Fighting Against the Current

Economics is pretty complicated, but there are a few fundamental rules that are nearly universally true. One of those is that if you want less of something, tax it (or increase the taxes on it).

Therefore, if you increase the taxes on working, you will get less work (i.e., people will work fewer hours). If people work fewer hours, fewer goods and services will be produced. If fewer goods and services are produced, our country will be less wealthy overall.

Can a poorer country make the poor better off? It's at best tricky because you have to give the poor an even larger slice of the smaller pie to do that. It's like swimming upstream and fighting against the current. It may be possible to funnel enough of the limited extra taxes efficiently enough to the poor to make them better off, but it's a bad bet in my opinion.

A Three Letter Word

According to an article in the Boston Herald, "Sen. Biden ... recently told supporters that Obama’s highest priority “is a three-letter word: Jobs! J-O-B-S.”

Unfortunately, Biden may have the math right. If Obama gets elected, his policies might mean that the number of new jobs created may well be singular. There might only be one job created during his whole term: "Job! J-O-B," a three letter word, just like he said.

Joe the Plumber

Nothing in politics has ever made me angrier than the MSM's treatment of Joe the Plumber after his recent conversation with Obama. In the past, I was taken aback by the attacks on Palin, but she, at least, is a public figure. I was even more taken aback by the massive attacks (many of which are untrue) on Palin's family, and I considered that to be beyond the pale since they aren't really public figures. But the attacks on Joe the Plumber represent a whole new level of Media malfeasance. They are a massive and unwarranted intrusion into the life of a private citizen that has dredged up a few minor skeletons in his closet that have the potential of to cause severe negative consequences for him.

It turns out that Joe doesn't have a plumber's license. I don't have a plumber's license either. I've done plumbing in my house and in friends' and neighbors' houses. I'm not sure whether or not my plumbing without a license was illegal, but it certainly shouldn't be. As of this writing, it's not clear whether or not Joe's plumbing without a license was illegal (since he was working for a licensed plumber), but it certainly shouldn't be.

The MSM managed to dredge up some other problems, and I can relate to all of them. He's had driver's license problems, I've had driver's problems (due to petty out-of-state bureaucrats jerking me around). He has a tax problem, I've been audited four times by the IRS (though I only ended up owing money once and that was for only a few hundred dollars). He may have overestimated the revenue of the plumbing company that he works for, I've been known to overestimate some revenue projections for my companies (as my investors are sometimes quick to note). What it comes down to is that I could not possibly withstand the severe media scrutiny that Joe has had to endure and my bet is that very few people could.

That's the first part of what makes me so angry: the MSM can ruin anybody's life if it wants to, and apparently it will if it suits its purpose. And it gets to decide if and when ruining lives suits its purpose.

The second part of what makes me angry is that Joe's background has no bearing on his conversation with Obama. That's because it's immaterial who asked Obama the questions. It doesn't matter if the private citizen who asked the questions has a plumbing license or has overestimated the revenue of the company he's currently working for during an impromptu conversation. The only news of importance is Obama's responses to those questions and his responses are his responses regardless of who asked the questions.

And what was wrong with Obama's responses? Is it really any surprise that Obama wants to "spread the wealth around?" That he wants to "make sure that everybody who is behind [Joe], that they've got a chance at success, too?" Indeed, wouldn't Obama's supporters, including the MSM, be unhappy if Obama didn't want to do those things? Doesn't it even seem like a rather nice exchange highlighting Obama's compassion for the little guy?

So why destroy Joe? I've seen few theories that make any sense to me. The only one that makes some sense to me and fits some of the facts is the scariest: the MSM was hoping to hide Obama's true beliefs until after the election, making him a blank slate upon which each individual voter would project his or her own beliefs such that they would trust and then vote for Obama; Joe, because of his innocent questions, elicited one of the few defining responses ever from Obama; As a result, at least some potential swing voters might vote against Obama because there is now something written on the previously blank slate that they don't like; So the MSM, instead of trying to inform the public, has instead tried to keep information from the public and are livid that Joe the Plumber has ruined their plans by writing on Obama's blank slate and are taking revenge.

