Politics

So, the citizens of Kansas City passed the no smoking ordinance yesterday. Although it is a flawed bill (you can still smoke on casino floors), it is a great step forward for the city.

I smoked years ago, so I have some perspective on this. And take my perspective for what it's worth, which is absolutely nothing.

So, let me answer these questions as I used to answer them when I did smoke. My position has not changed.

Why is this good for smokers
Admit it. No one (even smokers!) likes going out for the night and coming home smelling like you've bathed in an ashtray. Your clothes stink, you stink, your hair stinks.

Also, you smoke too much. I know, who am I to say, but it's true. I smoked about half a pack per day, but I could easily go through a pack in a couple hours drinking. Which compounded the hangovers. Ten times worse.

But I like to smoke when I drink
So did I! So, here was my little secret: I either went to drink at places with patios where I could smoke, or I went outside to light up.

Outside???? That might work for those librul Californians with great weather, but it gets COLD here in Kansas City. And HOT!
It works fine in New York as well, and it gets just as cold and just as hot. And talk about smokers! They're everywhere. Walk by any bar on a Friday night and see the massive throng out front smoking. They're not miserable.

I used to love going out in NYC as a smoker. I smoked half as much and felt twice as good. And the smokers there didn't seem to mind.

But why should you loser nonsmokers get to enforce your will on us?
Because it's a public safety issue. You have to wear a seatbelt in your car. Oh yeah, and we're also the majority. Suck on it.

Trust me, there are plenty of nonsmokers that will go out more now that they don't have to factor in a shower and a load of laundry :)

I stopped going to a place I loved to see shows because the smoke was so bad. I often choose not to go out because the smoke makes me feel like absolute shit. It did then also, but I was desensitized to it. Trust me smokers, most of you will appreciate this.

But what about the poor bars? Studies show that x% of bars close when smoking bans are enforced.
Not my problem. Adapt or die. Business owners seeking safety should sell their businesses and get a government job.

But shouldn't it be up to the business owners to decide?
No. The people spoke. This is a democracy. That's how it works!

I used to think the free market was capable of deciding this, and that some bar owners would see an opportunity and go smoke-free. But it never happened. So the people did something.

But it was backed by deep pocketed corporations who wanted an edge!
So, they got the people to follow. What's new. And just because someone has a motive, doesn't mean that the outcome is necessarily bad.

And, I'm sick of your whining. "But this...", "But that..." Get over it and move on with your life. In the grand scheme of things, this is trivial.

From the comments:

P.S. I saw your picture. I have a really hard time believing you were in a good fraternity that we would have actually gone to for after bars.

Classy!

dday at Digby's is posted a note that Brock Olivo is running for congress:

A new entry for the GOP, a rising star if you will, is former University of Missouri running back Brock Olivo, who is running in the 9th District in Missouri. And hey, he's got some qualifications:

"Not only was I football player, but I also was in social studies class, and I have a passion for how this country works," Olivo said.

I have very interesting memories of Brock Olivo. He used to come to our fraternity parties and try to steal bottles of liquor. Then he'd want to fight us all.

A fine GOP congressman he will make!

Now that John Edwards is out of the campaign, I've realized the intrinsic difficulty in supporting Edwards. It's hard, as a white male, to justify supporting him because it's either perceived as racist, sexist, or both.

But it was really about the ideas. John Edwards was the only candidate talking about the extent of corporate greed and the economic war on the middle class. I imagine we'll start hearing a lot more about the squeeze that affects 98% of the country.

So, now comes the difficulty. Both of the candidates have different strong suits:

Hillary is best suited to take on the Republican Slime Machine in the general election. While I'd rather return to some politics of substance, the reality is that it's not likely to happen, with the way the media are incentivized and the realities of the past elections. But Hilary brings along Bill, which I thought was a good thing until the last couple weeks. And I don't think she's played very fair in Nevada (only complaining about the casino caucus sites after Obama was endorsed) and Florida and Michigan, where the candidates agreed not to campaign.

Obama is an amazing speaker, and stands in such contrast to Bush that his speaking abilities are further emphasized. Now, being a good speaker and leading a country are 2 separate things (just like the ability to stay in a marriage and lead a country are separate skills). But from my experiences over the past 4 years, Obama likes to talk a lot about the process. About what the leaders should be doing. Instead of actually leading. And he keeps talking about bipartisanship, which (he will find out) really means letting the Republicans kick dirt in your face at every opportunity.

At this point I'm leaning toward Obama (sexist) but could see myself coming around to Hillary depending on the next few weeks of campaigning (racist). If the vote was today, with Edwards out, my vote would go to Obama.

But, no matter who wins the primary, we're infinitely better off with Hillary or Obama at the helm than we have been with Cheney and Bush.

I wrote about the impending banking crisis on this blog, on March 9, 2007. This was not exactly a surprise to anyone watching.

How quickly we forget the past.

I'm not one to usually suggest we add laws, but here's one I do want:

Why don't we pass a law making the predictions of a media outlet regarding an election outcome, once the polls have opened, and until they have closed or the official results in, legally binding to a set amount of damages?

