Don’t Get Your Hopes Up

The good news, via Captain’s Quarters:

Senator Tom Coburn’s office has announced that the Senate has just passed a new bill to replace the language of the original S.2590, which establishes an on-line searchable database for federal spending. This action will expedite the legislative process and may put the bill on President Bush’s desk by tomorrow:

The Senate just passed an amended version of the Coburn-Obama database bill based on our agreement with the House. Following House passage of the bill the measure will go to the president for his signature. Tonight’s action in the Senate means the Senate will not need to revisit the measure as the House will vote on this identical measure tonight or tomorrow.

The Senate, under Bill Frist’s guidance, simply took the modified language under consideration in the House and passed it themselves first, apparently by acclamation. This eliminates the need for a conference committee and avoids any delay after the adoption of the bill in the House. . . .

UPDATE: The bill passed the House tonight, and the bill is on its way to the White House for Bush’s signature already.

The bad news: S. 2590 as I read it, extends only to contracts and not to the operations of the federal government, itself, which will remain shrouded in the arcana of government budgeting. Moreover, the database on contract awards “shall be updated not later than 30 days after the award of any Federal award requiring a posting [emphasis added].” Can you say “barn door closed after horse has left”?

The so-called Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 falls well short of accountability and “transparency.” The only effective way to make the federal government accountable is to elect members of Congress who make themselves accountable to the Constitution and the limited powers that it bestows on Congress (see Article I, here).

While I’m being an old curmudgeon, I must add that I simply hate the buzz-word “transparency,” which has come into wide use in the past 10-15 years. What is really meant by “transparency” isn’t transparency. Something that is transparent cannot be seen because it can be seen through. What is really meant by “transparency” is visibility: the property of being able to be seen. We want to see what the government is up to (except where it would damage the war effort), and we want to see it before it becomes a fait accompli. I want a government whose operations and budgets are visible to me, not a government whose operations and budgets are invisible because they are transparent.

The Tenth Dimension

Here is a Flash animation that explains the ten dimensions of string theory. (Thanks to Alex Tabarrok of Marginal Revolution for the pointer.) Don’t go away, it’s really worth a few minutes of your time, as a mental exercise, even if you have no interest in physics. To help you through the rough spots, I’ve concocted this summary:

0. The zeroeth dimension is a point, an abstraction of the postion of an object in a system.

1. A line joining two points forms the first dimension. A line has length, but no width or depth.

2. A second line branching off the first adds a second dimension. We now have length and width, but not depth.

3. A third dimension results when the second line is “folded” back on first, enabling movement between the two branches (length and width). Thus we now have length, width, and depth. (Think of a flat piece of paper that is rolled into a tube, so that a point on one edge becomes adjacent to a point that had been on the opposite edge.)

4. As three-dimensional objects change they appear to move along a fourth dimension (time), which extends from, say, the Big Bang to the end of the Universe.

5. The multitude of paths that objects could follow through time (according to quantum mechanics) are branches from the time line. These possible paths constitute the fifth dimension.

6. A sixth dimension results from the folding of the multitude of paths, so that an object can jump from one possible future state (path) to another. The collection of all such possible moves is a point.

7. Each point in the sixth dimension represents all possible outcomes, through all of time, for a given set of initial conditions and physical laws (e.g., the speed of light). The seventh dimension is a line that joins all such possible points, representing all possible initial conditions and physical laws.

8. The eighth dimension is represented by branches from the the seventh-dimensional line. The eighth dimension is analagous to fifth dimension. That is, it represents all the possible “universes” that might result from each of the possible starting points as they move through time.

9. The ninth dimension is analagous to the sixth. That is, it represents the movement from one of the possible “worlds” to another because of the folding of the eighth dimension.

10. The tenth dimension is a single point that encompasses all the possibilities inherent in the ninth dimension. It is the ultimate dimension because, by definition, it encompasses all possible worlds and all of time.

Only the first three dimensions seem “real” to the typical person, who observes the world unaided by scientific instrumentation and theories. Einstein’s special and general theories of relativity account for the interactions of space and time (the first four dimensions). (For an accessible explanation of the special theory, read Lewis Carroll Epstein’s Relativity Visualized.)

Everything from the fifth dimension onward seems to hinge on the controversial “many worlds intepretation” of quantum mechanics. Quantum mechanics lays the foundation for a fifth dimension, but in a tacked-on way. Some 80 years have passed since quantum mechanics became the accepted view of physical behavior at the sub-atomic level, but there still is no generally accepted unifying theory for quantum mechanics and general relativity (see quantum gravity), let alone a “theory of everything,” of which string theory is one example.

