Brett's Brain

Posting

2010-05-09T14:12:00.000-07:00

I haven't been posting very often lately. I'm in the process of re-doing my blog so while I'm working on that and deciding how to deal with the material I want to post I won't be posting on blogspot.

The Health Care bill and inequality

2010-03-24T08:53:00.000-07:00

David Leonhardt: In Health Care Bill, Obama Attacks Wealth Inequality

David Brooks: Getting Obama Right

2010-03-14T09:21:00.000-07:00

From the New York Times:

The fact is, Obama is as he always has been, a center-left pragmatic reformer. Every time he tries to articulate a grand philosophy — from his book “The Audacity of Hope” to his joint-session health care speech last September — he always describes a moderately activist government restrained by a sense of trade-offs. . .

In a sensible country, people would see Obama as a president trying to define a modern brand of moderate progressivism. In a sensible country, Obama would be able to clearly define this project without fear of offending the people he needs to get legislation passed. But we don’t live in that country. We live in a country in which many people live in information cocoons in which they only talk to members of their own party and read blogs of their own sect. They come away with perceptions fundamentally at odds with reality, fundamentally misunderstanding the man in the Oval Office.

Dang, this man is funny

2010-02-23T07:18:00.000-08:00

Colin Powell on CBS

2010-02-23T06:57:00.000-08:00

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Glenn Beck: Self-educated genius

2010-02-20T21:46:00.000-08:00

Leaving the irrelevant and inaccurate rant about how successful people are hated and persecuted, I do give him a some credit that in this speech he's at least honest about the real health care debate. The real question is: should we let someone die or go bankrupt because they can't afford otherwise available health care? The real conservative answer is, "Yes," not, "Stop the secret Muslim, anti-white, elitist gay-married Nazi, reparations death panels."

It would be nice if he always spoke this clearly.

So much for runaway inflation

2010-02-19T06:26:00.000-08:00

Reuters: Consumer prices rise marginally, core falls

Consumer prices rose less than expected in January, while prices excluding food and energy fell for the first time since 1982 . . .

Kinda cool

2010-02-17T19:22:00.000-08:00

Link

Idiots

2010-02-11T15:32:00.000-08:00

SLTrib: Utah House OKs roadblocks for federal health reform

The Utah House approved a bill Thursday that would require the Legislature and governor to sign off before state agencies follow mandates under any federally enacted health care reforms.

BYU Economist on children losing health insurance

2010-02-11T13:24:00.000-08:00

This is old, but I hadn't seen it before. Interesting.
From BYU Newsroom:

A new study concludes that ongoing efforts to cut the costs of a program that provides low-income children with health insurance would send more kids to the emergency room and increase the total cost of care by $2,121 per child each year.

I wonder how this applies to the general population.

The Vice Guide to North Korea

2010-02-10T17:41:00.000-08:00

An independent news organization gets a couple of guys into North Korea as tourists who illegally film a documentary with a point-and-shoot camera. Very interesting and revealing.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Update: The embed code doesn't seem to be working, but I've added links so you can at least watch the videos on the VBS.tv site.

America's great. Except for the South

2010-02-05T10:08:00.000-08:00

Alabama Senator Richard Shelby (R) blocking ALL Obama nominations:
Over defense pork projects . . . Tell me again why it's the Democrats who are irresponsibly bringing us to ruin? It's definitely time to change the Senate rules.

Shelby is holding Obama's nominees hostage until a pair of lucrative programs that would send billions in taxpayer dollars to his home state get back on track. The two programs Shelby wants to move forward or else:
- A $40 billion contract to build air-to-air refueling tankers . . .

- An improvised explosive device testing lab for the FBI . . .

John Marshall:

In this case, we're not dealing with a stand on partisanship or ideology or simple political shiv play which I guess can each be respected in their own place. This is more like just a stick up. Gimme my money and I'll give you your Senate back! Worse than a squeegee man and not much better than a bank robber, Shelby is shutting down the president's ability to appoint anyone to anything until he gets his way.

Worth watching

2010-02-04T22:09:00.000-08:00

W. Davis: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World

There are a lot of good questions brought up here, as well as a generally interesting subject. Worth watching if you have time, or at least throwing on the iPod and listening to during "transit" time (driving, walking home, whatever).

Whoa

2010-02-02T16:02:00.001-08:00

Every once in awhile I read something that absolutely floors me. I don't know why this particular article thrills me so much, but I seriously feel like a gazillion light bulbs just got turned on in my head. Probably nothing new here for some of you, but I'm excited.

New Scientist: Viruses: The unsung heroes of evolution

[T]he era of genomics has unexpectedly revealed a much richer picture of viruses as a creative evolutionary force of unparalleled reach and power. "Everywhere you look, viruses seem to be playing a crucial role in evolution," says Luis Villarreal, director of the Center for Virus Research at the University of California, Irvine. "I would argue that they are the most creative genetic entities that we know of."

Oh, Canada

2010-02-02T06:36:00.000-08:00

Paul Krugman: Good and Boring

In times of crisis, good news is no news. Iceland’s meltdown made headlines; the remarkable stability of Canada’s banks, not so much. . .

Yes, I know, Canada is supposed to be dull. The New Republic famously pronounced “Worthwhile Canadian Initiative” (from a Times Op-Ed column in the ’80s) the world’s most boring headline . . . [But] when it comes to banking, boring is good.

