Obsidian Wings

Michele Bachman: Keeping It Real

by hilzoy

From CNN, via TPMDC:

"As he concluded his remarks, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann -- the event's moderator -- told Steele he was "da man."

“Michael Steele! You be da man! You be da man,” she said."

Dat Michele Bachmann is sho' nuff hep to da black man's lingo. She down with Malcolm and the Panthers. Any moment now she gwine get wise to da special secret code words like 'bling' and 'bitch' and 'chill' and 'whack'. 

She keep conversatin like dis, black folks gwine realize dat Barack Obama ain't the only hep cat on da scene.

Daycare?

by hilzoy

Here's a poll from USNews' Washington Whispers site:

Steve Benen asks: "Would it ever occur to them, even for a moment, to ask who would run the best daycare center: Barack Obama, John McCain, Joe Biden, or John Boehner?" Well, no. 

But let's take this a bit further. Here are some other polls I do not expect to see on the Washington Whispers page:

If you needed some yard work done, would you hire Mel Martinez, Henry Cisneros, Xavier Becerra, or Bill Richardson?

If you needed a rap DJ for a party, would you hire Barack Obama, Charlie Rangel, John Lewis, or Michael Steele?

If you needed an interior decorator, would you choose Jim McGreevey, Barney Frank, Larry Craig, or the disinterred corpse of Harvey Milk?

It's not just that the people who make up polls for the Washington Whispers page would not expect John McCain to run a daycare center. It's that they would probably recognize any of these other appeals to stereotypes as offensive. And yet, oddly enough, asking which one of four prominent women we'd like to have running our children's day care center is A-OK. 

The Washington Post's "Multi-Layer Editing Process"

by hilzoy

I haven't written about George Will's factually challenged column from last Sunday, but I have been following the various refutations of mistakes he made. I have also been following the various requests for comment from the Washington Post, and wondering when the Post might respond. Now they have:

"Thank you for your e-mail. The Post’s ombudsman typically deals with issues involving the news pages. But I understand the point you and many e-mailers are making, and for that reason I sought clarification from the editorial page editors. Basically, I was told that the Post has a multi-layer editing process and checks facts to the fullest extent possible. In this instance, George Will’s column was checked by people he personally employs, as well as two editors at the Washington Post Writers Group, which syndicates Will; our op-ed page editor; and two copy editors. The University of Illinois center that Will cited has now said it doesn’t agree with his conclusion, but earlier this year it put out a statement that was among several sources for this column and that notes in part that "Observed global sea ice area, defined here as a sum of N. Hemisphere and S. Hemisphere sea ice areas, is near or slightly lower than those observed in late 1979,"

Best wishes,
Andy Alexander
Washington Post Ombudsman"

Until I read this, I had been under the impression that newspapers didn't do as much fact-checking as magazines, because of deadline pressure; and I had imagined that the inaccuracies in George Will's column might result from applying standards designed for reported stories to columns. But on reading that Will's column had been subjected to a "multi-layer editing process", and that this "process" had checked the facts "to the fullest extent possible", I realized that I had been wrong. Naturally, I clicked the link Mr. Alexander provided, and read it. Did he? I don't know what would be worse: that he did, and takes it to support Will, or that he didn't take his job seriously enough to bother. 

Here's how George Will cited the Arctic Climate Research Center:

"As global levels of sea ice declined last year, many experts said this was evidence of man-made global warming. Since September, however, the increase in sea ice has been the fastest change, either up or down, since 1979, when satellite record-keeping began. According to the University of Illinois' Arctic Climate Research Center, global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979."

