Perception ... Reality

Under Obama 6.7 million private sector jobs have been created compared to 3.1 million under George W. Bush after six years in office. There has been a reduction of 600,000 in government employment under Obama compared to an increase of 1.2 million under Bush in the same time period. Discussion here.

Bush, the Housing Bubble and the Great Recession

Artificially pump up the housing market to make your presidency look good and what do you get? Ireland, on a massive scale. Data from Calculated Risk.

Damn I make this tiara look good

I've been everywhere, man.

Max Fisher states that, almost alone among nations, Korea and Japan escaped european colonization. While the US is clearly not part of Europe, the majority of its people are of european ethnicity and Japan and Korea have been under strong US influence and considerable control for more than half a century.

Where does morality come from?

Apparently not from religion.

When you've lost the Wall Street Journal ...

Matt Taibbi once described a major Wall Street financial firm as a “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” If anything this description falls short of capturing the putrid essence of the finance industry. Manufacturing and R&D are the lifeblood of great nations. Wall Street is steadily killing them off. The day approaches when we will be left with only lawyers and financiers, the parasites without the host. We will have become a larger version of Britain, an empty shell of a once great state.

There has been almost no effective push-back against these bloodsuckers. Politicians from both parties are primarily lawyers, who wouldn't know the meaning of productive work if it bit them in the ass, and, with few exceptions, are in debt to the financiers for their electoral campaign spending. Surprisingly, a small push back has come from the Wall Street Journal, belatedly recognizing that the death of the host is not good for the business of the parasites. One article is from Michael Dell, of Dell computers, describing the baleful effect on his company of short term investor interests.

The second article is by William Galston, and is subtitled, 'Financiers fixated on the short-term are forcing CEOs into decisions that are bad for the country'. An unbiased look at the country's arc over the last thirty years is all that is required to see the truth of this statement. The maximization of shareholder value by activist investors comes at the cost of long-term prosperity for the company and ultimately for the country. At present we are on a path to irrelevancy. Once our technical edge is completely eroded we will no longer be a great nation, irrespective of how many nukes we possess. Just look at Russia.

N.B. Both articles can be accessed by pasting their titles into Google.

Police safety

The murder rate for police in 2013 was well below the national average, suggesting that they are not in any unusual danger and should restrain their trigger happy ways. It is a difficult job but not a particularly dangerous one, despite this being a major rationale for their high salaries.

A bigger problem is that they are rarely in danger of facing any consequences for their actions. There is an inherent conflict of interest when a local prosecuting attorney is responsible for an investigation into homicides by the police with whom he/she regularly works. At a minimum, there has to be greater distance between the police and those responsible for investigating their alleged or actual malfeasance. This is just simple commonsense. If the police know beforehand that there will be no consequences for their actions, a perception that recent events strongly confirm, what is their motivation to act in a prudent way when it comes to the safety of their fellow citizens? More discussion here and here.

Why the enormous disparity?

Context here and here.

Reagan's Legacy

It ain't pretty. Details here.

Crazy Shit Wingers Believe

Wingers believe that college professors are evil Machiavellian manipulators of their children's thoughts, reliably turning them into liberals during a few hours of contact each week.

College professors trend liberal, young people trend liberal, correlation is not causation.

If this particular belief were actually true then right wing parents must have failed to introduce adequate critical thinking skills and/or failed to provide convincing support for their own beliefs, despite years of intimate contact with their children. Otherwise, their children would not be so susceptible to the wiles of professors who can apparently simultaneously beat the intricacies of single-variable calculus into the skulls of their progeny while also inculcating them with Marxist ideology. 

What is the Difference between the Financial and Palm Reading Industries?

Nothing other than the fees. In a meta study of financial research Campbell R. Harvey and colleagues, find that "most claimed research findings in financial economics are likely false." Not, that much research is false, or a majority of research is false, but most is false.

Why is this? Basic statistics. All the studies examined fail to correct for the multiple comparisons problem in their statistical testing and confound this by using very loose criteria for statistical significance.

This problem is further exacerbated by the inability to test hypotheses with rigorous experimental studies. Correlative studies plus faulty statistics equals nonsense.

Graph Humor

The relationship between CEO pay and stock return. The jokes on us. Interactive version here.

Am I a shallow person ...

if I gain some pleasure from the fact that my gut is no bigger than Lea's?

And smaller than Leo's.

Let us praise the Daily Mail and its never-ending obsession with the physical flaws of our pulchritudinous stars.

Is it such a horrific idea that we might teach math the way math has always been taught?

Erick Erickson, of Red State, posed the question, is it such 'a horrific idea that we might teach math the way math has always been taught?' The answer is yes. Our citizens have an appalling inability to understand and put into practice even very basic math concepts and the weak performance of our school students on international tests, if anything, understates the problem. This is one area where real conservatism, the desire to retain the 'old ways', produces a deeply flawed analysis. The old ways produce results that suck.

