I know I'm going to sound like a grinch again, but Baby Noor was not a good candidate for treatment in the U.S. Iraq is full of children who are going to die for want of ordinary medical treatment. How many millions of dollars will go into the effort to save Noor's life? She may die anyway. How many normal babies will die for want of the attention that the same money could have bought?
It would be worth the effort if it would fool the Iraqis into believing that we really care about them. I can't believe they're buying it. An awful lot of them died for lack of medical supplies during the period of sanctions. Unfortunately, I don't know where to find just what the Arabs think of this ploy, but I've checked three mideast news sites and can't find a word about this exciting event. I assume this means they aren't impressed with our benevolence.
We aren't going to win their hearts and minds this or any other way. Let's get out.
Saturday, December 31, 2005
Except for the French Quarter, New Orleans isn't coming back.
After all the emotional response, it's time to think this out. New Orleans was where it was because the French thought this was a good spot. It was the shortest distance upstream that could support a major town. Remember that the site was chosen before steam, when going upstream was much more of an undertaking than it is now.
Once a major metropolis is formed, it tends to stay put. Part of what it has is a large stock of lousy but low-rent housing. In New Orleans, most of that is gone. Anything that we replace it with will be at least newer and mostly built to higher standards. The poor people who were there won't be able to afford it at market prices.
Furthermore, it's below sea level and sinking. It's worse than a flood plain. If it weren't New Orleans, people wouldn't even be allowed to build there. It makes no sense to relocate lots of poor people someplace where they probably can't get jobs at a cost far above what it would take to settle them on really dry land.
The French Quarter should be protected by levees and the rest of it turned into a theme park. Lagoonland. I like the sound of that.
Once a major metropolis is formed, it tends to stay put. Part of what it has is a large stock of lousy but low-rent housing. In New Orleans, most of that is gone. Anything that we replace it with will be at least newer and mostly built to higher standards. The poor people who were there won't be able to afford it at market prices.
Furthermore, it's below sea level and sinking. It's worse than a flood plain. If it weren't New Orleans, people wouldn't even be allowed to build there. It makes no sense to relocate lots of poor people someplace where they probably can't get jobs at a cost far above what it would take to settle them on really dry land.
The French Quarter should be protected by levees and the rest of it turned into a theme park. Lagoonland. I like the sound of that.
Making Commitments We Haven't Paid For
Oregon is all a twitter over the state welfare agency being off $172 million in its budget estimates for the biennium. Editorialists are calling for a special session.
Although $172 million is not chump change, it pales in comparison with the annual fluctuations in the Unfunded Actuarial Liability (UAL) of Oregon's Public Employeement Retirement System (PERS). Oregon has created exceptionally expensive retirement programs for all public employees, local and county as well as state. It hasn't been paying enough into the program to cover liabilities, hence the huge UAL. This year, with assets of around $40 billion (last time I looked), the plan needed an 8% return to avoid falling behind. Based on the stock market indices, it probably earned about 2%. Being short 6% on $40 billion is $2.4 billion.
For PERS, 2005 was a lackluster year. The previous two had been good. The two that preceded those had been disastrous. Looking at NASDAQ, S&P 500 and Dow Industrial averages, the equity earnings over five years have been negative, so even including some bond revenue (30% of PERS assets), it's been about a wash. The actuarially assumed return of 8%, compounded for 5 years, would have been 47%.
Taxpayers have picked up the tab so far, but if the 8% can't be regularly achieved, this is a nightmare that will never end. It's the same all over the country, in both private and public sectors. Executives promise employees fixed payouts that are only possible if the modest funds paid in earn good returns, consistently, forever.
There's a very tidy logic behind the 401(K) strategy of pensions. People today, whether they are paying an autoworker to build a Chevy or a teacher to instruct first graders, include something for that person's pension. What it yields as retirement income depends on whether America prospers. We're all in the same boat.
Although $172 million is not chump change, it pales in comparison with the annual fluctuations in the Unfunded Actuarial Liability (UAL) of Oregon's Public Employeement Retirement System (PERS). Oregon has created exceptionally expensive retirement programs for all public employees, local and county as well as state. It hasn't been paying enough into the program to cover liabilities, hence the huge UAL. This year, with assets of around $40 billion (last time I looked), the plan needed an 8% return to avoid falling behind. Based on the stock market indices, it probably earned about 2%. Being short 6% on $40 billion is $2.4 billion.
For PERS, 2005 was a lackluster year. The previous two had been good. The two that preceded those had been disastrous. Looking at NASDAQ, S&P 500 and Dow Industrial averages, the equity earnings over five years have been negative, so even including some bond revenue (30% of PERS assets), it's been about a wash. The actuarially assumed return of 8%, compounded for 5 years, would have been 47%.
Taxpayers have picked up the tab so far, but if the 8% can't be regularly achieved, this is a nightmare that will never end. It's the same all over the country, in both private and public sectors. Executives promise employees fixed payouts that are only possible if the modest funds paid in earn good returns, consistently, forever.
There's a very tidy logic behind the 401(K) strategy of pensions. People today, whether they are paying an autoworker to build a Chevy or a teacher to instruct first graders, include something for that person's pension. What it yields as retirement income depends on whether America prospers. We're all in the same boat.
Thursday, December 29, 2005
First Kirkuk, then Baghdad
John Maynard Keynes once said something to the effect that any reasonably intelligent man could make a fortune in the stock market by reading the newspaper every morning. The premise of this blog is similar; that an ordinarily intelligent person can perceive trends in public affairs which may confound well paid commentators.
It doesn't work 100% of the time, just as Keynes didn't predict the stock market precisely, but the Occam's Razor of analysis with respect to the Middle East is that things will not work out well in the end. Deep-seated pessimism has so far given me a better batting average than Thomas Friedman or Andrew Sullivan. Sullivan developed reservations about Iraq long after the invasion that he supported, blaming his misjudgment on the "surprise" that politicians lie and the military wasn't efficient. Friedman is withholding judgment for six more months for reasons that are unclear.
Unfortunately, this record may hold up with Juan Cole as well. In Cole's blog today (12/29/2005), he reports that the fix may be in in Kirkuk. The Kurd's are putting the Peshmerga in place to assert military control when Iraq dissolves and civil war breaks out. The religious Shiite leaders seem to have largely ceded the region to them in exchange for enough votes to give them control of everything else of importance.
Of course. So why is Cole quibbling about whether civil war has already begun? I'm guessing he is reserving the phrase for a later stage of the conflict, because he wants something identifiable that our continued, albeit reduced, presence can prevent. He believes it is within our capacity, and our moral duty, to forestall the worst.
Not gonna happen. The Sunnis are now participating in every election and it is certainly not because they expect to win. They must have a reason, and it is most likely world opinion, or at least the Arab street. They know there will be fraud in any Iraq election, so by participating and losing, they can wrap themselves in the flag of democracy (considerable irony there). The Iraqi winners aren't going to buy it, but that doesn't matter. As the insurgency escalates, the Sunnis will want a patina of legitimacy.
The US will not be able to intervene against the insurgency with its air power. While the Sunni Arabs may be a 20% minority in Iraq, they are the dominant group in the region and their coreligionists are not going to stand idly by while they are crushed in Iraq.
Making actual predictions is dangerous. Fox picked Michigan by three touchdowns over Nebraska and now they're stuck with it. However, I'm not a public figure and I don't need to worry about the next election, so I'll just observe that all parties have been going through the motions that the US has dictated -- interim government, first unelected and then elected, constitution, national vote -- and they're running out of reasons not to take what they think they deserve. I predict that after a few months to form the government and a few more to go through false motions of renegotiating the constitution, things will get ugly. Six months, tops.
Not quite Afghanistan, which won't happen until after the US pulls its ground forces and that depends on when GW Bush gives up. As Senator Lieberman accurately says, he's our commander-in-chief for three more years and he's a stubborn man.
It doesn't work 100% of the time, just as Keynes didn't predict the stock market precisely, but the Occam's Razor of analysis with respect to the Middle East is that things will not work out well in the end. Deep-seated pessimism has so far given me a better batting average than Thomas Friedman or Andrew Sullivan. Sullivan developed reservations about Iraq long after the invasion that he supported, blaming his misjudgment on the "surprise" that politicians lie and the military wasn't efficient. Friedman is withholding judgment for six more months for reasons that are unclear.
Unfortunately, this record may hold up with Juan Cole as well. In Cole's blog today (12/29/2005), he reports that the fix may be in in Kirkuk. The Kurd's are putting the Peshmerga in place to assert military control when Iraq dissolves and civil war breaks out. The religious Shiite leaders seem to have largely ceded the region to them in exchange for enough votes to give them control of everything else of importance.
Of course. So why is Cole quibbling about whether civil war has already begun? I'm guessing he is reserving the phrase for a later stage of the conflict, because he wants something identifiable that our continued, albeit reduced, presence can prevent. He believes it is within our capacity, and our moral duty, to forestall the worst.
Not gonna happen. The Sunnis are now participating in every election and it is certainly not because they expect to win. They must have a reason, and it is most likely world opinion, or at least the Arab street. They know there will be fraud in any Iraq election, so by participating and losing, they can wrap themselves in the flag of democracy (considerable irony there). The Iraqi winners aren't going to buy it, but that doesn't matter. As the insurgency escalates, the Sunnis will want a patina of legitimacy.
The US will not be able to intervene against the insurgency with its air power. While the Sunni Arabs may be a 20% minority in Iraq, they are the dominant group in the region and their coreligionists are not going to stand idly by while they are crushed in Iraq.
Making actual predictions is dangerous. Fox picked Michigan by three touchdowns over Nebraska and now they're stuck with it. However, I'm not a public figure and I don't need to worry about the next election, so I'll just observe that all parties have been going through the motions that the US has dictated -- interim government, first unelected and then elected, constitution, national vote -- and they're running out of reasons not to take what they think they deserve. I predict that after a few months to form the government and a few more to go through false motions of renegotiating the constitution, things will get ugly. Six months, tops.
Not quite Afghanistan, which won't happen until after the US pulls its ground forces and that depends on when GW Bush gives up. As Senator Lieberman accurately says, he's our commander-in-chief for three more years and he's a stubborn man.
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
The Pope does the Limbo
My interest in theological discussions is one step removed. To actually care about the outcome, you need to at least give some level of credence to the premises. I'm simply intrigued that the debate goes on at all.
Take Limbo, that nifty solution to some of the hard edges of Christian theology. Nothing in the Bible suggests its existence, but the logic of original sin and redemption through Jesus brought the Catholic Church to a difficulty that it resolved by inventing a place that's not as nice as heaven but not as nasty as hell. Now, they are rethinking it.
All of this takes place within an institution that has declared the Pope's views on theology to be infallible. Change within an infallible structure entails certain contradictions, but Catholics have been adept over the centuries at reconciling them. It isn't easy to tap dance your way around the fact that the church arrested Galileo for saying that the earth wasn't flat.
So the current Pope, having inherited the position that the Pope is infallible, needs to work his way around the fact that, according to the IHT article,
It remained strong in 1905, when Pope Pius X stated plainly: "Children who die without baptism go into limbo, where they do not enjoy God, but they do not suffer either."
The current Pope thinks Limbo was just an unofficial hypothesis. Pius X seemed to think it was pretty clear, but maybe it didn't come through the Latin that well. All in all, Catholics are in a difficult position compared with Protestants, who can start a fresh church for the cost of renting a large tent and who can select from among the Biblical phrases they like to produce a marketable product. Being Number One has its disadvantages as well as its advantages.
Take Limbo, that nifty solution to some of the hard edges of Christian theology. Nothing in the Bible suggests its existence, but the logic of original sin and redemption through Jesus brought the Catholic Church to a difficulty that it resolved by inventing a place that's not as nice as heaven but not as nasty as hell. Now, they are rethinking it.
All of this takes place within an institution that has declared the Pope's views on theology to be infallible. Change within an infallible structure entails certain contradictions, but Catholics have been adept over the centuries at reconciling them. It isn't easy to tap dance your way around the fact that the church arrested Galileo for saying that the earth wasn't flat.
