Get A Grip People: UPDATED

I don't know if this is an entirely new phenomena, but when did we all devolve towards the memory ability of hamsters? CNN moves O'Brien, Cooper to NOLA

In a move that signals how Tropical Storm Isaac threatens to eclipse the Republican convention, CNN has announced that it is sending Soledad O'Brien and Anderson Cooper to New Orleans. The storm, which is bypassing Tampa and on course for the north Gulf Coast (and very possibly New Orleans), could now pose far bigger problems for the Republicans than high winds and waves ever would. There is a very real fear among Republicans that a natural disaster in New Orleans (seven years after Hurricane Katrina) or nearby could all but eclipse the convention -- or, worse, create an unfavorable "split-screen situation" in which images of Hurricane damage are juxtaposed with the theatrics of Mitt Romney's nomination.

Oh, for crying out loud. I know it has been awhile since we have had a hurricane of note make landfall in the United States but this is downright stupid. For starters, Issac has somehow managed to become a media star despite the fact it has not actually become a hurricane. Most forecasts had it gaining enough strength overnight, but it hasn't happen yet.

SUMMARY OF 100 PM CDT...1800 UTC...INFORMATION ---------------------------------------------- LOCATION...26.1N 85.9W ABOUT 255 MI...410 KM SSW OF APALACHICOLA FLORIDA ABOUT 280 MI...450 KM SE OF THE MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...65 MPH...100 KM/H PRESENT MOVEMENT...NW OR 305 DEGREES AT 14 MPH...22 KM/H MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...984 MB...29.06 INCHES

Secondly, the idea that this storm could cause the same trouble as Katrina is just laughable. Katrina spent a good part of its life cycle as a Cat 5 storm, though it hit the coast as a more pedestrian Cat 3. Because it had been so strong the storm surge piled up ahead of it to the tune of 26+ feet. To put this in perspective the National Hurricane Center puts the possibility of even a 10 foot storm surge in New Orleans at under 5%. (The most likely upper end is around the 4 foot level.) All indications are Issac is going to be a pretty wet event and the dangers of flooding in low lying areas, including New Orleans, will always be with us when these kinds of rainmakers come ashore. However, there is no indication there is a major natural disaster brewing in the Gulf.

One wonder if there is some "wishful" thinking going on at CNN.

UPDATE:

4PM CDT advisory:

SUMMARY OF 400 PM CDT...2100 UTC...INFORMATION
----------------------------------------------
LOCATION...26.4N 86.2W
ABOUT 320 MI...515 KM SSE OF MOBILE ALABAMA
ABOUT 255 MI...415 KM SE OF THE MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER
MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS...70 MPH...110 KM/H
PRESENT MOVEMENT...NW OR 305 DEGREES AT 12 MPH...19 KM/H
MINIMUM CENTRAL PRESSURE...981 MB...28.97 INCHES


WATCHES AND WARNINGS
--------------------
CHANGES WITH THIS ADVISORY...

THE HURRICANE WARNING FROM THE FLORIDA-ALABAMA BORDER TO DESTIN HAS
BEEN CHANGED TO A TROPICAL STORM WARNING.

 Still not a hurricane and they are downgrading some of the warnings.

Yep, sounds like the apocalypse to me.

"It's Not A Nazi Tactic When We Do It"

The liberal demonization of all those who do not agree with their agenda continues apace. But, of course, when they demonize people its because they were asking for it.

Hmmmm..... Where have I heard that before?

Why I'm Not Blogging About Politics Much Anymore

There was a perfect example on a Memeorandum thread today of the reason why I don't care to blog about politics these days.

It begins with this piece by David Brooks where Brooks castigates the Obama campaign's cynical rhetoric against "modern capitalism," of which Romany is supposedly the archetypal specimen. Its the usual Brooks fodder; a good bit here and there surrounded by over broad generalizations and the occasional sweeping denunciation.

Its not much of a piece, by any standard. That presidential campaigns will stoop to cynical populist posturing is hardly breaking news anywhere.

