Saturday, August 01, 2009
Goodbye, Post
I'm deleting the link to the Washington Post on the sidebar. I'm simply tired of and embarrassed for the paper - of its inane antics posing as, what, entertainment? Infotainment? Tired of its insistent establishment genuflection. Tired of having to log in each visit. It's not a lot of labor to log in, but it's even less effort to click on the NY Times link for their special brand of incompetence (see here and here), or somewhere else. I have a couple friends at the Post who are top-notch reporters, and it's the paper of my city, but I don't read it any more.
Gratuitous
Both Scott Horton and Andrew Sullivan have posted excerpts from this closing argument. It's by Maj. David J.R. Frakt, the lawyer of Mohammad Kawad, the 12-14 year old boy (at the time of his capture) who has been ordered released from Guantanamo after six years in the prison, where he was submitted to various tortures. I'm posting Sullivan's longish excerpt because I want it to be documented on yet one other little place. Please feel free to spread it widely.
A 12 year old boy as the extremely dangerous terrorist whose evil essence supposedly justifies torture.... We seem to have gotten the evil wrong. Here's Scott:"Why was Mohammad Jawad tortured? Why did military officials choose a teenage boy who had attempted suicide in his cell less than 5 months earlier to be the subject of this sadistic sleep deprivation experiment? Not that anything would justify such treatment, of course, but at least in the case of the other detainees known to have been subjected to sleep deprivation, they were believed to possess critical intelligence that might save American lives.
Unfortunately, we may never know. I’ve asked to speak to the guards who actually carried out the program, and I’ve been denied. In the absence of information to the contrary, which the government would surely provide if it existed, we are left to conclude that it was simply gratuitous cruelty.
The government admits that Mohammad Jawad was treated “improperly,” but offers no remedy. We won’t use any evidence derived from this maltreatment, they say, but they know that there was no evidence derived from it because the government didn’t even bother to interrogate him after they tortured him. Exclusion of non-existent evidence is not a remedy. Dismissal is a severe sanction, but it is the only sanction that might conceivably deter such conduct in the future.
February 7, 2002. America lost a little of its greatness that day. We lost our position as the world’s leading defender of human rights, as the champion of justice and fairness and the rule of law. But it is a testament to the continuing greatness of this nation, that I, a lowly Air Force Reserve Major, can stand here before you today, with the world watching, without fear of retribution, retaliation or reprisal, and speak truth to power. I can call a spade a spade, and I can call torture, torture.
Today, Your Honor, you have an opportunity to restore a bit of America’s lost luster, to bring back some small measure of the greatness that was lost on Feb 7, 2002, to set us back on a path that leads to an America which once again stands at the forefront of the community of nations in the arena of human rights. Sadly, this military commission has no power to do anything to the enablers of torture such as John Yoo, Jay Bybee, Robert Delahunty, Alberto Gonzales, Douglas Feith, David Addington, William Haynes, Vice President Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, for the jurisdiction of military commissions is strictly and carefully limited to foreign war criminals, not the home-grown variety.
All you can do is to try to send a message, a clear and unmistakable message that the U.S. really doesn’t torture, and when we do, we own up to it, and we try to make it right. I have provided you with legal authority for the proposition that you have the power to dismiss these charges. I can’t stand before you and say that you are legally required to do so. But I can say that that it is a moral imperative to do so, and I ask that you do so," - Major David J. R. Frakt, in his closing argument in favor of dismissal of the case against Mohammad Jawad.
In Guantánamo he was abused repeatedly, particularly by means of a form of sleep deprivation known as the “frequent flyer program.” This regime involved prison guards waking a prisoner every 2-4 hours and moving him to a different cell, ensuring that he would not sleep for days. Jawad was subjected to this process 112 times, according to military records. And interestingly, all of those incidents occurred after the military—following widespread criticism of the program—announced that it had ceased its use in May 2004. Judge Henley wrote that “[t]hose responsible should face appropriate disciplinary action, if warranted under the circumstances” for their “flagrant misbehavior.” There is no evidence so far of any disciplinary action or even of an investigation. Under the doctrine of command responsibility, the Pentagon has an affirmative duty to investigate war crimes allegations–and in this case, we have what approaches a judicial determination that war crimes occurred.
Slavery Lives On
The chart on where the "birthers" live has appeared in many places on the web. I'll link the first place I saw it yesterday. There are also a number of explanations going around, including that the number of Republicans in the South is higher than in any other part of the country. Now here's another map (h/t Tyler Cowen) that shows life expectancy of white males. It looks to me like this one correlates well with the "birthers" chart, down to a slightly lower life expectancy in the West.