So the current Pope, having inherited the position that the Pope is infallible, needs to work his way around the fact that, according to the IHT article,
The current Pope thinks Limbo was just an unofficial hypothesis. Pius X seemed to think it was pretty clear, but maybe it didn't come through the Latin that well. All in all, Catholics are in a difficult position compared with Protestants, who can start a fresh church for the cost of renting a large tent and who can select from among the Biblical phrases they like to produce a marketable product. Being Number One has its disadvantages as well as its advantages.
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
Why Col. Muhammed Wasif Taha matters
This morning's newspaper had the report that Col. Muhammed Wasif Taha, a well regarded military officer, had failed to win agreement from the Iraqi government to become the commander of a brigade responsible for some of the most sensitive security situations in Baghdad. The colonel is Sunni. The government is Shiite.
Colonel Taha is the choice of the Americans. From this, we can assume that his Baathist record is mild and his actions since the fall of Saddam impeccable. If this man cannot continue in his chosen profession because he is Sunni, then the message cannot possibly be lost on his coreligionists that there is no future for them in an Iraq governed democratically under the constitution that has been adopted. Their peaceful options are limited to deciding what to do with their time as they rot in futile impotence in the middle of a million acres of stinking desert. They will more likely opt for continued violence.
This analysis should not be mistaken for sympathy. The Sunnis are getting nothing worse, and generally much better, than the deal they parcelled out to the Shiites and Kurds when they held the whip hand. They have no moral basis for expecting anything better.
But this is an issue of realpolitik and morality has nothing to do with it. The United States has gotten itself into a situation where civil war is inevitable and nothing we can do (Juan Cole respectfully to the contrary notwithstanding) will prevent it or even materially retard it. Let's get out.
Colonel Taha is the choice of the Americans. From this, we can assume that his Baathist record is mild and his actions since the fall of Saddam impeccable. If this man cannot continue in his chosen profession because he is Sunni, then the message cannot possibly be lost on his coreligionists that there is no future for them in an Iraq governed democratically under the constitution that has been adopted. Their peaceful options are limited to deciding what to do with their time as they rot in futile impotence in the middle of a million acres of stinking desert. They will more likely opt for continued violence.
This analysis should not be mistaken for sympathy. The Sunnis are getting nothing worse, and generally much better, than the deal they parcelled out to the Shiites and Kurds when they held the whip hand. They have no moral basis for expecting anything better.
But this is an issue of realpolitik and morality has nothing to do with it. The United States has gotten itself into a situation where civil war is inevitable and nothing we can do (Juan Cole respectfully to the contrary notwithstanding) will prevent it or even materially retard it. Let's get out.
Sunday, December 25, 2005
Support for Intelligent Design from Dubai
It will doubtless comfort the ID enthusiasts that, despite their defeat in federal court and the near universal rejection of ID by real scientists, their views resonate in the archaic minds of the muslim world. Khaleej Times, the largest English language newspaper in the United Arab Emirates, asked editorial, "What's wrong with Intelligent Design?" They were unable to find anything.
I also found a letter to the editor, criticizing the paper for its extensive coverage of Elton John getting hitched to a man. The writer pointed out that this was a muslim family newspaper and it would be hard for parents to explain this stuff to their kids. Gee, Intelligent Design, homophobia. Maybe between Pat Robertson and the islamists there are only distinctions without differences.
I also found a letter to the editor, criticizing the paper for its extensive coverage of Elton John getting hitched to a man. The writer pointed out that this was a muslim family newspaper and it would be hard for parents to explain this stuff to their kids. Gee, Intelligent Design, homophobia. Maybe between Pat Robertson and the islamists there are only distinctions without differences.
Round and round we go again.
The Shiites in Iraq are unhappy about those who deny the validity of the election they just won. This shouldn't surprise anyone, but evidently some are easily shocked. The article includes the following:
But the Shiite religious bloc also deepened the post-election turmoil by claiming that Islamic extremists and Saddam Hussein loyalists were at the forefront of those questioning the results.
This seems odd. Those questioning the results are, with a few interesting additions, the political front men for the insurgency, which as Donald Rumsfeld has been assuring us consists of Islamic extremists and Saddam Hussein loyalists. Why does it add turmoil if the Shiites say the same?
The interesting additions are the "secular Shiites," who got their heads handed to them in the election. Somehow "secular Shiites" seems akin to "liberal Southern Baptists." There doubtless are some, but you aren't going to win elections appealing to them.
The United States keeps hoping that something good and democratic will emerge from the muslim countries of the Middle East. Our theory is that everyone yearns for democracy and that we can succeed if we simply "enable" these aspirations. In fact, you could gather all the truly pro-democratic Arab leaders in a phone booth. In both Iraq and Egypt, the struggle is between secular dictatorship and theocratic dictatorship. The remnants are mostly corrupt pro-Western CIA flacks.
Let's get out. The money we're spending militarily could be spent on technology to replace oil and we'd be way ahead of the game.
This seems odd. Those questioning the results are, with a few interesting additions, the political front men for the insurgency, which as Donald Rumsfeld has been assuring us consists of Islamic extremists and Saddam Hussein loyalists. Why does it add turmoil if the Shiites say the same?
The interesting additions are the "secular Shiites," who got their heads handed to them in the election. Somehow "secular Shiites" seems akin to "liberal Southern Baptists." There doubtless are some, but you aren't going to win elections appealing to them.
The United States keeps hoping that something good and democratic will emerge from the muslim countries of the Middle East. Our theory is that everyone yearns for democracy and that we can succeed if we simply "enable" these aspirations. In fact, you could gather all the truly pro-democratic Arab leaders in a phone booth. In both Iraq and Egypt, the struggle is between secular dictatorship and theocratic dictatorship. The remnants are mostly corrupt pro-Western CIA flacks.
Let's get out. The money we're spending militarily could be spent on technology to replace oil and we'd be way ahead of the game.
Saturday, December 24, 2005
The US Constitution Applies to Florence, Oregon
This may not seem like news to people from outside our area, but it has been the basis for a lawsuit that has just received a ruling in federal court. As background, a local Indian tribe has constructed a casino on the outskirts of Florence. The center of local opposition has been People Against a Casino Town (PACT).
PACT has tried various legal avenues to block the casino. The governing federal legislation is IGRA (Indian Gaming Regulation Act) and it requires the tribes to attempt to negotiate a compact with the state in which they will operate, which will determine certain intergovernmental protocols. Note that they are required to try, not to succeed. Oregon's governor negotiated such an agreement some years back.
The Oregon Constitution says that the legislature (and by extension the governor) must not permit a casino to operate in Oregon. PACT's remarkable position is that this means that the governor acted illegally by signing the compact.
Relations with Indians were ruled by the Supreme Court to belong exclusively to the federal government almost two centuries ago, so the position of the Oregon Constitution on casino gambling is moot. PACT, nevertheless, took it first to the Oregon Supreme Court, bypassing the ordinary lower court procedures, and were tossed out. When they started over at the appropriate level, they were told to take it to federal court instead.f
People with more sensitive minds would have seen a fatal problem at this moment. If the state courts, where issues of the Oregon Constitution are ordinarily resolved, didn't even see this as coming under their jurisdiction, that is just one step short of calling it frivolous. Undeterred, PACT took their case into the federal system and have just been told, unsurprisingly, that it is meritless.
A PACT spokesman said that they now have two options. One is to appeal again to the Oregon Supreme Court, another is to head to the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco. A third option leaps to mind. How about giving it up?
Oh, and to get back to an earlier point, should all of American jurisprudence since Independence be stood on its head and PACT prevail, it would mean that the local Indians would be under no obligation to deal with local governments at all, except under a compact which they would write and submit to the Secretary of the Interior for approval. IGRA is very clear that the failure of negotiations for a compact does not stop the casino. But people who are battling in court for a new Constitution would probably be hopeful about a new IGRA in the bargain. Who knows what they have in mind.
PACT has tried various legal avenues to block the casino. The governing federal legislation is IGRA (Indian Gaming Regulation Act) and it requires the tribes to attempt to negotiate a compact with the state in which they will operate, which will determine certain intergovernmental protocols. Note that they are required to try, not to succeed. Oregon's governor negotiated such an agreement some years back.
The Oregon Constitution says that the legislature (and by extension the governor) must not permit a casino to operate in Oregon. PACT's remarkable position is that this means that the governor acted illegally by signing the compact.
Relations with Indians were ruled by the Supreme Court to belong exclusively to the federal government almost two centuries ago, so the position of the Oregon Constitution on casino gambling is moot. PACT, nevertheless, took it first to the Oregon Supreme Court, bypassing the ordinary lower court procedures, and were tossed out. When they started over at the appropriate level, they were told to take it to federal court instead.f
People with more sensitive minds would have seen a fatal problem at this moment. If the state courts, where issues of the Oregon Constitution are ordinarily resolved, didn't even see this as coming under their jurisdiction, that is just one step short of calling it frivolous. Undeterred, PACT took their case into the federal system and have just been told, unsurprisingly, that it is meritless.
A PACT spokesman said that they now have two options. One is to appeal again to the Oregon Supreme Court, another is to head to the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco. A third option leaps to mind. How about giving it up?
Oh, and to get back to an earlier point, should all of American jurisprudence since Independence be stood on its head and PACT prevail, it would mean that the local Indians would be under no obligation to deal with local governments at all, except under a compact which they would write and submit to the Secretary of the Interior for approval. IGRA is very clear that the failure of negotiations for a compact does not stop the casino. But people who are battling in court for a new Constitution would probably be hopeful about a new IGRA in the bargain. Who knows what they have in mind.
Greatest Mideast Election Fraud? Get real!
The Sunnis and secular Shiites in Iraq are now claiming that the December 15 election was the greatest election fraud in the history of the Mideast. Really? What about the final election under Saddam, in which he got nearly 100% of the vote, in a process run by the same people who are now protesting.
Or Egypt? Where people were gunned down for trying to get to polling places. And where the main opposition leader has been jailed.
The story notes that:
Worst fraud in the history of the mideast? That's a rather high standard. This wouldn't even qualify as the worst election fraud in Patterson, New Jersey.
Or Egypt? Where people were gunned down for trying to get to polling places. And where the main opposition leader has been jailed.
The story notes that:
- Nur spent most of time in court instead of campaigning and lost his seat in his Bab Al-Shaaria stronghold in the first round.
"They announced my defeat on public television half an hour before the counting had even started," he said in an earlier interview.
Worst fraud in the history of the mideast? That's a rather high standard. This wouldn't even qualify as the worst election fraud in Patterson, New Jersey.
Thursday, December 22, 2005
Why Thomas Friedman and Juan Cole are both wrong.
Juan Cole seems to be pretty accurate in his analysis of the situation, past and present. I think his prescription for future action is wrong philosophically, although I can't argue with his critique of our options. Friedman is just wrong.
Friedman first. I can't seem to find his column online, but in this morning's newspaper, he argued that the jury is still out as we wait to see what sort of country the Iraqis voted for, united and compromising or splintered and confrontational. As Aaron Brown put it during Katrina, doesn't he watch television? Or read newspapers?
The vote divided on sectarian lines and tended to go strongly for religious lists. The secular candidates that the neocons hoped would do well were crushed. The hope was that Allawi and Chalabi would get 20% and 5%, respectively. Allawi is under 10% and Chalabi has dropped out of sight.
The Sunnis only have a negotiating position if they can obtain something by violence. Otherwise, they get a million acres of stinking desert as their patrimony. Civil war will continue and grow.
Cole sees this outcome, but thinks we have a moral obligation to keep it below the level of conflicts that were seen in the Balkans and Lebanon. I lack his deep knowledge of the region, so I won't contest the notion that if we leave, there will be a bloodbath. I am a little queasy about the minimal interference option, which Cole and Rep. Murtha seems to like, since it sounds a lot like Vietnamization.
Rather than trying to negotiate with the winners, the non-Kurd losers are complaining about fraud. Their concerns will be considered by an electoral commission controlled by the winners. Good luck!
I can't fathom why Friedman thinks another 6 months will be needed to sort out the results. The Kurds and Shiites won again. They have been winning consistently and they have no reason to give anything up. The promise to renegotiate was always a farce. They held and still hold all the cards.
Friedman first. I can't seem to find his column online, but in this morning's newspaper, he argued that the jury is still out as we wait to see what sort of country the Iraqis voted for, united and compromising or splintered and confrontational. As Aaron Brown put it during Katrina, doesn't he watch television? Or read newspapers?