But, no! According to some leading lights, Brooks' column is actually offensive!! Memeorandum helpfully links to drivel by Booman Tribune, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Reaction, and Balloon Juice that make a collective case that is at once idiotic, pig ignorant, dishonest and a complete waste of time for any thinking person. (I'm shocked that Steve Benen, the single dumbest and most unqualified political writer of our day didn't weigh in stupidly as well... he must have been napping.) Its pointless to even waste my time fisking it because it is all so bad I'd have to fisk even the definite articles. Worse yet, if I were to attempt to do so it would only sink myself into that shitty morass.

Part of me would like to blame Memeorandum for linking so often to such useless shit, but maybe they are simply constrained by the sheer amount of shit being produced. Its sad because there are real arguments to be had out there, and I love a good argument. What I do not like are dumbshits, especially when people are being tricked into taking the dumbshits seriously.

It begins to feel like we are all being sucked into the Monty Python "Argument Clinic" sketch, where one wants to say "I don't want to argue about that!" when more and more shitty drivel is being flung in our direction by this new class of aggressively stupid opinion makers. That is the scary part in all this. Its the stupid ones who are driving what gets counted as the "conversation" these days.

So, if you are wondering why I am not writing more just imagine an exasperated Michael Palin saying "I don't want to argue about that!" and you won't be too far off.

The Supreme Court Does The Democrats No Favor

Only time will tell what the practical upshot will be of SCOTUS's rubber stamp of Obamacare, but there may come a time when Democrats will say "with 'victories' like this who needs defeats?"

The trouble comes from the Court correctly labeling Obamacare as what it is; the single largest tax increase in the history of the United States. A tax increase, it must be stated, the brunt of which will be borne by the middle-class; precisely the group Obama promised he wouldn't raise taxes on. Of course Obama's tax promises were hollow from the get-go, but voters may be less likely to view things so strategically. This will be especially true given we are going into a campaigning season where nearly unlimited PAC money will be spent like it was going out of style. The advertizing theme resulting from this spending spree is easy to predict: "Obama is a liar who saddled the middle-class with the largest permanent tax increase in history."

And who said this was the case? Why, every liberal member of the Supreme Court. That's who.

The attempts of spin will be interesting. For the moment, press coverage is focusing upon the "victory" aspect. The political ramifications are a different animal all together. Obama and the Democrats have deliberately kicked the hornets nest. That has consequences, no matter how desperately they wish it didn't.

Let the fun begin. And, yes, for a political junkie this is where the fun kicks in. If you find yourself wishing it would all go away because you want to "win" once and for all, well, you're not a political junkie at all. You're a tyrant. Ain't democracy great?

The Problem Of Being Psuedo-Educated

From the "You've got to be kidding" department: Why Smart People Are Stupid

Here’s a simple arithmetic question: A bat and ball cost a dollar and ten cents. The bat costs a dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?

The vast majority of people respond quickly and confidently, insisting the ball costs ten cents. This answer is both obvious and wrong. (The correct answer is five cents for the ball and a dollar and five cents for the bat.)


For more than five decades, Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate and professor of psychology at Princeton, has been asking questions like this and analyzing our answers. His disarmingly simple experiments have profoundly changed the way we think about thinking. While philosophers, economists, and social scientists had assumed for centuries that human beings are rational agents—reason was our Promethean gift—Kahneman, the late Amos Tversky, and others, including Shane Frederick (who developed the bat-and-ball question), demonstrated that we’re not nearly as rational as we like to believe.

Talk about a bad premise.

For starters, when economists and social scientists assume "rational actors" they are usually doing so in the context of a model, and not using it as a description of the real world. The real world is far too complex for any social scientist to incorporate every potential variable that could affect their model. As a result, things get abstracted; things like the decision making processes of people. Economists and social scientists know "rational actor" models are unrealistic, but they work well enough for what they are trying to do.