Here's the statement Mr. Alexander cites as "one of" Will's sources, including the sentence he specifically references. It's a response to an article in the Daily Tech called "Sea Ice Ends Year at Same Level as 1979": 

"One important detail about the article in the Daily Tech is that the author is comparing the GLOBAL sea ice area from December 31, 2008 to same variable for December 31, 1979. In the context of climate change, GLOBAL sea ice area may not be the most relevant indicator. Almost all global climate models project a decrease in the Northern Hemisphere sea ice area over the next several decades under increasing greenhouse gas scenarios. But, the same model responses of the Southern Hemisphere sea ice are less certain. In fact, there have been some recent studies suggesting the amount of sea ice in the Southern Hemisphere may initially increase as a response to atmospheric warming through increased evaporation and subsequent snowfall onto the sea ice. (Details: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/06/050630064726.htm )

Observed global sea ice area, defined here as a sum of N. Hemisphere and S. Hemisphere sea ice areas, is near or slightly lower than those observed in late 1979, as noted in the Daily Tech article. However, observed N. Hemisphere sea ice area is almost one million sq. km below values seen in late 1979 and S. Hemisphere sea ice area is about 0.5 million sq. km above that seen in late 1979, partly offsetting the N.Hemisphere reduction." 

Where I come from, when someone writes something of the form: "P is not evidence for Q, and here's why", it is dishonest to quote that person saying P and use that quote as evidence for Q. If one of my students did this, I would grade her down considerably, and would drag her into my office for an unpleasant talk about basic scholarly standards. If she misused quotes in this way repeatedly, I might flunk her.

Will does this more than once. Since it's Will's only citation of a peer-reviewed journal I recognize, I checked the quote from Science in this passage:

"Although some disputed that the "cooling trend" could result in "a return to another ice age" (the Times, Sept. 14, 1975), others anticipated "a full-blown 10,000-year ice age" involving "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation" (Science News, March 1, 1975, and Science magazine, Dec. 10, 1976, respectively)."

It's from this paper (pdf, subscription wall.) Here is the bit Will cited in context:

"Future climate. Having presented evidence that major changes in past climate were associated with variations in the geometry of the earth's orbit, we should be able to predict the trend of future climate. Such forecasts must be qualified in two ways. First, they apply only to the natural component of future climatic trends -- and not to such anthropogenic effects as those due to the burning of fossil fuels. Second, they describe only the long-term trends, because they are linked to orbital variations with periods of 20,000 years and longer. Climatic oscillations at higher frequencies are not predicted. 

One approach to forecasting the natural long-term climate trend is to estimate the time constants of response necessary to explain the observed phase relationships between orbital variation and climatic change, and then to use those time constants in an exponential-response model. When such a model is applied to Vernekar's astronomical projections, the results indicate that the long-term trend over the next 20,000 years is toward extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation and cooler climate." 

So that "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation" is (a) supposed to happen "over the next 20,000 years", not imminently, and (b), more importantly: it's a prediction that does not take into account anthropogenic changes in climate, like, um, those "due to the burning of fossil fuels". Which is to say, the kind of global warming we're now talking about.

The fact that this prediction specifically excludes anthropogenic climate change means that you cannot use it to say: those silly scientists; they used to believe that the earth was cooling, and now they think it's warming. When scientists say "if we don't take man-made changes to climate into account, the earth will get cooler over the next 20,000 years", this is completely consistent with saying: "however, when you factor in those man-made changes, the earth will get warmer", or "when you factor in those changes, we don't know", or any number of things.

If Will actually read these two articles, it's hard to see how he's not being deliberately deceptive by citing them as he did. If, as I suspect, he just got them from some set of climate change denialist talking points and didn't bother to actually check them out for himself, he's being irresponsible. All those people who supposedly fact-checked Will's article as part of the Post's "multi-layer editing process" -- "people [George Will] personally employs, as well as two editors at the Washington Post Writers Group, which syndicates Will; our op-ed page editor; and two copy editors" -- should be fired, either for not doing their job or for doing it utterly incompetently. These are hard times for newspapers; I wouldn't have thought they could afford more than one layer of an editing process that produces no discernible improvement in quality.

And Andy Alexander? He should read the cites George Will gives him before he sends them out, under his own name, in support of his paper's decision to publish Will's piece, if he doesn't want to be embarrassed like this again.

