I've heard liberals and conservatives express confusion about why supposed conservatives would support such large and sustained deficits. There is a good reason for this.
If your major constituency is the rich, there is a very good reason to sell as many bonds as you can. When the government spends more than it takes in from taxes, it has to close the gap by selling bonds - getting money today by promising to pay interest on that debt over a defined period of time. If you are rich, the backing of the United States is about as sure a means to protect your money as you can find. If you are sufficiently rich, you have an incentive to protect at least a portion of your money in very safe investments.
So, what is the downside? One is that the fastest growing portion of the government budget is interest payments. Interest payments squeeze out other expenses. The other is that the government squeezes out the private sector in investment markets. Quite simply, if the government did not sell any bonds, investors would be forced to put them money into the private sector - corporate bonds or equities.
R World (Ron Davison muses aloud)
07 November 2006
A Difference Between Reagan and Bush
Bush the younger has said that he wants his presidency to be like Reagan's, not his father's. He has erred terribly in his attempt at emulation.
Perhaps more than any candidate, Reagan understood the theater of politics. When he wanted to stand tall, he invaded Grenada, one of the smallest countries in the world, and did not even allow the press to cover that invasion so intent was he on controlling image.
George bought into the myth of omnipotence, the image that Reagan projected, and decided that he, too, wanted to be strong in the world, standing up against and battling evil. The problem is, he thought there was substance behind the theater and took on a real war, the outcome of which could not be so easily managed.
Reagan was smart enough to realize that it was easier to manipulate perceptions and voters than reality. George, like a fan of magicians who doesn't understand illusion and really does try to catch the bullet with his teeth, took on the impossible task of invading and rebuilding Iraq. This has proved to be a far cry from standing tall on the shores of Grenada, a country that could have been subdued with a SWAT team.
Like Reagan, George is performing theater. Unlike Reagan, George doesn't realize it is theater.
Perhaps more than any candidate, Reagan understood the theater of politics. When he wanted to stand tall, he invaded Grenada, one of the smallest countries in the world, and did not even allow the press to cover that invasion so intent was he on controlling image.
George bought into the myth of omnipotence, the image that Reagan projected, and decided that he, too, wanted to be strong in the world, standing up against and battling evil. The problem is, he thought there was substance behind the theater and took on a real war, the outcome of which could not be so easily managed.
Reagan was smart enough to realize that it was easier to manipulate perceptions and voters than reality. George, like a fan of magicians who doesn't understand illusion and really does try to catch the bullet with his teeth, took on the impossible task of invading and rebuilding Iraq. This has proved to be a far cry from standing tall on the shores of Grenada, a country that could have been subdued with a SWAT team.
Like Reagan, George is performing theater. Unlike Reagan, George doesn't realize it is theater.
05 November 2006
Iraq - agreement means trouble
Years ago, almost everyone agreed that we should invade Iraq. Pundits, politicians and the common person all agreed. Today that agreement has shattered after a brutal encounter of policy with reality.
Today, almost everyone agrees that we should build up Iraqi defense and security forces. Pundits, politicians, and the common person all agree that this is the predecessor to our exit from Iraq. This commonly held, never thought-through opinion will prove just as faulty as the decision to invade.
Already the long-oppressed, now in rule Shia are using their official power to take revenge on Sunnis. Even medical staff is killing wounded Sunnis in the hospital. Hatred of America is widespread. Iraq has descended into a Civil War.
So, how can it be that the only real agreement about Iraq is that these people should have more sophisticated weaponry, more knowledge of military strategy and tactics, and better military communication equipment? Into this kind of situation the consensus is that we need to provide more military capability? We really think that people intent on genocide will right their ways if only they had a stronger military?
Some days it is harder than others to be a populist.
Today, almost everyone agrees that we should build up Iraqi defense and security forces. Pundits, politicians, and the common person all agree that this is the predecessor to our exit from Iraq. This commonly held, never thought-through opinion will prove just as faulty as the decision to invade.
Already the long-oppressed, now in rule Shia are using their official power to take revenge on Sunnis. Even medical staff is killing wounded Sunnis in the hospital. Hatred of America is widespread. Iraq has descended into a Civil War.
So, how can it be that the only real agreement about Iraq is that these people should have more sophisticated weaponry, more knowledge of military strategy and tactics, and better military communication equipment? Into this kind of situation the consensus is that we need to provide more military capability? We really think that people intent on genocide will right their ways if only they had a stronger military?
Some days it is harder than others to be a populist.
Murdering Moderates
155 Iraqi professors of both sects, mostly moderates, have been assassinated since the 2003 invasion, the Hindu has reported. When things get extreme, extremists thrive.
At one point I had this fantasy that the Iraqi war was a plot by moderates on both sides - a way to lure violent extremists from both sides into a battlefield. The eventual result? Only moderates who stayed away from violent solutions would be left standing.
But of course, violence doesn't work that way. And it is particularly disturbing for Iraq that even moderates are being targeted because moderates are always the glue that holds societies together.
A similar thing will happen Tuesday in this country. The murders will be political, of course, but it will be moderates who will be victims. Anyone who fails to feel some measure of delight at the prospect of Republicans losing their grip on Congress has simply failed to pay attention to this 109th Congress. Nonetheless, it is quite sad that their reign of error will be truncated by the political death of moderates.
Politics is about compromise - finding a peaceful solution to clashes of worldviews and values. Only fools think that there are violent shortcuts to political compromise or think that soon everyone will "get it" and the idiots on the other side will admit the error of their ways, repenting of being naive (pick one: conservatives or liberals or environmentalists or pro-lifers or ...) and joining with us in the forward march of progress. As the influence of moderates over the process wanes, the political process becomes more defined by acrimonious name-calling than progress.
Iraqis may think that they are murdering moderates but the real victim is a sense of inclusion in the political process by the average person and a resultant sense of optimism about the future of the country. As we vote moderates out of office, the result is similar – the average person feels more alienated and less optimistic about the direction of the country.
At one point I had this fantasy that the Iraqi war was a plot by moderates on both sides - a way to lure violent extremists from both sides into a battlefield. The eventual result? Only moderates who stayed away from violent solutions would be left standing.
But of course, violence doesn't work that way. And it is particularly disturbing for Iraq that even moderates are being targeted because moderates are always the glue that holds societies together.
A similar thing will happen Tuesday in this country. The murders will be political, of course, but it will be moderates who will be victims. Anyone who fails to feel some measure of delight at the prospect of Republicans losing their grip on Congress has simply failed to pay attention to this 109th Congress. Nonetheless, it is quite sad that their reign of error will be truncated by the political death of moderates.
Politics is about compromise - finding a peaceful solution to clashes of worldviews and values. Only fools think that there are violent shortcuts to political compromise or think that soon everyone will "get it" and the idiots on the other side will admit the error of their ways, repenting of being naive (pick one: conservatives or liberals or environmentalists or pro-lifers or ...) and joining with us in the forward march of progress. As the influence of moderates over the process wanes, the political process becomes more defined by acrimonious name-calling than progress.
Iraqis may think that they are murdering moderates but the real victim is a sense of inclusion in the political process by the average person and a resultant sense of optimism about the future of the country. As we vote moderates out of office, the result is similar – the average person feels more alienated and less optimistic about the direction of the country.
04 November 2006
When Good Politics Makes for Bad Policy
The growing gap between effective politics and effective policy has already cost us trillions and will get worse before it is corrected.
The most obvious example of this conflict can be seen in the policies pursued by Israelis and Palestinians. No political party can gain popular support unless it talks tough about retaliation. Yet the policy of retaliation has simply sustained a horrific condition of mutually-inflicted terrorism. In that situation, good politics makes for bad policy; what is effective at the polls fails when it makes contact with reality.
When leaders fail to articulate the stakes and make clear the links between present actions and future conditions, the press focuses on the story of politics. Rather than report on policy the media focuses on polls. When this happens, societies' become increasingly dysfunctional.
The most obvious example of this conflict can be seen in the policies pursued by Israelis and Palestinians. No political party can gain popular support unless it talks tough about retaliation. Yet the policy of retaliation has simply sustained a horrific condition of mutually-inflicted terrorism. In that situation, good politics makes for bad policy; what is effective at the polls fails when it makes contact with reality.
When leaders fail to articulate the stakes and make clear the links between present actions and future conditions, the press focuses on the story of politics. Rather than report on policy the media focuses on polls. When this happens, societies' become increasingly dysfunctional.
U.S.A. - under surveillance always?
We live indoors. We walk outdoors from our houses into our cars, only briefly passing through the open air. We live behind walls and our neighbors are unable to see us shower, sleep, stare at the walls or pick our nose. Most people would be outraged if they were told that they could no longer expect such privacy and that friends, neighbors, or the government would be watching them go about their daily routines, knowing that they'd be constantly monitored.
Yet this is the direction we're moving in terms of the life of the mind. Sadly, many Americans who would be outraged at the thought of someone looking in their windows as they got dressed yawn at the thought of someone monitoring their phone calls, book purchases, video rentals, and web surfing. According to at least one international comparison, we now rank as poorly as China and Malaysia, categorized as surveillance nations.
This matters for so many reasons. Perhaps the most important is that we have yet to reach the pinnacle of development, a peak that simply does not exist. Old social constructs - old worlds of theocracies, aristocracies, and robber barons - never willingly give up control. Challenges to their control is always initially perceived as subversive. If the state is successful at monitoring our thoughts and communications, where is the room to challenge the state, how do we further develop in ways that are a threat to the old constructs?
And if history teaches us nothing else, it is the inevitability of this: governments that put in place measures to protect the state inevitably use those measures to protect the governing party or administration. There is no exception to this rule - only differences in the time it takes for someone to make the inevitable leap.
Perhaps the simplest distinction between good and bad government is this. In a good government, the individual's life is private and government policies and practices are transparent. In a bad government, the government's policies and practices are private and the individual's life is transparent. In just the last century, we have spectacularly evil examples of this very thing in Mao's China, Stalin's USSR, and Hitler's Germany.
Yet this is the direction we're moving in terms of the life of the mind. Sadly, many Americans who would be outraged at the thought of someone looking in their windows as they got dressed yawn at the thought of someone monitoring their phone calls, book purchases, video rentals, and web surfing. According to at least one international comparison, we now rank as poorly as China and Malaysia, categorized as surveillance nations.
This matters for so many reasons. Perhaps the most important is that we have yet to reach the pinnacle of development, a peak that simply does not exist. Old social constructs - old worlds of theocracies, aristocracies, and robber barons - never willingly give up control. Challenges to their control is always initially perceived as subversive. If the state is successful at monitoring our thoughts and communications, where is the room to challenge the state, how do we further develop in ways that are a threat to the old constructs?
And if history teaches us nothing else, it is the inevitability of this: governments that put in place measures to protect the state inevitably use those measures to protect the governing party or administration. There is no exception to this rule - only differences in the time it takes for someone to make the inevitable leap.
Perhaps the simplest distinction between good and bad government is this. In a good government, the individual's life is private and government policies and practices are transparent. In a bad government, the government's policies and practices are private and the individual's life is transparent. In just the last century, we have spectacularly evil examples of this very thing in Mao's China, Stalin's USSR, and Hitler's Germany.
31 October 2006
Sex & Violence
I saw that Saw III was the top grossing film over the weekend. From what I've read, it falls into the category of the “can't be too graphic" horror movies that sound about as appealing to me as a trip to a dentist who doesn't budget for anesthetic. Putting aside personal preferences, it again brings up the question of movie ratings.
We expect our children will eventually engage in graphic sex and hope that they're never involved in graphic violence - either as thug or victim. Even in very violent cultures, on average there are more acts of sex than acts of violence. A sane community will do what it can to eradicate violence and regulate sex. But only a crazed community would work to eradicate sex and merely regulate violence. Such a community would soon disappear. So how is one to make sense of our movie ratings?
Graphic sex is rated X while graphic violence is rated R, suggesting that we're actually less squeamish about killing than procreation. This odd priority impacts policy.
California has a proposition on the ballot (Prop 83?) that will regulate sex offenders, limiting them from living within a certain distance of parks and strapping them with an electronic bracelet. Oddly, such measures are not first taken against those with a violent streak, but sex offenders - a loosely defined group that includes 18 year-old men who've had sex with a 17 year-old girlfriend. Yet someone who is out after serving time for second or third-degree murder, or someone who has a history of repeatedly violent acts, escapes these odd provisions.
Molestation is not a trivial thing, but it is certainly easier to recover from than murder. So why the special provision against the prospect of molestation but no corresponding provision against the prospect of other violent crimes, crimes that leave physical as well as emotional scars? Could it be that years of accepting the values implied in our movie rating system has distorted our perception of threats?
We expect our children will eventually engage in graphic sex and hope that they're never involved in graphic violence - either as thug or victim. Even in very violent cultures, on average there are more acts of sex than acts of violence. A sane community will do what it can to eradicate violence and regulate sex. But only a crazed community would work to eradicate sex and merely regulate violence. Such a community would soon disappear. So how is one to make sense of our movie ratings?
Graphic sex is rated X while graphic violence is rated R, suggesting that we're actually less squeamish about killing than procreation. This odd priority impacts policy.
California has a proposition on the ballot (Prop 83?) that will regulate sex offenders, limiting them from living within a certain distance of parks and strapping them with an electronic bracelet. Oddly, such measures are not first taken against those with a violent streak, but sex offenders - a loosely defined group that includes 18 year-old men who've had sex with a 17 year-old girlfriend. Yet someone who is out after serving time for second or third-degree murder, or someone who has a history of repeatedly violent acts, escapes these odd provisions.
Molestation is not a trivial thing, but it is certainly easier to recover from than murder. So why the special provision against the prospect of molestation but no corresponding provision against the prospect of other violent crimes, crimes that leave physical as well as emotional scars? Could it be that years of accepting the values implied in our movie rating system has distorted our perception of threats?
30 October 2006
Not in His Right Mind
First, two quotes of note, both spoken in regards to the Iraq invasion and occupation.
"Anyone who is not conflicted in their judgment is not thinking seriously."
- Representative Jim Leach, Republican from Iowa.
"I don't know how you operate unless you continually challenge your own assumptions."
- Brent Scowcroft, former national security adviser to both Ford and George H.W. Bush
Brain research indicates that the right brain and left brain have different roles in the complex process of formulating and defending world views. The right brain is the revolutionary, continually challenging the current worldview as new data streams in. Obviously, a person cannot reformulate worldviews as rapidly as he receives new data - the process is too time-consuming and potentially too disruptive. Plus, a worldview that didn't last longer than it took data to stream in would be useless. By contrast, the left-brain defends the existing worldview from new data. At its most extreme, a stroke victim unable to move her arm may insist that she is, indeed, pointing with it. When the brain has been hijacked by the left brain, it is unable to change the worldview no matter how poorly matched that is to reality.
The simple truth is, our minds are much smaller than the world and inevitably our worldviews are limited. Given a lack of omniscience, worldviews need to be regularly tweaked and occasionally shifted. The only option to allowing on-going changes to one’s worldview is to ignore or distort reality.
So what is one to make of Bush's insistence on staying the course in Iraq, even as events have repeatedly unfolded as contrary to his original theories? It is quite simple and fairly intuitive. Bush is not in his right mind.
"Anyone who is not conflicted in their judgment is not thinking seriously."
- Representative Jim Leach, Republican from Iowa.
"I don't know how you operate unless you continually challenge your own assumptions."
- Brent Scowcroft, former national security adviser to both Ford and George H.W. Bush
Brain research indicates that the right brain and left brain have different roles in the complex process of formulating and defending world views. The right brain is the revolutionary, continually challenging the current worldview as new data streams in. Obviously, a person cannot reformulate worldviews as rapidly as he receives new data - the process is too time-consuming and potentially too disruptive. Plus, a worldview that didn't last longer than it took data to stream in would be useless. By contrast, the left-brain defends the existing worldview from new data. At its most extreme, a stroke victim unable to move her arm may insist that she is, indeed, pointing with it. When the brain has been hijacked by the left brain, it is unable to change the worldview no matter how poorly matched that is to reality.
The simple truth is, our minds are much smaller than the world and inevitably our worldviews are limited. Given a lack of omniscience, worldviews need to be regularly tweaked and occasionally shifted. The only option to allowing on-going changes to one’s worldview is to ignore or distort reality.