The vote divided on sectarian lines and tended to go strongly for religious lists. The secular candidates that the neocons hoped would do well were crushed. The hope was that Allawi and Chalabi would get 20% and 5%, respectively. Allawi is under 10% and Chalabi has dropped out of sight.
The Sunnis only have a negotiating position if they can obtain something by violence. Otherwise, they get a million acres of stinking desert as their patrimony. Civil war will continue and grow.
Cole sees this outcome, but thinks we have a moral obligation to keep it below the level of conflicts that were seen in the Balkans and Lebanon. I lack his deep knowledge of the region, so I won't contest the notion that if we leave, there will be a bloodbath. I am a little queasy about the minimal interference option, which Cole and Rep. Murtha seems to like, since it sounds a lot like Vietnamization.
Rather than trying to negotiate with the winners, the non-Kurd losers are complaining about fraud. Their concerns will be considered by an electoral commission controlled by the winners. Good luck!
I can't fathom why Friedman thinks another 6 months will be needed to sort out the results. The Kurds and Shiites won again. They have been winning consistently and they have no reason to give anything up. The promise to renegotiate was always a farce. They held and still hold all the cards.
Monday, December 19, 2005
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's comments about Israel and the Holocaust
President Ahmadinejad has attempted to clarify his remarks about the Holocaust, but nobody seems to be listening. It's unfortunate that we have devoted to much attention to the word "myth" and not to his message. Since he spoke in Farsi, it's certain that he didn't use that word, and whatever he used could probably have been as easily translated as "legend." With that phrase, his position would have been easier to understand.
Those paying attention to both the original statement and the clarifications will note that Ahmadinejad is not saying that the Holocaust didn't happen. He used a word which was translated as "myth," but he is simply saying that it's been given a holy status above discussion. That's true. It may not be a bad thing, but it's true.
However, what he is strongly objecting to is the conclusion drawn from the Holocaust that the Jewish people deserved a homeland that would be carved out of Muslim lands, as a result of something inflicted on them by Europeans. That is the unexamined premise behind American, and to a lesser extent European, support for Israel.
Suppose for a minute that the Aztecs had lived a little farther north before being overwhelmed by the Spanish, and that after centuries of wandering, they had ended up in China. And that the Chinese, to compensate them for all their mistreatment in China, had decided that they should get Texas as a homeland. Would the Texans have been empathetic and understanding to the repatriated Aztecs? Have Muslims been empatetic and understanding to Israel? Are we surprised?
Those paying attention to both the original statement and the clarifications will note that Ahmadinejad is not saying that the Holocaust didn't happen. He used a word which was translated as "myth," but he is simply saying that it's been given a holy status above discussion. That's true. It may not be a bad thing, but it's true.
However, what he is strongly objecting to is the conclusion drawn from the Holocaust that the Jewish people deserved a homeland that would be carved out of Muslim lands, as a result of something inflicted on them by Europeans. That is the unexamined premise behind American, and to a lesser extent European, support for Israel.
Suppose for a minute that the Aztecs had lived a little farther north before being overwhelmed by the Spanish, and that after centuries of wandering, they had ended up in China. And that the Chinese, to compensate them for all their mistreatment in China, had decided that they should get Texas as a homeland. Would the Texans have been empathetic and understanding to the repatriated Aztecs? Have Muslims been empatetic and understanding to Israel? Are we surprised?
Hamas Wins Free Elections! Be careful what you ask for.
It seems that the Palestinians are leaning towards Hamas in municipal elections, and now the European Union is thinking about removing its financial support. The problem with democracy, which we keep saying we want to see springing up in the Middle East, is that the freely expressed will of such people may not correspond to America's announced interests.
What did we expect? Why are we surprised that Fatah, which exists on international welfare, should be corrupt and unresponsive to the needs of the Palestinians? We should also not be surprised that people welcome anti-corruption with a "law and order" theme.
Think Northern Ireland. Sinn Fein played a democratic role simultaneously with the IRA's violent role in the Troubles. Despite all the posturing, they were at the table and it was better to have them there.
Hamas has killed Israelis and announced its wish to obliterate Israel. The Likud has harbored politicians who wanted to obliterate Palestine and its founder and leader Ariel Sharon is deeply implicated in the Sabra and Chatila massacres. If the Palestinians can negotiate with Israel, nobody has the right to shun their chosen leaders, even if that turns out to be Hamas.
What did we expect? Why are we surprised that Fatah, which exists on international welfare, should be corrupt and unresponsive to the needs of the Palestinians? We should also not be surprised that people welcome anti-corruption with a "law and order" theme.
Think Northern Ireland. Sinn Fein played a democratic role simultaneously with the IRA's violent role in the Troubles. Despite all the posturing, they were at the table and it was better to have them there.
Hamas has killed Israelis and announced its wish to obliterate Israel. The Likud has harbored politicians who wanted to obliterate Palestine and its founder and leader Ariel Sharon is deeply implicated in the Sabra and Chatila massacres. If the Palestinians can negotiate with Israel, nobody has the right to shun their chosen leaders, even if that turns out to be Hamas.
Saturday, December 17, 2005
Southwest Airlines hasn't made me feel safer.
In the defense of the safety of the flying public, Southwest Airlines stopped a flight that was about to depart from Los Angeles because some wiseacre was joking with his friends about having a bomb. Everybody got off, the man was arrested, and the plane was searched. Nothing was found, but the guy is in deep doo-doo and will face serious consequences.
Do you feel safer because our airlines operate this way? If so, please join me in a mental experiment. Imagine a person who has decided to destroy an airplane in flight by bringing a bomb onto a flight which he himself will take. He is going to die along with everyone around him when, according to his intent and expectation, the bomb explodes. Do you have him in mind? Now, can you imagine him telling jokes about bombs after he's boarded the plane?
I can picture him sitting nervously, sweating profusely and not making eye contact. I can imagine, although I've never heard of an instance, of a terrorist changing his mind and confessing to a flight attendant. But joking?
During the last 10 million commercial flights within the United States, nobody has ever brought a bomb onboard and detonated it. A certain number of people have been detained for making remarks. Has any one of them ever been found to actually have brought one along? Not that I've ever heard.
But, you may say, all this security makes us feel safer. Safer than what? People in this country die from earthquakes, tornados and earthquakes. Roughly 80 people die in a typical year from being struck by lightning. These are real dangers, and I for one do not lose sleep over them.
Being on an airplane that has the bad luck to be selected by a dedicated and skillful bomber, one capable of evading security and ready to die to make his point, is a much lower probability than any of the above. I don't worry at all when I get on an airplane. If possible, I would worry even less if the guy in the next seat started joking about bombs.
Do you feel safer because our airlines operate this way? If so, please join me in a mental experiment. Imagine a person who has decided to destroy an airplane in flight by bringing a bomb onto a flight which he himself will take. He is going to die along with everyone around him when, according to his intent and expectation, the bomb explodes. Do you have him in mind? Now, can you imagine him telling jokes about bombs after he's boarded the plane?
I can picture him sitting nervously, sweating profusely and not making eye contact. I can imagine, although I've never heard of an instance, of a terrorist changing his mind and confessing to a flight attendant. But joking?
During the last 10 million commercial flights within the United States, nobody has ever brought a bomb onboard and detonated it. A certain number of people have been detained for making remarks. Has any one of them ever been found to actually have brought one along? Not that I've ever heard.
But, you may say, all this security makes us feel safer. Safer than what? People in this country die from earthquakes, tornados and earthquakes. Roughly 80 people die in a typical year from being struck by lightning. These are real dangers, and I for one do not lose sleep over them.
Being on an airplane that has the bad luck to be selected by a dedicated and skillful bomber, one capable of evading security and ready to die to make his point, is a much lower probability than any of the above. I don't worry at all when I get on an airplane. If possible, I would worry even less if the guy in the next seat started joking about bombs.
Iraq Elections - UIA wins or UIA doesn't win. Both bad.
At this point, it's not clear whether the UIA, the united front of the religious Shiite parties, will form the next government, but it's not likely that either option is going to work out for the United States.
Option one is they win. They are distinguishable from the Iranians, but there is a lot more in common between them and the ayatollahs in Tehran than between them and the United States. They will be inclined to tolerate a nuclear weapon program in Iran. They will disregard the rights of religious minorities to sin, i.e. to buy liquor or adopt Western standards of dress. They are going to prosecute the campaign of de-Baathification, which will keep the insurgency alive and well.
Option two is they lose. Remember that the Iraqi constitution has been adopted and for it to be modified, the Iraqi parliament must first approve the changes and then the Iraqi voters. It can be defeated by three provinces. Any effort to reduce the Shiite gains thus far made is going to fail.
I'm sure the UIA would love to run all of Iraq, but they already have what they most need, the right to establish regional control over the provinces with the most oil. As have the Kurds in their region.
So the only way the Sunnis can have a strong voice in the central government is if that government becomes irrelevant to the other two blocs. They have no voice or a voice that doesn't matter. Either way, civil war. You say tomato, ...
Option one is they win. They are distinguishable from the Iranians, but there is a lot more in common between them and the ayatollahs in Tehran than between them and the United States. They will be inclined to tolerate a nuclear weapon program in Iran. They will disregard the rights of religious minorities to sin, i.e. to buy liquor or adopt Western standards of dress. They are going to prosecute the campaign of de-Baathification, which will keep the insurgency alive and well.
Option two is they lose. Remember that the Iraqi constitution has been adopted and for it to be modified, the Iraqi parliament must first approve the changes and then the Iraqi voters. It can be defeated by three provinces. Any effort to reduce the Shiite gains thus far made is going to fail.
I'm sure the UIA would love to run all of Iraq, but they already have what they most need, the right to establish regional control over the provinces with the most oil. As have the Kurds in their region.
So the only way the Sunnis can have a strong voice in the central government is if that government becomes irrelevant to the other two blocs. They have no voice or a voice that doesn't matter. Either way, civil war. You say tomato, ...
Domestic Spying -- George Bush doesn't get it.
George Bush has acknowledged spying on US citizens but wants us to think it's OK because it's part of the War on Terror. That's not the point, as even members of his own party in the Senate are pointing out. It's the constitution, stupid.
There's a principle in the constitution that certain things cannot be done by the executive branch without the approval of at least some element of the judicial. Bush wants us to believe that because his tactics may have contributed to frustrating terrorist plans, he's on safe ground. However, there are virtually no restrictions on what he can do if he can convince a judge. I'm going to assume that the secret court established for just this purpose is not stacked with pro-ACLU types.
So if he isn't willing to run his decisions past even such a captive court, it raises serious questions about their merits. But more importantly, it's a precedent that cannot be allowed to stand. If Bush can do it, then a later President can do it, and not refer it to anyone except people in his own administration, appointed by him.
There are short-term dangers, like some fanatic islamist blowing up something or someone near and dear. There are long-term dangers, like subverting the institutions that have protected against governmental excess for over 200 years. Frankly, I'm more concerned about the long term.
There's a principle in the constitution that certain things cannot be done by the executive branch without the approval of at least some element of the judicial. Bush wants us to believe that because his tactics may have contributed to frustrating terrorist plans, he's on safe ground. However, there are virtually no restrictions on what he can do if he can convince a judge. I'm going to assume that the secret court established for just this purpose is not stacked with pro-ACLU types.
So if he isn't willing to run his decisions past even such a captive court, it raises serious questions about their merits. But more importantly, it's a precedent that cannot be allowed to stand. If Bush can do it, then a later President can do it, and not refer it to anyone except people in his own administration, appointed by him.
There are short-term dangers, like some fanatic islamist blowing up something or someone near and dear. There are long-term dangers, like subverting the institutions that have protected against governmental excess for over 200 years. Frankly, I'm more concerned about the long term.
Why are Italians so much smarter about medical costs?
John Kitzhaber, the former governor of Oregon, is seriously considering another run for the office. The foundation of his campaign, we are told, would be an effort to resolve Oregon's health care crisis, which is just a microcosm of the one national problem.
One of the points he is making is that we could probably cobble together about $2000 per person in Oregon through existing government expenditures, between actual expenses and tax breaks for medical insurance. That's about the amount Italy spends per capita to provide health care for all its citizens, with better health outcomes than we have in America.