As for philosophy... anyone who would claim that for centuries philosophers, as a group, have assumed people are rational doesn't know what the hell they are talking about. Socrates and Plato certainly make no such assumption. Even a cursory reading of The Apology or Crito make it clear that while rational thinking is a human possibility it is not a universally realized one. When Criton visits Socrates under house arrest awaiting execution and urges him to flee from Athens, Socrates responds by telling Criton to not worry about what "the many" think or do. The many do not use reason, argues Socrates, therefore they do not act from knowledge but instead act randomly so worrying about it won't help. So, for Plato at least, rational thought is not the default position for human beings.

And Plato is not alone. Thinkers as diverse as Machiavelli, Nietzsche, Henri Bergson, and, especially, pragmatists like Charles Sanders Peirce and William James, make no assumptions regarding the rationality of man. The philosophy of Peirce would be especially relevant to understanding why subjects respond to these questions from Kahneman the way they do.

For Peirce the way human beings think is made up of a few mental methods, one of which is indeed the classic rational method of syllogism and deduction. However, it is much more common for us to use the process which Peirce called "abduction" in order to make educated guesses about the world. We do it all the time, Peirce argues, without even realizing it. Have you ever had a conversation with someone about another person, except you thought you were talking about Person X while your conversation partner thought you were talking about Person Y? We can go on for a little wile talking at cross purposes, even when the information doesn't exactly conform to what we knew of Person X, until something way out of whack causes us to ask "Wait. Who are we talking about?" and the problem is revealed. Now, not only do we do this all of the time, we are actually pretty good at it. Most of the time when we make these sorts of guesses we do so correctly. Only when we screw it up do we realize we have even been guessing in the first place.

Movie makers realize this fact as well. Actually, our guessing is the only thing which allows shocker surprise endings in the first place. Take the movie The Sixth Sense. The filmmakers know we will make a guess, or fill in the blanks, in a particular fashion even though we have not been given the information to make our guesses accurate. The movie only works if we continually make such guesses over the course of the film which, luckily for filmmakers, is exactly what we are prone to do.

Which brings us back to the magic questions which prove how dumb we all are. The reason they work in tripping up people is similar to the way The Sixth Sense works. They are not "simple arithmetic questions," they are riddles.

OK, lets look at these more closely:

Here’s a simple arithmetic question: A bat and ball cost a dollar and ten cents. The bat costs a dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?

If we were going to represent this problem mathematically it would be:

x + (x+1) = 1.10 

Which could be simplified to:

2x +1 = 1.10

And resolved as:

2x + 1 - 1 = 1.10 - 1

2x = .10

2x / 2 = .10 / 2

x = .05

So, while there is no difficult math going on here, it isn't as simple as the question sounds.

The article offers another example. Read it as a riddle.

In a lake, there is a patch of lily pads. Every day, the patch doubles in size. If it takes 48 days for the patch to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half of the lake?

The answer is obviously 47 days. I'm willing to bet most people reading it after being told to treat it as a riddle would get it right. (Just as I'm willing to bet most people caught on to The Sixth Sense if they were first warned about a surprise ending.)

My point here is not to dog Prof. Kahneman's research, which sounds like a useful compendium of the variety of bad guesses human being make, as much as it is to dog the idea that rationality is a baseline assumption in philosophy. It isn't. And if journalists, among others, knew the first thing about it they would not make such dumb errors themselves.

Life At Ground Zero

For one day at least Wisconsin has become the political centerpiece for the country.

Oh goody.

You may have noticed I've had precious little to say about the electoral doings in my adopted home state. The thing is I'm essentially a contrarian at heart. Stuff that people generally don't care about (philosophy, power pop music, good whole grain mustard) I invest a lot into. Now politics is usually something I could add to that list. Most of the time most people keep only a casual watch upon the political scene. Oh, they will have their opinions on the questions of the day, but most of their energy is directed towards their own business (work, family, etc.).