You could claim that it violates freedom of speech, but we already limit freedom of speech specially regarding elections: no signs or campaigning within a certain distance of a polling place, etc.

Given all of my critiques of the Bush Administration (and there is very little they have done that hasn't been disastrous), I'm not one who believes that they could have stopped 9-11. 9-11 was simply a Black Swan event, which most likely could have been carried out in many other ways. Applying security to the latest-discovered-hole will only cause those who wish to do us harm to find a new one. Anyone with reasonable thinking skills could design an attack on an unsecured place that would inflict far more terror than 9-11.

Remember, the goal of terrorism is to cause terror. The amount of lives lost is somewhat correlated but not entirely significant to that goal. Since humans process risk probability in the same region of the brain that we process emotions, it is no wonder that terrorists can exploit this bug that our brains carry. So, it should go without saying to any reasonable person that we can't guard against everything, or rather, guarding everything would be an economic burden that would bankrupt the country. We can and should invest in guarding high-risk areas like nuclear plants, but the solution is not to add security everywhere.

Many have argued that, because of the above, we need to practice a foreign policy that stresses humanity and charity, and that propping up the enemies-of-our-enemies is a bad idea. I totally agree, however, I don't agree that it's enough to stop the terrorists. Consequentialism as practiced by the NeoCons, is easily disproved in a complex world, because it is theoretically impossible to calculate the effects of blowback. One action might spawn any of 20 consequences, which would also spawn any of 20 consequences. Going 10 steps forward, there is a 1 in 10,240,000,000,000 (yes, 10 trillion) chance that you picked the right outcome.

So, our foreign policy needs to be based on a Deontological philosophy, or, we need to judge our actions based on their own merits, not some guessed future outcome. Which is all to say that we can't predict the actions of others. Who knows, our kind actions could have some very negative, random, unforeseen blowback.

So, what's left. We can't fully secure everything, we can't stop them with foreign policy. Are we doomed?

Of course not. Let's go back to the word "terrorism" as defined in Wikipedia:

Terrorism, in the modern sense, is violence, the threat of violence, or other harmful acts committed for political or ideological goals. Most definitions of terrorism include only those acts which are intended to create fear (terror), are perpetrated for an ideological goal (as opposed to a lone attack), and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians).

So the only true way to stop terrorists is to not be terrorized. It's much more difficult than throwing money at the problem, as this requires us to look into ourselves and conquer our fears. Here's some ways that help me:

• September 11 was a horrible day. It still upsets me, but it doesn't make me scared. In fact, about 150,000 people die each day in the world. So, the tragic deaths of those 2,974 people on 9-11 only represented an increase of 2% increase for that day. Then, on 9-12, another 150,000 people in this world died. I know, I know, "tell that to someone who lost someone in the attacks." But the same applies for someone who lost someone for any reason on that day.
• Your risk of dying in a terrorist incident is still miniscule. According to this article by Michael L. Rothschild, even if terrorists blew up one shopping mall per week, and your shopping habits weren't affected, your odds of dying by the terrorists would be 1 in 1.5 million:
  

  The odds of dying in an automobile accident each year are about one in 7,000, yet we continue to drive. The odds of dying from heart disease in any given year are one in 400 and of dying from cancer one in 600, yet many of us fail to exercise or maintain a healthy diet. We have learned to live with these common threats to our health. Yet we have been afraid to return to the malls and the skies.

  What are the odds of dying on our next flight or next trip to a shopping mall? There are more than 40,000 malls in this country, and each is open about 75 hours per week. If a person shopped for two hours each week and terrorists were able to destroy one mall per week, the odds of being at the wrong place at the wrong time would be approximately 1.5 million to 1. If terrorists destroyed one mall each month, the odds would climb to one in 6 million. This assumes the total destruction of the entire mall; if that unlikely event didn't occur, the odds would become even more favorable.

  In another hypothetical but horrible scenario, let us assume that each week one commercial aircraft were hijacked and crashed. What are the odds that a person who goes on one trip per month would be in that plane? There are currently about 18,000 commercial flights a day, and if that person's trip has four flights associated with it, the odds against that person's being on a crashed plane are about 135,000 to 1. If there were only one hijacked plane per month, the odds would be about 540,000 to 1.

We need to look to leaders to educate us on our own natural biases towards thinking that the risks of sensational acts are greater than they actually are. We need to scorn those who sell us fear and gloom, for we've already shown that predicitons in any complex environment are worthless. We need to suck it up and not be afraid. We need to drop the Terrorism Threat Level, which should be looked at only as a measure of our fear, and a metric of effectiveness by those who wish to control us with it.

Then we should ask ourselves, who gains when we are afraid, and why would they want us to be afraid? We know why Al-Qaeda benefits, but we should ask anyone else with a stake in our terror what they have to gain. Control? Power? Money? Votes? Viewers? Ad Revenues? And then we should ask ourselves, if the goal of terrorism is to create irrational fear in the civilian population, why do we regard those who are selling us that fear from inside our government and media any differently?