I just saw a doctor about a problem and was given a prescription. I think it's a fairly new drug and it seems to be helping. A few years ago, it would not have been available. If I knew what it was costing and was paying out of pocket, I would consider whether the new drug was enough better than the old ones, or none at all, to be worth the price.
But since I have health insurance that includes prescriptions, I don't face that choice. If I decide to be frugal, the beneficiary will be my insurance company. Next year, my decision will be averaged statistically over everyone, both frugal and indulgent, to calculate the undoubtedly higher premiums that companies will pay.
The American system combines the bad aspects of private enterprise and socialism. The health care industry has little incentive to control costs, since they will be recouped from almost everyone, and in fact a doctor who prescribes less than the best may get sued, even if the increment is not worth the cost. Congress recently exacerbated the situation by denying states the right to insist on cheaper and nearly equivalent mental health drugs.
A single payer system would control some of the waste, but when it went on the ballot in Oregon, it was crushed. We need single payer and also a change in attitude. Everyone deserves a basic level of health care. For things that are optional, consumers should understand the costs and bear them personally. I'm not optimistic that we can achieve that in Oregon or anywhere else.
One of the points he is making is that we could probably cobble together about $2000 per person in Oregon through existing government expenditures, between actual expenses and tax breaks for medical insurance. That's about the amount Italy spends per capita to provide health care for all its citizens, with better health outcomes than we have in America.
I just saw a doctor about a problem and was given a prescription. I think it's a fairly new drug and it seems to be helping. A few years ago, it would not have been available. If I knew what it was costing and was paying out of pocket, I would consider whether the new drug was enough better than the old ones, or none at all, to be worth the price.
But since I have health insurance that includes prescriptions, I don't face that choice. If I decide to be frugal, the beneficiary will be my insurance company. Next year, my decision will be averaged statistically over everyone, both frugal and indulgent, to calculate the undoubtedly higher premiums that companies will pay.
The American system combines the bad aspects of private enterprise and socialism. The health care industry has little incentive to control costs, since they will be recouped from almost everyone, and in fact a doctor who prescribes less than the best may get sued, even if the increment is not worth the cost. Congress recently exacerbated the situation by denying states the right to insist on cheaper and nearly equivalent mental health drugs.
A single payer system would control some of the waste, but when it went on the ballot in Oregon, it was crushed. We need single payer and also a change in attitude. Everyone deserves a basic level of health care. For things that are optional, consumers should understand the costs and bear them personally. I'm not optimistic that we can achieve that in Oregon or anywhere else.
Thursday, December 15, 2005
How Determines US Policy Towards Cuba?
That's what people want to know when I talk to them in places like Canada and India. They're curious how it's possible for the United States, which talks to North Korea about assistance without regime change while keeping a multi-decade embargo against Cuba, to be so out of step with the rest of the world.
The answer is simple. The most adamant opponents of Castro are Cuban expatriates in Miami. They are so vocal and united that they can influence the outcome of national elections in Florida. Florida has enough importance to swing the nation. With so much in the balance, it's much easier to accommodate them than confront them, so the mild wishes of the majority are subordinated to the vocal demands of a minority.
Nowhere could this be plainer than in the fiasco of the international baseball championships, which the Bush administration now intends to prevent Cuba from participating in. As offensives go, it may not compete with the Bay of Pigs, but it to almost everyone except the Miami Cubans and Rupert Murdoch, it must look pretty silly.
How long are we going to continue this farce? There isn't a country in the world of any consequence that supports our embargo. The universal feeling outside the United States, and the majority feeling outside Miami, is that Castro is a doddering dictator in clearly declining health whose regime will probably not survive his death. This will be good news for Cubans, although they are not likely to open their doors to the exiles and return their lost possessions.
Apart from assassination, there is precious little the US can do to hasten that day. We may even be helping to prop him up. Nothing better for someone with domestic problems than to have a foreign adversary to point to.
Republicans frequently deride the roles that "special interests" play in Democratic Party politics. I guess they have granted a special exemption to Miami Cubans.
The answer is simple. The most adamant opponents of Castro are Cuban expatriates in Miami. They are so vocal and united that they can influence the outcome of national elections in Florida. Florida has enough importance to swing the nation. With so much in the balance, it's much easier to accommodate them than confront them, so the mild wishes of the majority are subordinated to the vocal demands of a minority.
Nowhere could this be plainer than in the fiasco of the international baseball championships, which the Bush administration now intends to prevent Cuba from participating in. As offensives go, it may not compete with the Bay of Pigs, but it to almost everyone except the Miami Cubans and Rupert Murdoch, it must look pretty silly.
How long are we going to continue this farce? There isn't a country in the world of any consequence that supports our embargo. The universal feeling outside the United States, and the majority feeling outside Miami, is that Castro is a doddering dictator in clearly declining health whose regime will probably not survive his death. This will be good news for Cubans, although they are not likely to open their doors to the exiles and return their lost possessions.
Apart from assassination, there is precious little the US can do to hasten that day. We may even be helping to prop him up. Nothing better for someone with domestic problems than to have a foreign adversary to point to.
Republicans frequently deride the roles that "special interests" play in Democratic Party politics. I guess they have granted a special exemption to Miami Cubans.
Sunday, November 20, 2005
The Smoking Gun
The International Herald Tribune did a piece on the Congressional "debate" over Iraq withdrawal that included the following quote:
But Kingston [Representative Jack Kingston of Georgia] said Republicans forced the vote out of frustration with Democratic tactics. "We had just had it with Democrats running around saying President Bush lied. It was time for us to call their bluff," he said.
Remember Watergate. Up to the end, Republicans in Congress were saying that no one had found the "smoking gun." Then as now, the landscape was littered with bullet-riddled bodies, spent cartridges, and the smell of gunsmoke, but there were then, as there apparently are now, those who would dispute the sufficiency of the evidence.
What do they need? The LA Times is now reporting that German intelligence people, five of them, all confirm that Berlin warned Washington not to believe "Curveball," the Iraqi source who dreamed up some of the later discredited claims about Saddam's WMD.
Like Watergate, we have the original events and we have the coverup of those events. Bush is still telling the American people that all the world's intelligence services joined him in being wrong about Iraq. Clearly not true and three years after the fact, Bush knows it now whether he did at the time or not.
This comes under the heading of "everything I needed to know I learned in kindergarten." It's not true and he knows it, but he says it anyway. That's called lying. President Bush lied about when he persuaded us that an invasion of Iraq was necessary. He is lying now about whether he lied about Iraq then. Mr. Kingston, you need to come to terms with that.
But Kingston [Representative Jack Kingston of Georgia] said Republicans forced the vote out of frustration with Democratic tactics. "We had just had it with Democrats running around saying President Bush lied. It was time for us to call their bluff," he said.
Remember Watergate. Up to the end, Republicans in Congress were saying that no one had found the "smoking gun." Then as now, the landscape was littered with bullet-riddled bodies, spent cartridges, and the smell of gunsmoke, but there were then, as there apparently are now, those who would dispute the sufficiency of the evidence.
What do they need? The LA Times is now reporting that German intelligence people, five of them, all confirm that Berlin warned Washington not to believe "Curveball," the Iraqi source who dreamed up some of the later discredited claims about Saddam's WMD.
Like Watergate, we have the original events and we have the coverup of those events. Bush is still telling the American people that all the world's intelligence services joined him in being wrong about Iraq. Clearly not true and three years after the fact, Bush knows it now whether he did at the time or not.
This comes under the heading of "everything I needed to know I learned in kindergarten." It's not true and he knows it, but he says it anyway. That's called lying. President Bush lied about when he persuaded us that an invasion of Iraq was necessary. He is lying now about whether he lied about Iraq then. Mr. Kingston, you need to come to terms with that.
Saturday, November 19, 2005
At long last, have you no shame?
Mark Twain said, as best I can recall, "Suppose I was a member of Congress. Suppose I was an idiot. Ah, but I repeat myself."
The Republican vote on Iraq hits a new depth. I'm sick. Not a political ploy, says Rep. Hunter, who introduced the resolution and intended from the start to vote against it. A legitimate question, he says. Has he never heard of the phrase, putting words in other people's mouths? How can there be a debate on a resolution that both sides oppose?
Three members voted in favor anyway. Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution? It passed the senate 98-2. Wayne Morse and Ernest Gruening were the only two senators who voted no. This resolution went down 3-403. Some day we may remember those three.
The Republican vote on Iraq hits a new depth. I'm sick. Not a political ploy, says Rep. Hunter, who introduced the resolution and intended from the start to vote against it. A legitimate question, he says. Has he never heard of the phrase, putting words in other people's mouths? How can there be a debate on a resolution that both sides oppose?
Three members voted in favor anyway. Does anyone remember the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution? It passed the senate 98-2. Wayne Morse and Ernest Gruening were the only two senators who voted no. This resolution went down 3-403. Some day we may remember those three.
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
Shiites torturing Sunnis -- Why didn't anybody look?
The important thing about the newly uncovered Iraqi torture centers is not that they existed, which was almost predictable, but that they were discovered by accident by people who weren't looking for them.
Reuters is reporting that not only were people being tortured, but they were being released back into society. Evidently, the Iraqi Interior folks weren't too worried about being found out, or the consequences if they were. A quote from the story:
Sunni politician Omar Hujail, of the Iraqi Islamic Party, said it was not the only place where Sunni Arabs were held and tortured. "We have been telling them for ages that there are people wearing the uniforms of the interior ministry raiding houses at night and arresting people but everybody denied it."
There now isn't much doubt that the Sunnis were generally right. There may be questions about specific stories, but not the general outline. Several questions arise immediately.
Why weren't the people doing the torturing worried about letting torturees back out? Obviously, they were going to tell people. Sunnis would be outraged. Did these people care? Did they ever conceive of a society in which Sunnis would be able to take such grievances into a judicial system and get fair treatment. Obviously not. And just as obviously, the Sunnis have known so, which is why they don't believe this "constitution" is going to do anything to protect them.
But this is only surprising to those Americans who have believed for two and a half years that things were going to somehow work out. We can't do much about it. But as Americans, we ought to consider this. We are spending conservatively $50 billion on this war per year, not counting its unbudgeted aftermath. We have an intelligence establishment that sucks up $30 billion or more. It may be $40 billion, but let's use 30 to avoid arguments. The primary mission for that $30 billion should be to learn whether things are going properly in our expenditure of $50 billion to execute the war.
Yet, if they knew, they didn't tell us. We have two possibilities. They didn't know, in which case we should send all our overpaid spooks home and devote the $30 billion to deficit reduction. In the past, they have made excuses about not being able to find where Saddam had WMD in a country the size of Texas (or Alaska or California, I don't recall). But this place was in the ministry's compound in Baghdad. Not hard to find. People were reporting the stuff in the popular press. Not hard to get a lead.
The second possibility is more likely. We knew. How could we not know? We have satellites that can show a man reading a newspaper and this could have escaped our notice? Not damned likely.
So if we knew and didn't stop it, why? Surely not because we thought this was a good way to reconcile the Sunnis. The only explanation is that we have lost all control over this government, we know it and they know it, and we're just hoping like hell that something turns out right and we can leave.
Reuters is reporting that not only were people being tortured, but they were being released back into society. Evidently, the Iraqi Interior folks weren't too worried about being found out, or the consequences if they were. A quote from the story:
There now isn't much doubt that the Sunnis were generally right. There may be questions about specific stories, but not the general outline. Several questions arise immediately.
Why weren't the people doing the torturing worried about letting torturees back out? Obviously, they were going to tell people. Sunnis would be outraged. Did these people care? Did they ever conceive of a society in which Sunnis would be able to take such grievances into a judicial system and get fair treatment. Obviously not. And just as obviously, the Sunnis have known so, which is why they don't believe this "constitution" is going to do anything to protect them.
But this is only surprising to those Americans who have believed for two and a half years that things were going to somehow work out. We can't do much about it. But as Americans, we ought to consider this. We are spending conservatively $50 billion on this war per year, not counting its unbudgeted aftermath. We have an intelligence establishment that sucks up $30 billion or more. It may be $40 billion, but let's use 30 to avoid arguments. The primary mission for that $30 billion should be to learn whether things are going properly in our expenditure of $50 billion to execute the war.