So what is one to make of Bush's insistence on staying the course in Iraq, even as events have repeatedly unfolded as contrary to his original theories? It is quite simple and fairly intuitive. Bush is not in his right mind.
29 October 2006
The Iraqi Hot Potato
The new plan for Iraq, stated by John Warner and echoed by others, is that we're going to turn to the Iraqi government to solve it. Amazing. The most powerful nation in the history of the world, the one with more Noble Prize winners than any other, can't solve this problem. Their solution? Foist the problem onto a government in turmoil. And they actually think that this qualifies as a strategy. By the time this is over, the invasion will be the fault of the Iraqi people.
27 October 2006
If elected pope …
This year, for Halloween, I was going to go as pope but decided that that would be irreverent. So rather than going as pope, I’m going to run for pope instead.
My campaign strategy is simple, really. Of the 6 billion people on this planet, only about a billion are Catholic. I’m going to go after the non-Catholic vote. As a previously ignored majority, I figure it should be easy to win their vote.
I’ve got in mind a number of changes. One is to revisit the policy towards women. Traditional religions have been notorious in their treatment of women – relegating them to lesser positions and silencing them in churches even though they show up in greater numbers than men. To help signal the kind of changes that I will champion, I intend to change their names from Nuns to Sums.
Concerned with rising obesity levels, I’m changing the name of the Sunday service from Mass to Form and will be using new high-fiber wafers and sugar-free wine.
It’s time to reach out to the Baby Boomers. They’re nearing retirement age and their minds are beginning to drift towards thoughts of their own mortality. They are ripe for conversion. Taking the name of Pope John Paul George Ringo, I feel that my papacy would be specially suited to that mission.
Along those lines, it seems time to end religious intolerance. Religious wars, speaking out about the hell-bent direction of those of other faiths, and the dismissal of “heretical” beliefs just makes the world a more dangerous place. With this in mind, it’s time to let non-Catholics be Catholic. I have my lawyers working on the details of how this could be logically possible, but it seems that if even non-Catholics were Catholic, it would be harder to perpetuate religious hatred. Imagine how disoriented and impotent Muslim fundamentalists would feel if they suddenly learned that they, too, were Catholic. My first papal bull would be to declare everyone Catholic (and as a parenthetical, acknowledge that Albert Pujols is the world's most popular Cardinal).
Please remember me on November 7. I have to admit that my candidacy is not motivated only by a vision of a better world. Outside of the amazing art collection, it seems as though the two best perks of the job are infallibility and getting to wear a cape – something I used to think reserved only for superheroes.
My campaign strategy is simple, really. Of the 6 billion people on this planet, only about a billion are Catholic. I’m going to go after the non-Catholic vote. As a previously ignored majority, I figure it should be easy to win their vote.
I’ve got in mind a number of changes. One is to revisit the policy towards women. Traditional religions have been notorious in their treatment of women – relegating them to lesser positions and silencing them in churches even though they show up in greater numbers than men. To help signal the kind of changes that I will champion, I intend to change their names from Nuns to Sums.
Concerned with rising obesity levels, I’m changing the name of the Sunday service from Mass to Form and will be using new high-fiber wafers and sugar-free wine.
It’s time to reach out to the Baby Boomers. They’re nearing retirement age and their minds are beginning to drift towards thoughts of their own mortality. They are ripe for conversion. Taking the name of Pope John Paul George Ringo, I feel that my papacy would be specially suited to that mission.
Along those lines, it seems time to end religious intolerance. Religious wars, speaking out about the hell-bent direction of those of other faiths, and the dismissal of “heretical” beliefs just makes the world a more dangerous place. With this in mind, it’s time to let non-Catholics be Catholic. I have my lawyers working on the details of how this could be logically possible, but it seems that if even non-Catholics were Catholic, it would be harder to perpetuate religious hatred. Imagine how disoriented and impotent Muslim fundamentalists would feel if they suddenly learned that they, too, were Catholic. My first papal bull would be to declare everyone Catholic (and as a parenthetical, acknowledge that Albert Pujols is the world's most popular Cardinal).
Please remember me on November 7. I have to admit that my candidacy is not motivated only by a vision of a better world. Outside of the amazing art collection, it seems as though the two best perks of the job are infallibility and getting to wear a cape – something I used to think reserved only for superheroes.
25 October 2006
Timetables, Benchmarks and Other Ways to Avoid the Hard Questions
Bush announced that he is going to establish benchmarks for leaving Iraq and explained why benchmarks are not the same thing as timetables about as well as he has explained his reasons for the Iraqi invasion in the first place. This is to say that anyone listening was simply left perplexed.
Putting aside the fact that the difference between timetables and benchmarks is trivial, there is a problem with both. One of my heroes, management guru W. Edwards Deming, used to admonish managers to do away with exhortations and slogans in the work place. What Deming continually asked is "By what method?" You want to increase sales by 10%? First he'd splay his fingers, look at them and say, "10 ... that's a nice round number. I wonder how they ever thought of that. If they can just increase sales by 10%, why didn't they do that last year? If they already know the method, why did they wait until this year?" If you don't have a method to achieve a goal, the goal is merely speculative.
What is worse, Bush is basically admitting that the US is unable to "solve" the problem of establishing a stable government in Iraq and is now turning on his heels to point the finger at the immature Iraqi government, foisting off responsibility for establishing security to them. He's turning to them to ask, "How long do you think you'll need for this benchmark?" If someone had asked US officials how long they thought it would have taken to establish a secure Iraq, they would have (Rumsfeld actually did) say that it might be about 3 months. This speculation turned out to be speculative, based as it was on neither an accurate assessment nor clear strategy.
Bush has not yet shown that he knows the difference between a strategy and an admonition. This is not so very rare for men in power who can simply make declarations and see things happen within their staff. But when the declarations are made against complex forces, against the tide or winds, against social dynamics he doesn't begin to understand, the consequences are never as satisfactory.
Bush says that he will soon have benchmarks. The real question is, "By what method?" So far, the operating theories that the Bush administration has used at every step of this invasion and occupation have been proven false. Until they offer a new, overarching operating theory, benchmarks will be meaningless.
Putting aside the fact that the difference between timetables and benchmarks is trivial, there is a problem with both. One of my heroes, management guru W. Edwards Deming, used to admonish managers to do away with exhortations and slogans in the work place. What Deming continually asked is "By what method?" You want to increase sales by 10%? First he'd splay his fingers, look at them and say, "10 ... that's a nice round number. I wonder how they ever thought of that. If they can just increase sales by 10%, why didn't they do that last year? If they already know the method, why did they wait until this year?" If you don't have a method to achieve a goal, the goal is merely speculative.
What is worse, Bush is basically admitting that the US is unable to "solve" the problem of establishing a stable government in Iraq and is now turning on his heels to point the finger at the immature Iraqi government, foisting off responsibility for establishing security to them. He's turning to them to ask, "How long do you think you'll need for this benchmark?" If someone had asked US officials how long they thought it would have taken to establish a secure Iraq, they would have (Rumsfeld actually did) say that it might be about 3 months. This speculation turned out to be speculative, based as it was on neither an accurate assessment nor clear strategy.
Bush has not yet shown that he knows the difference between a strategy and an admonition. This is not so very rare for men in power who can simply make declarations and see things happen within their staff. But when the declarations are made against complex forces, against the tide or winds, against social dynamics he doesn't begin to understand, the consequences are never as satisfactory.
Bush says that he will soon have benchmarks. The real question is, "By what method?" So far, the operating theories that the Bush administration has used at every step of this invasion and occupation have been proven false. Until they offer a new, overarching operating theory, benchmarks will be meaningless.
Bush and the US Joined in Dissatisfaction
WASHINGTON - In a somber but combative pre-election review of a long and brutal war, President Bush conceded Wednesday that the United States is taking heavy casualties in Iraq and said, "I know many Americans are not satisfied with the situation" there. I'm not satisfied either," he said at a speech and question and answer session at the White House 13 days before midterm elections.
To the surprise of the press corps, Bush went on to say, "I know many Americans are not satisfied with their president. I want them to know that neither am I.”
Cell Phones and Infertility
Recent research has indicated that use of cell phones can lead to infertility. However, officials have not indicated that use of cell phones can be assumed to substitute for use of contraceptives.
24 October 2006
A Confusion Between Rights and Being Right
Governments in France, the UK, and the US are corrupting a precious legacy of Western Civilization. France's lower house of parliament recently passed a bill making denial of the Armenian genocide a crime. The British recently charged an activist for passing out anti-homosexual leaflets at a gay and lesbian festival, enforcing a law that allows the crown to prosecute anyone causing a person "alarm or distress" on "at least two occasions." Bush has decided that habeas corpus is a gift that he is free to take from anyone he deems unworthy of it.
This confusion between what seems to be right - squelch the speech of activists who harass those with whom they disagree or indefinitely hold suspects without the need to go public with potentially dangerous information - and rights - freedom of speech and the right to trial - can very easily lead down a slippery slope towards benevolent dictatorships. Communities need to reverse their trend of worrying about what is right for the individual and instead focus on protecting individual rights.
This confusion between what seems to be right - squelch the speech of activists who harass those with whom they disagree or indefinitely hold suspects without the need to go public with potentially dangerous information - and rights - freedom of speech and the right to trial - can very easily lead down a slippery slope towards benevolent dictatorships. Communities need to reverse their trend of worrying about what is right for the individual and instead focus on protecting individual rights.
Bad Religion
In this country, we seem to have a number of folks who fail to understand the difference between a person being free to choose his or her own religion and being free to impose personal convictions onto others in the form of law. In Europe, they seem to have the opposite problem, failing to understand the difference between social norms and freedom for the individual to dress as she pleases.
First the French and now the English are making an issue of Muslim women wearing veils. Just as absurd and indefensible as the religious right's attempts in this country to turn scripture into legislation.
Speaking of legislation, it is time to mandate education on religion. It should have at least three components - how so many have consolation in it, how it has been used to wreck havoc on society, and the necessity of religious tolerance. If taught why and how so many have found peace and joy in faith - beliefs that are based in nothing scientific - students will come to appreciate the potential of faith. If taught how religions have resulted in negatives like chronic guilt, religious wars, and the rejection of scientific thinking and reason, students can come to appreciate how dangerous it is to let religion dictate to societies. If taught how much persecution has followed from forcing religion on the individual (as happened in medieval Europe) to forcing the individual to abstain from religion (as happened in so many communist regimes during the Cold War), students will learn the importance of religious tolerance. How communities believe that they can sustain healthy policies and respect for the individual without ensuring that students understand these issues is puzzling. When communities "do religion badly," it is hard for them to get much else right. Such an important issue should not be left to chance.
First the French and now the English are making an issue of Muslim women wearing veils. Just as absurd and indefensible as the religious right's attempts in this country to turn scripture into legislation.
Speaking of legislation, it is time to mandate education on religion. It should have at least three components - how so many have consolation in it, how it has been used to wreck havoc on society, and the necessity of religious tolerance. If taught why and how so many have found peace and joy in faith - beliefs that are based in nothing scientific - students will come to appreciate the potential of faith. If taught how religions have resulted in negatives like chronic guilt, religious wars, and the rejection of scientific thinking and reason, students can come to appreciate how dangerous it is to let religion dictate to societies. If taught how much persecution has followed from forcing religion on the individual (as happened in medieval Europe) to forcing the individual to abstain from religion (as happened in so many communist regimes during the Cold War), students will learn the importance of religious tolerance. How communities believe that they can sustain healthy policies and respect for the individual without ensuring that students understand these issues is puzzling. When communities "do religion badly," it is hard for them to get much else right. Such an important issue should not be left to chance.
23 October 2006
The Nonsense of Linking Illegal Immigration and National Security
A great deal of noise is made about how illegal immigrants are "illegal" and that should settle the issue. Proponents of this issue as one that matters continue to say that this is also a security issue, although they never offer a single statistic to substantiate this claim as any thing other than speculation.
To illustrate the absurdity of this, imagine taking an issue that also cracks down on "illegal" behavior and actually has statistics to show that it is a national security issue - something that kills about 20,000 Americans a year. Imagine trying to win an election on the basis of "cracking down" on speeding.
Illegal immigration as a political issue is not about legality or about security. It is about xenophobia, which I am pretty sure is Greek for fear of Hispanics.
To illustrate the absurdity of this, imagine taking an issue that also cracks down on "illegal" behavior and actually has statistics to show that it is a national security issue - something that kills about 20,000 Americans a year. Imagine trying to win an election on the basis of "cracking down" on speeding.
Illegal immigration as a political issue is not about legality or about security. It is about xenophobia, which I am pretty sure is Greek for fear of Hispanics.
Race and Performance
Watch baseball this week and note how varied are the races of the players on the two teams vying to become World Series champs. The engineers and programmers working on the technology development project inside of companies represent far more racial diversity than the administrative side of the house. Watch a great musical group like Pat Methany's or Bela Fleck's, and you'll be struck by the racial diversity.
When performance standards are clear and the playing field is level (that is, kids from any culture are free to enter), racial divides begin to melt.
So, what is one reason that race continues to be a factor in so many arenas of American life? Because in the domains of business (as opposed to technology) and politics, performance measures are so arbitrary and so "colored" by perception that race becomes a factor.
Racism should not just be attacked directly, but where racism is present, it should be a signal that performance metrics need to be better developed, understood, and used.
When performance standards are clear and the playing field is level (that is, kids from any culture are free to enter), racial divides begin to melt.
So, what is one reason that race continues to be a factor in so many arenas of American life? Because in the domains of business (as opposed to technology) and politics, performance measures are so arbitrary and so "colored" by perception that race becomes a factor.
Racism should not just be attacked directly, but where racism is present, it should be a signal that performance metrics need to be better developed, understood, and used.
The difference between a blog and a diary
You know the difference between a blog and a diary? Your roommate won't read your blog.
University Punt, Part 2
High schools and universities should feel obligated to find the intersection of three things for each student: what the student is good at, what they enjoy, and what there is demand for.
What the student is good at: Each student has a certain set of skills or potentialities. A great teacher or coach is able to lead a student through experiences that reveal that potential to the student - that help them to develop that skill. Sadly, schools tend to focus on the possibilities that lie within the traditional categories of logical-mathematical and linguistic intelligence. If a child's strength or potential lies more clearly within the categories of musical, bodily-kinesthetic, artistic, interpersonal or intrapersonal intelligence, school less clearly reveals that. A child deserves to be clear about what he or she is good at by the time they have been in the school system for 12 or more years.
What they enjoy: The experience of flow - the engagement in an activity so intense that one loses track of time, self, and other possibilities - is one of the biggest determinants of joy. There is a difference between what someone is good at and what creates flow. One of the conditions that promotes flow is a task that is neither too difficult (something that would create stress or anxiety instead of flow) nor too easy (something that would make someone bored or simply feel in control instead of flow). Flow can be used as a development compass - bored students need new challenges and stressed students need a new skill. Again, by 18 children have the right to expect to know what kinds of activities promote flow.
What there is demand for: Finally, children need to understand which activities contribute to others, which activities create value for which others will pay. Playing video games may be something a child is good at and something that promotes flow, but its consequences are contained to a virtual world. This matter of demand is perhaps the most opaque for children.
Each child should approach life after school with a clear sense of the intersection between these three elements, prepared to pursue a career that allows them to feel competent, engaged, and like contributing members of society. That these three issues are treated as peripheral to education rather than central to it is yet another thing that so perplexes me about our modern world.
What the student is good at: Each student has a certain set of skills or potentialities. A great teacher or coach is able to lead a student through experiences that reveal that potential to the student - that help them to develop that skill. Sadly, schools tend to focus on the possibilities that lie within the traditional categories of logical-mathematical and linguistic intelligence. If a child's strength or potential lies more clearly within the categories of musical, bodily-kinesthetic, artistic, interpersonal or intrapersonal intelligence, school less clearly reveals that. A child deserves to be clear about what he or she is good at by the time they have been in the school system for 12 or more years.