Financial Times on the Budget, short-term deficits

2010-02-01T20:23:00.000-08:00

FT.com - Budget distractions

Sadly, reckless politicians have persuaded voters that runaway deficits threaten their livelihoods more than a renewed slowdown. This makes the administration sound a bit like a small European country eager to reassure Brussels: it wants to cut the deficit to 4 per cent of GDP within three years.
Such a large swing is fine if growth proves robust, but dangerous if it does not, which is far from unlikely. Unemployment is likely to stay above 9 per cent into 2011. . .

Nice

2010-01-31T14:26:00.000-08:00

Full segment here

A link to the quote/video referred to.

Sen. Tom Udall on changing the Senate rules

2010-01-30T10:58:00.000-08:00

Plus he's a Mormon, so that's kinda cool.

Hat Tip: Paul Krugman

This is worth watching

2010-01-30T10:02:00.000-08:00

Update: GOP Dismayed by Obama's Strong Performance

Peace through education

2010-01-25T23:16:00.000-08:00

Just real quick. I just listened to this talk given last semester at BYU by Greg Mortenson. I was in bed even, and I got up to post it so I wouldn't forget. Anyway, it's very worth listening to. Just do it, don't ask questions. Now! Chop-chop!

Does "terrorism" remove all civil rights?

2010-01-25T13:56:00.000-08:00

rawstory.org: ACLU: The Constitution is not 'optional'

This made me laugh

2010-01-21T06:25:00.000-08:00

Al Qaeda in all its glory

2010-01-05T11:38:00.000-08:00

If this is all Al Qaeda can do, why the heck are we spending $1,000,000 a year in Afghanistan? Have we lost all sense of proportion? Let's get real.

Update a long time after the original post (I'm busy, ok?): I meant $1,000,000 per soldier.

China wrecked the Copenhagen deal

2009-12-23T17:40:00.000-08:00

Mark Lynas, guardian.co.uk: How do I know China wrecked the Copenhagen deal? I was in the room

China's strategy was simple: block the open negotiations for two weeks, and then ensure that the closed-door deal made it look as if the west had failed the world's poor once again. And sure enough, the aid agencies, civil society movements and environmental groups all took the bait.

Commoditized mobile internet?

2009-12-22T08:36:00.000-08:00

I hope so. Hooray for dumb pipes!

Charlie's Diary: Gadget Patrol: 21st Century Phone

Maybe there is an issue here

2009-12-15T08:22:00.000-08:00

NY Times: Glenn Beck’s Gold Deal Raising Questions at Fox

[I]t would be “problematic without question” if Mr. Beck did have a position as a paid spokesman for a product.

Obama's Nobel Remarks

2009-12-15T08:09:00.000-08:00

Text

Commentary from David Brooks

Intriguing idea

2009-12-11T22:42:00.001-08:00

So I was just saying to a friend the other day that the idea of someone heavily invested in gold could be a little unnerving because they gain an interest in societal instability. I kinda doubt Stewart's causal story - I suspect that Beck is paranoid, so he buys gold, not that he's paranoid because he's invested in gold and wants to increase demand for it. But, as they say, "isn't it interesting?"

Rent-seeking monopolist afraid of losing control

2009-12-07T16:56:00.000-08:00

People like this drive me nuts. I understand why he's worried, but his high-horse attitude is ridiculous. He wants to keep extracting monopoly profits from his books and is apparently willing to retard technological advance to make sure he can do that. I'm prejudiced towards the opinion that most authors worth reading would have written regardless of copyright laws. Dan Brown (assuming generously for a moment that he is worth reading) may not have become a millionaire, but it is far from obvious that he would have made nothing. But leaving that aside, boycotting technology won't make it go away. It will only make you adapt badly to it.

The Ascent of Man

2009-12-06T23:43:00.000-08:00

This is a really great series from Jacob Bronowski that I ran across the other day. It's basically a condensed cultural and scientific history of mankind, from the earliest evidence we have to the modern day. It's really interesting stuff, and great especially when you're doing something and want something going sort of in the background (otherwise it's probably too long to have time to sit through).

No comment

2009-12-06T23:36:00.000-08:00

This is all I will post on the matter. Honest.

2009-12-06T23:18:00.000-08:00

Andrew Sullivan, quoting John Mark Reynolds

I take Sarah Palin seriously, I take America seriously, I take her ideas seriously. Do you NOT take her seriously? Should I have picked up a four hundred page book and assumed it was error riddled fluff, but that is o.k. because it was just for the folks? How condescending is that? People are not well served when it is assumed any old dumb thing will do for us if it strokes our egos and tells us what we believe. That is the real snobbery.

My grandfather never got to go to high school, but he wanted his political heroes (men like Bob Taft and Eisenhower) to give it to him straight and to get it right. He wanted men of substance. He read his paper and his King James Bible every day and he would have had no time for books like “Going Rogue” that take his hard earned money, but don’t bother with the most basic fact check . . .

Sample phone scripts from subprime lenders

2009-12-02T22:00:00.000-08:00

This is pretty sleazy.

Obama's Speech on Afghanistan

2009-12-02T09:15:00.000-08:00

This is worth your time to listen to.

Unbelievable

2009-11-29T19:22:00.000-08:00

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Awful but kinda true . . .