Yet, if they knew, they didn't tell us. We have two possibilities. They didn't know, in which case we should send all our overpaid spooks home and devote the $30 billion to deficit reduction. In the past, they have made excuses about not being able to find where Saddam had WMD in a country the size of Texas (or Alaska or California, I don't recall). But this place was in the ministry's compound in Baghdad. Not hard to find. People were reporting the stuff in the popular press. Not hard to get a lead.
The second possibility is more likely. We knew. How could we not know? We have satellites that can show a man reading a newspaper and this could have escaped our notice? Not damned likely.
So if we knew and didn't stop it, why? Surely not because we thought this was a good way to reconcile the Sunnis. The only explanation is that we have lost all control over this government, we know it and they know it, and we're just hoping like hell that something turns out right and we can leave.
Monday, November 14, 2005
Whether Saddam had WMD was never the question.
President George W. Bush wants us to believe that since a great many people considered Saddam likely to have WMD in the winter of 2003, those people must have agreed with his rationale for war. Now that is rewriting history.
Looking back at the evidence, much of it still available on the Web for anyone who cares to look, it seems clear that the majority opinion in January 2003 was that Saddam had some WMD somewhere in Iraq. It also looks as though that opinion was eroding as the weeks passed and nothing was found. However, there's no getting around the fact that many people thought he had them. Looking at his archives, Juan Cole, hardly a fan of the war, appears to be saying that not finding WMD, although possible and worth considering, was still speculation.
What separated George W. Bush from most of the rest of the world's leaders at the time was his willingness to invade a sovereign nation based on hunches. As his supporters keep saying, this is a global war on terror and what better idea do you have?
In an active Washington Post blog this morning, a number of people took up that challenge. Finding Osama bin Laden, fixing Afghanistan, etc. Personally, I don't know about either of those. My guess is that Osama is semi-retired. We give him too much credit if we think he can pull a lot of strings from a location in Pakistan which, almost by definition since we can't find it, has no modern communications. Dead or alive, who cares? And while reconstructing Afghanistan may be an admirable goal, I don't see that worldwide terror has risen because we haven't.
But the question posed a false challenge. Are opponents of the war obliged to devise more effective positive actions? I don't think the alternatives mentioned were really dependent on Iraq. For instance, we haven't found bin Laden because we haven't invaded Pakistan to find him. The reasons not to do so are the same with or without Iraq.
The alternative to invading Iraq was not finding bin Laden. The alternative to invading Iraq was not invading Iraq. It was clear how we could contain his threat; ongoing inspections. We would have done just as well in preventing terror attacks, probably better, and it would have been a lot cheaper than half a trillion dollars.
Looking back at the evidence, much of it still available on the Web for anyone who cares to look, it seems clear that the majority opinion in January 2003 was that Saddam had some WMD somewhere in Iraq. It also looks as though that opinion was eroding as the weeks passed and nothing was found. However, there's no getting around the fact that many people thought he had them. Looking at his archives, Juan Cole, hardly a fan of the war, appears to be saying that not finding WMD, although possible and worth considering, was still speculation.
What separated George W. Bush from most of the rest of the world's leaders at the time was his willingness to invade a sovereign nation based on hunches. As his supporters keep saying, this is a global war on terror and what better idea do you have?
In an active Washington Post blog this morning, a number of people took up that challenge. Finding Osama bin Laden, fixing Afghanistan, etc. Personally, I don't know about either of those. My guess is that Osama is semi-retired. We give him too much credit if we think he can pull a lot of strings from a location in Pakistan which, almost by definition since we can't find it, has no modern communications. Dead or alive, who cares? And while reconstructing Afghanistan may be an admirable goal, I don't see that worldwide terror has risen because we haven't.
But the question posed a false challenge. Are opponents of the war obliged to devise more effective positive actions? I don't think the alternatives mentioned were really dependent on Iraq. For instance, we haven't found bin Laden because we haven't invaded Pakistan to find him. The reasons not to do so are the same with or without Iraq.
The alternative to invading Iraq was not finding bin Laden. The alternative to invading Iraq was not invading Iraq. It was clear how we could contain his threat; ongoing inspections. We would have done just as well in preventing terror attacks, probably better, and it would have been a lot cheaper than half a trillion dollars.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
The Arab League solves Iraq? Not likely.
Milton Viorst, writing today in the International Herald Tribune, suggests that we might get ourselves out of Iraq with the assistance of the Arab League. He cites the "successful" end of the Lebanese civil war in the late 80's as evidence that it can be done.
Dream on! The most intractable problem working against a peaceful, united Iraq is Kurdistan. The Kurds are not Arabs. They are distinctly unhappy with having been kept in an Arab-dominated country, so they are most unlikely to view the Arab League as a legitimate power broker. It seems necessary to say this over and over; they have what they want, which is de facto separation, and they have the military means to retain it. There is never again going to be a united Iraq with the Kurds accepting "majority rule" over more than some nominal aspect of their life.
Andrew Sullivan has the bright idea that all we need is to "seal the borders" with Syria and Iran. The administration officials with whom he speaks say it can't be done, but Sullivan knows better. He knows this, we presume, based on the vast expertise in military operations that he developed as an editor of the New Republic. We have a gung-ho military in this country, and when they say they can't do something, I'm inclined to credit them.
The pattern, however, is familiar. When people talk us into a war that we're supposed to be able to win easily, and then we can't, they start to say that all we need to do is X. This doesn't mean that X is their final demand. If we did X and it was not enough, they would tell us that all we needed was Y. Or Z. Always something more.
Then when the dust settles, they'll pontificate that we lost the war because we didn't have the "will to win." It's an intellectually bankrupt strategy, harking back to Vietnam.
Speaking of Vietnam, Sullivan shares with us the news from Iraq that our troops are happy and confident, based in part on a 20:1 kill ratio. General Westmoreland must be turning in his grave. Twenty to one was roughly what we achieved in Vietnam. Which was a victory, right?
Dream on! The most intractable problem working against a peaceful, united Iraq is Kurdistan. The Kurds are not Arabs. They are distinctly unhappy with having been kept in an Arab-dominated country, so they are most unlikely to view the Arab League as a legitimate power broker. It seems necessary to say this over and over; they have what they want, which is de facto separation, and they have the military means to retain it. There is never again going to be a united Iraq with the Kurds accepting "majority rule" over more than some nominal aspect of their life.
Andrew Sullivan has the bright idea that all we need is to "seal the borders" with Syria and Iran. The administration officials with whom he speaks say it can't be done, but Sullivan knows better. He knows this, we presume, based on the vast expertise in military operations that he developed as an editor of the New Republic. We have a gung-ho military in this country, and when they say they can't do something, I'm inclined to credit them.
The pattern, however, is familiar. When people talk us into a war that we're supposed to be able to win easily, and then we can't, they start to say that all we need to do is X. This doesn't mean that X is their final demand. If we did X and it was not enough, they would tell us that all we needed was Y. Or Z. Always something more.
Then when the dust settles, they'll pontificate that we lost the war because we didn't have the "will to win." It's an intellectually bankrupt strategy, harking back to Vietnam.
Speaking of Vietnam, Sullivan shares with us the news from Iraq that our troops are happy and confident, based in part on a 20:1 kill ratio. General Westmoreland must be turning in his grave. Twenty to one was roughly what we achieved in Vietnam. Which was a victory, right?
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Pat Robertson Warns Dover, Pennsylvania
The word has come from Pat Robertson that Dover had better look out. They've voted out the pro-creationism (masquerading as Intelligent Design) school board members and God is pissed. As Robertson put it, "God is tolerant and loving, but we can't keep sticking our finger in his eye forever."
In other words, God is tolerant and loving but not infinitely tolerant and loving. Dunno. That sounds to me like it's starting down a slippery theological slope.
On a more practical note, Robertson is ripping away the fig leaf that Intelligent Design was anything except an effort to introduce Christian theology into public schools. If it weren't, why would he be invoking the wrath of God? It was rather funny when one of the defeated pro-ID board members said that the issue had absolutely nothing to do with religion and that this was merely a misconception on the part of its opponents.
In other words, God is tolerant and loving but not infinitely tolerant and loving. Dunno. That sounds to me like it's starting down a slippery theological slope.
On a more practical note, Robertson is ripping away the fig leaf that Intelligent Design was anything except an effort to introduce Christian theology into public schools. If it weren't, why would he be invoking the wrath of God? It was rather funny when one of the defeated pro-ID board members said that the issue had absolutely nothing to do with religion and that this was merely a misconception on the part of its opponents.
Sunday, November 06, 2005
Indian Congress is Corrupt! This is News?
The Volcker Report on the Iraq Food-for-Oil program has discovered that high officials in India profited privately from arrangements that also benefited Saddam Hussein personally in ways not envisioned when the program was established. The foreign minister Natwar Singh seems to be singled out.
The foreign press is understandably isn't paying much attention to this. Everyone in India knows that Congress is corrupt, top to bottom, stem to stern, except for a few unrepresentative individuals. The only reason that this is a big story in India is that it comes from sources that are going to be difficult to impeach. Not that they won't try. Narwar Singh's response has been to attack Volcker and the UN, and wrap himself in the Congress' history in the Independence movement.
It would have been astounding if a program like this had not involved corruption. Corruption is the standard modus operandi throughout the world. Billions of dollars were moving around either through official government channels or with government approval, and in much of the world there simply wouldn't be non-corrupt options available.
Relatively clean and efficient government is a very recent phenomenon and is still limited to the nations with advanced economies. And not uniformly even there, as we are likely to discover as investigations of the New Orleans levees bring things to light.
The foreign press is understandably isn't paying much attention to this. Everyone in India knows that Congress is corrupt, top to bottom, stem to stern, except for a few unrepresentative individuals. The only reason that this is a big story in India is that it comes from sources that are going to be difficult to impeach. Not that they won't try. Narwar Singh's response has been to attack Volcker and the UN, and wrap himself in the Congress' history in the Independence movement.
It would have been astounding if a program like this had not involved corruption. Corruption is the standard modus operandi throughout the world. Billions of dollars were moving around either through official government channels or with government approval, and in much of the world there simply wouldn't be non-corrupt options available.
Relatively clean and efficient government is a very recent phenomenon and is still limited to the nations with advanced economies. And not uniformly even there, as we are likely to discover as investigations of the New Orleans levees bring things to light.
Saturday, November 05, 2005
Why the Pakistan Earthquake Doesn't Move Us
President Musharraf is reported in the Statesman to be ready to slow down the purchase of F-16 fighters from the U.S. in order to handle relief and reconstruction after the earthquake. He had been planning to buy 75 planes for $3 billion, which works out to $40 million each. Our government says this is OK, because Pakistan is our ally in the war on terror.
F-16's in the war on terror? What exactly does that mean? The only possible threat for which such aircraft would be appropriate would be India. China at the outside. Certainly not Osama bin Laden.
But leaving aside the question of how Pakistan spends its own meager resources, it does appear that the world is not rushing to send aid. I can think of many reasons. One is that the Indonesian tsunami victims included Westerners. No doubt about it. We are more sympathetic when our fellow countrymen are involved. Call it racist or whatever, but it's a fact of human nature.
But I think there are two other factors in play. One is the sense from westerners that maybe the Arabs should take care of this one. The amount by which the price of oil exceeds the prices which OPEC says it would like to see (although that itself seems to be climbing upwards) is at least $20/barrel. Nearly the entire amount that the UN is trying to obtain could be provided by OPEC with the excess earnings it receives in one day.
But the other is that Pakistan simply doesn't present a sympathetic picture. George Bush may regard Pakistan as an ally, but ordinary people watching TV aren't going to see that. Osama is still probably hiding out in Pakistan. The country doesn't protect its own women from gang rapes "for honor." Its Shiites and Sunnis attack one another in their mosques. In the midst all this, Pakistan-based terrorists killed dozens of innocent civilians in Delhi.
I think I reflect the views of a lot of people when I say I just don't especially like these people. Anyone with a hundred million odd citizens must be dealt with, but except by the most cynical calculations, Pakistan is not an ally of Western nations, the ones who have kept their wallets largely shut after this disaster.
