CBS News Andy Rooney: Let’s Have A Smart Board.

Chris F. Masse April 12th, 2007

I proposed a new institution, “The Open Institute of Prediction Markets“. I’d like you to take two minutes to read Andy Rooney’s proposal. It has nothing to do with prediction markets, as that wet blanket of Bo Cowgill will quickly notice, but the idea is to take a look at how such a proposal is best worded. I view Andy Rooney as an old schmuck, but I think that he is full on wisdom on this one. Take a look.

Let’s Have A Smart Board
Andy Rooney On Why College Professors Should Advise
Dec. 26, 2004

Some days, I have the nervous feeling that too few people who aren’t smart enough are making too many important decisions in Washington. They always sound confident, but I’ll bet they’d like some help, too.

There are 1,500 colleges in the United States and one million college professors. Both the colleges and the professors run from terrible to great, but overall, they’re among the best things we have in this country.

I do have one reservation, and they won’t like to hear me say this, but a lot of college professors don’t work hard enough. The school year is too short. It has too many interruptions. Our best professors aren’t doing their share with the brains they have and I have an idea. We should involve the brightest people among us, college professors, in the most important work we have: government.

Instead of sitting on the sidelines in funny costumes, just thinking and talking about what’s wrong, college professors should do something. We would establish a new government agency called The Smart Board. It would be an advisory group comprising a body of 100 college professors, all with PhDs. They wouldn’t be picked by Congress or elected by the rest of us. They’d be chosen by the people who know them best - other college professors.

We’d put up a new building for them in Washington. When television does a piece about the president, the reporter stands in front of the White House. When it’s about Congress, the reporter has the Capitol in the background. The professors’ new building would give television correspondents something to stand in front of when they reported on them.

It would be a full-time job for two years. After talking things over, they’d give their best advice to Congress and to the president. It wouldn’t be compulsory for officials to take it, but the board’s opinion would be made public and that would put pressure on politicians. For example, if the professors had advised against attacking Iraq, it would have been harder for the president to do that.

The professors would give Congress and the president their best advice on whether or not they should pass a new tax decrease that leaves no rich person behind.

Members of the Smart Board wouldn’t be Republican, and they wouldn’t be Democrat. They’d be too smart to be either.

What I want to demonstrate by re-publishing this 2004 proposal by Andy Rooney is that a great idea can be expressed simply. I’ll try to remember this while dealing with some new prediction market concepts. Thank you, mister Andy Rooney. And I’ll retract the “old schmuck” label.

(((I think that Robin Hanson’s PhD work was about something like “new institution design” but I don’t remember where the hell I read that.)))

Entrepreneurship , Politics
Comments(4)

4 Responses to “CBS News Andy Rooney: Let’s Have A Smart Board.”

# Alex Forshaw on 12 Apr 2007 at 11:01 pm

Dude.

It’s an awful idea.
# Chris. F. Masse on 13 Apr 2007 at 2:53 am

U really think that? I think it’s a great idea.

Anyway, the point was to see how a writer presents a new institution proposal.

Are Chris Masse’s Ideas Crazy ENOUGH For Google??
http://www.midasoracle.org/200.....or-google/
# Caveat Bettor on 15 Apr 2007 at 5:50 pm

Chris: I have spoken to over 100 professors personally, from one of my siblings all the way to Greg Mankiw. 95% of them are fairly mediocre or worse. I have spoken to over 1000 Wall Street professionals, and only about 80% of them are as unimpressive to me as professors.

Do you know many professors Chris? Most of them are the religious priests Tom Kuhn identifies in his “Structure of Scientific Revolutions”, building on someone else’s paradigm and then sniveling for tenure and then not taking any meaningful risks.
# Chris. F. Masse on 16 Apr 2007 at 2:08 am

I don’t “know” any professors. I read the papers on prediction markets from the economics scholars. Pretty good stuff, and thus I view them as smart. They have a flawed industry analysis and don’t have any vision for the future of this industry, but that’s just a side comment.

Your comment is interesting because I had in mind the professors in economics and “hard” science (e.g., physics), but you make me think that I dislike the liberal art professors. They are leftist idiots.

Maybe the flaw in Andy Rooney’s proposal, now that I think of it, is the self-appointing thing. Maybe the brightest professors should be picked by the best Wall Street professionals and the best Silicon Valley techno-entrepreneurs. Would you prefer that??