Photo: Flickr/coltera

• Municipalities are contracting out various public services like libraries and parking enforcement to private enterprises, and the Washington Post outlines some of the challenges of this approach. Unfortunately, the Post inaccurately describes this as privatization, which is when government divests itself entirely from a current function. Contracting the function while maintaining ultimate responsibility for its provision is simply outsourcing.
• Stephen Smith points out that when it comes to “privatization” of government parking facilities, “the ‘owners’ are barely even allowed to set their own prices, nevermind decide to use their land for, *gasp* something other than parking.”
• Adam at PlayNice.ly looks into what’s required to establish a merchant account for credit card processing. Smashing Magazine covers the same ground and suggests a few payment processors. Fundraisers should take special note of Adam’s warnings about PayPal, which may impose long-run costs hidden by its easy setup.
• The reliably progressive StreetsBlog argues that it would be a mistake to cut federal funding for bike paths and rail transit, which it argues are cost-effective. But even if a program is cost-effective, does that mean the federal government ought to spend money on it?
• Last but not least, Oregon lawmakers rick-roll the legislature:

  

“…all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” Photo: Wikimedia

“States don’t have rights,” Stephen Green reminds us. “Individuals do. It’s time we went about the business of restoring those rights, without alienating a huge constituency which suffered too long without them.” Green rightly argues that conservatives’ use of the language of states’ rights is not only muddle-headed but, for historical reasons, tends to associate conservatives with Jim Crow.

Nicola Moore and Eric Heis are undertaking an innovative project to raise youth awareness of federal overspending: they’re making a video game caled U.O.Me. They’re accepting contributions through mid-August to fund the game’s programming.

Realizing that spending is an issue of growing salience, progressives are rallying around new gimmicks like advanced rescission to bolster their budget-cutter bonafides. George Will is having none of it: the plan “certainly would not reduce deficit spending: Under the president’s proposal, if Congress kills the projects on the president’s list, the budgetary allocation would not be reduced, so legislators could dream up new things on which to spend the money.”

Timothy Carney, for his part, wonders if conservatives will look to military budgets as a source of savings.

E.J. Dionne says it’s ironic that conservatives who decry big government are calling for the federal government to more effectively manage the Gulf oil spill. Dionne, of course, is missing the point: there’s a difference between effective government (or energetic government, as Publius dubbed it in the Federalist) and big government. But all too many conservatives allow progressives to make such arguments by advocating for small government rather than a limited government that undertakes only its core responsibilities.

And last but not least, this is a clever submission to Google’s Search Stories campaign:

Would the Dupont Circle CVS perform better with open windows instead of opaque displays? Photo: M.V. Jantzen

Window-shopping isn’t what it used to be, Philip Kennicott explains in the Washington Post. In an effort to maximize shelf space, all too many D.C. retailers like CVS block their windows, which reduces engagement with passers-by. I wonder: have retailers ever tested whether an engaging, inviting storefront might improve sales and offset revenues from lost shelving? (via GGW).

Ross Douthat says Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul is a prime example of why politicians must exercise prudence in addition to principle. Julian Sanchez makes a similar point: “Libertarians need to think harder about how our principles should degrade elegantly, how they can guide us through a fallen world where the live political options seldom afford a full escape from injustice.”

Michael Perkins argues that federal workers shouldn’t get effectively unlimited mass-transit benefits, and suggests instead a benefit that can be spent on any form of transportation. But why stop there? Why not eliminate the benefit altogether and increase salaries accordingly, allowing workers to spend their incomes as they see fit? Not only would this remove the distortions Perkins rightly decries, but it would free workers to choose their own spending priorities.

This Washington Post headline raised hopes, but only briefly, that President Obama had proposed spending cuts: “Democrats cautious on Obama’s spending-cut proposal.” Alas, it refers only to the President’s (important) assertion of budgetary authority—but not to any evidence that he plans any actual reduction in outlays.

And last but not least, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has released a clever ad poking fun at many prominent critics of her state’s immigration law: