Alternative Anthems

Posted on July 4, 2009, 9:00am | Jesse Walker

I'll skip the usual complaints about "The Star Spangled Banner" and jump right to the eternally popular question: If Francis Scott Key's martial ballad were deposed as the national theme song, what would you want to replace it? Enter your suggestions in the comment thread below. You can call for as many replacements as you want -- the nation survived for more than a century without a single, centralized flag design, and on the road back to that happy day of vexillological competition we might as well bring a similar system to anthems. It's a diverse and sprawling country, and there's room for more than one song on the soundtrack.

I'll open the nominations with this old favorite from Johnny Cash:

Judge Throws Out Convictions in MySpace Hoax

Posted on July 3, 2009, 9:37pm | Jacob Sullum

Yesterday U.S. District Court Judge George Wu threw out the misdemeanor convictions of Lori Drew, the Missouri woman blamed for precipitating the suicide of a 13-year-old girl by assisting a cruel MySpace prank, under the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Taking a cue from critics such as George Washington University law professor Orin Kerr (who ended up serving as a pro bono attorney for Drew), Wu said he was worried that the legal theory underlying U.S. Attorney Thomas O'Brien's prosecution of Drew could make any violation of a website's terms of service a federal crime. "It basically leaves it up to a website owner to determine what is a crime," Wu said, "and therefore it criminalizes what would be a breach of contract."

O'Brien, a grandstanding prosecutor who bravely took on one of the most reviled people in America by twisting federal law beyond recognition so he could bring Drew to trial in Los Angeles for actions that were not criminal in Missouri, was contrite. Just kidding:

O'Brien...said after the decision was announced that the law needed to be strengthened.

"We call it cyber-bullying, and we don't have a law to address it," he said at a news conference.

O'Brien, who plainly has no concern about how his self-aggrandizing prosecutions imperil civil liberties, probably has in mind something like this. 

I condemned the Drew prosecution here. Other Reason coverage of the case here.

[via The Moderate Voice]

Resolved: The New York Times Should Be Staffed By Volunteers, Like Meals On Wheels

Posted on July 3, 2009, 8:35pm | Tim Cavanaugh

Flaming Eggheads: In the current New Yorker, Malcolm Gladwell gives an energetic pan to Chris Anderson's Free: The Future of a Radical Price. As Anil Dash points out, there's a vehement tone to Gladwell's review that suggests some harder feelings at work than you'd expect in a standard piece of intra-Condé Nast logrolling. Anderson has replied somewhat snippily too. (Disclosure: I know Anderson medium well and like him; Gladwell I've never met but he looks cool in pictures.)

The central virtue of Wired, as a great man once told me, was to be right enough on the large trend that it could afford to be repeatedly, spectacularly wrong on almost all the specifics. As a result, you can nearly always refute a Wired-type manifesto by pointing out how facts on the ground keep falling short of the vision. (I used to do that a lot, sometimes in the pages of Wired itself.) So Gladwell is on semi-solid ground in referring to YouTube's high maintenance costs, The Wall Street Journal website's (sporadically applied) pay structure, premium cable, and iPhone downloads as areas where free isn't paying and paid-for is paying.

Gladwell gets lost in his other arguments, though. He pedantically objects to Stewart Brand's statement that "information wants to be free," by noting, correctly, that "information can't actually want anything." But then he uses that same formula, stating that in another case, "information does not want to be free. It wants to be really, really expensive."

That other case is the market for orphan pharmaceuticals, which are growing more expensive. But Gladwell was right the first time: The new drug recipes don't want to be free or expensive. Their manufacturers want them to be expensive; many other parties (buyers, industrial spies, some national governments, and after a period of protection, U.S. patent laws) want them to be free.

Some of those parties have more moral legitimacy than others, but the point is that there are two parties to every deal. Gladwell uses this point when it serves him. He starts off his review by citing a dispute between the Dallas Morning News (which wants to license its content at a high price) and Amazon.com (which wants to pay close-to-free prices to repackage the paper's content). In Gladwell's formulation, this undermines Brand's famous phrase. "Why," he writes, "are the self-interested motives of powerful companies being elevated to a philosophical principle?"

But most of us have no problem with the principle that you have to pay for quality, and that view certainly serves the interests of Morning News owner A. H. Belo Corporation. A. H. Belo doesn't enjoy Amazon's vast market cap, but it has been around for more than 150 years and lists on the New York Stock Exchange — unlike Amazon, which lists in the Nasdaq ghetto. Should Belo's concerns be privileged because its industry is in decline?

For all the quibbling, it seems pretty straightforward that over time, the natural progression of information is to become worth $0.00. I might feel differently if I were a paleontologist trying to get a dig funded, but to take an example close to hand: A brand new title from Gladwell or Anderson fetches a hefty price; after only a few weeks it becomes available for a few bucks on the remainder table, after a year or so for a dollar at the charity bin; and eventually it will be put out by the curb, to be picked up for free by trashpickers like me.

And that's just information in some physical delivery form. (That is, right now, a nice printed book has some intrinsic value.) The effect is even sharper for pure information. Right now it might be worth it to me to hire somebody to steal Gladwell's notebooks or memory stick, in the hope of using his ideas to write a bestseller of my own. But the value of those intellectual nuggets drops rapidly. Death accelerates the process: Anderson's personal papers may one day be of interest to some university archive, but eventually they will be picked over and thrown out by disinterested liquidators (who I like to imagine speaking in broad cockney accents). Maybe some portions will be digitized, but in time they'll be "accidentally" deleted to make space for something more current.

The other time factor is that right now we are in a period of plummeting prices for the kind of information both men are writing about. To take Gladwell's examples: Downloading an album's worth of music is cheaper than buying a CD used to be. Premium cable, in adjusted dollars, is cheaper than it was when Jerry Levin first cooked up that so-crazy-it-might-work idea. Pharmaceutical information tends downward so quickly that it requires a vast scaffolding of IP protection and regulation to keep it up. That trend may change with new models of content creation or the invention of smellivision or whatever. But right now it's Anderson's view that is ascendant.

You can, of course, read Gladwell's review for free.

Volvo, Ikea, Abba, and the destruction of money...

Posted on July 3, 2009, 6:47pm | Tim Cavanaugh

Sweden's Riksbank has taken a pro-inflationary step other central banks can only envy: negative interest rates. Don't ask me to explain the mechanism, but the bank is now offering an effective deposit rate of negative .25%. The move appears to have succeeded in weakening the Swedish crown against the Euro.

Inflationists in the U.S. have been debating similar ideas, and even some more surprising stuff, such as the harebrained dollar decimation scheme, in which every tenth buck will be treated the way General Philippe Pétain dealt with the French army mutineers. Because more than 80 percent of the American work force is still employed, and because Americans have a pretty broad sense that they're getting ripped off when their money is devalued (because they are in fact getting ripped off), such overt policies seem like tough sells.

But could the Fed work a negative-interest-rate scheme, whose effects wouldn't be obvious right away? Anti-Swedenism rears its ugly head, as Mish Shedlock wishes the Scandinavian kingdom bad luck — and hopes the bad luck comes soon, before we end up with another Swedish export that seems good at the time but ends up filling us with shame and regret:

The global economy is in a mess because of the lack of savings not because of an excess of it. People spent money they did not have, pushing asset prices to ridiculous levels. Banks, in belief that asset prices would keep rising exponentially, increased leverage. Now consumers everywhere are retrenching in the wake of the collapse, a much needed phenomenon.

In light of the above, punishing savers with negative deposit rates is the height of stupidity.

It would be fitting if there was an immediate run on deposits. And if that happens what will Sweden do? Halt deposits? Sweden risks (and deserves) a currency collapse and bank runs for this insane effort. Look for capital flight in Sweden.

We should all be rooting for the demise of Sweden lest Bernanke or some other Central Bank clowns try the same thing. The risk is that Sweden does not immediately suffer for this stupidity and that Bernanke tries to do the same thing.

One thing is certain. This is eventually going to blow sky high. Let's hope it does before Bernanke gets the same brilliant idea.

Suze Orman's Personal Finance Advice: Quit Your Job

Posted on July 3, 2009, 4:31pm | Tim Cavanaugh

Here's a fairly dramatic encounter from this afternoon's Suze Orman Show. "Mike" works as a credit manager selling consolidation loans for a "major banking institution." A 22-year-old MBA, Mike calls people with substantial credit card debt (owed both to his own employer and to other lenders), and tries to get them to move their unsecured debt into car or home loans with lower interest rates. Mike had written into the show because he had ethical qualms about selling people potentially disadvantageous products.

Suze conducted her interview with Mike's silhouette in order to "protect his job." She made two cases against this type of loan consolidation: a) a car or home, unlike unsecured debt, can be seized by the bank; b) the maturity terms of mortgage and auto debt mean the person will likely end up spending more. Here's a portion of their exchange: 

Suze: I would feel far more comfortable with somebody who has credit card debt that is high going to somebody like a [Consumer Credit Counseling Service], consolidating that debt, getting them to reduce their interest rate, pay CCCS so that in five years you're through with this debt, and keep all my secured assets exactly that, secured, so no matter what happens I know that I in fact can keep my car and keep my home and that's what I want to do. Whenever you give people an option to pay less, they will take that option. That's how we got into trouble to begin with.

But you know, Mike, as you said, I think you knew all of this; that's why you wrote in to the Suze Orman Show. But now that you've heard if trom me what do you think you are going to do in regards to your job?

Mike: Well, uh, first thank goodness I have a job. But I'll definitely have to go back and think things over. Because, I don't know if I put that in my email, but that's one thing I always wanted to be was a financial advisor. You are somebody I look up to as an established financial advisor. But it's definitely something I'll have to go back and think about.

Suze: Mike, here's what I learned after all the years, and it's been thirty years now really that I've been doing this, is this: that it's better to do what's right than to do what's easy. And I understand that you need a paycheck. I understand that in this economy what are you gonna do? But if you make money off of telling people to do something that in the long run hurts them, that will only come back to bite you in ways that are far beyond what money can buy and what money can do for you. That's why I have never in my career made a move with somebody else's money that was good for me before it was good for them. Thanks, Mike, so I did just want to protect you, but honest to God, it makes no sense.

Mike: Right, when I took the job it was a little bit like, what is it? And like I said I wanted to be a financial advisor, so of course I analyzed it a little more than my fellow employees did, and I was like: I would never do this, why are they doing it?

Suze: Bingo, Mike! Bingo, and listen, you have to understand there's a big difference between a financial advisor and a financial salesperson. Don't you feel like a salesperson?

Mike: That's all I am right now.

Suze: Under the guise of being a so-called financial advisor or representative of this major bank. Again, when are the banks going to get it, that they have got to put people's interest at heart before they put their own bottom line at heart? And until they do that, this economy will never ever turn around. Good for you, boyfriend.

Mike: You're exactly right.

Suze: Bingo!

[Italics, and transcription, mine] I don't feel one way or another about personal finance celebrity Suze Orman, and I only learned today, while watching her show for the first time, that her first name is pronounced "Siouxsie" and not "Siouxs." Her advice seems sound enough, and she appears willing to strike a balance between respecting her callers' desire to buy stuff and advising them whether they can afford it. (For example, she "approved" one guy to buy a 1970 VW Beetle for $5,500 even while advising him that he was massively overpaying for the vehicle, on the logic that given his personal balance sheet he could afford the $5,500.)

But I'm gonna have to go ahead and ... disagree with Suze on this job advice. Mike is right: He's just a salesman right now. His job is to sell debt consolidation. To say he has an ethical obligation to stop selling the bank's products is like saying a lawyer should only become a prosecutor or an actor should only play good guys. Mike may have ethical concerns about his job, but they are no different than the concerns of a salesman who decides he can't sell porn or booze or cigarettes: They exist solely within the confines of Mike's own head.

In fact, when he makes "a move with somebody else's money" it's the bank's money, not the borrower's. So he does have an ethical obligation: to his employer. And because Suze is informally giving Mike advice, I'd say she served him poorly by implying that he needs to stop doing what he's doing. Not just because it means he loses his paycheck but because a 22-year-old MBA should be doing anything he can to learn about finance, particularly if he eventually wants to become a personal financial advisor. (And if he does, he should steer his clients away from this type of loan consolidation, for exactly the reasons Orman says.)

You Won't Have Sarah Palin to Kick Around Anymore

Posted on July 3, 2009, 4:01pm | Jesse Walker

Alaska's governor is resigning, citing her displeasure with "political blood sport." If you think that means she's through with politics, I have a bridge in San Clemente I'd like to sell you.

What's Next? Concerns About Fake Astrologers?

Posted on July 3, 2009, 2:15pm | Ronald Bailey

"Purity of Federal 'Organic' Label Is Questioned," is a front page headline in today's Washington Post. Considering that the organic label is largely a marketing scheme (or perhaps it is better described as a marketing scam) designed to get consumers to pay more for products that are no better than conventional ones, it's hard for me to get worked up over the fact some farmers and processors are violating the federal program's arbitrary rules.

One might reply that violations of the federal rules constitute a fraud on consumers who expect to get one sort of product and instead are getting another. On the other hand, the whole concept of "organic" is pretty much a scientific fraud (OK, maybe it's just a wrongheaded anti-scientific fable) itself--a fact which the anxious Washington Post article inadvertantly acknowledges when it reports:

The market's expansion is fueling tension over whether the federal program should be governed by a strict interpretation of "organic" or broadened to include more products by allowing trace elements of non-organic substances. The argument is not over whether the non-organics pose a health threat, but whether they weaken the integrity of the federal organic label. 

If "non-organics" pose no health threats, why do we need federal standards? Worries about the "purity" of organic foods and products represent an essentially religious stance much like kosher and halal, both of which are adequately established and monitored privately. Certification of organic products should be done the same way.

By the way, some astrologers do want professional governmental licensing. 

New at Reason: Cathy Young on Obama's Upcoming Trip to Russia

Posted on July 3, 2009, 12:00pm

As Barack Obama's trip to Moscow next week draws near, there is much talk of a fresh start—or, as Vice President Joseph Biden put it earlier this year, "pushing the reset button"—between the United States and Russia. But "reset" to what? A partnership based on shared democratic values, as many hoped in the 1990s? A pragmatic collaboration based on common interests such as combating terrorism, with issues of freedom and human rights sidelined? There are strong voices arguing for each viewpoint. But as Contributing Editor Cathy Young writes, for the foreseeable future, neither approach is likely to yield much progress in relations with Russia, since both arguments reflect a high degree of wishful thinking.

Read all about it here.

