Blackwater's crusade.

According to a disturbing interview on the NPR program Fresh Air today, it seems that the U.S. now has the largest mercenary army in our history -- and in the world -- with its own intelligence service and air force. There are more U.S.military contractors in Afghanistan today than U.S. troops.

Blackwater, renamed Xe, is the largest contractor and is run by Erik Prince, who according to sworn affidavits of former employees, "views himself as a Christian crusader tasked with eliminating Muslims and the Islamic faith from the globe," and that Prince's companies "encouraged and rewarded the destruction of Iraqi life."

Blackwater is entirely funded by U.S. tax dollars, yet is accountable to no one. It's doubtful that its employees could be prosecuted for rape or murder since Dick Cheney and others made sure they were exempt from U.S. law, and the laws of the nations we invaded. According to the author of the articles cited above (and others who've reported on this) Blackwater employees are making some targeting decisions instead of U.S. troops.

But whether or not it's a good idea for the U.S. be on a crusade to wipe out Islam is immaterial at this point. We've made sure Erik Prince has a strong profit motive to get the job done.

A mere 16 years ago, our greatest national fear was about private domestic militias dedicated to bringing down our government. Perhaps in our paranoia about external terrorists, we've already forgotten our own recent history.

Coopting cooperation.

A recent NY Times article collects a wide range of interesting facts about cooperation, but having read many articles by journalist Nicholas Wade I am dismayed about the incorrect impressions it conveys. I have not read Michael Tomasello’s new book Why We Cooperate, cited throughout, but anyone who has read more than one of Frans de Waal’s books knows that cooperation is definitely not what distinguishes humans from animals. Some of the ways that we cooperate are more elaborate, but anyone who asserts that “shared intentionality” makes us different from chimps must be unaware of de Waal’s seminal study Chimpanzee Politics written more than 25 years ago.

As for the strength of the urge to cooperate, it does not correlate with a species’ intelligence, and is not a measure, as this article implies, to infer that one species is superior to another. To give just one example, the highest level of cooperation measured in one classic experimental design came from a species known for its murderous inclinations: the spotted hyena. Hyenas are the only mammals that are both matriarchal and regularly murder adults of their own kind. In cooperation, they blow chimpanzees off the chart. Does that make them a better example of our nature? (Some have speculated that this hyena study was suppressed for 15 years because it upended the notion that cooperation tracked with intelligence and evolutionary sophistication.)

Rooting out torture.

In considering whether to appoint a prosecutor to investigate torture, Obama is deciding whether to dip a toe into the cesspool that Bush administration created with its torture and detainment policies. Cleaning up this mess could is the most important legacy President Obama will leave. A generation or two or more later, if the US goes down such a dark path again, people will ask why Obama failed to reinstill a national ethos that humane treatment and due process are the bedrock on which out nation stands or falls. (See my previous post.)

Subprime mortgages rejected by Calfornia voters.

The day after their defeat in a California special election, it’s clear that most voters viewed Props 1A-E like a subprime mortgages. I’ve used this analogy in a previous post about Bush’s unsustainable tax cuts, and it fits equally well here. In trying to solve an unprecedented financial challenge, these propositions offered voters a quick fix based on completely unrealistic revenue projections.

If Props 1A-E passed, voters were smart enough to realize that in a few short years they would be just like homeowners with subprime mortgages: unable to pay the bills and wondering how they got bamboozled into creating debts they couldn’t repay.

Subprime “victims” were told they could refinance their homes when their debt payments ballooned or bought into a fantasy that the ballooning economy would trickle down higher salaries to them that would cover their debt. Voters in yesterday's election were told that when the state’s income needs would further balloon in a couple of years – in large part because of the elaborate borrowing against future revenues orchestrated by these propositions – that either a huge economic recovery or the “rainy day fund” created by Prop 1-A would cover the gap. (Never mind that it might take decades, if ever, for the fund to grow large enough to keep voters from getting soaked.)

Another sad truth has been reinforced by the election: if the private sector figures out a way to fleece unsophisticated consumers, after politicians denounce the hucksters for their immoral greed those same politicians sometimes have the gall to try to fleece voters in a similar way. The focus on today at the expense of planning for tomorrow that has famously plagued American industry since the 1980's also has deeply infected politics and public policy. In California, with term limits forcing every newly elected public official to immediately set his or her sights on the race for the next office, it’s a miracle the ship of state didn’t sink years before yesterday.