The South still has not recovered from slavery. David Kaiser offers some historical thoughts on the subject.
The founders of the Republican Party included a number of small businessmen who recognized that the South's slavery was an economic advantage. The existing political parties, the Whigs and the Democrats, were not facing up to the deep divisions that slavery was causing. So the economics, along with the moral case for abolition, were all motivations for forming a new political party. Some of those same founders also established a college because they recognized the value of education.
Kaiser gives some of the history of how the Republican Party got from there to here, pretty much reversing all its stands along the way.
The South still has not recovered from slavery. David Kaiser offers some historical thoughts on the subject.
Yet it seems to me that slavery's most enduring effects, ironically, have fallen upon the descendants of those who owned the slaves, rather than the slaves themselves--and those effects still are a terrible burden to the American South.Since I travel regularly to Ripon, Wisconsin, which claims to be the birthplace of the Republican Party, let me add a bit more history from the abolitionist North.
The founders of the Republican Party included a number of small businessmen who recognized that the South's slavery was an economic advantage. The existing political parties, the Whigs and the Democrats, were not facing up to the deep divisions that slavery was causing. So the economics, along with the moral case for abolition, were all motivations for forming a new political party. Some of those same founders also established a college because they recognized the value of education.
Kaiser gives some of the history of how the Republican Party got from there to here, pretty much reversing all its stands along the way.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Bits and Pieces - July 31, 2009
The Guardian's "Week in Wildlife." Those ladybugs are everywhere - thick in Wisconsin last fall. Apparently they are the the ladybugs that you order for biological control. Except they're native to China, not Wisconsin, not Germany. They're eating the native Wisconsin ladybugs. Here's another photo I particularly liked:
Where the "birthers" live.
The world's biggest military boondoggles.
Political science issues Stephen Walt doesn't understand. I don't either.
Looks like maybe Russia and the US will do an official threat assessment like this one.
Where the "birthers" live.
The world's biggest military boondoggles.
Political science issues Stephen Walt doesn't understand. I don't either.
Looks like maybe Russia and the US will do an official threat assessment like this one.
Understanding Global Warming
There are many ways to do science. One is to observe nature, very carefully, as Jane Goodall did with her chimpanzees. Another is to measure the properties of things in a laboratory. The properties may be the strength of materials, or how a material behaves when it is heated, or any number of qualities that are needed for building automobiles and bridges, for example. Another is to look at what is known about a problem, build a hypothesis, and check out that hypothesis, as in many experiments that are in progress to determine the weaknesses of the AIDS virus that might be exploited to cure those suffering from it; these hypotheses may be about one tiny part of the problem, like how a receptor on a cell surface handles the flow of ions. Yet another is trying to put a number of facts together to form a bigger picture.
This is in contrast to the oversimplified picture of science that seems to be held by members of the press and too many K-12 science teachers. A scientist forms a hypothesis, goes into the laboratory, does an experiment, and comes out with a yes or no answer. Yes supports the hypothesis, no destroys it.
George Will wrote a week or so back about global warming, and James Fallows took the bait. His discussion includes a few posts, linked there, and his selection of reader e-mails. This link seems rather scattered; read all three posts for more coherence.
The climate deniers, like Will, feel that if they find one incorrect measurement, one incorrect calculation, the entirety of global warming is disproved. A public who have learned that oversimplified vision of science is inclined to take such things seriously. But it’s not that simple.
Global warming makes use of all those ways to do science. Observations of sea and land temperatures, gases trapped in glaciers, oxygen isotopes in cave formations, first arrival of migratory birds, extent of sea ice, spring sprouting of plants, and many more are part of the enormous data set. The physical properties, particularly relating to heat and movement, are necessary. Researchers are checking out how smoke particles affect reflectivity and how long they stay in the atmosphere; how ice forms in the upper atmosphere; how much light polar ice really reflects; the interactions between the water in clouds and the other components of the atmosphere, and many more of the individual interactions that make up climate. Putting all this together is the job of the climate modelers, of whom there are many.
Some of the information is wrong, or scrambled, or incorrectly entered into databases. It’s a good sign when those mistakes are found, and one indication that the models are working as they should. The models try to reconcile large amounts of the information; when something doesn’t fit, either the model is wrong or the data is. That’s how the mistakes are found.
