January 11, 2009
Mark Steyn on the "oldest hatred."
In Toronto, anti-Israel demonstrators yell "You are the brothers of pigs!," and a protester complains to his
interviewer that "Hitler didn't do a good job."
In Fort Lauderdale, Palestinian supporters sneer at Jews, "You need a big oven, that's what you need!"
In Amsterdam, the crowd shouts, "Hamas, Hamas! Jews to the gas!"
In Paris, the state-owned TV network France-2 broadcasts film of dozens of dead Palestinians killed in an
Israeli air raid on New Year's Day. The channel subsequently admits that, in fact, the footage is not from
Jan. 1, 2009, but from 2005, and, while the corpses are certainly Palestinian, they were killed when a truck
loaded with Hamas explosives detonated prematurely while leaving the Jabaliya refugee camp in another of
those unfortunate work-related accidents to which Gaza is sadly prone. Conceding that the Palestinians
supposedly killed by Israel were, alas, killed by Hamas, France-2 says the footage was broadcast
"accidentally."
In Toulouse, a synagogue is firebombed; in Bordeaux, two kosher butchers are attacked; at the Auber RER
train station, a Jewish man is savagely assaulted by 20 youths taunting, "Palestine will kill the Jews"; in
Villiers-le-Bel, a Jewish schoolgirl is brutally beaten by a gang jeering, "Jews must die."
In Helsingborg, Sweden ...
David Harsanyi writes on the protest that asked for "Death of all Juice."
In our nation, even twisted extremists are welcome to express their opinions.
Take, for instance, the young Muslim woman in Florida who used her constitutional right to tell Jews to "go
back to the oven!" last week. Or the more befuddled protester in New York who brandished a sign that read,
"Death to all Juice." (And I thought we Jews ran the country. Clearly, someone is sleeping on the job.)
These rare but revolting displays of hate do offer the "Juice" a valuable reminder that a secure Jewish state
in Israel is a historic imperative.
Nevertheless, it is distressing to hear the large number of supposedly peace- loving critics of Israel in
essence defend Hamas, one of the most virulently un-intellectual, illiberal, bellicose, misogynistic, hateful
and violent brands of religious fanaticism on Earth. ...
Guardian, UK Op-Ed on the fears of London's Jews.
... In August 2001, I turned 21 and my parents gave me a Star of David necklace. Then a month later, the
world changed and my mother, with remarkable foresight, began her campaign to rescind the gift, begging
me to take it off because she was frightened it would make me a target in the wake of mounting evidence
that fanatical Islamism was tightening its grip on the country. My argument was always the same - when I
am no longer safe being identifiably Jewish on the tube, I don't want to live in England.
Now it's happening and I am devastated. ...
Andy McCarthy Corner post notes a good LA Times piece on Eric Holder's part in the
pardoning of FALN terrorists.
Thomas Sowell takes up the case of Scooter Libby.
John Tierney posts again on John Holdren, Obama's science advisor. If you want to know more
about the Simons v. Ehrlich/Holdren wager, Tierney wrote about it in the NY Times Magazine
December 2, 1990. Click here for the link.
My post on John P. Holdren’s appointment as presidential science advisor prompted complaints that I was
making too much of Dr. Holdren’s loss of a bet to the economist Julian Simon about the price of some
metals. But that bet wasn’t just about metals. It was about a fundamental view of how adaptable and
innovative humans are, and whether a rich modern society is “sustainable.” Dr. Holdren and his collaborator,
Paul Ehrlich, were the pessimists.
Dr. Ehrlich made the best-seller lists in the 1960s with apocalyptic visions of imminent international famines,
food riots in America and catastrophic shortages of natural resources because humans were exceeding the
planet’s carrying capacity. (JC’s comment lists some of his failed prophecies.) In 1971, he and Dr. Holdren
wrote an essay wrote warning that if “population control measures are not initiated immediately and
effectively, all the technology man can bring to bear will not fend off the misery to come.”
They declared that “present technology is inadequate to the task of maintaining the world’s burgeoning
billions, even under the most optimistic assumptions,” and warned of shortages of food and water that would
have to be overcome in the next two decades for humans to “be to be granted the privilege of confronting
such dilemmas as the exhaustion of mineral resources and physical space later.” ...
Are government statistics reliable? Think for a minute. Who created them? Of course they are
unreliable. Real Clear Markets has the story.
... Probably the best place to start is the alleged trade deficit given that it’s arguably the least understood
economic statistic. It should be said plainly that there is no such thing as a trade deficit. It is a myth. For one,
countries don’t trade; instead people trade. When we consider it in that light we must conclude that rather
than deficits, individuals are constantly exchanging what they deem personal surplus for something they
don’t have but want.
The best way to look at trade is to view it in an individual context. As individuals we run trade deficits with
our landlords, our grocery stores, and restaurants we frequent. But are we in deficit? Hardly. We’re able to
maintain those supposed deficits in trade thanks to the work we engage in elsewhere. In the end all trade
balances due to the basic truth that we can’t buy from anyone unless someone’s purchased something from
us of equal value first.
The question then becomes why the government produces statistics suggesting we’re in “deficit” on a
monthly basis? The answer lies in what they define as “trade.” When Americans buy shoes, socks and shirts
that are made in China, those purchases accrue to the deficit. Conversely, the Chinese are big purchasers
of our equities, land and debt. None of those purchases count in the alleged “trade” balance because they
are “capital” assets. But we export opportunities to invest in our generally booming economy in exchange for
goods that are not in our economic interest to make.
The reality is that trade deficits are a sign of economic health. And while GDP figures are highly misleading
(more on that later), periods when our GDP has grown the most have regularly correlated with rising trade
“deficits.” ...
