16 July 2009

Today’s Tabbloid
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4th of July Tea Parties Update Lack of Deep Thinking = Belief

[Americans for Tax Reform] in the Living Constitution?
JUL 15, 2009 05:44P.M.
[Cato at Liberty]
As we reported previously, on the 4th of July thousands of citizens from JUL 15, 2009 04:49P.M.
all walks of life, from every state in the Union, rallied to promote the
values our Republic was founded upon: liberty individu... In a twist on the “lack of deep thinking” idea, part of what might be going
on in Sotomayor’s head—why she keeps answering questions about
judicial philosophy with reference to precedent rather than
constitutional first principles is because she’s not an originalist. How can
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS we hope for her to tell us her understanding of the meaning of the
constitutional text, after all, if that text’s meaning changes with the
Chart of the Day [The Club for times?

Growth] For example, Stuart Smalley Al Franken asked Sotomayor point blank,
JUL 15, 2009 05:08P.M. “do you believe the right to privacy includes the right to have an
abortion?” The nominee began here response with: “The Court has
This is what government-run health care looks like it. For a printable said….” That is, it is not the Constitution—whatever your view of it may
version, click here (PDF). be, whether you think it contains a right to abortion or not—that is the
supreme law of the land, but what nine black-robed philosopher-kings
say. Of course, if your (non-)theory of constitutional interpretation is to
keep “improving” the document—and to keep one step ahead of public
opinion, so judges can effect social “progress”—then it’s irrelevant what
the Constitution said before the Supreme Court put its gloss on it.

And if you subscribe to this “living Constitution” or “active liberty”

theory, then naturally the life experiences of a “wise Latina,” along with
lessons from foreign and international law—which, Sotomayor said as
recently as her April speech to ACLU, get a judge’s “creative juices
flowing”—are all valid parts of your jurisprudential toolkit.

CP Townhall

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FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS to imagine a rape case where the sex of the victim is not an issue. The
same goes for robbery - why grab a wallet from someone who can fight
The Price of Universal Health back on equal terms when you can pick a victim who is smaller and
weaker than you are?
Care: Our Freedom [Cato at
This would be different if this were a tweak to sentencing factors.
Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 04:26P.M. If this were a sentence enhancement on crimes motivated by racial
animus - a practice sanctioned by the Supreme Court in Wisconsin v.
In today’s Wall Street Journal, Thomas Szasz argues that universal Mitchell - then it would be less objectionable if there were independent
health care is impossible and the quest for it will cost us our freedom. “If federal jurisdiction.
we persevere in our quixotic quest for a fetishized medical equality we
will sacrifice personal freedom as its price.” Thing is, the federal government has already done this, with the
exception of gender identity, with the Federal Sentencing Guidelines
(scroll to page 334 at the link):

FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS If the finder of fact at trial or, in the case of a plea of guilty or
nolo contendere, the court at sentencing determines beyond a
House Dem Healthcare Tax reasonable doubt that the defendant intentionally selected
any victim or any property as the object of the offense of
Hike Breaks Obama’s Tax conviction because of the actual or perceived race, color,
religion, national origin, ethnicity, gender, disability, or
Pledge [Americans for Tax sexual orientation of any person, increase by 3 levels.

Reform] The contrast between a sentence enhancement and a substantive crime

JUL 15, 2009 03:33P.M.
Besides being the largest tax hike in American history, the House
Democrat health care tax increase breaks Obama’s pledge not to raise
any taxes on any American making less than $250,000: &ld...
gives us an honest assessment of what Congress is doing - federalizing
intrastate acts of violence.
If Congress were to pass a law prohibiting the use of a firearm or any
object that has passed in interstate commerce to commit a violent crime,
it would clearly be an unconstitutional abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Minus the hate crime window dressing, that is exactly what this law
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS purports to do.