Up in Wisconsin these days this isn't the case. Far too many people are far too emotionally involved in this election for my liking. I have an instinctual dislike for passion in politics. As a result the more emotional energy people put into a political campaign the more likely I am to tune it all out. And, if there was ever a contest that deserved to be tuned out it is this one. It was simple petulance which generated the abusive recall efforts in the first place. (I'm sorry folks, but this is an abuse of the recall mechanism. There is no way to spin it otherwise.) Losing an election has consequences, including ceding legislative initiative to the winning side. They might even (the horror) enact legislation you really dislike! The thing is there is a sure fire way to undo these sorts of things; win the next damn election which is only two years off anyway.

That being said I've found Walker's "all or nothing" governance to be almost entirely short-sighted. Walker's approach has made it almost inevitable that as soon as the pendulum swings back to the Democrats at the state level everything Walker did will be undone. Indeed the "all or nothing" attitude Walker exudes smacks of zealotry and not measured conservatism, and as such he appeals to my sensibilities very little.

So where does that leave me? Mostly as a spectator. I'm watching what is going on, but I am in no way invested in it. For today at least, I'm happier this way.

Is John Cole The Dumbest Person On The Internets?

Granted, there is a lot of competition out there, but when you read pig ignorant crapola like this you have to think we've got the new king of stoopid:

Democrats tell us that photo ID requirements disenfranchise minority voters, who, inexplicably, have limited access to photo IDs. Yet, at their own convention, they insist that all delegates provide a photo ID to even have access to the convention floor.

I guess they don’t understand the concept of the basic right to vote and how that differs from being one of a very few delegates to a party convention.

Uh, sorry to break it to you John but there is no "basic right to vote." Never has been. Its not a recognized "right" in the English common law tradition; its not a recognized "right" in the Natural Law tradition; its not a "right" in the liberal democratic tradition.

In order for something to be a "basic right" it has to be inalienable (or unalienable if one wishes to echo Jefferson.) Thus, if John Cole were to become a convicted felon, and we can only hope one day he manages to do so, he could lose his ability to vote. In other words, his vote is alienable and therefore not a right.

On the other hand, John Cole's right to liberty and free speech means he has the inalienable right to go on the Internet and make an ass of himself.

And aren't we all lucky?

Breaking My Silence For Convicted Domestic Terror Bomber Brett Kimberlin Day

There is no need to go into details, as they are copiously explained in dozens of places around the Net today. However, I would like to point people towards this harrowing account on harassment and attempted intimidation directed towards Patrick Frey of Patterico fame.

THE NIGHT I COULD HAVE BEEN KILLED BECAUSE OF MY BLOGGING



At 12:35 a.m. on July 1, 2011, sheriff’s deputies pounded on my front door and rang my doorbell. They shouted for me to open the door and come out with my hands up.


When I opened the door, deputies pointed guns at me and ordered me to put my hands in the air. I had a cell phone in my hand. Fortunately, they did not mistake it for a gun.


They ordered me to turn around and put my hands behind my back. They handcuffed me. They shouted questions at me: IS THERE ANYONE ELSE IN THE HOUSE? and WHERE ARE THEY? and ARE THEY ALIVE?


I told them: Yes, my wife and my children are in the house. They’re upstairs in their bedrooms, sleeping. Of course they’re alive.


Deputies led me down the street to a patrol car parked about 2-3 houses away. At least one neighbor was watching out of her window as I was placed, handcuffed, in the back of the patrol car. I saw numerous patrol cars on my quiet street. There was a police helicopter flying overhead, shining a spotlight down on us as I walked towards the patrol car. Several neighbors later told us the helicopter woke them up. I saw a fire engine and an ambulance. A neighbor later told me they had a HazMat vehicle out on the street as well.


Meanwhile, police rushed into my home. They woke up my wife, led her downstairs and to the front porch, frisked her, and asked her where the children were. Then police ordered her to stand on the front porch with her hands against the wall while they entered my children’s bedrooms to make sure they were alive.