I hope that's not it, but whatever the reason, the fear of being raked over the coals like Joe the Plumber is not going to help public discourse in this democracy of ours.

Bernanke's an Idiot

Deflation in August, no inflation in September.

He's not injecting liquidity nearly fast enough.

John Galt

Dr. Helen (who's Instapundit's wife) asks:

Do you ever wonder after dealing with all that is going on with the economy and the upcoming election if it’s getting to be time to “go John Galt”? For those of you who have never read Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, the basic theme is that John Galt and his allies take actions that include withdrawing their talents, “stopping the motor of the world,” and leading the “strikers” (those who refuse to be exploited) against the “looters” (the exploiters, backed by the government).

I don't think that there's any need for a "John Galt" to lead the productive to "strike". Individuals will review their situations and make decisions to cut back or stop working altogether depending on Obama's new tax and regulatory regimes and their own personal preferences and needs. The result may look like a John Galt organized them, but it will instead be a great example of Adam Smith's "Invisible Finger"¹ (the middle one, of course) causing such people to self organize into a group that decides that it's no longer worth their while to work as much any more.

Also, even though I am personally fairly likely to close down my business and stop working if and when Obama's new taxes take effect, I don't see any benefit whatsoever to trying to convince others to do so. The more productive others are, the better off I am. If they want to continue to work hard and don't mind the high taxes so much, why would I possibly want to discourage them? Indeed, after I close my business, I'll be pretty poor and will greatly enjoy the goods and services and handouts that they make possible.

Notes:
¹ My co-blogger Howard alerted me to the phrase "Invisible Middle Finger".

My Confidence is Shaken

In a post last month, I wrote, "I'm confident that the country will survive just fine regardless of who's elected."

However, after doing a little bit of research¹, I'm not so confident about that anymore. There are a number of things that I find disconcerting about Obama's background. There are also gaps in the record, or blank areas (and I also find that disconcerting).

The bottom line is that many of Obama's past supporters were radical socialists and/or anti-American activists and seemed to think that Obama was one of them. While there is no proof (as far as I can tell) that Obama was (or is) in fact a radical socialist and/or anti-American activist, there is also no proof that he was not, and I think that's a problem.

Usually, I would give the benefit of the doubt to a candidate. After all, it's quite difficult to get anywhere in politics without being exposed to some unsavory characters. Corruption and greed run rampant in all political systems. Corruption and greed I can handle. Hypocrisy? No big deal, especially when it's clearly just to win an election.

Radical ideologies and anti-Americanism? Those worry me. In the wrong hands, those characteristics have the potential to inflict a tremendous amount of damage. The president of the United States certainly qualifies as having the wrong hands to be trusted with such characteristics.

There are three associations in particular that I find disconcerting. None of the three is enough in itself, in my opinion, to reject Obama. But taken together, I'm worried.

First is the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The following is an excerpt from ABC News in March, 2008 regarding Wright and Obama:

Sen. Barack Obama's pastor says blacks should not sing "God Bless America" but "God damn America."

The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama's pastor for the last 20 years at the Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's south side, has a long history of what even Obama's campaign aides concede is "inflammatory rhetoric," including the assertion that the United States brought on the 9/11 attacks with its own "terrorism."

In a campaign appearance earlier this month, Sen. Obama said, "I don't think my church is actually particularly controversial." [...]

Rev. Wright married Obama and his wife Michelle, baptized their two daughters and is credited by Obama for the title of his book, "The Audacity of Hope."

Obama belonged to Wright's church for many years and was impressed enough with Wright that he used material from Wright's sermons as the title for one of his books. In addition, Obama doesn't think that the church was "particularly controversial."

Many of the articles written about Wright seem to dismiss him as a bit of a kook. In other words, they admit he has said some "controversial" things, but that's only because he's a little bit nutty.

But that explanation, I believe, is clearly wrong. Wright's church preaches Black Liberation Theology which is completely compatible with what Wright has preached according to numerous criticisms:

Theologians such as theology scholar Dr. Robert A. Morley take a dim view of black theology. Morley's paper "The Goals Of Black Liberal Theology" is one widely quoted paper citing specific criticisms of black theology. He states that black theology turns religion into sociology, and Jesus into a black Marxist rebel. [...]