New at Reason: Friday Funnies

Posted on July 3, 2009, 7:00am

In the latest edition of Friday Funnies, Henry Payne looks at President Barack Obama's battles against big tobacco.

Secession Then, Secession Now, Secession Forever!

Posted on July 2, 2009, 7:49pm | Brian Doherty

Those new-nation mavens at the "Let a Thousand Nations Bloom" blog are celebrating the week leading up the 4th of July the right way--with a week-long series on secession. Here is where the celebration begins.

I wrote about our times' leading theoretician and activist for new nations, Patri Friedman (one of the principles of the blog) and his "Seasteading" idea in the July issue of Reason magazine.

If You Prick Joe Jackson, Will He Not Bleed?

Posted on July 2, 2009, 6:35pm | Tim Cavanaugh

For a story most people I know profess not to care about, the death of Michael Jackson is still delivering in terms of structure, character, spectacle and narrative complexity. This week alone has brought Michael's enigmatic will [pdf], father Joe Jackson's impromptu record label promotion, the revelation that the King of Pop's apparently motherless and fatherless children came to Earth directly from Planet Sedna, and the curious twist that celebrity attorney Londell McMillan (who previously served as Michael's lawyer) is representing both of Michael's parents, although mother Katherine is named as Michael's executor and Joe is excluded from the will.

I kind of feel that Big Joe is the most compelling Jackson. It may be that I just have more sympathy for abusive fathers than I used to, or that, even if you don't believe this tale of Quincy Jones' full-contact producing technique, Michael's discography suggests that he tended to flail without a strong male presence in his life.

But who will speak for Joe Jackson? Who is the globalization-age Shakespeare able to comprehend a figure so rudely stamp'd that dogs bark at him as he halts by them?

Peter Bagge, that's who! Complete Reason's hat trick of Bagge celebration by watching Murray Wilson: Rock 'n' Roll Dad, the animated epic about the Beach Boys' rageaholic paterfamilias that Bagge and Dana Gould cooked up back when Thomas Edison was first experimenting with web video. Along with Fred Lennon and the title character, Joe Jackson gets a chance to stand up and speak for underappreciated producer/fathers everywhere: their fury, their foiled dreams, and their tireless search for the next big thing that will be "driven by Blu-ray technology." Watch the Joe Jackson parts on Youtube or at the original Icebox.com site (still up after all these years).

For Once, Cynthia McKinney's Problems Really Are Caused by the J-E-W-S

Posted on July 2, 2009, 6:33pm | Katherine Mangu-Ward

Former congresswoman and current crazywoman Cynthia McKinney is spending a little time in an Israeli hoosegow this week.

Only a matter of time, you say? Well, she isn't there because of the time her father blamed her electoral defeat on the "J-E-W-S." Nor, as far as we can tell, is it due to her habit of roughing up cops—although there's no official word about her demeanor when her Greek-flagged Gaza-blockade runner was boarded by the aforementioned J-E-W-S in uniform.

McKinney found herself in dangerous waters as part of her new affiliation with the Green Party (she was their presidential nominee in 2008, in case you missed that) she set sail for Gaza in a ship called the Spirit of Humanity, carrying "21 activists, medical supplies, cement, olive trees and children's toys." She says they were in international waters when she and her shipmates were netted by the Israelis, and refuse to sign a statement admitting guilt—a condition Israel has placed on her release.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor has said Israel was planning to free the crew and passengers.

"Nobody wants to keep them here," he said earlier this week. 

I bet.

Via Patrick of Popehat, who notes "While McKinney’s outspokenness and frank opinions have made her a lightning rod for controversy, including charges of anti-semitism, there can be no doubt that, this time, the J-E-W-S are at the root of Cynthia McKinney’s troubles. They really do run everything."

More on Cynthia McKinney here and here.

Einstein 3: The Return of George W. Bush

Posted on July 2, 2009, 6:30pm | Michael C. Moynihan

Another entry in the "same as the old boss" file, from The Washington Post:

The Obama administration will proceed with a Bush-era plan to use National Security Agency assistance in screening government computer traffic on private-sector networks, with AT&T as the likely test site, according to three current and former government officials.

President Obama said in May that government efforts to protect computer systems from attack would not involve "monitoring private sector networks or Internet traffic" and Department of Homeland Security officials say that the new program will only scrutinize data going to or from government systems.

But the program has provoked debate within DHS, the current and former officials said, because of uncertainty over whether private data can be shielded from unauthorized scrutiny, how much of a role NSA should play and whether the agency's involvement in warrantless wiretapping under the Bush administration would draw controversy.

"We absolutely intend to use the technical resources, the substantial ones, that NSA has. But . . . they will be guided, led, and in a sense directed by the people we have at the Department of Homeland Security," the department's secretary, Janet Napolitano, told reporters in a discussion of cybersecurity efforts.

Under a classified pilot program approved during the Bush administration, NSA data and hardware would be used to protect the networks of some civilian government agencies. Part of an initiative known as Einstein 3, the pilot called for telecommunications companies to route the Internet traffic of civilian government agencies through a monitoring box that would search for and block malicious computer codes.

Full article. Back in February, I noted the early similiarties between Obama and Bush's foreign policy visions.

Barney Frank to Spend TARP Profits?

Posted on July 2, 2009, 5:35pm | Amanda Carey

The Washington Examiner's Byron York reported yesterday that Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) has plans for the cash coming in as banks repay TARP money:

Last Friday, Frank introduced the "TARP for Main Street Act of 2009," a bill that would take profits from the program and immediately redirect them toward housing proposals favored by Frank and some fellow Democrats.

In other words, Frank wants to take any profit the government would have made off of TARP and immediately spend it on low income housing and mortgage subsidies. Never mind that TARP legislation says that any money the government receives from institutions paying off their bailouts "shall be paid into the general fund of the Treasury for reduction of the public debt."

While most institutions are still struggling to stay afloat, much less pay back TARP funds, it still remains to be seen if the stimulus program will ultimately end up paying for itself. In the meantime however, it seems as if Frank is doing his darndest to prevent what could be a positive outcome. Oh yeah, and did I mention that the U.S. debt is currently over $11.5 trillion?           
Reason's Nick Gillespie on the failures of Barney Frank here.

Coming to America

Posted on July 2, 2009, 5:05pm | Bill Flanigen

Via The New Yorker comes final confirmation that Osama bin Laden has actually visited the United States in the past. It was a mellow trip undertaken in 1979, hitting all of the Great White Satan's hot spots—including, of course, Indianapolis.

The tale comes mostly from his first wife, Najwa, who recounts one particular encounter with vintage American culture shock:

There was one incident that reminded me that some Americans are unaware of other cultures. When the time came for us to leave America, Osama and I, along with our two boys, waited for our departure at the airport in Indiana. I was sitting quietly in my chair, relaxing, grateful that our boys were quiet….

I saw an American man gawking at me. I knew without asking that his unwelcome attention had been snagged by my black Saudi costume…

I took a side glance at Osama and saw that he was intently studying the curious man. I knew that my husband would never allow the man to approach me…

The New Yorker's Steve Coll admirably resists the urge to conclude that this awkward moment (which, I imagine, is common for Muslim men carting burqa- or hijab-clad wives around in fly-over states) is, like, so important to understanding bin Laden's mind:

Not a particularly consequential experience, perhaps, but surely one that has a life in Osama’s memory and imagination—and another indication, among many available in his life, that he should be understood not only as a self-isolating radical imbued with millenarian religious narratives, but also as a modern and globalized figure whose experiences and outlook belong very much to our age.

