Angus Deaton, Nobel Laureate, found that death rates from self-inflicted activities (drinking, substance abuse and suicide) are rising among whites in their fifth decade. An anthropologist colleague noted that this groups more than any other part of American society has "lost the narrative of its lives". Living standards have declined relative to that of their parents and their past. Jobs and predictability have been lost. The establishment, captured by big money donors, seems out of touch. And, now unsurprisingly, they are leaning towards simple, feel-good populist messages such as those of Trump, Carson and Cruz. The worse things get, the more we'd like Trump, Santa, or Jesus to make everything better with a wave of their magic wands. But none of the populists have any defensible suggestions to back up the bluster.
Fareed Zakaria pointed out that defections from the Assad regime have been surprisingly few. Perhaps that's because many non-Muslims think that as terrible as Assad is, a secular regime is better than an Islamic State In Syria, that would likely replace him in a disorderly transition of power.
With recent tensions in the skies over Syria, Turkey and Russia are now at odds, Russia and the US are seemingly cooperating, over targeting and restricting ISIS' financing; but Crimea and the Donbass region are forgotten and Ukraine is, according to the Economist, struggling -- and failing -- to stamp out corruption.
The UN predicts that at current growth rates, Africa will be the most populous continent by 2100. Yet corrupt leaders and poor governance will stifle economic development, deprive generations of children of an eduction and prospects for a better life, and stifle economic growth.
People seemed worried and upset that the San Bernadino shooting were ISIL inspired; yet had they been, as was initially thought, simply an act of workplace rage, this would have made prevention far less likely. While law enforcement failed to detect and prevent this tragedy, their likelihood of preventing workplace violence is far far lower.
The bluster of the right wing of American politics is an indication not of strength, but of fear and insecurity, the instincts of many bullies to make up for their shortcomings and their lack of self-assurance through bravado, coercion and violence. A lack of deep, cohesive, historical roots and traditions exacerbates this; perhaps no one in America really knows deep down, at an almost instinctual level, what it means to be American, the way the French or the Brits do?
Aside from Bernie Sanders, no one is talking about campaign finance reform. And Bernie, and Hilary to a lesser extent, have been almost marginalized by the continuing obsession in covering each and every outrageous Trump utterance (and most of them are).
Sunday, December 20, 2015
Friday, November 13, 2015
Syria and its ramifications
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| Wall Street Journal |
Russia has understood the lessons of the last decade and a half; that propping up a brutal dictator creates greater local stability than taking the lid off the latent sectarian hatreds and rivalries. The risk, however, is that it becomes the target of terrorism.
The US on the other hand appears not to have learned that taking off that lid while still meddling in the region not only unleashes violent extremism, previously tamped down by totalitarian regimes, but that by not disengaging, it remains a convenient scapegoat for all sides and the threat of terrorism therefore remains.
With the Kurds making the most effective progress against ISIL in Iraq, it looks increasingly likely that both Iraq and Syria may soon cease to exist as countries, at least in their current form. They almost certainly will have to grant almost complete autonomy to the Kurds, and a sectarian partition or the remaining parts of both may be inevitable.
Millennials staying with their parents
According to research referred to by the PBS Newshour yesterday, around 45% of women and 24% of young men still live with their parents a high increase from 20 years ago. There is considerable speculation as to why this shift has occurred. In addition to increasingly burdensome student loan debt and wage stagnation, which are almost certainly causes, increasing uncertainty must also play role. Twenty to thirty years ago, when expectations were based on the relative stability experienced by one's parents, a young person could expect to secure gainful and stable employment which would enable them to plan ahead for the reduction in the debt burden. However, with increased uncertainty in the labour market, and the widespread belief that stable employment is a thing of the past, it makes no sense to take on large commitments like marriage, children or a mortgage. The model used by Lippmann and Rumelt in 1982 for firm entry applies equally to entry into a life of independence from ones parents.
Fantasy games of chance
However, a better analogy might be horse racing. Money is won based on the performance of athletes, in this case horses and their jockeys on the day whose track records, like athlete in other sports like football or baseball, are well known. And betting on the ponies is almost universally regarded as gambling.
If there is one thing that is clearly a gamble it's pushing the envelope and hoping that the courts will decide in your favor.
Paris - a watershed moment?
Is tonight’s horrific, appalling, reprehensible act of terrorism in Paris a watershed moment?
We have dichotomized the threat of terrorism from Islamic extremists into two categories; those (older-style) well planned, centrally coordinated attacks like 911 and those carried out by the 'lone wolf'. Doing so has has created a false sense of security; the conventional wisdom is that the large attack will be detected and prevented because their 'footprint' is large and detectable by current surveillance, and the lone wolf, though harder to catch, won't do that much damage (little enough that we accept that there's little we can do but live with the threat).
Tonight's attack, coming somewhere between these two suggests that we can't be that complacent; a pack of self-organising, locally coordinated lone-wolves can do enormous damage.
It's hard to predict what might happen at these points of discontinuity; responses are seldom linear. The long term, however, is perhasp easier to predict that the short term. Europe is in turmoil from the migration crisis. This will only add to calls for tighter border control, and fuel anti-immigrant sentiment. Borders will close; countries will become more xenophobic and nationalist; immigration will be curtailed and immigrants subject to increasingly close and unequal scrutiny. Surveillance will increase; Edward Snowden will come top be regarded not as a defender of civil liberties but as a naive fool; "Big Brother" will be watching us all and we will simply have to get used to it. In hindsight, the last 50 years of relative calm and increasing openness will come to be seen as a temporary aberration.
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| Wall Street Journal |
We have dichotomized the threat of terrorism from Islamic extremists into two categories; those (older-style) well planned, centrally coordinated attacks like 911 and those carried out by the 'lone wolf'. Doing so has has created a false sense of security; the conventional wisdom is that the large attack will be detected and prevented because their 'footprint' is large and detectable by current surveillance, and the lone wolf, though harder to catch, won't do that much damage (little enough that we accept that there's little we can do but live with the threat).
Tonight's attack, coming somewhere between these two suggests that we can't be that complacent; a pack of self-organising, locally coordinated lone-wolves can do enormous damage.
It's hard to predict what might happen at these points of discontinuity; responses are seldom linear. The long term, however, is perhasp easier to predict that the short term. Europe is in turmoil from the migration crisis. This will only add to calls for tighter border control, and fuel anti-immigrant sentiment. Borders will close; countries will become more xenophobic and nationalist; immigration will be curtailed and immigrants subject to increasingly close and unequal scrutiny. Surveillance will increase; Edward Snowden will come top be regarded not as a defender of civil liberties but as a naive fool; "Big Brother" will be watching us all and we will simply have to get used to it. In hindsight, the last 50 years of relative calm and increasing openness will come to be seen as a temporary aberration.
Sunday, November 8, 2015
ISIL vs Al Quaeda
One key difference between ISIL and Al-Qaeda noted by Michael Haydn, ex-Director of the CIA on GPS today, is that Al-Qaeda is a top-down, hierarchical organization that tightly controls its operations. ISIL, by contrast, is bottom-up and somewhat populists, relying on inspiration to motivate, rather than fiat and loyalty to compel, its members to act. ISIL is a franchise, a loose affiliation of allied interest groups.
That makes it harder eradicate because taking out its senior leadership has little effect. But it also gives rise to a different targeting strategy; without a strong command and control structure, decision making and motivation needs to be more proximate. "Think Global, Act Local" (with a nod to Yves Doz). Strategy follows structure.
"Distant" enemies like the US are less likely to be targeted when they are not directly involved, while directly involved participants are more likely to generate local ire and in so doing become targets.
That makes it harder eradicate because taking out its senior leadership has little effect. But it also gives rise to a different targeting strategy; without a strong command and control structure, decision making and motivation needs to be more proximate. "Think Global, Act Local" (with a nod to Yves Doz). Strategy follows structure.
"Distant" enemies like the US are less likely to be targeted when they are not directly involved, while directly involved participants are more likely to generate local ire and in so doing become targets.
Exceptionalism and escalation
I have written elsewhere about the choice between doing something and doing nothing as competing strategies; that sometimes doing nothing is better than any of the proposed courses of action.
Well, the question is rearing its head again with Obama's recent decision to put 50 SOF personnel into Syria. Many commentators note that this is too small really to matter, just as the timid aerial campaign has been relatively ineffective.
Both seem to reflect the Obama's dilemma; his instinct tells him to do nothing while the country and probably most of his military advisor tell him to intervene with military force. The result falls between two stools. it is neither the clear statement of disengagement, key to getting the target off our backs, not will it make much of a difference on the ground.
As in Vietnam 50 pairs of boots on the ground could easily escalate to 500, or 5,000 (in Vietnam it was 500,000). Why is every change in direction a doubling down?
My guess is that the "Doctrine of American Exceptionalism", combined with the youthful self confidence of a fairly young nation leads to the hubris that there is nothing that America can't fix. Combine that with a certain impatience and a seemingly broad cultural admiration for direct action (violence) over diplomacy, and every time a foreign adventure needs a change of course, the hawks will accuse the diplomats of appeasement, and more dogs of war are unleashed.
Well, the question is rearing its head again with Obama's recent decision to put 50 SOF personnel into Syria. Many commentators note that this is too small really to matter, just as the timid aerial campaign has been relatively ineffective.
Both seem to reflect the Obama's dilemma; his instinct tells him to do nothing while the country and probably most of his military advisor tell him to intervene with military force. The result falls between two stools. it is neither the clear statement of disengagement, key to getting the target off our backs, not will it make much of a difference on the ground.
As in Vietnam 50 pairs of boots on the ground could easily escalate to 500, or 5,000 (in Vietnam it was 500,000). Why is every change in direction a doubling down?
My guess is that the "Doctrine of American Exceptionalism", combined with the youthful self confidence of a fairly young nation leads to the hubris that there is nothing that America can't fix. Combine that with a certain impatience and a seemingly broad cultural admiration for direct action (violence) over diplomacy, and every time a foreign adventure needs a change of course, the hawks will accuse the diplomats of appeasement, and more dogs of war are unleashed.