Hate Crimes Bill Becomes an
Amendment [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 02:43P.M.
Unsure about prospects on passing the Local Law Enforcement Hate
Crimes Prevention Act as a stand-alone bill, proponents intend to attach
it as an amendment to the Department of Defense Authorization bill. As
I have said previously, this bill is an affront to federalism and
counterproductive hater-aid.
Federal Criminal Law Power Grab
This legislation awards grants to jurisdictions for the purpose of
combating hate crimes. It also creates a substantive federal crime of
violent acts motivated by the “actual or perceived religion, national
origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability of any
person.”
This is a federalization of a huge number of intrastate crimes. It is hard
What this really amounts to is a power grab - giving the federal
government power to try or re-try violent crimes that are purely
intrastate. Just as the Supreme Court invalidated the Gun Free School
Zones Act in United States v. Lopez because it asserted a general federal
police power, this law should be resisted as a wholesale usurpation of the
states’ police powers.
The act also essentially overrules United States v. Morrison, where the
Court overruled a federal civil remedy for intrastate gender-motivated
violence. Forget a civil remedy; while we’re re-writing the constitution
through the Commerce Clause let’s get a criminal penalty on the books.
Trials as Inquisitions
The hate crime bill will also turn trials into inquisitions. The focus of
prosecution could be on whether you ever had a disagreement with
someone of another “actual or perceived religion, national origin,
gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.” Worse yet, it
can turn to whether you have any close friends in one of these categories,
as demonstrated in the Ohio case State v. Wyant. The defendant denied