Having said that, cynical calculations are appropriate for foreign policy decisions and one should be made here. We are flushing billions through Iraq as we try to win their hearts and minds. For a few hundred million, we could ensure that the Pakistani countryside is littered with cartons reading, "aid provided by the American people," for years to come. The illusion that American care about the sufferings of ordinary Pakistanis, even if untrue, would bring our country more lasting benefit than blasting flat a dozen intransigent Fallujahs. Cheaper, too.
F-16's in the war on terror? What exactly does that mean? The only possible threat for which such aircraft would be appropriate would be India. China at the outside. Certainly not Osama bin Laden.
But leaving aside the question of how Pakistan spends its own meager resources, it does appear that the world is not rushing to send aid. I can think of many reasons. One is that the Indonesian tsunami victims included Westerners. No doubt about it. We are more sympathetic when our fellow countrymen are involved. Call it racist or whatever, but it's a fact of human nature.
But I think there are two other factors in play. One is the sense from westerners that maybe the Arabs should take care of this one. The amount by which the price of oil exceeds the prices which OPEC says it would like to see (although that itself seems to be climbing upwards) is at least $20/barrel. Nearly the entire amount that the UN is trying to obtain could be provided by OPEC with the excess earnings it receives in one day.
But the other is that Pakistan simply doesn't present a sympathetic picture. George Bush may regard Pakistan as an ally, but ordinary people watching TV aren't going to see that. Osama is still probably hiding out in Pakistan. The country doesn't protect its own women from gang rapes "for honor." Its Shiites and Sunnis attack one another in their mosques. In the midst all this, Pakistan-based terrorists killed dozens of innocent civilians in Delhi.
I think I reflect the views of a lot of people when I say I just don't especially like these people. Anyone with a hundred million odd citizens must be dealt with, but except by the most cynical calculations, Pakistan is not an ally of Western nations, the ones who have kept their wallets largely shut after this disaster.
Having said that, cynical calculations are appropriate for foreign policy decisions and one should be made here. We are flushing billions through Iraq as we try to win their hearts and minds. For a few hundred million, we could ensure that the Pakistani countryside is littered with cartons reading, "aid provided by the American people," for years to come. The illusion that American care about the sufferings of ordinary Pakistanis, even if untrue, would bring our country more lasting benefit than blasting flat a dozen intransigent Fallujahs. Cheaper, too.
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
We're getting better in Iraq, says the Pentagon
The New York Times reported today that the October death toll for Americans in Iraq was 92, the fourth highest on record. Most deaths are roadside bombs these days, which the insurgents have become much more adroit at producing. That's true, say the military spokesmen, but don't worry. We're getting better at countering this threat.
Let's do a reality check. If we're getting better at this, why are we losing more soldiers. If we're being successful in disrupting the influx of foreign fighters, why are there just as many of them. If we've pacified Fallujah, why can't we enter the city except in armored vehicles? If we've broken the back of the insurgency, why are they still standing. If they are in their final throes, ...
This is starting to sound all too reminiscent of Viet Nam.
Let's do a reality check. If we're getting better at this, why are we losing more soldiers. If we're being successful in disrupting the influx of foreign fighters, why are there just as many of them. If we've pacified Fallujah, why can't we enter the city except in armored vehicles? If we've broken the back of the insurgency, why are they still standing. If they are in their final throes, ...
This is starting to sound all too reminiscent of Viet Nam.
Monday, October 31, 2005
Samuel Alito -- Worth a fight?
I'm torn on this one. Alito is on record supporting legislation that requires a woman to inform her husband if she wants an abortion. The logic is other worldly, much as it was when the Supreme Court ruled a century ago in Plessy v. Ferguson that "separate but equal" facilities should not be viewed as reflecting badly on Negroes. Such a view was simply a misconception in the minds of non-whites.
By that reasoning, we could suppose that there's no real harm in expecting a woman to tell her husband that she wants an abortion. In some fantasy world, that may be true. In fact, many husbands were not educated at Princeton and Yale and would beat the crap out of their wives if they heard such a suggestion. Either a woman has a right to privacy and control of her body during the first trimester, or she doesn't. If she doesn't, then Roe v. Wade starts to look like a dead letter.
Of even greater concern to me, as a resident of Oregon, is the prospect of the court overturning Oregon's Right to Die legislation. You can argue that a woman who "needs" an abortion does so as a result of her own decision sometime earlier. You can't say the same about someone who is wasting away from colon cancer. There is no innocent third party. It's a straightforward question of whether the federal government can interfere in his end-of-life decision.
Alito deserves to a hearing. I'm going to be much more interested in his views on other privacy issues than just abortion.
By that reasoning, we could suppose that there's no real harm in expecting a woman to tell her husband that she wants an abortion. In some fantasy world, that may be true. In fact, many husbands were not educated at Princeton and Yale and would beat the crap out of their wives if they heard such a suggestion. Either a woman has a right to privacy and control of her body during the first trimester, or she doesn't. If she doesn't, then Roe v. Wade starts to look like a dead letter.
Of even greater concern to me, as a resident of Oregon, is the prospect of the court overturning Oregon's Right to Die legislation. You can argue that a woman who "needs" an abortion does so as a result of her own decision sometime earlier. You can't say the same about someone who is wasting away from colon cancer. There is no innocent third party. It's a straightforward question of whether the federal government can interfere in his end-of-life decision.
Alito deserves to a hearing. I'm going to be much more interested in his views on other privacy issues than just abortion.
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Progress on the Iraqi Constitution - Square Zero
The constitution has passed. What exactly has been demonstrated? The Kurds want out and if you give them a constitution that confirms what Peter Galbraith says has already happened, namely that they're out, they will be happy. We've always known that.
The Kurds insisted on a provision that prevented an arab coalition against their interests before the constitution writing process even began. The only reason why the Shiites wanted strong central government was to exercise control over Kurdish resources. Without Kurdish resources, strong central government means simply sharing the remainder, the arab patrimony, with the Sunnis. With the Kurds having set the precedent, the Shiites now see regionalism as the facade behind which to grab the maximum possible portion of what the Kurds didn't take.
So naturally, the Kurds and Shiites support the new constitution. Naturally, the Sunni arabs reject it. The vote seems to have been massively along sectarian lines, possibly at the 90% level or more. It certainly appears that the last-minute effort to obtain support from Sunni leaders was wasted, except from the standpoint of the those who got well paid for participating in the charade.
The details of intra-faction politics have not been resolved, since the constitution is generally vague and platitudinous. Whether the Shiites will govern themselves with secular or theocratic rule is unclear, although it's ominous that the Iranians are so happy.
For the Sunnis, this is now a full-fledged farce. Participate in the parliamentary elections, we say. They know they're being given a knife and told to join a gunfight. They know that the more the Shiites become accustomed to operating the levers of power, the bleaker their prospects become. Time is not on their side.
As a practical matter, political compromise only occurs when both sides want something from the other. The political calculus put in place by this constitution leaves the Sunnis with nothing to bargain with, hence no realistic motivation to give peace a chance. These are not fools. The insurgency is an assertion of Sunni vital interests and it isn't going to slow down to let the current version of democracy work.
The Kurds insisted on a provision that prevented an arab coalition against their interests before the constitution writing process even began. The only reason why the Shiites wanted strong central government was to exercise control over Kurdish resources. Without Kurdish resources, strong central government means simply sharing the remainder, the arab patrimony, with the Sunnis. With the Kurds having set the precedent, the Shiites now see regionalism as the facade behind which to grab the maximum possible portion of what the Kurds didn't take.
So naturally, the Kurds and Shiites support the new constitution. Naturally, the Sunni arabs reject it. The vote seems to have been massively along sectarian lines, possibly at the 90% level or more. It certainly appears that the last-minute effort to obtain support from Sunni leaders was wasted, except from the standpoint of the those who got well paid for participating in the charade.
The details of intra-faction politics have not been resolved, since the constitution is generally vague and platitudinous. Whether the Shiites will govern themselves with secular or theocratic rule is unclear, although it's ominous that the Iranians are so happy.
For the Sunnis, this is now a full-fledged farce. Participate in the parliamentary elections, we say. They know they're being given a knife and told to join a gunfight. They know that the more the Shiites become accustomed to operating the levers of power, the bleaker their prospects become. Time is not on their side.
As a practical matter, political compromise only occurs when both sides want something from the other. The political calculus put in place by this constitution leaves the Sunnis with nothing to bargain with, hence no realistic motivation to give peace a chance. These are not fools. The insurgency is an assertion of Sunni vital interests and it isn't going to slow down to let the current version of democracy work.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Florida and Pakistan
Wilma will probably prove to have been a significant event in Cancun, when the skies finally clear and we get a look, but the impact in Florida will be minimal despite a tense and extremely well reported week of anticipation. Nevertheless, Homeland Security's FEMA division is scurrying everywhere to prove they're on the job this time.
Meanwhile, in Pakistan, winter approaches and hundreds of thousands are homeless. We have responded but others have done more and for the world's largest economy, it hasn't been much of an effort.
The security of the homeland would become much easier if the image of the United States as a self-absorbed bully could be replaced with something positive. The Pakistan earthquake gave our country an opportunity to make that country less receptive to Osama's message of hate, but we seem to be letting it slip away. Higher priorities, it seems.
Meanwhile, in Pakistan, winter approaches and hundreds of thousands are homeless. We have responded but others have done more and for the world's largest economy, it hasn't been much of an effort.
The security of the homeland would become much easier if the image of the United States as a self-absorbed bully could be replaced with something positive. The Pakistan earthquake gave our country an opportunity to make that country less receptive to Osama's message of hate, but we seem to be letting it slip away. Higher priorities, it seems.
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Juan Cole should reflect on Harriet Miers
One of the more telling remarks I heard about Harriet Miers was, as best I can recall, "Harriet Miers is Bush's personal lawyer. You don't nominate your personal accountant to succeed Alan Greenspan." Analogous remarks could be made about quoting your wife in an internationally respected blog.
Juan Cole, in his generally insightful blog, refers occasionally to the opinions that his wife expresses to him. These he believes to be keen and insightful. The record is spotty at best, and today's jewel isn't like to improve it.
"Shahin M. Cole observed today, 'Partition is the consequence of failed colonialism.' "
Leaving aside the logical question, has there been successful colonialism and by whose measure, I wonder what this means. Given her origins, she is probably referring to the India/Pakistan partition. However, that was followed by the Pakistan/Bangladesh partition a few years later. Few people regard the East/West problems in Pakistan as colonialism.
Peaceful partitions have included Norway/Sweden a century ago and Czecho/Slovakia more recently. Are either of these the fruit of colonialization? Yugoslavia has broken up violently, but to describe what went before under Tito as colonialism is to stretch the word beyond recognition.
Ireland has been partitioned, but this is the result of highly successful colonialization of the northern counties by Protestants over a period of several centuries. Colonialism failed in Vietnam and there is no longer partition.
When your wife says something to you over breakfast, the remark may appear profound but before you publish, it's probably wise to get an outside opinion.
Juan Cole, in his generally insightful blog, refers occasionally to the opinions that his wife expresses to him. These he believes to be keen and insightful. The record is spotty at best, and today's jewel isn't like to improve it.
"Shahin M. Cole observed today, 'Partition is the consequence of failed colonialism.' "
Leaving aside the logical question, has there been successful colonialism and by whose measure, I wonder what this means. Given her origins, she is probably referring to the India/Pakistan partition. However, that was followed by the Pakistan/Bangladesh partition a few years later. Few people regard the East/West problems in Pakistan as colonialism.
Peaceful partitions have included Norway/Sweden a century ago and Czecho/Slovakia more recently. Are either of these the fruit of colonialization? Yugoslavia has broken up violently, but to describe what went before under Tito as colonialism is to stretch the word beyond recognition.
Ireland has been partitioned, but this is the result of highly successful colonialization of the northern counties by Protestants over a period of several centuries. Colonialism failed in Vietnam and there is no longer partition.
When your wife says something to you over breakfast, the remark may appear profound but before you publish, it's probably wise to get an outside opinion.
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
I'm in Oregon. Why should I pay for Wilma?
If Wilma follows the path that I'm seeing on my computer this morning, it will squeeze through the Cuba/Yucatan gap intact and enter the Gulf of Mexico as a Cat 3 hurricane. Right now, they've got it following the Florida Keys lengthwise to the mainland, but little dots on a map four days out are pretty hypothetical.