What they enjoy: The experience of flow - the engagement in an activity so intense that one loses track of time, self, and other possibilities - is one of the biggest determinants of joy. There is a difference between what someone is good at and what creates flow. One of the conditions that promotes flow is a task that is neither too difficult (something that would create stress or anxiety instead of flow) nor too easy (something that would make someone bored or simply feel in control instead of flow). Flow can be used as a development compass - bored students need new challenges and stressed students need a new skill. Again, by 18 children have the right to expect to know what kinds of activities promote flow.
What there is demand for: Finally, children need to understand which activities contribute to others, which activities create value for which others will pay. Playing video games may be something a child is good at and something that promotes flow, but its consequences are contained to a virtual world. This matter of demand is perhaps the most opaque for children.
Each child should approach life after school with a clear sense of the intersection between these three elements, prepared to pursue a career that allows them to feel competent, engaged, and like contributing members of society. That these three issues are treated as peripheral to education rather than central to it is yet another thing that so perplexes me about our modern world.
Universities Punt, Part 1
Our best and brightest are being failed by our universities.
For an 18 year-old clear about career goals, our university system generally does a great job of preparation. But for that poor and interesting kid - the vast majority - for whom such a thing is unclear, universities largely walk away.
Starting in high school, students should be coached in reaching the conclusion about two things. One, drawing from Stephen Covey's work, they should be taught the distinction between the four elements of work (or life, for that matter): the physical / economic, the social / emotional, the intellectual, and the spiritual / meaning. For most people, happiness at work depends on all four of these. If you are making good money, but hate your co-workers or hate yourself for what you do, you'll never make it 40 years. If you make good money, love your co-workers but are simply not learning anything, are rarely or never stimulated, you'll eventually walk away from the job. Finally, if you make good money, love your co-workers, and are mentally stimulated yet feel like what you do makes no difference to anyone (even your boss yawns at your efforts, much less customers or the world at large), you may last 40 years but only with a diminished vigor.
Physical / Economic: In a job, do you want to play with ideas or big pieces of wood? Working inside of an office or outside in the fresh air? What kind of physical environment do you want to be in? What are your financial goals and what is realistic given your skills and the demands for them?
Social / Emotional: How willing are you for risk? Do you have the emotional perseverance to take the risk of starting a business? Do you need a nurturing environment that encourages you or do you have the ability to withstand the rejection of, say, a sales job that might lead to more income? What kind of co-workers is it important for you to be with all day?
Intellectual / Mental: What kind of intellectual problems do you want to face? What questions would you love to answer or regularly confront?
Spiritual / Meaning: Finally, what kind of difference do you want to make in your work? If everyone made the same wage, what would you do because you think it matters? How do you measure what is fulfilling or meaningful?
If students become conversant at these elements, they can better filter through the myriad possibilities for majors or careers. That would be no panacea, but it would be a start.
For an 18 year-old clear about career goals, our university system generally does a great job of preparation. But for that poor and interesting kid - the vast majority - for whom such a thing is unclear, universities largely walk away.
Starting in high school, students should be coached in reaching the conclusion about two things. One, drawing from Stephen Covey's work, they should be taught the distinction between the four elements of work (or life, for that matter): the physical / economic, the social / emotional, the intellectual, and the spiritual / meaning. For most people, happiness at work depends on all four of these. If you are making good money, but hate your co-workers or hate yourself for what you do, you'll never make it 40 years. If you make good money, love your co-workers but are simply not learning anything, are rarely or never stimulated, you'll eventually walk away from the job. Finally, if you make good money, love your co-workers, and are mentally stimulated yet feel like what you do makes no difference to anyone (even your boss yawns at your efforts, much less customers or the world at large), you may last 40 years but only with a diminished vigor.
Physical / Economic: In a job, do you want to play with ideas or big pieces of wood? Working inside of an office or outside in the fresh air? What kind of physical environment do you want to be in? What are your financial goals and what is realistic given your skills and the demands for them?
Social / Emotional: How willing are you for risk? Do you have the emotional perseverance to take the risk of starting a business? Do you need a nurturing environment that encourages you or do you have the ability to withstand the rejection of, say, a sales job that might lead to more income? What kind of co-workers is it important for you to be with all day?
Intellectual / Mental: What kind of intellectual problems do you want to face? What questions would you love to answer or regularly confront?
Spiritual / Meaning: Finally, what kind of difference do you want to make in your work? If everyone made the same wage, what would you do because you think it matters? How do you measure what is fulfilling or meaningful?
If students become conversant at these elements, they can better filter through the myriad possibilities for majors or careers. That would be no panacea, but it would be a start.
That odd religious qualification for politics
Why does religion matter for politicians? Most people would consider me religious. I'm one of those people who usually attend a "religious service" two or more times a week. Yet little perplexes me quite as much as the seeming ironclad requirement for a political candidate to be Christian.
If you were to purchase a car, would you rather have the one made or designed by the Buddhist, the agnostic, or the Christian? How about a meal? A wooden cabinet for your living room or a new stereo? How important is the religious affiliation of the person who made what you are about to buy?
Obviously, we don't even consider it. We examine the product instead and make our decision based on the designer or maker's skill - not their religious beliefs. So why does the religion of political candidates matter a whit? Why not focus on their ability to formulate policy, to deal with people?
Yet I have to admit that I'm not completely apathetic about religious affliation. As I get older, I get more uneasy about the idea of religious people being able to start a nuclear war. I think that only atheists should have such power. I don't want the person who could end civilization to have the consolation of an afterlife. I want the guy at the buttons to feel eager to squeeze as many years out of this life as possible.
If you were to purchase a car, would you rather have the one made or designed by the Buddhist, the agnostic, or the Christian? How about a meal? A wooden cabinet for your living room or a new stereo? How important is the religious affiliation of the person who made what you are about to buy?
Obviously, we don't even consider it. We examine the product instead and make our decision based on the designer or maker's skill - not their religious beliefs. So why does the religion of political candidates matter a whit? Why not focus on their ability to formulate policy, to deal with people?
Yet I have to admit that I'm not completely apathetic about religious affliation. As I get older, I get more uneasy about the idea of religious people being able to start a nuclear war. I think that only atheists should have such power. I don't want the person who could end civilization to have the consolation of an afterlife. I want the guy at the buttons to feel eager to squeeze as many years out of this life as possible.
21 October 2006
This Will Disrupt Everything
An increasing amount of attention is being paid to creativity and entrepreneurship within business schools and corporations. For now, the movement looks innocuous - a means to marginally improve business performance. Yet it will disrupt everything.
Entrepreneurship is the new limit to progress, just as land, capital,and knowledge work were in previous economies. But history indicates that adjusting to a new limit to progress is disruptive - changing social constructs as varied as the dominant way of thinking and the dominant institution. When capital replaced land as the limit to progress (a process of transformation that played out fully from about 1700 to 1900), it forced democratic revolutions, the rise of the bank and modern financial markets, and the adoption of Enlightenment thinking to take the place of the Renaissance mind. When knowledge workers replaced capital as the limit to progress (from about 1900 to 2000), it forced the transformation of financial markets, the rise of the modern corporation, and the adoption of pragmatism in place of Enlightenment thinking.
Just as an invisible underwater earthquake can trigger a tsunami that everyone notices, so does a shift in the limit to progress trigger social changes that no one escapes.
Entrepreneurship is the new limit to progress, just as land, capital,and knowledge work were in previous economies. But history indicates that adjusting to a new limit to progress is disruptive - changing social constructs as varied as the dominant way of thinking and the dominant institution. When capital replaced land as the limit to progress (a process of transformation that played out fully from about 1700 to 1900), it forced democratic revolutions, the rise of the bank and modern financial markets, and the adoption of Enlightenment thinking to take the place of the Renaissance mind. When knowledge workers replaced capital as the limit to progress (from about 1900 to 2000), it forced the transformation of financial markets, the rise of the modern corporation, and the adoption of pragmatism in place of Enlightenment thinking.
Just as an invisible underwater earthquake can trigger a tsunami that everyone notices, so does a shift in the limit to progress trigger social changes that no one escapes.
The Need for Research into Social Constructs
A handshake is a social construct. So is a $20 bill, Mass, democracy, and disco dancing. Social constructs are fascinating because they are made real only by agreement. Should everyone - or even just most people - suddenly agree that handshakes are dumb, currency is not to be trusted, Mass is in error and democracy or disco are out of fashion ... well, theses suddenly become ideas instead of realities.
This is not to say that social constructs are arbitrary - any more than car design is arbitrary. Some designs move better on the road and others move better off the showroom. Design is essential to success in a car. Even though in theory car designers have a large number of options to choose from, in fact they are constrained by variables like fashion, the laws of physics, and the price of gas.
The dynamics of social constructs are fascinating. Collectively, our understanding of them is at best sketchy. Few individuals understand the concept; even fewer know how to operationalize it. Yet there is perhaps no area of inquiry that is more important to explore or to understand, no domain the mastery of which would do more to promote progress.
Which is to say that we should be funding research into this area of inquiry. Attempting nation-building in Iraq without research into social constructs to draw from is like trying to build a plane without developing some theories about avionics and as much as anything reveals our ignorance about our ignorance on this important topic.
This is not to say that social constructs are arbitrary - any more than car design is arbitrary. Some designs move better on the road and others move better off the showroom. Design is essential to success in a car. Even though in theory car designers have a large number of options to choose from, in fact they are constrained by variables like fashion, the laws of physics, and the price of gas.
The dynamics of social constructs are fascinating. Collectively, our understanding of them is at best sketchy. Few individuals understand the concept; even fewer know how to operationalize it. Yet there is perhaps no area of inquiry that is more important to explore or to understand, no domain the mastery of which would do more to promote progress.
Which is to say that we should be funding research into this area of inquiry. Attempting nation-building in Iraq without research into social constructs to draw from is like trying to build a plane without developing some theories about avionics and as much as anything reveals our ignorance about our ignorance on this important topic.
20 October 2006
Be Irrational - Vote as if You Make a Difference
Living in California, voting is a part time job. And the ugly secret that they never tell you in high school civics class? The odds of your vote being the deciding vote are actually lower than the odds of winning the lottery. That means that gradually, only the irrational will vote - which probably explains a great deal about election results.
A little tidbit. The Nazis rose to power in part because of the political turmoil after World War One led to frequent elections. Eventually, turnout dropped to the point that the extremists were able to take the election. Heil Hitler wasn't a song on the lips of a majority of Germans - just a majority of the voters who were persistent.
So, what's the moral of the story? Persevere. In politics, short-term irrational actions are eventually made rational. Don't let the extremists be the ones to steer this ship of state.
A little tidbit. The Nazis rose to power in part because of the political turmoil after World War One led to frequent elections. Eventually, turnout dropped to the point that the extremists were able to take the election. Heil Hitler wasn't a song on the lips of a majority of Germans - just a majority of the voters who were persistent.
So, what's the moral of the story? Persevere. In politics, short-term irrational actions are eventually made rational. Don't let the extremists be the ones to steer this ship of state.
The Liberal Media Bias
A majority of journalists are liberals. In this election, that will actually work against liberals.
First, it will be a problem because journalists can hardly seem to contain their fascination with the thought of Democrats regaining the House and perhaps the Senate. The problem with this? Reporting on this as though it were a done deal is going to alarm the conservative base that will plug its nose and pull the lever for Republicans. The result? Republicans will retain the Senate and, shockingly, come so close in the House that whether they "win" or "lose" will be academic for all purposes other than finger-pointing. That is, if the Democrats win by a single seat, say, they will be blamed for what happens even though they'll be largely ineffective to make anything happen.
Second, the fact that so many journalists are liberals has been a problem for liberal causes for years and will continue to be so in this election. If you've ever seen a math nerd dance, you intuitively sense the problem of people valiantly trying on activities that simply don't fit. Liberal journalists report what they don't understand and fail to properly analyze or review it. They accept nonsense from neo-conservatives and are afraid to label it as nonsense because they think that to do so would reflect a failing to provide unbiased news. To the math nerd, most dance moves look plausible, just as to the dancer most math problems look plausible. Liberal journalists are simply at a loss about how to report on conservative movements because they make little or no sense to them. Trying to be fair, they end up striving towards "fair and balanced" reporting of issues that are nonsense - issues like bombing people into liberation, banning the use of stem cells that would otherwise be disposed of, or insisting that kids who have grown up rich should not have to pay a tax on the income they've inherited by luck even while arguing that people who receive their income from working should pay taxes.
First, it will be a problem because journalists can hardly seem to contain their fascination with the thought of Democrats regaining the House and perhaps the Senate. The problem with this? Reporting on this as though it were a done deal is going to alarm the conservative base that will plug its nose and pull the lever for Republicans. The result? Republicans will retain the Senate and, shockingly, come so close in the House that whether they "win" or "lose" will be academic for all purposes other than finger-pointing. That is, if the Democrats win by a single seat, say, they will be blamed for what happens even though they'll be largely ineffective to make anything happen.
Second, the fact that so many journalists are liberals has been a problem for liberal causes for years and will continue to be so in this election. If you've ever seen a math nerd dance, you intuitively sense the problem of people valiantly trying on activities that simply don't fit. Liberal journalists report what they don't understand and fail to properly analyze or review it. They accept nonsense from neo-conservatives and are afraid to label it as nonsense because they think that to do so would reflect a failing to provide unbiased news. To the math nerd, most dance moves look plausible, just as to the dancer most math problems look plausible. Liberal journalists are simply at a loss about how to report on conservative movements because they make little or no sense to them. Trying to be fair, they end up striving towards "fair and balanced" reporting of issues that are nonsense - issues like bombing people into liberation, banning the use of stem cells that would otherwise be disposed of, or insisting that kids who have grown up rich should not have to pay a tax on the income they've inherited by luck even while arguing that people who receive their income from working should pay taxes.
18 October 2006
Uber-Entrepreneurs and the New Foundations
The Bills - Clinton and Gates - are probably the most obvious of a new breed: people who are helping to create a new type of social invention. In this, Bill Gates may have graduated from entrepreneur to uber-entrepreneur.
Foundations and other NGOs (non-governmental organizations) are making progress against issues that governments are unable to address. The Carter Foundation builds toilets in small African villages. This seemingly innocuous task mitigates disease which promotes productivity which enables autonomy. The Bills are targeting poverty, the environment, AIDS and other diseases, and are enlisting the help of others to accomplish these projects.
What we're seeing is a repetition of a pattern. When social problems defy the solutions of current social institutions, pioneers build new ones. The American Civil War was about slavery. It was also about a new reality. New means of transportation and production meant that the old boundaries of state governments were no longer sufficient. The Republicans understood this better than others and insisted on a union - a federal government that was strong enough to govern new interstate realities of railroads, factories, and legal contracts and transactions that would spill across state borders. The multinational corporation grew out of an invention of this period of the 1860s: the modern "interstate" corporation. (And to this day the Republican Party is perhaps most simply thought of as the party most aligned with the corporation.)Regional states could not be allowed to hinder corporate interests and a stronger federal government had to emerge as the context in which a new corporation could be invented.
Social inventions like nation-states, corporations and the foundations that have become so wildly popular in recent decades are created by visionaries who simply don't see a way to address real problems or exploit potential without creating a new means to do that. Entrepreneurs start businesses within a free-market economy. They aren't inventing businesses - just creating a specific one. Uber-entrepreneurs (an odd German-French contraction I've just coined**) are those who invent a new form of social invention: Martin Luther or John Calvin with Protestant churches, Henry VIII or Louis XIV with nation-states, the Rothschilds with international bond markets are examples of uber-entrepreneurs. Perhaps in a couple of decades we'll realize that the flurry of foundations established late in the 20th century represented a type of uber-entrepreneurship, the invention of a new social institution.
** disclaimer: sometimes I hate the net - it seems to reveal that nothing is really new. It turns out that the term uber-entrepreneur has been used before. Perhaps my definition is unique, defining an uber-entrepreneur as someone who isn't necessarily successful but helps to pioneer a new type of social invention.
Foundations and other NGOs (non-governmental organizations) are making progress against issues that governments are unable to address. The Carter Foundation builds toilets in small African villages. This seemingly innocuous task mitigates disease which promotes productivity which enables autonomy. The Bills are targeting poverty, the environment, AIDS and other diseases, and are enlisting the help of others to accomplish these projects.