Much is made of the inadequacies of teachers but the growing resistance to the Common Core reveals the inadequacy of parents. To argue, as Erick Erickson does, that parents cannot understand grade school math problems is more revealing than he appears to understand. Erickson is incredulous that common core supporters quote studies claiming that children whose parents do not help them with homework will, over the long term, out perform children whose parents do help them. Sadly, these studies are all too believable. Generational change in something as central and contentious as math education will inevitably be disruptive and slow but the status quo is unsustainable if we wish to remain a first rank nation.

The Great Recession and Material Discontent

The causes of the Great Recession have been subject to much fruitless debate. A recent book House of Debt by Atif Mian and Amir Sufi and a review of Timothy Geithner's book Stress Test by Paul Krugman provide some of the most convincing analysis to date. Geithner's book itself focuses on the bank run that triggered the recession and the steps taken to restore confidence but, as Krugman's review makes clear, although the recovery of confidence in the financial markets was achieved relatively quickly, and surprisingly cheaply, a full recovery from the Great Recession has yet to be achieved. Krugman is critical of the narrowness of Geithner's vision in approaching this problem since it is clear that the Great Recession was not simply due to the loss of confidence in the financial system. The fundamental problem appears to have been the doubling in household debt between 2000 and 2007. It has taken years to begin to clear this debt load and the task is still incomplete.

Debt is a financial issue but it is also a moral problem. We have been sold a bill of goods by our leaders, that wages could stagnate for decades but our living standard would continue to rise. The inherent contradiction was inevitably going to cause chaos. Our leadership was unwilling to admit that middle and lower class wages have stagnated, in large part due to their actions, and they turned a blind eye to the house of cards being constructed from the staggering increases in personal debt during the lead up to the Great Recession. They seemed to believe that things would be fine as long as they weren't actually leading the charge when the stampeding herd finally arrived at the cliff. Although Bush II fully deserved his own fall from the cliff, a failure of this magnitude had many fathers.

Ian Thorpe

Ian Thorpe is an Australian sporting hero and until recently a very tortured soul, subject to long periods of deep depression. After more than a decade of denial he has recently acknowledged that he is gay. It is one thing to come out when you work in theater, an all together different thing when you are one of a nation's greatest sports stars. The growing acceptance of homosexuals in sports together with his own increasing maturity presumably made it possible for Thorpe to finally break out of a life in the closet and it is to be hoped that this brings him some measure of personal peace of mind.

Fat, drunk and stupid

In two related articles in the New York Times Ross Douthat rails against the party culture at US universities and Kevin Carey points out that US universities are, in general, not that great in comparison with the rest of the world.

It's a shame they didn't connect the dots. One major reason US human capital lags behind other OECD countries is the sick culture at many US universities. Universities should be a places to learn and work hard. Instead they have become places to have 'fun'. School administrators have knowingly made the decision to undermine the academic mission of their universities in the belief that students who have 'fun' at college will be more likely to pump up the endowment when they leave. Between the party hard attitude that they promote and the semi-pro sports teams that they run these fools have made a complete mockery of their fundamental role in society.

Parents who pay through the nose to send their kids to 'party universities' and the governments that subsidize these debacles are also at fault. Federal and state governments should cap and tax  endowments and we will see how much administrators care about 'fun' then and parents should just say no. A properly run university can provide a life altering experience opening students up to new pathways and providing a lifetime's worth of intellectual skills. Alternatively, they can become breeding grounds for fat, stupid drunks. It is time for a far-sighted rethinking of the priorities of US universities that goes beyond who has the largest endowment.

Rand Paul - The Great White Hope

A while back Ross Douthat published a column claiming that the Democrats didn't have anyone but Hillary for president. It was an odd column given that most Democrat voters seemed to prefer anyone other than Hillary last time they were given a choice. He might have been better served to focus on his own team, which really does have only one viable choice. As Rand Paul's recent article in the Wall Street Journal makes clear, he is the only Republican presidential candidate with any chance of winning in 2016. He has resolutely repudiated the Bush legacy in Iraq and in doing so has hacked out a way forward for his party. Any Republican candidate unwilling to do this will never win a presidential election because the failure of the Bush policies in Iraq was so complete and so toxic. Paul is the only candidate to put adequate distance between himself and the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld debacle. While this isn't a sufficient condition for presidential electoral success it is a necessary one.

A head to head match up between Rand Paul and Hillary would be much closer than Democrats understand at present and may not end up in their favor. He can be demonized is certain ways, primarily thanks to his father's long record of intemperate outbursts, but he cannot be dismissed as Bush III.