Borowitz reports Obama has refused to reveal the size of his package.
Scrappleface and News Biscuit are here too.
Orange County Register
The 'oldest hatred' lives, from Gaza to Florida
Jew-hating pathologies ultimately harm the Jew-hater, too.
by Mark Steyn
In Toronto, anti-Israel demonstrators yell "You are the brothers of pigs!," and a protester complains to his
interviewer that "Hitler didn't do a good job."
In Fort Lauderdale, Palestinian supporters sneer at Jews, "You need a big oven, that's what you need!"
In Amsterdam, the crowd shouts, "Hamas, Hamas! Jews to the gas!"
In Paris, the state-owned TV network France-2 broadcasts film of dozens of dead Palestinians killed in an
Israeli air raid on New Year's Day. The channel subsequently admits that, in fact, the footage is not from
Jan. 1, 2009, but from 2005, and, while the corpses are certainly Palestinian, they were killed when a truck
loaded with Hamas explosives detonated prematurely while leaving the Jabaliya refugee camp in another of
those unfortunate work-related accidents to which Gaza is sadly prone. Conceding that the Palestinians
supposedly killed by Israel were, alas, killed by Hamas, France-2 says the footage was broadcast
"accidentally."
In Toulouse, a synagogue is firebombed; in Bordeaux, two kosher butchers are attacked; at the Auber RER
train station, a Jewish man is savagely assaulted by 20 youths taunting, "Palestine will kill the Jews"; in
Villiers-le-Bel, a Jewish schoolgirl is brutally beaten by a gang jeering, "Jews must die."
In Helsingborg, Sweden, the congregation at a synagogue takes shelter as a window is broken and burning
cloths thrown in. in Odense, principal Olav Nielsen announces that he will no longer admit Jewish children to
the local school after a Dane of Lebanese extraction goes to the shopping mall and shoots two men working
at the Dead Sea Products store. in Brussels, a Molotov cocktail is hurled at a synagogue; in Antwerp,
Netherlands, lit rags are pushed through the mail flap of a Jewish home; and, across the Channel in Britain,
"youths" attempt to burn the Brondesbury Park Synagogue.
In London, the police advise British Jews to review their security procedures because of potential revenge
attacks. The Sun reports "fears" that "Islamic extremists" are drawing up a "hit list" of prominent Jews,
including the Foreign Secretary, Amy Winehouse's record producer and the late Princess of Wales' divorce
lawyer. Meanwhile, The Guardian reports that Islamic nonextremists from the British Muslim Forum, the
Islamic Foundation and other impeccably respectable "moderate" groups have warned the government that
the Israelis' "disproportionate force" in Gaza risks inflaming British Muslims, "reviving extremist groups," and
provoking "UK terrorist attacks" – not against Amy Winehouse's record producer and other sinister members
of the International Jewish Conspiracy but against targets of, ah, more general interest.
Forget, for the moment, Gaza. Forget that the Palestinian people are the most comprehensively wrecked
people on the face of the Earth. For the past 60 years they have been entrusted to the care of the United
Nations, the Arab League, the PLO, Hamas and the "global community" – and the results are pretty much
what you'd expect.
You would have to be very hardhearted not to weep at the sight of dead Palestinian children, but you would
also have to accord a measure of blame to the Hamas officials who choose to use grade schools as launch
pads for Israeli-bound rockets, and to the U.N. refugee agency that turns a blind eye to it. And, even if you
don't deplore Fatah and Hamas for marinating their infants in a sick death cult in which martyrdom in the
course of Jew-killing is the greatest goal to which a citizen can aspire, any fair-minded visitor to the West
Bank or Gaza in the decade and a half in which the "Palestinian Authority" has exercised sovereign powers
roughly equivalent to those of the nascent Irish Free State in 1922 would have to concede that the
Palestinian "nationalist movement" has a profound shortage of nationalists interested in running a nation, or
indeed capable of doing so. There is fault on both sides, of course, and Israel has few good long-term
options. But, if this was a conventional ethno-nationalist dispute, it would have been over long ago.
So, as I said, forget Gaza. And, instead, ponder the reaction to Gaza in Scandinavia, France, the United
Kingdom, Canada, and golly, even Florida. As the delegitimization of Israel has metastasized, we are
assured that criticism of the Jewish state is not the same as anti-Semitism. We are further assured that antiZionism is not the same as anti-Semitism, which is a wee bit more of a stretch.
Only Israel attracts an intellectually respectable movement querying its very existence. For the purposes of
comparison, let's take a state that came into existence at the exact same time as the Zionist Entity, and
involved far bloodier population displacements. I happen to think the creation of Pakistan was the greatest
failure of post-war British imperial policy. But the fact is that Pakistan exists, and if I were to launch a
movement of anti-Pakism it would get pretty short shrift.
But, even allowing for that, what has a schoolgirl in Villiers-le-Bel to do with Israeli government policy? Just
weeks ago, terrorists attacked Mumbai, seized hostages, tortured them, killed them, and mutilated their
bodies. The police intercepts of the phone conversations between the terrorists and their controllers make
for lively reading:
"Pakistan caller 1: 'Kill all hostages, except the two Muslims. Keep your phone switched on so that we can
hear the gunfire.'
"Mumbai terrorist 2: 'We have three foreigners, including women. From Singapore and China'
"Pakistan caller 1: 'Kill them.'
"(Voices of gunmen can be heard directing hostages to stand in a line, and telling two Muslims to stand
aside. Sound of gunfire. Sound of cheering voices.)"
