Obsidian Wings

Security, social and otherwise

What boots it at one gate to make defence,
And at another to let in the foe?

John Milton, Samson Agonistes, Lines 559-60.

My grandfather on my mother's side worked in small-town New England factories for more than forty years after he returned from World War II.  It was precise machine work, carefully done, and it paid relatively well for the town and the job.  But there never was much for him to save.  He retired at 65, drawing a small pension. 

His savings went kaput long ago. He needs his Social Security checks.  There's not much to those checks, however; by the end of some months, he has nothing.  It has become something of a game for my parents to trick him into taking their money.  Day to day, week to week is how he lives on the government checks, in a rusting Quonset hut -- a relic of the war that opened his adult life. 

Social Security is not yet in crisis; credit Drum and DeLong for finally convincing me.  It can continue in its present form for at least a decade, and likely much longer.  But that does not mean that it should.  The lack of a crisis is not evidence of success. 

My grandfather, after all, is not alone.  A person born in 1925 who worked for forty years and retired at age 65 at a decent wage ($40,000) receives just under $19,000 in benefits per year today.  This is not a sum on which one lives the high life.  Indeed, it's barely getting by -- if it's getting by -- in most of the higher-priced places in the land. 

Moreover, the money that our hypothetical retiree receives is not the fruit of an investment.  It was not once used to build a factory or buy a new computer or train a new worker or start a company.  It was not put into some business, did not grow by the effort of others, and will never pay dividends.  It's a simple transfer, a from-here-to-there wire transmission, doing no work along the way.

We need to stop shuffling checks from person to person in a generational trading game of IOUs and paid-in expectations.  We need to build a system in which retirees own something -- a stock, a bond, a piece of their former employer -- that is theirs, rather than relying upon the passing benevolence of the voters.  And, better, a system in which the money paid in actually does something -- creates a job, builds a factory, starts a company -- that benefits us all.  An ownership society, the Das Kapital dream refitted for capitalist clothes, in which the workers do own the means of production.     

Privatizing Social Security will entail risks.  I will be the first to admit that it can be done poorly and that it will not cure all ills.  There are no silver bullets in this gun. 

But that's part of the point.  The present system is no silver bullet, no too fine thing.  Indeed, judged by the standards to which some hold privatization, the present system is an abject failure.  Thus, the fact that privatization is also not a silver bullet is hardly a knock against privatization.

The question to ask is whether privatizing a portion of Social Security has the potential to be better than the current system.  Frame the question that way -- the correct way -- and then let's have the debate.

UPDATE:  Jeremy Osner makes the following observation, which is echoed by several others in the thread:

But: advocates of ownership need to recognize that if you own something, there is a possibility that it will lose its value. Ownership entails risk; social security means a level of risklessness.

Sebastian Holsclaw (who ultimately disagrees with me, it should be noted) makes the point well in the thread, but it bears being made upfront:  All forms of Social Security are risky.  A significant, long term market failure will cause a private system to fail, the current  system to fail, and any conceivable new system to fail.  The asteroid strike won't care about the color of your parachute -- to mix metaphor and cliche'. 

It is important to remember that, over the long term, the modern stock market has always shown significant aggregate returns.  Even for the 30-year period from January 1, 1929 until January 1, 1959 -- a period that encompassed the Great Depression and a World War, among other things -- stocks were a good bet (graph of S&P 500):

There is no reason to believe that the future will significantly differ.  Or, put another way, if the future does significantly differ, it won't much matter what we do to Social Security.

Poorly Reported Statistics on American Views About Muslims

This report from Cornell University is being reported by the Associated Press as showing that "44 percent of those surveyed said they favored at least some restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans. Forty-eight percent said liberties should not be restricted."  The report is disturbing enough, we don't have to over-hype it, because it only shows that 44 percent of those surveyed support restriction on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans if you have an unusually broad definition of the term.  The actual results are as follows:

A) All Muslim Americans should be required to register their whereabouts with the federal government--27%

B) Mosques should be closely monitered and surveilled by U.S. law enforcement agencies--26%

C) U.S. government agencies should profile citizens as potential threats based on being Muslim or having Middle Eastern heritage--22%

D) Muslim civic and volunteer organizations should be infiltrated by undercover law enforcement agents to keep watch on their activities and fundraising--29%

48% of people agreed with none of the choices.  15% agreed with one statement.  29% agreed with two or more statements. 