Fallows is unhappy that scientists aren’t explaining global warming in an easily understandable way. I’m unhappy about it too, but I haven’t been able to come up with a simple answer because the problem is inherently complex. The scientists, when forced into a sound bite, give their results:
But the problem isn’t confined to global warming. President Obama recently spoke of his difficulty in explaining the issues related to health care.
On the science side, it can be hard to get the experts together and harder to get them to pay attention to the evidence. One expert may say it’s deer that are the problem in spreading Lyme disease, while another says it’s mice. They need to talk to each other. It could be that one or the other is right, or that the deer and the mice interact in such a way that it’s both. Notice that the answer doesn't have to be yes or no.
Doctors can be a breed apart from other scientists. But here are two examples of doctors not wanting to hear the facts, one at a summer camp infected with swine flu, and others who feel that the authority of a lab coat trumps its ability to carry germs from one patient to another. In the nineteenth century, doctors resisted washing their hands when going from one woman in labor to another; when they were finally convinced, the incidence of childbed fever plummeted.
People can be hard to convince. Add into that media that prefer “he said, she said,” and a widespread lack of understanding of science. And there are political-social preferences that might be overturned. That's why, along with the inherent complexity of the subject, it's hard to explain a complex topic like global warming.
Update: Or our media are using their precious time, energy, and money to provide such enlightment as this. I couldn't get through the video, it is so tedious.
This is in contrast to the oversimplified picture of science that seems to be held by members of the press and too many K-12 science teachers. A scientist forms a hypothesis, goes into the laboratory, does an experiment, and comes out with a yes or no answer. Yes supports the hypothesis, no destroys it.
George Will wrote a week or so back about global warming, and James Fallows took the bait. His discussion includes a few posts, linked there, and his selection of reader e-mails. This link seems rather scattered; read all three posts for more coherence.
The climate deniers, like Will, feel that if they find one incorrect measurement, one incorrect calculation, the entirety of global warming is disproved. A public who have learned that oversimplified vision of science is inclined to take such things seriously. But it’s not that simple.
Global warming makes use of all those ways to do science. Observations of sea and land temperatures, gases trapped in glaciers, oxygen isotopes in cave formations, first arrival of migratory birds, extent of sea ice, spring sprouting of plants, and many more are part of the enormous data set. The physical properties, particularly relating to heat and movement, are necessary. Researchers are checking out how smoke particles affect reflectivity and how long they stay in the atmosphere; how ice forms in the upper atmosphere; how much light polar ice really reflects; the interactions between the water in clouds and the other components of the atmosphere, and many more of the individual interactions that make up climate. Putting all this together is the job of the climate modelers, of whom there are many.
Some of the information is wrong, or scrambled, or incorrectly entered into databases. It’s a good sign when those mistakes are found, and one indication that the models are working as they should. The models try to reconcile large amounts of the information; when something doesn’t fit, either the model is wrong or the data is. That’s how the mistakes are found.
Fallows is unhappy that scientists aren’t explaining global warming in an easily understandable way. I’m unhappy about it too, but I haven’t been able to come up with a simple answer because the problem is inherently complex. The scientists, when forced into a sound bite, give their results:
increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will warm the earth unacceptably. We are producing enormous amounts of carbon dioxide by burning fossil fuels. We can stop burning fossil fuels or we can try to capture the carbon dioxide, neither of which is easy to do.What’s unsatisfying about that is the implicit “Trust me.” Trust is not in long supply these days. Explaining the models, beyond the superficial, is nearly impossible. If you know something about differential equations, you can get a general idea of what’s going on in them. If you’ve actually worked with models like these, you know that cross-checking within and between models and with large data sets is the only way to confirm them, and that it’s reliable. Along with a lot of parameters that can look like fudge factors, this kind of thing activates the trust question. Further explanation seldom helps.
But the problem isn’t confined to global warming. President Obama recently spoke of his difficulty in explaining the issues related to health care.
On the science side, it can be hard to get the experts together and harder to get them to pay attention to the evidence. One expert may say it’s deer that are the problem in spreading Lyme disease, while another says it’s mice. They need to talk to each other. It could be that one or the other is right, or that the deer and the mice interact in such a way that it’s both. Notice that the answer doesn't have to be yes or no.
