Nice Chart From Ezra Klein's WonkBlog. I think there is an error in the legend: "20-60 percentile" should be "20-40 percentile."
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Cui Bono?
I may yet comment on the good news/bad news about the "fiscal cliff."
Sometimes a Latin phrase delivered with a lifted eyebrow can suffice:
"Cui Bono"
Sometimes a Latin phrase delivered with a lifted eyebrow can suffice:
"Cui Bono"
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Reflections On The New Year
“The past is never dead. It's not even past.”
William Faulkner, Requiem for a Nun
“For I have known them all already, known them all—
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.”
― T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and Others
Reflections on the past and on the future. What are the chances of a clean break with the past?
Not high. Mark Twain put the matter in perspective:
"History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme."
Monday, December 31, 2012
Reforms And Other Illusions
Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits.
- Pudd'nhead Wilson (Mark Twain)
There is talk of reform in the air.
Hang onto your wallets.
Based on experience of the last couple of decades, there's nothing so harmful to ordinary working people as "reform."
Remember the song about the "rich get richer and the poor get poorer?" That was about reform.
Examples:
Tax reform. Translation: Rich people pay less tax. Workers pay more.
Welfare reform. Translation: Mothers go to work. Who raises the children? TBD.
School reform. Translation 1: Take money and resources from public schools, divert them to charter or private schools. Translation 2: Blame problems on teachers.
Entitlement reform. Translation: Reduce entitlement programs.
Social Security reform. Translation: Reduce benefits.
Election reform. Translation: Make it harder for poor people to vote.
You get the drift.
Happy New Year!
- Pudd'nhead Wilson (Mark Twain)
There is talk of reform in the air.
Hang onto your wallets.
Based on experience of the last couple of decades, there's nothing so harmful to ordinary working people as "reform."
Remember the song about the "rich get richer and the poor get poorer?" That was about reform.
Examples:
Tax reform. Translation: Rich people pay less tax. Workers pay more.
Welfare reform. Translation: Mothers go to work. Who raises the children? TBD.
School reform. Translation 1: Take money and resources from public schools, divert them to charter or private schools. Translation 2: Blame problems on teachers.
Entitlement reform. Translation: Reduce entitlement programs.
Social Security reform. Translation: Reduce benefits.
Election reform. Translation: Make it harder for poor people to vote.
You get the drift.
Happy New Year!
Bad Bargains
It can be well nigh impossible to undo a bad bargain.
Slavery was a bad bargain in 1787/1789. It took three quarters of a century and the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives to undo that bad bargain.
Would it have been better to let the slave states go their own way? Possibly.
The settlement of the disputed election of 1876 (Hayes/Tilden) was a bad bargain. It ended reconstruction prematurely and left the former slave states free for nearly another century to do as they wished with their own citizens. It took the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's and the loss of yet more lives to undo that bad bargain.
The Second Amendment was a bad bargain. It sought to limit the coercive power of the federal government by depriving it of a standing army in lieu of state militias. In the end, we got both.
Unification of the armed forces was a bad bargain. A classic case of a solution in search of a problem. Coordination between the Army and the Navy was quite good throughout World War II. Coordination between the Army and the US Army Air Forces was not so good. USAAF wanted to go off and fight wars on their own. That was not ever a really good idea. It is even less so now. But we'll never be able to undo having a separate independent Air Force. Even if no one any longer remembers who Douhet was.
Deregulation was a bad bargain.
The Bush tax cuts were a bad bargain.
Deregulation and tax cuts together have enabled the super rich to redistribute wealth upward from working people to wealthy plutocrats.
Pardon me if I fail to salute the idea of a grand fiscal bargain.
Slavery was a bad bargain in 1787/1789. It took three quarters of a century and the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives to undo that bad bargain.
Would it have been better to let the slave states go their own way? Possibly.
The settlement of the disputed election of 1876 (Hayes/Tilden) was a bad bargain. It ended reconstruction prematurely and left the former slave states free for nearly another century to do as they wished with their own citizens. It took the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's and the loss of yet more lives to undo that bad bargain.