What we're seeing is a repetition of a pattern. When social problems defy the solutions of current social institutions, pioneers build new ones. The American Civil War was about slavery. It was also about a new reality. New means of transportation and production meant that the old boundaries of state governments were no longer sufficient. The Republicans understood this better than others and insisted on a union - a federal government that was strong enough to govern new interstate realities of railroads, factories, and legal contracts and transactions that would spill across state borders. The multinational corporation grew out of an invention of this period of the 1860s: the modern "interstate" corporation. (And to this day the Republican Party is perhaps most simply thought of as the party most aligned with the corporation.)Regional states could not be allowed to hinder corporate interests and a stronger federal government had to emerge as the context in which a new corporation could be invented.
Social inventions like nation-states, corporations and the foundations that have become so wildly popular in recent decades are created by visionaries who simply don't see a way to address real problems or exploit potential without creating a new means to do that. Entrepreneurs start businesses within a free-market economy. They aren't inventing businesses - just creating a specific one. Uber-entrepreneurs (an odd German-French contraction I've just coined**) are those who invent a new form of social invention: Martin Luther or John Calvin with Protestant churches, Henry VIII or Louis XIV with nation-states, the Rothschilds with international bond markets are examples of uber-entrepreneurs. Perhaps in a couple of decades we'll realize that the flurry of foundations established late in the 20th century represented a type of uber-entrepreneurship, the invention of a new social institution.
** disclaimer: sometimes I hate the net - it seems to reveal that nothing is really new. It turns out that the term uber-entrepreneur has been used before. Perhaps my definition is unique, defining an uber-entrepreneur as someone who isn't necessarily successful but helps to pioneer a new type of social invention.
17 October 2006
The Price of University Age Apathy
A tank of gas: $45
Your student loan: $215 a month
Your mortgage: $2,500 a month
Political apathy: priceless
No generation of Americans will enter the work force with more debt (the vast majority of which will be in the form of student loans) or faced with such outrageously out of reach home prices. And no generation of students will have plowed through school more apathetic about politics and influencing the policy that could impact their reality. Only 28% of unversity-age adults vote.
Is it any wonder that Cheney could hastily fly back from the Middle East last year to break a tie in the Senate, allowing that august body to finally cut spending on one thing: the subsidies to the student loan program? He knew that there could be no political fallout from this generation.
Your student loan: $215 a month
Your mortgage: $2,500 a month
Political apathy: priceless
No generation of Americans will enter the work force with more debt (the vast majority of which will be in the form of student loans) or faced with such outrageously out of reach home prices. And no generation of students will have plowed through school more apathetic about politics and influencing the policy that could impact their reality. Only 28% of unversity-age adults vote.
Is it any wonder that Cheney could hastily fly back from the Middle East last year to break a tie in the Senate, allowing that august body to finally cut spending on one thing: the subsidies to the student loan program? He knew that there could be no political fallout from this generation.
What if We the People Determined How Our Money Was Spent?
So, what are you spending to support our federal government? On average, you spend about (family of four amounts in parenthesis)
$78 ($313) a year on energy expenses, only a fraction of which subsidizes research
$25 ($101) a year on the environment - less than what many people spend in a week at Starbucks
$19 ($75) a year to support scientific research.
$49 ($195) a year on transportation
$1,370 ($5,480) a year on defense
$333 ($1,333) a year on Iraq and Afghanistan.
Think about this. We spend more on Iraq in a month than we spend on the environment in a year. We spend about as much on transportation as we do on a single tank of gas. If these really are our national priorities, I'm more out of touch with mainstream America than I thought.
I think that it's time to begin a national campaign, starting out in focus groups around the country to determine the national priorities and translate them into budget amounts. What if real Americans engaged in real conversations about what mattered and what they'd like to create with their combined clout of nearly $3 trillion, the $9,000 a year each of us spends on the federal government. What an amazing country we could create.
$78 ($313) a year on energy expenses, only a fraction of which subsidizes research
$25 ($101) a year on the environment - less than what many people spend in a week at Starbucks
$19 ($75) a year to support scientific research.
$49 ($195) a year on transportation
$1,370 ($5,480) a year on defense
$333 ($1,333) a year on Iraq and Afghanistan.
Think about this. We spend more on Iraq in a month than we spend on the environment in a year. We spend about as much on transportation as we do on a single tank of gas. If these really are our national priorities, I'm more out of touch with mainstream America than I thought.
I think that it's time to begin a national campaign, starting out in focus groups around the country to determine the national priorities and translate them into budget amounts. What if real Americans engaged in real conversations about what mattered and what they'd like to create with their combined clout of nearly $3 trillion, the $9,000 a year each of us spends on the federal government. What an amazing country we could create.
Well, I'll be ... those viagra spam ads are working
The U.S.population hit 300 million this morning.
16 October 2006
Presidential Prediction Through 2020
John McCain will win the presidency in 2008. You may have read that elsewhere. Let me be the first to say that his presidency will be like Carter's. Even his political opponents will express respect for his principles and honesty and even his supporters will acknowledge their disappointment in his efficacy. And, like Carter's, his will be a single-term presidency. Not only will McCain simply have too much mess to clean up from Bush to ever look good, but he will simply wear out. He will not only be the oldest president ever elected to a first term but, as a former prisoner of war, the combined toll of age, wounds, and the stress of the job will lead him to campaign rather half-heartedly, if at all, for the 2012 campaign.
There is a lot that can and will be said about the intervening years, but I'm in the mood to make an uncharacteristically long-term political forecast: Elliot Spitzer will win the 2012 election and will handily win re-election. Spitzer - President in 2020.
Blogs - daring to print the news that is purely speculative (as if that sets us apart from the mainstream media).
There is a lot that can and will be said about the intervening years, but I'm in the mood to make an uncharacteristically long-term political forecast: Elliot Spitzer will win the 2012 election and will handily win re-election. Spitzer - President in 2020.
Blogs - daring to print the news that is purely speculative (as if that sets us apart from the mainstream media).
14 October 2006
Noble Peace Prize for Making Loans?
Muhammad Yunus won the Noble Peace Prize. He has pioneered the use of micro-loans as a way to fight poverty. His is a brilliant idea that deserves the additional focus that it will get now that he's been made famous by the Scandinavians.
Yunus's idea is simple. Rather than offer charity to the poor, offer them credit. In a typical loan, he'll give a woman enough money to buy a sewing machine or cow, just enough capital to enable her to begin working for herself rather than working for subsistence wages. These women are able to pay back the loan while still generating more revenue than they made as employees. Some have gone on to what their village might consider moderate affluence. Nearly all are in better financial shape than before they received the loan.
Poverty can be mitigated but sustained by charity. It can be ignored by free markets. Much better that policy be used to invest in people who haven't the means to invest in themselves. This breaks the cycle of poverty and what Yunus has done is shown that access to credit is as important to this process as access to education or health care.
As mentioned earlier in this blog, one of the most transformative forces of the 20th century was the extension of credit to a wider and wider swath of the population, the popularization of credit. How wonderful that the world community will be given more reason to consider access to credit as much a right as education or health. In a market economy, as all the world is fast becoming, access to financial markets is key to freedom, to autonomy. In 20 years, it will be considered a right. Noting its importance in making the world a more peaceful place, the Noble Prize Committee has shown itself a visionary group.
Yunus's idea is simple. Rather than offer charity to the poor, offer them credit. In a typical loan, he'll give a woman enough money to buy a sewing machine or cow, just enough capital to enable her to begin working for herself rather than working for subsistence wages. These women are able to pay back the loan while still generating more revenue than they made as employees. Some have gone on to what their village might consider moderate affluence. Nearly all are in better financial shape than before they received the loan.
Poverty can be mitigated but sustained by charity. It can be ignored by free markets. Much better that policy be used to invest in people who haven't the means to invest in themselves. This breaks the cycle of poverty and what Yunus has done is shown that access to credit is as important to this process as access to education or health care.
As mentioned earlier in this blog, one of the most transformative forces of the 20th century was the extension of credit to a wider and wider swath of the population, the popularization of credit. How wonderful that the world community will be given more reason to consider access to credit as much a right as education or health. In a market economy, as all the world is fast becoming, access to financial markets is key to freedom, to autonomy. In 20 years, it will be considered a right. Noting its importance in making the world a more peaceful place, the Noble Prize Committee has shown itself a visionary group.
Democracy and Capitalism
Financial markets were relatively primitive before the development of representative governments. The Venetians led the way in the evolution of bond markets in the early Renaissance, and the Dutch followed a couple of centuries later, making more advances. Finally, after the Glorious Revolution, the English established financial institutions like the Bank of England that would become the foundation to the modern world of finance. All these developments followed the deveopment of representative governments.
The link is fairly straight forward. Kings and queens who need money would rather tax their subjects. They take $100 from you and it is now theirs, to do with as they please. But parliaments who are themselves subject to taxation would rather loan the government money in the form of bonds. Citizens pay $100 for a bond and get $5 payments for years - perhaps for as long as the government stands. Parliament would rather own an asset that could be bought and sold in bond markets than simply lose money through taxes.
Yet the demands of a government like England or France for money during the Napoleonic Wars was huge - requiring the rapid growth in the size and complexity of financial markets. Once financial markets were able to finance large governments and armies, they were well prepared to finance railroads and factories. It is no coincidence that the Napoleonic Wars ended in about 1815 and the first steam engine railroad began operation a decade later in 1825.
Representative government and its demand for money was the social invention that created the context for railroads and automated factories.
The link is fairly straight forward. Kings and queens who need money would rather tax their subjects. They take $100 from you and it is now theirs, to do with as they please. But parliaments who are themselves subject to taxation would rather loan the government money in the form of bonds. Citizens pay $100 for a bond and get $5 payments for years - perhaps for as long as the government stands. Parliament would rather own an asset that could be bought and sold in bond markets than simply lose money through taxes.
Yet the demands of a government like England or France for money during the Napoleonic Wars was huge - requiring the rapid growth in the size and complexity of financial markets. Once financial markets were able to finance large governments and armies, they were well prepared to finance railroads and factories. It is no coincidence that the Napoleonic Wars ended in about 1815 and the first steam engine railroad began operation a decade later in 1825.
Representative government and its demand for money was the social invention that created the context for railroads and automated factories.
12 October 2006
Nailing Jello to the Wall
As I read Woodward's State of Denial, I find myself increasingly appalled at George and his administration and increasingly impressed with the quality and integrity of the military people. It's too bad that they were given a task the success of which was wildly improbable and ultimatlely had little to do with military skills.
Pornography of Fear Sullies the National Conversation
Fear, like sex, hits a primal chord that is hard to ignore. Because sex plays the audience in ways that aren't particularly rational, society has chosen to regulate access to pornography. It's about time that we did the same thing with fear in politics.
One of the big, big problems with the way that the pornography of fear has hijacked the national political conversation is that what a person or group focuses on is what they create. Death is inevitable and whether someone who worries every day about death actually lives longer than the person who spends little time worried about it is not the point. The point is to live until you die and fearing death the whole time you live is not much of a life, in the same way that a policy focused by fear isn't much of a policy.
Tell someone not to think of elephants and what will they immediately think of? Elephants. We worry about terrorists in Iraq killing Americans and what do we now have? Terrorists in Iraq killing Americans.
Politics instead needs a focus on what we want to create - not what we fear. Until the American public and their politicians end their addiction to the pornography of fear, we're unlikely to get that. Never has a generation been faced with such extraordinary possibilities and never has its media been so focused on rubbish. It's time to realize that what we focus on is what we gravitate towards.
One of the big, big problems with the way that the pornography of fear has hijacked the national political conversation is that what a person or group focuses on is what they create. Death is inevitable and whether someone who worries every day about death actually lives longer than the person who spends little time worried about it is not the point. The point is to live until you die and fearing death the whole time you live is not much of a life, in the same way that a policy focused by fear isn't much of a policy.
Tell someone not to think of elephants and what will they immediately think of? Elephants. We worry about terrorists in Iraq killing Americans and what do we now have? Terrorists in Iraq killing Americans.
Politics instead needs a focus on what we want to create - not what we fear. Until the American public and their politicians end their addiction to the pornography of fear, we're unlikely to get that. Never has a generation been faced with such extraordinary possibilities and never has its media been so focused on rubbish. It's time to realize that what we focus on is what we gravitate towards.
North Korea and Nuclear Ambitions
Does anyone seriously question that more and more countries will aspire to become nuclear powers over the next decade or two? If that is the case, does the US really want to pursue a policy of disarmament through intervention every time this happens? Are we really going to threaten invasion of countries armed with nukes every time they get nukes? And how paranoid is that going to make the already paranoid leaders of these countries?
If Iraq has reminded us of nothing else, it should have reminded us that our good intentions need to be run through a filter of what is practical, what can become sustainable policy.
It was a form of apostacy to say that perhaps the best solution to the problem of Iraq was to continue to endure Saddam's rule, looking for opportunities to change rather than forcing them. Perhaps the real policy towards North Korea should be to quietly allow them to be armed, abstaining from talk that makes them feel even more compelled to be armed and hostile, looking for opportunities to change rather than forcing them. People who say that this is dangerous are ignoring the obvious: it is dangerous to make a ruler with nukes feel cornered by the world community.
If Iraq has reminded us of nothing else, it should have reminded us that our good intentions need to be run through a filter of what is practical, what can become sustainable policy.
It was a form of apostacy to say that perhaps the best solution to the problem of Iraq was to continue to endure Saddam's rule, looking for opportunities to change rather than forcing them. Perhaps the real policy towards North Korea should be to quietly allow them to be armed, abstaining from talk that makes them feel even more compelled to be armed and hostile, looking for opportunities to change rather than forcing them. People who say that this is dangerous are ignoring the obvious: it is dangerous to make a ruler with nukes feel cornered by the world community.
Media Misses Biggest Influence on Audience
Our media is focused far more on political changes than businesses changes. Yet it is changes in the realm of business that are going to most change the life of the average person living in a G-7 country (the US, Canada, Japan, France, UK, Germany, and Italy).
Political policy is a huge determinant to quality of life and ought not to be overlooked, but that is hardly a possibility. Yet for the quality of life of the average person living in a G-7 country, business policy is at least as big. Assuming that you live in a democratic country with accoutrements like sewage and running water, your sense of dread or enthusiasm is likely to be a function of whether your company knows how to properly channel your potential into meaningful and engaging work.
More emphasis needs to be paid to business policy and differences in the reality that companies create for their employees, in much the same way that the media now looks at how national policies change the lives of average citizens.
Political policy is a huge determinant to quality of life and ought not to be overlooked, but that is hardly a possibility. Yet for the quality of life of the average person living in a G-7 country, business policy is at least as big. Assuming that you live in a democratic country with accoutrements like sewage and running water, your sense of dread or enthusiasm is likely to be a function of whether your company knows how to properly channel your potential into meaningful and engaging work.
More emphasis needs to be paid to business policy and differences in the reality that companies create for their employees, in much the same way that the media now looks at how national policies change the lives of average citizens.
09 October 2006
Elliott Spitzer as the New Democrat
Too much attention has been paid to the political prospects of Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, or John Edwards for the 2008 election and too little been paid to Elliott Spitzer's rise in the party. Spitzer represents the future of the party.
In 1901, Republican Teddy Roosevelt became president and redefined the role. He challenged businesses in a way that made his Republican peers nervous - feeling that big business needed a big government to counter its power. He realized that labor needed an advocate to balance its battle against capital. Roosevelt was ousted from the Republican Party and his sentiments towards labor were adopted by the Democratic Party, which rode the rise of labor in the 20th century to electoral strength.
Yet late in the 20th century, the division between capital and labor was muddled. Business geniuses like Sam Walton made their employees partners in their business, offering them stock and stock options to align the interest of labor and capital. Through pension funds and mutual funds, labor became the new capitalists. Suddenly, the vote for Republicans or Democrats seemed less clearly about economic policy and more apparently about culture values.
Spitzer has been an activist as Attorney General in New York. Right now, labor owns corporations but lacks any real mechanism for exercising influence over corporate policy. In a plot twist that might have amused Dickens and has been oddly overlooked by the media, labor has become the capitalist. Spitzer, more than any politician at work in the US (he is now running for governor of New York) understands this new reality. His efforts have less easily been understood as attacks on corporations or trusts as Roosevelt championed than as attempts to empower the new labor with new means to exercise their will over the new corporation. His efforts have less to do with curtailing the power and size of corporations than in ensuring that the many owners of these big corporations are properly represented.