Bowe Bergdahl - American POW

In the future, when wingers complain that liberals see the military as just another jobs program, they should remember Bowe Bergdahl. The core philosophy that sets the Army apart from other Federal Departments is the concept of no man left behind. A one for all and all for one philosophy that is a critical element in the maintenance of an esprit de corps during what can be extremely harsh circumstances. In their response to Bergdahl's release, as part of a POW swap with the Afghan Taliban, this core belief was trampled into the ground in the unseemly rush to score cheap partisan advantage. It is hard to imagine a less inspiring spectacle or one more damaging to the image of the military. It was undisciplined, mean-spirited and largely incorrect.

Now, the Bergdahl family, a rural conservative Christian family of gun owners and hunters, is subject to death threats and has had to take security precautions to protect themselves from the more unhinged members of this lunatic fringe.

No liberal could ever undermine the image of the military more effectively than the wingers have done during this episode. Small minded, petty gossips spreading lies and innuendo across the internet and in the media. It was the complete disgrace. While political figures like Clinton and Obama are free targets, to attack a private POW and his family like this will a leave a bitter aftertaste that will not wash out for a very long time.

Fabulist Evolution

Hypocrisy Watch — Gun-nuts for thee but not for me

The Georgia legislature has decreed that concealed weapons will be allowed pretty much everywhere —including bars — except in the Capitol and other government offices where lawmakers might congregate. Surely, since more guns obviously make us safer, the lawmakers should demand that all gun carrying citizens be allowed free passage into the Capitol. It is clear that we could make the world a much safer place if there were more guns in the Georgia Capitol, a lot more guns.

Down Syndrome and Abortion Hypocrisy

Down Syndrome is where the rubber hits the road for opponents of abortion. Approximately 90% of Down Syndrome pregnancies are terminated with an abortion. This behavior is entirely rational, given the enormous difficulties of caring for a Down Syndrome individual from adulthood into old age.  These numbers are, however, strikingly discordant with polls showing that a majority of people oppose abortion. While the numbers for Down Syndrome abortions remain so high, abortion poll numbers represent the meaningless expressions of personal preferences for an ideal world rather than core beliefs that survive the reality of an imperfect biological world.

The "Inner City" Irish

Brilliantly sly take-down of Paul Ryan by Timothy Egan, showing how Ryan's comments regarding the ethical qualities of the inner city poor echo upper class English views of the Irish poor, to whom Ryan claims ethnic affinity.

Crony Capitalism Watch

The Tesla Model S was recently voted car of the year, but you can't buy one in New Jersey because of the power of the car dealership lobby. Chris Christie, who made his name by standing up to the little guy, apparently doesn't have the balls to stand up to middle-sized guys in the form of car dealers and so the beat of crony capitalism marches on in the great state of New Jersey.

Only the good die young

I do not think I have ever read a fairer assessment of Bob Dylan's musical talent than this: Dylan fans are the battered wives of the music industry.

Maloof low back chair

Modern art seems to be driven almost entirely by the investment strategies of the very rich and retains little interest for us commoners. I still have an interest in crafts, particularly woodwork. This is a beautiful chair by the recently departed Sam Maloof. I have seen this particular chair in the flesh at the Smithsonian Institute and the picture does not do it full justice. It is a minor miracle of sculptural furniture.

Morning in America watch

Rubio in free fall

Good discussion of Marco Rubio's rough introduction to federal politics. Once again Krauthammer's predictions have proven spectacularly wrong.

The cumulative humiliations have transformed the former party savior into a figure himself in need of saving. How did it all go so badly? The Rubio Plan had sounded clever in the abstract. The premise, as Krauthammer had explicitly laid out, was that the party could jettison a single-issue position while holding fast to its cherished anti-government bromides. (“No reinvention when none is needed,” urged Krauthammer. “Do conservatism but do it better.”) Krauthammer may have been right that Republican elites would more willingly, or even eagerly, toss aside their fear of illegal immigration than revise their cherished anti-­tax, anti-spending dogma. But broadening the party’s economic message has turned out to be easier.

Apparently Krauthammer was unfamiliar with the anti-immigration faction within his own party.

Government Pensions

As shown by the bankruptcy of Detroit, government pensions are not guaranteed, in large part because the do not meet any reasonable accounting standards. Left and right should be able to find some way to ensure that government pensions are held to the same minimal accounting standards to which private industry pension funds are held. Some discussion of the problem here.

Satriani

Morning in America watch

The deficit for 2013 dropped to $680 billion, from $1.1 trillion in 2012, bringing the debt to the lowest level since the end of the Great Bush Recession.

