New York Times

News you can abuse from the New York Times

muricaderp Books, Economics, History, Links, Religion , , , , , , , , ,

Annoyed New York Times readers are asking why the Gray Lady recently deigned to publish an advice piece on avoiding interpersonal and legal troubles with one’s household staff. I can answer this:

1) A paper must cater to the demographic that actually buys the obscenely overpriced, and roundly obscene, items that it advertises, instead of just staring in amazement that such things exist. The Times’ gleaming new office building across from the Port Authority ain’t paying for itself, now.

You probably are not part of that demographic. When I’m cooking my own quesadillas and potato-onion stirfries in a housekeeping motel in Springfield, Oregon, I most certainly am not.

2) It is excellent click bait and a good business practice to regularly troll the poors.

My main topic tonight, however, is this week’s book review of a new Malthusian work, Countdown, arguing that the world population is overshooting its carrying capacity and nearing a crash.

I definitely find some of the alleged threats in question quite concerning, in particular the brittleness of modern crop monocultures (the Ug99 wheat stem rust is partially contained so far, but it’s no joke) and the depletion of the world’s fisheries. It’s worth noting that that’s why Somalia has so many pirates these days. Somalia has gone a generation without a coast guard. As a result, it has practically no fishery left, foreign trawlers having effectively strip-mined it in the absence of any functioning sovereign government, but as Captain Philips could tell you, it is a nation (if that) lately renowned for its fishers of men. Notice, too, that Iceland, settled by Vikings, does not have pirates or an extremist sectarian militia but does have a coast guard that opens live fire on poaching vessels within its territorial waters. These things are related.

The author, Alan Weisman, starts with a buzzkill for those who love them some Biblical living. According to the review, “Because of agricultural irrigation, the Jordan River is now a ‘fetid ditch’; pilgrims who attempt to bathe at the spot where Jesus is said to have been baptized will develop a rash and, if they swallow the water, will most likely vomit.”

Actually, Ecclesiastes was right: there’s nothing new under the sun, at least not in Holocene times. Check out this foreign army commander bitching to Elisha’s messenger in 2 Kings 5:12 about the skankiness of the Jordan, presumably not knowing its coming longue durée: “‘Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?’ So he turned and went off in a rage.”

Dude eventually listened to the obscurantists, took his dip, and was cured. These days, the Jordan will more likely give a man leprosy, but it isn’t so much different as merely worse: thousands of years ago, rational people were scared to swim in that shit.

That said, things can get really unstable as they’re scaled up. A few tens of thousands of people watering their riverside farms from the same glorified creek may be sustainable. Several million people trying to water major cities and industrial monocultures from the same glorified creek is not sustainable at all.

The inevitable result is war. What, all sides swear that they’re holy peoples living in the Holy Land? Tough titty: they’ve still got war. In fact, they’ve got even more of it, since they’re not just desperate for resources but also inflamed by sectarian passions, the two aspects of their anger feeding one another.

As an institution, it’s good for a lot more than Edwin Starr ever wanted to contemplate. The Nazi expansion into Eastern Europe was about the glory of the Deutsche Volk, but it was also about the oil fields of Ploiesti. Hitler was a megalomaniac, but he wasn’t a total fool. Japan had an even starker motivation for its invasions of Korea (coal) and Indochina (oil, lumber, rubber): it was a heavily populated archipelago devoid of many important natural resources and, starting in 1941, under American embargo at a time when the US was the world’s top oil producer.

In a moral sense, though, Starr was right. War is a travesty. One has to be a bit dense or a lot immoral and atavistic not to recognize this. (These are great traits for government “service,” by the way.) A huge portion of the restiveness in the world can be straightforwardly explained by blatant resource shortages in times of growing population. It’s a total buzzkill for the nationalist and the End Times aficionado (similar personality types, and often the very same people, no?) but it’s true. Surely there must be an alternative to this madness.

There is. Brace yourselves.

Japan.

[T]he fertility rate is so low–1.4 children per female–that the population has been declining since 2006. This might make Japan something of a best-case situation, but an aging population means there are too many senior citizens, and not enough young people to take care of them. Already Japan has a shortage of geriatric nurses. Weisman visits Nagoya Science Park, where Japan’s oldest scientific firm has built RIBA II, a robotic white bear designed to carry elderly people around the house. It has large, widely-spaced black eyes, cute little ears and a painted smile.

“I will do my best,” says the bear, as it approaches a man who is lying on a hospital bed. “I will carry you as though you were a princess.”