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that he was a racist, which led to the following exchange in cross-
examination on the nature of the defendant’s relationship with his black
neighbor:
Q. And you lived next door . . . for nine years and you don’t
even know her first name?
A. No.
Q. Never had dinner with her?
A. No.
Q. Never gone out and had a beer with her?
A. No. . . .
Q. You don’t associate with her, do you?
A. I talk with her when I can, whenever I see her out.
Q. All these black people that you have described that are
your friends, I want you to give me one person, just one who
was really a good friend of yours.
David Neiwert says that this won’t happen because of a constitutional
backstop in the legislation. Unfortunately, the House version of the bill
explicitly endorses impeaching a defendant in exactly this manner:
In a prosecution for an offense under this section, evidence of
expression or associations of the defendant may not be
introduced as substantive evidence at trial, unless the
evidence specifically relates to that offense. However, nothing
in this section affects the rules of evidence governing
impeachment of a witness.
Worse yet, the Senate version of the hate crime bill, the one which will
likely become law after conference committee, does not contain this
provision. Instead, it explicitly says:
Courts may consider relevant evidence of speech, beliefs, or
expressive conduct to the extent that such evidence is offered
to prove an element of a charged offense or is otherwise
admissible under the Federal Rules of Evidence. Nothing in
this Act is intended to affect the existing rules of evidence.
Anyone want to bet that an aggressive prosecutor could find that not
having a close enough relationship with your neighbor counts as
“expressive conduct” for the purposes of prosecution?
Future Push for More Federal Authority Over Intrastate
Crimes
The hate crime bill also pushes a snowball down the mountain toward
wholesale federalization of intrastate crime. In a few years this snowball
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16 July 2009
will be an avalanche. By making any gender-motivated crime a hate
crime, which will necessarily include nearly all rapes, we will define
ordinary street crimes as hate crimes.
With a consistent average of 90,000 rapes a year, this expansion of hate
crime definition will come back in a few years where those ignorant of
the change in terms will wonder why hate crime is now rampant.
“Rampant” only because we have made the relevant definition over-
inclusive to the point of being meaningless.
And in a few years, we can revisit this issue with a fierce moral urgency
to pass more feel-good legislation that upends state police powers in an
effort to do something - anything - to confront this perceived crisis. A
perception that Congress is creating in this legislation.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Who Gets Taxed? [The Club for
Growth]
JUL 15, 2009 02:31P.M.
Economist Keith Hennessey has a great summary (included examples) of
how the House Democrats’ health care bill would affect people without
insurance. Excerpt:
I expect the House Democrats will emphasize that their bill
would result in 97 percent of U.S. citizens having coverage.
Those other three percent, however, really get shafted, and
that’s about eight million people.
If the President were to sign such a bill into law, I cannot
figure out how his team could reconcile this consequence
with his pledge not to raise taxes on the middle class.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
The Myth of Arne Duncan’s
“Chicago Miracle” [Cato at
Liberty“Chicago Miracle”]
JUL 15, 2009 01:18P.M.
Last week, I blogged about the fact that Chicago students’ NAEP test
score gains were modest under Arne Duncan’s leadership, and
statistically indistinguishable from the modest gains made in urban
districts around the nation. My analysis — which contradicts the
rosy impression given by Illinois’ ISAT test – has just been released here.
Secretary Duncan has said that state and district officials should not
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make inflated claims about student achievement based on misleading
state test scores, and has used the NAEP to fact check their claims. He’s
right about that.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
End the Credit Rating
Monopoly [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 12:27P.M.
Earlier this week, SEC Chair Mary Shapiro appeared before Congress to
suggest ways to fix the failings in our credit rating agencies. Sadly her
proposals miss the market, although that shouldn’t be so surprising as
her suggestions appear to rest upon a misunderstanding of the problem.
The thrust of the SEC’s current approach is more disclosure, such as
releasing “pre-ratings” that debt issuers may get before final issuance.
Additional disclosure of ratings methodology and assumptions is likely
to be useless. Almost all that information was available during the
building housing bubble. The problem is that the rating agencies had
little incentive to go beyond the consensus forecasts of increasing to at
most modest declines in home prices. These same assumptions were the
foundation of almost all government economic forecasting as well, yet
few believe that forcing CBO or OMB to disclosure more of their
forecasts will cure our budget imbalances. What is needed is a change in
incentives.
Here again the SEC seems to misunderstand the incentives at work, but
then recognizing such would force the SEC to admit its own role in
creating those some perverse incentives. The SEC’s notion that agencies
issue favorable ratings in order to gain business misses the most basic
fact of the ratings business - they don’t have to compete for business, any
debt issuer wanting to place “investment grade” debt has to use the
agencies, and often has to use more than one of them. Due to a variety of
SEC and bank regulations, there is almost no competition among the
rating agencies. They have been given a government created monopoly.
If the rating agencies were, as the SEC proposes, competing strongly for
business, then they wouldn’t have been earning huge profits on that
business. Competition erodes a business’ profits. During the housing
boom, the rating agencies continued to make ever more profits - more
the sign of a monopoly than one of competition.
The truth is not that the agencies were captive to the debt issuers, but the
other way around. And like any monopolist, the agencies became lazy,
slow and fat. The real fix for the failure of the credit raters is to reduce
the excessive reliance on their judgements inherent in most securities,
banking and insurance regulations. An investment grade rating
should never serve as a substitute for appropriate due diligence on the
part of investors (especially pension fund managers) or regulators.