Anthony Bradley of the Christian Post interprets that the language of "economic parity" and references to "mal-distribution" as nothing more than channeling the views of Karl Marx.

He believes James Cone and Cornel West have worked to incorporate Marxist thought into the black church, forming an ethical framework predicated on a system of oppressor class versus a victim much like Marxism.[23]

Stanley Kurtz of the National Review criticizes black liberation theology, saying, "A scarcely concealed, Marxist-inspired indictment of American capitalism pervades contemporary 'black-liberation theology'...The black intellectual's goal, says Cone, is to "aid in the destruction of America as he knows it." Such destruction requires both black anger and white guilt. The black-power theologian's goal is to tell the story of American oppression so powerfully and precisely that white men will "tremble, curse, and go mad, because they will be drenched with the filth of their evil."

In other words, Obama belonged to a church for many years that was essentially Marxist and which Obama did not find controversial.

The New Party, an offshoot of the Democratic Socialists of America, claimed Obama as one of their candidates in 1996, only 12 years ago, and worked actively to help him get elected. The following is an excerpt from a 1996 New Party Internet Newsletter²:

Illinois: Three NP-members won Democratic primaries last Spring and face off against Republican opponents on election day: Danny Davis (U.S. House), Barack Obama (State Senate) and Patricia Martin (Cook County Judiciary).

Here is an excerpt from a Democratic Socialists of America newsletter from the same year:

Barack Obama, victor in the 13th State Senate District, encouraged NPers to join in his task forces on Voter Education and Voter Registration.

Obama may not have considered himself a member of either the Democratic Socialists of America or of its offshoot, the New Party, but they sure considered that he was one of them and were quite happy that he won the election. In other words, they thought he was a socialist, and Obama has not repudiated those alliances. Once again, in and of itself, it's no big deal. As part of pattern, I think it should be taken more seriously.

Then there Obama's relationship with Bill Ayers and his wife Bernardine Dohrn, leaders of the violent, far left, anti-American group, The Weather Underground. This group is so well known, and so visciously evil, that I find it well beyond the pale for anyone to have even a casual relationship with leaders of such a group. If political expediency absolutely requires it, then you need to thoroughly condemn the actions and beliefs of such people whenever the subject comes up. Obama has not done that.

Just a few statements and actions by these people that I think are the most appalling:

"Dig it! First they killed those pigs and then they put a fork in their bellies. Wild!" Bernardine Dohrn regarding the Charles Manson led Tate-LaBianca murders in 1969.

"Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home, kill your parents — that's where it's really at." Bill Ayers describing the Weather Underground's philosophy in 1969.

"Guilty as hell, free as a bird—America is a great country." Bill Ayers after government misconduct caused the case against him to be dismissed in 1980.

The last statement is indicative of how little responsibility he felt for his actions and his complete lack of contrition and regret. He and his group waged war against the United States and are proud of it. Obama's response to all this? None, other than Ayers was just a guy in the neighborhood.

The extent of Obama's relationship with Ayers and Dohrn is unclear, but at a minimum (according to the NY Times):

Their paths have crossed sporadically since then, at a coffee Mr. Ayers hosted for Mr. Obama’s first run for office, on the schools project and a charitable board, and in casual encounters as Hyde Park neighbors.

While the crossing of their paths may have been sporadic, I believe their paths crossed numerous times. According to Victor David Hanson:

He [Obama] did not just know a Wright or Rezko, but knew them quite well for quite a long time. And in the case of Ayers, Obama has sorely misled: he apparently still emailed and communicated with him after 9/11, when Ayers, on his Fugitive Justice book tour, grandly announced that he regretted only that he had not bombed enough. At that point any further communication was indefensible, since the New York Times had widely circulated Ayers’ views. Yet Obama was emailing him at least until 2005!