I'm a bit confused about why the people who agreed with zero plus the people who agreed with one plus the people who agreed with two or more equals only 92%, but I'll put that aside. 

The reporting of these figures is inaccurate.  A) is clearly a restriction on civil rights.  B) is ambiguous as to 'closely monitored'.  I can see a number of people who support monitoring of mosques--especially those mosques that preach violence--that would not violate civil rights.  C) depends on what you are profiling and how much the religious aspect comes into play.  I know that some people hate the idea of profiling at all, and an overly broad profile can certainly lead to the violation of civil rights.  But it isn't a violation in itself.  To borrow a concept from affirmative action, is this a plus factor or the deciding factor?  Considering the fact that using Muslim civic and volunteer organizations are routinely used by terrorists to hide their activities and to funnel money from legitimate uses to illegitimate uses, D) is not a problem so long as it involves those organizations which the federal governement can legitimately suspect of engaging in such activities.  With the wording of the question it isn't obvious what people mean by supporting it. 

It is fair to report those supporting A) as clearly supporting restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslims in America.  Reporting the same for B) and C) is a close call which could have been clarified with better questioning.  Reporting the same for D) is illegitimate. 

It is bad enough that 27% of people polled support clear restrictions on civil liberties by wanting to create something akin to the registered sex offender unit for Muslims.  Isn't that scary enough?  Doesn't that suggest enough of a problem to require attention?  You don't need to hype it up past that with poorly worded questions.  To that 27%, we need to explain that the number of Islamist supporters in the Muslim population is a small enough portion of the whole community of Muslims to make thinking about a resgistry completely ridiculous.  It would be like requiring everyone who has a DVD player to report to the police because you had a fear that they might watch child porn on it.  It would be like forcing everyone with a gun to constantly report their whereabouts because someday they might shoot someone. 

Bush's Moral Values

From the ACLU, via Atrios, comes news that President Bush authorized the use of inhumane treatment on detainees:

"A document released for the first time today by the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that President Bush issued an Executive Order authorizing the use of inhumane interrogation methods against detainees in Iraq. Also released by the ACLU today are a slew of other records including a December 2003 FBI e-mail that characterizes methods used by the Defense Department as "torture" and a June 2004 "Urgent Report" to the Director of the FBI that raises concerns that abuse of detainees is being covered up. (...)

The documents were obtained after the ACLU and other public interest organizations filed a lawsuit against the government for failing to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request.

The two-page e-mail that references an Executive Order states that the President directly authorized interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and "sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc." The ACLU is urging the White House to confirm or deny the existence of such an order and immediately to release the order if it exists. The FBI e-mail, which was sent in May 2004 from "On Scene Commander--Baghdad" to a handful of senior FBI officials, notes that the FBI has prohibited its agents from employing the techniques that the President is said to have authorized."

More highlights (if that's the appropriate word) from the documents released today:

"Another e-mail, dated December 2003, describes an incident in which Defense Department interrogators at Guantánamo Bay impersonated FBI agents while using "torture techniques" against a detainee. The e-mail concludes "If this detainee is ever released or his story made public in any way, DOD interrogators will not be held accountable because these torture techniques were done [sic] the ‘FBI’ interrogators. The FBI will [sic] left holding the bag before the public." (...)

The June 2004 "Urgent Report" addressed to the FBI Director is heavily redacted. The legible portions of the document appear to describe an account given to the FBI’s Sacramento Field Office by an FBI agent who had "observed numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilian detainees," including "strangulation, beatings, [and] placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees ear openings." The document states that "[redacted] was providing this account to the FBI based on his knowledge that [redacted] were engaged in a cover-up of these abuses (...)