I refuse to be terrorized.

In The Tipping Point, Gladwell writes about how an attempted KKK resurgence was thwarted when their childish rituals became widely dispersed amongst the population, and especially children.

But this counter-protest takes the cake. Honestly, this seems to be one of the best ways to counter ridiculous arguments. Hats off to the masterminds who planned and executed this brilliant counter-protest:

Nazi's out of Knoxville!

Knoxville rejects Nazis and Klan.

Saturday May 26th the VNN Vanguard Nazi/KKK group attempted to host a hate rally to try to take advantage of the brutal murder of a white couple for media and recruitment purposes.

Unfortunately for them the 100th ARA (Anti Racist Action) clown block came and handed them their asses by making them appear like the asses they were.

Alex Linder the founder of VNN and the lead organizer of the rally kicked off events by rushing the clowns in a fit of rage, and was promptly arrested by 4 Knoxville police officers who dropped him to the ground when he resisted and dragged him off past the red shiny shoes of the clowns.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s shouted, “White Flour?” the clowns yelled back running in circles throwing flour in the air and raising separate letters which spelt “White Flour”.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s angrily shouted once more, “White flowers?” the clowns cheers and threw white flowers in the air and danced about merrily.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s tried once again in a doomed and somewhat funny attempt to clarify their message, “ohhhhhh!” the clowns yelled “Tight Shower!” and held a solar shower in the air and all tried to crowd under to get clean as per the Klan’s directions.

At this point several of the Nazi’s and Klan members began clutching their hearts as if they were about to have a heart attack. Their beady eyes bulged, and the veins in their tiny narrow foreheads beat in rage. One last time they screamed “White Power!”

The clown women thought they finally understood what the Klan was trying to say. “Ohhhhh…” the women clowns said. “Now we understand…”, “WIFE POWER!” they lifted the letters up in the air, grabbed the nearest male clowns and lifted them in their arms and ran about merrily chanting “WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER!”

It was at this point that several observers reported seeing several Klan members heads exploding in rage and they stopped trying to explain to the clowns what they wanted.

Apparently the clowns fundamentally misunderstood the nature of the rally, they believed it was a clown rally and came in force to support their pointy hated brethren. To their dismay, despite their best jokes and stunts and pratfalls the Nazis and Klan refused to laugh, and indeed became enraged at the clowns misunderstanding and constant attempts to interpret the clowns instruction.

The clowns on the other hand had a great time and thought the Nazis were the funniest thing they had ever seen and the loud laughter of over 100 counter protesters greeted every attempt of the Nazis and Klan to get their message out, whatever that was.

.....

After the VNNers left in their shiny SUVs to go back to Alabama and all the other states that they were from the clowns and counter demonstrators began to march out of the area chanting ‘WHOSE STREETS? OUR STREETS!”

But the cops stopped the clowns and counter protestors. “Hey, do you want an escort” an African-American police officer on a motorcycle asked. “Yes” a clown replied. “We are walking to Market Square in the center of town to celebrate.”

The police officers got in front of the now anti racist parade and blocked the entire road for the march through the heart of Knoxville. An event called imagination station was taking place and over 15,000 thousand students and their parents were in town that weekend. Many of them cheered as the clowns, Knoxvillians and counter protestors marched through the heart of Knoxville singing and laughing at the end of the Nazi’s first attempt at having a rally in Knoxville.

What caused the depression was a credit crunch followed by major debt deflation.

Hmmm. Tightening credit. Soaring levels of debt, backed by declining assets. Sounds familiar.

Hyman Minsky:

This is that a pure market economy is characterised by a fundamental asymmetry which can cause the debt to output ratio to rise over time, to levels which can be unsustainable. This asymmetry is easily put: firms incur debt to finance investment during booms, but have to repay that debt during slumps. Since the cyclical path of a capitalist economy is itself asymmetrical, this results in the level of debt ``ratcheting up'' during a sequence of trade cycles. Under fairly general conditions, this process can reach a point at which the accumulated debt overwhelms the debt-financing capacity of the economy, thus leading to a Depression.

Luckily, government spending is at a level that helps smooth out any adverse cycles (I'm always perplexed how the right-wingers never see this fact), but we could be in the midst of something big in the real estate market. A lot of people will lose money, but the banks will rush to sell their foreclosed properties to get whatever they can to keep cash flowing. This will flood the market, increasing the cycle. Credit will tighten, forcing banks to sell more properties, ad infinitum. Some banks will fail. The government will step in to bail them out. We will all pay.

The fed will drop interest rates to ensure the banks stay as healthy as possible, and make new mortgages available for all the homes being sold at a loss. Interest could continue to drop to fight the deflationary forces and may eventually end up in a classic Keynsian "liquidity trap".

In my mind, the problem with government spending now vs. Depression-era spending goes once again to Keynes: the government money is going to huge companies, widening the income gap, and generally flowing to people with very low marginal propensities to consume.

On the bright side, our open markets tend to correct harshly and quickly, and are the most resilient in the world. The world can not afford to let us fail, but they can stop sending their money here in the future.