If the Democrats want to win again, they have to demonstrate that they know the difference between attacking business and attacking a lack of representation in those businesses. This country was founded by a people who refused government that offered them no representation. The next generation of politicians will represent the large segment of the American population that refuses management that offers them no representation. Elliot Spitzer understands this dynamic and sentiment. His will continue to be a fascinating career to watch.
In 1901, Republican Teddy Roosevelt became president and redefined the role. He challenged businesses in a way that made his Republican peers nervous - feeling that big business needed a big government to counter its power. He realized that labor needed an advocate to balance its battle against capital. Roosevelt was ousted from the Republican Party and his sentiments towards labor were adopted by the Democratic Party, which rode the rise of labor in the 20th century to electoral strength.
Yet late in the 20th century, the division between capital and labor was muddled. Business geniuses like Sam Walton made their employees partners in their business, offering them stock and stock options to align the interest of labor and capital. Through pension funds and mutual funds, labor became the new capitalists. Suddenly, the vote for Republicans or Democrats seemed less clearly about economic policy and more apparently about culture values.
Spitzer has been an activist as Attorney General in New York. Right now, labor owns corporations but lacks any real mechanism for exercising influence over corporate policy. In a plot twist that might have amused Dickens and has been oddly overlooked by the media, labor has become the capitalist. Spitzer, more than any politician at work in the US (he is now running for governor of New York) understands this new reality. His efforts have less easily been understood as attacks on corporations or trusts as Roosevelt championed than as attempts to empower the new labor with new means to exercise their will over the new corporation. His efforts have less to do with curtailing the power and size of corporations than in ensuring that the many owners of these big corporations are properly represented.
If the Democrats want to win again, they have to demonstrate that they know the difference between attacking business and attacking a lack of representation in those businesses. This country was founded by a people who refused government that offered them no representation. The next generation of politicians will represent the large segment of the American population that refuses management that offers them no representation. Elliot Spitzer understands this dynamic and sentiment. His will continue to be a fascinating career to watch.
Why Oil Producing States Are So Often Bad States
Many of the oil-producing states in the world are notoriously immature politically, characterized by authoritarian governments, chaos, or both. Why would a blessing of natural resources so often lead to a curse of bad governments?
The most basic factor of production, or source of wealth, is land. Land refers to all natural resources, from oil to timber to acreage used for ranching or farming. When markets first emerge in a community they are characterized by trade of natural resources - whether it is pepper from the Orient to medieval Europe or gold from the New World to the Orient.
Land is a gift of God. Weather and soil conditions determine crop yields. Those who find themselves atop oil fields or gold mines are more likely to point to God's provision than chance. When land is the basis of wealth, as it is in the early stages of social evolution, religion is a strong partner to commerce and the state.
The state is key to this stage of economic development because it is the state that defines and enforces property rights, lending order to a process that could easily devolve into chaos. Given that communities at this stage of development have been characterized by tribal customs more than national law, the state competes with local counts, barons, or tribal elders for authority and this authority ultimately comes from religious standards or overwhelming force (or some combination).
Power is asserted at this stage of development. Whoever is able to assert power has wealth because economic wealth accrues from control over natural resources.
Once communities reach the next stage of development - dependent on capital that requires the emergence of financial markets and technological development - individuals matter more and power is dispersed from the state to capitalists. Political and economic power are jointly dispersed in the interplay of progress. (In England and the U.S., it seems as though the political power was dispersed before, or along with the economic power; in Singapore and China, it seems as though the economic power has been dispersed before political power.)
Until states move from dependence on natural resources to dependence on capital (and then later the knowledge workers who are key to an information economy), political power is a crude instrument that almost always overlooks the need for individual autonomy. And given that force is key to ownership - as opposed to creativity or knowledge as might be key to ownership in a more advanced economy - literal battles for control will define politics. And given that the natural resources are so obviously gifts of God, religion often colors these brutal struggles for control. And finally, given that in the West (Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities) religion is the force that dominated before the emergence of markets and the state, the battles to define the community are between secularists who follow market forces ("but people pay for rap music") and religious leaders who follow precepts ("but pop culture is immoral and should be regulated or banned").
When the basis of wealth in a country is land, it probabaly will be governed with brute force. If these oil-producing states had to rely on the creativity and initiative of their people for wealth, they'd be forced to govern more liberally.
The most basic factor of production, or source of wealth, is land. Land refers to all natural resources, from oil to timber to acreage used for ranching or farming. When markets first emerge in a community they are characterized by trade of natural resources - whether it is pepper from the Orient to medieval Europe or gold from the New World to the Orient.
Land is a gift of God. Weather and soil conditions determine crop yields. Those who find themselves atop oil fields or gold mines are more likely to point to God's provision than chance. When land is the basis of wealth, as it is in the early stages of social evolution, religion is a strong partner to commerce and the state.
The state is key to this stage of economic development because it is the state that defines and enforces property rights, lending order to a process that could easily devolve into chaos. Given that communities at this stage of development have been characterized by tribal customs more than national law, the state competes with local counts, barons, or tribal elders for authority and this authority ultimately comes from religious standards or overwhelming force (or some combination).
Power is asserted at this stage of development. Whoever is able to assert power has wealth because economic wealth accrues from control over natural resources.
Once communities reach the next stage of development - dependent on capital that requires the emergence of financial markets and technological development - individuals matter more and power is dispersed from the state to capitalists. Political and economic power are jointly dispersed in the interplay of progress. (In England and the U.S., it seems as though the political power was dispersed before, or along with the economic power; in Singapore and China, it seems as though the economic power has been dispersed before political power.)
Until states move from dependence on natural resources to dependence on capital (and then later the knowledge workers who are key to an information economy), political power is a crude instrument that almost always overlooks the need for individual autonomy. And given that force is key to ownership - as opposed to creativity or knowledge as might be key to ownership in a more advanced economy - literal battles for control will define politics. And given that the natural resources are so obviously gifts of God, religion often colors these brutal struggles for control. And finally, given that in the West (Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities) religion is the force that dominated before the emergence of markets and the state, the battles to define the community are between secularists who follow market forces ("but people pay for rap music") and religious leaders who follow precepts ("but pop culture is immoral and should be regulated or banned").
When the basis of wealth in a country is land, it probabaly will be governed with brute force. If these oil-producing states had to rely on the creativity and initiative of their people for wealth, they'd be forced to govern more liberally.
Social Evolution and Iraq
Social evolution is an oddly overlooked topic. I would argue that the Bush administration's problems in Iraq have less to do with intent, planning, or execution than with Iraq's stage of development. It shows their disregard for the principles of evolution or even development.
Evolution suggests that we can't have animals until we have plants for them to eat and can't have carnivores until we have other animals for the carnivores to eat. Evolution suggests that things develop and emerge as an environment produces a particular species that, in turn, becomes a part of the environment that produces another species (and perhaps renders another extinct). Even development suggests a particular order, a need to put up the framing of the house before hammering in sheet rock.
Bush, who has at best shown a disinterest in evolution, opts for a different model. He simply banishes the tyrant, says, "Let there be Democracy," and rests during August.
He says that it is a kind of prejudice to say that Arabs can't have democracy. Actually, it is a kind of ignorance - various Arab states do have various levels of democracy. But the fact is, certain social constructs have to evolve within communities in order for them to arrive at nation-states instead of tribes, to arrive at democracies instead of theocracies, etc. Iraq demonstrated few, if any, of the predecessors to democracy that Japan and Germany had before the reconstruction efforts after World War 2.
To this day, policy analysts overlook this critical analysis - at what stage of development is Iraq? How do the regions of Iraq differ in their development, their readiness for financial markets, political compromise, secular education? What does that suggest about the type of government needed? Readers of my blog hopefully know that I'm nearly idealistic about the importance and value of giving individuals autonomy. Having said that, at a certain level of social development, fairly autocratic governments actually make sense. The attempt to install democracies prematurely can simply create chaos, as it has in Iraq. It is one thing to say that a person should be free to define his or her own life; it is quite another to force a kindergartener to live on his own.
The question not being asked - the question that is essential to reversing the decline into chaos that defines Iraq - is what type of government is appropriate to their level of development? What does that suggest about the "soft" development that is so overlooked. It is one thing to build churches or banks. It is quite another to have people gather for fellowship or shop for loans. The best governments start with where people are - where their beliefs and customs and social practices have them.
Evolution suggests that we can't have animals until we have plants for them to eat and can't have carnivores until we have other animals for the carnivores to eat. Evolution suggests that things develop and emerge as an environment produces a particular species that, in turn, becomes a part of the environment that produces another species (and perhaps renders another extinct). Even development suggests a particular order, a need to put up the framing of the house before hammering in sheet rock.
Bush, who has at best shown a disinterest in evolution, opts for a different model. He simply banishes the tyrant, says, "Let there be Democracy," and rests during August.
He says that it is a kind of prejudice to say that Arabs can't have democracy. Actually, it is a kind of ignorance - various Arab states do have various levels of democracy. But the fact is, certain social constructs have to evolve within communities in order for them to arrive at nation-states instead of tribes, to arrive at democracies instead of theocracies, etc. Iraq demonstrated few, if any, of the predecessors to democracy that Japan and Germany had before the reconstruction efforts after World War 2.
To this day, policy analysts overlook this critical analysis - at what stage of development is Iraq? How do the regions of Iraq differ in their development, their readiness for financial markets, political compromise, secular education? What does that suggest about the type of government needed? Readers of my blog hopefully know that I'm nearly idealistic about the importance and value of giving individuals autonomy. Having said that, at a certain level of social development, fairly autocratic governments actually make sense. The attempt to install democracies prematurely can simply create chaos, as it has in Iraq. It is one thing to say that a person should be free to define his or her own life; it is quite another to force a kindergartener to live on his own.
The question not being asked - the question that is essential to reversing the decline into chaos that defines Iraq - is what type of government is appropriate to their level of development? What does that suggest about the "soft" development that is so overlooked. It is one thing to build churches or banks. It is quite another to have people gather for fellowship or shop for loans. The best governments start with where people are - where their beliefs and customs and social practices have them.
October 13
This week is October, Friday the 13th. You know what that means: all the dyslexic kids will be out trick or treating.
05 October 2006
Weapons of Mass Distraction
Perhaps I'm heading down the slippery slope that will eventually turn me into the old, gout-ridden man who spouts conspiracy theories to the neighborhood children. Or perhaps the party in power has simply earned my distrust. But one has to wonder...
Is it at all possible that Mark Foley is a sacrificial lamb for the gutting of the constitution? I heard John Yoo on the radio the other day, very matter of factly stating that the US - the richest country in the history of the world - could not afford to grant habeas corpus because it was too expensive. He says this with the same calm manner that Bill Kristol uses when he casually suggests that we should trigger World War 3. The Bush administration is deciding who does and who does not qualify for constitutional rights - as if this were something that they could decide. Meanwhile, Mark Foley decides to IM a page and is busted - a story that conveniently breaks the very day that Congress passes legislation enabling Bush's decision to parse out constitutional rights like food stamps, deciding who is worthy.
Is it the Republican Party that is using this sex-less sex scandal to distract us from the real issue of constitutional rights or is it the media? Is it just a coincidence that the network (ABC) that decided to rewrite the 9-11 report to shift blame towards Clinton in the national consciousness is the network that broke the story on Foley?
Kids! Kids! Don't just ride your bike over my petunias! Stop and listen. I have a story to tell you about life in a country that believed that individual rights were more important than state-sponsored paranoia. It was a wonderful country and then that drunken frat boy drove it into the ditch.
Is it at all possible that Mark Foley is a sacrificial lamb for the gutting of the constitution? I heard John Yoo on the radio the other day, very matter of factly stating that the US - the richest country in the history of the world - could not afford to grant habeas corpus because it was too expensive. He says this with the same calm manner that Bill Kristol uses when he casually suggests that we should trigger World War 3. The Bush administration is deciding who does and who does not qualify for constitutional rights - as if this were something that they could decide. Meanwhile, Mark Foley decides to IM a page and is busted - a story that conveniently breaks the very day that Congress passes legislation enabling Bush's decision to parse out constitutional rights like food stamps, deciding who is worthy.
Is it the Republican Party that is using this sex-less sex scandal to distract us from the real issue of constitutional rights or is it the media? Is it just a coincidence that the network (ABC) that decided to rewrite the 9-11 report to shift blame towards Clinton in the national consciousness is the network that broke the story on Foley?
Kids! Kids! Don't just ride your bike over my petunias! Stop and listen. I have a story to tell you about life in a country that believed that individual rights were more important than state-sponsored paranoia. It was a wonderful country and then that drunken frat boy drove it into the ditch.
University 2020
Education supports society and society supports the dominant institution. At one point in Western history the dominant institution was the Church - today it is the Corporation. So what does that suggest about the change in education?
For the medieval church, education was simple - everyone was taught church doctrine. Between 1088 and 1150, universities at Bologna, Oxford, and Paris were established. Basically, a heretic is someone who does not accept the dogma of the church - an independent thinker. It is perhaps no coincidence that the Inquisition began almost exactly at this time - suddenly universities were encouraging thought and minds opened to new ideas were not so easily shut again. Soon, instead of education being subordinated to the church, the church was subordinated to education of radical thinkers like Dr. Martin Luther. Soon, new churches were being founded and minds were shaping churches just as churches had earlier shaped minds.
For the modern university, education is simple - prepare students for gainful employment. That is, subordinate education to the needs of today's dominant institution - the corporation. Within the last century, attendance at universities has exploded as jobs as knowledge workers and managers looked more promising than jobs in manufacturing and agriculture. The sixties probably saw the popularization of corporate heretics - people who began to reject the way that corporate policy and conformity polluted the environment and the soul. The nineties were even more interesting. The generation that questioned authority in the sixties were, perhaps unsurprisingly, questioning the corporate model in the nineties. New technologies like the Internet (which is actually a confluence of a myriad of technologies) and venture capital markets were merged with notions of social constructs - the idea processes and practices, organizations and groups were "just made up." Suddenly, start-ups proliferated as a growing number of minds were shaping new companies just as companies had earlier shaped minds.
This suggests that education will soon be transformed. Instead of preparing students to become employees, universities will prepare students to become entrepreneurs. Education will increasingly have less to do with "civilizing" students in the traditional sense of encouraging conformity and will, instead, point students towards conforming social constructs to their own potential, to harmonize with what it means to be human and what is required to sustain an ecosystem.
Successfully making this transformation will require a number of changes. Chief among them is making a more concerted effort to understand the individual and his or her potential. It will mean a customization of education unlike anything we've seen outside of the world of autodidacts. Increasingly, things like lectures will be "tuned into" over the Internet and certain professors will have millions of "students" in the same way that singers and actors have millions of fans. Those professors who are not wildly popular will have difficultly getting an audience to listen to their version of Shakespeare or logarithms. Instead, they will play brokers - helping students to put together a package of formal education and community / work experience that allows them to better understand their own potential for contribution and making a living. Instead of the big question about "what should I study or do or BE?" being incidental to the machinery of universities, it will become the central, organizing question.
For the medieval church, education was simple - everyone was taught church doctrine. Between 1088 and 1150, universities at Bologna, Oxford, and Paris were established. Basically, a heretic is someone who does not accept the dogma of the church - an independent thinker. It is perhaps no coincidence that the Inquisition began almost exactly at this time - suddenly universities were encouraging thought and minds opened to new ideas were not so easily shut again. Soon, instead of education being subordinated to the church, the church was subordinated to education of radical thinkers like Dr. Martin Luther. Soon, new churches were being founded and minds were shaping churches just as churches had earlier shaped minds.
For the modern university, education is simple - prepare students for gainful employment. That is, subordinate education to the needs of today's dominant institution - the corporation. Within the last century, attendance at universities has exploded as jobs as knowledge workers and managers looked more promising than jobs in manufacturing and agriculture. The sixties probably saw the popularization of corporate heretics - people who began to reject the way that corporate policy and conformity polluted the environment and the soul. The nineties were even more interesting. The generation that questioned authority in the sixties were, perhaps unsurprisingly, questioning the corporate model in the nineties. New technologies like the Internet (which is actually a confluence of a myriad of technologies) and venture capital markets were merged with notions of social constructs - the idea processes and practices, organizations and groups were "just made up." Suddenly, start-ups proliferated as a growing number of minds were shaping new companies just as companies had earlier shaped minds.