RIBA II slides one paw under the patient’s knees, the other beneath his back. The robot cradles the man in its arms. It carries the man across the room, and lowers him tenderly into a wheelchair.

“I’m finished,” announces RIBA II, and it’s hard not to wonder whether the robot speaks for us all.

That bear won’t be finished with me until it can respond to my follow-up command: “Fuck you. Bring me a White Russian.”

Even if you’re familiar with Hello Kitty, you’ve probably been mercifully ignorant of Fukuppy. No more. He (she? it? ooh, goody: “indeterminate gender”) is like the Maytag Man, but actually a smiling Humpty-Dumpty with angel’s wings. Don’t blame me; I’m not the one using that imagery to market refrigeration equipment.

Why do I get the vague sense that there’s something off about modern Japan’s zeitgeist that isn’t all about raw demographics? Hello Kitty, Fukuppy, girls’ shopping getaways to Vegas, the hikikomori and the dame-ren, virtual girlfriends, a popular magazine imploring young people to start having sex again, a robotic bear that promises to carry old geezers like princesses: this isn’t just a skilled nursing shortage. If the papers aren’t reporting about how similar demographic changes play out in, say, Russia, it’s probably because the results aren’t weird enough. Babushka hoeing her cabbage patch again while her grandkids shoot smack behind a disused asbestos factory, or shut-ins who only leave the house to go on “honeymoons” with pixellated “girlfriends” while bedridden grandpa is romanced by ElderBear: which would you rather read?

There is, however, a bit of good news about Japan’s demographic profile. Rod Serling would approve.

Несколько слов про Сирию

Evgenii Grigorev Current Events , , , ,

Не знаю как у вас там, а у нас, у большинства населения, вполне четая позиция по этому вопросу. Лично я считаю, что не надо вообще туда к ним лезть, в их закрытый мусульманский мир. Пусть живут по своим законам и сами решают свои проблемы.

Далеко за примерами ходить не надо. Достаточно вспомнить военные вмешательства во Вьетнам, в Ирак, в Чечню, в Афганистан. Попытки железной рукой пресечь конфликт вылились в многолетнюю затяжную войну с бандформированиями, в партизанское движение, в террористические акты по всему миру. Возникает вопрос: надо ли оно нам дальше? Я конечно понимаю Обаму, для которого Сирия – это как болячка на демократическом теле, которую постоянно расковыривают, и которая не дает покоя. И, казалось бы, если влезть туда “всем миром”, можно террористическую заразу подавить. Ха-ха-ха. На словах все получается гораздо радужнее, чем в реальности.

“Война это плохо. Поэтому мы вторгнемся в Сирию, как великие демократы и покажем им всем огнем и мечом, что убивать друг друга – это грех”. Окей. Если такая позиция кого-то устраивает – пусть так оно и будет. Только после того как очередные террористы взорвут очередные торговые центры – не надо плакать. Сами виноваты.

В России, повторюсь, позиция по Сирийскому конфликту весьма четкая, так как мы до сих пор пытаемся решить собственные конфликты с Чечней. И каждый год мы теряем солдат, которые подрываются на очередных минах, расстреливаются в засадах, погибают где-то в горных лесах, преследуя очередной бородатый отряд партизан-горцев.

У нас в России весьма двойственное отношение к нашему президенту. Его вроде как и любят и не любят одновременно. Однако его письмо в New York Times с разъяснением позиции России по поводу Сирии вызвало у нас в стране волну одобрения. Применять силу нужно лишь для самообороны, для отстаивания независимости СВОЕГО государства, и для охраны его границ. А вторгаться в другие страны и насаждать там свои порядки – это неправильно. Каждый живет как умеет.

Предвижу некоторое количество комментариев на тему того, как русские вторглись в Осетию в августе 2008 года и принудили Грузию к миру в коротком вооруженном конфликте. Так вот, там была слегка другая ситуация. Прочитайте статьи на Википедии об этом конфликте, прежде чем набрасываться меня с обвинениями в двойных стандартах.

Buddhist Leaders Call on Myanmar to Expel Muslims

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Religion , , , , ,

From the New York Times:

After a ritual prayer atoning for past sins, Ashin Wirathu, a Buddhist monk with a rock-star following in Myanmar, sat before an overflowing crowd of thousands of devotees and launched into a rant against what he called “the enemy” — the country’s Muslim minority.

“You can be full of kindness and love, but you cannot sleep next to a mad dog,” Ashin Wirathu said, referring to Muslims.