In sum, everything from the fifth dimension onward falls in the realm of scientific speculation. Science proceeds from speculation based on observation, but speculation should not be mistaken for scientific knowledge.

In any event, enjoy the animation.

The Nexus of Conservatism and Libertarianism

I wrote about the theoretical and practical aspects of anarcho-capitalism, libertarianism, and conservatism in several recent posts:

What Is the American Constitution?
Utopian Schemes
Is Exit Unrealistic?
The Source of Rights
A Trichotomy of American Conservatism

In response to a reader’s comment about the second of those posts, I said this about anarcho-capitalism:

How can a political philosophy that assumes peaceful cooperation also assume the possibility of violence and non-cooperation? Anarcho-capitalism assumes the possibility of violence and non-cooperation when it allows for private defense agencies. Given that possibility, it then follows that violence and non-cooperation may arise just as readily from within as from without. Not all members of a community can possibly agree about all issues all of the time. Sometimes those disagreements may turn violent. (To assume perfect agreement and non-violence is utopian.) In the end, a majority or super-majority must be prepared to impose peaceful cooperation within a community by empowering an agency for that purpose. That agency — the state — thereby acquires a status independent of the community because it exists to impose the will of the majority of the moment on the renegades of the moment. There is never a consensus, either at a given time or across time.

Anarcho-capitalists typically object to the Constitution of the United States as an imposition on subsequent generations. But how do they then create a stable, cooperative, enduring community? By revisiting the “contract” that binds every member at every moment? That is the only way to true consensus. And it is nonsense.

The real question that faces the friends of liberty is how to contain the power of the state. The Constitution offers the most realistic answer. Friends of liberty should abandon unrealistic schemes, such as anarcho-capitalism, and focus on the restoration of the Constitution.

I am certain to return to the topic of anarcho-capitalism in future posts, mainly because its adherents like to claim, wrongly, that it is “true” libertarianism. It is not even that, however. It is nothing but a pipe dream. Here is John Kekes in “What Is Conservatism?“:

A common ground among conservatives is that the political arrangements that ought to be conserved are discovered by reflection on why, how, and for what reason they have come to hold. The conse~ative yjew is that history is the best guide to understanding the present and planning for the future because it indicates what political arrangements are likely to make lives good or bad.

The significance of this agreement among conservatives is not merely what it asserts, but also what it denies. It denies that the reasons for or against particular political arrangements are to be derived from a contract that fully rational people might make in a hypothetical situation; or from an imagined ideal society; or from what is supposed to be most beneficial for the whole of humanity; or from the prescriptions of some sacred or secular book. Conservatives, in preference to these alternatives, look then to history. Not, however, to history in general, but to their history, which is theirs because it is a repository of formative influences on how they live now and how it is reasonable for them to want to live in the future. Yet their attitude is not one of unexamined prejudice in favour of political arrangements that have become traditional in their society. They certainly aim to conserve some traditional political arrangements, but only those that reflection shows to be conducive to good lives.

In other words, conservatism is a reality-based political philosophy. But what does conservatism have to do with libertarianism? I have in various posts essayed an answer to that question (here, here, here, and here, for example), but now I turn the floor over to Kekes, who toward the end of “What Is Conservatism?” says this:

The traditionalism of conservatives excludes both the view that political arrangements that foster individual autonomy should take precedence over those that foster social authority and the reverse view that favours arrangements that promote social authority at the expense of individual autonomy. Traditionalists acknowledge the importance of both autonomy and authority, but they regard them as inseparable, interdependent, and equally necessary. The legitimate claims of both may be satisfied by the participation of individuals in the various traditions of their society. Good political arrangements protect these traditions and the freedom to participate in them by limiting the government’s authority to interfere with either.

Therein lies true libertarianism — true because it is attainable.

September 11: Five Years On

The time-date stamp of this post is 7:46 a.m. CDT (8:46 a.m. EDT), September 11, 2006 — exactly five years after Mohammed Elamir Awad al-Sayed Atta flew American Airlines Flight 11 into the north tower of the World Trade Center. Atta was an Egyptian-born Muslim who was recruited into al Qaeda in 1998.

Al Qaeda is led by Osama bin Laden and dominated by adherents of Wahabism, a fundamentalist sect of Islam. Al Qaeda is one of dozens of Islamic terrorist organizations, many of which are devoted to Islamism — “a set of political ideologies that hold that Islam is not only a religion, but also a political system that governs the legal, economic and social imperatives of the state according to its interpretation of Islamic Law” — and to jihad in pursuit of Islamism.