I’ve mentioned in previous posts some long standing issues that must be fixed as part of raising the wreck, such the requirement that any bill with fiscal impact pass by a two-thirds vote. Hopefully this will all play out like a disaster movie formula, and we’ll be rescued in time. My additional hope is that the Governator will make good on his promise to leave politics forever, and that future entertainers who assume that public office is just another venue that would draw on their existing skill set will study the careers of Arnold and Jesse and try stand up comedy instead.

Is that a gun in your pocket or do you just want to rape me?

I’m feeling violated by Obama’s signature on a bill demonstrating that no matter who sits in the Oval Office, the National Rifle Association packs the biggest pistol in Washington. One of the main reasons I’ve preferred to visit, camp, climb, backpack, and volunteer to work in National Parks is because I’m much less likely to run into visitors or “campers” with pistols. Sorry this decades old policy banning weapons in the parks is inconvenient for those too fearful to leave home without a gun at the ready, but getting away from some of the more insane aspects of our society for a weekend is fundamental to my wilderness experience.

Our National Park System (NPS) is perhaps the most important cultural and environmental contribution the United States has made to the world. Jazz is the only positive thing that even comes close. (Feel free to educate me with a comment, if you disagree.) Few Americans realize this, but the no other nation had a federalized park system before we created one well over a hundred years ago. The idea of preserving areas of great scenic beauty or ecological importance with a commitment that would endure as long as the nation that contained them was the most important catalyst of the modern environmental movement.

In his campaign for President, Mr. Obama brought hope to hundreds of millions around the world that the terrible vectors in our national policy that acquired so much traction after 9/11 would be drastically altered. Obama sought to reestablish the notion that the U.S. had earned its place as the leader of the free world through its values and its deeds. We’re more than just a posse of drunken cowboys presumptively in charge only because we have more rifles than anyone else. Perhaps no one outside the U.S. will care that we’ve just shot some holes in our greatest contribution to world culture. But I worry it’s symbolic that our efforts at self-rehabilitation – and the change many so fervently fought for – are one step closer to being scattered to the ill winds of political expediency.

(Other essays bring different perspectives to mixing guns and parks, including the fact that pepper spray protects people from large animals much better than guns.)

U.S. productivity miracle a statistical illusion.

Paul Krugman's blog questions whether the boom in the U.S. financial industry actually increased the productivity of the economy, and speculates that the “the apparent US productivity miracle, a miracle not shared by Europe, was a statistical illusion created by our bloated finance industry,” as its recent collapse demonstrated. 

Krugman cites a paper showing that standard of living, the best measure of economic productivity, has increased more in Europe than in the U.S. in the past thirty years.

The paper took into account a number of measurements that track tradeoffs a nation makes in allocating resources for short term consumption at the expense of long-term growth, such as living on debt and not saving. Another important factor taken into consideration was adjusting for decreases in the balance of trade. Larger trade deficits translate into increases in the standard of living – as the U.S. has seen though buying cheap goods from China – but are not sustainable in the long term because the imbalance must eventually decrease and thus erase the standard of living gains. The paper also uses net domestic product instead of gross domestic product so resources that go simply to replace deteriorating capital equipment and infrastructure do not count toward economic growth.

So much for the notion that the U.S. version of unrestrained free markets and absence of a social safety net is superior to the European brand of regulation and more socialist human services programs.

No brains in California May Propositions

“No brainer” is the tag line for the campaign urging voters to approve the latest smoke and mirrors referendums put forward by California’s dysfunctional state legislature and Governator. “No brain” is a better description of the opinion the “leaders” behind these referendums have of voters. There has been very little public discussion of these six propositions, which will be on the ballot on May 19. I believe that the supporters do not want voters to know much about the details and are hoping to fly them through under the radar.

These propositions are a train wreck resulting from the inability of the legislature to agree on a budget year after year. The Democrats won’t reduce spending the Republicans won’t raise taxes. In good economic times, they stumble all over themselves to reduce taxes to make voters happy, knowing full well that the in bad times they won’t have the courage to raise taxes in order to keep the state out of the red. The requirement for a two-thirds vote to pass a budget gets us a worsening series of accounting tricks, of which these propositions are the latest.

We’re told that this is the best deal we’re going to get, and that failure to pass these six propositions will plunge the state back into uncertainty. We should not buy into to these scare tactics. The plan is already fatally flawed because it is based on unrealistic revenue projections. Even if these propositions pass, the latest estimate is that the state will still be facing an additional eight billion dollar deficit this year that they do not address.

