It's the Best of Times

Lyman Stone is an ex-USDA bureaucrat with an interesting take on many things (demography, religion being two of the big ones).  This morning he tweeted things weren't too bad.

the world is actually fairly okay. there is no compelling reason for anyone with a job in a rich country to be miserable and angry all the time. inequality mostly doesn't impact most peoples' daily lives. the best evidence we have suggests it's been falling for a few years now. https://t.co/yg3vZtJTLB

— Lyman Stone 石來民 🦬🦬🦬 (@lymanstoneky) October 27, 2022

That was in response to a tweet by Claudia Sahm, an economics professor with a dismal outlook, at least today.

Today the sun is out after a spell of cloudy days, so my mood is improved.  I'd claim now the world is in better shape than ever before.  People are living longer and better, with more access to more options and more information than ever before. That's especially true of what we used to call the Third World. 

 

Republican Hypocrisy--1990's and Now

 I may be one of the few who remember the scandal which plagues the Clinton administration in the 1990s.  No, not Monica, but Charlie Trie and John Huang.

Anyone interested can read this collection of Post articles, For those too lazy   busy to do the reading, the capsule summary is that the Democrats accepted donations from various individuals, either Chinese or Chinese-Americans, which might have violated or indeed did violate laws on permissible political donations.  The Republicans pointed at sleaze, claimed the money originated in China, were intended as bribes for favorable treatment and friendly attitudes by the government, and must be investigated by a special counsel.

If I recall, because I'm too lazy to research, the scandal eventually petered out with. Some cases ended in not guilty findings, some in plea bargains, some were more smoke than fire, some were fuzzy areas in the laws.

I'm now reading Andrew Weissmann's "Where the Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation".  I'll comment on the book another time, but what's striking is the degree to which the Trump campaign welcomed Russian aid, specifically the hacks of the DNC and DCC.  Granted there's a difference between money and other kinds of aid, but I don't remember Republicans criticizing the campaign for doing so.  

Forgotten History

Either the Post or the Times today had a piece on the effects of using primaries to select candidates, with the main argument being that primaries widened the gaps between parties and increased partisanship.  I don't have the patience to find the url.

The overall thesis may be right; I won't dispute it. But one sentence I did dispute--describing the time frame during which primaries became important.  It wasn't the 1980s, but earlier. 

For example, in the 1960 campaign, JFK and Hubert Humphrey were the main competitors in several state primaries. I acknowledge not every state held presidential primaries, but effectively JFK won the nomination by winning the primaries.  In 1960, and before, the selection process was a composite: "party bosses", the man in a given state or often a major citywho could sway the selection of delegates to the convention, and "favorite sons" usually the governor or highest elected official in the state who also could sway delegates.  (The "bosses" were behind the scenes; the "sons" might or might not have dreams of becoming the nominee themselves.)

Today states use primaries, in 1960 the bosses and sons relied on the primaries to assess the strength of candidates, rather like polls today. 

Our Limited Vision

Marginal Revolution pointed to this Ezra Klein piece on housing for the homeless in LA. Interesting, encapsulated for me in this quote from one of the mayoral candidates.:

Funders don’t want to give you general operating costs. They want you to solve their pet issue. What I always wanted was money for general operating costs.”

She's talking about her experience as an NGO exec, but the problem is universal. Every problem which Klein identifies, and there are so many neither he nor his readers will come away optimistic, is the result of proponents having tunnel vision, pushing a good idea into law or the courts without reckoning for the effects.  

Liberals criticize capitalism for ignoring exogenous effects of the market economy.  We also need to recognize that our good ideas will also have exogenous effects.

Birx Book

 I've commented on it before.  Some bits:

• US has 574 Indian/Native American nations.
• Jared Kushner comes off as helpful and capable in this book, unlike other recent books where he and his young crew are mocked.
• Seema Verma is mentioned favorably.
• Birx doesn't come across as very flexible--she's focused on data, and keeps referring to the UP/CHop model, always emphasizing asymptomatic spreading. I don't know whether there any consensus has developed over the issue.
• She's down on CDC and portrays Redfield, the CDC head, as unable to move his bureaucracy in the directions she believes it should have gone, though he's one of the group of doctors (Fauci, Hahn, Redfield, and Birx who agreed to hang together). She thinks CDC should have people in the field with the state health departments (I didn't read her extensive set of recommendations at the end of the book).n
• She's no writer, so I did a lot of skimming in the last half. 
• She has an extensive list of recommendations, which I didn't study.  Now have Scott Gottlieb's book on the pandemic which seems also to look to the future. 