Almost a 3-party system
The Freedom Caucus, in exchange for its acquiescence of the recent bill to fund the government and raise the debt ceiling, apparently now has a section of the Capital building named in its honour. Which got me thinking that a small group that agrees on so little with the rest of it's party should probably be a party unto itself.
Doh!
Robert Reich posted some observations he'd made while on a book tour of the 'red' states. He observers that "Heartland Republicans and progressive Democrats remain wide apart on social and cultural issues. But there’s a growing overlap on economics".
It has always astonished me people seem to have forgotten that when the Tea Party was just taking off, before it was over-run by the right, it was the nearest thing to a populist up-rising we've seen. At the time, it seemed to me to be an expression of angry disenchantment with the prevailing power structure and its lack of accountability. The Occupy movement, while less coherent in its message, was born of similar misgivings. As surprising to me is that these two groups are so divided on the 'social and cultural' issues that they can't come together to change a system that is beholden to wealthy political donors.
Sunday, October 25, 2015
Pot pourri
The Republican's dogged pursuit Clinton over Benghazi is driven by three things: a fairly thinly disguised hatred; the goal of scoring political advantage in the run up to the next general election; and a penchant for conspiracy theories that "there must be something there, if only we look hard enough" (which while almost certainly true of anyone except the odd saint, may in fact be slightly more likely in Clinton's case).
In discussing Britain's role in the toppling of Saddam Hussein, Tony Blair noted that he had believed the faulty intelligence about WMD. His interview was particularly interesting for several reasons. First, his tone was apologetic - indeed he actually said "I have to apologise", unusual for any politician, even retired ones - and despite his claim to to be immune to public opinion, it would appear that 10 years of vilification have left their mark. Second, his strongest justification for invading was the strengthening of ties with the US. Cementing the 'Special Relationship' seems to have trumped good planning.
He also pointed out that no one has come forward with a better policy; walking away hasn't worked (Iraq and Afghanistan), nor have air-strikes while avoiding boots on the ground (Libya), nor arming a handful of rebels (Syria). Of course a better post-regime change plan might have made the choice-set in Iraq less problematic, although things were handled better in Afghanistan and the situation there isn't altogether too rosy. But that may have as much to do with Pakistan's poor behaviour as with the post-Taliban Afghan administration.
Why is Trump is spending his fortune on a futile bid for the Republican nomination?
- He likes nothing more than fame and publicity and spending money to get it makes utilitarian sense
- This is an investment in the Trump brand that will pay off down the line in TV deal and book sales etc.
- He hopes to shift the terms of the debate, possibly towards issues he cares about such as immigration (though perhaps we'll never know what he really thinks - it may all be an act. Or it might not be, which is slightly more disturbing)
President Obama is much more popular abroad then he is at home. One explanation is his reluctance to project power though the use of force, which Republicans (and some Democrats) interpret as weakness and everyone else sees as blessed relief.
Putin has been roundly criticised for supporting the Assad regime in Syria. Yet he for one seems to have learnt the lessons of Iraq and Libya; that if you depose a dictator either you remain as a colonial power (or at least an enforcer) or chaos ensues which may well spill over outside the country's borders.
Monday, October 12, 2015
Campaign cycles
A typical election cycle moves through three distinct phases. In the first primary voters are exposed to candidates' different personalities and backgrounds. In the second, debate shifts to specific policies, but only those that have survived first round of scrutiny. In the final phase, a choice needs to be made as to which candidate is realistically electable, although this is not always infallible, as perhaps is the case of the election of Jeremy Corbyn in the UK.
In tandem, there is a behind-the-scenes process of fund-raising which needs to keep pace with the spending demands of the psycho. Candidates how cannot raise money at a pace sufficient to keep up with the spending demands for campaign messaging may face the vicious circle of reduced exposure, declining poll numbers, reduced expectations of potential victory, and reduced funding.
This model applies as much to primaries as to the general election.
Trump and Carson will do well in the first phase, largely because pundits and pollsters victims are focused on personality and 'character'. Policy is generally articulated only in broad strokes and sweeping, fact free generalizations and predictably, is unscrutinised by the media.
Over time, the policy details will be prized from them, and in the process light-weights (Trump, Carson, Fiorina) will fall by the way. The interesting question is what then?
Both sides are faced with a prisoner's dilemma. Both want the candidate who reflects their values and antipathy for the other side; for Republicans that's most likely Ted Cruz; for Democrats is Bernie Sanders. But if either side chooses this route (the 'cooperate' option in a PD game) it runs the risk that the other will defect with a rush to the middle ground; the equilibrium is therefore defect-defect, with both sides fielding the centrist candidate, none of whom have any new ideas and whose agendas continue to reflect the main money-providing interest groups.
Trump's goal
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| USA Today |
And while he has been lauded as a good example of personal branding, arguably it's his reality TV experience that is the most appropriate lens though which to view his presidential run. His campaign is real-time reality TV with Trump as its central (and only) melodramatic character. His appearances and sound-bites, often shocking, are intentionally light on specifics (who needs to be bothered with all that boring and hard to comprehend detail) and intended to stir the emotions. Just like "Real Housewives of Orange County / New York City / New Jersey / Atlanta..." the audience lives vicariously though its central character whose chief appeal is behaving badly.
Whether Trump believes his own hype is questionable; more than likely he is treating this as another brand building exercise. If he is as smart as he claims, he must know that he will never be elected President. But it looks like he'll have some fun running, and in the process, show the world how truly dysfunctional the American political system really is.
Sunday, September 27, 2015
Mass migration
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Stinkingly, many of the migrants have smartphones; that enables them to navigate unfamiliar geographies, making alternative plans when their original routes are closed. And it provide instant messaging from other migrants as to the current situation, political trends, places to head for, and places to avoid. This has lead to unexpected developments.
For example, while Europe tried hard to ignore the situation in the hope that it would either go away or at least not get much worse, the steady drip of distressing images and the lack of resources to regions having to deal with the newly arrived immigrants, eventually prodded Angela Merkel into making public statements welcoming refugees to Germany's metaphorical shores. At the speed of light, the change in mood was disseminated around the world, triggering new waves of migration and completely overwhelming those European governments in the front line. The situation hasn't been helped by the fact that most are relatively poor by European standards (Greece, southern Italy, Serbia, Croatia) and others are led by right wing xenophobic governments (Hungary and Austria both fairly reactionary polities).
Unable to cope, peripheral European states are putting up fences and closing their borders, leaving thousands of migrants stranded. Despite the worsening problem, Europe bickers, the rest of the world treats it as someone else's problem and Ban Ki Moon pontificates while the UN does nothing. Not a moment we will be able to look back on with admiration as notable for its compassion, statesmanship and leadership.
Saturday, September 26, 2015
VolksWagen
Based on its debt and interest expense, VW's current cost of capital it might be as low as 2% but whether it could borrow that cheaply again seems questionable. Were it to borrow the €200b at 3%, it would cost the company about €6b in additional interest payments, which would take a big chunk out of its €15b before-tax earnings. That would be about a 40% reduction, not inconsistent with the 30% fall in the company's share price after the scandal broke this week.
However, it may face fines which could run into billions, and that assumes sales remain at their 2014 levels which is unlikely. Already Switzerland has banned sales of VW cars; granted Switzerland isn't a huge market but if other counties follow suit, that combined with the loss of brand image, worldwide sales might easily fall 15%. That would reduce its pre-tax profit to €11.5b. After the additional interest burden, that leaves €5.5b, or 37% of current EBT. While VW will probably survive, I expect the shares to fall much further, probably halving in value from there they are now (€128 per share) to around €70.
As I recall, diesel cars are a fairly recent phenomenon in the US. In Europe they were more popular, and become more main-stream in Britain in the 1980s and the US in the 2000s. Their popularity was fuelled in part by rising petrol prices which made their low fuel consumption an attractive feature. But they had to overcome significant barriers including higher noise levels, and the perception as being much more polluting than gas engines. While noise levels, particularly in the cabin, have been fixed with engineering improvements, the emission of pollutants, it appears, had not.
Sunday, September 13, 2015
"The Donald"
For example, on Face The Nation today he said he thinks hedge-fund managers aren't paying enough tax, that CEOs are overpaid, that corporate governance is plagued by boards packed with insider cronies, and that the middle class has been eviscerated by off-shoring.
Here are some of his comments: "They [hedge-fund managers] are all supporting Jeb Bush and Hilary Clinton. ...Hilary and Jeb are totally controlled by the hedge-fund guys". That should be music to Larry Lessig's ears.
"We're going to be reducing tax for the middle class but for the hedge-fund guys - they're going to be paying up".
On high CEO pay and corporate governance: "It does bug me, but it's very hard if you have a free enterprise system to do anything about that; you know the boards of companies are supposed to do it, but I know companies very well and the CEO puts in all his friends... ...and you they get whatever they want because the friends love sitting on the board. So, that's the system that we have and it's a shame and it's disgraceful and sometimes the boards rule but I would way it's less than 10% and you see these guys making these enormous amounts of money; it's a total and complete joke".
And as NPR noted last week, he's come out in favour of a single payer health care! Given the Republican's stance on ACA, this is worse than heresy.
He might have more in common, at least as far as issues go (probably less so in terms of solutions), with Bernie Sanders than he does with Jeb!
The risk, of course, is that he is fickle and inconstant and in the (hopefully) unlikely event of his being nominated, still less elected, he would discard these positions as he "makes an unbelievably great deal for America"...
What I think we are seeing this year is a maturing manifestation of the anger and frustration that fuelled the tea party 7 years ago. The sense that Washington works only for those with great wealth and doesn't represent the majority of the electorate is a common theme in Sander's, Lessig's, and Trump's rhetoric. It's in the Warren Wing. That, combined with the now evident failure of the Thatcher-Ragan revolution that put blind faith in free markets and "trickle-down" and the sense that a government controlled economy (China's) is doing demonstrably better than ours for it's citizenry, at least economically, is leading to a resurgence of left-wing ideas.
