Tiger, Tiger

The Left is balanced in their imbalance.

Sanders' universal health care comes in at $32 trillion in government spending over 10 years. Add to that free college, student loan forgiveness, and a guaranteed jobs program and the tab totals $42.5 trillion, according to the Manhattan Institute economist Brian Riedl, formerly a Senate Finance Subcommittee staff member.
The federal government currently collects $44 trillion in tax revenues over 10 years. The current progressive agenda would require doubling that. The 70%  tax hike on the rich would raise, at most, $720 billion over 10 years, according to Mark Mazur, a former Treasury Department official now at the centrist Tax Policy Center. That sounds like a lot of money, but $720 billion is a mere sliver of the $42.5 trillion cost of the progressive agenda. There just aren't enough rich taxpayers.

These people historically have solved technological problems--like global warming--with technologies that don't exist. Now they are going to pay for fixing problems by taxing people who don't exist. A fearful symmetry.

Dr. Watson Presumes

“At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated. The break will then be rendered wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state as we may hope, than the Caucasian and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as at present between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.”

This rather astonishing quote is from Darwin's Descent of Man. It has been dissected to death in an effort to give it context, successfully, I think, by those that argue he was trying to show the episodic behavior in evolution and an apparent confusion between biologic and cultural evolution, the prejudice of a Eurocentric man. I think of this having read an interview with the 90 year old James Watson who, with Crick, developed the theory of the double helix. He has always had a cloud over him, originally from the supporters of Rosalind Franklin, the abrasive expert in X-ray crystallography whose photography allowed Watson to finish his calculations of the helix. Her supporters think she was excluded from credit because she was a woman. (Watson did not like her and did diminish her but she had been dead four years before the Nobel Prize was awarded to Watson and Crick, an award given only to the living.)

But it is Watson's racism that has ruined his life. He has lost his teaching positions, cannot speak on campuses and is the only man in history to sell his Nobel Prize for money he needed to live. His infamous interview in 2007 with the Sunday Times did the damage.  He said he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa," because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really." He added that while he hoped everyone was truly equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true."

Racism brings diversity full circle for diversity is a means of change, not enjoyment. Diversity allows for differences to be weighed and measured on the scales of evolution. Advantageous diversity moves on, disadvantageous diversity drops off. So differences among us may be charming, but may be lethal. As difference is a means of advancement, it seems that disparities--the flowering of differences--are inevitable. And even if there were no differences between groups, there would be differences among men. Should we not admit the differences between Ghandi and Himmler? Lincoln and Ted Bundy?

What is probably at the heart of this anxiety is the unspoken notion that some differences are irremediable, are handed down to children and leaves an identifiable portion of man as forever dependent upon others' charity and forbearance. But that area is more obtuse than ever. No one knows what IQ means now (a big portion of Dr. Watson's bigotry.) Nurture has an apparently sizable impact on Nature. And there is the fascinating implication of epigenetics which makes all geneticists sound Lamarckian now.

The truth of the matter is, testing is a poor measurement of man.


 

Gillette/Tucker Carlson

Re the recent ad campaign by Gillette using the #MeToo theme: Generalizing from small numbers in science is called "bad science." In social analysis it is called "bigotry." Any company asking its customers to identify with Harvey Weinstein is called "stupid."

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"Dignity. Purpose. Self-control. Independence. Above all, deep relationships with other people. Those are the things that you want for your children. They're what our leaders should want for us, and would want if they cared."
These are the sensitive and heartfelt words of Tucker Carlson, a guy I had to Google, who is the FOX replacement for O'Reilly at the 8:00 pm weekday slot. They are worth reading again. Carlson, a self--declared conservative, seems to believe that the government is responsible for citizen integrity and the betterment of interpersonal relationships. These are family, social and religious qualities, not political. Fortunately, Gillette wants to help too.

Expanding the congregation is one thing, expanding access to the pulpit is quite another.

Assimulation

 

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The average black family has been in America longer than the average white family. Why then should blacks be hyphenated as African-American when they are more centuries removed from Africa than most Europeans are from Europe? Does anyone speak of European-Americans? How long should a hyphen persist?--Sowell

This is White House Chief of Staff John Kelly on the problem of Central American immigrants:
"They’re not MS-13… . But they’re also not people that would easily assimilate into the United States, into our modern society. They’re overwhelmingly rural people. In the countries they come from, fourth-, fifth-, sixth-grade educations are kind of the norm. They don’t speak English; obviously that’s a big thing. … They don’t integrate well; they don’t have skills."