To the unknown, uncouth fellow who looked askance at Mrs. bin Laden that one time 30 years ago in Indianapolis: Thanks.

(One more bit of crazy bin Laden family trivia: Osama's niece Wafah Dufour did a spread in GQ and is both Ivy-League educated and smokin' hot.)

New At Reason: Brian Doherty Interviews Alan Gura about the Post-Heller Fight for Gun Rights

Posted on July 2, 2009, 4:30pm

Last week was the first anniversary of the Heller case, in which the Supreme Court for the first time declared that the Second Amendment indeed protects an individual right to own guns in the home for self-defense. It was a great victory for individual rights, but by no means a final one.

The lawyer who successfully argued that case, Alan Gura, has remained a dedicated opponent of all sorts of gun regulations that still stand post-Heller. Senior Editor Brian Doherty talked to Gura by phone earlier this week about the various legal challenges he’s fighting against state and local gun laws.

Read all about it here.

Genetic Test Results Encourage Smokers to Quit

Posted on July 2, 2009, 4:11pm | Ronald Bailey

GenomeWeb News is reporting the results of a very preliminary study in which researchers test smokers for a genetic variant that slightly increases their risk of lung cancer:

Researchers from the National Human Genome Research Institute and elsewhere used online and telephone surveys to gauge smokers' perceptions and understanding of online genetic test results indicating whether individuals carried a copy of the glutathione S-transferase gene GSTM1. Previous research suggests those missing the enzyme have a slightly elevated lung cancer risk...

The researchers evaluated 44 smokers between the ages of 23 and 55 years old. Participants received a mouth swab kit by mail and were notified when the results were available online...

Half of the smokers tested were missing GSTM1. All of these individuals reported that they understood that this was a higher risk condition...

All participants sought some form of help quitting and 91 percent of individuals in both groups requested nicotine replacement therapy. After six months, five individuals in the higher risk group and one in the lower risk group reported that they had quit smoking. Still, the study authors were cautious about linking smoking cessation to the test itself, noting that "the study was not sufficiently powered for, nor was it a study aim to, assess smoking cessation as an outcome." 

Of course, some bioethicists think that such direct-to-consumer genetic testing needs to be strictly regulated. 

Go here for whole GenomeWeb News report. 

You Know The Real Reason Why Time Mag Is Going Down the Drain? The Content!

Posted on July 2, 2009, 3:30pm | Nick Gillespie

For all the tears that get shed over the beginning of the middle of the end for Mr. Luce's mag and newsweeklies in general, one obvious explanation generally gets glossed over: They are mostly written by conventional-wisdom mongerers who can barely finish shipping an issue of "Why Dinosaurs Believed in God" and "The Mother Mary Holy Water Diet" before rushing out something like this time-waster by esteemed historian David M. Kennedy.

Sample verbiage:

It's old news that F.D.R.'s New Deal did not end the Depression....F.D.R. appreciated the irony that it was the Depression that made it possible for him to realize those larger objectives. It would be too much to say that he deliberately prolonged the crisis to preserve the possibilities for reform. But he candidly acknowledged the relationship between peril and progress in his second Inaugural Address, on Jan. 20, 1937....

President Obama knows this. Asked by PBS news anchor Jim Lehrer in February if he did not feel burdened by the several crises now besetting the country, Obama noted that the moment "is full of peril but full of possibility" and that such times are "when the political system starts to move effectively."

Roosevelt could not have said it better. F.D.R. championed a long-deferred reform agenda that put security at its core. Obama wants to advance another set of reforms that have long been stalled.

Whole rendezvous with declining circulation here.

Hat tip: Roger L. Simon.

Given that it's such old news that the New Deal was an economic flopperoo and that President Obama is pushing a New Dealish-like economic stimulus package, you'd think that maybe Time would be interested in engaging the whys and wherefores of such things. Or in anything like a critical analysis of FDR and BHO. It needn't be negative or libertarian, but something other than idle idol worship might actually pull some eyeballs.

Check out Radley Balko and Jeff Winkler's great social-panic stories from the past four decades of Time here. But don't try satanism at home, kids!

In any case, what can Obama learn from FDR? Plenty. Especially what not to do during an economic downturn. Just watch below.

U.S. Economy: Turtles All the Way Down

Posted on July 2, 2009, 3:29pm | Tim Cavanaugh

"Less devastating" is President Obama's description of new Labor Department unemployment figures that massively exceeded expectations. Some 467,000 jobs vanished in June, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That figure was well above the 350,000-363,000 job losses guesstimated by economists, but it was quite close to the 473,000 figure calculated by Macroeconomic Advisers, LLC in its ADP National Employment Report [pdf].

Calculated Risk notes, once again, that the unemployment figures have blown through the "more adverse" scenario envisioned in the first of the so-called bank stress tests. The financial markets are in the process of giving up a non-trivial portion of their second-quarter gains — a slightly unusual pattern for the pre-Fourth of July period. (CNBC calls it the "single worst day before the long Fourth weekend in more than a century," for all you economic sabermetricians out there.) Will any news be coming after the holiday to indicate economic activity is increasing, or decreasing at a decreasing rate, in these here United States?

Obama economic advisors Christina Romer and David Axelrod both downplay but do not dismiss the possibility of a second stimulus package. Meanwhile, paying for the first stimulus package is getting easier, as 10-year Treasury yields drop to 3.49 percent. The Department of the Treasury will be borrowing new piles of money next week, and China is reiterating its call to replace the dollar as a reserve currency. Disgruntled goldbugs (ain't they all disgruntled?) may enjoy this headline: "China, Dollar Vie for Gold Standard."

Title explained.

Reason.tv: PJ O'Rourke: "Where was the government with Studebaker?"—The best-selling author on bailouts, easy women, the ruination of the U.S. auto industry, and his new book, Driving Like Crazy

Posted on July 2, 2009, 3:02pm

P.J. O'Rourke is a 21st-century H.L. Mencken-a libertarian satirist and quote-machine who's deeply suspicious of most any office-holder ("Politics is the attempt to achieve power and prestige without merit").

Since the 1970s, O'Rourke has written for all kinds of publications, including Playboy, Esquire, Vanity Fair, Automobile, and The National Lampoon. He is the H.L. Mencken Research Fellow at the Cato Institute, a regular correspondent to for The Atlantic Monthly, and the best-selling author of 12 books, the latest of which is Driving Like Crazy: 30 Years of Vehicular Hell-Bending.

In June, Reason.tv's Ted Balaker sat down with O'Rourke at the Peterson Automotive Museum in Los Angeles. Topics include: bailouts, who ruined the U.S. auto industry, politicians' love affair with trains, how easy women made O'Rourke a youthful socialist and how getting a paycheck turned him into a libertarian.

Go here for embed code, audio podcast, iPod, and HD versions.

Go to Reason's YouTube channel!

Approximately 15 minutes. This interview produced by Ted Balaker. Director of photography is Alex Manning, editor is Nate Chaffetz, and associate producer is Paul Detrick.

Wal-Mart and the Employer Mandate: Ezra Klein Misses the Point

Posted on July 2, 2009, 12:18pm | Radley Balko

In a post about Wal-Mart signing on to an employer mandate for health insurance, Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein says he was initially skeptical, but then read the joint letter between Wal-Mart, the Service Employees Union International, and the Center for American Progress, and pronounces himself convinced.