"Kill all hostages, except the two Muslims." Tough for those Singaporean women. Yet no mosques in
Singapore have been attacked. The large Hindu populations in London, Toronto and Fort Lauderdale have
not shouted "Muslims must die!" or firebombed Halal butchers or attacked hijab-clad schoolgirls. CAIR and
other Muslim lobby groups' eternal bleating about "Islamophobia" is in inverse proportion to any examples of
it. Meanwhile, "moderate Muslims" in London warn the government: "I'm a peaceful fellow myself, but I can't
speak for my excitable friends. Nice little G7 advanced Western democracy you got here. Shame if anything
were to happen to it."
But why worry about European Muslims? The European political and media class essentially shares the
same view of the situation – to the point where state TV stations are broadcasting fake Israeli "war crimes."
As I always say, the "oldest hatred" didn't get that way without an ability to adapt: Once upon a time on the
Continent, Jews were hated as rootless cosmopolitan figures who owed no national allegiance. So they
became a conventional nation state, and now they're hated for that. And, if Hamas get their way and destroy
the Jewish state, the few who survive will be hated for something else. So it goes.
But Jew-hating has consequences for the Jew-hater, too. A few years ago the poet Nizar Qabbani wrote an
ode to the intifada:
O mad people of Gaza,
a thousand greetings to the mad
The age of political reason
has long departed
so teach us madness.
You can just about understand why living in Gaza would teach you madness. The enthusiastic adoption of
the same pathologies by mainstream Europe is even more deranged – and in the end will prove just as selfdestructive.
Denver Post
"Death to all Juice"
by David Harsanyi
In our nation, even twisted extremists are welcome to express their opinions.
Take, for instance, the young Muslim woman in Florida who used her constitutional right to tell Jews to "go
back to the oven!" last week. Or the more befuddled protester in New York who brandished a sign that read,
"Death to all Juice." (And I thought we Jews ran the country. Clearly, someone is sleeping on the job.)
These rare but revolting displays of hate do offer the "Juice" a valuable reminder that a secure Jewish state
in Israel is a historic imperative.
Nevertheless, it is distressing to hear the large number of supposedly peace- loving critics of Israel in
essence defend Hamas, one of the most virulently un-intellectual, illiberal, bellicose, misogynistic, hateful
and violent brands of religious fanaticism on Earth.
That's no easy trick, mind you. After all, the magnificently overused "cycle of violence" — a platitude that
shrewdly spreads blame equally among the culpable and innocent — has thankfully cliched itself to death.
So now, detractors have turned to a feeble argument that claims Israel is guilty of failing to deploy a
"proportional" response against Hamas.
It is said that every story has two sides. In this tale, one group has a nihilistic interest in placing Jews in
ovens (though Hamas, without Iran, lacks the technological capacity to construct a match, much less an
oven) and the other side has a stubborn habit of postponing this fate.
For Israel, there is no choice. There is no political solution. No happy ending. The present circumstance in
Gaza refutes the Left's quixotic notion that antagonists can just, you know, hug it out for peace. It also
counters the neoconservative idea that democracy will spread among people who place no value in it.
Because Gaza is free. Obviously the Palestinians cannot be placated with an independent state — a gift
they never had until Israel handed them Gaza with nary a condition. But this is not a 3,000-year-old war
steeped in ancient history, despite widespread perceptions. This was a 20th century battle between Jewish
and Arab nationalists. It has turned into a more insidious 21st century war with Islamic fundamentalism.
Hamas will not be romanced by the idea of "building bridges" with Israel. There are not enough conference
rooms in Oslo or Davos to persuade Hamas to even recognize the existence of a Jewish state. And Hamas
is uninterested in ceasefires, except when it is in need of re-loading rocket launchers — supplied by Iran.
When asked if he could ever imagine a long-term ceasefire with Israel, Hamas leader Nizar Rayyan
responded: "The only reason to have a hudna [cease-fire] is to prepare yourself for the final battle."
Reportedly, Rayyan celebrated the idea of martyrdom and death in this glorious battle against Jews, not only
for himself, but for his family as well. The Israeli air force blew Rayyan into nano-pieces last week in what we
call a "win-win" situation. Rayyan's four wives and 11 of his children unfortunately died along with him.
But make no mistake: Every Arab civilian that perishes does so at the hands of Hamas. The group provoked
Israel with thousands of rocket attacks indiscriminately aimed at civilian centers. Once Israel responded —
after years of warnings — Hamas placed caches of weapons near schools, mosques and homes in an effort
to cause carnage on its own people. Civilian death is the point.
Most reasonable Americans will understand that Israel did not invade Gaza to terrorize the civilian
population or murder the innocent. Israel is there to dismantle Hamas' infrastructure and dispose of as many
jihadists as possible.
Will Israel's latest assault radicalize Palestinians even further? It's possible. But what other nation would
allow a terror state to attack it on a daily basis without defending itself? The answer is none.
Guardian, UK
How Gaza is alienating Britain's Jews and Muslims
As a British Jew, growing antisemitism makes me feel that I am no longer safe
by Francesca Segal
I am a secular, liberal, identifying British Jew. My parents would have taken great pleasure if my acting
talents had landed me a starring role in the primary school nativity play; on Christmas Day, we gather at
home eating smoked salmon bagels and mince pies. There is no conflict whatsoever between my religion
and nationality. On the contrary, they have always supported and echoed one another in terms of the values
and moral structure they promote. Judaism has taught me to value liberalism, education, tolerance, family
and charity. All Jewish religious services and celebrations include a heartfelt toast to the Queen, because
Jews in this country have felt safe, well-assimilated and, most of all, grateful.