The vast majority of Central American immigrants do not speak English when they arrive in the United States. In 2016, according to data from the American Community Survey, 82 percent of Central American immigrant adults over the age of 25 who arrived that year spoke English “not well” or “not at all,” but length of residence does appear to result in greater language acquisition, with nearly three quarters knowing English after three decades or more in the United States.
With less than a year in the United States, already nearly half of Central American adults had found employment in 2016. Employment rates increase with the length of residence in the United States. Those with more than five years in the United States had an employment rate over 70 percent, more than 10 percentage points higher than the rate for all U.S. adults.
Poverty among Central American adult immigrants who have lived in the United States in 2016 drops substantially, and those with 30 or more years experience in the United States had a lower poverty rate in 2016 than all U.S. adults.
English language assimilation continues even faster into the second generation. There is an impressive difference between first-generation immigrants with Central American ancestry and their descendants born in the United States (i.e. “natives”). 91 percent of Americans with Central American ancestry speak English “very well” with another 6 percent speaking it “well”. Only 3 percent speak it poorly or not at all. This compares with 49 percent in the first generation.
Central American immigrants have little formal schooling—half had dropped out of high school, and just eight percent had a college degree in 2016. Adults with Central American ancestry who were born in the United States had the exact same level of educational attainment as all other natives—30 percent had a college degree, and only 10 percent dropped out of high school.
Central American native-born adults have no fall-off in terms of finding jobs either. In 2016, 78 percent of them were employed—a higher rate than Central American immigrant adults and nearly 20 percentage points higher than all other adults born in the United States.
American adults with Central American ancestry were more than twice as likely to be an active duty member of the military than other U.S.-born American adults

Kamala Harris vs. James Madison

There have been some hearings on judicial nominees. On December 5, Kamala Harris posed a series of written questions to Brian Buescher, President Trump’s nominee for district court in Nebraska. The third question reads as follows:

Since 1993, you have been a member of the Knights of Columbus, an all-male society comprised primarily of Catholic men. In 2016, Carl Anderson, leader of the Knights of Columbus, described abortion as “a legal regime that has resulted in more than 40 million deaths.” Mr. Anderson went on to say that “abortion is the killing of the innocent on a massive scale.” Were you aware that the Knights of Columbus opposed a woman’s right to choose when you joined the organization?

Her follow-ups included “Were you aware that the Knights of Columbus opposed marriage equality when you joined the organization?” and “Have you ever, in any way, assisted with or contributed to advocacy against women’s reproductive rights?”

Buescher, a Nebraska native and graduate of the Georgetown Law Center, replied that he joined the Knights when he was 18 years old; that his involvement includes charitable work; and that his job as a judge is to apply the law regardless.

Article Six, Section Three, of the Constitution states, “No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or Public Trust under the United States.” But these people are above all that. The foundations of the law must not hamper the righteous. This is a virtual teaching moment as to why the limits of government were designed as they were by the geniuses that formed the American Constitution.

Sunday/Baptism

Today is the Baptism of Christ, where Christ joins human ritual and symbolism and is baptized by John. There is a tolerant, understanding quality about his joining; one can see a smiling condescending Christ among us as he agrees to the event. But it is more, a peculiar, complex scene where Christ--a mosaic himself--is caught in a moment as part of a larger mosaic, where Christ is both complete and part of something larger, a scene to drive Arians mad.

Claritas. The dry-eyed Latin word
Is perfect for the carved stone of the water
Where Jesus stands up to his unwet knees
And John the Baptist pours out more water
Over his head: all this in bright sunlight
On the façade of a cathedral. Lines
Hard and thin and sinuous represent
The flowing river. Down between the lines
Little antic fish are all go. Nothing else.
And yet in that utter visibility
The stone’s alive with what’s invisible:
Waterweed, stirred sand-grains hurrying off,
The shadowy, unshadowed stream itself.
All afternoon, heat wavered on the steps
And the air we stood up to our eyes in wavered
Like the zig-zag hieroglyph for life itself.
(Seamus Heaney)

Reverie

The first thing the new House started  to talk about was raising taxes. The next is the promise that the investigations will begin. The political shoe is now on the other stupid foot.

Populism. This is a word that s being thrown around as if it means something definitive. It has become pejorative, "anti-elite" as if that meant anti-educated. My understanding of the word comes from its original meaning in the late 1800s in the U.S., monetary and agricultural. It's become an insult the establishment uses to defend itself. Expect to see it in discussion of Trump's decision to leave Syria. Trump is a jerk, but that does not mean our decisions in Iran, Iraq, Libya, Egypt, Yemen and Somalia have been well thought out. The real risk with Trump is that he is so incompetent he will make the return of the original idiots look like an upgrade.

An interesting article in the HuffPo, which is beginning to take itself seriously, viciously attacked Romney's anti-Trump article in the WashPo, continuing the policy of Wack-a-Mole aimed at any non-Dem who might start to emerge. No one will be allowed to take advantage of anti-Trump rhetoric except them.

60% of the return of stocks is buy-backs. With dividends and buybacks, Apple pays the equivalent of 9.5%.

In 1800, 75% of [an American's] working man's expenditures went for food alone. By 1850, that had dropped to 50%. Today it is a little more than 11%. --The Wall Street Journal, September 20, 1996

 

Some very tough teams in the playoffs last weekend.