Weaponized Globalization

 Here's the first of a thread in which Henry Farrell updates the thesis of a previous book in light of today's developments:

1. Six stories in the last few days about the weaponization of the world economy. It's very strange for @ANewman_forward and me to see the logic of our 2019 article (and forthcoming book - Underground Empire - Holt 2023) playing out. https://t.co/Z742KIljsl

— Henry Farrell (@henryfarrell) October 12, 2022

The thread is interesting. But I've a "but".  I remember back in the early Clinton administration when there was a big controversy over export controls on 486 chips (the hot PC cpu of the day). The Times made a big thing out of it, in my view misunderstanding  the problems of coordinating regulations between two cabinet departments.  Anyhow, Moore's law quickly made the 486 a dead issue.  It suggests to me that the "weaponization" which Farrel describes might be a bit more impressive on the surface, than it is when you get into the details. 

Bottom line: It's difficult for bureaucrats to keep up with innovation; even more difficult for Congress to keep up.

The Importance of History

Just getting back to the blog after a trip to NY Sheep and Wool. 

Noted something this morning on the holes in the sanctions on Russia--Greek oil tankers are getting a break.  The article referenced the large role Greeks play in oil shipments.

Led me to think of Aristotle Onassis, of Jackie fame.  Also of an early scandal after WWII when Greeks picked up cheap ships from war surplus.  

And finally to the Iliad and Greek ships.  I wonder, has Greece always been prominent in shipping since Troy?  Is that culture, or is it geography? 

Hybrid Tanks

 Remember that TFG had big problems with the Ford aircraft carrier--the latest and best USN warship?  He told the Navy to go back to steam-powered catapualts instead of the electromagnetic ones they were pioneering.  Navy ignored him.

Just imagine what he'll think of the new Abrams tank the Army is getting.  It's a hybrid--I guess on the model of a prius though this doesn't give details. Presumably the diesel (rather than gas turbine) drives a generator to the battery which feeds electric motors.  Advantages in fuel consumption and a "silent" mode of operation.

Disadvantages, which the TFG will note:  it's new and therefore will having bugs.

The Force of the Job

 Had a brief discussion about whether Republican victories in 2022 and 2024 would destroy our democracy.  My position is firm: No.

Why? First I define our democracy as continuing to have free elections with winners taking office and losers leaving. (I'm not worrying here about restrictions on the ballot in any real sense.) 

Next I believe in what I can call the "force of the job", which I think we saw working in 2020 and which will continue.  Theoretically our allegiance is to the United States, but in reality our allegiance is to ourselves, our family, neighbors,  etc. But part of our allegiance to ourselves is the widespread desire to do the job.  In the end in 2020 election officials did the job, judges and courts did the job, the police on Capitol Hill did the job, the military did the job--across the board people did the job. 

My prediction is twofold:

• the vast majority of people will continue to be in the system for mundane reasons with no burning desire to see Trump or Biden or whoever break the system.
• those who come into the system supporting Trump with the hope of seeing him elected in 2024 (or similar political desires) will find themselves gradually placing the integrity of their job and themselves over politics--the job (and their co-workers) will be more important than politics. So, in the end, they will do their job, just as the people involved on Jan 6 did their job.

The Problem of Too Many Choices

 Had to buy a clothes washer today.  Our old Magtag broke after 23 years so we were plunged into a world of many options; many new manufacturers (LG, Samsung, Medea) since the last time we bought, new alternatives (Consumer Reports seems to recommend front loaders now, not the top loading impeller used by our old machine, but there are pros and cons to all. Prices are higher now. IIRC the last time we bought the price range was $250 to $800, and ours was right in the middle. This time the range seemed to be $450 to $1.5K, and our purchase towards the low end.

Passed up one option because it had too many options, too complicated for two older people, even though the salesman recommended it as the best value ($400 off the list price--I wonder how many are really sold at the list prices.)

All the choices made for a stressful day, but the choice is made, the money is paid, and the machine comes tomorrow.