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FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Sotomayor Displays a Lack of
Deep Thinking [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 11:57A.M.
It strikes me that Sotomayor has been fairly forthright in her responses
to questioning, not hiding too much behind the tired cliché that she can’t
answer a question because it could lead to prejudging a case—certainly
far less than Ruth Bader Ginsburg and even John Roberts. Still, on
several important issues, such as property rights, national security law,
abortion, and even her overall judicial philosophy, she has appeared
disingenuous in saying that she has no firm views on the subject—hiding
behind precedent again and again as if first principles didn’t exist. In
other words, she says a lot—displaying a broad knowledge of cases and
legal doctrine—without answering larger questions. She answers
questions about what the law should be with what the law is, questions
about what the Constitution says with what the Supreme Court has said
about the Constitution.
This would be barely appropriate for a nominee to a lower court, who is,
of course, bound by precedent. But senators rightly want to know a
Supreme Court nominee’s preferred legal theories, what her view of the
Constitution is unencumbered by others’ attempts to interpret that
document.
The more Sotomayor speaks, the more it becomes clear that these types
of nonanswers, this inability to see (or lack of desire to express) a big
picture view, is her own essence. It continues a pattern that is evident
from her judicial opinions, which are mostly unremarkable and, in the
neutral sense of that term, unimpressive. For all her career success and a
personal story we should all celebrate, she is an average judge who
apparently gives little thought to the broad swath of law and where her
rulings fit into that.
That is, Sonia Sotomayor is not a Cass Sunstein or Larry Tribe or Elana
Kagan or (fellow circuit judge) Diane Wood. She is not a scholar or an
ideologue. Her liberality is reflexive and warmed-over, a product of the
post-modern educational environment that formed her in the
1970s—complete with ethnic activism—but not an intellectual edifice.
This does not mean she isn’t a danger to liberty and the rule of law, or
that her votes and opinions won’t harm the Constitution. But it does
indicate that, for all her bluster about being a “wise Latina,” she is little
more than a left-leaning empty robe.
CP Townhall
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FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Wednesday’s Daily News [The
Club for Growth]
JUL 15, 2009 11:53A.M.
THE DAILY NEWS Banks Winning at Expense of Taxpayers - Larry
Kudlow, Money Politics 9 Reasons Pelosi’s Healthcare Surtax is
Disastrous - Jimmy P., Reuters Obama Open to Partisan Vote on Health
- Edwin Chen, Bloomberg Health Care Plan Has Surtax On Wealthy -
Mongomery & Connolly, WaPo Universal Health Care Isn’t Worth Our
Freedom - Thomas Szasz, WSJ The Conceit of the Rulers - John Stossel,
ABC News The Stimulus Isn’t Working - IBD Editorial The Increased
Competitiveness of the US Economy - Alex Tabarrok, MR A Tale of Two
Bailouts - Wall Street Journal Editorial PODCAST: Choice, Competition
Should Drive Health Care - Mike Tanner, Cato
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
The Health Care Reform Bill
Will Cost $500 Billion in New
Taxes [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 11:24A.M.
House Democrats released their 1,018 page health care reform bill,
America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, yesterday.
This bill is a dog’s breakfast of bad ideas paid for by more than $500
billion in new taxes. The reform would impose an individual mandate on
individuals, requiring every American to buy a government designed
insurance package or pay a new tax equal to 2.5 percent of their income.
At a time of rising unemployment, businesses would be required to
provide health insurance to workers or pay a new tax equal to 8 percent
of workers wages. These new taxes could drive the total cost to taxpayers
much higher than the $500 billion in direct taxes in the bill.
In addition, the bill includes a host of new insurance regulations that will
drive up the cost of insurance premiums, and a new government-run
insurance plan that will “compete” with private insurance. That
government-run plan will ultimately force millions of Americans out of
their current insurance plan and into the government-run system. This is
a health care “reform” under which Americans will pay more for worse
care.
To get an idea of what sort of bureaucratic nightmare that would ensue
with passage of this bill is illustrated by the Republican Staff of the Joint
Economic Committee here.
For regular updates on the reform process as it progresses, check out
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16 July 2009
Cato’s health care Web site.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Why Taxing the Rich Is Not
Enough to Fund Big
Government [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 11:09A.M.
Appearing on Fox News on Monday, Cato’s Daniel J. Mitchell explained
why taxing the rich to pay for big government programs may make for a
good sound bite on the campaign trail, but when there aren’t enough
wealthy people to tax, the middle class ends up footing the bill.
“When politicians are aiming at the rich, it’s the middle class that winds
up getting hit in the crossfire,” Mitchell said. “They use ‘tax the rich’ as
the rhetoric, but they always go after the ordinary people to get more
money to fund their big government schemes.”
Watch the whole thing:
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Intervention Begets
Intervention, Which Begets…
[Cato at Liberty…]
JUL 15, 2009 09:03A.M.
The logic in Washington is ineluctable. If government provides money,
then it needs to impose regulations. If the government takes ownership,
then it must provide management.
Bail out the banks. Set bankers’ salaries. Bail out the insurers. Decide on
corporate bonuses.
And if the government takes over the automakers, then it should run the
automakers. That, of course, means deciding who can be dealers.
Reports the Washington Post:
Now that the Obama administration has spent billions of
dollars on the bailouts of General Motors and Chrysler,
Congress is considering making its first major management
decision at the automakers.
Under legislation that has rapidly gained support, GM and
Chrysler would have to reinstate more than 2,000
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dealerships that the companies had slated for closure.
The automakers say the ranks of their dealers must be
thinned in order to match the fallen demand for cars. But
some of the rejected dealers and their Capitol Hill supporters
argue that the process of selecting dealerships for closure was