Identifying the problems is one thing; fixing them, however, is quite another.
Election Coverage
I've just watched "Face The Nation" on CBS; it was notable for several things but in particular the fact that in 46 minutes of interviews and panel discussion there was no serious discussion of issues and policies. None.
After the ritual providing of an uncritical public platform to the two guests (Donald Trump and Ben Carson), CBS News Elections Director Anthony Salvanto talked exclusively about the electoral process and campaign dynamics. That's about as inside baseball as you could want and frankly of no particular interest to anyone other than die-hard political junkies.
Next came the consummate political operative, David Axelrod, diagnosing Hilary's campaign problems. Talking about Obama's 2008 campaign, he recalled what happens when campaigns falter: "what happens is every donor in America becomes an amateur political consultant and very generous with their advice. I remember a donor summoning Obama and telling he had to fire his team". That tells you all you need to know about who is pulling the strings, and that advice is almost certainly not limited to operational campaigning issues.
Also of interest was Axelrod's reaction to Joe Biden's interview with Stephen Colbert: "I don't think he's playing a game when he says he doesn't know what he has the emotional reserves to run a presidential race". Axelrod's initial assumption is that this was a calculated political stratagem; which gives you an insight into political campaign management.
Peter Baker noted "the Clintons have been through this so many times, scandal, recovery, scandal, recovery, setback of some sort, and they're good at it. They're the leading re-bounders in American politics of the last two decades". Paraphrasing Oscar Wilde, "to be embroiled in one scandal is misfortune; to be embroiled in several looks like carelessness".
The one clip from Stephen Colbert's interview with Joe Biden the media are playing again and again is the one in which he talks about having the emotional energy to run for president. The far more moving moments for me was when he talked about his son. A measure of his humility is that he really did think the son had outgrown the father, and as someone whose father though he was a perpetual disappointment, for me that was particularly poignant.
After the ritual providing of an uncritical public platform to the two guests (Donald Trump and Ben Carson), CBS News Elections Director Anthony Salvanto talked exclusively about the electoral process and campaign dynamics. That's about as inside baseball as you could want and frankly of no particular interest to anyone other than die-hard political junkies.
Next came the consummate political operative, David Axelrod, diagnosing Hilary's campaign problems. Talking about Obama's 2008 campaign, he recalled what happens when campaigns falter: "what happens is every donor in America becomes an amateur political consultant and very generous with their advice. I remember a donor summoning Obama and telling he had to fire his team". That tells you all you need to know about who is pulling the strings, and that advice is almost certainly not limited to operational campaigning issues.
Also of interest was Axelrod's reaction to Joe Biden's interview with Stephen Colbert: "I don't think he's playing a game when he says he doesn't know what he has the emotional reserves to run a presidential race". Axelrod's initial assumption is that this was a calculated political stratagem; which gives you an insight into political campaign management.
Peter Baker noted "the Clintons have been through this so many times, scandal, recovery, scandal, recovery, setback of some sort, and they're good at it. They're the leading re-bounders in American politics of the last two decades". Paraphrasing Oscar Wilde, "to be embroiled in one scandal is misfortune; to be embroiled in several looks like carelessness".
The one clip from Stephen Colbert's interview with Joe Biden the media are playing again and again is the one in which he talks about having the emotional energy to run for president. The far more moving moments for me was when he talked about his son. A measure of his humility is that he really did think the son had outgrown the father, and as someone whose father though he was a perpetual disappointment, for me that was particularly poignant.
Biden's struggle
As distressing as it was to watch, you felt you were privileged to be party to a rare sharing of private sentiment, Biden's grief and vulnerability, something that in my experience is a critical component to building trust. Arguably, that did more for his possible candidacy than tens of millions of dollars-worth of campaign advertising.
If he does decide to run, and my money is that he will for reasons I'll return to later, Hilary's race will be all but run. As experienced and as competent as she may be (Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal noted that she has been and the pinnacle of American politics for a quarter of a century), she comes across as entitled, privileged, patronising, and out of touch. Her support depends largely on the assumption of her inevitability; once that goes all bets are off. Those of her supporter who were there only because there was no other option are now seeing two; in Bernie Sanders and (perhaps) in Joe Biden. The only thing keeping them in the Hilary camp is the notion that Sanders is too left-leaning to be electable in the presidential race. But that restraint goes away if Biden declares; Hilary supporters my trample one another in a rush for the exit and the campaign will implode much faster, I think, than anyone imagines.
Aside from struggling with his most recent loss, Biden may be held back knowing that his entry will likely severely wound Hilary's campaign and divide Democratic voters (and donors). Whether he feels any loyalty to Hilary is unclear, but given his apparent decency as a human being, it's quite possible that he may feel reluctant to torpedo Hilary. But my guess is that ultimately as her campaign numbers continue to slide while Bernie Sander's rises, he will feel a sense of duty compelling him to step in as a more electable establishment candidate. We'll know one way or another by mid-November 1, when the first states' filing deadlines fall due for campaigns to register their candidate.
Friday, September 4, 2015
2 dimenisional politics
Bernie Sanders, by contrast, speaks not from a carefully tested and polished script but from a set of passionately held beliefs. Unlike Clinton, who comes across as calculating, instrumental ultimately inscrutable and inauthentic, there is never any doubt about Sanders' views. But absent a sea-change in American politics, he may do for the Democrats what Michael Foot did for Labour 33 years ago. That's the fear bolstering Hilary's nevertheless wilting campaign.
Enter Joe Biden. He's still a completely establishment insider. But like Sanders, you have the feeling that he speaks from the heart. His many 'gaffs' show how unscripted he is. Unlike Hilary, who oddly reminded me of Queen Elizabeth II, with her carefully masked disdain for, and completely lack of comprehension of, the lives of common folk (she noted last year than its been more than 30 years since she has driven herself anywhere), Biden used to take the train from Delaware to Washington, and is at easy with ordinary people in a way that Bill may have been able to fake but Hilary clearly can't.
If he does decide to run, Joe Biden may be the 'compromise' candidate that the Democrats are looking for.
Europe in crisis
The Hungarian government has made a catastrophic pig's ear in its handling of the refugee crisis. It's actions are incoherent; it is insisting on registering the refugees which would mean they would stay in Hungary, yet repeatedly sends xenophobic signals inconsistent with allowing them to remain. Shutting the main railway station in Budapest and leaving refugees, who'd already bought tickets to German, stranded for days was a terrible start; then allowing a train into the station, letting them board, only to be stopped a few miles down he road where a reception committee of riot police was waiting to escort them to a camp. While the comparison is clearly inaccurate, the spectre of a right-wing regime putting people onto trains that ended up in camps was hovering in the background. Today saw hundreds of refugees beginning to walk from Budapest towards Germany, a journey of over 700km, half though Austria, which is likely to about as welcoming as Hungary.
Of course Europe as a whole has not really covered itself in glory either. Jordan has taken between 600k and 1.4 million depending on your source, the higher figure being 20% of Jordan’s pre-crisis population. Lebanon has taken 1.2 million. These are small countries. The UK has so far taken 25k.
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
The China Syndrome
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| Shanghai Stock Exchange Composite Index |
It was a knee-jerk reaction to a sell-off in China. That in turn was a bursting of an equity bubble that had been created after the run-up in property prices stalled and many of China's new-to-the-market fairly naïve investors were looking for the next big opportunity. Many were over-extended and had to sell as market began to turn down, turning a gentle slide into a route. But that was always going to happen - PE ratios were absurdly high and prices had become completely disconnected from the underlying fundamentals. (Even now,they are probably too high - the market is 50% above where it was 18 months ago).
But instead of looking at China's melt-down as just a much needed market correction and not an indicator of any real change to the economy, investors in Europe and the US panicked and rushed for the exits too.
That may be over-stating the case. There are several ways in which the "China Syndrome" might impact US companies. First the Chinese government's response (lowering interest rates and devaluing the Yuan) were hurried and cast doubt on the Party's ability to manage the market economy it is creating. Second, the devaluation and the denting in consumer confidence among China's neauveau riche will hurt consumer technology and luxury goods sales; much of Apple's recent profit growth has come from China.
But the scale of the investors' reaction in the US vastly outweighs the impact of a likely 1% reduction in China's GDP this year (which we already knews was on the cards). If US companies relied exclusively on China for sales and profit, then the drop in US stocks would be in the right ball park - but US exports to China ($123bn in 2014) account for less than 1% of US GDP ($17.4tr). Granted other countries to which the US exports might also themselves export to China so that the effect is larger than just the US' trade with China; but even so the reaction seems quite out of proportion with any reasonable estimate of the impact of China's slow-down on the US economy.
All of which supports my contention, an observation I made to a finance colleague 20 years ago, that finance is less about pricing of assets and risk than it is a function of rumour, social network and herd behaviour. If expectations of the present value of future cash flows determined asset prices none of last week ups and downs would have happened.
Collective intelligence
One distinguishing feature of human civilization is out ability to share information with each other and pass accumulated information across generations. Standing on the shoulders of giants has enabled the development of a huge body of knowledge and understanding that enables us to manipulate our environment in ways that no other species has achieved.
Information sharing, while central to our species' success, is nevertheless fairly crude and imperfect for two reasons. First language requires that knowledge be encoded and that encoding leads to a loss of fidelity in transmission. This is the flip side of tacit knowledge. Second, some people decide that sharing reduces their relative advantage on which resource appropriation depends. In other words keeping information to oneself and exploiting it leads to higher rewards than sharing it.
Recently there have been some luminaries in the IT world who have expressed the fear that machine intelligence will soon surpass human intelligence and at that point all bets are off.
