Attention Span Misorder

The financial crisis now upon us has focused my attention, and reminded me that another important aspect of filtering extraneous information is to keep an eye out for stopped clocks.

A stopped clock may be right twice a day, but since it gives you no indication as to when those times may be, its information value to you is zero. And while seeing a stopped clock come unstuck is informational, it is in fact an event of such note that you can be sure every other clock in town will let you know should it occur. So even in that case, you can safely forget it exists.

A perfect example of this is Kathryn Jean Lopez's presence in NRO's Corner blog. Whatever yeoman work she does behind the scenes, her postings are as predictable as the tides and comets. On a slightly larger scale, Paul Krugman of the NY Times delivers product of equally creamy, easily-swallowed consistency. The only time it makes sense to read folks like this is to guffaw at their histrionics in the event of some Outrage concerning one or more head of their sacred herds, which are invariably large.

None of this means that either Lopez or Krugman are always wrong. For all I know, one or both of them are always right. However, I know with mathematical certainty that I will not find that out by reading them. And so, I refrain.