There is much more in the piece, including this:

[…] images of rampaging Burmese Buddhists carrying swords and the vituperative sermons of monks like Ashin Wirathu have underlined the rise of extreme Buddhism in Myanmar — and revealed a darker side of the country’s greater freedoms after decades of military rule. Buddhist lynch mobs have killed more than 200 Muslims and forced more than 150,000 people, mostly Muslims, from their homes.

Ashin Wirathu denies any role in the riots. But his critics say that at the very least his anti-Muslim preaching is helping to inspire the violence.

What began last year on the fringes of Burmese society has grown into a nationwide movement whose agenda now includes boycotts of Muslim-made goods. Its message is spreading through regular sermons across the country that draw thousands of people and through widely distributed DVDs of those talks. Buddhist monasteries associated with the movement are also opening community centers and a Sunday school program for 60,000 Buddhist children nationwide.

This bad news is, of course, contradictory to everything Dr Delacroix and other imperialists have written on the subject of religious extremism. Imperialists in this century like to pretend that Islam has suddenly appeared to take the place of communism as the preeminent threat to peace and prosperity in the world. They point to violence, poverty and state-sponsored oppression as examples of Islam’s inherent incompatibility with the liberal world order.

This is all anecdotal evidence. There is nothing inherently violent about Islam. All religions are equally authoritarian at their core.

I pull two things from this piece: 1) it reaffirms my commitment to secular government and 2) it reconfirms my skepticism of democracy. These two things go hand-in-hand, of course.

A government that decides to adhere to one religion is necessarily going to oppress those it does not sponsor. This is easy enough for our Western readers to understand, but it is an argument that does not have nearly enough clout in the non-Western world (you could perhaps exclude China from this list, and India has essentially been Westernized; New Delhi even has its own condescending policy towards its indigenous minorities).

The democratic aspect, too, should be familiar to Western readers. Democracy needs restraints, and lots of them. The reasons for this are practically infinite, but suffice it to say here going to war in the name of democracy is a foolish, morally horrendous thing to do. The fact that imperialists today often shroud their lust for power in terms of democracy speaks volumes about the immoral nature of their worldview. (h/t Eugene Volokh)

Cognitive Blocks and Libertarianism

Brandon Christensen Economics , , , , , , , , , ,

Last year Brian Gothberg, who was lecturing at a summer seminar I attended in 2009, left the following comment in response to a post about media coverage and Austrian economics:

I think there’s a perceptual or cognitive block, that simply makes it hard for many people to see government activity in the foreground of the story, as an actor which actively and (often) arbitrarily changes outcomes. It reminds of the recent Brian Greene programs on cosmology on PBS. In one, he compares the treatment of space, through most of scientific history, as simply being the unadorned theater stage, upon which the truly interesting things actually happen. It’s only later that Einstein (using Riemann’s math) described space as having positive, unambiguous characteristics. After Einstein brought space itself into the foreground, you could make statements about particular things that space did do, and other particular things that space did not do.

Another example: at a gathering of friends with children, my wife and I were observing a small boy (3-ish) who kept biting the other children. When it came to tears, parents would come in and intervene, and scold him. Later, we watched the same parents — who were baffled at the boy’s biting — laugh and giggle as the father playfully bit his son. Apparently, nobody had ever brought the father’s behavior into the foreground, for their scrutiny, as a possible influence on the son’s problem. Sometimes, the obvious does stare people in the face. I think that the way we describe the role and actions of government, in the press and schools, goes a long way to explain this cognitive block. Libertarianism is nothing like common sense; not nearly.

I was reminded of this as I read the following 2008 piece by Roger Lowenstein in the New York Times, where he documents the regulatory regime that was built by the state in the years leading up to the Great Recession. Check this out: Continue reading →

A Possible Explanation for Greece’s Economic Woes

Brandon Christensen Current Events, History , , , ,

And one that does not have to do with Athens’ infamous bookkeeping practices. From the New York Times:

But property ownership in Greece is often less than clear cut. So Mr. Hamodrakas put a padlock on his gate and waited to see what would happen. Soon enough, he heard from neighbors. Three of them claimed that they, too, had title to parts of the property.

In this age of satellite imagery, digital records and the instantaneous exchange of information, most of Greece’s land transaction records are still handwritten in ledgers, logged in by last names. No lot numbers. No clarity on boundaries or zoning. No obvious way to tell whether two people, or 10, have registered ownership of the same property.

Yikes. There is more here. I highly recommend it.

Forget fiscal and monetary policy, Greece needs to instate a decent property rights regime before it can become a wealthy and healthy property-owning democracy.