This suggests that education will soon be transformed. Instead of preparing students to become employees, universities will prepare students to become entrepreneurs. Education will increasingly have less to do with "civilizing" students in the traditional sense of encouraging conformity and will, instead, point students towards conforming social constructs to their own potential, to harmonize with what it means to be human and what is required to sustain an ecosystem.
Successfully making this transformation will require a number of changes. Chief among them is making a more concerted effort to understand the individual and his or her potential. It will mean a customization of education unlike anything we've seen outside of the world of autodidacts. Increasingly, things like lectures will be "tuned into" over the Internet and certain professors will have millions of "students" in the same way that singers and actors have millions of fans. Those professors who are not wildly popular will have difficultly getting an audience to listen to their version of Shakespeare or logarithms. Instead, they will play brokers - helping students to put together a package of formal education and community / work experience that allows them to better understand their own potential for contribution and making a living. Instead of the big question about "what should I study or do or BE?" being incidental to the machinery of universities, it will become the central, organizing question.
A Brief History of the Modern University
Schools and universities have always been subordinate to the dominant institution. They get their funding and their support because they support the Church (even Harvard, established in the 1600's, turned out more theology students than anything else initially), the State (geography lessons are important for soldiers heading off to conquer or rule colonies) or the corporation.
The origins of the modern university can be traced back to Wilhelm Humboldt, whose brother Alexander was not only friends with Thomas Jefferson and Simon Bolivar but whose wide-ranging travel and writing led to his having more geographic spots named after him than anyone else (e.g., Humboldt County in California). To make a gross simplification, before Wilhelm universities taught accepted knowledge, conveying what was known. After Wilhelm, the model for higher education became a research university - an institution that actually created knowledge in the form of studies and research that could be conveyed. The Prussian government agreed to finance Wilhelm's university in Berlin because its research was so helpful to industry. By WW1, Germany led the world in industries that depended on knowledge workers - industries like automobiles and chemicals. Even after the allies defeated Germany, after the first world war, they were unable to make much sense of the patents and formulas they found, given that British and American education were not up to German standards. Since that time, the modern university naturally feeds the corporate need for fresh knowledge and fresh knowledge workers.
There are divinity schools that prepare young people for the Church. There are military schools that preare young people for service to the State. But these two forms of higher education are dwarfed by the number and size of universities that prepare our youth for the Corporation.
The origins of the modern university can be traced back to Wilhelm Humboldt, whose brother Alexander was not only friends with Thomas Jefferson and Simon Bolivar but whose wide-ranging travel and writing led to his having more geographic spots named after him than anyone else (e.g., Humboldt County in California). To make a gross simplification, before Wilhelm universities taught accepted knowledge, conveying what was known. After Wilhelm, the model for higher education became a research university - an institution that actually created knowledge in the form of studies and research that could be conveyed. The Prussian government agreed to finance Wilhelm's university in Berlin because its research was so helpful to industry. By WW1, Germany led the world in industries that depended on knowledge workers - industries like automobiles and chemicals. Even after the allies defeated Germany, after the first world war, they were unable to make much sense of the patents and formulas they found, given that British and American education were not up to German standards. Since that time, the modern university naturally feeds the corporate need for fresh knowledge and fresh knowledge workers.
There are divinity schools that prepare young people for the Church. There are military schools that preare young people for service to the State. But these two forms of higher education are dwarfed by the number and size of universities that prepare our youth for the Corporation.
30 September 2006
Social Invention and Power
We know that progress depends on technological inventions - the wheel, the steam engine, and the computer are often cited as keys to our movement into the modern world. What gets less attention is the importance of social inventions like the church, state, bank, and corporation.
One of the reasons that we have such great technology and such amazing abilities (we can fly through the air! Talk to people on other continents! See through walls!) is that we embrace new technology and are constantly putting time and effort into improving it, greatly rewarding innovators who improve existing technology by even 10 or 20%.
Yet on the topic of social inventions, we are far more conservative, far less willing for innovation. People kill one another to squelch innovation in religion or politics. Precedent still has enormous sway with courts. Traditions within finance and business still define a great deal of how people and power are organized.
My prediction about the future? Communities that do as much to make individuals comfortable with social innovation as we are with technological innovation will emerge as the leaders of the next economy. Power and wealth will gravitate to these communities.
One of the reasons that we have such great technology and such amazing abilities (we can fly through the air! Talk to people on other continents! See through walls!) is that we embrace new technology and are constantly putting time and effort into improving it, greatly rewarding innovators who improve existing technology by even 10 or 20%.
Yet on the topic of social inventions, we are far more conservative, far less willing for innovation. People kill one another to squelch innovation in religion or politics. Precedent still has enormous sway with courts. Traditions within finance and business still define a great deal of how people and power are organized.
My prediction about the future? Communities that do as much to make individuals comfortable with social innovation as we are with technological innovation will emerge as the leaders of the next economy. Power and wealth will gravitate to these communities.
Cowards or Coup?
Yesterday, the senate passed a new defense spending bill 100-0. Every single Senator agreed that we should spend another half a trillion dollars on defense. It is impossible that a Senate so divided would actually have true unanimity on any topic. It seems to me that there can only be two explanations: either Senators talking about support for our brave troops are too cowardly to be accused of "not supporting our military" should they question a single dime that the Pentagon asks for, or there has already been a coup and the military no longer has to answer to anyone (a possibility strengthened by the fact that it has been half a decade since Congress has even gone through the motions of oversight of Pentagon spending, basically giving the Pentagon free rein to spend unchecked).
There is a difference between loving one's children and blindly granting every funding request that they make, without question or oversight. At a minimum one might think that at least one Senator could stand up and make this point but even that timid claim would take more courage than any Senator has yet demonstrated.
There is a difference between loving one's children and blindly granting every funding request that they make, without question or oversight. At a minimum one might think that at least one Senator could stand up and make this point but even that timid claim would take more courage than any Senator has yet demonstrated.
27 September 2006
George - Boy Cheerleader for Life
At times it seems as though our president is in denial. For instance, he claims that the recently released intelligence report that states that the war in Iraq has allowed Al Qaeda to recruit more freely doesn't actually say that. He wants to "stay the course" in Iraq, never really clarifying whether that course is reflected in the rate of spending, civilian causalities, troop casualties, or terrorist recruitment. For George, things are great.
Smarter people than me have argued that a great deal of our life is spent trying to get high school right. Working out the social dynamics and our role in groups, overcoming fears and knee-jerk reactions. Reliving past successes and hiding from past failures. In this context, George's behavior makes a great deal of sense.
If he had been a football coach in high school, he might be more interested in calling plays in Iraq. If he had been a player, he might be more interested in the reality that our troops face. But George was a cheerleader. His job was to turn his back on the game and keep up the spirits of the crowd, no matter what was happening on the field. Not even the worst defeats were an excuse to hang one's head or shout out suggestions for a play in lieu of cheers. George is boy cheerleader for life. It's just that simple.
Smarter people than me have argued that a great deal of our life is spent trying to get high school right. Working out the social dynamics and our role in groups, overcoming fears and knee-jerk reactions. Reliving past successes and hiding from past failures. In this context, George's behavior makes a great deal of sense.
If he had been a football coach in high school, he might be more interested in calling plays in Iraq. If he had been a player, he might be more interested in the reality that our troops face. But George was a cheerleader. His job was to turn his back on the game and keep up the spirits of the crowd, no matter what was happening on the field. Not even the worst defeats were an excuse to hang one's head or shout out suggestions for a play in lieu of cheers. George is boy cheerleader for life. It's just that simple.
Corporation 2020: Lesson From the Dot-Bomb
The dot-com boom and bust is dismissed as a typical speculative bubble, a lesson for those enchanted with the prospect of sustaining outrageous returns for more than a year or two. It could be that. It could also be a signal of something else - a latent potential in our financial system that we've yet to tap.
In today's world, trillions of dollars slosh about the globe in search of high returns. It may be that the lesson of the dot-bomb is that there is now more money than entrepreneurial opportunity. That is, if you have, say, $1,000 but only $100 worth of decent investment opportunities, you either bid up the value of those decent investment opportunities, fund some not so decent opportunities, or sit on your money, which is hard to do when the $1,000 is bidding up the value of investment opportunities so rapidly that they promise a great return.
Prices rise when demand is greater than supply. When there is more money seeking return than there are legitimate investment opportunities, prices of those investments rise ... for a time. There were actually two ways that the market could have reached equilibrium once prices were too high. One was to have prices collapse so that they aligned with returns (and this is what did happen). Another is to have the business market respond to higher prices by creating business investments - increasing quantity of investments supplied to align with the quantity of money used to demand investments (or buy stocks). That is, corporations could have become more entrepreneurial.
The lesson of the dot-bomb market was that the business world simply wasn't able to generate enough investment opportunities. This was a less a failure of the venture capital markets than a failure of corporations to imitate those markets.
Corporations are notoriously risk adverse. No one wants to look bad. Anyone who is able to closely observe management can only conclude that they don't like surprises. By contrast, venture capitalists know that a majority of their investments will bomb and look for successes to more than offset those failures. Within the portfolio of a venture capitalist, only a minority of investments will succeed. Corporations were unable to take advantage of the conditions in the late 1990s - the conditions that made expansion so favorable - because business practices within organizations are more focused on cost reduction and efficiencies than entrepreneurship and creativity.
When NASDAQ fell so far, so fast early in this century, it may not have been a problem of financial markets at all. It may have simply been a problem of corporations being unable to produce what the market demanded - more entrepreneurship.
But corporations are enamored of information and knowledge workers - the key to progress in the last economy. They still see entrepreneurship as something that happens outside of their doors and their policies reveal a blind eye to entrepreneurial possibilities within their organization. Until they change their focus, the latent potential of modern financial markets will continue to go unrealized.
In today's world, trillions of dollars slosh about the globe in search of high returns. It may be that the lesson of the dot-bomb is that there is now more money than entrepreneurial opportunity. That is, if you have, say, $1,000 but only $100 worth of decent investment opportunities, you either bid up the value of those decent investment opportunities, fund some not so decent opportunities, or sit on your money, which is hard to do when the $1,000 is bidding up the value of investment opportunities so rapidly that they promise a great return.
Prices rise when demand is greater than supply. When there is more money seeking return than there are legitimate investment opportunities, prices of those investments rise ... for a time. There were actually two ways that the market could have reached equilibrium once prices were too high. One was to have prices collapse so that they aligned with returns (and this is what did happen). Another is to have the business market respond to higher prices by creating business investments - increasing quantity of investments supplied to align with the quantity of money used to demand investments (or buy stocks). That is, corporations could have become more entrepreneurial.
The lesson of the dot-bomb market was that the business world simply wasn't able to generate enough investment opportunities. This was a less a failure of the venture capital markets than a failure of corporations to imitate those markets.
Corporations are notoriously risk adverse. No one wants to look bad. Anyone who is able to closely observe management can only conclude that they don't like surprises. By contrast, venture capitalists know that a majority of their investments will bomb and look for successes to more than offset those failures. Within the portfolio of a venture capitalist, only a minority of investments will succeed. Corporations were unable to take advantage of the conditions in the late 1990s - the conditions that made expansion so favorable - because business practices within organizations are more focused on cost reduction and efficiencies than entrepreneurship and creativity.
When NASDAQ fell so far, so fast early in this century, it may not have been a problem of financial markets at all. It may have simply been a problem of corporations being unable to produce what the market demanded - more entrepreneurship.
But corporations are enamored of information and knowledge workers - the key to progress in the last economy. They still see entrepreneurship as something that happens outside of their doors and their policies reveal a blind eye to entrepreneurial possibilities within their organization. Until they change their focus, the latent potential of modern financial markets will continue to go unrealized.
25 September 2006
Pope on Crusade Against Religious Intolerance and Violence
Like so many of the policy pronouncements of the modern world, this only makes sense to people who are multitasking or lack a sense of history. Hm. Okay, okay ... I guess this only makes sense to most people.
Leadership and Potential
The potential of a child born in medieval France is very different than the potential of a child born in modern France. Potential may be something that the individual realizes, but its boundaries are largely defined by society.
The responsibility of leaders is to change what is possible - to improve the potential of the average person.
The responsibility of leaders is to change what is possible - to improve the potential of the average person.
The Last Chapter of Reality TV
So, I'm sitting in a hotel last week, channel surfing and playing pop culture catch up. One of the cable channels has a show, apparently inspired by Ozzy Osbourne's, following Kiss's Gene Simmons and his family. It's a terribly self-conscious performance for a presumed reality show (although given I didn't watch the beginning or end it may not have been billed as such). Watching this, it occurs to me that there would be a simple way to put a stake in the heart of reality TV. Someone needs to make a show with TV cameras following a group of people around, filming their daily lives, and then they need a second set of cameras to follow them around to see how the crew deals with the subjects and how the subjects deal with being filmed. It'd be a reality show about how people cope with being on a reality show.
After that, we would just need a reality show that shows the audience what they look like as they watch the reality show, letting the snake swallow its tail until it disappears. What was it that Confucius said? When TV finally becomes a mirror we will see ourselves as we really are and change the channel from reality show to reality. It's an odd and circuitous route to self-awareness, but we all knew that we'd get there eventually.
After that, we would just need a reality show that shows the audience what they look like as they watch the reality show, letting the snake swallow its tail until it disappears. What was it that Confucius said? When TV finally becomes a mirror we will see ourselves as we really are and change the channel from reality show to reality. It's an odd and circuitous route to self-awareness, but we all knew that we'd get there eventually.
22 September 2006
C-e(Bay)-O
Competitive markets help drive down prices and raise the probability that resources will be best used. In the last 25 years, CEO pay has shot upwards from about 25X the average employee's salary to about 500X. Some argue that this tracks the escalation of salaries for pop stars, movie stars, and famous authors like JK Rowling. CEOs are the new stars of the business world, and like stars in other arenas, they are beneficiaries of the new information economy and globalization.
I'm less impressed with this argument. Nobody has to be JK Rowling but somebody has to be the CEO of GE or GM. Nobody advertises for a position described as "create a world of magic for fame and fortune." Boards do advertise (albeit informally) for someone to manage their company.
What if companies used markets as a means to drive down the price and raise the quality of one of their biggest costs? What if stockholders were allowed to use eBay to vote on the next CEO?
CEOs could campaign - taking advantage of internet technology to create broadcasts and informative web sites. They could compete with one another by offering alternative strategies for products, for process, and for work environments. Employees, who so often own a significant share of stocks, would have influence over this process as well, able to vote their stock. The process of competing campaigns would, itself, help to buttress the quality of the company by forcing every CEO candidate to respond to the ideas any candidate might put forth. Mutual fund managers could take a more activist role, looking for candidates they felt would do the most to enhance stock value because of their combination of positive impact on business profits and their affordability vs. other candidates.
This campaign could exploit auction technology, allowing CEO candidates to under bid one another and "voters" in the form of stockholders to out bid each other for particular candidates.
CEO's currently make too much and impact companies too little. Perhaps C-eBay-O's would be more affordable and help to open up a currently opaque process in a way that would allow them to have a more positive impact.
I'm less impressed with this argument. Nobody has to be JK Rowling but somebody has to be the CEO of GE or GM. Nobody advertises for a position described as "create a world of magic for fame and fortune." Boards do advertise (albeit informally) for someone to manage their company.
What if companies used markets as a means to drive down the price and raise the quality of one of their biggest costs? What if stockholders were allowed to use eBay to vote on the next CEO?
CEOs could campaign - taking advantage of internet technology to create broadcasts and informative web sites. They could compete with one another by offering alternative strategies for products, for process, and for work environments. Employees, who so often own a significant share of stocks, would have influence over this process as well, able to vote their stock. The process of competing campaigns would, itself, help to buttress the quality of the company by forcing every CEO candidate to respond to the ideas any candidate might put forth. Mutual fund managers could take a more activist role, looking for candidates they felt would do the most to enhance stock value because of their combination of positive impact on business profits and their affordability vs. other candidates.