Other documents released by the ACLU today include:

An FBI email regarding DOD personnel impersonating FBI officials during interrogations. The e-mail refers to a "ruse" and notes that "all of those [techniques] used in these scenarios" were approved by the Deputy Secretary of Defense. (Jan. 21, 2004)

Another FBI agent’s account of interrogations at Guantánamo in which detainees were shackled hand and foot in a fetal position on the floor. The agent states that the detainees were kept in that position for 18 to 24 hours at a time and most had "urinated or defacated [sic]" on themselves. On one occasion, the agent reports having seen a detainee left in an unventilated, non-air conditioned room at a temperature "probably well over a hundred degrees." The agent notes: "The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night." (Aug. 2, 2004)

An e-mail stating that an Army lawyer "worked hard to cwrite [sic] a legal justification for the type of interrogations they (the Army) want to conduct" at Guantánamo Bay. (Dec. 9, 2002)

An e-mail noting the initiation of an FBI investigation into the alleged rape of a juvenile male detainee at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. (July 28, 2004)

An FBI agent’s account of an interrogation at Guantánamo - an interrogation apparently conducted by Defense Department personnel - in which a detainee was wrapped in an Israeli flag and bombarded with loud music and strobe lights. (July 30, 2004)"

The email referring to the Presidential order is here (pdf); other documents released by the ACLU are here. As for comments: words fail me yet again.

Supporting The Troops, Opposing The War

Yesterday the Washington Post published an op ed by Rick Atkinson on the difficulty of separating support for the troops from support for the war. A key passage:

"While some voice private doubts, others insist -- often with increasing stridency -- that the war is justified, that the insurgency can be crushed and that naysaying undermines both national will and troop morale. I admire their steadfast faith, even as I recognize the dilemma. To disbelieve seems too much like betrayal. Skepticism and dissent appear inimical to service and sacrifice.

Keeping the warriors and the war untangled is extraordinarily difficult, intellectually and emotionally. All that most of us can do is to mean precisely what we say: We back you."

Phil Carter adds a thoughtful comment:

"This is a dilemma I've wrestled with since March 2003, if not earlier. I'm still not sure there's a way to coherently reconcile one's support for the troops with opposition to the war. This seems like cognitive dissonance in the extreme; to support the people who are laboring on one hand, but to oppose the purpose towards which they pour their blood, sweat and tears. On the receiving end of this speech, it's hard to see the line between supporting our soldiers while opposing the purpose for which they labor. It's not like we're talking about some corporate bottom line here. This purpose is used to justify great sacrifice by our soldiers, much more so than any employee in any other context. They face mortal danger every day; they miss their families; some will be wounded, a few killed — all in the name of this purpose. And you're going to come in and say that the war's being fought wrong — or worse yet, that this purpose isn't good enough? If that's true, the whole house of cards comes tumbling down — there's no more purpose to justify their enormous sacrifices.

Viktor Frankl wrote so many years ago that man will bear almost any hardship in the name of a purpose. If we oppose the purpose of this administration in Iraq, do we make it tougher for our soldiers to bear the hardship? On the other hand, if we remain mute, do we risk prolonging the hardship unnecessarily?"

Both the original op ed and Carter's commentary are extremely thoughtful, and very much worth reading. But on one central point I disagree with them: I have always found it both straightforward and necessary to separate support for the troops from support for the war they are fighting.

It's a Wonderful War

Not sure if they coordinated, but NYTimes columnists Maureen Dowd and William Safire offered competing versions of "what if we hadn't invaded Iraq" in their most recent columns. Dowd, playing off "It's a Wonderful Life" (as experienced by Rumsfeld seeing the world as it would have been if he never existed) offered these conclusions:

Sam Nunn. He's the defense secretary. Sam consults with Congress. Never acts arrogant or misleads them. He didn't banish the generals who challenged him - he promoted 'em. And, of course, he caught Osama back in '01. He threw 100,000 troops into Afghanistan on 9/11 and sealed the borders. Our Special Forces trapped the evildoer and his top lieutenants at Tora Bora. You [addressed to Rumsfeld] weren't at that cabinet meeting the day after 9/11, so nobody suggested going after Saddam. No American troops died or were maimed in Iraq. No American soldiers tortured Iraqis in Abu Ghraib. No Iraqi explosives fell into the hands of terrorists. There's no office of disinformation to twist perception abroad. We're not on the cusp of an Iraq run by Muslim clerics tied to Iran.