In August 2001, I turned 21 and my parents gave me a Star of David necklace. Then a month later, the
world changed and my mother, with remarkable foresight, began her campaign to rescind the gift, begging
me to take it off because she was frightened it would make me a target in the wake of mounting evidence
that fanatical Islamism was tightening its grip on the country. My argument was always the same - when I
am no longer safe being identifiably Jewish on the tube, I don't want to live in England.
Now it's happening and I am devastated. It was bluster. I am resolutely, irreducibly British. I love Marmite
and Labradors and Sunday lunch. If you step on my foot, I will reflexively apologise. New York, where I will
go if I have to leave the UK, does not feel like home for me nor, I suspect, could it ever. But as the British
establishment sides with the appeasing of Islamism at home and abroad and as the word Zionism is
increasingly bastardised, hijacked by a new definition comprising traditional antisemitic libels and
demonising conspiracy theories, and as the liberal media and campaigning groups single out Israel
disproportionately among all other countries for criticism, perpetuating the myth that Israel is responsible for
mushrooming anti-western sentiment, I feel increasingly that I cannot stay.
My little sister arrived back at her university last week to discover buildings had been daubed with
antisemitic graffiti. Across north London, the same scrawled vitriol has been appearing - "Jihad to Israel",
frequently accompanied by the message: "Kill Jews."
Hamas' leader Mahmoud Zahar has now declared Jewish children worldwide as "legitimate targets" and
although Fleet Street's recent Hamas revisionism made his statement easy to miss, it seems that plenty of
others have taken note. The Community Security Trust has dealt with more than 50 antisemitic incidents in
the UK in the last two weeks, including an arson attack on a synagogue, a massive spike in violence since
the current operation began in Gaza.
"Normally, in that period we'd expect about a dozen," their press officer explained to me, but what a
staggering and unacceptable base rate. The average number of antisemitic attacks in a civilised western
country should be zero. There has been a sea change in Europe and it's terrifying.
The Corner
Pardon Attorney Blasts Eric Holder on Clinton's Shameful 1999 Terrorist Pardons [Andy
McCarthy]
From the Los Angeles Times:
Attorney general nominee Eric H. Holder Jr. repeatedly pushed some of his subordinates at the Clinton
Justice Department to drop their opposition to a controversial 1999 grant of clemency to 16 members of two
violent Puerto Rican nationalist organizations, according to interviews and documents....
President Clinton's decision to commute prison terms caused an uproar at the time. Holder was called
before Congress to explain his role but declined to answer numerous questions from angry lawmakers
demanding to know why the Justice Department had not sided with the FBI, federal prosecutors and other
law enforcement officials, who were vehemently opposed to the grants. ... Clinton's decision outraged law
enforcement officials, who had tried to contain a bombing campaign in New York, Chicago and elsewhere in
the 1970s and 1980s by groups seeking independence for Puerto Rico from the United States.
New interviews and an examination of previously undisclosed documents indicate that Holder played an
active role in changing the position of the Justice Department on the commutations. Holder instructed his
staff at Justice's Office of the Pardon Attorney to effectively replace the department's original report
recommending against any commutations, which had been sent to the White House in 1996, with one that
favored clemency for at least half the prisoners, according to these interviews and documents. And after
Pardon Attorney Roger Adams resisted, Holder's chief of staff instructed him to draft a neutral "options
memo" instead, Adams said.
The options memo allowed Clinton to grant the commutations without appearing to go against the Justice
Department's wishes, Adams and his predecessor, Margaret Colgate Love, said in their first public
comments on the case....
The 16 members of the FALN (the Spanish acronym for Armed Forces of National Liberation) and Los
Macheteros had been convicted in Chicago and Hartford variously of bank robbery, possession of
explosives and participating in a seditious conspiracy. Overall, the two groups had been linked by the FBI to
more than 130 bombings, several armed robberies, six slayings and hundreds of injuries....
After one meeting with advocates of the FALN prisoners, Holder asked Adams to try to obtain statements of
repentance from the inmates to include in the revised clemency report and recommendation being prepared
for the White House, according to a 1999 Senate Judiciary Committee inquiry. Clinton later justified the
commutations in part by citing his consultation with the Justice Department and the statements of
repentance provided by the prisoners.
"The Justice Department is supposed to say what we think on the merits," said another Justice Department
official opposed to clemency at the time, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity
of the subject. Instead, "we were pushed to tell [Clinton] what he wanted to hear, which was to grant it and to
provide political cover."
When Clinton issued the commutations on Aug. 11, 1999, the House and the Senate passed resolutions
condemning his decision. Some lawmakers charged that Clinton approved the commutations to bolster
Latino support for First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was building her campaign for senator of New
York, and Vice President Al Gore, who was gearing up to run for president. Holder was called to testify on
the case by the Senate Judiciary Committee but, invoking Clinton's claim of executive privilege, declined to
say whether the Justice Department had changed its position on the commutations....
ME: We've heard a lot the last few years from Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats about how shameful
it is for an Attorney General to "politicize" the Justice Department; to buck the views of professional, career
prosecutors; and to engage in "secrecy" by withholding from Congress the administration's deliberations on
important policy matters. Were they serious?
The LATimes continues:
In mid-1998, Adams said, he sent a draft report recommending against any clemency of FALN members to
Holder, but he said that Holder did not send it to the White House and instructed him to revise it....
After the clemency grant was announced, 11 members of the nationalist group were released from federal
prison; one served an additional five years on unrelated charges; two who had been previously released had
their fines reduced; and two others remained in prison, refusing to participate in the deal that required them
to renounce violence.