Those terrorist organizations that are not devoted to Islamism, as such, are nevertheless motivated by an intolerance for non-Islamic cultures in general, a jealous hatred of Western civilization in particular, and a zeal to eradicate Israel, which is an outpost of Western civilization in the midst of Muslim lands. The attacks of September 11, 2001, underscored what had been true for years — and what remains true today — which is that America and the West are chosen enemies of Islamist jihadists. Those who ignore that truth are doomed either to die at the hands of Islamists or to suffer under their rule.

* * *

When my wife and I turned on our TV set on the morning of September 11, 2001, we learned that a plane had, minutes earlier, struck the north tower of the World Trade Center. Minutes later we watched in horror as a second plane soared through the bright blue sky and struck the south tower. And with that horror came the understanding that America had been attacked. That understanding soon was confirmed when — in the awful silence that had fallen over Arlington, Virginia — we could hear the “whump” as a third plane slammed into the Pentagon.

Our shock and rage were accompanied by fear for our daughter, whom we knew was at work in the adjacent World Financial Center when the planes struck the World Trade Center. (See photos below.) Was her office struck by debris? Had she fled her building only to be struck by or trapped in debris? Had she smothered in the huge cloud of dust that enveloped lower Manhattan as the towers collapsed? Because telephone communications were badly disrupted, we didn’t learn for several hours that she had made it home safely, before the towers collapsed.

Our good fortune was not shared by tens of thousands of other persons: the grandparents, parents, brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, children, grandchildren, lovers, and good friends of the 3,000 who died that day in Manhattan, the Pentagon, and western Pennsylvania.

I was enraged by the events of September 11, 2001, and I remain enraged. I am, of course, enraged at the perpetrators and those like them who remain at large. I am, if anything, even more enraged by those of my fellow citizens who seem unable to grasp the fact that terror is the fault of terrorists, and that the United States must defend itself against those terrorists, even if it means that we are at times inconvenienced and at other times deprived of a smattering of privacy. Those who lament inconvenience and conjure a police state where there is none are rank narcissists and untrustworthy companions in the fight to the finish in which we are engaged.

I have reserved a special place in hell for those politicians, pundits, journalists, celebrities, and bloggers (especially Leftists and anarcho-libertarians) who criticize the war effort simply for the sake of criticizing it, who exude schadenfreude when there is bad news from the front or when the administration suffers a political or judicial setback in its efforts to combat terrorists, and who are able to indulge themselves precisely because they live in a nation that affords them that luxury. It is not a luxury they would enjoy under Leftist or Islamist rule.

A time of war is a time for constructive criticism, for being on the same team and helping that team win by offering ideas about how to win the war. When your country loses a war, you do not win. In fact, you cannot win, unless you choose to join the other side — and the other side chooses to accept you. But, as always, be careful what you wish for.

As for me, I repeat what I have said on every anniversary of September 11, 2001:

Never forgive, never forget, never relent.

* * *

The photos below include views of the building in the World Financial Center in which our daughter was working on the morning of September 11, 2001. (The building is at the right in the first photo, center in the second, and right in the third.) The second photo shows how close her building was to the twin towers of the World Trade Center — the remains of which are partly visible in the foreground. The third photo hints at the substantial damage her building suffered as a result of the collapse of the towers. (The photos are three of many that were taken on September 13, 2001. The entire collection is available here. I am indebted to Keith Burgess-Jackson (AnalPhilosopher) for providing the link to the collection.)

A Trichotomy of American Conservatism

My reading of Roger Scruton’s The Meaning of Conservatism (about which more at a later date) prompts me to dash off this trichotomization of American conservatism. Not all of the following types are truly conservative, by Scruton’s lights, but all usually carry the label “conservative” in American discourse.

True-Blue Traditionalist: This type simply loves and revels in family, community, club, church, alma mater, and the idea of America — which includes American government, with all its faults. If government enacts truly popular policies, those policies are (by and large) legitimate in the eyes of a true-blue. Thus a true-blue may be a Democrat or a Republican, though almost certainly not a libertarian. This type comes closest to Scruton’s view of what constitutes conservatism, even though most Americans would not think of it as conservative.