My take is slightly different. It's not the power of single computers that presents a threat but their collective intelligence; computers have no qualms about sharing data, and data can be communicated losslessly between them. So even if they are individually less capable at the nodes, their ability to access collective information though the network and develop a collective intelligence (akin to "organizational intelligence" - see Jim March's writing) vastly outstrips ours. That is what I think should give is pause.
That leads to the question of societal organization; Keynes imagined a world 100 years from the time of his writing in 1930 in which machines did almost all the work and people lived lives of leisure. Yet that looks unlikely; more people are working and working at least as long as they did 100 years ago - his anticipated life of leisure seems a cruel joke.
If indeed machines do soon acquire the ability to performs not just repetitive manual task but a wide range of more complex cognitive tasks, the way we currently organize society looks untenable. 80% unemployment with the owners of capital benefiting from the machines' labors is a recipe for high social unrest and instability. So we may have to grapple with the issue of some transfer of wealth to provide for those who have been displaced - otherwise, we risk a society that looks rather like the middle ages with a handful of unimaginably wealthy barons enjoying the services of a huge number of serfs, living in abject poverty.
Some might say that with 45 million Americans already living on or below the poverty line, we are well on the way.
Information sharing, while central to our species' success, is nevertheless fairly crude and imperfect for two reasons. First language requires that knowledge be encoded and that encoding leads to a loss of fidelity in transmission. This is the flip side of tacit knowledge. Second, some people decide that sharing reduces their relative advantage on which resource appropriation depends. In other words keeping information to oneself and exploiting it leads to higher rewards than sharing it.
Recently there have been some luminaries in the IT world who have expressed the fear that machine intelligence will soon surpass human intelligence and at that point all bets are off.
My take is slightly different. It's not the power of single computers that presents a threat but their collective intelligence; computers have no qualms about sharing data, and data can be communicated losslessly between them. So even if they are individually less capable at the nodes, their ability to access collective information though the network and develop a collective intelligence (akin to "organizational intelligence" - see Jim March's writing) vastly outstrips ours. That is what I think should give is pause.
That leads to the question of societal organization; Keynes imagined a world 100 years from the time of his writing in 1930 in which machines did almost all the work and people lived lives of leisure. Yet that looks unlikely; more people are working and working at least as long as they did 100 years ago - his anticipated life of leisure seems a cruel joke.
If indeed machines do soon acquire the ability to performs not just repetitive manual task but a wide range of more complex cognitive tasks, the way we currently organize society looks untenable. 80% unemployment with the owners of capital benefiting from the machines' labors is a recipe for high social unrest and instability. So we may have to grapple with the issue of some transfer of wealth to provide for those who have been displaced - otherwise, we risk a society that looks rather like the middle ages with a handful of unimaginably wealthy barons enjoying the services of a huge number of serfs, living in abject poverty.
Some might say that with 45 million Americans already living on or below the poverty line, we are well on the way.
Monday, July 13, 2015
A Greek settlement?
Several things are clear. First Germany's desire to stick to the rules has trumped France and Italy's desire for the appearance of European Unity. Second, the crisis has exposed flaws in the structure of the common European currency, which looks like it has fallen between the two stools of monetary and fiscal independence and full integration, a position that it turns out is unworkable. Third, it has shown how important are integrity and honesty in negotiations; and that when they are gone things get very difficult very quickly. And finally, any deal which might have made economic sense has been distorted by the whipping up of public opinion and the resulting transition from the realm of finance to that of politics.
It would appear that the economic can has again been kicked down the road in that Greece may have been forced to make promises in return for a lifeline that it simply hasn't the capacity to deliver. And even supposing that the numbers did add up, something Paul Krugman disputes, Greece's history of lax implementation of revenue raising policies and its attachment to spending may scupper implementation of key parts of the deal; and that's even assuming that the deal is approved by an parliament that must feel angry at Europe and betrayed by its prime minister.
One commentator asked a Greek MP this morning whether this was 'Europe trampling on the democratic will of the people'. I understand journalists like to ask provocative questions but this was at the sillier end of the spectrum. Europe has 503 million people, 482 million (97%) of whom were excluded from that referendum; and ultimately they are footing the bill.
If European monetary union is to succeed, the notion that economic under-performance in one region can be solved by labour migration, which replaced currency fluctuation as the purported adjustment mechanism, must be largely discarded. Instead the richer Europe countries will have to come to terms with the fact that direct transfers of wealth may be required semi-permanently to support the less productive parts of the European economy, while the latter must accept that those transfers will come with strings attached: and that effectively means a loss of sovereignty—something the Greeks are just finding out.
Tuesday, July 7, 2015
Greece
Here's my take. When Greece joined the Euro, its government was able borrow money from private lenders at very low interest rates. They were prepared to lend at rates that didn't reflect the risk of Greek sovereign default in part because the government cooked the books on its tax receipts, and in part, I'm assuming, because they calculated that the EU would not let the Greek government default; that would put lots of European 'too big to fail' institutions in peril.
When Greece's finances began to look shaky, interest rates on Greek debt soared, and default looked likely, the IMF, the ECB and the EU then stepped in, bailed out the private lenders to reduce the risk of contagion (exactly as those lenders predicted) and, in return for lending European tax payers money to the Greek government, asked for a repayment plan, one based on 'austerity' (meaning a drastic cut in government spending and the privatization of state owned enterprises).
It seems that some of this plan was never implemented: the retirement age was not raised, pension reform was neglected, privatization proceeded at a snail's pace, and tax collection wasn't improved. But government downsizing did lead to a severe contraction in economic activity, lowering tax receipts still further and prompting another bailout. With it came more pressure for reforms and government spending cuts, leading ultimately to a soft 'revolt' by the people who, in 2015, elected an anti-austerity government led by Alexi Trsipras. Trsipras' Syriza party came to power promising to undo austerity, something it really had no way of knowing it could deliver.
Over the six months of rancorous negotiation and increasingly hostile rhetoric, Trsipras and Yanis Varoufakis, Greece's finance minister, failed to get the concessions they had promised their voters and in a desperate move, called referendum on the austerity deal which, perhaps not surprisingly, the Greeks rejected, in effect tying Trsipras to the mast of his electoral ship.
By now, private lenders were largely off the hook so 'contagion' in the banking system was mitigated. But that meant that instead, European tax payers in effect were backing Greece through the IMF, the ECB and directly through (I'm assuming) Greek debt purchases made by European governments.
In June an IMF repayment deadline came and went with out visible consequences; in early July and ECB deadline (it had promised not to renew it's prpovision of funds to the Greek banks were a deal not reached) passed and funds continued to be provided. So a big bang (much like the passing of the US debt ceiling) went off with hardly a sound, making all the dire warnings look like posturing and negotiating. What people say they will do and whey they actually do when push comes to shove often seem to differ.
So where now? For one thing, despite the artificially whipped up emotional indignation of "being cast out of Europe" there may be benefits to letting the Greek currency float again. Import substitution should create jobs and the economy, after some period of inevitable chaos, should recover. That may give Greece some breathing space to decide for itself which path it wants to take - reform or economic stagnation and collapse. But at least that won't be a solution imposed on them by outsiders.
Sunday, June 28, 2015
A momentous week
The Supreme Court handed down three monumental decisions this week: on the ACA, on discrimination and on gay marriage. This post deals with the two I've read, on the ACA and same-sex marriage. Common to both is the holistic interpretation taken by the Court, rather than nitpicky, language parsing, strict constructionist interpretations we've seen in the past.
The ACA
Four things in the Court's ruling seem noteworthy. First it wasn't the usual 5-4
decision, and since one might have expected 4-5 that's two who "switched sides".
Second, it puts to rest for the moment the question of health care - though not doubt those opposed to the bill on principle (that principle seeming to have been being that it was proposed by a black man) will continue their attempts to deny access to health care to tens of millions of people.
Third, it allows centrist Republican presidential candidates to avoid the question of what they'd replace it with if it were to be repealed. This is a tough question since ACA is not universal health care (that "socialist cancer on society" if Fox is top be believed (which, of course, it should not) ) but a tweak to the existing insurance system, one originally proposed by a moderate Republican. While providing greater access though risk pooling, it does nothing to reduce the outrageous cost of health care in the US. Inadvertently, Obama pulled a 'Tony Blair'; taking a centre right position, making it impossible for the center right to respond without moving still further to the right (which they duly did).
Fourth, it lets law-makers off the hook for drafting poor legislation. This is a problem since it paves the way for more longer convoluted bills that pander to special interests by absolving them from the very basic responsibility of drafting commonsensical, coherent legislation. In turn that helps lobbyists since law-makers will spend even less time carefully reading the bills they sponsor and vote on; and that's bad for representative democracy.
Gay Marriage
Justice Kennedy, writing for the majority noted that the institution of marriage has changes over the years: "These new insights have strengthened, not weakened, the institution of marriage". That seems a stretch' suffice it to day I think that marriage has endured as an institution despite a changing social climate; first the individuals wanting to marry, rather than their parents, were given the right to make that decisions for themselves, and as women's second class status was gradually replaced by more equal treatment so the was forced to adapt accordingly.
What is curious in the matters is why marriage should have been a state matter in the first place, given the widespread understanding on both sides that it is an almost universal and long standing human institution.
In arguing that marriage is necessary to create a stable environment in which a child can grow up and then noting that children are only the result of sexual relations between a man and a woman, the dissenters completely ignore adoption and in-vitro fertilization, to means by which same sex couples can have children. Unless they are advocating a ban on gay adoption, then by this argument they should support gay marriage.
But the dissenters say they are not arguing on the societal merits of the case but more narrowly on whether it is the Courts role or the States' to make the determination of what marriage should be. To the extent that marriage confers advantages, any state law that restricts access to those advantages to one group or another must be considered unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment guaranteeing equal protection under the law, as the majority suggest. The argument that the Framers did not specifically address the question of marriage and left the "whole subject of the domestic relations of husband and wife to the States doesn't mean that the Court can't ensure that rights are not being trampled on by the States, just as it did in its civil rights decisions.