Some of Adams' concerns were borne out. Before their release, the Senate Judiciary Committee concluded,
none of the prisoners was pressed to provide information on the whereabouts of stolen funds or fugitive coconspirators — one of whom was later killed in a shootout with federal agents.
"This is an outrage. There is no better word for it, in my view," said Rick Hahn, a former FBI agent who spent
more than 13 years investigating the FALN, when told of the new details about Holder's role. The son of one
bombing victim agrees. "Eric Holder has been nominated for the top law enforcement position in the
country, yet, if this is true, he supported and pushed for the release of terrorists," said Joseph F. Connor,
whose father, Frank, was killed in the FALN bombing of New York City's Fraunces Tavern on Jan. 24, 1975.
"How can he reconcile that? Why would he push for something so dangerous?"
The entire Times report is here.
Jewish World Review
Manufacturing a crime
by Thomas Sowell
In December, I was asked to file a second report on an automobile accident that took place back in
September, during a visit to Los Angeles. A truck slammed into my car from behind while I was stopped at a
traffic light.
As I sat down to write a new report, I tried to recall the details, beginning with where the accident took place,
which I remembered as having been on Wilshire Boulevard.
Fortunately, I had saved a copy of my first report on this same accident, which showed that it took place on
Santa Monica Boulevard, not Wilshire, which was the street up ahead.
What if I had not saved a copy of that first report, and had written down and signed a report saying that the
accident took place on Wilshire Boulevard, when everyone else involved said it was on Santa Monica
Boulevard? If this was a statement made under oath, I could have been prosecuted for perjury.
All this made me think back to a more important case where memories differed and a man's life was ruined
because of a perjury conviction. Moreover, it was about something that was no more crucial than the name
of the street where an accident took place.
That man was Lewis ("Scooter") Libby, assistant to Vice-President Dick Cheney. He testified under oath that
he had not leaked to reporters the information that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA, but had in fact learned
about it himself from reporters, including Tim Russert.
Unfortunately for Scooter Libby, there was testimony from Tim Russert that he himself did not know that
Valerie Plame worked for the CIA at the time of his conversation with Libby. Perhaps even more damaging,
the White House's own press secretary, Ari Fleischer, said that Libby mentioned to him that Ms. Plame
worked for the CIA. This was a few days before Libby talked with Russert.
It seems clear that Libby had his facts wrong.
But in more than 8 months between the various conversations at issue and Scooter Libby's testimony before
a grand jury, those facts assumed a far greater importance than they had at the time, when there was no
reason for them to be particularly memorable.
While it is a crime to reveal the identity of an undercover CIA agent, Valerie Plame was no longer an
undercover agent, her identity having already been revealed long before this whole episode. She was now
just someone with a desk job at CIA headquarters in Virginia when this furor broke out.
The only reason her name appeared in the media was that her husband, former ambassador Joseph
Wilson, had attacked the Bush administration for going to war in Iraq. Wilson had gone to the African nation
of Niger to check out suspicions that Saddam Hussein was seeking uranium from there, in order to create
weapons of mass destruction. He concluded that this was not so.
Wilson became an instant hero to critics of the Iraq war in the mainstream media. The impression was
widespread that the Bush administration — specifically Vice-President Dick Cheney — had sent him to Niger
and then rejected his report.
This was news to officials of the Bush administration, who scrambled to find out who this man was and who
sent him to Niger. Among those scrambling to find out was Scooter Libby.
What Libby and others discovered was that Wilson had been sent by the CIA, on the recommendation of his
wife, Valerie Plame. When this was revealed in a column by Robert Novak on July 14, 2003, a clamor went
up that a CIA agent had been "outed" in retaliation for her husband's criticism of the administration.
In reality, Robert Novak got his information from Richard Armitage, not Scooter Libby. Moreover, Novak was
a critic of the Bush administration's decision to go to war in Iraq, so he was very unlikely to be part of a plot
to retaliate against Wilson.
Neither Novak nor Armitage nor anybody else was prosecuted for revealing Valerie Plame's name, for it was
no crime. But Scooter Libby was prosecuted big time for getting his facts wrong.
As someone who has any number of times had his memory corrected by consulting old records or old
letters, I don't think a man's life should be ruined for that, when there was no crime to investigate in the first
place.
Surely President Bush can pardon this man before leaving office.
NY Times - Tierney Lab
Science Adviser’s Unsustainable Bet (and Mine)
by John Tierney
My post on John P. Holdren’s appointment as presidential science advisor prompted complaints that I was
making too much of Dr. Holdren’s loss of a bet to the economist Julian Simon about the price of some
metals. But that bet wasn’t just about metals. It was about a fundamental view of how adaptable and
innovative humans are, and whether a rich modern society is “sustainable.” Dr. Holdren and his collaborator,
Paul Ehrlich, were the pessimists.
Dr. Ehrlich made the best-seller lists in the 1960s with apocalyptic visions of imminent international famines,
food riots in America and catastrophic shortages of natural resources because humans were exceeding the
planet’s carrying capacity. (JC’s comment lists some of his failed prophecies.) In 1971, he and Dr. Holdren
wrote an essay wrote warning that if “population control measures are not initiated immediately and
effectively, all the technology man can bring to bear will not fend off the misery to come.”
They declared that “present technology is inadequate to the task of maintaining the world’s burgeoning
billions, even under the most optimistic assumptions,” and warned of shortages of food and water that would
have to be overcome in the next two decades for humans to “be to be granted the privilege of confronting
such dilemmas as the exhaustion of mineral resources and physical space later.”