2009-11-25T08:55:00.000-08:00

I knew there was a reason I supported this guy

2009-11-24T16:34:00.000-08:00

Oh no! Leisure!

2009-11-24T08:47:00.000-08:00

Good post from Greg Mankiw that I agree with and wish we could talk about this more.

The fundamental question is, Should Americans embrace a more robust social safety net at the cost of much higher marginal tax rates, reduced work incentives, and a smaller economic pie?

From a strictly economic perspective, there is no right answer to this question. Arthur Okun said long ago that the big tradeoff in economic policy is between equality and efficiency. The pending healthcare reform bill moves us along that tradeoff . . .

Put simply, the healthcare reform bill would make the United States more like western Europe. That may mean more security about healthcare, but it also means that future generations of Americans will likely spend more time enjoying leisure.

The stimulus is working

2009-11-24T07:53:00.000-08:00

Brad Delong: The People Who Sell Their Forecasts to Paying Clients Believe the Stimulus Is Working

Only those who make their nut one way or the other by pleasing Republicans claim that it isn't.

40 Years of Sesame Street

2009-11-04T08:35:00.000-08:00

I don't understand the probem here . . .

2009-10-30T15:21:00.000-07:00

NY Times: Book Association Challenges Retailers' Price Plan

In the letter dated Thursday, the association argues that steep discounting on 10 hardcover titles by authors including John Grisham, Stephen King and Barbara Kingsolver “is damaging to the book industry and harmful to consumers.”

Brilliant Idea

2009-10-27T07:06:00.000-07:00

BBC News: Facebook 'memorialises' profiles

Great way to keep people sentimentally attached to your network.

This guy is crazy (in a good way, I suppose)

2009-10-18T20:19:00.001-07:00

NY Times: Held by the Taliban

This raises a question . . .

2009-10-13T22:05:00.000-07:00

NY Times: Saudis Seek Payments for Any Drop in Oil Revenues

Is it a good thing if the only major commodity that ties the Middle East to the rest of the world fairly rapidly loses its value due to new technology/climate change restrictions? If we really are "independent of foreign oil" in 10 years like Obama supposedly is going to move us towards, what happens to the Middle East?

This is pretty cool . . .

2009-10-07T08:36:00.000-07:00

I've been reading a lot about biology lately (just pop stuff . . . I don't know enough to understand anything else). Anyway, this article/video struck me as interesting.

My little zebra: The secrets of domestication

Krugman: The Politics of Spite

2009-10-06T07:02:00.000-07:00

Krugman: The Politics of Spite

There was what President Obama likes to call a teachable moment last week, when the International Olympic Committee rejected Chicago’s bid to be host of the 2016 Summer Games.

“Cheers erupted” at the headquarters of the conservative Weekly Standard, according to a blog post by a member of the magazine’s staff, with the headline “Obama loses! Obama loses!” Rush Limbaugh declared himself “gleeful.” “World Rejects Obama,” gloated the Drudge Report. And so on.

So what did we learn from this moment? For one thing, we learned that the modern conservative movement, which dominates the modern Republican Party, has the emotional maturity of a bratty 13-year-old.
But more important, the episode illustrated an essential truth about the state of American politics: at this point, the guiding principle of one of our nation’s two great political parties is spite pure and simple. If Republicans think something might be good for the president, they’re against it — whether or not it’s good for America . . .

I'm speachless . . .

2009-10-06T06:47:00.000-07:00

Conservapedia: Conservative Bible Project

Click on the link and read the project outlines for yourself. It's pretty nuts, though obviously not representative of people with conservative beliefs (most Conservapedia contributors/articles are not, I think).

Commentary from beliefnet:

[T]he insane hubris of this really staggers the mind . . . They really think it's wise to force the word of God to conform to a 21st-century American idea of what constitutes conservatism? These jokers don't worship God. They worship ideology.

True.

2009-09-27T01:22:00.001-07:00

Bruce Bartlett: Fiscal Responsibility Requires Higher Taxes; Auditing the Fed; How Much Debt is Too Much?

The Republican party needs more adult voices like this.

FCC Chairman Julias Genachowski at Brookings

2009-09-26T19:31:00.000-07:00

Broadband and Mobile Communications

Oh no . . .

2009-09-24T09:20:00.000-07:00

I don't think I'll ever view that Sunday school lesson the same . . .

Update: It was pointed out to me that it doesn't look like he threw the frog in the water . . . I'm not sure what he was trying to do.

How Congress Works

2009-09-23T09:48:00.001-07:00

BREAKING NEWS: BAT LOOSE IN CONGRESS

New Flash: Fox is not a legitimate news source

2009-09-23T09:04:00.000-07:00

Not a huge fan of CNN either, but they're at least not blatant hacks.

I knew there was a reason I voted for Obama

2009-09-22T13:03:00.000-07:00

To get people like this into government. Take that! wireless providers.

This is awesome!

2009-09-18T23:02:00.000-07:00

The Guardian: Google signs deal to print 2m books on Espresso machines

Two million out-of-copyright books that have been scanned by Google could come back into limited printed form after the search giant signed a deal with On Demand Books, the company that makes the Espresso Book Machine - a custom book printer able to produce a bound one-off 300-page paperback, with a full-colour cover, in about five minutes.