Doctors can be a breed apart from other scientists. But here are two examples of doctors not wanting to hear the facts, one at a summer camp infected with swine flu, and others who feel that the authority of a lab coat trumps its ability to carry germs from one patient to another. In the nineteenth century, doctors resisted washing their hands when going from one woman in labor to another; when they were finally convinced, the incidence of childbed fever plummeted.
People can be hard to convince. Add into that media that prefer “he said, she said,” and a widespread lack of understanding of science. And there are political-social preferences that might be overturned. That's why, along with the inherent complexity of the subject, it's hard to explain a complex topic like global warming.
Update: Or our media are using their precious time, energy, and money to provide such enlightment as this. I couldn't get through the video, it is so tedious.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
A Pause with Iran
Trita Parsi today suggests a pause in American attempts to engage Iran. I'll second that. The government is in uproar, with rival factions apparently undercutting each other, although all we can really see from here is President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's difficulty in assembling a cabinet.
The counterargument is that Iran's nuclear program is moving forward, and Israel's trigger finger is getting itchy.
But when a government hasn't even been assembled, there are likely to be changes in direction and emphasis. Not a good time to try any sort of serious negotiations. And the IAEA inspectors are still there, although limited in the scope of what they can inspect.
Consider how it would have been for the EU to insist on major trade negotiations, or for Russia to insist on negotiating nuclear weapons numbers during the month-long impasse over the 2000 US presidential election between George Bush and Al Gore. That's what we would be doing by insisting on starting talks with Iran now.
The counterargument is that Iran's nuclear program is moving forward, and Israel's trigger finger is getting itchy.
But when a government hasn't even been assembled, there are likely to be changes in direction and emphasis. Not a good time to try any sort of serious negotiations. And the IAEA inspectors are still there, although limited in the scope of what they can inspect.
Consider how it would have been for the EU to insist on major trade negotiations, or for Russia to insist on negotiating nuclear weapons numbers during the month-long impasse over the 2000 US presidential election between George Bush and Al Gore. That's what we would be doing by insisting on starting talks with Iran now.
Principles and Stories
Peter Levine's latest book will be out soon. In the meantime, Peter posts the first paragraph of the book:
This is a book about ethics and stories. Ethics (or morality) encompasses what is right or good, what we ought to do, and how laws and institutions should be organized. I argue that a good way to make ethical judgments and decisions is to describe reality in the form of a true narrative. Fictional stories also support moral conclusions that can translate into real life. I argue that when the moral judgments supported by a good story conflict with general principles, we ought to follow the story and amend or suspend our principles, rather than the reverse. What makes a story “good” for this purpose is not its conformity to correct moral principles, but its merits as a narrative--for instance, its perceptiveness and coherence and its avoidance of cliché, sentimentality, and euphemism.
Legacy
Andrew Sullivan discusses the Gates arrest:
I note two things that stand out to me. The first is the crudeness of the racism. "Banana-eating jungle monkey" is the baseline description of Gates, coupled, as it always is, with "I am not a racist". He also thinks it's real cool to use "ax" instead of "ask". Then this description of policing in his riposte to a journalist:Your defense of Gates while he is on the phone while being confronted [INDEED] with a police officer is assuming he has rights when considered a suspect. He is a suspect and always will be a suspect. His first priority of concern should be to get off the phone and comply with police, for if I was the officer he verbally assaulted like a banana-eating jungle monkey, I would have sprayed him in the face with OC deserving of his belligerent non-compliance.Notice the Cheney view: that a suspect has no rights; and is always a suspect, always at the mercy of the state and government, with a duty to obey police and military power or face brutal consequences. Notice the use of pepper-spray as a response to mere verbal complaints of mistreatment.
And the more you read, the more you realize how deep the Bush-Cheney legacy runs and how the torture and 'enemy combatant' state, celebrated nightly on Fox, easily seeps into domestic law enforcement. Notice how Cheney actually wanted to use the military against "suspects" in America. And how proud he is of that move. And notice in the email how all of this is bound up with a defense of God. Notice the classic Christianist line to the journalist:
You are an infidel.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Detroit Misses the Mark Again
Chevrolet today has an extra-obnoxious ad on the New York Times site. One of the latest ad memes is to have something unfold across the print you'd like to read. Presumably the geniuses who thought this up believe that I am stupid enough to read their ads instead of the text of the article. Wrong!
Today's brilliant stroke unfolds across the text. It has a "close X" in the upper right-hand corner. But you have to click within approximately a millimeter square, perhaps less (two pixels?) not to activate the full thing in a new tab. And when you get within that millimeter or so, nothing happens. That's the best you can do. And the ad remains splayed across the text.