This should not be surprising for a couple of reasons, but only if one is somewhat familiar with the modern history of the region. The Balkans has been, until very recently, under the thumb of various empires governed from afar (Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian). Once independence from foreign despots was attained (through war) in the nineteenth century, these states then had to survive more war (World Wars), endure more occupation (through the same world wars), and then navigate their young states through the Cold War (where dictatorship was sometimes preferable to ideological considerations, and sometimes integral to ideological considerations). In addition, Balkan states have had to constantly deal with threats from each other as well.

If anything, the inclusion of these states into the European Union is probably the best thing to happen to them in a long, long, long time. It is unfortunate that bureaucrats in Brussels decided to hastily implement a single currency without first ensuring that each of the member states possessed the institutions necessary for protecting clear and well-defined property rights.

Update: On the other hand, entry into the EU was probably (correctly) seen as a way to strengthen institutions associated with protecting property rights.

Scotland and Secession

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , , , , , , ,

From the New York Times:

Scotland would have to renegotiate membership in the European Union and other international organizations if it votes for independence in a referendum next year, according to legal advice expected to be published Monday by the British government.

Read the whole thing.

A couple of thoughts:

  1. Wow, the British government published a report on the possibility of secession. Can you imagine Washington ever doing something so outside the box?
  2. The rest of the analysis falls in line nicely with my own arguments (if I do say so myself!) that secession/devolution will only succeed in Europe (or elsewhere) if the new states are allowed into the EU (or other regional and international bodies not named the UN).

Power and Happiness (President Obama in India)

Jacques Delacroix Current Events, Economics , , , , , ,

There is widespread confusion around between two ideas that should be easy to separate from each other. I keep bumping into it. I had several lengthy discussions of it with strangers on Facebook. Some were of the left, some of the right. I found it in my morning paper under the pen of no less than columnist David Brooks of the New York Times (“Midwest at Dusk”11/7/1)).

I refer to the confusion between the happiness of a country’s citizens and the country’s standing in the world. David Brooks wrote:

“If America can figure out how to build a decent future for the working-class people in this (mid-Atlantic) region, then the US will remain a predominant power. If it can’t, it won’t.”

Like this.

President Obama’s post- “shellacking” visit to India is a good time to clear the confusion.

It may be that there is some sort of connection between the happiness of a country’s citizens (or some) and being a “predominant power.” It may be but it’s far from obvious. You would have to demonstrate it. It would be hard; casual evidence does not support the idea. Deeper research does not either. Continue reading →

Patriotism, the Last Refuge of Scoundrels

Jacques Delacroix Liberty , , ,

I have Obama ennui and petroleum fatigue so, here is a story.

In spite of its title, this story is largely about feces so, if you have a weak stomach, stop right here. It’s also about my war, stretching over several years, against raccoons.

I live close to downtown on a parcel that includes four bearing fruit trees. This ought to make me gloriously happy because I was reared in a big city where I always longed for the countryside. Now, for me, on a small scale, the old wish that cities ought to be built in the countryside has come true. The problem is that a tribe of impudent raccoons lives nearby on an untended cliff. For half the year, one or another of my trees is bearing fruits and the raccoons make nightly visits, singly or in groups. Generally, that would be OK with me: Share and share alike, I say. However, raccoons apparently feel the need to defecate soon after they eat, nearly always on my property, in this case. In fact, they are so regular (so to speak), that they always do it on the roof of a low shed adjacent to a lovely small sun-deck. I spent significant money two years ago to build a grape arbor above the sun-deck. I had visions of myself writing outdoors and lazily reaching up for my own dangling grapes.

In the past, I have won indecisive victories with a b.b. gun used at close range. I say indecisive because, one particularly ornery old mama I had shot in the ass several time retaliated by leaving a turd right plum in the middle of my bathroom’s skylight. Continue reading →

A European Union of More Nations?

Brandon Christensen Liberty , , , , , , , , ,

Wouldn’t that be so bad ass? Or am I just a geek?

The New York Times picks up on concepts that libertarians have been talking about for years. From the article:

The great paradox of the European Union, which is built on the concept of shared sovereignty, is that it lowers the stakes for regions to push for independence.

Has the NYT been reading Notes On Liberty? That’s a tongue-in-cheek question, of course, but one that makes me feel smug and sexy at the same time!

I have largely addressed the crisis in Europe from a political standpoint on this blog, and I don’t see that changing much over the next few years. Fiscal responsibility and civil society can only flourish if political institutions are well-defined.