Juxtaposition Of The Day

by hilzoy

From National Review's list of the 25 best conservative movies:

"12. The Dark Knight (2008): This film gives us a portrait of the hero as a man reviled. In his fight against the terrorist Joker, Batman has to devise new means of surveillance, push the limits of the law, and accept the hatred of the press and public. If that sounds reminiscent of a certain former president -- whose stubborn integrity kept the nation safe and turned the tide of war -- don't mention it to the mainstream media. Our journalists know that good men are often despised by the mob; it just never seems to occur to them that they might be the mob themselves. 

13. Braveheart (1995): Forget the travesty this soaring action film makes of the historical record. Braveheart raised its hero, medieval Scottish warrior William Wallace, to the level of myth and won five Oscars, including best director for Mel Gibson, who played Wallace as he led a spirited revolt against English tyranny. Braveheart taught that freedom is not just worth dying for, but also worth killing for, in defense of hearth and homeland. Six years later, amid the ruins of the Twin Towers, Gibson’s message resonated with a generation of American youth who signed up to fight terrorists, instead of inviting them to join a “constructive dialogue.” Liberals have never forgiven Gibson since."

I have this quaint belief that freedom involves the rule of law: the idea that no one -- not the government, and not private vigilantes -- gets to spy on me, imprison me, or kill me without working through normal legal channels, whose content I get to influence by electing the people who write the laws. That the writers at the National Review take a different view has been obvious for a while -- see, for instance, Kathryn Lopez on McCain :

"I'm second to none in praising him on his surge leadership. But on a whole host of issues --including water boarding, tax cuts, and the freedom of speech -- he’s not one of us."

I just liked this particular juxtaposition. According to the National Review, conservatives fight for freedom, but what they mean by "freedom" is wholly unclear. It's certainly nothing I recognize. 

And when I read a sentence like "Our journalists know that good men are often despised by the mob; it just never seems to occur to them that they might be the mob themselves", I think: our National Review writers know that people can fight for tyranny and against freedom without ever admitting to themselves that that's what they're doing; it just never seems to occur to them that they might be those people.

Ladies And Gentlemen: The Party Of Ideas

by hilzoy

Erick Erickson shows us the kind of fresh new thinking that I have come to expect from the Republican Party:

"The most radical, and effective, thing we could do for the economy right now is this: Stop collecting all forms of Federal business, income and payroll tax. EVERY PENNY OF IT. RIGHT NOW.

Gasp! Yes, I said it, and I meant it. Go on an absolute, 100% Federal tax holiday. That’s a real shot in the arm that would suddenly inflate the economy by a solid $1.5 trillion or more per year.

Are you worried about the resulting fiscal deficits? Don’t be. There is a huge amount of demand for debt from global investors, and the credit crunch has blown a huge hole in private debt formation. That leaves a lot of room for the government to borrow more."

That certainly is a radical proposal. But "the most radical thing we could do for the economy"? I don't think so. If we really don't have to worry about deficits, Erick's proposal seems pretty small-bore. Why not help Americans deleverage by having the government buy up all individual and corporate debt? That would help get the economy moving again! Why not provide health insurance for everyone, along with Supertrains, flatscreen TVs, living room suites, and a lifetime supply of chocolate? And why hasn't he mentioned this to his co-bloggers at RedState, so that they can stop writing things like this?

"Do the Blue Dogs care about balanced budgets? Do they oppose wasteful spending? Are they the taxpayer’s best friend, the conscience of the Congress, and the moderates who craft bipartisan solutions? Today is the day to prove it."

Or this:

"A $789 billion spending bill, all of which will have to be borrowed and later repaid by our progeny, cannot possibly be “fiscally responsible.”"

It's almost as though the people at RedState are applying, well, a double standard: they care about fiscal responsibility when it comes to spending money to build schools or fix bridges, but all that concern just flies out the window when it comes to tax cuts. 

The RedState Strike Force Strikes!

by hilzoy

Erick Erickson of RedState has a message for the RedState Strike Force about their latest triumph (and may he enjoy many more victories like this one):

"Persevere. And relish victories like we had last night – the House Republicans heard us and stood united against Barack Obama’s socialist stimulus plan."