Plastic Jesus

goto fail;

Having made my share of stupid programming errors it is good to see that the professionals make them too. Appple's serious goto fail security flaw was due to just one extra line of code in C, an extra (goto fail;) line.

This mistake would have been discovered automatically if they had used Python, due to an indentation error.

    OSStatus err;
        if ((err = ReadyHash(&SSLHashSHA1, &hashCtx)) != 0)
            goto fail;
        if ((err = SSLHashSHA1.update(&hashCtx, &clientRandom)) != 0)
            goto fail;
        if ((err = SSLHashSHA1.update(&hashCtx, &serverRandom)) != 0)
            goto fail;
        if ((err = SSLHashSHA1.update(&hashCtx, &signedParams)) != 0)
            goto fail;
            goto fail;
        if ((err = SSLHashSHA1.final(&hashCtx, &hashOut)) != 0)
            goto fail;
    fail:
        return err;

Good non-technical discussion of the problem here.

Hipster rock anthem

The stickiness of class - Part Deux

Gregory Clark, the author of 'The Son Also Rises: Surnames and the History of Social Mobility' discussed earlier, has an article in the New York Times that raises some interesting and some questionable claims. The interesting parts relate to his main thesis that it can take several centuries for a high class or low class family to regress to the mean i.e. become average. Class advantage or disadvantage is hard to shake. The questionable part of his article is his insistence that much of this effect is related to genetics. It is unclear to me why people with no training or obvious knowledge of genetics are so taken with genetic determinism. There are multiple critiques of his position in the comments but the most obvious is that he has no information about the marriage partners of the males whose names he follows through history. If you are going talk breeding you have know who bred with who.

Greenspan - Putz

Of all the people who deserve to have their reputations permanently blackened by the Great Recession there is no more deserving candidate than Alan Greenspan, an ideologically blinded hack for the ages. The ultimate takedown of Greenspan's incompetence has yet to written but Reason magazine gives it a half-assed shot in their recent review of his book - 'The Map and the Territory' (even the title is a rip off). Notable quotes:

Greenspan never considers the possibility that his own actions contributed to the housing bubble and the ensuing financial collapse.

you can understand the “irrational exuberance” of the years preceding the crash of 2008 as a rational response to the Federal Reserve Bank’s artificially low interest rates. But not if you are Alan Greenspan, the man who chaired the Fed from 1987 to 2006.

He does not raise the possibility that the Fed’s expansionary policies had something to do with driving the inflation-adjusted federal funds rate—the rate that banks charge one another for short-term loans of reserves—below zero for almost two years.

Greenspan, like many behavioral economists, is quick to blame market actors for irrational choices rather than asking whether policy makers have distorted signals or incentives in ways that lead rational actors to bad outcomes.

Given Greenspan’s belief about the cause of lower interest rates, the only explanation he can offer for over-building is irrationality. He never seems to consider the alternative hypothesis, that the Fed might have turned all the lights green.

Morning in America watch

Peggy Noonan's column in the Wall Street Journal criticizing Obama's handling of the crisis in the Ukraine has proven to be spectacularly ill-timed, given the subsequent collapse of the pro-Russian government and the ascendancy of a pro-Western democratic movement.

Original Sin for atheists

Of the various ideas that come from the Old Testament the concept of Original Sin is the one that I find most interesting. I had, however, never thought of Original Sin as being an essential part of my moral code until reading this brief discussion, the key line of which is 'We need Original Sin as a restraint against our arrogant – and possibly evil – self-certainty'. To understand and accept your own capacity for evil is a valuable starting point for any moral code.

The stickiness of class

Much has been written about income mobility in recent years, generally implying that there is a considerable mobility between generations. These studies do not jibe well with my experience of social mobility. This book review in the Economist addresses this disconnect, arguing that class is very sticky and class mobility is very low even over a large number of generations. Long time frames are always difficult to relate to personal experience but you can get a sense of the argument from your own extended family. There is considerable income variation within my family, covering more than half of the income percentile range, from a pastor of a small rural congregation up to an oil company executive. Yet, they all belong to the same middle class social group. If you look at the children in the next generation, outcomes and parental income do not co-assort. All of the pastor's children attained four year degrees from decent universities as did the oil executive's children. The prospective incomes of this next generation are largely unaffected by the previous generation's income. No one accumulated sufficient wealth to permanently move their lineage into the upper class nor did anyone fall into a permanent underclass.

Individual incomes are a noisy signal displaying considerable variation from generation to generation. This noise largely reflects individual choices whereas class, although much harder to define, is quite stable over long generational time frames. The fortunes of individuals within the family rise and fall, but the fortunes of the family remain relatively stable, based on long established class attributes. The review addresses what this means for social policy, concluding that some mechanisms to promote social mobility are a good idea if we wish to avoid both permanent underclasses and overclasses.