The Chargers played against the Ravens with three safeties at linebacker.

A number of stories on the Internet suggesting the Steelers will get rid of Brown.

And tough shows on Netflix too. Bodyguard. The Last Kingdom, from the Cornwell book, has raised species brutality to an art form. I had to take some time away from it. Fortunately there are some crazy silly funny options.

The recently departed--and sainted--Khashoggi seems to have had a more complicated background. Text messages between Khashoggi and Maggie Mitchell Salem, an executive at Qatar Foundation International and a former State Department official during the Clinton presidency, show she "at times shaped the columns he submitted to The Washington Post, proposing topics, drafting material and prodding him to take a harder line against the Saudi government." The Post added, "Khashoggi also appears to have relied on a researcher and translator affiliated with the organization."

Qatar? Former State Department?

Researchers found those who gave up booze for a month reported drinking less, even seven months later. Even more striking, the participants reported a range of other lasting benefits: 70 percent reported improved overall health, 71 percent slept better, 67 percent had more energy, 58 percent lost weight, and 54 percent had better skin.

What does it mean that Bohemian Rhapsody is thought to be the best movie of the year?

A civil rights institute in Alabama has withdrawn an award for Angela Davis, the longtime radical political activist, author and academic. The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's board of directors had chosen Davis to receive its "Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award" at its annual gala next month. But the institute decided to withdraw the award and cancel the annual gala at which Davis, a Birmingham native, would have been honored. It is said the award was withdrawn because of her opposition to Israel. Apparently being a supporter of the homicidal Communists and the Black Panther Party was ok.

When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou sayst,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty," – that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.       
 Sooo,beauty is a virtue?  And ugliness a vice?

 Ocasio-Cortez suggested that the wealthiest Americans ought to pay a marginal tax rate of as high as 70% to fund a “Green New Deal.” “It only has ever been radicals that have changed this country,” she said. “Abraham Lincoln made the radical decision to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. Franklin Delano Roosevelt made the radical decision to embark on establishing programs like Social Security. If that’s what radical means, call me a radical.”  Shallow, illogical, and silly.  That statement is as dumb as anything Trump has said.  Voting rights for dolphins is radical too.   

Explorers and producers are finding themselves in the midst of an increasingly heated debate in Norway on the future of fossil fuels, with calls for cuts to incentives, more drilling restrictions and higher taxes.

If you had a perfect ability to predict how far the market would fall and when it would bottom out, it would make sense to move money in and out. But you do not.

Gunmen opened fire in a crowded bar in the Mexican resort city of Playa del Carmen, killing seven people, authorities and media reports said Monday.

 

Bordeaux summarizing McCloskey: "While reasonably secure private property and contract rights, and reasonably free markets, are necessary for capitalism to operate, they are not sufficient. An openness to innovation and (for lack of a better term) a culture that accepts economic change are also necessary. If fear of innovation and opposition to change are widespread throughout a society, that society cannot and will not be capitalist. And the typical denizens of that society cannot and will not be as materially prosperous as are even the poorest denizens of capitalist societies."

Like all these goofy government programs created to subvert the laws of economics, the tariffs will be shouldered by the usual people, the hard working average guy. Some vague character or industry will eventually have some symbolic benefit but it will be the result of the usual transfer from the working guy to the connected guy. For some reason this lesson has to be relearned and relearned, like some problem of recurrent social amnesia.

While Carol was ill last year, we started a writing project during hospital visits. The idea was this: If Kevin O'Leary on Shark Tank says that 95% of wine in the U.S. sells for $13.95, then all those people are enjoying average wine without the need for greatness. So it might be with novels; not everything has to be To The Lighthouse or Moby Dick. So the plan was to write a novel with Mondovi, not Petrus, intent. Two novellas and a short story have emerged. Now the question is what if anything to do next. 

Malthus anticipated that population would soon outstrip the food supply. His thinking was mathematical: Food production was linear, population growth logarithmic. It made a lot of sense. Was that settled science?

The anxiety over losing Ginsberg from the Supreme Court is impressive. She must be as smart as Bork.

If we are looking for topics to worry us, try this: A Wall Street Journal reconstruction of the worst known hack into the nation’s power system reveals attacks on hundreds of small contractors. The hackers then worked their way up the supply chain. Some experts believe two dozen or more utilities ultimately were breached.
 

Last year the Republican Party approved a deficit approaching $779 billion. The Congressional Budget Office figured the president's 2019 budget will push the deficit to nearly $1 trillion, and the numbers will continue to rise, to $1.527 trillion in 2028.This debt increase would be accompanied by rising interest rates. CBO figured "net interest," which disguises federal costs by subtracting interest paid to Uncle Sam, will rise from $315 billion last year to $819 billion in 2028.

 

37 percent of all American adults now say they prefer socialism to capitalism. A 2016 Harvard University survey revealed that 51 percent of Americans aged 18 and 29 say they reject capitalism outright. If anyone was looking for evidence of a failure in American education, this It.