Missing Republicans

2009-09-18T10:17:00.000-07:00

Kung Fu Monkey: I miss Republicans

Hat Tip: Delong

Poor whites and the race factor

2009-09-18T08:48:00.001-07:00

I wondered for a while why there was/is so much hatred of blacks among people of Irish heritage and poor whites in general. Beyond observation of current events, it seems to come up again and again in history (even in my informal, non-exhaustive studies) that you see especially high levels of racism among poor whites and Irish immigrants in particular(who tended to be uneducated, discriminated against, and thus very poor).

I concluded that in a highly hierarchical society such as the Old South, those who are near/at the bottom of the totem pole can be expected to fight hard for any status that they have. When all of a sudden the stratus below you starts organizing effectively for more civil rights and equality (leaving you behind), you can't be expected to be happy about your impending loss of relative status. This is obviously not the entire explanation, but I think it is partially what was/is going on.

Anyway, here's an article I stumbled upon that articulates very well what I concluded (wow that sounds really snotty).

The Root: The Birthers and Jim Crow 2.0

Update: Another article that talks about the issue well as far as I can tell.

racismview.com : Irish-Americans, Racism and the Pursuit of Whiteness

Wow, this looks familiar . . .

2009-09-17T12:12:00.001-07:00

This concerns me . . .

2009-09-15T18:49:00.000-07:00

BBC: The Rise of Israel's military rabbis

Israel's army is changing. Once proudly secular, its combat units are now filling with those who believe Israel's wars are "God's wars".

Military rabbis are becoming more powerful. Trained in warfare as well as religion, new army regulations mean they are now part of a military elite.

. . .

In previous wars rabbis had to stay far from the front, he says. In Gaza, they were ordered to accompany the fighters.

"Our job was to boost the fighting spirit of the soldiers. The eternal Jewish spirit from Bible times to the coming of the Messiah."

None of this is necessarily surprising or unprecedented, but I still don't like it. A country who thinks it has God on its side regardless of the atrocities it commits cannot be a dependable ally to the United States or any other country. We already have militant Islamic fanatics to deal with. We don't need a more modern (nuclear-armed) and efficient state to engage in the same kind of fanaticism.

In short, this is obviously a terrible development to the extent that peace in the Middle East is desirable. There is no hope as long as either/both sides think God gave them the land of Palestine, and that's just that.

Delong: Tire tariffs stupid

2009-09-13T19:31:00.001-07:00

Barack Obama does something really stupid: Tire Tariffs

Why oh why can't we have better Democratic presidents? . . .

Let's see... 250 million cars in America... need 4 tires per car... need new tires every 2.5 years. 400 million tires a year... $1.4 billion dollars a year... 10,000 worker jobs saved... $140,000 dollars per worker-job per year.

Looks like we could (a) let the Chinese sell us tires, (b) tax each tire by $2.50, (c) pay each tire worker who loses his or her job $100K a year, and we come out ahead: American households have more money to spend on other things, China has more jobs to help what is still a very poor country grow, and tire workers have higher incomes and more leisure as well.

But, you say, it would be stupid to impose a $2 a tire tax and use the money to pay each laid-off tire worker $100K a year.

That's the point: when the policy you are adopting is worse for everybody than a policy you agree is stupid, the policy you are adopting is best characterized as really stupid.

This is ridiculous . . .

2009-09-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

Apparently the next Beck target is Cass Sunstein, co-author of Nudge. His ideas have been all but endorsed by the likes of Greg Mankiw, Steven D Leavitt and all kinds of very market-oriented economists and business managers. He himself has even presented and been well-received at the libertarian CATO institute (a very interesting listen by the way). How are we supposed to attract competent and fresh-thinking individuals to low-paying government jobs if they know they're going to be intellectually lynched by politically-motivated demagogues?

Glenn Beck - Fox's Robert Langdon

2009-09-07T16:29:00.000-07:00

NY Times on the Speech Controversy

2009-09-05T23:39:00.000-07:00

Some Parents Oppose Obama School Speech

It's a good article. First, some mind-bogglingly misinformed comments:

“The thing that concerned me most about it was it seemed like a direct channel from the president of the United States into the classroom, to my child,” said Brett Curtis, an engineer from Pearland, Tex., who said he would keep his three children home.

“I don’t want our schools turned over to some socialist movement.”

Then a good reminder that both parties are political in the cynical sense of the word:

The first President George Bush, a Republican, made a similar nationally broadcast speech from a Washington high school in 1991, urging students to study hard, avoid drugs and to ignore peers “who think it’s not cool to be smart.” Democrats in Congress accused him of using taxpayer money — $27,000 to produce the broadcast — for “paid political advertising.”

And finally, some people who make sense:

Some Houston parents, however, said telling children they should not hear out the president of the United States, even if their parents dislike his policies, sends the wrong message — that one should not listen to someone with whom you disagree.

“It’s difficult for me to understand how listening to the president, the commander in chief, the chief citizen of this country, is damaging to the youth of today,” said Phyllis Griffin Epps, an analyst for the city who has two children in public school.

Orwellian?

2009-09-05T20:29:00.000-07:00

Hardly. Having looked at it after being asked about it by various people, I don't see a big problem. The democratically elected leader of the country is going to give a nice speech about staying in school, educational achievement, setting goals, etc. I don't see anything insidious at work here, but I also don't give any credence to the hypothesis that President Obama is another Mao waiting to happen.

