In the diaries, he puts on his A-list of desirable things "the propinquity of a female bottom I can quite freely whip" (his italics).
Symmetry suggests orderly development in the womb and during childhood, and thus, the theory has it, captures a range of desirable things from good genes to infection-resistance.
While they support a long list of desirable things, like arts and music, smaller classes and community schools that provide health and social services in poor neighborhoods, they have been vague about how to pay for them.
"You are bombarded with pages and pages of pictures of desirable things.
Suppose, he writes, that you can have just one of three desirable things — A, B, or C, in order of preference.
It stands for democracy, fairness, stability, quality, meticulousness, punctuality, thrift, efficiency, openness and all sorts of other desirable things.
Also, building and maintaining big surpluses in Social Security and Medicare, to prepare for the retirement of the baby-boom generation, encourages middle-class people to think of the federal government as the reliable provider of two extremely desirable things: old-age pensions and health care.
"If we try harder we can all find these kinds of savings without cutting back essential services or even most of the very desirable things that we do," Mr. Bloomberg told commissioners and reporters at City Hall.
Government, after all, is, as Lincoln said, simply the business of our doing together "the desirable things which the individuals of a people cannot do, or cannot well do, for themselves".
In reality, the chances are that one of two much less desirable things will happen.
(All these things are desirable, but their privileged treatment imposes a cost, in the form of higher taxes, on other desirable things).