He seems to be a bit more concerned about Mitch McConnell, though, and so he has come up with a new plan of action for the Strike Force:

"So here’s what we need to do. I’ve said he lost his testicles and is now spreading a cancer of capitulation throughout the Senate Republican Conference. We need to send Mitch some balls.

Seriously.

We’re teaming up with the Don’t Go Movement to do just that. Go here and send Mitch some balls. The House GOP can hold the line. Mitch and the Senate GOP should do the same and oppose the stimulus bill.

Mail the balls to Mitch’s Louisville Office (...)

The Senate GOP Leadership needs to stand up for the GOP, not kowtow to the Democrats."

The DontGo Movement is more colorful about what sorts of things people might send to Senator McConnell:

"These items could be golf balls, novelty items (think Spencers, eBay, Amazon for inspiration), or real items such as various “dried scrotum” products found in grocery stores (make sure we can actually ship this sort of thing first)."

I'm trying to imagine the look on one of Mitch McConnell's staffers' face when he opens the package, takes out a shriveled bit of skin or desiccated flesh, tries to figure out what it is, and realizes that it's a bit of dried genitalia. What, I wonder, will he say to Senator McConnell? "Um, Senator, in addition to these letters from your constituents, you also received eight dried scrota, three cans of prairie oysters, twenty-six golf balls, eighteen ping-pong balls, two basketballs, and one testicular tumor preserved in formaldehyde. They're from people calling themselves -- let me check -- 'The RedState Strike Force'. No, I don't know what it's about, but I've called security to be on the safe side."

That should really win McConnell over.

Still, the general concept is not entirely devoid of interest. Do you think we should start a campaign to send Erick Erickson a clue? 

Chill Out

by hilzoy

From the NYT:

"Is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed coming to a prison near you?
One day after President Obama ordered that the military detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, be shuttered, lawmakers in Washington wrestled with the implications of bringing dozens of the 245 remaining inmates onto American soil.

Republican lawmakers, who oppose Mr. Obama’s plan, found a talking point with political appeal. They said closing Guantánamo could allow dangerous terrorists to get off on legal technicalities and be released into quiet neighborhoods across the United States. If the detainees were convicted, the Republicans continued, American prisons housing terrorism suspects could become magnets for attacks.

Meanwhile, none of the Democrats who on Thursday hailed the closing of the detention camp were stepping forward to offer prisons in their districts or states to receive the prisoners."

Jim Geraghty explains why housing terrorists in US prisons would be much worse than housing all the dangerous people who are already there:

"It's hard to picture militia members, the Crips, Bloods, or what have you doing something as extreme as, say, crashing a plane into the prison to faciliate an escape and/or provide martyrdom to their brethren."

As Glenn Greenwald notes, there are already terrorists in US prisons. He helpfully provides a partial list:

Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, convicted, 1996, U.S. District Court (before then-U.S. District Judge Michael Mukasey) -- plotting terrorist attacks on the U.S. (currently: U.S. prison, Butler, North Carolina);
 
Zacarias Moussaoui, convicted, 2006, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit the 9/11 attacks  (currently:  U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
 
Richard Reid, convicted, 2003, U.S. Federal Court -- attempting to blow up U.S.-bound jetliner over the Atlantic Ocean (currently:  U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
 
Jose Padilla, convicted, 2007, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit terrorism (currently:  U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
 
Iyman Faris a/k/a/ Mohammad Rauf, convicted, 2003, U.S. Federal Court -- providing material support and resources to Al-Qaeda, conspiracy to commit terrorist acts on behalf of Al Qaeda (currently:  U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado);
 
Ali Saleh al-Marri, accused Al Qaeda operative -- not yet tried, held as "unlawful enemy combatant" (currently:  U.S. Naval Brig, Hanahan, South Carolina);
 
Masoud Khan, convicted, 2004, U.S. Federal Court -- conspiracy to commit terrorism as part of Lashkar-e-Taiba and Islamic jihad (currently: U.S. prison, Terre Haute, Indiana);
 
John Walker Lindh, convicted, 2002, U.S. Federal Court -- providing material support to the Taliban (currently: U.S. prison, Florence, Colorado).

