From Will Wilkinson. They’re not pretty.
Category Archives: Media Criticism
Straw Men
I’m listening to the president, and on the verge of throwing something at the flat screen. I’m very tired of hearing him make the vague “argument” that we can’t get out of this situation with the “same failed policies of the past eight years.” This is apparently an argument against tax cuts in the “stimulus” bill, though it’s hard to know, because it’s vague. Why won’t some reporter ask him what in the hell he’s talking about? To actually put forth his supposed theory of how we got here, and what “failed policies” caused it? Because if he’s arguing that we’re in trouble because of tax rate cuts, that’s a ludicrous proposition. He seems desperate, and has fallen back on the only thing he seems to know how to do — campaign with vague and misleading rhetoric.
Charles Johnson has further commentary on these Obama strawmen.
[Update a few minutes later]
Some questions that the president should, but probably won’t be asked tonight.
[Update a few minutes later]
More thoughts from Victor Davis Hanson:
…things are upside down: The conservatives are mad that Bush over-spent, and suddenly when out of power want to restore fiscal sanity, while Obama says that the Bush borrowing brought on this mess and must be addressed by more borrowing. What is what? Conservatives suddenly are once again fiscal purists when out of power? Liberals blame Bush for reckless Keynesian spending and want to cure it by more of the same?
Few tell the truth: The conservatives should say ‘Mea culpa—our deficit spending and borrowing helped to get us into this mess, so we’ve seen the error of our ways, and want you liberals not to repeat our mistakes.’ And the liberals should say, ‘Bush on the budget was one of us in borrowing and spending and priming, so we can’t really trash the last eight years since we’re now advocating more of the same.’
Yes, few tell the truth. Including, foremost, the president.
[Update late morning]
“The worst bill since the 1930s.” An interview with economist Robert Barro.
[Evening update]
He’s doing the press conference now, and repeating the stupid, false history that we’ve done nothing in the past eight years except tax cuts. I want to throw a shoe at him.
[Bumped from this morning]
[Update a few minutes later]
He claims that he’s been “civil” and “respectable.” I don’t think that it’s either civil or respectable to set up strawman arguments based on a false history, and kick them down. And now he’s claiming that there are no earmarks in this package? Please.
This Is Stimulus?
One of the (no doubt many) economic time bombs in the bill could force employers to extend COBRA for decades. What’s the problem?
The HR departments for large employers are looking at this provision with great alarm, as indicated in this policy brief. PricewaterhouseCoopers produced an analysis which pegs the ten-year cost of this provision at $39 billion to $65 billion just for those current COBRA-eligible workers age 55 to 64. The estimated costs would be even higher if the analysis assumed, as is reasonable, that many more workers would elect early retirement if they were assured of access to group-rated insurance.
What would employers do if faced with the costs of implementing this provision? It’s fairly predictable. They would hire fewer workers, and pay their current employees less. Not exactly “stimulus.”
Indeed, this is exactly the kind of complex provision which should be considered by Congress only after careful study and a hearing or two to avoid unintended consequences. Certainly it has no business on a bill purportedly aimed at promoting short-term job growth. Unfortunately, logic and reason may not be enough to prevail in the current mad-dash rush to “pass something.”
I suspect that most of the bill is like that. This is madness. The Founders would be appalled at what has happened to the Republic.
Where’s The Hurry?
Ramesh makes a damned good point:
If time is of the essence and the bill has to pass right now, as Democrats keep saying, why should there be a conference committee at all? As soon as the Senate bill passes, Pelosi should just bring it up in the House and urge the Democrats to put the putative good of the country first. The bill could be on the president’s desk by Wednesday afternoon. If there’s time for the House Democrats to try to improve the bill/pork it up, why isn’t there time for anyone else to try to get a better product?
I guess because it can only be improved by House Democrats.
Everything You Know Is Wrong
…about the Vietnam War. The first in a series.
What Should NASA Do?
Go take the poll. I picked the last choice, but I think that Clark must have voted for the penultimate one. But between the two of them, they currently grab about sixty percent of the vote. The others are mostly down in the noise. Don’t expect the powers that be to pay any attention, though.
Oh, and here’s the official NASA version. Note which options are missing. Steve Gonzales has thoughts, and asks for input.
What We Can Learn About The World
- Apple, Inc. supplies well over 98% of computers in the USA.
- All good cops are tormented creatures in one way or another. 90% plus are divorced but have amazing relationships with their kids, usually teenagers.
- “Religious types”, regardless of religion, are one step away from acting out violently, and usually do! Christians seem the most hair-triggered in this regard. Also, abject fear drives 100% of a “religious types” decision making process.
There are more, and a lot of good comments.