But the predicted famines and resource shortages never arrived. Instead, the amount of food consumed per
capita around the world increased over the following decades, and the prices of food and natural resources
continued their long-term downward trend. Even though poor countries rejected the coercive populationcontrol policies advocated by Dr. Ehrlich, even though population boomed, even though the store of
minerals in the Earth was finite, people adapted and ended up better off. Dr. Ehrlich and Dr. Holdren would
have lost their bet whether they’d picked food or energy or other natural resources.
Dr. Simon’s victory was not (as some Lab readers suggested) a fluke based on exceptionally lucky timing,
as you can see from this Wikipedia graph showing the inflation-adjusted prices for the five metals in the bet
from 1950 to 2002. (Since 2002, metal prices rose sharply for several years but have since plummeted back
to familiar levels.) Prices do sometimes shoot up for natural resources, but people react by finding new
sources and substitutes, and prices come back down. If you look back over the past several centuries, as
Dr. Simon demonstrated in his book, “The Ultimate Resource,” you’ll see that the trend was downward long
before 1950, too.
What lessons did Dr. Holdren learn from that bet? The only one I’m aware of is: Don’t test your theories by
betting on them. After Dr. Simon collected his winnings in 1990, he offered to make another bet not just on
natural resources but also on any measure of human welfare, like life expectancy or food per capita. Once
again, Dr. Simon predicted that humans would adapt to new problems (like global warming) and end up
better off in the future — by any measure at any future date that Dr. Holdren or Dr. Ehrlich cared to name.
They refused his offer. They did, however, go on making more gloomy predictions and calculations about
the problems of sustainability, as in this this 1995 essay discussing how to avert future shortages of
resources.
In 2005, I found a more adventurous prophet willing to bet on resource scarcity. Matthew Simmons, an
expert on the oil industry and the author of “Twilight in the Desert,” bet $5,000 against me and Rita Simon,
Julian’s widow, that the average price of oil, in 2005 dollars, would exceed $200 per barrel in 2010. (Here’s
my column on the bet; here’s the Wikipedia entry on it; here’s an analysis of where we stood earlier this year
by Stuart Staniford in the Oil Drum.)
Last week, the price of oil hit a four-year low, dropping below $35 per barrel, but Mr. Simmons remained
optimistic of winning our bet. He told Jay Hancock of the Baltimore Sun that 2010 is “an eternity” away and
predicted the price of oil would shoot back up. Well, anything’s possible. But I’m glad I followed Julian
Simon’s advice to bet low. Now if only I could get Dr. Holdren to put up some money . . . .
Real Clear Markets
The Misleading Nature of Government Statistics
by John Tamny
"Macroeconomics is a tautology and a myth, a dangerous one at that, sustaining the illusion that prosperity
is necessarily linked with territory, national units, and government spending in general." - Reuven Brenner,
Labyrinths of Prosperity
The Labor Department is set to announce the nation's unemployment rate Friday. And while the number is
expected to be bad, what sometimes goes unquestioned is the reliability of the government's calculations
when it comes to the health of the economy. The view at H.C. Wainwright Economics is that its various
measures of our economic health are faulty.
And if goverment economic statistics aren’t misleading investors about the health of the economy, they’re
frequently telling us long after the fact what has actually happened.
Trade deficit. Probably the best place to start is the alleged trade deficit given that it’s arguably the least
understood economic statistic. It should be said plainly that there is no such thing as a trade deficit. It is a
myth. For one, countries don’t trade; instead people trade. When we consider it in that light we must
conclude that rather than deficits, individuals are constantly exchanging what they deem personal surplus for
something they don’t have but want.
The best way to look at trade is to view it in an individual context. As individuals we run trade deficits with
our landlords, our grocery stores, and restaurants we frequent. But are we in deficit? Hardly. We’re able to
maintain those supposed deficits in trade thanks to the work we engage in elsewhere. In the end all trade
balances due to the basic truth that we can’t buy from anyone unless someone’s purchased something from
us of equal value first.
The question then becomes why the government produces statistics suggesting we’re in “deficit” on a
monthly basis? The answer lies in what they define as “trade.” When Americans buy shoes, socks and shirts
that are made in China, those purchases accrue to the deficit. Conversely, the Chinese are big purchasers
of our equities, land and debt. None of those purchases count in the alleged “trade” balance because they
are “capital” assets. But we export opportunities to invest in our generally booming economy in exchange for
goods that are not in our economic interest to make.
The reality is that trade deficits are a sign of economic health. And while GDP figures are highly misleading
(more on that later), periods when our GDP has grown the most have regularly correlated with rising trade
“deficits.”
Savings rate. In his classic book The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith wrote that “Capitals are increased by
parsimony, and diminished by prodigality and misconduct.” This is important when we consider the savings
rate, because the basic truth is that without savings, there is no wealth.
The paradox here is that the government regularly reports that the savings rate in the United States is nil, or
often times negative. This is so despite the fact that the Federal Reserve frequently reports on total wealth in
the U.S., and the number of late has hovered in the $50 trillion dollar range. If we allegedly don’t save, how
is it that we’re so rich?
The answer to this question lies in how this statistic is computed. When the government measures our
savings, it measures it in terms of our monthly income versus our monthly spending. And there lies the
problem with this statistic. The savings rate first of all can’t distinguish between spending on a vacation or
spending for instance on home Internet access that would in theory lead to higher income.
The reality that Americans as a whole have historically invested some of their income at some point greatly
distorts the whole savings picture. That is so because the savings rate does not account for capital gains.