The call that sent deputies to my home was a hoax. Someone had pretended to be me. They called the police to say I had shot my wife. The sheriff’s deputies who arrived at my front door believed they were about to confront an armed man who had just shot his wife. I don’t blame the police for any of their actions. But I blame the person who made the call.


Because I could have been killed.

Pat is a friend of a friend, has been incredibly nice and generous to me and my little blog over the years, and has fantastic taste in music. It is a damn shame he was to deal with these kinds of lunatics. Its also a damn shame that so many on the Left, after they hear about this situation, have taken the side of the lunatics because they disagree with Pat's politics. It is unconscionable, but, sadly, par for the course these days.

The Liberal Mind In Action

It goes something like this....

"Those people in North Carolina are sooooooooo prejudiced. It must be because they are inbred hillbillies."

....and they go on and feel wonderful about themselves all the live long day because they are so enlightened and tolerant and stuff.

The Chronicle of Higher Education And Fascism

Well, the cyber brown shirts were out in force over an opinion piece written by Naomi Schaefer Riley suggesting that black-studies programs were a bastion of "political partisanship and liberal hackery." Granted, you would have to be a braindead moron to not realize the truthfulness of such an opinion, but that hasn't stopped The Chronicle from firing Riley because she offended moronic political partisans and moronic liberal hacks.

This will be the last time I ever read, comment or link to anything in The Chronicle. They have violated the basic principles of a liberal society. In fact they have thrown their lot in with the brown shirts and have announced they will deem entire blocks of the American political tradition, such as Republicanism and conservatism, as anathema. They are goosestepping against freedom and I will have nothing to do with them.

Demagoguery At Forbes: Education Edition

Here is a piece from someone claiming to be against "bad science."  Evidently, they don't include "bad social science" in that description:

Wow, no one saw this coming. The University of Florida announced this past week that it was dropping its computer science department, which will allow it to save about $1.4 million. The school is eliminating all funding for teaching assistants in computer science, cutting the graduate and research programs entirely, and moving the tattered remnants into other departments.

Let’s get this straight: in the midst of a technology revolution, with a shortage of engineers and computer scientists, UF decides to cut computer science completely?
save about $1.7 million

OK, Mr. Outraged, you tell me: How many majors was the UF computer science department producing? What was the quality of its graduate program? Will eliminating classes taught by grad student teaching assistants improve or worsen the quality of instruction?

The answers to the above questions are: Who knows; Who knows; and Probably improve. Without dealing with these fundamental questions there is no way to rationally assess the impact of this move by UF. Indeed, this entire piece is more about emotionalism than rational argumentation. Time for the non sequitar:

 Meanwhile, the athletic budget for the current year is , $97.7 million, an increase of more than $700,000 from last year.
$99 million

Ah, yes, the old bogeyman, college athletics. It's the eggheads favorite punching bag. Of course, as the writer had to ultimately admit, the athletic budget has nothing to do with the UF budget process for academics (oops), but, hey, it feels good to take the moral high ground against the dumb jocks. How enlightened.

But maybe there is a reason why this particular subject is being deemphasized at UF: (From the same freakin' article!!)

 Meanwhile, just two days ago, Florida governor Rick Scott approved the creation of a brand-new public university, Florida Polytechnic University, to be located near the city of Tampa.

Gee, could it be the state has decided not to have redundant departments, and instead will focus upon building the program at the Polytech? There is nothing special or magical about being the "flagship" campus that requires their program to be the prestige programs. Plenty of state university systems have other campuses which host the premiere programs in various subjects.

Maybe this is what is going on. Maybe it is not. From this Forbes article it is impossible to know. Then again, I think that maybe the point of this piece, i.e. to leave its reader uninformed but emotionally engaged. If that isn't demagoguery then nothing is.