The dissenters' next argument is risible; they turn to the dictionary definition from 1828! I'm sure there are quite a few words whose meaning has changed since then; and a dictionary is simply a reflection of widely understood meanings at the time, something that takes from the culture and times, not dictating it.
Justice Scalia, joining with the dissenters, but writing a separate opinion, lamented, melodramatically, the threat to democracy, of the Courts intervention. He notes that "when the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, every State limited marriage to one man and one woman, and no one doubted
the constitutionality of doing so". But the same was true of slavery and racial discrimination; and that's something that the Course has (rightly) weighed in on. And where was this anti-activist sentiment when he ruled on Citizens United, changing in profound ways the entire democratic political process.
He is also wrong that: "judges are selected precisely for their skill as lawyers". There are other criteria involved in their selection (and ratification); most people seem to think that political views matter too. If not, there wouldn't be such a party-political bun-fight over the Justices' nominations.
Scalia's opinion is notable for it's "Mr Angry" tone, not the measured legal prose: "The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic" or sentences starting "Really?", "Huh?" and "What say?" (Page 8). And then, without a trace of irony, he finishes his rant with: "The stuff contained in today’s opinion has to diminish this Court’s reputation for clear thinking and sober analysis".
It's probably not the last we'll here of either issue, but it seem to be two steps in the right direction.
The ACA
Four things in the Court's ruling seem noteworthy. First it wasn't the usual 5-4
decision, and since one might have expected 4-5 that's two who "switched sides".
Second, it puts to rest for the moment the question of health care - though not doubt those opposed to the bill on principle (that principle seeming to have been being that it was proposed by a black man) will continue their attempts to deny access to health care to tens of millions of people.
Third, it allows centrist Republican presidential candidates to avoid the question of what they'd replace it with if it were to be repealed. This is a tough question since ACA is not universal health care (that "socialist cancer on society" if Fox is top be believed (which, of course, it should not) ) but a tweak to the existing insurance system, one originally proposed by a moderate Republican. While providing greater access though risk pooling, it does nothing to reduce the outrageous cost of health care in the US. Inadvertently, Obama pulled a 'Tony Blair'; taking a centre right position, making it impossible for the center right to respond without moving still further to the right (which they duly did).
Fourth, it lets law-makers off the hook for drafting poor legislation. This is a problem since it paves the way for more longer convoluted bills that pander to special interests by absolving them from the very basic responsibility of drafting commonsensical, coherent legislation. In turn that helps lobbyists since law-makers will spend even less time carefully reading the bills they sponsor and vote on; and that's bad for representative democracy.
Gay Marriage
Justice Kennedy, writing for the majority noted that the institution of marriage has changes over the years: "These new insights have strengthened, not weakened, the institution of marriage". That seems a stretch' suffice it to day I think that marriage has endured as an institution despite a changing social climate; first the individuals wanting to marry, rather than their parents, were given the right to make that decisions for themselves, and as women's second class status was gradually replaced by more equal treatment so the was forced to adapt accordingly.
What is curious in the matters is why marriage should have been a state matter in the first place, given the widespread understanding on both sides that it is an almost universal and long standing human institution.
In arguing that marriage is necessary to create a stable environment in which a child can grow up and then noting that children are only the result of sexual relations between a man and a woman, the dissenters completely ignore adoption and in-vitro fertilization, to means by which same sex couples can have children. Unless they are advocating a ban on gay adoption, then by this argument they should support gay marriage.
But the dissenters say they are not arguing on the societal merits of the case but more narrowly on whether it is the Courts role or the States' to make the determination of what marriage should be. To the extent that marriage confers advantages, any state law that restricts access to those advantages to one group or another must be considered unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment guaranteeing equal protection under the law, as the majority suggest. The argument that the Framers did not specifically address the question of marriage and left the "whole subject of the domestic relations of husband and wife to the States doesn't mean that the Court can't ensure that rights are not being trampled on by the States, just as it did in its civil rights decisions.
The dissenters' next argument is risible; they turn to the dictionary definition from 1828! I'm sure there are quite a few words whose meaning has changed since then; and a dictionary is simply a reflection of widely understood meanings at the time, something that takes from the culture and times, not dictating it.
Justice Scalia, joining with the dissenters, but writing a separate opinion, lamented, melodramatically, the threat to democracy, of the Courts intervention. He notes that "when the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, every State limited marriage to one man and one woman, and no one doubted
the constitutionality of doing so". But the same was true of slavery and racial discrimination; and that's something that the Course has (rightly) weighed in on. And where was this anti-activist sentiment when he ruled on Citizens United, changing in profound ways the entire democratic political process.
He is also wrong that: "judges are selected precisely for their skill as lawyers". There are other criteria involved in their selection (and ratification); most people seem to think that political views matter too. If not, there wouldn't be such a party-political bun-fight over the Justices' nominations.
Scalia's opinion is notable for it's "Mr Angry" tone, not the measured legal prose: "The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic" or sentences starting "Really?", "Huh?" and "What say?" (Page 8). And then, without a trace of irony, he finishes his rant with: "The stuff contained in today’s opinion has to diminish this Court’s reputation for clear thinking and sober analysis".
It's probably not the last we'll here of either issue, but it seem to be two steps in the right direction.
Sunday, June 21, 2015
Nature or nurture? Reflections on 'American Sniper'
After watching "American Sniper" this morning, Judith asked me what I thought. That was a difficult question partly because I know from experience she wouldn't agree with my views, but partly because I had a variety of reactions to the film. In what follows, I'm not going to deal with the errors and deceptions at the very top that took the US and a few of its allies into Iraq, nor with the blunders, political and strategic, made while the campaign was being conducted, but focus more narrowly on the portrayal of Chris Kyle and the implications of the way Clint Eastwood chose to represent him, both in Iraq and back in the US, in his film.
First, I felt it was poorly made. It didn't tell a particularly coherent story, nor was the character development convincing. Too much time was devoted Kyle's work in Iraq, and too little to the disconnect he and other veterans feel when getting back to the US. One scene that did work was was late in the film, after his last tour; he is seen sitting in a bar shortly after a fierce battle, and behind him the television news is reporting on basket ball. Another were the scenes, all too brief, of his interaction with wounded veterans.
The scene in which Kyle kills the Iraqi sniper stuck me a almost comically fanciful; there was nothing for him to shoot at, yet miraculously, he hits this unseen target over a mile away. There are two things wrong here - either Kyle had a better view of his target than the film showed so while he was an exceptional at his job he wasn't supernatural; or he took a shot in the dark, and while lucky, put all his fellow marines and SEALs in danger.
This was not the only point in the film where artistic license may have painted an unfortunate picture of US activities in Iraq. The decision to go door to door routing out Kyle's nemesis seemed to be based more on emption than strategy. I was left with the sense that dedication and commitment of a lot of brave men and women was being squandered through poor decision making, tactical and organizational miss-steps, and a lack of a clear strategy. I was left wondering whether the film was accurate, which reflects poorly on the running of the campaign, or whether the story was embellished and hammed-up for dramatic effect, which reflects poorly on its iconic director. Of course it may be a bit of both, but I hope that while the top level political decision making was deeply flawed, the mid-level tactical decision making was, in reality, better than was portrayed in the film.
Another powerful scene was the footage at the very end, I assume real, of the crowds who turned out to watch Kyle's funeral procession. No question that he was exceptionally effective at what he did; but would there have been this kind of turnout for the battlefield medic who had saved the most lives? I doubt it. And that speaks to a disturbing trait, the celebration of violence against "the other", a manifestation of intolerance and a lack of empathy and understanding. This has broader implications than the demonetization of Arabs or Muslims; it is also manifest in hate crimes at home against gays or blacks or Latinos. Ironically, despite the heroic portrayal of a patriotic cowboy turned military super-star, what fuels the hatred and violence is usually fear. It also underscores the sentiment that problems can be resolved by the use of force, which we have seen recently see in the militarized police response to numerous situations of unrest and protest.
That's not to say that there aren't a lot of people who hate what America stands for (not, incidentally, a simple construct) and who are hell bent on killing Americans and destroying what they consider evil. But we seem unable or unwilling even to see the conflict through the eyes of impartial bystanders, let alone our adversaries.
While watching film I was struck by recollections of WWII movies I'd seen growing up that recounted, indeed glorified, the heroism of resistance fighters in Norway ("633 Squadron") and France. Those portrayed in American Sniper, a little clumsily, as the villains of the piece could easily be seen in the same light as the WWII heroes of the resistance by those who consider themselves under occupation. And if the argument is made that the US is not an occupying force in Iraq because Iraq has its own government, think of the Vichy government. Some Americans feel contempt for the French for collaborating with the Germans; but do they think the same way about the Iraqi government and those willing to support it?
Is this widespread xenophobia, fear, hostility, aggression and an infatuation with projection of power through force a universal human trait or is it something country specific? Ultimately, I am left only with questions, not answers, and the sense that the world is complex and often rather depressing.
First, I felt it was poorly made. It didn't tell a particularly coherent story, nor was the character development convincing. Too much time was devoted Kyle's work in Iraq, and too little to the disconnect he and other veterans feel when getting back to the US. One scene that did work was was late in the film, after his last tour; he is seen sitting in a bar shortly after a fierce battle, and behind him the television news is reporting on basket ball. Another were the scenes, all too brief, of his interaction with wounded veterans.
The scene in which Kyle kills the Iraqi sniper stuck me a almost comically fanciful; there was nothing for him to shoot at, yet miraculously, he hits this unseen target over a mile away. There are two things wrong here - either Kyle had a better view of his target than the film showed so while he was an exceptional at his job he wasn't supernatural; or he took a shot in the dark, and while lucky, put all his fellow marines and SEALs in danger.