This campaign could exploit auction technology, allowing CEO candidates to under bid one another and "voters" in the form of stockholders to out bid each other for particular candidates.
CEO's currently make too much and impact companies too little. Perhaps C-eBay-O's would be more affordable and help to open up a currently opaque process in a way that would allow them to have a more positive impact.
20 September 2006
Mandatory drug testing for the presidency
This week Time magazine has a cover "War with Iran." That the invasion of Iraq would be such a fiasco and that Iran would be at least five years away from nuclear weapon capability suggests that this drum beat for another war can only be attributed to one thing - drug use. Seriously. What else would explain such paranoia and delusion?
It can't just be a coincidence that the generation that popularized recreational drug use has taken the reins of power in the government and media and that both are now exhibiting such high levels of paranoia, alarm and disconnection from reality.
Drug testing for presidents. It could save lives.
It can't just be a coincidence that the generation that popularized recreational drug use has taken the reins of power in the government and media and that both are now exhibiting such high levels of paranoia, alarm and disconnection from reality.
Drug testing for presidents. It could save lives.
19 September 2006
Virgo
I’m not really pleased that eblogger has translated my birth date into an astrological sign. I’m a Virgo. We don’t believe in astrology.
18 September 2006
Clash of Religions
Two religions are destined to continually clash. They are not Christianity and Islam. Rather, they are religion as experienced by the individual and religion as experienced by society. What society needs is toleration of others; what the individual needs is separation from, and even rejetion of, others.
Huston Smith points out that he doesn't speak "language" but, rather, speaks "a language." All the talk of religion, of the transcendent, of God and souls ultimately needs a means of expression other than the abstract. In this, the individual has the need for something specific and, in a sense, something custom and true to the self. This kind of religion invariably separates the individual from the community - whether it is a group of Christians who shy away from worldly influences or the individual who loves fellowship within that group while feeling a degree of separation from even his or her group. This role of communing with something eternal - whether it is perceived as touching God, Holy Scriptures, the spiritual, the eternal, or the god within - is necessarily separating. Such a separation invariably includes, or at least connotes, a condemnation of the world or other groups who find their refuge through some other process, intermediary, or belief or even profess no need for such separation.
What the individual experiences as refuge from the world the world quite rightly experiences as rejection. And crudely or thoughtlessly done, it becomes offensive. The pope trying to declare a distinction from Islam very easily slips into condemning Muslims.
There was a time when it was laughable that communities would have to be mindful of their impact on the environment. Nature was so big and people so small that the notion of harming it was inconceivable. During medieval times, people wrote of walking through forests and not seeing sun light for days – walking through forests that no longer exist. When Christ or Mohammed first preached, it may well have seemed ridiculous to their early followers that there would some day be billions of Christians and Muslims whose desire to protect themselves from a hostile world would actually be a threat to that world.
Obviously, religious individuals need to do more to show toleration, to exhibit the side of most religions that emphasizes the love for others more than love for self. Much, but perhaps still not enough, has been made of this. Less has been made of the need for society to become more sensitive to the need of the individual to withdraw from and even reject "the world" as a means for the individual to save his or her soul.
Huston Smith points out that he doesn't speak "language" but, rather, speaks "a language." All the talk of religion, of the transcendent, of God and souls ultimately needs a means of expression other than the abstract. In this, the individual has the need for something specific and, in a sense, something custom and true to the self. This kind of religion invariably separates the individual from the community - whether it is a group of Christians who shy away from worldly influences or the individual who loves fellowship within that group while feeling a degree of separation from even his or her group. This role of communing with something eternal - whether it is perceived as touching God, Holy Scriptures, the spiritual, the eternal, or the god within - is necessarily separating. Such a separation invariably includes, or at least connotes, a condemnation of the world or other groups who find their refuge through some other process, intermediary, or belief or even profess no need for such separation.
What the individual experiences as refuge from the world the world quite rightly experiences as rejection. And crudely or thoughtlessly done, it becomes offensive. The pope trying to declare a distinction from Islam very easily slips into condemning Muslims.
There was a time when it was laughable that communities would have to be mindful of their impact on the environment. Nature was so big and people so small that the notion of harming it was inconceivable. During medieval times, people wrote of walking through forests and not seeing sun light for days – walking through forests that no longer exist. When Christ or Mohammed first preached, it may well have seemed ridiculous to their early followers that there would some day be billions of Christians and Muslims whose desire to protect themselves from a hostile world would actually be a threat to that world.
Obviously, religious individuals need to do more to show toleration, to exhibit the side of most religions that emphasizes the love for others more than love for self. Much, but perhaps still not enough, has been made of this. Less has been made of the need for society to become more sensitive to the need of the individual to withdraw from and even reject "the world" as a means for the individual to save his or her soul.
Corporation 2020: Free Press Inside the Corporation
The first in a series of musings about corporations in the future ....
Today, the cost of "broadcasting" video has dropped exponentially. Video production equipment that once cost millions is now available for a few thousand, thanks to technology from folks like Video Toaster. Video, like print after the Gutenburg Press, will rapidly proliferate as costs plummet. (During medieval times, one man actually sold his house in order to get enough to buy a Bible.)
This suggests that a new type of journalism will emerge, doing for corporations what journalism of the 18th century did for the nation-state. Coverage of what is really going on inside of corporations has already begun with blogs. Soon, this will spread to more sophisticated forms of media, imitating the professional and argumentative tone of political media within modern democracies.
Many of the traditional corporations will likely resist this - reinforcing the notion that modern corporations are not places that grant employees simple rights like freedom of speech. Just as oppressive governments use the cover of national security, corporations will use the cover of proprietary knowledge and competition sensitive to mute their internal reporters and critics. But the enlightened corporations will embrace this as a means to check bad management, test policy options, and gain fuller involvement in the important task of policy formulation.
Today, the cost of "broadcasting" video has dropped exponentially. Video production equipment that once cost millions is now available for a few thousand, thanks to technology from folks like Video Toaster. Video, like print after the Gutenburg Press, will rapidly proliferate as costs plummet. (During medieval times, one man actually sold his house in order to get enough to buy a Bible.)
This suggests that a new type of journalism will emerge, doing for corporations what journalism of the 18th century did for the nation-state. Coverage of what is really going on inside of corporations has already begun with blogs. Soon, this will spread to more sophisticated forms of media, imitating the professional and argumentative tone of political media within modern democracies.
Many of the traditional corporations will likely resist this - reinforcing the notion that modern corporations are not places that grant employees simple rights like freedom of speech. Just as oppressive governments use the cover of national security, corporations will use the cover of proprietary knowledge and competition sensitive to mute their internal reporters and critics. But the enlightened corporations will embrace this as a means to check bad management, test policy options, and gain fuller involvement in the important task of policy formulation.
15 September 2006
Unwinding Keynes
About a year ago, congress passed legislation that made it harder for folks to walk away from bankruptcies, leaving the irresponsible and unlucky burdened with more debt than before. Even ignoring the audacity of this congress - the one that has reversed a record surplus into a record deficit - passing a bill that supposedly forces more fiscal discipline onto American households, this is bad policy.
About half of all bankruptcies are the result of health problems. Perhaps only 10 or 20% of bankruptcies result from what we typically think of as irresponsible spending. Many people need to incur debt just to start their careers - investing in a college education. Homes, too, are expensive and mortgage payments often leave young families with very little breathing room between fixed costs and expected income. A serious health problem that costs $100,000 or more can be just enough to tip people over the edge and into bankruptcy.
Even if this were not the case, think about the consequences of more punative bankruptcy legislation. People are willing to spend money on college, refigerators, houses, and vacations in part because they feel like if they do fail to pay they will find someway to recover. When that hope is taken from them, they will become more hesitant about buying. This could, in time, cause a perceptible slump in consumption.
During the days of debtor's prisons, there was little money and little consumption. The big factories that emerged at the tail end of this era literally produced more goods than people could buy. One of the ways that capitalists became rich was by granting credit to consumers who otherwise could not have afforded the new product that came off the assmebly lines. This created a virtuous cycle of economic activity: granting credit stimulated spending which stimluated production which stimulated employment -- and the employed could buy more which allowed companies to employ more and on it went. The economic growth of the last century has in no small part been stimulated by easier credit.
What happens when credit is tighter? The next economic slump - and there are always more slumps coming - could lead to a economic contraction that is disproportionate to its initial cause, as people cautiously reduce their spending in response to economic uncertainty. When such caution becomes widespread, it inevitably justifies itself with a recession.
About half of all bankruptcies are the result of health problems. Perhaps only 10 or 20% of bankruptcies result from what we typically think of as irresponsible spending. Many people need to incur debt just to start their careers - investing in a college education. Homes, too, are expensive and mortgage payments often leave young families with very little breathing room between fixed costs and expected income. A serious health problem that costs $100,000 or more can be just enough to tip people over the edge and into bankruptcy.
Even if this were not the case, think about the consequences of more punative bankruptcy legislation. People are willing to spend money on college, refigerators, houses, and vacations in part because they feel like if they do fail to pay they will find someway to recover. When that hope is taken from them, they will become more hesitant about buying. This could, in time, cause a perceptible slump in consumption.
During the days of debtor's prisons, there was little money and little consumption. The big factories that emerged at the tail end of this era literally produced more goods than people could buy. One of the ways that capitalists became rich was by granting credit to consumers who otherwise could not have afforded the new product that came off the assmebly lines. This created a virtuous cycle of economic activity: granting credit stimulated spending which stimluated production which stimulated employment -- and the employed could buy more which allowed companies to employ more and on it went. The economic growth of the last century has in no small part been stimulated by easier credit.
What happens when credit is tighter? The next economic slump - and there are always more slumps coming - could lead to a economic contraction that is disproportionate to its initial cause, as people cautiously reduce their spending in response to economic uncertainty. When such caution becomes widespread, it inevitably justifies itself with a recession.
Do Your Civic Duty - Bore a Child Today
100 years ago, parents fretted over keeping their children fed. Today, parents fret about keeping their children amused. Videos, theme parks, iPods, and trips to the mall are among the attempts parents make to keep their children from slipping into that dreaded state of boredom.
Yet it is unlikely that anyone who is continually amused by life will ever have the time or inclination to define a life. Leo Buscalgia once shared his response to his children complaining, "Dad, I'm bored." "Good," he responded. "Let me know how it works out."
So much lies beyond boredom - wonderful things like creativity, goal formulation, and introspection. Given that, consider it a public service to bore a child today. If you can, offer to pick up a niece or nephew, a neighbor's child, even your own child, and take them somewhere devoid of stimulation. See how it works out.
Yet it is unlikely that anyone who is continually amused by life will ever have the time or inclination to define a life. Leo Buscalgia once shared his response to his children complaining, "Dad, I'm bored." "Good," he responded. "Let me know how it works out."
So much lies beyond boredom - wonderful things like creativity, goal formulation, and introspection. Given that, consider it a public service to bore a child today. If you can, offer to pick up a niece or nephew, a neighbor's child, even your own child, and take them somewhere devoid of stimulation. See how it works out.
13 September 2006
News?!
Today's San Diego Union Tribune has an interesting headline: Pope Says Jihad Not God's Plan. Actually, that's not news. News would be: Pope Says Jihad Is God's Plan.
I'm amazed at how comprehensive is the coverage of sports. That's news. It includes analysis, personalities, stories, and strategy, but sports news always has a large infusion of numbers: passing yards, runs scored, field goal percentage, etc. Given that sports coverage is so focused on so many statistics, fans can easily track how their teams and players are doing. Performance is well understood and easy to track.
By contrast, news coverage of important events - like healthcare coverage, performance of schools or businesses, progress or setbacks in war - suffers from a far different ratio of analysis, speculation, and prognosis to actual statistics. That is to say, there is a paucity of statistics and an abundance of analysis. This is partly because the stakes are higher and the timeframe is longer: the sports fan can measure progress every minute of the game. Statistics measuring policy comes more slowly and the variables that impact outcomes like unemployment, crime, teen pregnancy, life expectancy, and inflation are more complex.
Nonetheless, it seems as though a news program that would focus on quality of life statistics in the same way that ESPN analysts focused on Ryan Howard or David Ortiz's homerun totals would be engaging and quite feasible in this age of 24-hour news coverage. Given that there is so much at stake in this game of policy formulation, one might think that the media could offer coverage that was as grounded in real metrics and real outcomes as the coverage of grown men playing games.
I'm amazed at how comprehensive is the coverage of sports. That's news. It includes analysis, personalities, stories, and strategy, but sports news always has a large infusion of numbers: passing yards, runs scored, field goal percentage, etc. Given that sports coverage is so focused on so many statistics, fans can easily track how their teams and players are doing. Performance is well understood and easy to track.
By contrast, news coverage of important events - like healthcare coverage, performance of schools or businesses, progress or setbacks in war - suffers from a far different ratio of analysis, speculation, and prognosis to actual statistics. That is to say, there is a paucity of statistics and an abundance of analysis. This is partly because the stakes are higher and the timeframe is longer: the sports fan can measure progress every minute of the game. Statistics measuring policy comes more slowly and the variables that impact outcomes like unemployment, crime, teen pregnancy, life expectancy, and inflation are more complex.
Nonetheless, it seems as though a news program that would focus on quality of life statistics in the same way that ESPN analysts focused on Ryan Howard or David Ortiz's homerun totals would be engaging and quite feasible in this age of 24-hour news coverage. Given that there is so much at stake in this game of policy formulation, one might think that the media could offer coverage that was as grounded in real metrics and real outcomes as the coverage of grown men playing games.
12 September 2006
Slipping From Neoconservative Philosophy to Neoconservative Faith
History will judge ….
What do you do when you demand more accountability in government and then your own government policies lead to a series of mistakes? You shift accountability out to a point in time when you are dead and gone. Pretty slick, if you can get away with it.
But what this really illustrates is that Condi, Dick, Donald, and George have slipped from the world of philosophy to faith. They no longer make assertions based on their neoconservative philosophy. Rather, they make assertions based on the neoconservative faith. “History will judge,” has become the equivalent of “God will judge.” And in this they move from bad philosophy to bad religion, for only bad religions ignore the consequences (whether they be called spirits or fruits) harvested in this lifetime and instead defer all judgment to a spiritual afterlife.
What do you do when you demand more accountability in government and then your own government policies lead to a series of mistakes? You shift accountability out to a point in time when you are dead and gone. Pretty slick, if you can get away with it.
But what this really illustrates is that Condi, Dick, Donald, and George have slipped from the world of philosophy to faith. They no longer make assertions based on their neoconservative philosophy. Rather, they make assertions based on the neoconservative faith. “History will judge,” has become the equivalent of “God will judge.” And in this they move from bad philosophy to bad religion, for only bad religions ignore the consequences (whether they be called spirits or fruits) harvested in this lifetime and instead defer all judgment to a spiritual afterlife.
11 September 2006
Economic Performance Under Republican Presidents
1948 to 2001, average economic performance under Democratic (D) or Republican (R) presidents.
____Unemployment_______GDP Growth________Inflation
D__________4.84%____________4.08%__________3.97%
R__________6.35%____________2.86%__________3.95%
Further, all income groups did better under post-war Democratic presidents, with those in the bottom 20 percent enjoying income increases as much as four times under the Democrats as what they enjoyed under Republican presidents.
Paper cited:
http://www.princeton.edu/~bartels/income.pdf
Article from which summary was extracted:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200608u/stagflation
____Unemployment_______GDP Growth________Inflation
D__________4.84%____________4.08%__________3.97%
R__________6.35%____________2.86%__________3.95%
Further, all income groups did better under post-war Democratic presidents, with those in the bottom 20 percent enjoying income increases as much as four times under the Democrats as what they enjoyed under Republican presidents.
Paper cited:
http://www.princeton.edu/~bartels/income.pdf
Article from which summary was extracted:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200608u/stagflation
10 September 2006
Beat Poets and Club Baby Seals
Dylan and Springsteen are rare. As I get older, I find it more perplexing that pop rock musicians feel obliged to imitate them - writing the music and lyrics for songs. So many of the lyrics are both inane and poorly written.
Why couldn't more musicians share the wealth with real poets, hiring them to write or at least collaborate on the lyrics to catchy tunes? In a world of iPod plugged young people, just think what intelligent lyrics could mean. A national campaign to hire poets for music could do more to raise SAT scores and IQs than reading programs.