He notes, though, that Wal-Mart isn't doing this for altruistic reasons, and in doing so Klein comes perilously close to grasping the concept of rent seeking and regulatory capture. But then he whiffs.

This isn't, of course, a story of altruism. By being of use to the administration, Wal-Mart ensures that its concerns will be heard and heeded. By publicly associating itself with health reform, the company repairs some of the damage SEIU and others have done to its reputation in recent years. And, in a more macro sense, by throwing its weight behind strict cost controls, Wal-Mart makes it likelier that it gets the largest of all possible benefits: an eventual slowing in the double-time march of health-care costs.

Klein then again almost stumbles onto the point. But again he misses.

But health reform isn't supposed to be about altruism. And that's arguably the most important message of this letter. Reforming health reform [sic] isn't just some liberal president's agenda item. It's good business.

Supporting new regulations is usually good business if your company is big enough to absorb compliance costs that could slow down or cripple your competitors. Even better if can you sign on early and win over a few influential opinion makers, interest groups, and politicians so you'll have some pull over how the regulations are written.

Michael Moynihan on Wal-Mart's money connection to the Center for American Progress here. Peter Suderman wrote on Wal-Mart's support for the mandate here.

Gay Sex is Now Legal in New Delhi

Posted on July 2, 2009, 12:15pm | Bill Flanigen

Eight years after a petition to decriminalize gay sex was originally filed by sexual health advocates, India's Delhi High Court has acquiesced. Their ruling applies only to the city of New Delhi and it may be appealed to the Indian Supreme Court, but sexual liberty (and public health) advocates on the subcontinent hope that the decision will stick and influence other parts of the country to follow suit. In a nation where intimate homosexual relations can net you a 10-year prison sentence, this is no small victory.

Meanwhile, advocates and opponents of gay sex bans are busy playing hot-potato with the legacy of colonialism and western influence in India:

Some religious leaders quickly criticized the ruling. "This Western culture cannot be permitted in our country," said Maulana Khalid Rashid Farangi Mahali, a leading Muslim cleric in the northern city of Lucknow....

"This legal remnant of British colonialism has been used to deprive people of their basic rights for too long," Scott Long, director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Rights Program at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. "This long-awaited decision testifies to the reach of democracy and rights in India.

I'm not exactly sure what sort of permissive "Western culture" Mr. Maulana Khaldi Rashid Farangi Mahali is imagining, but gay sex only became legal in my home state of Virginia in 2003, and "carnally know[ing] any male or female person by the anus or by or with the mouth" remains a felony (by dint of a probably unconstitutional law) in the Old Dominion.

Reason's Managing Editor Jesse Walker covered the Lawrence case here, and contributor Cathy Young considered it here and here.

"It's not often that Supreme Court opinions go into such detail to criticize the way a city is run."

Posted on July 2, 2009, 12:14pm | Damon W. Root

Overlawyered.com proprietor and Reason Contributing Editor Walter Olson had a great New York Post op-ed earlier this week on the Supreme Court's decision in Ricci v. DeStefano:

MORAL of the day: If you're going to give white job applicants the shaft, don't be blatant about it. Moral No. 2: Don't annoy Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy....

Most of all, Kennedy went out of his way to document his evident disgust with the way New Haven leaders, from Mayor John DiStefano on down, handled the firefighter controversy.

The after-the-fact and pretextual rationalizations they devised, Kennedy wrote, were "blatantly contradicted by the record." And that was just the start of the unwelcome scrutiny of New Haven's town fathers....

It's not often that Supreme Court opinions go into such detail to criticize the way a city is run. Some high-profile figures in Connecticut's Elm City must be quite embarrassed right now--if they're capable of embarrassment.

Read the rest here. My article on the Ricci case here.

New at Reason: John Stossel on the Costly Truth About Canada's "Free" Health Care System

Posted on July 2, 2009, 12:00pm

President Obama says government will make health care cheaper and better. But as John Stossel writes, there's no free lunch, even in Canada. "People line up for care, some of them die. That's what happens," says Canadian doctor David Gratzer. As Stossel reports, Dr. Gratzer liked Canada's government health care—until he started treating patients.

Read all about it here.

Cheap Health Care Not So Cheap After All

Posted on July 2, 2009, 11:54am | Peter Suderman

Did the Senate Health, Labor, Education, and Pensions (HELP) Committee figure out a way to provide most Americans with health insurance coverage for a lot less money than anyone thought possible? That's what a quick read of some news items seems to suggest. But it's not exactly true.

The AP is reporting that the HELP committee has brought the CBO score of their revised health-care bill down to $600 billion, and that the new bill will cover 97% of America's legal population. The first version of the bill was scored at $1 trillion, and was projected to only cover about 16 million people.

But as The New Republic's Jon Cohn notes, the new numbers are somewhat misleading. The expanded coverage numbers aren't possible unless you also factor in an expansion of Medicaid that isn't included in the $600 billion price tag — an expansion that will probably raise the total cost to between $1 and $1.3 trillion. So it's incorrect to say that the bill would cover most Americans for only $600 billion.

Cohn says the outlays will be deficit neutral, but as the Spectator's Phil Klein points out, there's considerable disagreement over how to raise the revenue to pay for all of this. And of course, there's always the Senate Finance Committee, which is in the midst of revising its health-care reform bill, to think about too.

The obvious upshot of all this is that it'll put a solid wind in the sails of a reform movement that's been roughing fairly stormy waters for the last two weeks. But some of the reform movement's newfound energy will no doubt come from excitement about numbers that don't tell the whole story.

Elsewhere at Reason, John Stossel argues that there's no such thing as free health care.

Peter Bagge's Everybody Is Stupid Except For Me (And Other Astute Observations)

Posted on July 2, 2009, 11:45am | Nick Gillespie

As Brian Doherty noted yesterday, Reason's own beloved Peter Bagge has a fantastic collection of a near-decade's worth of political cartooning coming out from Fantagraphics. The content is king but the actual production is nothing short of stunning, filled with the bright, bright colors than Paul Simon used to sing about back when Kodak was still making film. 

Pre-order Everybody is Stupid Except for Me And Other Astute Observations now from Amazon for the stunningly low price of $11.55.

Or (writes Peter hisself!): "If you want a copy RIGHT NOW, you can order it by phone directly from Fantagraphics Books. If you dial (800-657-1100) between now and the end of July they won't charge you postage, so it'll cost you about the same that Amazon charges. DEAL!"

And check out the reviews so far (the last one included to be fair and balanced):

How to describe Peter Bagge? Cartoonist? Cynic? Little ball of human rage? All of the above. Also satirist, raconteur, concerned citizen, and critic. And finally, Libertarian. But one from the realist branch of that political tree.

For the past eight years, Bagge has been producing regular strips and features for Reason, the scathingly brilliant libertarian journal that's the secret guilty favorite of Washington insiders Left and Right. Now the best of that work has been collected by Fantagraphics. Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me is as combative, iconoclastic, and embittered as its title suggests it would be. It is also smart, thought-provoking, and funny as hell. Disconcertingly, you'll agree with at least half of what Bagge says. Then, gratifyingly, you'll realize that everybody is stupid except for you, too.—Tim Heffernan, Esquire

Everybody Is Stupid, overt political concerns aside, is pleasingly consistent with Bagge's earlier work: As mass-population stupidity (tax-dollar boondoggles, sports-arena and shopping-mall mania and so forth) escalates, so do Bagge's abilities to hold it up to razor-edged ridicule.