arbitrary and went too far.
Since federal money has been used to sustain the automakers,
they say Congress has an obligation to intervene.
At a gathering of dozens of dealers who came to Capitol Hill
yesterday to lobby their representatives, House Majority
Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) and several other
congressmen spoke in support of the dealers. More than 240
House members have signed onto the bill, supporters said.
“We are going to stand with them for as long as it takes,”
Hoyer told an approving crowd.
What is next? Congress deciding the prices that should be charged for
autos? The accessories to be offered? The colors cars should be painted?
I have no idea who should or should not be an auto dealer. But I do know
that it is a decision which should not be made in Washington, D.C.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
The “Washington Monument
Syndrome” Backfires in
Massachusetts [Cato at
Liberty“Washington Monument
Syndrome” Backfires in
Massachusetts]
JUL 15, 2009 09:01A.M.
While politicians and bureaucrats generally are on the same side, there
are occasional conflicts. For instance, if politicians want to limit the
growth of an agency’s budget (an infrequent impulse, to be sure), the
bureaucrats get upset and sometimes they fight back. A common tactic is
to try and generate public opposition by leaking to the press that they
will have to curtail something that taxpayers actually value. This is
known as the Washington Monument Syndrome, which is a reference to
the National Park Service’s petulant decision about 40 years ago to close
national monuments two days per week because of a very small budget
reduction. A very perverse example of the Washington Monument
Syndrome just took place in Massachusetts, where officials at the New
England Zoo threatened to kill some of the animals if their subsidy was
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16 July 2009
reduced. This was so over the top that even the state’s collectivist
governor felt compelled to condemn the bureaucrats for using dishonest
scare tactics. The Boston Globe reports:
Governor Deval Patrick yesterday accused Zoo New England
officials of creating a false and inflammatory scare with their
warning that state budget cuts may force them to close two
Greater Boston zoos and euthanize some animals. “As a
supporter of the zoo and a parent who has visited often, the
governor is disappointed to learn that Zoo New England has
responded to this difficult but unavoidable budget cut by
spreading inaccurate and incendiary information,’’ Kyle
Sullivan, a spokesman for the governor, said in a statement.
And a second Patrick aide emphatically ruled out the killing
of any animals. …Zoo officials declined to comment on
Patrick’s remarks yesterday. They also canceled a public
event to welcome two French Poitou donkeys to the Franklin
Park facility in honor of Bastille Day tomorrow. John
Linehan, Zoo New England chief executive, was scheduled to
attend the event. …On Friday zoo officials released a
statement saying the funding reduction might require them
to shutter both zoos. Then on Saturday, they issued a
statement that said state bureaucrats - and not animal-care
professionals - would be responsible for deciding whether
some animals would have to be killed if the zoos closed. …At
least one visitor to the Franklin Park Zoo yesterday suggested
the operator solve the budget crisis on its own. “I wonder why
the Franklin Park Zoo doesn’t raise their prices so they can
support themselves,’’ said Emanuel Achidiev, 28. “They
shouldn’t have to rely on the state.’’
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Who’s the Isolationist? [Cato at
Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 08:58A.M.
There may be no more vicious epithet from neoconservatives these days
than “isolationist.” One would think the term would mean something
like xenophobic no-nothings who want to have nothing to do with the
rest of the world. No trade or immigration. Little or no cultural exchange
and political cooperation. Autarchy all around.
But no. ”Isolationist” apparently means something quite different. Never
mind your views of the merits of international engagement. If you don’t
want to kill lots of foreigners in lots of foreign wars you are automatically
considered to be an isolationist.
President Bill Clinton called Republican legislators “isolationists” for not
wanting to insert the U.S. military into the middle of a complex but
strategically irrelevant guerrilla conflict in Kosovo. (He made the same
criticism against them for not supporting even more money for foreign
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aid, which presumably meant the Heritage Foundation was filled with
isolationists at the time).
But the definition is even broader today. It means not willing to go to war
for any country that clamors for a security guarantee irrespective of its
relevance to American security. At least, that appears to be the definition
applied by Sally McNamara of Heritage.
On Monday in National Interest online I criticized the argument
advanced by Ms. McNamara and others that alliances and military
commitments automatically prevent war. More specifically, the claim is
that if only the U.S. would bring the country of Georgia into NATO — or
simply issue a Membership Action Plan, which neither offers a security
promise nor guarantees NATO membership — Moscow would never dare
take the risk of attacking Georgia.
History suggests this is a dangerous assumption. Both World Wars I and
II featured alliances that were supposed to prevent conflict but which
instead acted as transmission belts of war. One can argue whether or not
the alliances were prudent. One cannot argue that they prevented
conflict as so many people thought (and certainly hoped) they would.
Thus, alliances should be viewed as serious organizations. A promise to
defend another nation should be treated as a momentous undertaking.
And the public should be aware of all of the risks of policies advanced by
the nation’s leaders. This should go double when a nuclear-armed power
is involved and treble when the geopolitical stakes are trivial for the U.S.
while significant for the opposing state.
For suggesting this Ms. McNamara argues that I am both an isolationist
and a neo-isolationist. (I’m not sure of the difference between the two.
Maybe the latter indicates that she realizes I believe in free
trade, increased immigration, and international cooperation, which
makes for a curious kind of “isolationism.” Still, advocating a reduction
in military commitments and the consequent risk of war, rather than a
policy of galloping about the globe tossing security guarantees hither and
yon, apparently means I am at least a “neo-isolationist.”)
Even worse, I am accused of “appeasement” for suggesting that being
prepared to trade Washington for Tbilisi is a bad bargain. Ah, the “A”