Libertarian of the Classical Liberal School: This type may (or may not) love and revel in most of the institutions revered by a true-blue traditionalist, but takes a different line when it comes to government. Voluntary institutions are good, but government tends to undermine them. Government’s proper role is to protect the citizenry and the citizenry’s voluntary institutions, not to dictate the terms and conditions of their existence. The classical liberal favors government only when it observes its proper role, and not for its own sake.

Rightist: The rightist differs from the true-blue traditionalist and classical liberal in three key respects. First, he is hostile toward those persons and voluntary institutions that are not in the “American tradition” of white, northern Europeanism. Second, his disdain for things outside the “American tradition” is so great that he is likely to be either an “America firster” or a reincarnation of Curtis “bomb them back to the stone age” LeMay. (That is, he would call the troops home and leave the “heathen masses” to fight it out amongst themselves, or he would simply deal with “those ragheads” by “nuking” them.) Third, he is willing to use the power of government to enforce the observance of those values that he favors, and to do other things that he (arbitrarily) sees as necessary.

I have exaggerated the characteristics of the three types to make them recognizable. Certainly, there are blends of and variations on the three types. There is, for example, the rightist who is isolationist without being racist. And I must add that it is not racist or bigoted to believe with good reason that certain cultures and “movements” contain elements that are destructive of civil society, elements which should therefore be resisted and denied legitimacy.

Profiles in Principle

Apropos the preceding post, here are the names of the U.S. Senators and Representatives who voted against McCain-Feingold (Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002).

Senators against:*

Allard (R-CO)
Allen (R-VA)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Breaux (D-LA)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burns (R-MT)
Campbell (R-CO)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeWine (R-OH)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)

Frist (R-TN)
Gramm (R-TX)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Helms (R-NC)
Hutchinson (R-AR)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lott (R-MS)
McConnell (R-KY)
Murkowski (R-AK)

Nelson (D-NE)
Nickles (R-OK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Santorum (R-PA)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Smith (R-NH)
Smith (R-OR)
Stevens (R-AK)
Thomas (R-WY)
Thurmond (R-SC)
Voinovich (R-OH)

Representatives against:**

Aderholt
Akin
Armey
Bachus
Baker
Ballenger
Barcia
Barr
Bartlett
Barton
Biggert
Bilirakis
Blunt
Boehner
Bonilla
Boozman
Boucher
Brown (SC)
Bryant
Burr
Burton
Buyer
Callahan
Calvert
Camp
Cannon
Cantor
Chabot
Chambliss
Coble
Collins
Combest
Cooksey
Cox
Crane
Crenshaw
Culberson
Cunningham
Davis, Jo Ann
Davis, Tom
Deal
DeLay
DeMint
Diaz-Balart
Doolittle
Dreier
Duncan
Dunn
Ehlers
Ehrlich
Emerson
English
Everett
Flake
Fletcher
Forbes
Fossella
Gallegly
Gekas
Gibbons
Gillmor
Goode
Goodlatte

Goss
Granger
Graves
Green (WI)
Gutknecht
Hall (TX)
Hansen
Hart
Hastert
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Hayworth
Herger
Hilleary
Hilliard
Hobson
Hoekstra
Hostettler
Hulshof
Hunter
Hyde
Isakson
Issa
Istook
Jenkins
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Keller
Kelly
Kennedy (MN)
Kerns
King (NY)
Kingston
Knollenberg
Kolbe
LaHood
Largent
Latham
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (KY)
Linder
Lipinski
Lucas (OK)
Manzullo
McCrery
McInnis
McKeon
Mica
Miller, Dan
Miller, Gary
Miller, Jeff
Mollohan
Moran (KS)
Murtha
Myrick
Nethercutt
Ney
Northup
Norwood
Nussle
Otter
Oxley
Paul

Pence
Peterson (MN)
Peterson (PA)
Pickering
Pitts
Pombo
Portman
Pryce (OH)
Putnam
Radanovich
Rahall
Regula
Rehberg
Reynolds
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Royce
Ryan (WI)
Ryun (KS)
Saxton
Schaffer
Schrock
Scott
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shadegg
Shaw
Sherwood
Shimkus
Shows
Shuster
Simpson
Skeen
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Souder
Stearns
Stump
Sununu
Sweeney
Tancredo
Tauzin
Taylor (NC)
Terry
Thomas
Thompson (MS)
Thornberry
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Toomey
Vitter
Walden
Watkins (OK)
Watts (OK)
Weldon (FL)
Weller
Whitfield
Wicker
Wilson (NM)
Wilson (SC)
Young (AK)
Young (FL)

If I had no other information about a person listed above, I would vote for that person if he or she is standing for election to the U.S. House or Senate this fall.