Not so hypothetical is that if it reaches the Gulf, it pretty much has to hit the U.S. mainland somewhere. It will cause billions in damages. Congress will agree to pay for much of it, including aid for private individuals who decided of their own free will to live along the Gulf.
Hurricanes along the Gulf and the Atlantic seaboard are predictable. They happen every year. We can't say where they will hit, but they will hit. This is why God invented insurance. The idea is that people share their risk with others who have a similar risk.
But instead, hurricane damage is something the federal government keeps paying for. I'm in Oregon, where we don't get hurricane damage. Ever. Why are my taxes going for this? It pisses me off. Wilma is just one more example.
Not so hypothetical is that if it reaches the Gulf, it pretty much has to hit the U.S. mainland somewhere. It will cause billions in damages. Congress will agree to pay for much of it, including aid for private individuals who decided of their own free will to live along the Gulf.
Hurricanes along the Gulf and the Atlantic seaboard are predictable. They happen every year. We can't say where they will hit, but they will hit. This is why God invented insurance. The idea is that people share their risk with others who have a similar risk.
But instead, hurricane damage is something the federal government keeps paying for. I'm in Oregon, where we don't get hurricane damage. Ever. Why are my taxes going for this? It pisses me off. Wilma is just one more example.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Renewable Energy and the Long Term Trend
The many critics of Bjorn Lomborg tend to focus on specifics where educated opinions differ. However, not much attention is paid to his grand theme, which is that a market-driven economy will solve the problem of fossil fuel depletion by advancing the technology, and afterwards the production, of renewable energy.
This is the fact that makes Lomborg tend toward the lower estimates of global warming's impact over the next century. Estimating such a complex outcome over such a long period is less science then clairvoyance anyway, but the that doesn't seem to prevent the media from reporting someone's estimate that we're going to be, say, 1.7 to 4.8 degrees warmer and the seas will be 11 to 26 inches higher, and so forth. When actually, anything on the temperature past 10 years is based on murky assumptions and ocean levels are more problematic yet.
I'm completely in agreement with Lomborg on technology. So much so that I probably wouldn't have devoted as much effort to debunking the catastrophic costs imputed to global warming. He has done some service by pointing out the exaggerations involved, but I'm feel pretty strongly that, forget the economics, the climate scenario is hard to believe.
First off, the atmosphere recycles CO2. Mechanisms such as photosynthesis and absorption by the oceans operate at increasing rates as the concentration rises, so a long term increase along the historical straight line requires not just a continued high consumption of fossil fuels but a steadily increasing usage.
This is extraordinarily unlikely for two reasons. Although we are nowhere near running out of fossil fuels, we are running short on cheap sources that are easy to convert with acceptable environmental costs. High prices are bringing new sources online, such as tar sands in Alberta, but these are going to put a very high floor under future prices. Prices are going to affect consumption patterns, perhaps not over the space of a month, but over years for sure.
That floor is also going to change the alternative energy equation in a big way. In the past, R&D on alternative sources required government subsidies. The payoff looked way too distant. Now the big energy companies, who used to be big oil companies, see the economics in a new light and are beginning to push hard. The worldwide pool of available engineering graduates is enormous. Put a few hundred thousand of them on this problem and you'll see results in a hurry.
Which will tip the balance between fossil and renewable energy sources, which will rapidly curtail and then reverse the rate of release of CO2, which will stop global warming. QED.
This is the fact that makes Lomborg tend toward the lower estimates of global warming's impact over the next century. Estimating such a complex outcome over such a long period is less science then clairvoyance anyway, but the that doesn't seem to prevent the media from reporting someone's estimate that we're going to be, say, 1.7 to 4.8 degrees warmer and the seas will be 11 to 26 inches higher, and so forth. When actually, anything on the temperature past 10 years is based on murky assumptions and ocean levels are more problematic yet.
I'm completely in agreement with Lomborg on technology. So much so that I probably wouldn't have devoted as much effort to debunking the catastrophic costs imputed to global warming. He has done some service by pointing out the exaggerations involved, but I'm feel pretty strongly that, forget the economics, the climate scenario is hard to believe.
First off, the atmosphere recycles CO2. Mechanisms such as photosynthesis and absorption by the oceans operate at increasing rates as the concentration rises, so a long term increase along the historical straight line requires not just a continued high consumption of fossil fuels but a steadily increasing usage.
This is extraordinarily unlikely for two reasons. Although we are nowhere near running out of fossil fuels, we are running short on cheap sources that are easy to convert with acceptable environmental costs. High prices are bringing new sources online, such as tar sands in Alberta, but these are going to put a very high floor under future prices. Prices are going to affect consumption patterns, perhaps not over the space of a month, but over years for sure.
That floor is also going to change the alternative energy equation in a big way. In the past, R&D on alternative sources required government subsidies. The payoff looked way too distant. Now the big energy companies, who used to be big oil companies, see the economics in a new light and are beginning to push hard. The worldwide pool of available engineering graduates is enormous. Put a few hundred thousand of them on this problem and you'll see results in a hurry.
Which will tip the balance between fossil and renewable energy sources, which will rapidly curtail and then reverse the rate of release of CO2, which will stop global warming. QED.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Straining to be optimistic
If there is one positive in Iraq, it's the existence of great potential wealth. Before Saddam got into a war with Iran, Iraq was rich, secular, and if you weren't on Saddam's enemies list, not a bad place to live. More so if you were a Sunni arab, but not bad overall.
What it will take is for the Shiites and especially the Kurds to conclude that there will be enough more wealth in a peaceful Iraq that it can be shared with the Sunnis. The task of the Sunnis is to convince them, through violence, that it's more profitable to share. The insurgency is not irrational. Mao expressed it when he said, "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."
The fly in the ointment is that the Kurds may be so disaffected from Iraq that they are not prepared to do anything to preserve it. They may relish the prospect of retaking Kirkuk and whacking a few Baathist remnants in the process. Furthermore, if they have their own army, police, laws, and oil revenues, as the new constitutions guarantees them, the Sunnis may not believe a word they say even if they sound conciliatory.
It's hard to see why it would happen now if it didn't happen during the summer, but the Kurds might say to the Sunnis, "We didn't really mean that part in the constitution about Kirkuk being Kurdish. Let's split it." From there, who knows where it might go. That's as optimistic as I can get.
What it will take is for the Shiites and especially the Kurds to conclude that there will be enough more wealth in a peaceful Iraq that it can be shared with the Sunnis. The task of the Sunnis is to convince them, through violence, that it's more profitable to share. The insurgency is not irrational. Mao expressed it when he said, "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."
The fly in the ointment is that the Kurds may be so disaffected from Iraq that they are not prepared to do anything to preserve it. They may relish the prospect of retaking Kirkuk and whacking a few Baathist remnants in the process. Furthermore, if they have their own army, police, laws, and oil revenues, as the new constitutions guarantees them, the Sunnis may not believe a word they say even if they sound conciliatory.
It's hard to see why it would happen now if it didn't happen during the summer, but the Kurds might say to the Sunnis, "We didn't really mean that part in the constitution about Kirkuk being Kurdish. Let's split it." From there, who knows where it might go. That's as optimistic as I can get.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Andrew Sullivan and the Atrophy of Logic
According to Andrew Sullivan's Blog, we had to invade Iraq because (a) they had a lot of immoral people who would have worked with the jihadists if it suited them and (b) everybody agreed. We must stay the course because(c) if we leave, the jihadists will have a base from which to operate.
Mr. Sullivan views anyone who trusted Saddam and his sons as naive. I guess I'm naive in not worrying that Mr. Sullivan would, if it suited his purposes, combine forces with the dictators of Myanmar to overthrow American democracy. Actually, I don't lose any sleep over this prospect, not because I have any great faith in Mr. Sullivan, since I don't know him from Adam, but because I can't conceive of the situation where aligning with Myanmar would suit his purposes. So, naive fool that I am, I sleep well at night.
Perhaps I was similarly naive about Saddam and his crowd, but since Bin Laden appears to be a religious fanatic and Saddam's sons were dissolute playboys, the common cause which they might have made seems pretty hard to discern. And, of course, there isn't the slightest evidence that they ever tried.
It's not technically true that everyone thought we needed to invade Iraq eventually. Most Europeans did not, and in particular the people who were in Iraq looking industriously for WMDs and finding none, thought it might be a good idea to develop at least an iota of concrete evidence first.
However, it may be true that almost the entirety of the American political establishment backed invading Iraq. This is not quite the same thing as a logical demonstration of truth. The Gulf of Tonkin resolution passed the U.S. Senate 98-2. However, the more telling point is that essentially all the responsible people who spoke in favor, did so because they believed the fiction of Iraqi WMDs. Nobody at the time, and no one now with any decent respect for facts, put forward stopping Al Qaeda as the reason.
Nevertheless, even if we were lied to at the outset, if today we face the prospect of an emboldened and empowered enemy, we might be forced to stay in Iraq. However, the post-US Iraq/Al Qaeda connection is only a little less tenuous than Sullivan/Mynamar.
In the first place, the Sunni arabs have just 20% of the population and a still lower percentage of the oil, which is the only valuable thing Iraq has. If somehow they manage to "win" the ensuing civil war, about the best they can hope for is 20% of the pie. If no war, they have millions of acre of stinking desert. If war, they may get a modest reward but they will exhaust themselves in the battle. In neither case is it plausible to present them as a springboard for radical Islam.
For the second point, refer to (a) above. The Baathists are secular. Al Qaeda is Wahabist. Oil and water. They may hold together to face a common enemy, but not afterwards.
Iraq is not going to be a pleasant place after the U.S. leaves. I don't want to be there. More generally, I have never wanted, and never will, want to be there. But at the end of the day, it's their problem. Our problem is that we're paying for this with money we're borrowing from the Chinese. That is an actual problem that we will someday need to confront.
Mr. Sullivan views anyone who trusted Saddam and his sons as naive. I guess I'm naive in not worrying that Mr. Sullivan would, if it suited his purposes, combine forces with the dictators of Myanmar to overthrow American democracy. Actually, I don't lose any sleep over this prospect, not because I have any great faith in Mr. Sullivan, since I don't know him from Adam, but because I can't conceive of the situation where aligning with Myanmar would suit his purposes. So, naive fool that I am, I sleep well at night.
Perhaps I was similarly naive about Saddam and his crowd, but since Bin Laden appears to be a religious fanatic and Saddam's sons were dissolute playboys, the common cause which they might have made seems pretty hard to discern. And, of course, there isn't the slightest evidence that they ever tried.
It's not technically true that everyone thought we needed to invade Iraq eventually. Most Europeans did not, and in particular the people who were in Iraq looking industriously for WMDs and finding none, thought it might be a good idea to develop at least an iota of concrete evidence first.
However, it may be true that almost the entirety of the American political establishment backed invading Iraq. This is not quite the same thing as a logical demonstration of truth. The Gulf of Tonkin resolution passed the U.S. Senate 98-2. However, the more telling point is that essentially all the responsible people who spoke in favor, did so because they believed the fiction of Iraqi WMDs. Nobody at the time, and no one now with any decent respect for facts, put forward stopping Al Qaeda as the reason.
Nevertheless, even if we were lied to at the outset, if today we face the prospect of an emboldened and empowered enemy, we might be forced to stay in Iraq. However, the post-US Iraq/Al Qaeda connection is only a little less tenuous than Sullivan/Mynamar.
In the first place, the Sunni arabs have just 20% of the population and a still lower percentage of the oil, which is the only valuable thing Iraq has. If somehow they manage to "win" the ensuing civil war, about the best they can hope for is 20% of the pie. If no war, they have millions of acre of stinking desert. If war, they may get a modest reward but they will exhaust themselves in the battle. In neither case is it plausible to present them as a springboard for radical Islam.
For the second point, refer to (a) above. The Baathists are secular. Al Qaeda is Wahabist. Oil and water. They may hold together to face a common enemy, but not afterwards.
Iraq is not going to be a pleasant place after the U.S. leaves. I don't want to be there. More generally, I have never wanted, and never will, want to be there. But at the end of the day, it's their problem. Our problem is that we're paying for this with money we're borrowing from the Chinese. That is an actual problem that we will someday need to confront.