The problem with these associations is not necessarily the associations themselves. It's a combination of the pattern and pervasiveness of the associations coupled with the fact that Obama has not made it clear that he doesn't agree with those associates. Any repudiation of his associates' viewpoints has come late and under severe pressure for him to do so and has been quite mild.

While I have not taken strong sides in past elections, I believe that Obama is by far the most radical left-wing socialist candidate for President (from a serious political party) that this country has ever seen and with the support of one of the more left-wing Congresses that we've had in quite some time, could actually spell disaster for this country.

I sure hope I'm wrong. Looks like we'll find out.

Notes:
¹ Unlike the MSM, I haven't done a great deal of fact checking so any of the claims in the post could be completely wrong - do your own damn fact checking!
² The page isn't still available on the New Party website but has been archived by archive.org.

Wait and See

The likelihood of Obama becoming president is inversely correlated with the price of the S&P 500 stock market index. The correlation coefficient is only about -0.4, which isn't a particularly strong correlation, and correlation certainly doesn't prove causation. However, I believe that the correlation is valid and I believe there is a mechanism for causation. In other words, I believe that the increasing likelihood of Obama becoming president is a cause for the cratering of the stock market that we are currently experiencing.

It seems clear that the drop in the stock market has been at least partially caused by the credit contraction, which has been at least partially caused by the mortgage securities problem, which has been at least partially caused by falling house prices. This is a train wreck that's been waiting to happen for more than a decade. The questions are why now, and why so severe?

My answers to those questions are based on my observations and my observations are based on my perspective. My perspective is that of an entrepreneur/businessman/technologist who has co-founded companies that have created jobs for and employed 100+ people over the last 25+ years.

Starting and running businesses is risky. Indeed, I would personally have been far, far better off if I had just taken a job that someone else created rather than building these companies.

The potential for change increases risk. The riskiest point in the political cycle is when there will be a change in administration and the new administration's political affiliation is likely to align with the party that controls Congress. This is further exacerbated (from my point of view) when the incoming Administration's mantra is "Change" and that change is promised to be higher taxes and more regulation, both of which increase the risk to businesses.

As a result, I personally have stopped investing in my company for several months now. I have stopped trying to grow the business. I have stopped trying to hire people. I'm now in a "wait and see" mode. The pain of growing and hiring new people only to have to retrench and lay them off is very, very painful and not something I'm willing to do except as a very last resort.

I hang out with other entrepreneurs¹ and they tell me they're in the same boat. Let's wait and see, let's just wait and see.

Well, you don't really need all that many employers waiting and seeing before it has an adverse effect on at least parts of the economy. I think the housing markets softness was exacerbated by the softer job market which was exacerbated by waiting and seeing. The credit crunch and stock market drops are also exacerbated by waiting and seeing.

So I do think that Obama's successful candidacy has contributed to the precipitation and depth of the stock market plunge. Once elected, things will likely stabilize, since the waiting and seeing part will be over and I, and others, will reformulate our strategies based on the new rules of the game. Obama will then, of course, get credit for stabilizing the economy, in what I will consider to be the greatest irony of all.

Notes:
¹ Though I'm not actually a CEO, just a business owner who hired a CEO to take care of all the administrative BS that I don't like to do anyway, it looks like a solid majority of CEOs feel the way I and the other entrepreneurs that I know do about the election

A Competent Response

There's been a lot of discussion lately about FDR and whether or not his policies prolonged the depression.

But whether or not his policies helped or hurt, my opinion is that his response was very, very competent. There is no doubt that his policies achieved the following:
1. He made himself far more powerful;
2. He made his party far more powerful (they controlled the country for generations); and
3. He made government far more powerful.

These are signs of a very, very competent politician.

Prolonging the economic misery of tens of millions of Americans, laying part of the groundwork that precipitated a world war that killed tens of millions and laid two continents to waste, and stifling the economic development of the United States for generations seems a small price to pay for the political accomplishments listed above.

To those who are wishing that the next Administration responds "competently" to the economic situation, I say, "Be very careful what you wish for!"

Not that far from the Truth

Paulson to Congress: You’re Mine Now, Suckas

It's funny because it's frighteningly close to reality. Do not drink hot liquids while reading it.