word. To count the cost and not support every commitment, no matter
how distant or irrelevant, is the same as encouraging the next Adolf
Hitler.
Please.
It is time for a serious discussion as to why we have alliances today. If it
isn’t to promote American security, let’s be clear about that. If NATO is
an international social club, or a second European Union, or a global
Good Housekeeping seal of sorts, then policymakers should level with
the American people who are paying the bills.
Even more so, if the alliance is geared to defending everyone else, then
let’s admit that too. Georgia would not be defending America. Nor will
Albania, Croatia, Estonia, and the other geopolitical titans recently
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16 July 2009
inducted into the NATO fraternity. The security commitment effectively
runs one way.
So for what stakes are NATO expansion advocates willing to risk war
with nuclear-armed Russia? To hope that America’s commitment is
never called is no substitute for honestly assessing the risks, interests,
and trade-offs at stake.
If none of these considerations is relevant — if failing to constantly add
new defense welfare clients is the same as “withdrawing from the world”
and giving Hitler a green light — is there any stopping
point? Presumably no. If Georgia is to come in, then presumably Ukraine
too. If Ukraine, how about Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan,
Azerbaijan, and Armenia? Why not Mongolia, Nepal, and Bhutan?
Maybe go a bit further. Perhaps Sri Lanka?
But why stop there? Should not any nation which desires protection from
any other nation be entitled to American protection? After all, to say no
would, in Ms. McNamara’s words, offer “a geo-political victory to
Moscow” or someone else, whether Beijing, New Delhi, Ankara, or
whoever. Failing to protect weak states — East Timor, Congo, Belize, and
more — would demonstrate that we have failed to learn the lesson that
“appeasement simply does not work.”
It is easy to conjure up new missions for the U.S. military. But the most
important question is whether these tasks advance the security of
America — this nation, its people, and its system of constitutional liberty.
Scattering security guarantees about the globe as if they were party
favors — treating them as a costless panacea to the problem of war —
makes America less, not more secure.
And making that argument does not mean one is an “isolationist”
advocating “appeasement.” Unless the Founders were isolationist
appeasers as well.
As George Washington observed in his Farewell Address:
Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none;
or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in
frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially
foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise
in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary
vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and
collisions of her friendships or enmities.
His sentiments apply even more today, when America’s adversaries are
pitiful and few, and America’s friends are many and dominant. The U.S.
need not — and should not — withdraw from the world. But
Washington should stop making unnecessary and dangerous military
commitments.
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Response to Conor Clarke, Part
I [Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 08:51A.M.
Last week Conor Clarke at The Atlantic blog , apparently as part of a
running argument with Jim Manzi, raised four substantive issues with
my study, “What to Do About Climate Change,” that Cato published last
year. Mr. Clarke deserves a response, and I apologize for not getting to
this sooner. Today, I’ll address the first part of his first comment. I’ll
address the rest of his comments over the next few days.
Conor Clarke:
(1) Goklany’s analysis does not extend beyond the 21st
century. This is a problem for two reasons. First, climate
change has no plans to close shop in 2100. Even if you believe
GDP will be higher in 2100 with unfettered global warming
than without, it’s not obvious that GDP would be higher in
the year 2200 or 2300 or 3758. (This depends crucially on
the rate of technological progress, and as Goklany’s paper
acknowledges, that’s difficult to model.) Second, the
possibility of “catastrophic” climate change events — those
with low probability but extremely high cost — becomes real
after 2100.
Response: First, I wouldn’t put too much stock in analyses purporting to
extend out to the end of the 21st century, let alone beyond that, for
numerous reasons, some of which are laid out on pp. 2-3 of the Cato
study. As noted there, according to a paper commissioned for the Stern
Review, “changes in socioeconomic systems cannot be projected semi-
realistically for more than 5–10 years at a time.”
Second, regarding Mr. Clarke’s statement that, “Even if you believe GDP
will be higher in 2100 with unfettered global warming than without, it’s
not obvious that GDP would be higher in the year 2200 or 2300 or
3758,” I should note that the conclusion that net welfare for 2100
(measured by net GDP per capita) is not based on a belief. It follows
inexorably from Stern’s own analysis.
Third, despite my skepticism of long term estimates, I have, for the sake
of argument, extended the calculation to 2200. See here. Once again, I
used the Stern Review’s estimates, not because I think they are
particularly credible (see below), but for the sake of argument.
Specifically, I assumed that losses in welfare due to climate change under
the IPCC’s warmest scenario would, per the Stern Review’s 95th
percentile estimate, be equivalent to 35.2 percent of GDP in 2200.
[Recall that Stern’s estimates account for losses due to market impacts,
non-market (i.e., environmental and public health) impacts and the risk
of catastrophe, so one can’t argue that only market impacts were
considered.]
The results, summarized in the following figure, indicate that even if one
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16 July 2009
uses the Stern Review’s inflated impact estimates under the warmest
IPCC scenario, net GDP in 2200 ought to be higher in the warmest world
than in cooler worlds for both developing and industrialized countries.
Source: Indur M. Goklany, “Discounting the Future,” Regulation 32: 36-
40 (Spring 2009).
The costs of climate change used to develop the above figure are, most
likely, overestimated because they do not properly account for increases
in future adaptive capacity consistent with the level of net economic
development resulting from Stern’s own estimates (as shown in the
above figure). This figure shows that even after accounting for losses in
GDP per capita due to climate change – and inflating these losses — net
GDP per capita in 2200 would be between 16 and 85 times higher in
2200 that it was in the baseline year (1990). No less important, Stern’s