[...] With the help of our allies around the world, we have won the war on terror. And Saddam has been overthrown. Once Hans Blix exposed the fact that Saddam had no weapons, the tyrant was a goner. No Arab dictator can afford to be humiliated by a Swedish disarmament lawyer.

Safire, taking his license in the form of a parody/sequel to Philip Roth's book The Plot Against America, sees it differently:

Sovereignty, Interrupted

The "full sovereignty" Iraqis are waiting for keeps evading them. With a message that more or less translates into, "we'll let you vote, but we're still in control indefinitely," today Bush announced that Iraqi troops are not ready to take over.

President Bush pointedly acknowledged Monday that U.S.-trained Iraqi troops are not ready to take over their country's security, and cautioned that next month's elections there are only the beginning of a long process toward democracy.

I'm no political science scholar, but when a country openly elects its own government, doesn't that suggest they are already at democracy? I mean, there are variations on the theme, but what does "long process toward democracy" mean in this context if not actually "long process toward sovereignty"?

In other words, Bush is saying we're going to continue to occupy Iraq officially for as long as we wish, despite whatever government Iraq has in place. And before anyone suggests a simple reality check makes this less ominous than I'm painting it here, let's backtrack just a moment. Back before the first partial restoration of "full sovereignty", Powell said it would be up to the interim Iraqi government and its people to decide "whether the troops stay or not":

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said today that if the interim Iraqi government scheduled to take power in six weeks asks the United States and its coalition partners to pull its troops out of Iraq, "we would leave."

So we went from saying the interim government could ask us to leave to saying the fully elected government cannot ask us to leave. We're not marching Iraq "toward democracy" in any meaningful sense here.

A Stampede of Angry Pachyderms

As a Democrat, I watched in horror, but with a grudging respect, the impressive degree of discipline the GOP displayed during the last election. They were in step, they were on message, and they were, obviously, unbeatable. The extreme right held its tongue as a parade of moderates got prime time slots during the convention. The moderates parroted without choking that it wasn't important that those in the GOP had ideology differences, that the tent was big enough for all of them.

Well, now, it seems those tent flaps may just blow wide open and release a stampede of angry pachyderms charging off in all directions:

President Bush's second-term plans to reshape Social Security, immigration laws and other domestic programs are facing a stiff challenge from a group that was reliably accommodating in the president's first four years: congressional Republicans.

After essentially rubber-stamping much of Bush's first-term agenda, many House and Senate Republicans plan to assert themselves more forcefully to put their mark on domestic policy in the new year, according to several lawmakers.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) has privately criticized White House handling of the recent intelligence bill and Bush's plan to postpone tax reform until 2006 or later. Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.) and others have publicly complained about the political and fiscal hazards of overhauling Social Security. Several senators, including a few 2008 presidential contenders, are rushing to promote their own Social Security plans to compete with Bush's.

And a number of conservative Republicans such as Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), who are concerned about states' rights, are threatening to derail the White House plan to impose federal limits on medical lawsuits. "It's one of the worst bills going," Graham said.

But the first big dispute is predicted to be immigration reform

Happy Birthday, Thirteenth Amendment!

It's one hundred and thirty nine years old today!

"Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

Taboos and Social Policy

In a recent ObsidianWings discussion on Social Security I have repeatedly come across an argument against changing it which operates along these lines:

...I have very little faith that our poor elderly will be taken care of should the system be dismantled, all promises to that end duly noted.

To which I replied:

There are a lot of steps to be taken between "We pay no one who is in the top third" to "We pay no one". Also, if this is about support, 2/3 is still a very large majority.

This got responses like:

Unfortunately, the people proposing the privatiziation have made no secret that paying no one is their ultimate goal. Failing to believe they will stop after one step is prudence.

and

All the arguments for cutting out the rich who don't need it seem insincere to me...Dantheman sums it up perfectly "the people proposing the privatiziation have made no secret that paying no one is their ultimate goal."

and

I don't question SH's sincerity in wanting a more ideal system - but I hold that the better is the enemy of the good.

and

The system is ok as it stands - suggesting ways to change it empowers people who want to do away with it.

This is pretty much a 'slippery slope' argument with nasty insinuations about people's political character thrown in.  It operates under the same idea as a taboo--this line must be jealously guarded, because once it is crossed there is no stopping point.  It is basically an abnegation of intellectual thought in the face of some other irresistable force.  I don't think the argument is always wrong.  Intellectual force does not always win the day.  But I think the argument is often misused. 

