) the state and local government bears substantial responsibility for this slow response. We are also in agreement that FEMA was practically useless in the early days of the fire, and that the military were anxious to help out and should have been allowed to do so. You are, however, much too quick to let FEMA and the military off the hook, and you left out the U.S. Forest Service altogether.

Sparked your interest? Read today's entry and join the discussion here.

Columnist Jonah Goldberg critiques liberals and conservatives who place rhetoric over policy:

...both sides are certain they have staked out the intellectually superior ground. So they fixate on tactics, packaging and spinning. A lot has been written, including by myself, about how liberals consider political strategy more important than ideas. But it's worth noting that conservatives fall prey to such lines of thinking too, even as we take pride in our squabbles about liberty versus virtue.

Duke University professor Henry Petroski follows the evolution of the toothpick through human history. David A. Lehrer and Joe R. Hicks decry the Los Angeles City Claims Board's award of $95,000 to Gloria Jeff, linking it to "a worldview in which racial/ethnic identity is more important than any other factor in judging a person." Meanwhile, Mark Weisbrot cheers the role of Argentina's powerful first couple in their country's economic upswing.

The editorial board tips its hat to the Georgia Supreme Court for freeing Genarlow Wilson, originally sentenced to a decade in prison and branded a child molester. The board eyes upcoming water and power rate changes, and reminds NBC Universal and News Corp. that while joint project Hulu "seems to want complete control over the programming lineup ... the Net isn't television. Content may be king, but the mob rules."

Spooked by Joel Stein's recent column about tomorrow's sexed-up All Hallow's Eve, readers ruminate about the nature of sluttiness. Estin Stewart wonders, "Since when did underwear become a costume?" while Erin Tavano retorts:

Either Stein's column on Slutoween is unbelievably retrograde and sexist — a serious assertion that any woman who wears a sexy costume is a slut or a whore? — or a childish and tiresome attempt at being shocking.

The wildfires were so hot last week they managed to burn "Stonehenges all around us," Craig Childs' long-lived piece about neolithic medicine wheels, out of what had seemed to be a permanent place in our Top 10. Our usual gang of columnists returned to form, with some fire, some nukes and some porn rounding out the most popular stuff. Special bonus: One comment from the blogs about each piece. Here are our ten best-read stories for the week ending October 26:

1) Straitjacket Bush by Rosa Brooks

"by far the roughest thing I've ever read about Bush in a mainstream publication"

2) One strike, Iran could be out by Niall Ferguson

"For about four years now, George Bush has been repeating the mantra, 'All options are on the table.' That seems to be the totality of his solution to the problem of Iran."

3) Candidate Hillary: the GOP's dream by Jonah Goldberg

"Jonah Goldberg watches GOP hopefuls trying to capitalize on Mrs. Clinton's negatives, and he believes they aren't going far enough."

4) The fire last time. And the time before that Cold Copy

"Oh my God!"

5) Where did Mexicans come from? by Gregory Rodriguez

"Mexicans, why not reinvent thyself?" [sic]

6) Our fraying alliance with Turkey by Graham E. Fuller

"Is Graham Fuller really out of his mind?"

7) I'm going to hell by Joel Stein

"Sometimes you can take the Bible just a bit too literally."

8) Mukasey's confirmation: a vote about torture by Jonathan Turley

"should be mandatory reading for the Senate Judiciary Committee and for all the other senators as well."

9) Smarter ways to handle fire by Daniel James Brown

"Then there's the issue of why San Diego and California at large resist embracing the occasional wildfire."

10) The Porn Age's unsexiness by Meghan Daum

"This observation is very similar to the one made by C.S. Lewis — that men and women have an "ever-increasing appetite for ever-decreasing pleasure." Ultimately, images and pleasure lose their "sexiness" when they are severed from the mystery of intimacy that God weaved into marriage."

Ever since the dawn of man, us monkeys have been staring slack-jawed at the awesome sight of flame. For almost as long, we've been making up terrible poetry to describe it. What happens when the doggerel blends with, say, the perennial east coast desire to interpret the land of fruits and nuts for the civilized natives back home? Pure comedy gold, that's what!

From the letters section of the New York Times:

There was an eerie silence as I stood there in the orange smoky haze, ashes falling like snow on Mercury, and blinked two or maybe three times.

By motivation, this had absolutely nothing to do with the fire -- it just seemed like something that would happen in Southern California. As I quietly closed the door, I thought about Joan Didion; she would understand this.
Tom Impelluso

How could you not close the door "quietly" with all those heavy thoughts rattling around your noggin! Letter-writer Martin Kruming also added: "White ashes rain down from blackened skies; residents wear surgical masks outside; estates and homes crumble in seconds and tens of thousands flee."

Lest you think I'm being unkind to Seaboard proles, I give you Janet Fitch of the Washington Post:

All week, it has been like a funeral here in the city. The moon rose orange through the smoke. Although surrounded by miles of concrete, we could feel the million trees burning, taste the fear but even more the sadness in the air [...]

The funeral we Angelenos feel is the periodic funeral of all our illusions about the nature of this place. [...]

California is so dry now, a wet towel hung over a shower bar will be usable within half an hour. Street trees have been looking stressed all summer.

I come not to bury Fitch (or Didion, or Raymond Chandler, or Mike Davis), but to salute the whole lot of 'em for giving it the old college try while fighting an ultimately losing battle -- using the wholly inadequate medium of words to describe a force of nature that's all about the visuals. Like this one, by The Times' phenomenal Wally Skalij:

To see and celebrate the poetry no words can convey, keep on reading after the jump.