estimate of the costs of climate change neglect secular technological
change that ought to occur during the 210-year period extending from
the base year (1990) to 2200. In fact, as shown here, empirical data show
that for most environmental indicators that have a critical effect on
human well-being, technology has, over decades-long time frames
reduced impacts by one or more orders of magnitude.
As a gedanken experiment, compare technology (and civilization’s
adaptive capacity) in 1799 versus 2009. How credible would a projection
for 2009 have been if it didn’t account for technological change from
1799 to 2009?
I should note that some people tend to dismiss the above estimates of
GDP on the grounds that it is unlikely that economic development,
particularly in today’s developing countries, will be as high as indicated
in the figure. My response to this is that they are based on the very
assumptions that drive the IPCC and the Stern Review’s emissions and
climate change scenarios. So if one disbelieves the above GDP estimates,
then one should also disbelieve the IPCC and the Stern Review’s
projection for the future.
Fourth, even if analysis that appropriately accounted for increases in
adaptive capacity had shown that in 2200 people would be worse off in
the richest-but-warmest world than in cooler worlds, I wouldn’t get too
excited just yet. Even assuming a 100-year lag time between the
initiation of emission reductions and a reduction in global temperature
because of a combination of the inertia of the climate system and the
turnover time for the energy infrastructure, we don’t need to do anything
Today’s Tabbloid PERSONAL NEWS FOR lgn@limitedgovernmentnetwork.com
drastic till after 2100 (=2200 minus 100 years), unless monitoring shows
before then that matters are actually becoming worse (as opposing
merely changing), in which case we should certainly mobilize our
responses. [Note that change doesn’t necessarily equate to worsening.
One has to show that a change would be for the worse. Unfortunately,
much of the climate change literature skips this crucial step.]
In fact, waiting-and-preparing-while-we-watch (AKA watch-and-wait)
makes most sense, just as it does for many problems (e.g., some cancers)
where the cost of action is currently high relative to its benefit, benefits
are uncertain, and technological change could relatively rapidly improve
the cost-benefit ratio of controls. Within the next few decades, we should
have a much better understanding of climate change and its impacts, and
the cost of controls ought to decline in the future, particularly if we
invest in research and development for mitigation. In the meantime we
should spend our resources on solving today’s first order problems – and
climate change simply doesn’t make that list, as shown by the only
exercises that have ever bothered to compare the importance of climate
change relative to other global problems. See here and here. As is shown
in the Cato paper (and elsewhere), this also ought to reduce vulnerability
and increase resiliency to climate change.
In the next installment, I’ll address the second point in Mr. Clarke’s first
point, namely, the fear that “the possibility of ‘catastrophic’ climate
change events — those with low probability but extremely high cost —
becomes real after 2100.”
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Continuing Erosion of the
Iranian Regime’s Legitimacy
[Cato at Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 08:42A.M.
The gravest threat to the survival of the repressive regime in Tehran may
be the continuing attacks on its perceived legitimacy. Part of the factional
infighting undoubtedly reflects a simple power struggle. However,
religious principles also appear to be at stake. A number of Muslim
clerics are denouncing the authorities for their misbehavior.
For instance, Iranian cleric and blogger Mohsen Kadivar recently applied
several Islamic principles to the Iranian government:
The fourth question concerns attempts by some to cite the
protection of the Islamic state to justify suppressing people’s
efforts to defend their own rights.
The response is that an Islamic state cannot be protected
through violence.
The fifth question is about what Shari’a law says are the signs
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16 July 2009
of suppressive guardianship.
The response is that a leader who fails to respect Shari’a law,
promotes violence, and rejects the public’s demands is a clear
sign of oppressive guardianship and that leader is oppressive.
The recognition of those signs is the responsibility, firstly, of
Islamic jurists (experts in religious law) and, secondly, of
ordinary people.
His words alone will not topple Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and those
behind and around him. But as the regime’s moral foundation further
erodes, the long-term possibility of significant changes in Tehran grows.
Americans should cheer for the advance of liberty in Iran. But the U.S.
government, with precious little credibility for promoting democracy in
Iran, needs to stay far away. The last thing Iranian human rights
advocates need is for their struggle to become a contest between the
Iranian and American governments instead of the Iranian government
and Iranian people.
FISCALLY CONSERVATIVE BLOG FEEDS
Quadrennial Claptrap [Cato at
Liberty]
JUL 15, 2009 08:36A.M.
Since the mid-1990s, the Defense Department has been legally required
to review its strategy and force structure every four years, producing
what’s called the Quadrennial Defense Review.
The result has been a series of vacuous documents that commingle
vague, unsubstantiated claims about great historical shifts underway
(think Tom Friedman but without the empirical rigor) with threat
inflation. There is no evidence that these documents have produced
much beyond wasted time and effort.
Naturally, the Department of Homeland Security decided to produce a
quadrennial homeland security review, which is underway. Last week,
ForeignPolicy.com reported that the State Department will get in on the
act with a Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review. Apparently
grand strategy documents have great allure to policy-makers. So it’s
worth reflecting on why the QDR has failed.
I say it’s because strategy is overrated. The idea is that government is a
scientific enterprise where smart people get together, figure out the
wisest course, and then marshal their bureaucracies to the new
objectives. The trouble with this view is that government is political; it is
about competing bureaucratic interests or ideologies trying to impose
their preferences on each other. Strategy documents have no inherent
power over these forces.
In practice, because the military services participate in the QDR’s
Today’s Tabbloid PERSONAL NEWS FOR lgn@limitedgovernmentnetwork.com 16 July 2009