Thomas Friedman: Wile E. Coyote Op-Ed Writer

From one of the NY Times super-geniuses:

I had to catch a train in Washington last week. The paved street in the traffic circle around Union Station was in such poor condition that I felt as though I was on a roller coaster. I traveled on the Amtrak Acela, our sorry excuse for a fast train, on which I had so many dropped calls on my cellphone that you’d have thought I was on a remote desert island, not traveling from Washington to New York City. When I got back to Union Station, the escalator in the parking garage was broken. Maybe you’ve gotten used to all this and have stopped noticing. I haven’t. Our country needs a renewal.

Gee, that's a coincidence. I too was recently at Union Station in DC having caught the MARC train down from Baltimore where my wife and I stayed while she hits some libraries for a biography she is writing.

For those who do not know DC well, and as someone who lived there for eight years, let me fill you in on a couple things:

A) There is no traffic circle around Union Station (mostly because of all the train tracks coming into it.... duh.)

B) There is a traffic circle in front of Union Station.... well kind of. Columbus Circle isn't a traffic circle the way Dupont Circle is. In fact, it is less a traffic circle and more a traffic ampersand. (Strange but true.)

C) That traffic circle is currently being re-constructed. That is why its so bumpy.

D) Union Station itself is in the middle of a large renovation project. Maybe this could explain why Mr. Friedman was inconvenienced so by that faulty escalator. One can only hope he was able to extricate himself from the station in an unexerted state.

E) The wife and I used our phone, which uses the dodgier Virgin Mobile network to boot, along the line as far as Princeton Junction with nary a problem. Maybe Mr. Friedman should think about switching carriers.

F) I can't say anything about the Acela one way or the other. Normal people like us can't afford to take it. The slower trains we were on were clean and comfortable. Of course, without a quicker train we may have been forced to do without this particular piece of Mr. Friedman's work. Now that would have been a tragedy too terrible to contemplate.

I'm always suspicious of these personal anecdotes used to illustrate whatever point an Op-Ed writer is trying to make. I nearly always suspect they are BS. In this case I know it is BS because I was just there.

And, when we see one of the reasons why the road is bumpy and the escalators aren't necessarily working, etc. is that we are already doing the "renewal" the opinion piece claims we are not doing... well, its enough for me to just shake my head and say "Shut up."

Our Tax Future

Almost an actual proposal: Romney Specifies Deductions He'd Cut

Mitt Romney, speaking at a private fundraising event on Sunday, offered the first details of deductions he would eliminate or limit in order to offset the income tax cut he has proposed for all taxpayers.

Mr. Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, said he would eliminate or limit for high-earners the mortgage interest deduction for second homes, and likely would do the same for the state income tax deduction and state property tax deduction.



He also said he would look to the Department of Education and the Department of Housing and Urban Development for budget cuts.

Mr. Romney discussed his plans while speaking to high-dollar donors at a private estate. During the backyard event, which could be heard by reporters outside on a public sidewalk, Mr. Romney offered policy specifics he has yet to unveil on the campaign trail.



Mr. Romney has pledged a 20% cut to income tax rates for taxpayers in all income brackets but has offered few details for how he would pay for the proposal. Mr. Romney also has vowed to bring federal spending under control, while offering few details on which programs he would cut.

The problem with all of these sorts of things is it is difficult to know what the impact will be at the level of the individual. Like most Americans I don't hold a mortgage on a second home, so there is no personal impact on my family there. However, I do itemize deductions including state income and property taxes. So I hear this proposal and I immediately think "Crap. I'll have to take the standard deduction."

But, what would the overall impact be?

It's hard to know exactly how the "20% cut to income tax rates for taxpayers in all income brackets" will be implemented, but right now my taxes came to 13% of taxable income. A 20% reduction in that rate would result in a 10.4% rate. However, using the standard deduction (sans the state income and property tax deductions) would raise my taxable income 3.5%.

The net result? Under Romney's plan my family would owe $1100 less in taxes.

I could live with that.

Q: How Do We Know Republicans Are Radically Right?

A: Their last two Presidential nominees will have been John McCain and Mitt Romney.

Wait.... what?

Never mind.

In Case You Didn't Already Know

Cory Booker rocks.