Fuel to the Fire

The intrade.com odds of Obama becoming President is inversely correlated (-.4) with the stock market. In other words, as it has becoming more likely that Obama will be President, the stock market has done worse and worse.

The common narrative on the stock market is that plummeting housing prices triggered a financial crisis which has pummeled the stock markets. Therefore, plummeting housing prices are the root cause.

But I think that the root cause is deeper.

As a businessman/entrepreneur who is running a small robotics technology company, I can tell you that for the last two years, with Pelosi and Reid running congress, and the increasing likelihood of a far left President, I've been very hesitant at pursuing any expansion plans given the additional taxes and regulations that are going to be imposed on businesses during the coming administration(s). I know that many of my associates who run other businesses feel the same way.

The result is reduced investment, reduced expansion, reduced hiring, reduced employment, and reduced wealth creation. Reduced wealth means that most assets like houses are going to have lower prices. That is the root cause of the plummeting housing prices which has caused the financial turmoil.

The great irony is that once Obama finally takes office, the damage will already be complete. The anticipated taxes and regulations will be put in place and the economy will resume growth (though at a slower rate and from a lower level) and Obama will be given credit for "fixing" the economy and Bush will continue to be vilified for having mismanaged it and most of us will learn the wrong lessons and make the same bad decisions in the future.

Oroborous Wins!

Oroborous and I made a bet in September, 2007. I bet that the SP500 wouldn't close below 1131 between then and the end of September, 2008. That price was picked as the level that would demarcate random market fluctuations (my side of the bet) from the prediction that the market price in September, 2007 was predictably overpriced because of falling housing prices and mortgage problems (the side of the bet Oroborous signed up to).

Well, the price did close below 1131 on September 29, 2008, with less than 30 hours left in the bet. While that was a close call, I'll certainly admit that much of the price action is due to housing and mortgage related issues, so Oroborous won both the spirit and letter of the bet.

I now owe Oroborous up to $100 of books, CDs, or DVDs.

Oroborous, please leave your email in the comments so we can make arrangements.

Or Not

On Tuesday the stock market had a big rally after the plunge on Monday.  The headlines everywhere were more or less, "Markets Rally Because of Renewed Optimism That Bailout Plan Will Eventually Pass".

So, how does the Main Stream Media know that for the hundreds of millions of shares that traded, the price was driven up because of buyers' renewed hope that some bailout plan would pass?  Why didn't they have at least some of that optimism on Monday?

If I was left to make up the headline, I would have guessed something more like, "Markets Rally Because Everyone Came to Their Senses and Realized That the Bailout Plan Wasn't Really Particularly Great After All" or, "Markets Rally Because Dollar Surges Against Foreign Currencies".  Or, how about, "Markets Rally Because Fed Continues to Inject Huge Amounts of Liquidity Into System Along with Planning to Reduce Reserve and Capitalization Requirements"?

It could be renewed excitement about the Bailout.  Or not.

Something for Everyone

The beauty of the financial situation is that there's something for
everyone. It was a real team effort by multitudes of players.

If you want to blame evil capitalist lenders and banks, there was
certainly plenty of greed and fraud to point your finger at.

If you want to blame big government, the CRA and Freddie and Fannie
give lots of opportunity for that sort of thing.

Hate mark-to-market regulations? Go ahead and blame that. Hate short
selling? Sure, why not blame that? Sarbanes-Oxley is even fair game
if you don't mind stretching a bit.

You think Bush and/or Congress suck? Certainly plenty of ammo for
blame there.

That's the wonderful thing. No matter what your ideology, there's
someone for you to blame!!! And that blame proves beyond a shadow of
a doubt that your ideology has been perfectly flawless all these
years!!! What could be better than that?

I haven't seen so many people so happy ever!!!

Great Depression History

In tonight's presidential debate, Obama said:

"Even if we get all $700 billion back, let's assume the markets recover, we' holding assets long enough that eventually taxpayers get it back and that happened during the Great Depression when Roosevelt purchased a whole bunch of homes, over time, home values went back up and in fact government made a profit."