Penny Wise, Billions Foolish
As Clark Lindsey notes, even if we can believe the Probabilistic Risk Analysis that declares Ares “twice as safe” as an EELV (of course, to do that, we’d have to first actually see it…), that’s a pretty pathetic safety improvement considering the billions of dollars and many years that it will cost us. Considering how high the operational costs will be, it’s not likely to fly very much, anyway (I can’t see more than a four lunar missions a year, given the the budget likely to be available at the outrageous per-mission cost for the Constellation architecture). So the difference between, say, 0.999 and 0.995 is likely to be academic. Particularly when most of the hazards in a lunar mission occur after orbit has been attained. I am increasingly less and less impressed by Mike Griffin’s vaunted intelligence, and don’t miss him as administrator, even if he’s never replaced.
Speaking of which, this is indicative either of how disconnected with policy the president’s press secretary is, or how low a priority space policy is (and perhaps some depressing combination of the two):
“Q: Robert, the James A. Baker Institute is recommending that the Obama administration defer another lunar shot, and instead focus on energy and climate change. Does the White House have a reaction on that?
MR. GIBBS: I don’t have anything particularly from — I would point you to folks over at NASA. I don’t have any particular guidance on that.”
What would the “folks over at NASA” know about it? Policy has to come from the White House, but so far, it seems lacking. Clearly the administration is (over)interested in energy and climate change, but to set that up as an alternative to a “lunar shot” is a false choice. Of course, characterizing VSE as a “lunar shot” is simply a display of ignorance on the part of the questioner, but I suspect that this will be representative of the clueless quality of the space policy debate to come. If there is one.
[Update a couple minutes later]
Oh, and just in case you thought that Ares 1 didn’t have enough technical problems, here’s a new one — post-staging recontact:
This so-called recontact problem could end an Ares I mission – possibly catastrophically – during ascent. Failure could come seconds after firing of the separation pyrotechnics, if the upper stage’s J-2X engine does not provide enough power fast enough to stop it from slowing down and colliding with the first stage and its motor, which would still be providing residual thrust.
This is what caused SpaceX’ third failure. It will be a lot harder for NASA to solve, though.
SpaceX had the problem because they made a change to their first-stage propulsion that resulted in a slightly longer thrust tailoff than they expected. It was solved by simply decreasing the delay between separation and upper-stage ignition.
NASA doesn’t have this option, necessarily, because there are relatively large dispersions in thrust tailoff for an SRB, so it may be hard to find an optimal and reliable delay duration between separation and ignition. This wasn’t a problem for Shuttle because it doesn’t actually stage — it does a parallel burn, and the SSMEs are already at full thrust when the solids separate, and it can easily outrun them. But now, since they’ve come up with the brilliant concept of a solid first stage with an air-start second, they have a new serious risk in the program. And Ares-1X will tell them absolutely nothing about how to solve it.
[Update a few minutes later]
One more point. I’d like Dr. Griffin to tell us what he thinks an astronaut’s life is worth. Because clearly it’s not infinite. He has decided that making it twice as safe is worth billions, but even then, it’s not “safe” in absolute terms (because nothing is, this side of the grave). So we’ve established what he is — one of those heartless bastards who are willing to kill astronauts to pinch pennies. Now we’re just haggling over the price. I’d like to know what it is, though clearly, it’s a lot higher than my own estimate.
An Open Letter to Kellogg’s
This is pretty funny. And as someone familiar with the history of the company, the irony is quite amusing. I remember when I was a kid, we drove down to Battle Creek to tour the factory. I got free Cocoa Crispies at the end of the tour.
As an adult, though, I can’t take sugary cereals any more (in fact, I’ve quit almost all cereals except the occasional oatmeal, and toasted oats, due to carb concerns). But then, it’s been decades since I did a bong hit. Or wanted to.
No New Thing Under The Sun
A lesson from Plato, on how Republics die.
[Update a while later]
Here I come to save the day:
Unfortunately, some politicians see the current crisis as an “opportunity” to push an agenda. They haven’t stopped to consider to what extent that agenda may exacerbate the very problems they are trying to solve. The WSJ captured the philosophy of the present administration in White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel’s remarks that “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste. Things that we had postponed for too long, that were long-term, are now immediate and must be dealt with. This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before.” Emmanuel subsequently proceeded to enumerate a list of social spending items some of which arguably sound like new versions of the same community housing spending which may have been one of the original “political risks” to start with. When asked whether the stimulus package had turned into a spending spree, President Obama acknowledged it with pride. “That’s the point. Seriously, that’s the point.”
But that’s not the point; not the point at all. And it’s a shame BHO doesn’t realize it and a greater shame if he does. The real question is whether current government solutions to the crisis contribute to political risk or reduce it. That means knowing what’s broke before applying the screwdriver to the screw.
Well, it’s what politicians do. Too bad we have politicians, and not statesmen.