Here are some sources that may be interesting (hosted on my Skydrive).

The original lesson plans:

Pre-K to 6-year-olds
7 to 12-year-olds

The new, post-outrage lesson plans:

Pre-K to 6-year-olds
7 to 12-year-olds

Really?

2009-09-05T09:29:00.000-07:00

NYTimes: Conservatives See Need For Serious Health Debate

And the lack of this would be who's fault?

Update: A good discussion of this

Yay for Libertarian Paternalism

2009-09-05T09:19:00.000-07:00

CNNMoney: Obama to workers: we'll help you save

Most of the following changes will take effect immediately because of rule changes made by the Treasury Department.

Auto enrollment in retirement plans: To make it easier for smaller and medium-sized employers to automatically enroll workers into retirement plans, the administration will clear up some bureaucratic paper-work hurdles for employers to offer that option. Employees could still choose to opt out of the retirement plans.

Saving tax refunds: To make it easier for those owed tax refunds to save, the IRS will allow tax filers in 2010 to recoup their refund by issuing U.S. savings bonds.

Sick days and vacation time become 401(k) money: To make it easier for workers to rack up savings, the White House will make it easier for employers to convert (or allow workers to convert) unused vacation and sick leave pay into 401(k) contributions.

Richard Thaler's hands are obviously all over this.

Krugman on Macroeconomics

2009-09-04T20:58:00.001-07:00

How Did Economists Get It So Wrong?

A good article that you should read.

Hat Tip: Greg Mankiw

Why hadn't I heard of this?

2009-08-31T21:52:00.000-07:00

Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

Description: Aspiring super-villain Dr. Horrible (Neil Patrick Harris) wants to join the Evil League of Evil and win the girl of his dreams, but his nemesis, Captain Hammer (Nathan Fillion), stops him at every turn in this three-part musical.

RIP Senator Kennedy

2009-08-26T11:37:00.000-07:00

CNN: Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy dies after cancer battle
SL Trib: Kennedy & Hatch: A bond forged by politics

It's too bad we don't have more like him.

Legal action against torture?

2009-08-25T22:25:00.000-07:00

NYTimes: Justice Dept. Report Advises Pursuing C.I.A. Abuse Cases

This is nuts . . .

2009-08-24T22:36:00.000-07:00

No idea why it would occur to anyone to make this, but it is cool. I especially liked the Commodore references (my first computer was a Commodore 64). The music is kind of haunting.

Hat Tip: ShortFormBlog

This isn't surprising . . .

2009-08-22T12:42:00.000-07:00

Apparently, the people who have been bringing guns to Presidential town hall meetings belong to the same ultra-conservative organization and have ties to the militia movements during the '90s.

Amen!

2009-08-21T15:30:00.000-07:00

A friend sent me this. I agree 100%.

Andy Kessler: Why AT&T Killed Google Voice

Google stimulus spending map

2009-08-20T11:41:00.000-07:00

This is pretty cool.

Rationing

2009-08-20T07:53:00.000-07:00

Free Exchange discusses a piece by Martin Feldstein and Mark Thoma gives his two cents.

Martin Feldstein: The president has emphasized the importance of limiting services to "health care that works." To identify such care, he provided more than $1 billion in the fiscal stimulus package to jump-start Comparative Effectiveness Research (CER) and to finance a federal CER advisory council to implement that idea. That could morph over time into a cost-control mechanism of the sort proposed by former Sen. Tom Daschle, Mr. Obama's original choice for White House health czar. Comparative effectiveness could become the vehicle for deciding whether each method of treatment provides enough of an improvement in health care to justify its cost.

In the British national health service, a government agency approves only those expensive treatments that add at least one Quality Adjusted Life Year (QALY) per £30,000 (about $49,685) of additional health-care spending. If a treatment costs more per QALY, the health service will not pay for it. The existence of such a program in the United States would not only deny lifesaving care but would also cast a pall over medical researchers who would fear that government experts might reject their discoveries as "too expensive."

Free Exchange: The . . . problem with the argument by rationing is that it seems to ignore how resources are allocated in a perfectly free market—by willingness or ability to pay. . .

The nub of the matter is this—government can afford to provide basic coverage to everyone, but it can't afford to provide every treatment everyone may want to everyone who wants it. It must therefore decide how to limit its expenses, and it can leave open the option of using a private practitioner to those who are denied care based on a cost-benefit analysis. Or government can provide coverage to no one, and those who cannot afford a treatment—effective or not—will go without.

Mark Thoma: The goal of Democrats is to lower costs without sacrificing the quality of care (which will allow coverage to be expanded). Whether that's achievable or not is a legitimate point to debate, I think the experience in other countries suggests there's quite a bit of excess in the system that can be removed without affecting the quality of care people receive, but accusing Democrats of intending to cut the quality of care or to ration care within particular segments of the population (or overall) mischaracterizes what they are trying to achieve.

Gun culture

2009-08-19T08:17:00.000-07:00

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

I'm the first to admit that 99% of gun owners (I obviously made that number up) are law-abiding citizens and that people who have concealed weapons permits don't typically cause problems (I am not aware of any cases). I think that much if not most of the gun control debate is based on people's emotional response to guns. It's based more on the disgust reflex than anything logical.