This was not the only point in the film where artistic license may have painted an unfortunate picture of US activities in Iraq. The decision to go door to door routing out Kyle's nemesis seemed to be based more on emption than strategy. I was left with the sense that dedication and commitment of a lot of brave men and women was being squandered through poor decision making, tactical and organizational miss-steps, and a lack of a clear strategy. I was left wondering whether the film was accurate, which reflects poorly on the running of the campaign, or whether the story was embellished and hammed-up for dramatic effect, which reflects poorly on its iconic director. Of course it may be a bit of both, but I hope that while the top level political decision making was deeply flawed, the mid-level tactical decision making was, in reality, better than was portrayed in the film.
Another powerful scene was the footage at the very end, I assume real, of the crowds who turned out to watch Kyle's funeral procession. No question that he was exceptionally effective at what he did; but would there have been this kind of turnout for the battlefield medic who had saved the most lives? I doubt it. And that speaks to a disturbing trait, the celebration of violence against "the other", a manifestation of intolerance and a lack of empathy and understanding. This has broader implications than the demonetization of Arabs or Muslims; it is also manifest in hate crimes at home against gays or blacks or Latinos. Ironically, despite the heroic portrayal of a patriotic cowboy turned military super-star, what fuels the hatred and violence is usually fear. It also underscores the sentiment that problems can be resolved by the use of force, which we have seen recently see in the militarized police response to numerous situations of unrest and protest.
That's not to say that there aren't a lot of people who hate what America stands for (not, incidentally, a simple construct) and who are hell bent on killing Americans and destroying what they consider evil. But we seem unable or unwilling even to see the conflict through the eyes of impartial bystanders, let alone our adversaries.
While watching film I was struck by recollections of WWII movies I'd seen growing up that recounted, indeed glorified, the heroism of resistance fighters in Norway ("633 Squadron") and France. Those portrayed in American Sniper, a little clumsily, as the villains of the piece could easily be seen in the same light as the WWII heroes of the resistance by those who consider themselves under occupation. And if the argument is made that the US is not an occupying force in Iraq because Iraq has its own government, think of the Vichy government. Some Americans feel contempt for the French for collaborating with the Germans; but do they think the same way about the Iraqi government and those willing to support it?
Is this widespread xenophobia, fear, hostility, aggression and an infatuation with projection of power through force a universal human trait or is it something country specific? Ultimately, I am left only with questions, not answers, and the sense that the world is complex and often rather depressing.
Saturday, June 20, 2015
Charleston, SC
Columbine, Sandy Hook elementary school, Fort Hood, Virginia Tech, Aurora Theatre, The Sikh temple shooting... those are the ones I can remember. But there are many many more. The last time in which a full calendar year passed without a mass shooting was 2002; and before that 1985. And as tragic as this is (on average 34 people killed every year) it pales by comparison to the number of homicides by gun which were averaging over 26 EVERY DAY (data for 2006 to 2011). The majority (72%) involved handguns and almost 80% were obtained legally.
Sunday, June 14, 2015
Bernie
Bernie Sanders, who decried the US political system as corrupted by big money donors, was asked whether that meant the politicians were corrupt. He seemed a little caught off guard; perhaps he was thinking "yes" but realized that he really couldn't say that on national television.
His answer should have been, I think, a firm 'no'. They are simply doing what they must to survive in the system of campaign finance rules. It's the system, not the people in it, that is flawed. They are no more to blame than CEOs pursuing a profit - that's their job - even if that means doming something we don't like but which saves the company money and which we haven’t legislated against. It's the role of government to set the rules of the game and regulate the incentives in order to get the outcomes we collectively want.
Of course that's harder to do when those we are asking to change the rules are the beneficiaries of the current system. But at least we need to be clear about the problem and then we can examine what that leads to; perhaps then we might elect representatives whose mandate is changing the rulers of the game.
His answer should have been, I think, a firm 'no'. They are simply doing what they must to survive in the system of campaign finance rules. It's the system, not the people in it, that is flawed. They are no more to blame than CEOs pursuing a profit - that's their job - even if that means doming something we don't like but which saves the company money and which we haven’t legislated against. It's the role of government to set the rules of the game and regulate the incentives in order to get the outcomes we collectively want.
Of course that's harder to do when those we are asking to change the rules are the beneficiaries of the current system. But at least we need to be clear about the problem and then we can examine what that leads to; perhaps then we might elect representatives whose mandate is changing the rulers of the game.
Asymetry
The abstraction: suppose country A provides arms to, and trains, a local militia, B, in country C.
Question: is country A an evil interfering superpower, at least as seen by those in C fighting the local militia, B?
If A is Russia and C is Ukraine, the answer is yes. If A is the US and C is ISIS (with ambitions to be a state ), the answer one generally gets is 'no'.
But to those who have been oppressed by the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government, and who think (perhaps wrongly) that ISIS is their salvation, I imagine that's the way the US will be seen if it continues to support Iraq's sectarian government.
Richard Hass (on FZs' GPS) noted that incrementalism is leading nowhere. But getting in more robustly isn't the right answer (as Larry Ellison noted wrt. Apple "we tried that experiment"). So something completely different is needed. Most serious thinkers seem to have concluded that Iraq as a single entity is a non-starter now. So the questions should be: 1) what does a partitioned Iraq look like and 2) how does it get there as painlessly as possible?
Question: is country A an evil interfering superpower, at least as seen by those in C fighting the local militia, B?
If A is Russia and C is Ukraine, the answer is yes. If A is the US and C is ISIS (with ambitions to be a state ), the answer one generally gets is 'no'.
But to those who have been oppressed by the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government, and who think (perhaps wrongly) that ISIS is their salvation, I imagine that's the way the US will be seen if it continues to support Iraq's sectarian government.
Richard Hass (on FZs' GPS) noted that incrementalism is leading nowhere. But getting in more robustly isn't the right answer (as Larry Ellison noted wrt. Apple "we tried that experiment"). So something completely different is needed. Most serious thinkers seem to have concluded that Iraq as a single entity is a non-starter now. So the questions should be: 1) what does a partitioned Iraq look like and 2) how does it get there as painlessly as possible?
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Through the looking glass
The Economist had an article last week on the threat to the reinsurance industry from catastrophe bonds. I was struck by the thought that AIG got into trouble by creating a product (credit default swaps) that looked like insurance but for which it didn't have the competences needed to price the risk accurately. Now we have financial firms substituting bonds for reinsurance -- which looks to an outside an awful lot like the same things in reverse.
Sunday, May 31, 2015
On Combinatorial Innovation, Extrapolation and Root Causes: Implications for Policy?
This morning, on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, Zakaria moderated a discussion with two military experts, retired U.S. Lieutenant General Mark Hertling and Michael O'Hanlon. co-director of the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence at Brookings on ISIS' military capability.
All were impressed by ISIS's tactics and it's adaptability. With the benefit of hindsight its ability to employ the tactics of a regular army rather than those of a terror organisation should not come as a surprise given that the Coalition Provisional Authority under Paul Bremer de-Ba'athified the Iraqi army, creating a pool of unemployed, dissatisfied Sunni's, with more military training than the current army, on which ISIS could draw. And by interning them together in Camp Bucca, the religious zealots and the ex-military were brought conveniently under one roof.
Combinatorial Innovation
More interesting however is the organization's ability to innovate; drawing on this enlarged pool of tactics, those of conventional warfare and those of terrorism, it has created new strategies not previously available to either precursor organization. This has led to great adaptability and some recent military success such as its recent taking of Ramadi.
Michael O’Hanlon suggested that ISIS has a weakness; that it needs not only to capture territory, but also to hold and govern it. Yet applying the same logic, it seems reasonable to expect that it will draw on dismissed Ba'athist government officials with the knowledge to help it govern. So relying on its need to govern as its Achilles heel seems rather optimistic.
Goals
What is often lacking from these discussion, and this was no exception, was a discussion of threats, targets, likelihoods and mediating mechanisms. The US must be clear whether its interest is in fixing Iraq, preventing sectarian violence in the Middle East, spreading democracy and ousting tyrants, or making life safer for US citizens. These do not all go together; making progress on one, for example preventing sectarian violence, may lead to a reduction in safety for US citizens. And the US has been fairly unsuccessful of late in its mission of spreading democracy; Iraq is in danger of becoming a failed state. In the remainder of this post, I will try to explore only the last goal, making life safer for US citizens.
Root Causes
Intervening in an sectarian armed struggle, even when this is done with good intentions and, theoretically, even handedly, makes the intervening party the target of one, if not both, sides. Think, for example, of the British Army and the RUC in Northern Ireland. So increasing US intervention will likely increase the degree of hatred towards it within ISIS.
ISIS projects power locally by drawing people into a vision of a new regime in which Sunni's will be better represented than under either the Shiite Iraqi regime or the authoritarian, secular regime of Bashar al-Assad. It recruits disaffected Muslim youth from around the world to come to Syria and Iraq to fight using social media. It hopes to bring Amreian troops back into Iraq or Syria for a final apocalyptic battle.
The threat it poses in the short term is largely to people living in Iraq and Syria. The threat to US citizens at home is through the radicalization of disaffected youth in the US, again through social media, who are turned into "home grown" terrorists.
At its root, ISIS' power lies in the resentment of the disenfranchised, whether they be those who have been stripped of positions of power, or those who see themselves as an excluded minority, both socially and economically. Eventually, I hope, planners will realize that destroying any group that is sustained by resentment from exclusion is a fools errand. Then we can start looking for more realistic solutions.
Implications for Policy?
If doing more of the same isn't working what might? Some suggest that we should go back with embedded special forces (boots on the ground by another name). But at best this will be a holding pattern which the US will have to maintain, absent any other ideas, indefinitely. As Larry Ellison remarked on Steve Job's and Apple's history: "We've tried that experiment before".