__________

* 38 of 49 Republicans and 2 of 50 Democrats. (Jeffords of VT, a nominal Independent, voted for BCRA.)

** 176 of 217 Republicans (with 5 others not voting), 12 of 210 Democrats (with 1 other not voting), and 1 of 2 Independents.

One Small Blow for Freedom of Speech

First, the bad news:

Andy Roth of The Club for Growth posts a roundup of reactions to McCain-Feingold Iron Curtain Day. As David Keating explains in a followup post,

our free speech rights disappeared at 12:00:01 AM this morning.

It is now illegal for virtually all nonprofit groups to run any radio or TV ad that merely mentions the name of a congressman. Even a 10 second spot that simply had a congressman’s photo and no audio could land you in jail.

David goes on to quote “Former FEC Chairman Brad Smith [who] explains the ‘reform’ today and asks”:

In exchange for surrendering our First Amendment rights, what have we gained? Do you feel Congress is more ethical than before? Less attuned to special interests? Do you feel more empowered, or less empowered, than you did four years ago, when the law passed? Can you name any tangible benefit from these prohibitions?

Absolutely none. Not a one. The only benefit accrues to McCain, Feingold, and the other hypocrites on Capitol Hill who have used their power to immunize themselves from criticism and to perpetuate their incumbency.

Well, I’m mad as hell about it, and I’m going to do something about it.

So, here’s the good news:

This is an open invitation to the supporters of any U.S. House or Senate candidate who has opposed McCain-Feingold, and who is running against an incumbent who voted for it. Send me the links to your candidate’s web site and to his or her statements about McCain-Feingold. If your candidate has indeed opposed McCain-Feingold and his or her opponent did indeed vote for it, I will publicize those facts right here on this blog.

UPDATE (12/09/06): No one has yet taken up my offer. Sad.

Economics: The Dismal (Non) Science

Marton Fridson, writing at TCS Daily, pours some “Rain on the Economic Forecasters’ Parade“:

Investors are keenly interested in the pronouncements of economic forecasters, judging by the massive amounts of ink and airtime allotted to them by the media. It doesn’t necessarily follow, however, that heeding the prognosticators is useful in selecting securities. Whether or not seers have insight into future conditions is a testable proposition. If it turns out that they don’t, governmental attempts to guide the economy also come into question. Such efforts, after all, rely on forecasts generated by the same methodology that private-sector economists utilize.

Statistics compiled by Bloomberg L.P. shed light on the success of prominent forecasters. Each month, the financial information company surveys 60-plus economists from business and academe. The respondents handicap key indicators for the current quarter (which will not be reported until after quarter-end), and for the next four quarters. Among several indicators covered in the survey, I’ll focus on gross domestic product (GDP), the most popular measure of aggregate economic activity. . . .

[The forecasters] overestimated current-quarter GDP 15 times and underestimated it just 6 times, with one bulls-eye. . . .

[D]uring 2001-2006, the year-ahead forecast hardly varied from one year to the next. The median prediction was in the range of 3.1% to 4.0% in every single quarter. Perhaps not coincidentally, the actual quarterly GDP increase over the past 25 years (1981-2005) averaged 3.14%. The forecasters, in aggregate, perennially thought that one year hence, business conditions would be just about average. In reality however, actual GDP gains gyrated between 0.2% and 7.5%. The forecasters’ nearly inert consensus was all but worthless. . . .

As for government policymakers, the message is to forget about trying to control short-run economic performance. Given the lagged impact of fiscal or monetary intervention, deciding whether stimulus or restraint is needed depends on knowing where GDP will be a few quarters down the line. That isn’t something economists have shown they can reliably predict. A more appropriate mission for government policy is to refrain from meddling that ultimately undermines confidence among business and consumers.

Fridson corroborates my similar critique of macroenomic forecasting (first link below). But the failure of economics as a quantitative discipline runs deeper than its inability to model macroeconomic activity with any degreee of reliability.

“Hard science” is far from “hard.” But economics, by comparison, is essentially a pre-scientific, a priori mode of analysis. That’s not to denigrate the valid insights of the likes of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, but to suggest that the validity of their insights precedes quantification and does not depend on it.