Can somebody point me to a link that describes the Roosevelt Administration's profitable home purchasing program? I missed that part of the history of the great depression and I'm having trouble finding information about it with Google.

A more comprehensive perspective

Recently, Alan Blinder wrote a column appearing in NYT espousing the superiority of Democrat economic policy. I was a bit embarrassed for Mr. Blinder given the obvious weakness of the case he presented. Russ Roberts picked apart the claims here offering several points including:

I learned from my textbook (Samuelson) the fallacy of post hoc, ergo propter hoc. After this, therefore because of this. Alan Blinder commits this fallacy...

Most economists will also tell you that Presidents don't even control fiscal policy. Here in the United States we have three branches of government. The Presidency is one of them. Then there is what is called the Congress. They have a say, too. Then there are external events besides fiscal policy and monetary policy and oil prices that affect the economy and that are beyond the President's control. Demographics. Cultural trends. Technology. None of these are controlled by the President.

Statistical regularities are stubborn things? No they're not. They are dominated by randomness almost by definition. That's why they're called regularities. They reveal a pattern in the data. Nothing more. Nothing less. Without a theory (and saying Democratic presidents are better at running the economy than Republican presidents is not a theory) it's just a regularity.

Don Luskin makes his contribution with DIVIDED GOVERNMENT IS BEST FOR THE MARKET:(read the whole article)

Let's get something settled once and for all. Have the stock markets and the economy historically done better under Democrats or Republicans?

I've run the numbers myself. Superficially at least, the Democratic claims are true: Since 1948, the Standard & Poor's 500 total return (capital gains plus dividends) has averaged 15.6% when a Democrat was in the White House and only 11.1% when a Republican was in the White House.

You get a similar result if you look at growth in real gross domestic product. Under Democratic presidents, the average since 1948 has been 4.2%. Under Republican presidents it has been only 2.8%.

But it's not so simple when you study that "study." First, not all Democrats act like Democrats, and not all Republicans act like Republicans. John F. Kennedy, for example, was an enthusiastic supply-side tax cutter, and George H.W. Bush raised taxes. Bill Clinton promoted free trade, and Richard Nixon imposed wage and price controls.

If you assign those four presidents to the opposite party based on that -- make the two Democrats into Republicans and the two Republicans into Democrats -- the numbers completely reverse. Now stocks average 14.7% under Republicans and only 10.5% under Democrats.

In fact, it turns out that if you do just one single switch -- if you make Richard Nixon into a Democrat -- it's enough to reverse the numbers. Then stocks average 14% under Republicans and only 12.1% under Democrats. This fact discredits this whole study more than it does Republicans, or even Richard Nixon himself. Any analysis that can be undone by omitting or changing a single data point isn't very robust.

By the way, as fond as Democrats are of saying how poorly stocks have performed under George W. Bush, here's a sobering fact: Stocks averaged 14.1% return in those Bush years when Republicans controlled Congress -- and when Democrats got in there and mucked things up, the average has been a loss of 8.9%. That's not even including 2008 year-to-date, which doesn't look so pretty.

If the electorate were really smart, it would elect a Democratic president and a Republican Congress. Under that deal, stocks have averaged a 20.2% total return, and real GDP averaged 4%. That tells us that economic and stock market success isn't really about partisan politics at all. Sadly, nobody has a political incentive to conduct a study about that.

The role of Nixon's economic record is rather interesting. I have long been amused that the left is so angry with RMN for nailing their boy Alger Hiss. If they really knew any economics they would have a better appreciation for how his economic policies set off an economic stink bomb that nobody knew how to defuse until Ronald Reagan came along. That would really get them worked up.

Also, did you make note of this?: Any analysis that can be undone by omitting or changing a single data point isn't very robust. Failure to grasp the significance of this point is yet another wonderful example of what Richard Feynman called fragile knowledge.

Finally, I'm a pretty big fan of divided government, Bret is an even bigger fan. Pretty smart guy that Bret!

global what?