The NYT article decided to quote a scholar at the European Council on Foreign Relations (which is not *sigh* a think tank dedicated to furthering the interests of a small, elite circle of bankers and industrialists) instead of me: Continue reading →

Aging Hippies Aren’t So Hip

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , ,

This is not new to anyone under the age of 40, but this New York Times article is a nice nail in the coffin of the pernicious myth that hippies are somehow radical Leftists. It talks about how young people are becoming more fiscally conservative and socially liberal. That is to say, that most people are becoming more libertarian. The NYT doesn’t mention the “l” word, of course, but the libertarian streak is easy to see nonetheless.

Economist Steve Horwitz has a great take on this on his Facebook page. He wrote:

This is good thing. A more socially progressive GOP is a better GOP. Of course these kids are really libertarians and don’t know it. But if you really want some laughs, read the comments. See how old-fart, un-hip leftists are mystified that young people might think leftist ideas have failed and genuinely believe that there are better ways to improve the world. See the hate, see the befuddlement, see the frustration. Try some new ideas folks, maybe the young’uns will then think you’re hip again.

‘Nuff said.

The Champions of Los Angeles.

Socialism and Empire, Not Immigration, Are Destroying America.

Status Quo Biasing and Conformity Signaling.

More on Chick-fil-A

Warren Gibson Liberty , , , , , , ,

Here’s a commentator in the New York Times who echoes my views on the Chick-fil-A matter, and in a more gracious manner:

… a society that truly believes in individual freedom will respect Mr. Cathy’s right to his views. Those who disagree with him are free to boycott Chick-fil-A in protest. But if our elected officials run Chick-fil-A out of town, they are effectively voting for all of us, regardless of our respective beliefs, and eliminating our individual freedoms.

The writer is Steve Salbu, dean of the Scheller College of Business at the Georgia Institute of Technology.  And he happens to be a gay man.  Here is the link.  Not sure if it’s gated.

Around the Web: Left and Right Edition

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Some sense is finally being made on foreign policy in the Wall Street Journal (h/t Jacques)

Jury nullification in New Hampshire!?! Please buh-lieve it!

When Left links up with Right

Will Wilkinson (of the Economist) and Nick Gillespie (of Reason) take turns ganging up on a recent hit piece of libertarianism in the New York Times. Libertarianism, if you will remember, is the best of both the Left and the Right (with none of the nastiness).

And on Leftist-but-realist (a rarity I assure you!) Stephen Walt’s blog over at Foreign Policy, a Cato Institute foreign policy wonk gets his due.

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Links , , , , , , , , , , ,
  1. Conor Friedersdorf has a great piece in the Atlantic about defending the stay-at-home mom.
  2. In the New York Times there is a great read about how Mexican drug cartels earn their billions of dollars (via @MarketUrbanism)
  3. F.A. Hayek on why he was not a conservative. Good stuff on the confusion in the US about the term ‘liberal’, too. I recommend reading the book from which this article was excerpted, too also (the word ‘too’ has been used too many times).
  4. The Economics of Outsourcing.

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Economics, Links , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Co-editor Fred Foldvary is participating in a symposium over at Bleeding Heart Libertarians.  Check him out.

Michael Mungowitz bags on Greece and the Euro Zone.

Zach Gochenour has a complimentary follow-up piece on Dr. Foldvary’s essay: Progress or Poverty: The Economics of Land and Discovery.

All Hail Azawad.  A blogger obsessed with maps from the New York Times writes about the new state’s prospects .  I have written about Azawad here, here, here, and here (oh God I hope I don’t sound like Walter Block!).

Jacques Delacroix provides even more insights into the French elections and its implications for the Euro Zone.

The collapse of the Euro Zone is kind of a big deal.  Personally, I hope the collapse only destroys the currency of the zone, and not the ability of its members to trade and work freely anywhere throughout the zone.  I also want a pony and never-ending supply of really good weed.

The European policymakers and technocrats should not have been so brash as to believe that they could unify Europe politically.  Not only is that bad for democracy, but it has also given the underlying principle behind the EU – free trade – a very bad name.  Repeat after me: large polities that are economically united and politically divided are good for everybody, but large polities that are economically and politically united are bad for everybody.

It’s even worse when you throw in concepts like Old World identities such as ethnicity into the mix and try to get everybody to play nice through the democratic process.

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Links , , , , , , , ,

At Last, Some Bright Spots in Indian Country (if you can’t view it, just copy and past the title and Google it).

The enduring failure of democracy promotion abroad.

Borderlines. A blog about maps.