Nice work, New York Times and Chevrolet!
Update: Aaahhh, recalled that refreshing the page brings up a different ad.
All this gives the NYT and Chevrolet extra clicks. But not reader love.
Today's brilliant stroke unfolds across the text. It has a "close X" in the upper right-hand corner. But you have to click within approximately a millimeter square, perhaps less (two pixels?) not to activate the full thing in a new tab. And when you get within that millimeter or so, nothing happens. That's the best you can do. And the ad remains splayed across the text.
Nice work, New York Times and Chevrolet!
Update: Aaahhh, recalled that refreshing the page brings up a different ad.
All this gives the NYT and Chevrolet extra clicks. But not reader love.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Bits and Pieces – July 28, 2009
A report that Uzbekistan is doing better than I thought.
Photographs from James Fallows at the Experimental Aircraft Association’s annual Oshkosh (Wisconsin) Fly-In. More here.
Do patents stifle innovation?
Does Macedonia, a country born out of the rubble of the former Yugoslavia, have the right to call itself what it wants? Greece says no. And by the way, Alexander of Macedon was a Greek, not a, er, Macedonian.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that national defense protects nuclear plants from attack.
More information suppressed by the Bush administration becoming available: spy satellite photos of ice loss in the Arctic and mountain glaciers. A few images are available at ThinkProgress and Reuters, but they are very difficult to find at the US Geological Service site that Reuters links.
And, speaking of secret Bush stuff, the news that Dick Cheney wanted to use the US Army to arrest alleged terrorists in Lackawanna, New York, is more than scary. Scott Horton reads John Yoo’s memos as being crafted to support Cheney in this effort. Emptywheel seems to agree with Horton for the most part. I find it disturbing that these memos and incidents are coming out piecemeal, obscuring their interconnections. Emptywheel is following them, though, and hopefully we can expect a unified explanation from her when enough material is available. I can’t help but wonder whether that CIA program that Leon Panetta stopped as soon as he was read into it is part of all this.
While the Birthers are getting all the attention, Jon Kyl (R, AZ) is trying to make sure that the followon START treaty is dead on arrival. His colleague John McCain (R, AZ), however, is considering supporting the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty when it arrives in the Senate again for ratification, as President Obama has promised. AP styles Kyl’s support by Jeff Sessions (R, AL) and Joe Lieberman (I, CT) as “the Senate.” Hey AP, the R’s are in the minority! Maybe this kind of thing is why AP doesn’t want their stuff quoted.
Photographs from James Fallows at the Experimental Aircraft Association’s annual Oshkosh (Wisconsin) Fly-In. More here.
Do patents stifle innovation?
Does Macedonia, a country born out of the rubble of the former Yugoslavia, have the right to call itself what it wants? Greece says no. And by the way, Alexander of Macedon was a Greek, not a, er, Macedonian.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that national defense protects nuclear plants from attack.
More information suppressed by the Bush administration becoming available: spy satellite photos of ice loss in the Arctic and mountain glaciers. A few images are available at ThinkProgress and Reuters, but they are very difficult to find at the US Geological Service site that Reuters links.
And, speaking of secret Bush stuff, the news that Dick Cheney wanted to use the US Army to arrest alleged terrorists in Lackawanna, New York, is more than scary. Scott Horton reads John Yoo’s memos as being crafted to support Cheney in this effort. Emptywheel seems to agree with Horton for the most part. I find it disturbing that these memos and incidents are coming out piecemeal, obscuring their interconnections. Emptywheel is following them, though, and hopefully we can expect a unified explanation from her when enough material is available. I can’t help but wonder whether that CIA program that Leon Panetta stopped as soon as he was read into it is part of all this.
While the Birthers are getting all the attention, Jon Kyl (R, AZ) is trying to make sure that the followon START treaty is dead on arrival. His colleague John McCain (R, AZ), however, is considering supporting the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty when it arrives in the Senate again for ratification, as President Obama has promised. AP styles Kyl’s support by Jeff Sessions (R, AL) and Joe Lieberman (I, CT) as “the Senate.” Hey AP, the R’s are in the minority! Maybe this kind of thing is why AP doesn’t want their stuff quoted.
Gaffes? Or Not
The MSM's gaffe-of-the-day award goes to...(drumroll)...Joe Biden!
Biden is a favorite for such things and may someday make the MSM's Gaffe Hall of Fame.