Gun-control activists find the presence of guns distasteful and bad for the kind of cultural environment they want to foster. The fact that they hold on to support for gun control laws even though they don't affect crime rates doesn't mean they are stupid. It's the disgust reflex. They just don't like the thought of everyone packing heat when they go to the grocery store.

Gun enthusiasts see "keeping and bearing arms" as an important part of their cultural identity, and are driven mad by the idea of latte-sipping yuppies looking judgmentally at their lifestyle. Even the LDS church's gun-control policies/positions occasionally provoke the ire of the NRA crowd (No guns in chapels, Temple Square, BYU campus, etc.).

Bringing a gun to a public rally or, to an extent, getting a concealed carry permit are ways of making a statement against our modern sanitized, suburban sensibilities. I think it's analogous to homosexuals parading around in thongs or engaging in obnoxious public displays of affection. Both are frustrated that much of society looks at their way of life with suspicion (at best), and they want to make a public statement that tests the limits of constitutional and statutory tolerance for their lifestyle.

The key quotes from the video, in my view, are "Our forefathers fought for the right to keep and bear arms and that everybody should be armed." and "The question is, why don't people bear arms these days." (both around 2:30).

I don't really know where I stand on the gun issues, but it is really interesting to watch.

I may have a problem.

2009-08-17T19:22:00.000-07:00

Ok, I had a half self-commitment to not post any more about Glenn Beck for awhile, but this Daily Show clip was too good. I'm sorry.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Glenn Beck's Operation

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Spinal Tap Performance

Legalize Drugs?

2009-08-17T10:47:00.000-07:00

Peter Moskos and Stanford "Neill" Franklin: It's Time to Legalize Drugs
Rafael Pardo and Juan Gabriel Tokatlian: The war on drugs needs a timeout

The real source of Medicare's problems

2009-08-16T22:26:00.000-07:00

Obvious, but a good reminder.
Richard Dooling: Health Care's Generation Gap

Richard Thaler on the public option

2009-08-16T21:35:00.000-07:00

The Public Option isn't a Curse, or a Cure

Interesting perspective to keep in mind. It reminds me that I need to read up more on the public option, as it appears that I am not as "up" on it as I thought (I was under the impression that all of the federal employees would be put on the public plan, giving it a big initial pool . . . not sure where I got that.). And, of course, Nudge is a very fun read and highly recommended.

The history of crazy in America . . .

2009-08-16T06:52:00.000-07:00

Rich Perlstein: In America, Crazy is a Prexisting Condition

. . . So the birthers, the anti-tax tea-partiers, the town hall hecklers -- theseare "either" the genuine grass roots or evil conspirators staging scenes forYouTube? The quiver on the lips of the man pushing the wheelchair, the crazed risk of carrying a pistol around a president -- too heartfelt to be an act. The lockstep strangeness of the mad lies on the protesters' signs -- too uniform to be spontaneous. They are both. If you don't understand that any moment of genuine political change always produces both, you can't understand America, where the crazy tree blooms in every moment of liberal ascendancy, and where elites exploit the crazy for their own narrow interests. . .

Good article. It made me grateful that stuff like this isn't taught over the pulpit in General Conference any more (Sorry about the cheezy source. lds.org only has archives back to the late '70s).

Colbert on Glenn's advertisers and general hypocrisy

2009-08-14T12:26:00.000-07:00

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

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Meryl Streep

Really?

2009-08-12T22:26:00.000-07:00

No matter what Beck says, he's trying to scare people with talk of eugenics. Trying to brush it off later and say that the discussion is relevant because Nazi Germany started cutting health care to handicapped people because of budget constraints and that the U.S. will too is, frankly, idiotic. The supremacy of the "master race" and the elimination of "undesirables" is a fairly central doctrine. It had nothing to do with budget constraints. The Germans were taking over the world at the time. There was plenty of money/resources.

Also, can we please stop portraying Nazism as a "left-wing" political movement? There is of course the slight issue that Hitler arrested and killed left-wingers (communists, socialists) along with all the other dissidents who opposed his policies. But more broadly, most if not all comprehensive moral philosophies (political, religious, social, whatever) have a sort of built-in totalitarian/dictatorial instinct that tries to force people to conform to it. This is why liberal institutions (like separation of powers, referenda, direct election of representatives, civilian control of the military, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, etc.) are so important.

It's interesting to me that Beck justifies the whole thing based on the assertion that it is likely that the Federal Government is in danger of defaulting on the national debt (through hyper inflation). First of all, Large deficits are desirable during recessions. Once we have a recovery, taxes need to be raised and spending needs to be cut. If Congress can't/won't do this, we have a problem. As of right now, this doomsday scenario doesn't seem likely if interest rates on government debt mean anything.

I feel like I say this a lot (probably too much for someone as young and inexperienced as I am), but there are intelligent reasons to oppose the kind of health care reform being portrayed (Megan McArdle makes some especially good arguments and links to many others). Familiarize yourself with what credible people have to say before you make a up your mind.

Hawking - "I wouldn't be here today if it were not for the NHS"

2009-08-12T22:21:00.000-07:00

Here's the article in The Guardian

Stan Collender on Bloomberg

2009-08-06T18:27:00.000-07:00

A very good interview overall.