Top Russian scientist: global cooling coming

For the remainder of this century, it will be global cooling we'll have to worry about, according to highly credentialed Russian scientist, Dr. Oleg Sorokhtin.

The high standing of Dr. Sorkhtin and the inherent plausibility of his argument that climate will continue to follow the same basic causal factor, solar activity, make this another heavy blow to the heavy breathing of the global warming alarmists, who insist there is no argument at all.

We shall see. Meanwhile, we have this:

There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:

1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.

Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.

2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.

3. The satellites that measure the world's temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980).

4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect.

None of these points are controversial. The alarmist scientists agree with them, though they would dispute their relevance.

The world has spent $50 billion on global warming since 1990, and we have not found any actual evidence that carbon emissions cause global warming. Evidence consists of observations made by someone at some time that supports the idea that carbon emissions cause global warming. Computer models and theoretical calculations are not evidence, they are just theory.

It will be fun to watch this play out in the public arena.

I Must've Seen a Different Speech

The reviews of Sarah Palin's VP nomination acceptance speech seem to be overwhelmingly positive, at least those reviews from conservative pundits: "The start of something truly big", "A star was born last night"; "She has star quality"; etc.

I watched her speak and I thought it was a pretty decent delivery of a somewhat marginal speech. The crowd stepped on a lot of her lines with applause, she made a lot of references to Obama's foibles that people who aren't political junkies probably didn't get, and while she was trying to stress her relevant experience, she still looks pretty green to me.

On the other hand, looking at the faces at the convention while she was speaking, and also noticing the rapt look on my daughters (ages 12 and 9) and wife's faces, she is clearly a mesmerizing speaker for many people. Just like Obama. Now each ticket has their very own hypnotist. I'm not surprised that Obama hypnotizes people. His cadence and tone sound somewhat hypnotic to me. I'm a little more surprised that Palin has this effect since she has a much different speaking style. However, I'm pretty convinced that a lot of the crowd was hypnotized.

This could be a serious problem. This election, like the previous two presidential elections, might also be close. Hypnotized followers can be incited to do very extreme things. Hitler was such a speaker and leader and his leadership didn't turn out too well for the world. I'm not saying that either Obama or Palin (McCain) would take us in a direction even vaguely similar to Hitler. What I am saying is that the side that loses this election, being hypnotized, may be even more irrational in dealing with their disappointment than in previous elections. And the losers were already pretty scary in those previous elections.

My wife and I have made a strict rule that we're not going to talk about politics at all with friends, family, co-workers, or anybody in person until well after the election. Many of our friends are already hypnotized by one side or the other and are clearly extremely emotional when politics is even mentioned. Emotional to the point of visibly shaking. Emotional to the point of being completely irrational. Emotional to the point of talking about moving out of the country if their candidate loses. And these are generally intelligent and balanced people. I'm finding it very scary.

Fortunately, I can still spout off about politics here in the safety of the blogosphere. If I piss y'all off, at least I won't suffer any significant harm.

Ultimately, I'm confident that the country will survive just fine regardless of who's elected. Everybody needs to splash some cold water on their faces, wake up, take a deep breath, and get a grip.

A Heartbeat Away

On the face of it, one of the stronger arguments against McCain/Palin is that McCain is older than dirt and will likely keel over any second now, and that Palin is too inexperienced to take over when that happens.

So what is the likelihood that McCain does indeed shuffle off this mortal coil shortly after being elected? I'm surprised that I haven't seen this probability published in any of the dozens of articles that I've read that have made the above argument.

I looked up the relevant probabilities in the Social Security Administrations Actuarial Life Table. I don't think there is any information regarding McCain that would allow us to do better than these tables. Yes, he's had skin cancer and his ancestors have died somewhat younger than average. On the other hand, he looks reasonably fit, healthy, and vibrant, and I think that pushes him back towards having typical life expectancy. Maybe not, but it's still an interesting exercise to consider life expectancies for typical men of McCain's age.

From the tables, McCain has close to 97% probability of surviving the first year and better than 85% chance of surviving all four years. So no, he's not all that likely to kick the bucket during the next presidential term.