The Arkansas Baby Machine
You read about people protesting hospitals that permit abortions. What about the hospital in Arkansas that facilitates that woman's plan to flood Arkansas with her progeny? 16 babies, for Christ's sake! If everyone was that irresponsible, in two generations we'd have half a trillion people. Minus a few hundred billion who would have starved.
Where's a good abortionist when you need one? People used to get lynched in Arkansas for a lot less than this.
Where's a good abortionist when you need one? People used to get lynched in Arkansas for a lot less than this.
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
The Worst Iraq Election Outcome
I've been wondering which would be worse, a defeat of the Iraq constitution, starting the process all over, or a narrow win with the Sunni arabs voting mostly against. I have never really considered the idea that it would pass because all three major groups would feel satisfied with it.
Now another option seems to be emerging, which is Sunni support based on everyone pretending that it will be progress to adopt a constitution that will be renegotiated in January. If possible, this seems worse.
The Kurds have no interest in a successful Iraq, but they aren't anxious for a failed one either. They have most of what they want and can afford to wait. The motivations of the arabs, either Sunni or Shiite, is murkier, but one should remember that the decision to "compromise" was made by the power brokers behind closed doors. Their motivation may be a lot simpler. Money.
This is a part of the world where the phrase "corrupt politician" is largely redundant. Following our overt occupation government, Puppet Government 1 now seems to have viewed its mission as looting the treasury. It has been replaced by Puppet Government 2, which has doled out ministries to the various factions. A ministry is a license to steal. It seems plausible that powerful political elements prefer a continuation of the status quo to an unpredictable resolution.
So what are they stealing from whom? Some from Iraqis, but certainly billions of dollars from American taxpayers. We may be doing some of it consciously. We spent a ton of money backing Chalabi before the invasion. We are probably paying off "tame" Sunnis now, although it is doubtless called reconstruction.
I wish I were a better person and that my motivation was deep concern for the plight of Iraqis, but they were badly off under Saddam, they are badly off now, and they will probably be badly off when this degenerates into civil war. I'm more concerned about the half trillion dollars this is likely to cost. I know the official cost is still far less, but I'm working on the assumption that many costs are being hidden, or just deferred like maintenance or repair, or yet-to-come like VA medical care.
When historians discuss this in the future, I predict they will arrive at a figure around a half trillion and will note that there were lots of better ways to spend it.
Now another option seems to be emerging, which is Sunni support based on everyone pretending that it will be progress to adopt a constitution that will be renegotiated in January. If possible, this seems worse.
The Kurds have no interest in a successful Iraq, but they aren't anxious for a failed one either. They have most of what they want and can afford to wait. The motivations of the arabs, either Sunni or Shiite, is murkier, but one should remember that the decision to "compromise" was made by the power brokers behind closed doors. Their motivation may be a lot simpler. Money.
This is a part of the world where the phrase "corrupt politician" is largely redundant. Following our overt occupation government, Puppet Government 1 now seems to have viewed its mission as looting the treasury. It has been replaced by Puppet Government 2, which has doled out ministries to the various factions. A ministry is a license to steal. It seems plausible that powerful political elements prefer a continuation of the status quo to an unpredictable resolution.
So what are they stealing from whom? Some from Iraqis, but certainly billions of dollars from American taxpayers. We may be doing some of it consciously. We spent a ton of money backing Chalabi before the invasion. We are probably paying off "tame" Sunnis now, although it is doubtless called reconstruction.
I wish I were a better person and that my motivation was deep concern for the plight of Iraqis, but they were badly off under Saddam, they are badly off now, and they will probably be badly off when this degenerates into civil war. I'm more concerned about the half trillion dollars this is likely to cost. I know the official cost is still far less, but I'm working on the assumption that many costs are being hidden, or just deferred like maintenance or repair, or yet-to-come like VA medical care.
When historians discuss this in the future, I predict they will arrive at a figure around a half trillion and will note that there were lots of better ways to spend it.
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Intelligent Design - What are scientists afraid of?
Many will read this title as rhetorical. For creationists, the answer is already known. Scientists are afraid that their theories will be shown to be shallow and unconvincing.
For me, this is a serious, literal question. I count myself in the community of lay scientists, people with enough scientific training to be able to follow discussions at Scientific American levels and an inclination to favor the scientific method. If I were a biology teacher, I don't think I'd feel threatened by a comparison between evolution and Intelligent Design, which I capitalize because He is clearly the author, whether mentioned or not.
It's a "hearts and minds" issue. Evolution is a theory that is consistent with the methods of modern science, due to which we have put a man on the moon, created cell phones with pictures, and cracked the genetic code of the 1918 influenza virus. Intelligent Design is the product of the sort of minds that have successfully bent spoons if you don't look too closely and can find images of the Virgin Mary in cumulus clouds.
Bring them on, I say. You aren't going to persuade everyone. Objective evidence doesn't always work, or there wouldn't be millions of people who believe that Saddam was behind the 9/11 attacks. Hardly anyone who deeply believes in biblical creation is going to change his mind even when shown the achievements of science and the ineffectualness of religion.
But a few might, and on the other side of the coin, I can't imagine anyone who has not been previously been inculcated with Christianity finding religion as the result of a classroom discussion. There is a perpetual battle for the intellects of young people and it may as well be joined in the biology classroom as anywhere else. Science is more likely to get a fair hearing then than at any later time. Let's make the case when the playing field is as level as it's ever going to get.
For me, this is a serious, literal question. I count myself in the community of lay scientists, people with enough scientific training to be able to follow discussions at Scientific American levels and an inclination to favor the scientific method. If I were a biology teacher, I don't think I'd feel threatened by a comparison between evolution and Intelligent Design, which I capitalize because He is clearly the author, whether mentioned or not.
It's a "hearts and minds" issue. Evolution is a theory that is consistent with the methods of modern science, due to which we have put a man on the moon, created cell phones with pictures, and cracked the genetic code of the 1918 influenza virus. Intelligent Design is the product of the sort of minds that have successfully bent spoons if you don't look too closely and can find images of the Virgin Mary in cumulus clouds.
Bring them on, I say. You aren't going to persuade everyone. Objective evidence doesn't always work, or there wouldn't be millions of people who believe that Saddam was behind the 9/11 attacks. Hardly anyone who deeply believes in biblical creation is going to change his mind even when shown the achievements of science and the ineffectualness of religion.
But a few might, and on the other side of the coin, I can't imagine anyone who has not been previously been inculcated with Christianity finding religion as the result of a classroom discussion. There is a perpetual battle for the intellects of young people and it may as well be joined in the biology classroom as anywhere else. Science is more likely to get a fair hearing then than at any later time. Let's make the case when the playing field is as level as it's ever going to get.
AIDS in Developing Countries -- Let them die quietly
People have been giving Bill Bennett enormous grief over his hypothetical argument, posed as a logical construct merely to refute it, that the nation's crime rate could be reduced by aborting black babies. That he never for an instant endorsed the argument hasn't save him.
So it is only with the secure knowledge that not a millionth as many people will ever note this proposal that I suggest a policy that on the surface is as comparably racist, heartless, and many other adjectives. In the developing countries, people who develop AIDS should be given a place to die in as much peace as possible. Attempts to prolong their lives are a waste of resources.
Too many people think that health care in developing countries is somehow analogous to what happens in the United States. Not so. In the U.S., we attempt to save everybody who gets sick or is injured, no matter how pointless the attempt. We keep Teri Schiavo alive in a vegetative state for years. By comparison with much of what we do, treatment for HIV is almost rational, although an aggressive anti-smoking campaign with the same amount of money would probably save more lives. But I'm not trying to discuss American healthcare priorities.
In developing countries, it's much clearer. As long as there is no prospect of actually curing the infection, keeping an HIV-positive person alive will require a lifetime of medication. Meanwhile, millions of people are living in unhygienic conditions with no access to health care. Compared with the low tech solutions such as sanitation and simple medical procedures, the cost to save an HIV life is probably a thousand times as expensive. Until we've exhausted the low-hanging-fruit options, we should be ignoring HIV treatment.
That's not the same as HIV prevention. We should be shipping out billions of free condoms with instruction manuals attached, and paying no attention to the moralists who think we should restrict our approaches to abstinence. Actually, that would be a good idea in this country as well.
So it is only with the secure knowledge that not a millionth as many people will ever note this proposal that I suggest a policy that on the surface is as comparably racist, heartless, and many other adjectives. In the developing countries, people who develop AIDS should be given a place to die in as much peace as possible. Attempts to prolong their lives are a waste of resources.
Too many people think that health care in developing countries is somehow analogous to what happens in the United States. Not so. In the U.S., we attempt to save everybody who gets sick or is injured, no matter how pointless the attempt. We keep Teri Schiavo alive in a vegetative state for years. By comparison with much of what we do, treatment for HIV is almost rational, although an aggressive anti-smoking campaign with the same amount of money would probably save more lives. But I'm not trying to discuss American healthcare priorities.
In developing countries, it's much clearer. As long as there is no prospect of actually curing the infection, keeping an HIV-positive person alive will require a lifetime of medication. Meanwhile, millions of people are living in unhygienic conditions with no access to health care. Compared with the low tech solutions such as sanitation and simple medical procedures, the cost to save an HIV life is probably a thousand times as expensive. Until we've exhausted the low-hanging-fruit options, we should be ignoring HIV treatment.
That's not the same as HIV prevention. We should be shipping out billions of free condoms with instruction manuals attached, and paying no attention to the moralists who think we should restrict our approaches to abstinence. Actually, that would be a good idea in this country as well.
Thursday, October 06, 2005
Disturbing Trends
Three disturbing but unsurprising news items have appeared recently. The number of independently combat-ready Iraqi batallions is down to one, the Shiites are trying to rewrite the rules for constitutional approval in their favor, and Kurds are starting to grumble about the Shiite leadership.
People say that Iraqis need to start defending themselves but they already have. Effective Iraqi fighting forces exist, just none belonging to our puppet national government. Kurds have the Peshmerga, Shiites have militias, and Sunnis arabs have the insurgency. None of them intend to fight for American goals not aligned with their own.
The Kurdish goal is to separate, de facto if not de jure. Should the Shiites renege on constitutional guarantees to the Kurds, the latter will completely split, taking much of Iraq's oil with them. The Shiites want a patina of legitimacy on their new power, for which they will endure American meddling until after the elections. They have no intention of letting Sunni arabs have a veto over that outcome. Their attempt to rewrite the election rules in their favor has backfired, but it should leave no doubt in anyone's mind that the Shiites consider constitutional protections a necessary evil leading to their ascendancy.
Sunni arabs know that and, not wanting to be stuck in a million acres of useless desert, are going to fight for two essential things: some oil, for which they will defend Kirkuk, and half of Baghdad. Both of these will probably entail civil war, since the Kurds and Shiites respectively are unlikely to accommodate them.
I'd suggest that we pull out, but politically that's not an option. Not even a half trillion dollars will buy us an outcome that we like, but there's nothing to do except watch it unfold.
People say that Iraqis need to start defending themselves but they already have. Effective Iraqi fighting forces exist, just none belonging to our puppet national government. Kurds have the Peshmerga, Shiites have militias, and Sunnis arabs have the insurgency. None of them intend to fight for American goals not aligned with their own.
The Kurdish goal is to separate, de facto if not de jure. Should the Shiites renege on constitutional guarantees to the Kurds, the latter will completely split, taking much of Iraq's oil with them. The Shiites want a patina of legitimacy on their new power, for which they will endure American meddling until after the elections. They have no intention of letting Sunni arabs have a veto over that outcome. Their attempt to rewrite the election rules in their favor has backfired, but it should leave no doubt in anyone's mind that the Shiites consider constitutional protections a necessary evil leading to their ascendancy.
Sunni arabs know that and, not wanting to be stuck in a million acres of useless desert, are going to fight for two essential things: some oil, for which they will defend Kirkuk, and half of Baghdad. Both of these will probably entail civil war, since the Kurds and Shiites respectively are unlikely to accommodate them.
I'd suggest that we pull out, but politically that's not an option. Not even a half trillion dollars will buy us an outcome that we like, but there's nothing to do except watch it unfold.
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