Bagge cartoons himself as a confused Everyman, perpetually attempting to make sense of a society-gone-senseless. If Bagge is a curmudgeon, he tempers the attitude with a willingness to laugh at everything—even himself. If a documentarian, he is an interpretive and exaggerative one. If a social critic or polemicist, he brings to the table a rare combination of backhanded affection and rambunctious humor. No "ifs" as to the matter of his being one terrific cartoonist, with a keen constancy of purpose.—Michael H. Price, Fort Worth Business Press

First of all, sorry to bury the lead, I'm getting to the point.  Second of all, Iggy Pop wouldn't suffer shit like this from smug, vodka-swilling liberal arts majors at a bar.  Third of all, is it all right if I draw from this isolated incident with a moron, that all libertarians are idiots?

If Everyone is Stupid is any indication, that's totally fine.  This bloated collection of Peter Bagge's work is just a series of similar encounters, through the lens of libertarianism.  The book would have you believe that the world is comprised of bleeding-heart pinko Democrats who want to tax you to death and take away your assault rifles, and the GOP's flock of sexually-repressed bible-thumping rednecks.—Ashley Cardiff, CC2K

Rearranging the Cow Tails on the Titanic

Posted on July 2, 2009, 11:32am | Matt Welch

I may have written and edited a few critical things about Arnold Schwarzenegger over the years, but I find him among the smartest and most interesting politicians I've ever covered. Unlike most pols, he can be pretty damned funny, especially during those increasingly frequent (of late, anyway) occasions when he says something with which I agree. For instance:

Follow Arnold on Twitter! And the You-Tube! Listen to David Bowie pronounce "Warhol" the same way Schwarzie pronounces "cow tails!" And read Reason's archive on the cyborg here.

Who Watches the Wikipedians?

Posted on July 2, 2009, 11:24am | Bill Flanigen

Since The New York Times' David Rohde has escaped Taliban captivity, information about his capture—and the voluntary six-month media blackout that accompanied it—is finally out. In order to protect Rohde, the Times explains that it corralled print media into a circle of story suppression, but had a tougher time keeping the vigilant user-editors of Wikipedia silent:

The Wikipedia page history shows that [the day after he was kidnapped], someone without a user name edited the entry on Mr. Rohde for the first time to include the kidnapping. [Times investigative reporter Michael] Moss deleted the addition, and the same unidentified user promptly restored it, adding a note protesting the removal. The unnamed editor cited an Afghan news agency report. In the first few days, at least two small news agencies and a handful of blogs reported the kidnapping...

On Nov. 13, news of the kidnapping was posted and deleted four times within four hours, before an administrator blocked any more changes for three days. On Nov. 16, it was blocked again, for two weeks....

Most of the attempts to add the information, including the first and the last, came from three similar Internet protocol addresses that correspond to an Internet service provider in Florida, and Wikipedia administrators guessed that they were all the same user.

“We had no idea who it was,” said [Wikipedia founder Jimmy] Wales, who said there was no indication the person had ill intent. “There was no way to reach out quietly and say ‘Dude, stop and think about this.’”

It's hard to say whether this makes new media (or new ways of managing media) look bad. Given a situation in which "lives were at stake"—that is, in which the nearly-anarchic quality of Wikipedia's management threatened to put Rohde in more danger by publicizing his situation—Wales compromised and used top-down censorship to suppress news of the kidnapping. It is remarkable, and a little bit reassuring, that Wales and his editors had such a difficult time censoring the site's more ornery, persistent users. Rohde's case, however, also exposes an interesting kink in Wikipedia's model of content control. Usually, it's possible for decentralized governance to keep content on a medium-sized leash, but decentralization requires public discussion about what is or isn't worth including. What should be done when the subject is so sensitive that preventing public discussion of it has to be the entire aim of content control? It looks like we have Wales' answer.

In June 2007, Reason's Associate Editor Katherine Mangu-Ward wrote about Wales, Wikipedia, and the changing World Wide Web.

Reason Foundation Chairman Bill Dunn on Free Minds, Free Markets, & The Current Crisis

Posted on July 2, 2009, 10:33am

Over at the MartinKronicle ("insight from a commodity trader), Michael Martin interviews Bill Dunn, the chairman of Reason Foundation, the nonprofit that publishes this website, and principal at Dunn Capital Management.

There's two parts and both are well worth watching if you're interested in freedom and fiscal sanity.

Go here for Part 1 and here for Part 2.

New at Reason: Steve Chapman on the Student Strip Search Case

Posted on July 2, 2009, 10:30am

Public schools are filled with eager, fresh-faced youngsters, and prisons contain many rough-looking adults with uninviting personalities. But put aside that difference, writes Steve Chapman, and you find some important similarities between the two places—government-run facilities where individuals are held for a specific number of years without their consent, at the mercy of their custodians. So it was a mild surprise last week to learn from the Supreme Court there are some abridgments of freedom and invasions of privacy inflicted on children that the justices will not tolerate.

Read all about it here.

Bubbles Jackson: Alive, Well, But Too Violent to Go to Jacko's Funeral (Wherever it will be)

Posted on July 2, 2009, 9:14am | Nick Gillespie

Just as Wham!'s George Michael had his Andrew Ridgely, Michael Jackson had a mostly silent and apparently useless pal during his superstar heyday: Bubbles the Chimp, immortalized by Jeff Koons and beloved by fans.

So what's up with Bubbles these days? We report, you decide:

There have been many rumours regarding Bubbles's whereabouts, the most recent being that he had been plastinated a number of years ago and was being exhibited at The Body Worlds & Mirror Of Time exhibition at the O2 Centre in London.

Jackson rescued Bubbles from a cancer research centre and in the late Eighties, the pair travelled everywhere together.

He sat in for the recording sessions of the smash-hit Bad album and during the ensuing world tour he and the singer shared a two bedroom hotel suite.

At Neverland, he slept in a crib in Jackson's bedroom and was allowed to use the star's private toilet.

That last, btw, is a privilege denied former Jacksonian Corey Feldman.

The 26-year-old chimpanzee has been discovered alive and well at an animal sanctuary in Florida.

Now bosses at the Centre for Great Apes in Wauchula, Florida, have allowed TV cameras to film Bubbles to prove he was still alive.

Jackson banished the monkey not for telling tales out of school but because he reportedly became violent around the singer's children.

For Bubbles fans only, go here.

WashPost Peddling Access to Health Care Reporters?

Posted on July 2, 2009, 9:05am | Matt Welch

According to a flier obtained by Politico from a health care lobbyist, the Washington Post is selling access to its top employees. Literally.

"Underwriting Opportunity: An evening with the right people can alter the debate," says the one-page flier. "Underwrite and participate in this intimate and exclusive Washington Post Salon, an off-the-record dinner and discussion at the home of CEO and Publisher Katharine Weymouth ... Bring your organization's CEO or executive director literally to the table. Interact with key Obama Administration and Congressional leaders ...

"Spirited? Yes. Confrontational? No. The relaxed setting in the home of Katharine Weymouth assures it. What is guaranteed is a collegial evening, with Obama Administration officials, Congress members, business leaders, advocacy leaders and other select minds typically on the guest list of 20 or less. ...