What this means is that if someone bought 1000 shares of Dell Computer back in 1994 only to see those
shares split six times, this person might not appear as a saver in the government’s calculation. Thanks to six
splits, that individual might sell shares on occasion to fund all manner of purchases, so despite the fact that
this person would be wealthy by any definition, the extra spending wrought by past parsimony would often
eclipse that person’s savings rate thanks to the spending of capital gains.
In short, the broad prosperity experienced by Americans over the last twenty five years has created
enormous capital gains that were attained by savings but, in the ultimate paradox, have driven our savings
rate lower. To find a time when the savings rate was high, one would have to go back to 1982 when stocks
and housing were both down at the same time. With no capital gains to access, Americans rightly saved a
great deal of income. Far from a sign of prosperity, this signaled a weak economic outlook.
In short, the notion that Americans don’t save is yet another myth.
Durable goods orders. Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan has frequently pointed out that while the
aggregate output of the United States is five times greater in real terms than it was in 1950, the output
weighs the same. Greenspan’s observation deserves special attention considering all the attention given to
the durable goods number produced by the federal government. When the durable goods number comes in
below expectations, economists and commentators frequently key on it as evidence that the economy is not
very sound.
But as the late Warren Brookes wrote in his 1982 book, The Economy In Mind, “the thing that is most
responsible for keeping the United States competitive in the world market has relatively little to do with
physical assets.”
To understand what Brookes meant, we need only look at the composition of the S&P 500 upon its inception
in 1957 compared to today. Fifty years ago, steel, aluminum, chemical, paper, and mining companies made
up half the value of the S&P, whereas today those sectors account for only 12 percent of the index’s value.
Conversely, the technology, health-care, and financial sectors now account for nearly one-half of the S&P,
compared to 6 percent fifty years ago. So while many still concentrate on statistics measuring investment in
new plant and equipment, the actual U.S. economy has evolved in such a way that these measures are far
less impactful to our overall economic well-being.
The durable goods number is rooted in the past given its reliance on heavy equipment. But we are once
again an economy of the mind, so when commentators suggest a poor number here is indicative of poor
economic health, they’re engaging in thinking that mattered in the past, but that has very little relevance to
the present.
Unemployment. Probably the most watched economic statistic each month on Wall Street is the
unemployment number. It is assumed that the level of employment is an indicator of health "thus the
attention "but it seems the major reason unemployment gets so much press is that the Fed watches the
number owing to its counterproductive obsession with employment levels.
The reality is that the level of employment or job creation is very much a function of population. When
populations grow, so do job levels. In this sense, unemployment is somewhat of a misnomer. People aren’t
not working so much due to lack of jobs as they don’t work owing to a failure to supply their labor at a rate
that attracts employers.
So barring government restrictions on employment, jobs are always being created and destroyed at the
same time. Indeed, the computer is arguably the greatest destroyer of jobs in world history, but the
efficiencies wrought by its broad use freed up all sorts of human and financial capital that led to the creation
of higher paying jobs.
Notably, when we read about “high” levels of unemployment in some of the European countries, it’s
important to not take them very seriously either. Due to high rates of taxation, many workers seek to hide
their employment from the government. At the same time, restrictions on firing most notably in France have
fostered a high level of unemployment there that is belied by strong stock-market returns in that country over
the years. Through temping and other ways around the rules, businesses continue to hire.
And while it is correctly said that lots of jobs were created during the Reagan and Clinton years, it’s also true
that percentage job growth under Jimmy Carter was the highest of any president post WWII, not to mention
that job growth has been very impressive under President Bush. No one would mistake the Carter/Bush
economies for those enjoyed under Reagan/Clinton, but if you measured them purely in terms of
employment, they might all look very similar.
Instead, it’s better to look at the quality of jobs and economic dynamism forever revealed by the stock
market. In that case, jobs were plentiful and good under Reagan/Clinton in ways that the Carter/Bush eras
have not measured up too. In short, employment is a factor in our economic health, but not a reliable one.
Consumer price index. The Consumer Price Index, or CPI, is probably the most backward-looking
government statistic of them all. That is so most prominently because prices are sticky. All one need do is go
to a bookstore to figure this out. Most books are priced in U.S. and Canadian dollars, and the despite the
looney’s near parity with the dollar, books are usually priced 50% higher in the Canadian currency.
Another example showing the misleading nature of consumer prices involves Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream.
Rather than raise the price of a tub of Cookies & Cream, Dreyer’s has recently shrunk the size of each icecream container from one holding 1.75 quarts to a smaller one holding 1.5 quarts. Given the infinite inputs
producers consider in reaching a market price, it’s undeniably difficult for government bureaucrats to reliably
factor in those same inputs.
It should also be said that prices change all the time for reasons unrelated to the value of the currency.
Outsourcing and the growing efficiency of computer makers has led a sharp drop in computer prices, while
the memory contained in a $300 iPod would have cost you $10,000 ten years ago. CPI cannot account for
productivity either; the very productivity that has at least in the short-term mitigated the rising costs of goods
that would result from a weaker unit of account.
Looked at today, despite a stupendous drop in the dollar which has shown up in the price of gold along with
every major foreign currency, government measures of inflation stateside are largely quiescent. But we
shouldn’t be fooled, and if this is doubted, we need look no further than the countries whose currencies have
crushed the dollar in recent years, and that are experiencing multi-year highs in terms of consumer-price
inflation.
In the end, consumer prices organize the market economy, and in doing so they account for all manner of
inputs that have nothing to do with the value of the unit of account. Since inflation is purely monetary in
nature, it’s important to remember this in light of the consumer prices relied on by the Bureau of Labor
Statistics to divine inflationary pressures.