This taboo invocation is often used by hard-core anti-drug warriors.  They note that almost all of the heavy drug users start out smoking pot.  They define it as a gateway drug which encourages use of other drugs.  Once you start using pot they portray an inevitable decline into the use of far more dangerous drugs.  This ignores the fact that the vast majority of pot users stick with pot (and often stop using even that) when compared with the ones that eventually end up hooked on heroin or crystal meth.  Furthermore, I think they are identifying the taboo improperly.  I think there is a taboo which once violated ends up operating, but it isn't what they think.  Violating the 'illegal drugs' taboo with pot and noticing that it isn't worse than alcohol allows many pot users to believe that the whole anti-drug taboo has been created for no legitimate reason whatsoever.  This false impression, which has been encouraged by society, ends up deceiving some pot users who then end up on harder drugs.  (I'm aware that some would have used harder drugs anyway, they aren't really being damaged by the taboo). 

What does this have to do with Social Security?  I'm not sure.  I'm just thinking aloud about how taboos work in practice.  But I think it has something to do with this idea--moving from the status quo in the direction of what most people would think was fairer or better, is not an appropriate use of a slippery slope argument.  A slippery slope which ends at the genocide might very well begin with beating people up based on race.  But arguing that it is not that bad to beat someone up based on their race is already a step away from fairness and justice. 

My actual proposal regarding Social Security is that it would be both fairer (in the sense of being in line with most people's moral intuitions about government) and cheaper to not pay rich people and the upper-middle class money during retirement--if warned of that intention ahead of time they can certainly provide for themselves.  I would provide the warning by phasing out benefits over a long time.  (I suggested reducing benefits by rich and upper middle class people by 3 and 1/3% a year for 30 years).  This was the proposal which seems to have provoked the worry about breaking the taboo against meddling with Social Security.  I suspect that a very large number of people would think that my method was much fairer (in the sense of being good stewards of government money without abandoning the poor) than the current system.  I suspect that a huge percentage of those same people (and almost all of the people who think that the current policy is excellent in fairness) would think that a system which involved letting the poor die on the streets was less fair.  As a matter of political will, therefore, moving toward my proposal (in the direction of increased fairness) is not subject to a slippery slope.  You are afraid of zero benefits.  I am unhappy with the $60 billion in benefits.  But not all movements toward zero from $60 billion are in a straight line down in terms of fairness.  You are not held back from an inevitable political decline toward zero by overpaying.  People can see a movement toward fairness as good while still recognizing that moving away from fairness (letting grandma freeze to death in New York) is bad.  Moving toward something that is both fairer and cheaper is not part of a slippery slope that must lead to the destruction of Social Security.  It solidifies support for Social Security by reducing economic pressures which bother people like me and von, without damaging safety net features which appeal to almost everyone. 

Godless Hollywood, Part I

I've been hearing conservative pundits and reading conservative writers taking aim at Hollywood more and more lately, and their efforts strike me as so disingenuous and transparent, I believe it's time to shed some serious light on them. This is the first in a series of posts devoted to exploring the methods and goals behind these efforts. To get it started, I'll jump right into the film that symbolizes better than any other the "passion" of this campaign.

On Tacitus, there's a blog-ad that illustrates the tone and temperment, not to mention the lack of rationality, behind some of these efforts. With a picture of Michael Moore flashing a "peace sign" it reads:

This Man Wants Another Oscar

But you can help us stop him.

Impose your values on Hollywood.

Visit Passion for Fairness today and support Mel Gibson and The Passion of The Christ.

That's right. There's an entire blog, with a petition you can sign, devoted to lobbying the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences into nominating Gibson's film for Oscars in several categories. The petition begins:

To the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences:

It has come to my attention that you and your Board of Governors are considering ignoring the important film The Passion of The Christ, its director and its actors when you hand out nominations on January 25th. This would be an unspeakable insult to the millions of us mainstream Americans who believe this is the most important film in years, decades even.

I urge you to give fair consideration to the film and its principals when you determine and announce the nominees for this year's Oscars.