Why couldn't more musicians share the wealth with real poets, hiring them to write or at least collaborate on the lyrics to catchy tunes? In a world of iPod plugged young people, just think what intelligent lyrics could mean. A national campaign to hire poets for music could do more to raise SAT scores and IQs than reading programs.
07 September 2006
What's good enough for America is good enough for General Motors
Poll CEOs at Fortune 500 companies and you're unlikley to find more than a small fraction who would support command and control economies at the national level. Yet this is exactly what they create within their corporations. Depending on the measure, of the 100 largest global economies, corporations constitute from one-third to two-thirds of the total. GE's sales and market cap are considerably more than the GDP of most countries. Given how much better market economies perform than command and control economies, this suggests that the corporations' use of centrally-planned, command and control economies represents a huge loss of potential.
Companies try to link performance and rewards now, but most attempts miss the point. The market economy doesn't dictate to people, "Do X and we'll pay you your wage and throw in a bonus of up to 20%." The market doesn't actually give instructions, it simply gives feedback. And the rewards are not bounded by quotas but, rather, by interaction of supply and demand. Players within a market (e.g., labor market) are free to choose what to do in order to best reconcile often conflicting goals of personal satisfaction and cash flow and location and coworkers, etc.
Companies need to allow employees more freedom to choose what to do, just as market economies do. And these employees can make less or more than they might think reasonable, depending on the consequences of their choices. In this post-information age of person-to-person communication and the possibility of auctions (like eBay), internal markets could emerge. There are a variety of ways that smart companies could add enormous value to such internal markets, from mitigating the highs and lows of market swings to providing information about supply and demand trends (e.g., "project teams have recently bid up the price of C++ programmers and MS Project Analysts by over 20%"), helping to facilitate the attainment of new skills and experiences that enhance wages for employees and value for the company.
Such solutions obviously raise a number of questions, but they are the questions whose answers promise progress. CEOs need to stop imposing on their employees conditions that they would reject having imposed on them. If there is ever a assumption that ensures poor leadership, it would be that "They (the commoners) are motivated differently than we are."
Companies try to link performance and rewards now, but most attempts miss the point. The market economy doesn't dictate to people, "Do X and we'll pay you your wage and throw in a bonus of up to 20%." The market doesn't actually give instructions, it simply gives feedback. And the rewards are not bounded by quotas but, rather, by interaction of supply and demand. Players within a market (e.g., labor market) are free to choose what to do in order to best reconcile often conflicting goals of personal satisfaction and cash flow and location and coworkers, etc.
Companies need to allow employees more freedom to choose what to do, just as market economies do. And these employees can make less or more than they might think reasonable, depending on the consequences of their choices. In this post-information age of person-to-person communication and the possibility of auctions (like eBay), internal markets could emerge. There are a variety of ways that smart companies could add enormous value to such internal markets, from mitigating the highs and lows of market swings to providing information about supply and demand trends (e.g., "project teams have recently bid up the price of C++ programmers and MS Project Analysts by over 20%"), helping to facilitate the attainment of new skills and experiences that enhance wages for employees and value for the company.
Such solutions obviously raise a number of questions, but they are the questions whose answers promise progress. CEOs need to stop imposing on their employees conditions that they would reject having imposed on them. If there is ever a assumption that ensures poor leadership, it would be that "They (the commoners) are motivated differently than we are."
06 September 2006
Slamo-o-Fascists
Earlier this summer, Democratic senator Dick Durbin got in trouble for comparing the mistreatment of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay with what Nazis did. This week, Donald Rumsfeld got in trouble for comparing critics of the war with Nazi appeasers. In response to criticism, Rumsfeld clarified that critics are not just like Nazi appeasers but also those who appeased communists.
The Bush administration has taken to calling theirs the fight against Islamofascism. In the midst of all these references to Nazis and fascists, it is worth reviewing what political ideology helped to trigger the atrocity that killed more people than now live in Canada.
Here is a definition captured on Wikipedia:
Paxton further defines fascism's essence as:
· "1. a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of traditional solutions; 2. belief one’s group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits; 3. need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts; 4. right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint; 5. fear of foreign `contamination."
Using this definition of fascism, let’s see who comes closest to the ideology – the Bush administration or its critics.
1. a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of traditional solutions
The Bush administration and its apologists have argued that even civil rights have to be renegotiated in light of the threat of this new war against terrorism, suggesting that prevention of terrorist acts has priority over any traditional civil rights.
Critics of the Bush administration have maintained that terrorism calls for international cooperation and police action – treating terrorism as a crime rather than a war. In this light, the threat is no different than so many others that we’ve learned to live with.
2. belief one’s group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits
The Bush administration has launched an invasion of Iraq in spite of hard evidence of a threat to the lives of Americans from the Iraqi regime. As a result, some 30,000 to 150,000 Iraqis have been killed. The American invasion was not sanctioned by international organizations like the UN and even today the administration claims exemptions from the international criminal court. Guantanamo Bay in Cuba was chosen as a holding place for suspects in the war on terrorism because it was in location that exempted it from US or international law.
Bush’s critics have argued that holding children in Guantanamo is both illegal and immoral, and have questioned the need to kill civilians in the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
3. need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts
Bush has repeatedly asserted his exemption from laws. He knew that Putin had a good soul because he looked into his eyes; he knew that Saddam was a threat because he’d threatened his father.
Bush’s critics argue that the constitution and not the former C-student from Yale is the ultimate authority in this country.
4. right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint
See definitions 1 through 3.
5. fear of foreign `contamination."
The Bush administration seriously curtailed the number of foreign graduate students and workers who would have earlier come to this country, a group that has previously included Andy Grove (co-founder of Intel) and Sergy Brin (co-founder of Google).
Bush’s critics have seen foreign opinion and people as not only relevant but beneficial in the commerce of ideas, much as foreign goods and services benefit our economy through open trade.
There is a reason that people revert to the Nazi comparisons. One has to do with the desire to again face a force that is clearly in the wrong. More subtly, another has to do with the recurrence of policies that trace their origins to the same uber-patriotism that sees national identity as something to be protected from real people, disregard for legal niceties that constrain one from doing “the right thing,” and conviction that the times we live in do not allow us to enjoy the same civil liberties that previous, less troubled generations enjoyed. Perhaps there is a reason that more Europeans see America as a greater threat to global stability than Iran.
The Bush administration has taken to calling theirs the fight against Islamofascism. In the midst of all these references to Nazis and fascists, it is worth reviewing what political ideology helped to trigger the atrocity that killed more people than now live in Canada.
Here is a definition captured on Wikipedia:
Paxton further defines fascism's essence as:
· "1. a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of traditional solutions; 2. belief one’s group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits; 3. need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts; 4. right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint; 5. fear of foreign `contamination."
Using this definition of fascism, let’s see who comes closest to the ideology – the Bush administration or its critics.
1. a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond reach of traditional solutions
The Bush administration and its apologists have argued that even civil rights have to be renegotiated in light of the threat of this new war against terrorism, suggesting that prevention of terrorist acts has priority over any traditional civil rights.
Critics of the Bush administration have maintained that terrorism calls for international cooperation and police action – treating terrorism as a crime rather than a war. In this light, the threat is no different than so many others that we’ve learned to live with.
2. belief one’s group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits
The Bush administration has launched an invasion of Iraq in spite of hard evidence of a threat to the lives of Americans from the Iraqi regime. As a result, some 30,000 to 150,000 Iraqis have been killed. The American invasion was not sanctioned by international organizations like the UN and even today the administration claims exemptions from the international criminal court. Guantanamo Bay in Cuba was chosen as a holding place for suspects in the war on terrorism because it was in location that exempted it from US or international law.
Bush’s critics have argued that holding children in Guantanamo is both illegal and immoral, and have questioned the need to kill civilians in the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
3. need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts
Bush has repeatedly asserted his exemption from laws. He knew that Putin had a good soul because he looked into his eyes; he knew that Saddam was a threat because he’d threatened his father.
Bush’s critics argue that the constitution and not the former C-student from Yale is the ultimate authority in this country.
4. right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint
See definitions 1 through 3.
5. fear of foreign `contamination."
The Bush administration seriously curtailed the number of foreign graduate students and workers who would have earlier come to this country, a group that has previously included Andy Grove (co-founder of Intel) and Sergy Brin (co-founder of Google).
Bush’s critics have seen foreign opinion and people as not only relevant but beneficial in the commerce of ideas, much as foreign goods and services benefit our economy through open trade.
There is a reason that people revert to the Nazi comparisons. One has to do with the desire to again face a force that is clearly in the wrong. More subtly, another has to do with the recurrence of policies that trace their origins to the same uber-patriotism that sees national identity as something to be protected from real people, disregard for legal niceties that constrain one from doing “the right thing,” and conviction that the times we live in do not allow us to enjoy the same civil liberties that previous, less troubled generations enjoyed. Perhaps there is a reason that more Europeans see America as a greater threat to global stability than Iran.
05 September 2006
Simple Rules for Complex Times
I once heard a comedian question the allure of NASCAR. "Oh great. He's making another left turn. Oh! There he goes again."
There is something both necessary and assuring about having a choice between the right and the left when it comes to our politics. The moderate will fail to see in free markets (or, more properly, in big corporations) the answer to every problem. The moderate will also realize that the people's voice (or, more accurately, big government) isn't the answer to every problem. That is, the inclination to steer right or left should be dictated more by the road than one's preference to steer left or right. Imagine how freaked out you'd be riding with a driver who insisted that turning right was best - in spite of how the road curved.
I recently heard Rick Santorum debate his challenger, Bob Casey. One of the statements Santorum made was that he would never vote for a tax hike. Pretty extraordinary statement for a guy who has voted with Bush about 100% of the time and has, in the process, voted to raise federal spending to record levels. It's like having a limit on one's credit card bill payment but no limit on what one spends. No matter what the situation, Santorum will never veer left - no matter which way the road bends.
This might be as good of an explanation of a ideologue as any. Someone who has decided that the best response to complex times is to adhere to simple rules - regardless of the environment, conditions, or whose swimming pool he's driven into.
Although it seems alluring to have two choices that quite simply steer left or right (turn to the Democrats for solutions that call for new or improved government programs like universal health care or homeless shelters and turn to the Republicans for solutions that call for less regulation or taxation on businesses, thereby enabling more rapid and robust corporate responses to opporunities), reality is not so simple. It's true that we want to steer right or left at times, but if you closely monitor your steering you'll see that you rarely do either one for more than a few seconds. Good government, like good driving, requires a hand on the wheel that is more attuned to the road than the inclination of the driver to veer in one direction or the other.
There is something both necessary and assuring about having a choice between the right and the left when it comes to our politics. The moderate will fail to see in free markets (or, more properly, in big corporations) the answer to every problem. The moderate will also realize that the people's voice (or, more accurately, big government) isn't the answer to every problem. That is, the inclination to steer right or left should be dictated more by the road than one's preference to steer left or right. Imagine how freaked out you'd be riding with a driver who insisted that turning right was best - in spite of how the road curved.
I recently heard Rick Santorum debate his challenger, Bob Casey. One of the statements Santorum made was that he would never vote for a tax hike. Pretty extraordinary statement for a guy who has voted with Bush about 100% of the time and has, in the process, voted to raise federal spending to record levels. It's like having a limit on one's credit card bill payment but no limit on what one spends. No matter what the situation, Santorum will never veer left - no matter which way the road bends.
This might be as good of an explanation of a ideologue as any. Someone who has decided that the best response to complex times is to adhere to simple rules - regardless of the environment, conditions, or whose swimming pool he's driven into.
Although it seems alluring to have two choices that quite simply steer left or right (turn to the Democrats for solutions that call for new or improved government programs like universal health care or homeless shelters and turn to the Republicans for solutions that call for less regulation or taxation on businesses, thereby enabling more rapid and robust corporate responses to opporunities), reality is not so simple. It's true that we want to steer right or left at times, but if you closely monitor your steering you'll see that you rarely do either one for more than a few seconds. Good government, like good driving, requires a hand on the wheel that is more attuned to the road than the inclination of the driver to veer in one direction or the other.
02 September 2006
The Allure of Kings
I once heard management consultant Peter Block say that leadership is a collusion between control freaks and the irresponsible. As I get older, I find this claim more convincing.
It's not politically correct to contrast the Protestant and Catholic faiths, but if it weren't for the Protestant Revolution it is very doubtful that things would have changed much from medieval times. Yet plenty of people are still Catholic and plenty more Protestants have adopted the medievel model of reliance on religious leaders. There is something very alluring about the notion that one's salvation, one's peace and joy, can be outsourced like laundry.
Which brings us to politics. Like others, I find myself appalled at the direction neo-conservatives have taken this country. The over-arching theme of the neo-conservatives who own every branch of the American government - from legislation that makes it more difficult for the poor and disenfranchised to vote to repeal of the estate tax - is movement backwards towards a consolidation of wealth and power.
The progress since medieval times has moved us in the exact opposite direction of this. Even de Tocqueville commented that every half century or so, the difference between aristocracy and the commoner is lessened. Our modern world is a place where the commoner is free to make decisions about how (and if) to worship, how (and if) to borrow or invest, how (and if) to vote for policy. Neoconservatives have recently attacked these freedoms from every side, trying to legislate teaching religion in schools, and instituting harsh penalties for mistakes in credit management, retirement planning (or execution), and voter registration efforts.
Politicians and the media need to stand up to denounce any efforts that consolidate rather than diffuse wealth and power. Progress is the result of two things: steady increases in the quality of life of society's elites and a steady erosion in the difference between the quality of life of the elites and us commoners. Any effort to derail this progression that has defined the West for 500 years should be vigorously opposed, even if it does promise freedom of responsibility for one's own life.
It's not politically correct to contrast the Protestant and Catholic faiths, but if it weren't for the Protestant Revolution it is very doubtful that things would have changed much from medieval times. Yet plenty of people are still Catholic and plenty more Protestants have adopted the medievel model of reliance on religious leaders. There is something very alluring about the notion that one's salvation, one's peace and joy, can be outsourced like laundry.
Which brings us to politics. Like others, I find myself appalled at the direction neo-conservatives have taken this country. The over-arching theme of the neo-conservatives who own every branch of the American government - from legislation that makes it more difficult for the poor and disenfranchised to vote to repeal of the estate tax - is movement backwards towards a consolidation of wealth and power.
The progress since medieval times has moved us in the exact opposite direction of this. Even de Tocqueville commented that every half century or so, the difference between aristocracy and the commoner is lessened. Our modern world is a place where the commoner is free to make decisions about how (and if) to worship, how (and if) to borrow or invest, how (and if) to vote for policy. Neoconservatives have recently attacked these freedoms from every side, trying to legislate teaching religion in schools, and instituting harsh penalties for mistakes in credit management, retirement planning (or execution), and voter registration efforts.
Politicians and the media need to stand up to denounce any efforts that consolidate rather than diffuse wealth and power. Progress is the result of two things: steady increases in the quality of life of society's elites and a steady erosion in the difference between the quality of life of the elites and us commoners. Any effort to derail this progression that has defined the West for 500 years should be vigorously opposed, even if it does promise freedom of responsibility for one's own life.
01 September 2006
Futility of Economic Sanctions
Throughout history, tyrants have exploited the vulnerability of their subjects. This vulnerability is inevitably linked to a lack of economic clout.
So now, the US is considering sanctions against Iran. What do sanctions do? They limit economic growth. What happens when a people are economically impoverished? They lack the power to change their circumstances. If you want to make a tyrant more secure, just take away the power of his people.
Do sanctions work? Castro's decades of rule in Cuba might suggest that they don't. It's not at all clear that there are examples that suggest that they do. Oh well, I guess as futile gestures sanctions are better than war.
So now, the US is considering sanctions against Iran. What do sanctions do? They limit economic growth. What happens when a people are economically impoverished? They lack the power to change their circumstances. If you want to make a tyrant more secure, just take away the power of his people.
Do sanctions work? Castro's decades of rule in Cuba might suggest that they don't. It's not at all clear that there are examples that suggest that they do. Oh well, I guess as futile gestures sanctions are better than war.
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