1A continues the tax increases recently approved for four years instead of two. Rather than hiking the gas tax and encouraging people to get fuel efficient vehicles or drive less, one Republican legislator whose vote was needed to pass the budget insisted on a sales tax increase instead, which is the most regressive form of taxation (hurts the poor the most). To take the heat off the legislature and get voters to swallow this bitter medicine themselves, 1A sets up an automatic rainy day fund. The problem with this is that revenue only flows into the fund when the State actually spends the amount of money on education mandated by Prop 98, which never happens (see 1B below). Given how many prior propositions are being eviscerated by the May 19th “gang of six” (see below), it’s hard to believe much about how all of this will work in the future.

1B would give schools and colleges 9.3 billion dollars starting in 2010-2012 they think they should have been paid under Prop 98 and that they think the Governator screwed them out of. Is the only way to solve this dispute is via another proposition? What are the odds various government entities will be fighting about this new one in 2010 and beyond? Where is the 9.3 billion dollars going to come from?

1C is an end run around Props 58 and 98 and is one the worst accounting tricks. It borrows money from future lottery revenue that is supposed to go to education to help close today’s budget deficit. This whole Madoff-like Ponzi scheme depends on the economy roaring back in 2010 so there will be money for the payments mandated by 1B. Oh, and it removes competitive bidding requirements from some lottery operations.

1D is an end run around Prop 10 that allows the state to take tobacco litigation money that is supposed to go to "First Five" early childhood development programs and instead spent it on other human services programs. Many First Five programs will end. Just to be consistent with the name of the programs it will kill, 1D will steal that money for five years.

1E allows the state to take money that voters said in Prop 63 should go to mental health programs for children and instead use it to pay for federally mandated Medicaid programs. Cutting and reducing funding for mental health programs will hurt people who need the help the most and cost taxpayers more in the long run, as failing to treat mental health problems always does. Its annual savings are less than half of one percent of the deficit.

1F is a Trojan Horse built to fool voters into thinking that elected officials are sacrificing something in this package. All it does it prevent salary increases for public officials during deficit years. It does nothing to prevent foregone increases from being made up later when times are good. This sort of faux pain for politicians is often used to bait voters into supporting propositions containing bad public policy.

Where is the proposition to lower the votes in the legislature to pass a budget or raise taxes from two-thirds to something more sensible like sixty percent, or God forbid, the simple majority used in Congress and most state legislatures? Vote no on the May 19th gang of six.

We're not in Kansas anymore, are we?

A report from the inspector general and Office of Professional Responsibility at the Justice Department, says The NY Times, found that a former senior official at the Justice Department, Bradley Schlozman, "selected conservative lawyers for prime assignments and transferred three lawyers out of the Civil Rights Division because they were seen as liberals who were opposed to his political agenda. All three later brought federal discrimination claims and returned to the division after Mr. Schlozman left. The transfers, the report found, violated federal civil service law and 'constituted misconduct.'

"The investigation found that among people hired by Mr. Schlozman, 63 of 65 were considered Republican or conservative, but that when he was not involved, 'the results were more balanced,' with conservatives and liberals split about evenly.

"In a 2003 voice-mail message to a colleague, Mr. Schlozman said experience in civil rights law was not needed to work for the division. 'I just want to make sure we don’t start confining ourselves to, you know, Politburo members because they happen to be a member of some, you know, psychopathic left-wing organization designed to overthrow the government,' he said." (It's amazing how conservatives embrace affirmative action if it applies only to conservatives - see my previous post.)

"The investigators for the inspector general and the Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that Mr. Schlozman’s repeated denials to the Senate in 2007 that he had used ideological considerations in his personnel decisions constituted a 'false statement,' and they referred the matter to prosecutors for criminal prosecution last year."

The United States Attorney’s Office, headed by a Bush appointee, declined to prosecute. Mr. Schlozman is happily practicing law in his native Kansas.

No credit? No problem if you're dealing with the Bush administration.

A sly college student activist recently was able to disrupt a fire sale of oil and gas leases announced by the Bush administration on election day by bidding up the prices at auction and buying leases at high prices other bidders could not afford. The truly astounding thing about this sting is that it could only be accomplished because the Bush administration is still blind to the lessons from the mortgage crisis. They were so eager to sell off government assets on the cheap that they didn't do a credit check on the buyers. The student had no money to complete his purchases and the auction can't be repeated until after Obama, who has vowed to stop it, takes office.