Another way of looking at it is this. If experience is critically important, and you consider McCain to be adequately experienced, but Obama only to be 80% likely to be adequately experienced for situations that might come up in the next four years, you'd be better off voting for McCain, even if you think that Palin certainly does not have adequate experience.

Everything Else Palin' by Comparison

Wow!

I'm finding the buzz around McCain's VP pick astounding. I've seen more email and blog traffic on this subject than on anything other topic for months. I've gotten emails from left wing friends that I haven't heard from in eons (they hate her, of course). A fairly left wing egroup that I subscribe to (another group of friends) had dozens of posts regarding Palin (yes, they hate her too, but there was no way they were going to vote for McCain anyway). Compare this to the complete lack of interest in Joe Biden.

She's not my type (for example, she thinks Creationism should be taught in schools, which is a bit beyond the palin for me), but there's no doubt in my mind that McCain's campaign is getting huge publicity from his surprising pick, and as a result, I think it was an impressively good roll-of-the-dice. It may not work in the end, but hey, it's worth the shot.

The power of beliefs and ideas

Beliefs are a powerful motivator of human action. We are at the core moral believing animals. Our beliefs shape the culture and the culture shapes our beliefs. People will believe in something, sometimes anything. Bret Stephen offers us this :

None of this seems to trouble Mr. Gore. He thinks that simply by declaring an emergency he can help achieve Stakhanovite results. He might recall what the Stakhanovite myth (about the man who mined 14 times his quota of coal in six hours) actually did to the Soviet economy.

A more interesting question is why Mr. Gore remains believable. Perhaps people think that facts ought not to count against a man whose task is to raise our sights, or play Cassandra to unbelieving mortals.

Or maybe he is believed simply because people want something in which to believe. "The readiness for self-sacrifice," wrote Eric Hoffer in "The True Believer," "is contingent on an imperviousness to the realities of life. . . . All active mass movements strive, therefore, to interpose a fact-proof screen between the faithful and the realities of the world. They do this by claiming that the ultimate and absolute truth is already embodied in their doctrine and that there is no truth nor certitude outside it. . . . To rely on the evidence of the senses and of reason is heresy and treason. It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible."

Sometimes reconsidered ideas and notions allow us to adjust our beliefs as suggested in this :

Of the farm's whole New Age mission, Tim remarks: "The error was, I think, imagining that there was somewhere new to go, someone new to be. It became increasingly clear that a closed system of myth did not jibe with the world as it really was." Looking later at the outside world, Tim saw "a system formed less from malice than from a kind of natural order, less from inordinate greed than from longings much like our own for privacy, comfort, individual freedom, and one's familiar or chosen way of life."

A nice insight that would be helpful to many people!

Herb Meyer reminds us that sometimes the distortions provided by existing notions and beliefs totally disable our ability to perceive things realistically:

Now, imagine that half of you were looking at me through a prism - one of those long, triangular bars of glass. A prism refracts and disperses light, so everything you see through a prism is distorted. Those of you looking at me through a prism might see a tall man with purple skin. My sports jacket might look green instead of brown, and my shirt might look red instead of white. In short, if you're looking at me through a prism you'll get everything wrong.

Well, just as there are real prisms -- those long, triangular bars of glass - there are intellectual prisms, in our minds. And if you're looking at the world through an intellectual prism, you'll also get everything wrong.

He applies this idea to an observation:

Let me put this as starkly as I can: What's going on today in our country isn't normal politics. In normal politics honorable people will disagree, sometimes fiercely, about how best to deal with the issues that confront us - national security, border control, healthcare, education, energy, the environment, and all the rest. What's going on today is a kind of domestic Cold War -- a seemingly endless standoff, with the occasional hard skirmish -- between those of us who see the US for what it really is, and those of us who are seeing the US through a prism. And remember, unlike real prisms these intellectual prisms -- or, if you prefer, these political prisms -- are invisible. If you're looking at the US through a political prism, you don't know you're seeing through a prism and you won't believe anyone who tries to tell you that you are.

This is why Americans who see our country and the world through a prism are impervious to facts.