But sometimes it's useful to say strong things. It's no big deal to walk back something that the media calls a gaffe. Ronald Reagan even got away with saying "we begin bombing [Russia] in five minutes."
Now here's what Biden said that constitutes the latest gaffe, in Jay Newton-Small's view:
There are a number of additionally interesting quotes in the Wall Street Journal's version of the interview. They've cut it up into individual quotes, which eliminates any possibility of understanding the context and makes it easier for their colleagues to find the gaffe-of-the-day. Let's take just one:
It's fair enough to press the boundaries. Russia needs to recognize its limitations. So does the United States. We don't have Russia's financial problems, but perhaps getting the nuclear numbers down is to our economic benefit, too.
And maybe that's an indirect part of Biden's message.
A somewhat similar analysis here. But I like mine better.
Biden is a favorite for such things and may someday make the MSM's Gaffe Hall of Fame.
But sometimes it's useful to say strong things. It's no big deal to walk back something that the media calls a gaffe. Ronald Reagan even got away with saying "we begin bombing [Russia] in five minutes."
Now here's what Biden said that constitutes the latest gaffe, in Jay Newton-Small's view:
Russia has to make some very difficult, calculated decisions. They have a shrinking population base, they have a withering economy, they have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years, they're in a situation where the world is changing before them and they're clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable.This all happens to be true. But Biden did not say
they're on the brink of becoming an irrelevant third world countryThat was Newton-Small. The Los Angeles Times calls it a blunder.
There are a number of additionally interesting quotes in the Wall Street Journal's version of the interview. They've cut it up into individual quotes, which eliminates any possibility of understanding the context and makes it easier for their colleagues to find the gaffe-of-the-day. Let's take just one:
On whether he is concerned about Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili living up to promises to strengthen democratic institutions:It's generally thought to be a bad idea to claim that the actions of a head of state are influenced by another country's statesman. I guess that this didn't qualify for gaffe-of-the-day because Georgia is "an irrelevant third world country," in Newton-Small's words. And there's more that isn't entirely complimentary to Georgia.
"I'm not concerned, but I'm not taking any chances. The opposition believes the only reason he said it was because I was coming. The opposition said to me the only reason he did some of the stuff he did in terms of backing off the demonstrations was because I told him….It may or may not have had an effect on his judgment."
It's fair enough to press the boundaries. Russia needs to recognize its limitations. So does the United States. We don't have Russia's financial problems, but perhaps getting the nuclear numbers down is to our economic benefit, too.
And maybe that's an indirect part of Biden's message.
A somewhat similar analysis here. But I like mine better.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Bits and Pieces – July 27, 2009
Does the Iranian opposition need leadership? The initial response to an apparently rigged election made sense. But what else is the opposition asking for? What are they opposing? Until we hear some reasonably unified answers from them, it’s very difficult to support or oppose them. Fareed Zakaria is trying to figure this out, too.
We are finding new mammal species because we humans are moving into more of their habitats.
I’m wondering why the interest in Central Asian military bases is centering on Kyrgyzstan, rather than Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan. The last three are politically unstable, which may be part of the reason, and Kazakhstan is big enough to act fairly independently. If geography were the basis, I think I’d go for Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan. The others are awfully mountainous.
North Korea wants two-party talks with the United States, not the six-party talks. It’s worth remembering that the two states are at war; the Korean War was ended with an armistice.
We are finding new mammal species because we humans are moving into more of their habitats.
I’m wondering why the interest in Central Asian military bases is centering on Kyrgyzstan, rather than Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan. The last three are politically unstable, which may be part of the reason, and Kazakhstan is big enough to act fairly independently. If geography were the basis, I think I’d go for Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan. The others are awfully mountainous.
North Korea wants two-party talks with the United States, not the six-party talks. It’s worth remembering that the two states are at war; the Korean War was ended with an armistice.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
The Quant Recalls How She Learned To Save
I did a series of posts a while back (at WhirledView) styling myself as “the quant.” Like many of the Wall Street quants, I am a physical scientist turning my talents to economics. Unlike them, I do not have the power to destroy enormous amounts of wealth.
We need to save more. We have a burgeoning national debt that may not be a good thing in the hands of foreigners. It is likely to increase in the future. We also had a very large national debt as a result of fighting World War II.