The Second Amendment was a bad bargain. It sought to limit the coercive power of the federal government by depriving it of a standing army in lieu of state militias. In the end, we got both.
Unification of the armed forces was a bad bargain. A classic case of a solution in search of a problem. Coordination between the Army and the Navy was quite good throughout World War II. Coordination between the Army and the US Army Air Forces was not so good. USAAF wanted to go off and fight wars on their own. That was not ever a really good idea. It is even less so now. But we'll never be able to undo having a separate independent Air Force. Even if no one any longer remembers who Douhet was.
Deregulation was a bad bargain.
The Bush tax cuts were a bad bargain.
Deregulation and tax cuts together have enabled the super rich to redistribute wealth upward from working people to wealthy plutocrats.
Pardon me if I fail to salute the idea of a grand fiscal bargain.
Seventy Years Ago: War In The Pacific
December 31, 1942. The Japanese military high command decides to evacuate forces from Guadalcanal. It will be a complex and challenging undertaking to withdraw forces, and will take more than a month. There will be more battles.
USS Essex, lead ship of a more powerful class of aircraft carriers, is commissioned today.
On New Guinea, after more than two months of jungle fighting against well-defended Japanese positions, the US Army I Corps was nearing victory at Buna on the north coast of New Guinea. Victory here will relieve pressure on Port Moresby.
USS Essex, lead ship of a more powerful class of aircraft carriers, is commissioned today.
On New Guinea, after more than two months of jungle fighting against well-defended Japanese positions, the US Army I Corps was nearing victory at Buna on the north coast of New Guinea. Victory here will relieve pressure on Port Moresby.
Saturday, December 29, 2012
Seventy Years Ago: Pacific Fleet Carriers
December, 1942, the US Navy's force of aircraft carriers was depleted. Of the seven carriers in service at the time of Pearl Harbor, only USS Ranger, smallest and slowest of the seven, remained undamaged. She was also the only one of the seven serving in the Atlantic Fleet.
The Pacific Fleet had lost Lexington, Yorktown, Hornet and Wasp. That left only Saratoga, twice torpedoed and repaired and Enterprise, damaged at the Battle of Coral Sea,and bombed six times later in the year.
Relief was at hand.
USS Essex, prototype of a newer, more powerful class of carriers, was to be commissioned in two days - December 31, 1942. Two weeks later, USS Independence, prototype of a smaller carrier built on a cruiser hull, was to be commissioned. Independence carried fewer aircraft, but was as fast as the larger Enterprise and Saratoga.
There would be nine new Independence class carriers in service by the end of 1943, almost one a month entering service. Only one, USS Princeton, was sunk in combat.
But the backbone of the Pacific Fleet was to be the Essex class. Thirty-two were ordered. Twenty-four were completed by war's end.None was lost in combat.
The Pacific Fleet had lost Lexington, Yorktown, Hornet and Wasp. That left only Saratoga, twice torpedoed and repaired and Enterprise, damaged at the Battle of Coral Sea,and bombed six times later in the year.
Relief was at hand.
USS Essex, prototype of a newer, more powerful class of carriers, was to be commissioned in two days - December 31, 1942. Two weeks later, USS Independence, prototype of a smaller carrier built on a cruiser hull, was to be commissioned. Independence carried fewer aircraft, but was as fast as the larger Enterprise and Saratoga.
There would be nine new Independence class carriers in service by the end of 1943, almost one a month entering service. Only one, USS Princeton, was sunk in combat.
But the backbone of the Pacific Fleet was to be the Essex class. Thirty-two were ordered. Twenty-four were completed by war's end.None was lost in combat.
Thursday, December 27, 2012
Seventy Years Ago: Women Auxiliary Territorial Service
On the home front in the US, women were tending their victory gardens, saving tin cans, riveting aircraft together and such like. In the U.K., it turns out some young women were drafted into various auxiliary services. This included manning antiaircraft artillery.
Some gave their lives. Here is one story.
Some gave their lives. Here is one story.
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