Hat Tip: Brad Delong

Good Question

2009-08-06T17:56:00.000-07:00

Delong: Nine Republicans for Sotomayor

Interesting that Orrin Hatch (R-UT) voted for Ginsburg and Breyer--and against Sotomayor...

Not only voted for, but suggested.

Ah Capitalism . . .

2009-08-06T17:34:00.000-07:00

MediaMatters.org: Advertisers dump Glenn Beck

2009-08-05T22:11:00.000-07:00

NY Times: Signs of Dissent Emerge in an Iranian Power Base

The ruling conservative faction still draws most of its support from such remote and religious strongholds . . .

But the quickening exodus of young villagers in search of jobs has challenged the traditional mind-set of residents of these communities. The young return on the weekends from nearby cities like Kashan and Qum, bringing back news of a changing world . . .

Why is this so often true, I wonder. Even in Albania, as I recall, the Communist party won the first free election in 1990-ish because of the rural vote.

I need to read The New Yorker more.

2009-08-03T21:56:00.000-07:00

The Courthouse Ring: Atticus Finch and the limits of Southern liberalism

I'm not sure whether I completely agree with the article, but it's among the most thought-provoking I've read in a while.

Mankiw: Not so simple

2009-08-03T19:25:00.000-07:00

Health Reform: Simple or Not?

To Paul, the administration's health plan is simple and straightforward. To Keith, it is a nonstarter.

Why do these two smart commentators reach such opposite conclusions? The essence of the difference, I think, is that Paul is mainly concerned with universal coverage and is happy to put off discussion of the government budget constraint to another day, while Keith is focused on how the reforms will be paid for and, in particular, with the administration's claims that a major goal of health reform is to put the government on a more sustainable fiscal path.

Health Reform Made Simple

2009-08-03T06:53:00.000-07:00

Krugman:

The essence is really quite simple: regulation of insurers, so that they can’tcherry-pick only the healthy, and subsidies, so that all Americans can afford insurance.

Everything else is about making that core work. Individual mandates are a way to prevent gaming of the system by people who don’t sign up until they’re sick; employer mandates a way to hold down the on-budget costs by preventing a rush by employers to drop insurance; the public option a way to create effective competition and hold costs down further.

But what it means for the individual will be that insurers can’t reject you, and if your income is relatively low, the government will help pay your premiums.

That’s it. Any commentator who whines that he just doesn’t understand it is basically saying that he doesn’t want to understand it.

Israeli Settlements

2009-08-02T16:02:00.000-07:00

Thomas Friedman: Free Marriage Counseling

Here’s what Israelis need to understand: President Obama is not some outlier when it comes to Israel. His call for a settlements freeze reflects attitudes that have been building in America for a long time. For the last 40 years, a succession of Israeli governments has misled, manipulated or persuaded naïve U.S. presidents that since Israel was negotiating to give up significant territory, there was no need to fight over “insignificant” settlements on some territory. Behind this charade, Israeli settlers bit off more and more of the West Bank, creating a huge moral, security and economic burden for Israel and its friends . . .
For years, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and the pro-Israel lobby, rather than urging Israel to halt this corrosive process, used their influence to mindlessly protect Israel from U.S. pressure on this issue and to dissuade American officials and diplomats from speaking out against settlements. Everyone in Washington knows this, and a lot of people — people who care about Israel — are sick of it . . .
What about Mr. Obama? He has nothing to apologize for policy-wise. The president is working on a deal whereby Israel would agree to a real moratorium on settlement building, Palestinians would uproot terrorists and the Arab states would begin to normalize relations — with visas for Israelis, trade missions, media visits and landing rights for El Al. If the president can pull this off, it would be good for everyone.

Rule of Thumb:

2009-08-02T07:21:00.000-07:00

If Anne Coulter thinks you're a right-wing nut job, you are.

Coincidence?

2009-08-02T06:35:00.000-07:00

Yglesias: Majority of White Southerners Doubt Obama's US Birth

You can tell a lot about a person by observing what he accepts without proof and what he demands detailed documentation of. Regarding the "birther" issue (and the "secret Muslim" issue, and the "flag pin" issue, and the "secretly hates white people" issue) I think we have something like the racist version of Jesus' observation that "An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign".

I'm not saying that seeking proof for something makes you prejudiced, but when literally two minutes of research destroys the conspiracy theory, there aren't many other explanations for your belief.

Update: Relevant video that I intended to post earlier

Serious discussion bad for ratings

2009-08-02T06:17:00.000-07:00

Politico: Health care talk sinks Obama press conference ratings

MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan said Thursday morning that while President Barack Obama has “elevated the conversation” when it comes to health care, there’s a downside for cable executives and his fellow hosts: “Health care is bad for ratings.”

Discussing the previous night’s low-key news conference, Ratigan
said that “cable networks’ ratings go off a cliff” during the health care debate, which eventually “forces the conversation out of the TV.”
. . . Fox’s decision not to air the presser paid off: The network won the 8 p.m. time slot with an episode of “So You Think You Can Dance.”
. . .
In trying to not get bogged down like President Bill Clinton in the ’90s, Obama decided to take the health care fight to a prime-time audience last week. But perhaps the biggest story coming out of the press conference had nothing to do with health care. Instead, it was Obama’s statement that the Cambridge, Mass., Police Department acted “stupidly” in its arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Yet, save for his emotional response to a question about Gates in the event’s final minutes, Obama got lukewarm reviews for his talking points on health care. “Snooze conference,” was the Philadelphia Inquirer headline; “Snoozer conference” was the verdict from MSNBC’s First Read.