I didn’t know about the national debt when I was in grade school. What I knew was that for some small sum (either a dime or a quarter), I could buy stamps to paste in a book. They were nice engraved government stamps, like the postage stamps I collected. When the book was full, I would get a $25 savings bond. The full book represented $18.75 in stamps, and it seemed like a really good thing to me that if I waited a few years, I would get $25 for that.
I didn’t know that the government was paying down all that money it had borrowed to fight World War II. The bonds were referred to as “war bonds,” but I didn’t fully realize the connection until fairly recently. It took most of my childhood for the country to pay down the excess war debt, so when my husband and I bought our first house and cashed in the bonds we had accumulated on our own or as birthday and Christmas presents from relatives, they must have represented some of the last of that excess debt, as you can see in the graph. The US budget has grown so much that the percent of GDP makes the graph more understandable than dollars or adjusted dollars would be.
So why not start similar campaigns for savings bonds now? I know, we’re all much more sophisticated, and probably kids today are too. But they still like stickers, and stickers with a monetary purpose might be appealing. It would remind all of us that it is our national debt, and that we might just do something about it; minimally buy some bonds, but also keep our elected representatives on their toes about dealing with the debt. And the kids would develop an intuitive or better understanding of compound interest and what saving can do for them.
We need to save more. We have a burgeoning national debt that may not be a good thing in the hands of foreigners. It is likely to increase in the future. We also had a very large national debt as a result of fighting World War II.
I didn’t know about the national debt when I was in grade school. What I knew was that for some small sum (either a dime or a quarter), I could buy stamps to paste in a book. They were nice engraved government stamps, like the postage stamps I collected. When the book was full, I would get a $25 savings bond. The full book represented $18.75 in stamps, and it seemed like a really good thing to me that if I waited a few years, I would get $25 for that.
I didn’t know that the government was paying down all that money it had borrowed to fight World War II. The bonds were referred to as “war bonds,” but I didn’t fully realize the connection until fairly recently. It took most of my childhood for the country to pay down the excess war debt, so when my husband and I bought our first house and cashed in the bonds we had accumulated on our own or as birthday and Christmas presents from relatives, they must have represented some of the last of that excess debt, as you can see in the graph. The US budget has grown so much that the percent of GDP makes the graph more understandable than dollars or adjusted dollars would be.
So why not start similar campaigns for savings bonds now? I know, we’re all much more sophisticated, and probably kids today are too. But they still like stickers, and stickers with a monetary purpose might be appealing. It would remind all of us that it is our national debt, and that we might just do something about it; minimally buy some bonds, but also keep our elected representatives on their toes about dealing with the debt. And the kids would develop an intuitive or better understanding of compound interest and what saving can do for them.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Bits and Pieces - July 25, 2009
This seems like a good reason to levy a tax per trade on the exchanges.
William Safire recalls his role in the Nixon-Khrushchev "kitchen debate." The year before, there was a Soviet computer exhibition in New York. A group of my friends and I took the opportunity to harass the exhibitors about the superiority of digital versus analog. Got that one right!
The two best articles I've found on the Henry Louis Gates uproar:
bmaz on contempt of cop
Jim Sleeper on civil society
William Safire recalls his role in the Nixon-Khrushchev "kitchen debate." The year before, there was a Soviet computer exhibition in New York. A group of my friends and I took the opportunity to harass the exhibitors about the superiority of digital versus analog. Got that one right!
The two best articles I've found on the Henry Louis Gates uproar:
bmaz on contempt of cop
Jim Sleeper on civil society
Friday, July 24, 2009
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Bits and Pieces - July 22, 2009
Ewww - girls really do have more cooties than boys! Or maybe we should call it an enhanced ecosystem.
China Lake was once a secret city for its research into weapons. The weapons part still is, but the residential areas are booming since the Navy consolidated its research there.
Anyone catch the tv ads for prescription eyelash grower?
The Armchair Generalist sets Newt Gingrich straight on the EMP threat.
An interview with Henry Louis Gates on his arrest. I'll just add that women in Kazakh foxfur hats can be suspects too.
China Lake was once a secret city for its research into weapons. The weapons part still is, but the residential areas are booming since the Navy consolidated its research there.
Anyone catch the tv ads for prescription eyelash grower?
The Armchair Generalist sets Newt Gingrich straight on the EMP threat.
An interview with Henry Louis Gates on his arrest. I'll just add that women in Kazakh foxfur hats can be suspects too.
More Distraction
By the end of yesterday, I knew I meant to follow up my post on distraction, but I had forgotten what it was I meant to say. This morning, I remembered.