Doing less might not seem like a strategy but what about doing the opposite of what we've been trying to do? As repugnant as ISIS methods and values are, they appear to want to govern the Sunni population in Syria and Iraq; so why not let them, indeed encourage them? Iraq will inevitably be partitioned at some point. The Kurds will form their own independent state and further partitioning into two separate countries, one Shiite he other Sunni may be not only inevitable but possibly desirable. The breakup of Yugoslavia might be a model; eventually there would be a reduction in sectarian conflicts. It would also mean ISIS would set up institutions of power and governance which in turn would mean 1) that it would be permanently preoccupied principally with local issues and 2) that any efforts to export terrorism would be easier to track down. And while the problem of disaffected youth in this country is a hard one to solve, since it's partly economic, partly ethnic and social, removing one component, the claim that the US is oppressing Sunni Muslims around the world would be harder to make.
Clearly the approach has risks; but given the alternatives, might not a counter-intuitive solution be worth a look?
All were impressed by ISIS's tactics and it's adaptability. With the benefit of hindsight its ability to employ the tactics of a regular army rather than those of a terror organisation should not come as a surprise given that the Coalition Provisional Authority under Paul Bremer de-Ba'athified the Iraqi army, creating a pool of unemployed, dissatisfied Sunni's, with more military training than the current army, on which ISIS could draw. And by interning them together in Camp Bucca, the religious zealots and the ex-military were brought conveniently under one roof.
Combinatorial Innovation
More interesting however is the organization's ability to innovate; drawing on this enlarged pool of tactics, those of conventional warfare and those of terrorism, it has created new strategies not previously available to either precursor organization. This has led to great adaptability and some recent military success such as its recent taking of Ramadi.
Michael O’Hanlon suggested that ISIS has a weakness; that it needs not only to capture territory, but also to hold and govern it. Yet applying the same logic, it seems reasonable to expect that it will draw on dismissed Ba'athist government officials with the knowledge to help it govern. So relying on its need to govern as its Achilles heel seems rather optimistic.
Goals
What is often lacking from these discussion, and this was no exception, was a discussion of threats, targets, likelihoods and mediating mechanisms. The US must be clear whether its interest is in fixing Iraq, preventing sectarian violence in the Middle East, spreading democracy and ousting tyrants, or making life safer for US citizens. These do not all go together; making progress on one, for example preventing sectarian violence, may lead to a reduction in safety for US citizens. And the US has been fairly unsuccessful of late in its mission of spreading democracy; Iraq is in danger of becoming a failed state. In the remainder of this post, I will try to explore only the last goal, making life safer for US citizens.
Root Causes
Intervening in an sectarian armed struggle, even when this is done with good intentions and, theoretically, even handedly, makes the intervening party the target of one, if not both, sides. Think, for example, of the British Army and the RUC in Northern Ireland. So increasing US intervention will likely increase the degree of hatred towards it within ISIS.
ISIS projects power locally by drawing people into a vision of a new regime in which Sunni's will be better represented than under either the Shiite Iraqi regime or the authoritarian, secular regime of Bashar al-Assad. It recruits disaffected Muslim youth from around the world to come to Syria and Iraq to fight using social media. It hopes to bring Amreian troops back into Iraq or Syria for a final apocalyptic battle.
The threat it poses in the short term is largely to people living in Iraq and Syria. The threat to US citizens at home is through the radicalization of disaffected youth in the US, again through social media, who are turned into "home grown" terrorists.
At its root, ISIS' power lies in the resentment of the disenfranchised, whether they be those who have been stripped of positions of power, or those who see themselves as an excluded minority, both socially and economically. Eventually, I hope, planners will realize that destroying any group that is sustained by resentment from exclusion is a fools errand. Then we can start looking for more realistic solutions.
Implications for Policy?
If doing more of the same isn't working what might? Some suggest that we should go back with embedded special forces (boots on the ground by another name). But at best this will be a holding pattern which the US will have to maintain, absent any other ideas, indefinitely. As Larry Ellison remarked on Steve Job's and Apple's history: "We've tried that experiment before".
Doing less might not seem like a strategy but what about doing the opposite of what we've been trying to do? As repugnant as ISIS methods and values are, they appear to want to govern the Sunni population in Syria and Iraq; so why not let them, indeed encourage them? Iraq will inevitably be partitioned at some point. The Kurds will form their own independent state and further partitioning into two separate countries, one Shiite he other Sunni may be not only inevitable but possibly desirable. The breakup of Yugoslavia might be a model; eventually there would be a reduction in sectarian conflicts. It would also mean ISIS would set up institutions of power and governance which in turn would mean 1) that it would be permanently preoccupied principally with local issues and 2) that any efforts to export terrorism would be easier to track down. And while the problem of disaffected youth in this country is a hard one to solve, since it's partly economic, partly ethnic and social, removing one component, the claim that the US is oppressing Sunni Muslims around the world would be harder to make.
Clearly the approach has risks; but given the alternatives, might not a counter-intuitive solution be worth a look?
Friday, May 22, 2015
ISIS redux
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One of the central elements of our current strategy is being seen clearly to be in the back seat, helping local actors in their efforts (and at their request) to battle ISIS, rather than in the driving seat. That was not helped by the recent Special Forces operation in Syria that killed ISIS’s ‘money man’, Abu Sayyaf. This was not only inconsistent with the rhetoric of “no boots on the ground”, it also put the US squarely back in the sights as a primary combatant in the eyes of all Sunis, ISIS included.
One option is to move further down this path – to intervene more robustly with a few more boots on the ground. Two questions arise; first will it work and second will it escalate? For an answer to the second, Viet Nam may be a guide. A few military advisers became over half a million military personal, 80,000 of whom were in a combat role. To answer the first, that looks very like a road we’ve already been down in Iraq; one that didn’t work out too well. Fighting a fanatically motivated, volunteer force that frequently uses terror and guerilla tactics is ultimately an winnable battle for the US, but one that makes us a target both there and here. So if more force isn’t the answer what is?
Perhaps it’s re-framing the question. If our aim is not to defeat ISIS but to reduce the likelihood of America and Americans being attacked by ISIS (and other similar religious extremists) then stepping away may be a better answer. True, ISIS will probably continue to commit atrocities (but Boko Haram is doing that in Nigeria and we’re not talking about getting into that mess). But the question should be not whether ISIS will continue to brutalize ‘non-believers’, but whether they there would be less of this were the US to intervene more aggressively?
Suppose ISIS isn’t stopped and incorporates most if not all of Iraq and Syria into the Califate? Is America safer with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi controlling (or trying to control) swathes of the Middle East? One argument is that trying to crush ISIS is a fool’s errand and that more fighters will appear to replace those killed in the struggle. On the other hand, letting ISIS try to manager and control the territory it has taken may prove sufficiently challenging that is has little capacity left for foreign adventures. Added to that, its focus will be far less on what is now sees as its Evil Empire, and more on the enemy within (the Shiites) or nearby (Iran). So perhaps if the goal is not to obliterate ISIS, bur to reduce the likelihood of Americans and America being attached perhaps less is more?
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
Structure matters (reprise)
Sunday, March 8, 2015
And the alternative is...?
Zakaria pointed out, interestingly, that we had been here just over 10 years ago, when George W. Bush pressured the British into scuppering a deal with Iran that was far better for the West than the one now under negotiation. The result was that Iran returned to Uranium enrichment and made steady progress on a path to a bomb. The lesson is that holding out for the no-compromise deal that America and Israel would like was, and likely will be, counter-productive.
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Parallels
An odd parallel occurred to me today. (Rich would call it a context switch).
Obama is being criticized by the vocal right for not labelling ISIL as Islamic Terrorists. His rationale is that he wants moderate non-violent Muslims to help in the fight against extremism and lumping them all together as some do (the "they're all to blame" crowd) doesn't help.
Ironically this is completely consistent with the other call from the vocal right; that it's time that the moderates distanced themselves from the extremists. That the vocal right doesn't see the contradiction in their rhetoric is nothing new - their comments, as John Stewart noted last night, often come more from the heart than the head.
But here's the parallel. I need to be careful not to lump all Republicans into the same category as the lunatic fringe (Bachman, Palin, Trump et al) or the s#*t stirring, hate-mongering loonies on Fox (Hannity, Gutfeldt and his acolytes). There are some decent Republicans (I happen to know one).
Perhaps, then the moderate middle will disown the virulent infection of unthinking "I'm not a scientist" blowhards. But I have to stop labelling Trump and his ilk "Republicans" - he may claim to be a Republican, just as ISIL claims the legitimacy of Islam. But tarring them with the same brush will help push the moderates (Muslims and Republicans) into the arms of the extremists.
Extremists, whether political hacks or disenfranchised angry youth, have both found a cause through which to find a sense of purpose, build community, and gain power and respect (or fear). And both are doing so by peddling an equally perverted and insane variant of their faiths, narratives that the moderates shouldn’t want anything to do with.
Obama is being criticized by the vocal right for not labelling ISIL as Islamic Terrorists. His rationale is that he wants moderate non-violent Muslims to help in the fight against extremism and lumping them all together as some do (the "they're all to blame" crowd) doesn't help.
Ironically this is completely consistent with the other call from the vocal right; that it's time that the moderates distanced themselves from the extremists. That the vocal right doesn't see the contradiction in their rhetoric is nothing new - their comments, as John Stewart noted last night, often come more from the heart than the head.
But here's the parallel. I need to be careful not to lump all Republicans into the same category as the lunatic fringe (Bachman, Palin, Trump et al) or the s#*t stirring, hate-mongering loonies on Fox (Hannity, Gutfeldt and his acolytes). There are some decent Republicans (I happen to know one).
Perhaps, then the moderate middle will disown the virulent infection of unthinking "I'm not a scientist" blowhards. But I have to stop labelling Trump and his ilk "Republicans" - he may claim to be a Republican, just as ISIL claims the legitimacy of Islam. But tarring them with the same brush will help push the moderates (Muslims and Republicans) into the arms of the extremists.
Extremists, whether political hacks or disenfranchised angry youth, have both found a cause through which to find a sense of purpose, build community, and gain power and respect (or fear). And both are doing so by peddling an equally perverted and insane variant of their faiths, narratives that the moderates shouldn’t want anything to do with.