Read on:
About Economic Forecasting
Is Economics a Science?
Economics as Science
Maybe Economics Is a Science
Hemibel Thinking
Physics Envy
Proof That “Smart” Economists Can Be Stupid
Time to Retire the Fair Model
The Thing about Science
What’s Wrong with Game Theory
Debunking “Scientific Objectivity”
Science’s Anti-Scientific Bent
Ten Commandments of Economics
More Commandments of Economics
Science, Axioms, and Economics
Mathematical Economics

Academic Fools

AP story:

Harvard dean defends Khatami invitation

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The dean of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government defended the decision to invite former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami to speak on the eve of the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

“Do we listen to those that we disagree with, and vigorously challenge them, or do we close our ears completely?” Dean David Ellwood said in an interview published Thursday in The Boston Globe.

This is an excellent example of what passes for rational thought in the academy.

What Dean Ellwood says, in effect, is this: We should listen to an armed thug who is preparing to attack us because if we listen we might learn something. Right! What we’ll “learn” is that the armed thug really isn’t preparing to attack us — just before he does that very thing.

It should come as no surprise to academicians of Ellwood’s ilk (which seems to be most of them) that non-academicians take them for deluded fools, dupes, and Leftists who prefer despotism to freedom. For that is what they are.

The Source of Rights

Stephan Kinsella of Mises Economics Blog, in a pugnacious and meandering post, finally gets around to naming the source of rights, as he sees it. That source is empathy, which is:

1. Identification with and understanding of another’s situation, feelings, and motives. See Synonyms at pity.

2. The attribution of one’s own feelings to an object.

Empathy has something to do with it. But my view is that rights arise from self-interest, best expressed as the Golden Rule:

“Love your neighbor as yourself” – Moses (ca. 1525-1405 BCE) in the Torah, Leviticus
“What you do not want others to do to you, do not do to others.” – Confucius (ca. 551–479 BCE)
“What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man.” – Hillel (ca. 50 BCE-10 CE)
“Do to others as you would have them do unto to you.” – Jesus (ca. 5 BCE—33 CE) in the Gospels, Luke 6:31; Luke 10:27 (affirming of Moses); Matthew 7:12;
“Hurt no one so that no one may hurt you” — Muhammad (c. 571 – 632 CE) in The Farewell Sermon.

The Golden Rule implies empathy; that is, the validity of the Golden Rule hinges on the view that others have the same feelings as oneself. But the Golden Rule also encapsulates a lesson learned over the eons of human coexistence. That lesson? If I desist from harming others, they (for the most part) will desist from harming me. (There’s the self-interest.) The exceptions usually are dealt with by codifying the myriad instances of the Golden Rule (e.g., do not steal, do not kill) and then enforcing those instances through communal action (i.e., justice and defense).

The lesson here is three-fold:

Rights are “natural,” but not in the sense that they are somehow innate in humans. Rather, rights are natural in the sense that they arise from a nearly universal sense of empathy and an experiential belief in the value of mutual forbearance.

Those “natural rights” have no force or effect unless they are generally recognized and enforced through communal action.

Rights may therefore vary from place to place and time to time, according to the mores of the community in which they are recognized and enforced.

Those "Dedicated" Public "Educators"

They not only refuse to teach, they also try to prevent others from teaching. What a web of woe we have woven around our children — except for those who are lucky enough to have escaped the public school system.

See also: Detroit Teachers Put Special Interest Politics Ahead of Students (written in anticipation of the Detroit teachers’ strike) and Schools Need Competition Now (John Stossel’s take on the public-school monopoly).

Is Exit Unrealistic?

Joe Miller (Bellum et Mores) writes that “the preferred libertarian solution to political philosophy, namely exit, isn’t a realistic option right now. Voice, however poorly it might work, is an option.” His views seem to parallel mine:

Social norms can and do evolve. Moreover, in a society with voice and exit they will evolve toward greater liberty, rather than less, if exit is not mooted by legislative and judicial imposition of common norms across all segments of society.

Exit remains an option within the United States, because there are significant inter-State differences in tax rates and regulatory burdens, as I discuss here. But it is undeniable that those differences have dwindled as the central government has usurped more and more power from the States and the people.

Which leads to the question whether exit would be a realistic option were the laws of all States to approach oppressive homogeneity. Americans seeking liberty would then have to look elsewhere for it. Exit would then become far less feasible than it is now, given the high emotional and finanical costs of leaving one’s homeland for a foreign land. Consider, for example, the list of nations that rank as high or higher than the United States on the 2006 Index of Economic Freedom:

Hong Kong
Singapore
Ireland
Luxembourg
United Kingdom (?????)
Iceland
Estonia
Denmark
Australia
New Zealand

The looming loss of exit as a realistic option argues for redoubled efforts to resist — and to roll back, as far as possible — the encroaching homogeneity of the laws of the States. It is likely that that homeogeneity will be neither of the “Left” nor of the “Right” (and certainly not libertarian) but a blend of the worst of both possible worlds. There will be no winners under a homogeneously oppressive central government, except those who run it.