Gross domestic product. This economic measure is perhaps what Brenner was alluding to most
prominently in proclaiming macroeconomics a myth. Certainly no national measure of production could ever
be definitive evidence of broad economic health, or weakness for that matter. All one need do to confirm this
is make the short drive from New York City to Newark, New Jersey.
Furthermore, one region or city’s productivity in one country is surely a function of foreign productivity that
lies outside the scope of what is a national calculation. Silicon Valley thrives not just for its human capital
based in northern California, but also booms thanks to the productivity of workers on the other side of the
world.
Even if we ignore the limiting nature of border-specific calculations, we must remember that while the trade
deficit’s economic reality is one of capital and goods inflows that are a reward for our productivity, a large
deficit in trade subtracts from our GDP growth. Conversely, while government spending is by definition an
economic retardant for capital being removed from the private sector for immediate government
consumption, when it comes to GDP, this adds to the number.
Furthermore, GDP in the ’70s actually grew more than it did in the ’50s; this despite the fact that the ’70s are
correctly known for economic malaise rather than vitality. If one solely used GDP as a measure of economic
health, one would be unaware that the S&P 500 rose a mere 17 percent in the allegedly high-growth ’70s
versus a 255 percent gain in the ’50s. The economy in GDP terms grew all four years of Jimmy Carter’s
presidency and has grown impressively under George W. Bush, but the S&P rose only 30% under Carter
and has had negative returns under Bush.
What these numbers tell us is that rather than using government statistics to understand our economic
situation, we would do better to reference market prices. Market prices serve as the world’s great voting
booth when it comes to the health and direction of the economy.
Economists and commentators alike will continue to try and draw economic pictures based on the
misleading and backward looking statistics. But Wainwright research will continue to draw a more accurate
picture; one informed by the wisdom of infinite individual decisions that government statisticians could never
hope to harness.
John Tamny is editor of RealClearMarkets, a senior economist with H.C. Wainwright Economics, and a
senior economic advisor to Toreador Research and Trading (www.trtadvisors.com).
Borowitz Report
Obama Refuses to Answer Questions About Size of His Package
A Personal Matter,’ Says President-elect
At a press conference in Washington today, President-elect Barack Obama repeatedly refused to answer
questions about the size of his package, calling the subject "a personal matter."
Again and again, reporters attempted to get Mr. Obama to tell them exactly how big his package was, but
the President-elect was steadfast in his refusal to quantify it.
"If I tell you the size of my package, some of you will think that it sounds too small, " he said. "And others
will be uncomfortable with how big it is."
The President-elect seemed to indicate, however, that the size of his package may vary according to the
circumstances.
"Depending on what is going on, my package could grow significantly larger," he said. "It all comes down to
the amount of stimulus."
The President-elect apologized for his vagueness about his package, telling reporters, "I know you're having
a hard time getting your arms around it."
Mr. Obama's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, later indicated that the President-elect does plan on unveiling
his package for the American people, probably at his inauguration.
"This will give the American people an opportunity to finally grasp his package," Mr. Emanuel said.
Scrappleface
Obama Picks Blagojevich as Mid-East Envoy
by Scott Ott
(2009-01-09) — Resolving a standoff between Senate Democrats and the embattled Democrat governor of
Illinois today President-elect Barack Obama named Gov. Rod Blagojevich as special envoy to the middle
east responsible for guiding peace negotiations between Israel, Hamas and Hezbollah.
“Rod has demonstrated extraordinary skill and persistence,” said Mr. Obama. “A month after getting arrested
by the FBI, this guy is still in office. That’s the kind of character it’s going to take to gain credibility with
Hamas and Hezbollah.”
Mr. Obama said he would dispatch Mr. Blagojevich immediately to the troubled region.
“I have already spoken directly with Hamas leadership,” said Mr. Obama. “They have agreed to provide
housing and office space for Ambassador Blagojevich and his charming wife adjacent to a weapons depot to
ensure their safety.”
News Biscuit
Judges rule on landmark case of Sod’s Law versus Parkinson’s Law
A longstanding legal dispute between Sod’s law and Parkinson’s law was no closer to resolution last night
after a widely anticipated ruling by the High Court was postponed when the judge presiding over the case
was injured in a freak accident attempting to get to court on time. Lawyers in favour of Sod’s Law have
described the delay as ‘bloody typical,’ while advocates of Parkinson’s Law welcomed an extension to
proceedings which they have criticised throughout for being ‘unduly rushed’.
The dispute began when barristers invoking Parkinson’s law, (which states that work expands to fill the time
available), challenged the assertion laid down in Sod’s Law that if something can go wrong it will. ‘The
unplanned calamities stipulated by the defendant’s doctrine were causing many tasks to overrun’ claimed
one barrister, ‘violating the central edict of Parkinson’s law and rendering the two codes incompatible.’
Evidence cited in the case showed that students were particularly likely to be victims of the clash between
these jurisdictions, with many of them taking the full two weeks to complete an essay and then losing the unbacked-up file on their laptops the moment they attempted to print it out.
Lawyers for Parkinson’s law have also argued that the influence of Sod’s Law increases disproportionately
the closer a project gets to its deadline. ‘It’s much worse for things to go wrong at the last minute, so that’s
inevitably when they do’ claimed one witness. ‘If it wasn’t for Parkinson’s Law, we would have time to correct
any mistakes or maybe even start again.’
Both parties will now have to wait for a ruling at a date to be determined after Lord Justice Collins’
unfortunate accident, which requires extensive hip and knee surgery. Doctors did not want to put a date on
when Lord Collins might have finished his course of treatment, especially after they operated on the wrong
‘Lord Collins’ last thing on Friday afternoon.