I can't stand it. I just can't stand it.

Health economist Uwe E. Reinhardt on cost-cutting

2009-07-29T16:07:00.000-07:00

A German Import That Could Help U.S. Health Reform:

After a three-hour meeting at the White House on Tuesday, fiscally conservative Democrats in the House of Representatives — the so-called Blue Dog Democrats — got a tentative agreement on an addition to the health reform bill. The new provision would give an outside panel of health policy experts and stakeholders the power to make cuts to government-financed health care programs.

Although brushed off by some as a “pint-sized breakthrough in an ocean of concern,” Peter Orszag, the White House budget director, called it “probably the most important piece that can be added” to the health care bill in the House.

I could not agree more. Such a provision, if part of the final bill, would be the proverbial camel’s nose under the tent for a more rational approach to America’s health policy.
It would be a very big deal . . .

I encourage you to read the whole article.

Obama's press conference on health care reform and some good commentary

2009-07-27T14:23:00.000-07:00

Costs and Compassion
By PAUL KRUGMAN

The talking heads on cable TV panned President Obama’s Wednesday press conference. You see, he didn’t offer a lot of folksy anecdotes.

Shame on them. The health care system is in crisis. The fate of America’s middle class hangs in the balance. And there on our TVs was a president with an impressive command of the issues, who truly understands the stakes.

Mr. Obama was especially good when he talked about controlling medical costs. And there’s a crucial lesson there — namely, that when it comes to reforming health care, compassion and cost-effectiveness go hand in hand.

To see what I mean, compare what Mr. Obama has said and done about health care with the statements and actions of his predecessor.

President Bush, you may remember, was notably unconcerned with the plight of the uninsured. “I mean, people have access to health care in America,” he once remarked. “After all, you just go to an emergency room.”

Meanwhile, Mr. Bush claimed to be against excessive government expenditure. So what did he do to rein in the cost of Medicare, the biggest single item driving federal spending?

Nothing. In fact, the 2003 Medicare Modernization Act drove costs up both by preventing bargaining over drug prices and by locking in subsidies to insurance companies.

Now President Obama is trying to provide every American with access to health insurance — and he’s also doing more to control health care costs than any previous president.

I don’t know how many people understand the significance of Mr. Obama’s proposal to give MedPAC, the expert advisory board to Medicare, real power. But it’s a major step toward reducing the useless spending — the proliferation of procedures with no medical benefits — that bloats American health care costs.

And both the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats have also been emphasizing the importance of “comparative effectiveness research” — seeing which medical procedures actually work.

So the Obama administration’s commitment to health care for all goes along with an unprecedented willingness to get serious about spending health care dollars wisely. And that’s part of a broader pattern.

Many health care experts believe that one main reason we spend far more on health than any other advanced nation, without better health outcomes, is the fee-for-service system in which hospitals and doctors are paid for procedures, not results. As the president said Wednesday, this creates an incentive for health providers to do more tests, more operations, and so on, whether or not these procedures actually help patients.

So where in America is there serious consideration of moving away from fee-for-service to a more comprehensive, integrated approach to health care? The answer is: Massachusetts — which introduced a health-care plan three years ago that was, in some respects, a dress rehearsal for national health reform, and is now looking for ways to help control costs.

Why does meaningful action on medical costs go along with compassion? One answer is that compassion means not closing your eyes to the human consequences of rising costs. When health insurance premiums doubled during the Bush years, our health care system “controlled costs” by dropping coverage for many workers — but as far as the Bush administration was concerned, that wasn’t a problem. If you believe in universal coverage, on the other hand, it is a problem, and demands a solution.

Beyond that, I’d suggest that would-be health reformers won’t have the moral authority to confront our system’s inefficiency unless they’re also prepared to end its cruelty. If President Bush had tried to rein in Medicare spending, he would have been accused, with considerable justice, of cutting benefits so that he could give the wealthy even more tax cuts. President Obama, by contrast, can link Medicare reform with the goal of protecting less fortunate Americans and making the middle class more secure.

As a practical, political matter, then, controlling health care costs and expanding health care access aren’t opposing alternatives — you have to do both, or neither . . .

Wow . . . look what I missed while I was on vacation

2009-07-26T20:41:00.000-07:00

Beck loses an argument and his temper majorly . . .

And the attempted damage control . . . or something. I don't know what.

Ok, so the woman was a little snooty, but really? Can we stop taking this man seriously?

LDS leaders meet with Obama

2009-07-20T18:14:00.000-07:00

Article here

The crazy Balkans . . .

2009-07-20T14:20:00.000-07:00

CNN.com - Serb cousins guilty of burning Muslims alive

The Onion has been sold to the Chinese!

2009-07-20T13:13:00.000-07:00

I don't know if this is a permanent development or not, but it's pretty amusing the way they've set it up.

My favorite articles so far:

Nothing At All Happens to 28 Tibetan Protesters, Their Families

China Strong

This was pretty good too:

Police Still Searching For Missing Productive, Obedient Woman