Friday, February 20, 2015
Muslims Extremists or Terrorists? What's in a name?
President Obama has been repeatedly criticized, mainly by Fox and friends, for not calling terrorist, who are also Muslim, “Islamic terrorists”. Protestants, Catholics (recall the “The Troubles”) and Jews (Irgun) have all resorted to terrorism to defend their religions.
Recall too, that many wealthy and prominent Americans not only didn’t call the IRA terrorists, they event raised funds for them; and some of those who gave money to the IRA have more recently called for the arrest and conviction on charges of conspiracy to commit acts of terror anyone funding mosques at which suspected terrorist may have worshipped.
Aside from the question of consistency and integrity, there is pragmatic reason for calling acts of terror just that and not labelling them with a religious moniker. Terrorists aren’t created in a vacuum. They can be tacitly encouraged or explicitly discouraged by members of their community and of their faith. This is all the more important as terrorists are increasingly “home grown” rather than part of secretive, well organized networks.
If you want those communities to discourage the use of violence rather than keep silent, it would be prudent to not tar them with the same brush as the terrorists, and to make it clear that this is not a problem with their faith but rather with those to use violence to get their way. Once you make it “an Islam problem”, (or, 30 years ago, a Catholic or a Protestant one) the people you need as allies become, at best, neutral and at worst, quiet apologists for the extremists’ actions.
Recall too, that many wealthy and prominent Americans not only didn’t call the IRA terrorists, they event raised funds for them; and some of those who gave money to the IRA have more recently called for the arrest and conviction on charges of conspiracy to commit acts of terror anyone funding mosques at which suspected terrorist may have worshipped.
Aside from the question of consistency and integrity, there is pragmatic reason for calling acts of terror just that and not labelling them with a religious moniker. Terrorists aren’t created in a vacuum. They can be tacitly encouraged or explicitly discouraged by members of their community and of their faith. This is all the more important as terrorists are increasingly “home grown” rather than part of secretive, well organized networks.
If you want those communities to discourage the use of violence rather than keep silent, it would be prudent to not tar them with the same brush as the terrorists, and to make it clear that this is not a problem with their faith but rather with those to use violence to get their way. Once you make it “an Islam problem”, (or, 30 years ago, a Catholic or a Protestant one) the people you need as allies become, at best, neutral and at worst, quiet apologists for the extremists’ actions.
Sunday, February 15, 2015
Frustration
Some long running frustrations:
1) Commentators
Bob Schaefer began his program today by describing various trouble spots around the world (Boko Haram in Nigeria, ISIL in Iraq and Syria, AQAP in Yemen, Putin in Ukraine), played a clip of Susan Rice calling for a sense of perspective and cautioning against being buffeted by the daily news cycle and then asked "Is this administration taking this seriously enough?". That's a new low in journalism for Face the Nation. First, it implicitly conflates seriousness with boots on the ground. Second, the comment itself contributes to the buffeting Rice talked about.
2) Commentators and Panellists
After two experts (Michael Morrell, Thomas Donilan) both provided a balanced view of the issues ("It is important to have perspective ... and to keep your eye on the long haul" Thomas Donilan. "Perspective is really important here, Bob" Michael Morrell ), Schaefer said "I'm still not sure that this administration is galvanized to fight this fight and do what's necessary to do it". By implication Schaefer is saying that military intervention is the answer (if history of our recent intervention in the Middle East teaches us anything, it's not).
Morrell then noted that without the air strikes, ISIL would be in Baghdad by now; that's an achievement. In sum, both Morrell and Donilan provided a wonderfully informed and well thought out insight into the issues; which Schaefer sought to over-simplify and sensationalize.
One of the commentators - I forget which - said later on: "Hilary isn't facing challenges from the left". Apparently she hasn't met Senator Warren, who is polling in second place at 16% in the Democratic primary race. She also appeared completely oblivious to any of the nuanced comments Donilan and Morrell had made on that same show 5 minutes before interpreting them as hawks. A better example of selective filtering I've not seen in a while.
3) Republicans
After criticizing Obama for being "weak" and "leading from behind", they don't want to give him war authorization for taking on ISIL. That's either because they are hypocritical (very likely) or want to attach riders such as approving the XL pipeline or defunding the ACA (somewhat likely). Either would contribute the perception of politicians as conniving and helps explain why the institution which they collectively are is held in such low regard.
4) Linux
Ubuntu had a reasonably reliable and stable desktop environment; in part this is probably a function of a large user base providing bug reports and a largish army of developers. Then it adopted Unity which sucks so I went in search of other distributions. I've tried many in the last 6 months (Crunchbang, Kubuntu, Ubunto with Gnome and now Mint). Mint has the desktop environment I find the most conducive to being productive; but it just doen't work well enough. The tendency of the open-source community to fork parts or all of the components leads to more incompatibilities, bugs and glitches. For example, Firefox won't launch Flash if it's not up to date but the updating channel isn't working. The file manager often hangs probably because of issues accessing the file system, a problem which afflicts other programs too. So after 10 years, I am at the point of abandoning Linux as my desktop; I don't know what the next OS will be yet; I have OSX running but it relied on some hacks and I can't afford Apple hardware; so then it's Windows. Sigh!
5) Fox 'News'
The usual mix of making shit up to fit its political agenda, an chronic irritation which woke me up this at about 5am this morning.
1) Commentators
Bob Schaefer began his program today by describing various trouble spots around the world (Boko Haram in Nigeria, ISIL in Iraq and Syria, AQAP in Yemen, Putin in Ukraine), played a clip of Susan Rice calling for a sense of perspective and cautioning against being buffeted by the daily news cycle and then asked "Is this administration taking this seriously enough?". That's a new low in journalism for Face the Nation. First, it implicitly conflates seriousness with boots on the ground. Second, the comment itself contributes to the buffeting Rice talked about.
2) Commentators and Panellists
After two experts (Michael Morrell, Thomas Donilan) both provided a balanced view of the issues ("It is important to have perspective ... and to keep your eye on the long haul" Thomas Donilan. "Perspective is really important here, Bob" Michael Morrell ), Schaefer said "I'm still not sure that this administration is galvanized to fight this fight and do what's necessary to do it". By implication Schaefer is saying that military intervention is the answer (if history of our recent intervention in the Middle East teaches us anything, it's not).
Morrell then noted that without the air strikes, ISIL would be in Baghdad by now; that's an achievement. In sum, both Morrell and Donilan provided a wonderfully informed and well thought out insight into the issues; which Schaefer sought to over-simplify and sensationalize.
One of the commentators - I forget which - said later on: "Hilary isn't facing challenges from the left". Apparently she hasn't met Senator Warren, who is polling in second place at 16% in the Democratic primary race. She also appeared completely oblivious to any of the nuanced comments Donilan and Morrell had made on that same show 5 minutes before interpreting them as hawks. A better example of selective filtering I've not seen in a while.
3) Republicans
After criticizing Obama for being "weak" and "leading from behind", they don't want to give him war authorization for taking on ISIL. That's either because they are hypocritical (very likely) or want to attach riders such as approving the XL pipeline or defunding the ACA (somewhat likely). Either would contribute the perception of politicians as conniving and helps explain why the institution which they collectively are is held in such low regard.
4) Linux
Ubuntu had a reasonably reliable and stable desktop environment; in part this is probably a function of a large user base providing bug reports and a largish army of developers. Then it adopted Unity which sucks so I went in search of other distributions. I've tried many in the last 6 months (Crunchbang, Kubuntu, Ubunto with Gnome and now Mint). Mint has the desktop environment I find the most conducive to being productive; but it just doen't work well enough. The tendency of the open-source community to fork parts or all of the components leads to more incompatibilities, bugs and glitches. For example, Firefox won't launch Flash if it's not up to date but the updating channel isn't working. The file manager often hangs probably because of issues accessing the file system, a problem which afflicts other programs too. So after 10 years, I am at the point of abandoning Linux as my desktop; I don't know what the next OS will be yet; I have OSX running but it relied on some hacks and I can't afford Apple hardware; so then it's Windows. Sigh!
5) Fox 'News'
The usual mix of making shit up to fit its political agenda, an chronic irritation which woke me up this at about 5am this morning.
Sunday, January 25, 2015
The Foriegn Policy Conundrum
And "52% say the United States 'should mind its own business internationally and let other countries get along the best they can on their own'. Just 38% disagree with the statement. This is the most lopsided balance in favor of the U.S. 'minding its own business' in the nearly 50-year history of the measure".
Yet at the same time the President is being widely criticized for his handling of foreign policy: "By a 56% to 34% margin more disapprove than approve of his handling of foreign policy. The public also disapproves of his handling of Syria, Iran, China and Afghanistan by wide margins". Yet most politicians (McCain being the prime example) have been arguing that the US didn't intervene robustly enough. Assuming that they reflect a substantial swath of public opinion (not necessarily a good assumption, admittedly), what explains a simultaneous lack of interest in intervening and class for greater intervention?
One possible explanation is this: the only news that makes it though the US new 'abroad filter' is really really bad news; everyone wants it just to go away. And if it doesn't it most be the President's fault. And the only cure for a problem is action, generally offensive, rather than laissez faire and defense.
President Obama is right that 'crushing' AQAP or ISIL (or even Boko Haram whose atrocities are orders of magnitude greater) doesn't do anything but put a temporary lid on a pressure cooker; which will eventually explode again as long as the heat that keeps it on the boil isn't turned off. While drone strikes appear a simple and low cost - at least in US lives - solution, it takes only a modicum of imagination to realize that living in a region where a constant unseen threat that may at any moment reign fire from 26,000ft often killing as many non-terrorists as terrorists is unlikely to lower the temperature. Nor is meddling to prop up Yemen's embattled and now ex- president Abed Rabbo Hadi, or Nouri Al Makili's sectarian administration, or Hamid Karzai, someone the US effectively installed as president.
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