Status, Spite, Envy, and Income Redistribution

Andrew Roth of The Club for Growth summarizes the current blogospheric debate about income redistribution. Will Wilkinson (The Fly Bottle) adds what I think is the clincher. Go. Read.

(My views about income inequality and redistribution are captured in the preceding post and the various posts linked to therein.)

Your Labor Day Reading

This, this, and this (summarized here). The poor in the U.S. are less poor than they used to be (and they are not, by and large, the same poor of a generation ago). Moreover, the poor in the U.S. are no poorer than the poor in the socialistic “paradises” of Western Europe and Canada. But the poor in the U.S. can become better off than the denizens of those other nations. And the chances of becoming better off are much greater in the U.S., given its superior economic performance.

Related links:
Now and Then, by Don Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek
More Data on Middle Class Americans, ditto
Half Empty or Half Full, Part I, by Russell Roberts of Cafe Hayek
A Kept Promise, by Greg Mankiw of the eponymous blog
A Primer on the Standard of Living and the Cost of Living, by Russell Roberts of Cafe Hayek
Census and Sensibility, by Jerry Bowyer at TCS Daily
Is the Increased Earnings Inequality among Americans Bad?, by Gary Becker of The Becker-Posner Blog
Why Rising Income Inequality in the United States Should Be a Noninssue, by Richard Posner of ditto

A Haunting Lyric

I think I first heard A.A. MIlne‘s “Disobedience” as a rope-skipping chant. It’s a hanting lyric, the first three lines of which you may never be able to banish from your mind. Here is the first stanza:

James James
Morrison Morrison
Weatherby George Dupree
Took great
Care of his Mother,
Though he was only three.
James James Said to his Mother,
“Mother,” he said, said he;
“You must never go down
to the end of the town,
if you don’t go down with me.”

You Bet Your Life

Most persons who are confronted by an armed mugger will accede to the mugger’s demands for wallet, jewelry, etc. The immediate prospect of being killed or injured generally outweighs the thought of resistance or flight, neither of which is likely to be effective and both of which might simply infuriate the mugger. The instintive logic at work in most persons goes like this: My odds of surviving this incident unharmed are much greater if I accede to the mugger’s demands than if I try to resist or flee. I value my life and limb more than the money and jewelry demanded by the mugger. Therefore, I will accede to the mugger’s demands.

Environmental alarmists react to the very mixed and uncertain evidence about climate change and its causes as if they were facing an armed mugger. Oh, they say (in effect), let’s give in to the “mugger” and forswear our wealth so that we might live to see a cooler, less turbulent day.

The difference, of course, is that the threat posed by the mugger is immediate and obvious. He’s right there in your face. That is not the case with climate change; we see the change (e.g., rising temperatures) but we are very far from certain about its causes, effects, and future course. (In addition to the item linked above, see this, this, and this, and follow the many links in the third item. See also John Ray’s Greenie Watch, which is replete with relevant material.)

Those who counsel environmental “action” in the face of such great uncertainty about the causes, effects, and future course of climate change are not being mugged, nor are they witnesses to a mugging. They are spectators to a scene that is visible to them through a translucent screen. They see something going on and they assume that it is a crime and that they can identify and shoot the criminal without harming the victim. In fact, there may be neither criminal nor victim. To assume that there is a crime and an identifiable criminal runs the risk of harming innocent persons (i.e., everyone) for the sake of nothing.

We are not facing the one-sided certainties of such screen “gems” as The Day After Tomorrow or An Inconvenient Truth. We are peering through a sceen darkly. The only muggers we face, in actuality, are the perpetrators of such propaganda as The Day After and Inconvenient — and those scientists who abet them, wittingly or not.

Do you want to bet your life (or livelihood) on the biased inferences of environmentalist muggers? I don’t. I want a lot more information about what is happening to the climate, why it is happening, whether the consequences for humans are good or ill, and what (if anything) humans can do about it if the consequences are ill.

Related link: Reality-Based Skepticism of Government Action to Reduce Global Warming, by Don Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek

Is the State Necessarily Paternalistic?