Curiously, no jihadists have flown planes into prisons to facilitate the escapes of any of these terrorists. Maybe they're waiting until we have been lulled into a false sense of security. Since the blind Sheikh has been in prison for over a decade, they are showing a lot of patience. Maybe, on the other hand, Jim Geraghty and the Repubicans in Congress just have hyperactive imaginations. 

Moreover, it's not as though terrorists are the only dangerous people with associates who would be prepared to do a lot to spring them. Consider drug kingpins, for instance: they generally have lots of money and large organizations, and while I'm not sure they would fly planes into prisons (??), they could probably think of less lurid ways to spring people. 

And yet the United States, under George W. Bush, actually sought to have these dangerous people extradited to the United States, exposing our citizens to danger! Not only that, we succeeded! For instance, Francisco Javier Arellano Félix, the head of the Tijuana cartel, is now locked up in San Diego. We are seeking the extradition of his brother Eduardo, and have several other high-ranking members of the cartel in custody. OMG!! Americans are at risk!!! What shall we do???

I suggest chilling out. We are talking about maximum security prisons, which are designed to keep very dangerous people locked up. If our government decides that extra resources are needed to keep terrorists safely behind bars, it has very capable people who could be deployed for that purpose. 

This would also be a good time for members of Congress to show some leadership. They need to explain to their constituents that there are already a whole lot of very dangerous people in our prisons, that some of them are terrorists, and that no one has flown planes into prisons to rescue them yet.

Fanboyz

by hilzoy

I gather there are football games today. Apparently, one of them even involves my hometown team. Buildings all over Baltimore are illuminated in purple. But we haven't gone as far as the mayor of Pittsburgh (h/t):

"In light of the big Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Baltimore Ravens matchup this weekend, mayor Luke R. Ravenstahl has officially changed his name to Luke R. Steelerstahl. The change is only temporary, but he's gone so far as to change the nameplate on his office door. He said he wants to "eliminate the Ravens just as the Steelers will on Sunday.""

Delightful quirkiness, abject pandering, or evidence of mental illness? And did he pay for the replacement nameplate himself, or ask the citizens of Pittsburgh to foot the bill? If he lived in San Francisco, would he have changed his name to 49erstahl? Questions, questions...

What Do You Mean 'We', White Man?

by hilzoy

Robert Samuelson has an infuriating op-ed in today's Washington Post. It's called "Humbled By Our Ignorance":

"It's the end of an era. We know that 2008, much like 1932 or 1980, marks a dividing line for the American economy and society. But what lies on the other side is hazy at best. The great lesson of the past year is how little we understand and can control the economy. This ignorance has bred today's insecurity, which in turn is now a governing reality of the crisis.

The entire column is devoted to explaining all these things that "we" were ignorant of. But who, specifically, are "we"? It's hard to say. Mostly, it seems to be the nameless subject of the passive voice:

"It was once believed that the crisis of "subprime" mortgages -- loans to weaker borrowers -- would be limited, because these loans represent only 12 percent of all home mortgages. (...)

It was once believed that American consumers could borrow and spend more, because higher home values and stock prices substituted for annual savings. [Ed.: Apparently, it was also believed that stocks and home prices always went up.](...)

It was once believed that the rest of the world would "decouple" from the United States.

And so on, and so forth. All these beliefs, and no believers in sight. All this bustle and commotion, and there's nobody around!

The closest Samuelson gets to identifying people who actually believed these things is at the beginning of his piece ("The great lesson of the past year is how little we understand and can control the economy"), and at the end ("Our ignorance is humbling.") Which is to say: it's "us".