production, it is an output of the politics it is supposed to guide, a logroll

that justifies existing realities. The services all employ manpower to
defend their prerogatives. Consultants get hired. A great fuss occurs.
Compromise language carries the day, and the thing winds up vapidly
endorsing the existing force structure and programs.

A better way to go would for the Office of the Secretary of Defense to use
strategy documents to give its views official heft; one more way to
impose their preferences on the rest of the Pentagon. That argues for
civilian authorship, not service inclusion. Of course, this method is only
as good as OSD’s ideas.

The next QDR is due this year. The document will likely endorse the
Secretary Gates’ desire to make the military better suited to
counterinsurgency, which is OK, and overstate our ability to succeed in
these wars, which is not.

The owner of the document is the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy,

Michelle Flournoy, who previously founded the Center for New
American Security, which has, in its brief life, exhibited great enthusiasm
for counterinsurgency campaigns or US military-led nation-building.

Flournoy and a co-author just published a kind of preview of the QDR in

Proceedings, the Naval Institute’s magazine. The article not encouraging.
It cites the disastrous vehicle of Cold War threat inflation, NSC-68, as an
example to emulate. Unsurprisingly it buys into the trendy idea that
future US wars will be hybrid wars, mixing conventional and
unconventional tactics as Hezbollah did in 2006 in Lebanon. It takes the
conventional position that the United States has to police global
commons (space, cyberspace, airspace and sea lanes), to protect the
“international system.” This apparently means that free trade requires
US military hegemony, a common claim with a hazy causal logic. The
article makes the curious argument that because the commons are a
public good, other nations have “powerful incentives” to help the United
States police them. I am all for burden sharing, but this misunderstands
the meaning of public goods, which are notoriously underprovided.
Powerful incentives encourage free-riding, not mutual aide.

Worst of all, the article buys into the idea that the United States needs to
fix failed states, which is a recipe for empire.

The good news is that there is time to fix all this. Maybe the Pentagon
will embrace restraint. You never know.

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