"Offered at $25,000 per sponsor, per Salon. Maximum of two sponsors per Salon. Underwriters' CEO or Executive Director participates in the discussion. Underwriters appreciatively acknowledged in printed invitations and at the dinner. Annual series sponsorship of 11 Salons offered at $250,000 ... Hosts and Discussion Leaders ... Health-care reporting and editorial staff members of The Washington Post ... An exclusive opportunity to participate in the health-care reform debate among the select few who will actually get it done. ... A Washington Post Salon ... July 21, 2009 6:30 p.m."

This is actually shocking, from a Journalism Ethics point of view (the paper is offering you the chance to pay money to "alter the debate" on health care at an "off-the-record dinner" with its own "health-care reporting and editorial staff members," and I just don't see any way to pretty up that concept). I'll be curious to see whether the story is confirmed.

Link via Drudge.

UPDATE: Confirmed, and cancelled.

Reason.tv: The Bestest 4th of July Ever—A fireworks finale not to be missed!

Posted on July 2, 2009, 8:20am

Produced by Meredith Bragg. 

Reason Morning Links: Police Chiefs Want No Part of Immigration Enforcement, California May Issue IOUs, Congress Tours the World on Taxpayer Dime

Posted on July 2, 2009, 8:14am | Radley Balko

• Big city police chiefs say illegal immigrants' fear of discovery hampers law enforcement, urge Congress to separate local law enforcement from immigration enforcement.

• California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says state may have to issue IOUs unless legislature can overcome budget impasse.

• Taxpayer-funded overseas trips for members of Congress have tripled since 2001, increased tenfold since 1995.

• Study finds that over time* ex-cons pose no greater risk of re-offending than the general population.

• ACLU contends federal government is using false confessions obtained by torture of a detainee to keep him at Guantanamo. He me may have been as young as 12 when he was captured by Afghan police.

(*Edit: "over time" added to better reflect the study's findings.)

"What this is about is a personal issue that happened late in the campaign relating to a close, personal friend of Bill Kristol"

Posted on July 2, 2009, 8:14am | Matt Welch

In case you needed any fresh reminders of why the gang at The Weekly Standard should never be within drop-kicking distance of the Oval Office, this Politico article about the Palin Wars within the McCain campaign last fall should do the trick. If Sarah Palin emerges as a 2012 front-runner for the GOP, her intrigue-fomenting, audibly panting WS kingmakers would be reason enough to run screaming for the exits. Though in fairness to the former in-flight magazine of Air Force II, for whatever managerial or temperamental reasons, John McCain's political campaigns have frequently been riven by messy civil wars.
 
Read the Vanity Fair Palin profile that kicked off the latest spat here. More on the Weekly Standard and John McCain here.

Peter Bagge's Reason Cartoons: In Book Form and Publisher's Weekly Approved

Posted on July 1, 2009, 8:06pm | Brian Doherty

Reason magazine's own supercartoonist Peter Bagge has a brand-new collection of his Reason comics journalism collected in the covers of a real book, and available as of right now. It's called Everybody is Stupid Except Me, and Other Astute Observations.

Publisher's Weekly interviewed him about it. Excerpts:

PWCW: Has the post-9/11 America actually become even more insane, or was 9/11 just an excuse to allow the collective madness to run rampant with fewer questions asked?

PB: Both! Our collective response to 9-11 has been appalling, in that most Americans were (and are) totally willing to throw the Constitution right in the trash heap without any hesitation. Most of us have no idea what's even IN the Constitution, let alone why. My daughter recently graduated from public school, and her teachers didn't discuss the Bill of Rights once in those 13 years. They never taught her a single civics lesson! The paranoid part of me can't help but think that was intentional.

PWCW: In the wake of your observations and Libertarian-leaning opinions, have you received any backlash from readers who find your observations to be "anti-American?

PB: Not so much "anti-American, but I've received a lot of harsh feedback from people who are deeply offended by my libertarian-leaning worldview, which to them is bad enough.

PWCW: What has doing a series that's all social commentary taught Peter Bagge?

PB: That doing social commentary is difficult! At least when it comes to getting your point across as clearly as possible, while still being entertaining. I also tried to reach out to fence-straddlers and avoid preaching to the choir as much as possible. I could have taken the Doonesbury route and pandered to my fellow libertarians by pretending I (and they) had all the answers, but that would have been both too easy and dishonest. If I felt ambivalent about something I would say so, rather than pretend otherwise.

And you can buy it on Amazon, and you should! A while back, the Washington Post praised Bagge's political cartooning.

Marines Hit Afghanistan in Operation: Hearts, Minds, and Suicide Attacks

Posted on July 1, 2009, 7:50pm | Brian Doherty

It's the biggest Marine operation since Fallujah underway in Afghanistan as of today, as peace candidate Barack Obama gets his very own central Asian war to help define his legacy. Excerpts from the Washington Post report:

The operation will involve about 4,000 troops from the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade...The Marines, along with an Army brigade that is scheduled to arrive later this summer, plan to push into pockets of the country where NATO forces have not had a presence.....

Once Marine units arrive in their designated towns and villages, they have been instructed to build and live in small outposts among the local population. The brigade's commander, Brig. Gen. Lawrence D. Nicholson, said his Marines will focus their efforts on protecting civilians from the Taliban, and on restoring Afghan government services, instead of a series of hunt-and-kill missions against the insurgents.

"We're doing this very differently," Nicholson said to his senior officers a few hours before the mission began. "We're going to be with the people...."

....Additional forces were slated to pour into the valley during the predawn hours on more helicopters and in heavy transport vehicles designed to withstand the makeshift-but-lethal bombs that Taliban fighters have implanted along the roads.

It was not immediately clear whether the initial Marine units faced resistance as they converged on their destinations. Marine commanders said prior to the start of the operation that they expected only minimal Taliban opposition at the outset but that assaults on the forces likely would increase once they move into towns and begin patrols. Field commanders have been told to prepare for suicide attacks, ambushes and roadside bombings.

Previously, in Reason Online: Steve Chapman tries to figure a way out of Afghanistan, and David Weigel assesses Obama's liberal interventionism. 

Karl Malden Died For Your Sins

Posted on July 1, 2009, 6:59pm | Tim Cavanaugh

My local news station describes Karl Malden, dead today at 97 years young, as having been "a fixture of seventies television." Even for a committed Quinn Martin fan, that seems like pretty uncharitable praise for a major cultural figure. If nothing else, as celebrities continue to pop off before their time, Malden proved that clean living can help get you almost a century.

With his slightly monstrous physiognomy and a temperament permanently set at "lovable but overbearing," Malden was the greatest of the second bananas. Even his breakthrough American Express commercials hinged on Malden's ability to reassure you: "I'm not a big star; you can trust me." And you could! By some accounts it was Malden's eloquent defense of Elia Kazan that got the controversial HUAC songbird his lifetime achievement award in 1999. As it is the nature of supporting players not to get the glory, there's no sense in complaining about underrating. So I'll just say that for me, On the Waterfront, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Patton are all Karl Malden vehicles in which somebody else got most of the credit.

InstaVision Talks With Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Who Makes a Lot of Economic Sense

Posted on July 1, 2009, 6:21pm | Nick Gillespie

Over at PJTV, Glenn "InstaVision" Reynolds interviews Texas Gov. Rick Perry on why the Lone Star State is doing relatively well compared to other giga-states such as California, which is in full-on breakdown mode. The secret, says Perry, is low taxes, predictable and minimal business reg climate, keeping spending low, and the like. About the best-kept secret: Texas's legislature meets for only 140 days every other year.