And yet, strange to say, I did not believe these things. I'm almost sure I wrote about this in 2006, but I can't recall where, so this from March 2007 will have to do. In it I predict that the mortgage meltdown will knock the legs out from under consumer spending, create a serious credit crunch, and slam the many investors who own CDOs based on mortgages; and that the combination of these three things will be very, very bad, even without taking into account the possibility of systemic risk.

Apparently, I did better than Robert Samuelson. I'm not saying this because I think I deserve credit for that. I don't. That's the point. I'm not especially astute about the housing market, or an expert in economics. I do tend to be common-sensical and cautious about economics -- I do not, for instance, tend to believe such things as: that houses will go up in value indefinitely, or: that we can keep living way beyond our means forever. But that shouldn't exactly set me apart from anyone.

The only reason I saw this one coming was that I read people who know a lot more than I do: people like Paul Krugman, Dean Baker, Tanta at Calculated Risk, Stephen Roach at Morgan Stanley, and Nouriel Roubini. They all challenged one or another of the myths Samuelson lists, and they did so years ago. Moreover, they had arguments to back up their claims, and I found these arguments much more persuasive than the arguments of the people who disagreed with them.

There were very smart people who did predict this. Their writings were not arcane or hard to find -- I mean, I found them, and this is not my area of expertise. Nor was their basic point that hard to grasp. If I could grasp it, then anyone remotely worthy of having an economics column in the Washington Post should have.

Whether or not Samuelson realizes it, I take the point of his op-ed to be that he is not competent in his alleged area of expertise, and moreover lacks one of the basic skills that a PhD in a discipline almost always provides: the ability to spot good arguments in that discipline made by other people, and to decide who is worth listening to and who is not. In his shoes, I would ask myself what, in the absence of competence or the ability to learn from the writings of others, could possibly justify my continuing to take up valuable space in the Post. It's certainly not obvious to me.

Happy Human Rights Day

by hilzoy

Via Undiplomatic, I see that Bush decided to celebrate Human Rights Day by awarding the Presidential Citizens Medal to, among other, Chuck Colson. Here's what the Presidential Citizens Medal is supposed to be:

"The Presidential Citizens Medal was established in November 13, 1969, to recognize U.S. citizens who have performed exemplary deeds of service for the nation. It is one of the highest honors the President can confer upon a civilian, second only to the Presidential Medal of Freedom."

And here, from ThinkProgress, is David Plotz at Slate, offering some background on Chuck Colson:

"As special counsel to the president, he was Richard Nixon's hard man, the "evil genius" of an evil administration. According to Watergate historian Stanley Kutler, Colson sought to hire Teamsters thugs to beat up anti-war demonstrators, and he plotted to raid or firebomb the Brookings Institution. He eventually pleaded guilty to scheming to defame Daniel Ellsberg and interfering with his trial. In 1974, Colson served seven months in federal prison."

From Time in 1974:

"Colson took on the tough jobs for the President. He leaked damaging or misleading information to the press about people who criticized the President, had young men hired to pose as homosexuals supporting McGovern at the Democratic National Convention, and engineered mail campaigns in favor of Nixon's policies. He allegedly ordered his close friend E. Howard Hunt to fabricate a State Department telegram implicating President Kennedy in the assassination of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem. At one point, according to Senate Watergate testimony, he urged that Washington's Brookings Institution be fire-bombed as a diversionary tactic in a raid to seize some politically damaging documents. "Chuck could never play anything straight," says one of his former underlings. "Everything had to be contrived, a setup. Chuck always had to stuff the ballot box.""

He also wrote the Enemies' List, said that he would walk over his own grandmother if it would help get Nixon re-elected, and hired the "plumbers" who carried out the Watergate break-in.

The one episode that will always sum up Chuck Colson for me is his plan to firebomb the Brookings Institution. Imagine: a Special Counsel to the President of the United States actually proposing to firebomb a centrist political think-tank.

When I think of "U.S. citizens who have performed exemplary deeds of service for the nation", Chuck Colson is not exactly the sort of person who leaps to mind. But then, when I think of "good judges of people's exemplary service", George W. Bush doesn't exactly leap to mind either.