The New York Times had an article on one of my pet peeves, drivers who are on the phone. Santa Fe has one of those laws that hands-free devices are okay, hand-held not, but every time I go as far as the main street, I see drivers holding something to their ears. There aren't enough police in the state to stop them all.
And, since I got a cell phone, it's been clear to me that I can barely walk while carrying on a conversation. I really don't know how people do it. If I have to call someone while I'm carless, I find a bench and sit down.
Today Maureen Dowd confesses her cellphone-driving sins, and the Times summarizes the comments they've been getting. Pardon me if I find the suggestions of licensing people to use cellphones more of the "competence for me, but not for thee" rationalization.
The New York Times had an article on one of my pet peeves, drivers who are on the phone. Santa Fe has one of those laws that hands-free devices are okay, hand-held not, but every time I go as far as the main street, I see drivers holding something to their ears. There aren't enough police in the state to stop them all.
And, since I got a cell phone, it's been clear to me that I can barely walk while carrying on a conversation. I really don't know how people do it. If I have to call someone while I'm carless, I find a bench and sit down.
Today Maureen Dowd confesses her cellphone-driving sins, and the Times summarizes the comments they've been getting. Pardon me if I find the suggestions of licensing people to use cellphones more of the "competence for me, but not for thee" rationalization.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
A Summer Post: Surfin'
I was kind of an off-and-on surfer dude as a youngster in southern California, following an older cousin who made surfboards (including my own) and was sunk deeply into the surf culture of the 1960s-1970s. His sister was big on the Beach Boys and late summer afternoons hanging at the beach with friends. I was growing up in different places in Asia, but my hometown of San Diego was always home base for a year or two in between a few years here and a few years there in different countries. My cousins were the closest family apart from my immediate family and they were the direct conduit back into American culture. So I learned to surf with my cousin, riding on one of his handmade boards, and going to spots that are now legendary names - Black's Beach and Windansea in La Jolla, OB, up north to what was then a relatively uncrowded Trestle's, and our favorite Swami's. There's a certain feeling to that - the refracted sun slowly burning through San Diego's typical morning fog and chill; the excitement of waking up to a Santa Ana wind; the scent of coconut from Mr. Zogg's sex wax mingled with an occasional whiff of marijuana in the air; sometimes dolphins playing in the waves; fish tacos for our happily tired lunch; War, Led Zeppelin, and Bob Marley....For the longest time, the general culture of surfing viewed anything Atlantic as cute little sibling to the bigtime Pacific waves. The Pacific Ocean was large, deep and mysterious, full of dark forces that pushed seismic signals across thousands of miles to rise up into monsters on the sandbars and reefs of California, Mexico, Hawaii, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji. This immense energy ended its ocean voyage often with a human being atop it. This sense of power and vastness as the backdrop to one's activity infused surf culture, even on small days in southern California. The Indian Ocean and the perfect waves it brought to Indonesia were also far more serious than anything produced by the Atlantic Ocean. American surfers from the west coast sighed or chuckled at the homely sight of North Carolina or New Jersey beach breaks. North Carolina had a bit of a name, and it certainly had its local surfers, but the breaks were usually a mess and constantly shifted location along with the sands below. Plus, the waves came out of the ocean that belonged to Old Europe. Quaint, but not the frontier Pacific, which held out the ever-present possibility of finding some "new," remote, unsurfed spot - the "secret spot." As I recall from then, places like France and Spain - well-surfed today on beautiful and strong waves - simply weren't on the surfing map yet. Surfing was centered on the powerful Pacific Ocean with Hawaii its mecca.
This is all a long-winded and nostalgic way of directing you to Chris Bickford's photo essay in the NY Times on North Carolina's surf. NC may still be the jokey younger sibling for most west coast and Hawaiian surfers, but it's a serious place for surf with its own unique sense of this beautiful relationship between the physical power of nature and human beings.
While I'm at it, let me toss in a photo of a wave I've found absolutely terrifying since its "discovery" in the late 80s. It's certainly not the largest in the world, and larger waves at places like Maverick's in northern California or Waimea Bay and Jaws in Hawaii also break on reefs, but imagine your board racing near-uncontrollably ahead of this uniquely thick mass of water, the reef speeding past just a couple of feet beneath the surfboard. This is the deadly wall of water that is Teahupo'o in Tahiti:
Here's another perspective:
Teahupo'o may very well be the last discovery, the closing of the surfing frontier.
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