Correspondence with a reader about my post, “The Feds and ‘Libertarian Paternalism’,” leads me to this observation:

The state is not paternalistic per se. The state acts paternalistically when it forces or incentivizes its citizens to behave in certain ways. But the state is not acting paternalistically when it shields its citizens and enables them to behave as they will, in accordance with the harm principle as it is properly understood (see below).

Related definitions:

paternalism – the attitude (of a person or a government) that subordinates should be controlled in a fatherly way for their own good

shielding – the act of shielding from harm

Democrats: The Anti-People People

From a story by Jim Kouri at The National Ledger:

The continuous demonizing and vilifying of Wal-Mart Stores by Democrat Party officials is not working to turn Americans against the enormously successful US retailer, according to a recent poll. It may actually be hurting some Democrat politicians who are trying to hide their liberal-left agenda.

Wal-Mart spokeswoman Sarah Clark on Friday released the following statement on a new poll conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press:

“This poll is the latest proof that politicians will turn off most voters by attacking Wal-Mart and that the attacks themselves are not working. America’s working families want to decide for themselves where to work and where to shop.

“The numbers make it clear that America’s working families value Wal-Mart’s job opportunities, savings, and the benefits we provide the communities we serve. By attacking Wal-Mart, politicians show they are out of touch with working families.

“Working families support Wal-Mart because the company creates tens of thousands of jobs each year, provides health care for as little as $11 per month, and because economic studies verify that Wal-Mart saves American families $2300 a year.”

Here’s the moral, in a nutshell, for those Democrats who are open to reason: Wal-Mart provides jobs for low-income families; Wal-Mart offers low prices to low-income families. When politicians hurt Wal-Mart, they hurt low-income families. Get it? Republicans do.

Related: See this post by Donald Boundreaux, whom I sometimes chide for his radical libertarianism. When sticks to economics he is first rate.

Remembrance of Teachers Past

With the aid of the Social Security Death Index (searched via this tool), I “found” several teachers and school adminstrators from my K-12 days who have passed on. At the end of this post I draw meaning from this trivial exercise. First, the list of “found” educators:

First grade:
Margaret S. Lester, 02/24/1921 – 04/03/1989

Third grade:
Ethel Parsons, 05/27/1895 – 05/xx/1974

Fourth grade:
Lila Nurenberg, 02/07/1905 – 07/xx/1972

Sixth grade:
Esther L. Minnie, 08/05/1909 – 03/xx/1980

Seventh grade (homeroom):
Maurice B. Greene, 10/22/1910 – 06/22/1995

Junior high principal:
Stanley R. Hardman, 09/13/1901 – 03/05/1992

Junior high math:
William L. Laidlaw, 11/12/1904 – 03/xx/1972

Senior high principal:
Omer P. Bartow, 09/15/1902 – 08/22/1992

Senior high math:
Frank B. Yon, 01/04/1920 – 08/11/2001

Senior high Latin:
Thelma Sharritt, 04/07/1900 – 01/xx/1982

Senior high English:
Aharas Kresin, 10/06/1908 – 01/23/2001

Senior high social studies:
Dwight Lange, 08/02/1918 – 01/05/1994

Senior high guidance counselor:
Burman J. Misenar, 07/25/1915 – 08/06/1994

Superintendent of schools:
Howard Crull, 04/09/1898 – 06/xx/1968

Superintendent of schools:
Norris Hanks, 05/06/1900 – 10/xx/1981

Missing are: female teachers who were unmarried when they taught me but went on to marry and use their husbands’ names, teachers with combinations of first names and last names that are common, and teachers whom I knew only by last name. Also missing, of course, are those teachers with uncommon first name-last name combinations who are still among the quick.

I am convinced that the principal of the first school I attended (a Mrs. Forbes) was born soon after (if not during) the Civil War. I exaggerate (a bit), but it is evident that my worldview was influenced strongly by many persons who came of age in the early part of the 20th century, persons who remembered vividly the Great Depression and World War II. Then there was the influence of my maternal grandmother, who came of age in the late 1800s. (See here.)

Think about the persons who were influential in your life when you were a child and adolescent. When were they born? What great events did they live through as adults? Do you, in some ways, see their attitudes reflected in yours?

Eternity Road Takes It Up Several Notches

Francis W. Porretto, proprietor of Eternity Road, takes my humble post of yesterday (“Utopian Schemes“) and builds upon it a towering edifice of erudition and logic. Go there and read the whole thing. I’m still digesting it, and I may — or may not — have more to say on the subject.

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