As a former resident of both California and Texas, I can attest to the many differences in the states (especially the weather). I don't think Texas is any sort of paradise, but when you stack the place up compared to virtually every other state in the U.S., it's got a helluva lot going for it.

Watch the interview below. It's about 15 minutes long and while Perry is pure politician (and I mean that in a bad way!), he makes pretty damn good economic sense (while being awful on any number of other issues, such as border enforcement, social freedoms, the drug war, and more).

CAP's Wal-Mart Cash

Posted on July 1, 2009, 6:10pm | Michael C. Moynihan

As Peter Suderman wrote yesterday, news that Wal-Mart had joined forces with the liberal think tank Center for American Progress (CAP) and the SEIU in support of "health care reform" is, at first blush, perhaps something of a surprise. Except that it isn't at all surprising to those who have been paying attention. Washington Examiner columnist Tim Carney, who has written a book on the pernicious intersection of big government and big business, reminds those arguing that corporate-government convergence is some type of Obama "breakthrough" of recent history:

Wal-Mart's support for this regulation is new, but times have not changed. Wal-Mart, remember, joined labor unions in lobbying for a hike in the minimum wage, and a Wal-Mart executive testified before Congress in favor of cap-and-trade years ago.

And "The highly ideological behavior of the business community"? What in the world is [CAP blogger Matt] Yglesias talking about? The Chamber of Commerce's endorsement of Obama's stimulus plan? Or the fact that Barney Frank scored higher on the Chamber's score card than did Ron Paul? What does Yglesias make of Philip Morris's decade-long campaign for tobacco regulation, or Mattel's 2007-08 full-court press for toy-safety rules?

Are GE and Duke Energy's support fo Waxman-Markey "change" from Enron's support for U.S. ratification of Kyoto? And on health care, did Yglesias miss the fact that the big HMOs supported HillaryCare?

The notion that Big Business has long been reflexively anti-government is a myth, and Yglesias repeats it here in order to pat his boss John Podesta (whose brother lobbies for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and whose sister-in-law lobbies for Boeing, Cigna, and dozens of other megacorps,) and the President (who received more money than anyone else from Wall Street, and frankly every industry but insurance) on the back for "change."

Over at Forbes.com, Tevi Troy points out that CAP is the (recent?) beneficiary of Wal-Mart largesse:

As for the liberal-leaning Center for American Progress, it has an added incentive to welcome Wal-Mart into polite company. While the left has shunned the corporate behemoth for years, according to its Web site Wal-Mart gives the think tank between $500,000 and $999,999. Perhaps CAP will get more than just brownie points from the Obama administration for brokering this deal.

So CAP accuses Wal-Mart of "corporate social irresponsibility" and gets a big bag of cash in return, while I wrote this paean to the big box store and get bupkis?

Did the Bubble Start In 1994? Did the Recession Start In 2006?

Posted on July 1, 2009, 5:59pm | Tim Cavanaugh

Honor the unofficial 31st day of June by reading Volume 1, Number 1 [pdf] of BEACONOMICS A quarterly economic forecast for the U.S. and California, published last month by Christopher Thornberg's Beacon Economics.

Don't expect to like everything you read. Thornberg agrees with the principle that public spending can and should be used to move surplus resources from the private sector, going so far as to say recently that government "should be spending when everyone else is cutting back" and "buying cars when no one else is buying cars." You may also object to his reference to "the myriad of long run issues — healthcare, social insurance, massive public debt, and environmental issues — that need to become a priority of public policy and debate in the coming decade." Finally, I have to say ouch for Reason when Thornberg dismisses "claims that the United States was entering into a 'lost decade' like Japan experienced in the 1990s" as "unwarranted hysteria."

That having been said, the study is the most useful broad view of the recession I've seen in a while. Thornberg has been a reliable realist on housing prices and a skeptic of all efforts to shore up real estate values. I share his disdain for the scapegoating of "mark-to-market" accounting rules and for the subsequent changes to FASB rules, which Thornberg describes as a "delay tactic" that will allow "many a defunct bank to avoid acknowledging their problems and leave the entire system weakened for years." And I am of course totally on board with his indictment of the real criminals:

The largest imbalance in the economy and the primary issue that turned the quasi recession of the first three quarters of 2008 into the full blown downturn of the fourth quarter was not housing or finance, but the American public.

Thornberg is less optimistic than I am about the far future of asset-backed securities (pp 7-9). But he's more optimistic about the recovery, predicting that output will bottom out this fall and growth will remain in a hockey-stick pattern stretching into next year, with house prices hitting bottom in the first half of 2010. That's on the premise that the recession began quite a bit earlier than the December 2007 start date given by the National Bureau of Economic Research. His discussion of the recovery prospects (pp 13-15) is the only green shoots-type talk I know of that is in any way closely argued or persuasive. And page 10 contains an interesting estimate that the 2007 U.S. economy was overvalued by $15 trillion (an idea I've cribbed several times), having begun to super-inflate way back in 1994. But rather than go on cherry-picking the stuff I agree with, I suggest you check out the report for yourself.

New at Reason: Matt Welch on the Cost of Doing Something

Posted on July 1, 2009, 5:30pm

As this summer's congressional debates over global warming and health care have illustrated, the urge to have the government do something in the face of a perceived crisis is arguably the most powerful and effective legislative engine known to man. But, argues Reason Editor in Chief Matt Welch, it has also produced ample amounts of bad law and big government.

Read all about it here.

Should States Tax Online Affiliate Programs? Overstock and Amazon Say No Way

Posted on July 1, 2009, 5:23pm | Nick Gillespie

Last year, New York and a few other states started taxing online affiliate programs, in which website operators link to retailers and then get a commission on any business generated from their site. The logic behind it was that online affiliates constituted a "physical presence," akin to having a plant, warehouse, retail store, etc.

While the Supreme Court ruled in the early '90s that it was too onerous to expect catalog and online retailers to collect sales tax in the 7,000 taxing jurisdictions in the U.S., everyone involved agrees that if you have a bricks-and-mortar operation somewhere, you must collect the relevant sales tax. Hence, Utah-based Overstock collects tax on sales within the Beehive State. But in the wake of the New York law, Amazon and Overstock pulled their affiliate programs for Empire-State-based websites and launched a still-pending suit to overturn the law. Thousands of websites were shut out of affiliate status as a result.

Due to similar laws, reports the Los Angeles Times, Overstock has just pulled its online affiliate program from California, Hawaii, North Carolina, and Rhode Island. Amazon has also pulled its program from Rhode Island and North Carolina.

"It's awful to have to terminate these relationships with affiliates simply because they live in states where unconstitutional laws are being passed," said Patrick Byrne, Overstock.com's chairman and chief executive. "However, politicians have to remember that a tax is a price that government charges for a service, and when they raise their prices, we're going to buy less of their services."

LA Times bit here.

Byrne and others argue that catalog and online retailers shouldn't have to pay the same type of tax because they don't put the same sort of stress on services and infrastructure that local businesses do. As he told Reason.tv in a recent interview, Overstock and its employees aren't using as much water, electricity, health and education services, you name it, in places where it simply ships in merchandise.

What do you think, Hit & Runners? Is that a good argument, persuasive even to those who disagree initially?

Here's Byrne talking it up at Reason.tv (go here for embed code, related vids, etc):

"An angry ex-girlfriend or wife is the best person in the world, the greatest source of information": ATF Agent on "hunt for guns, one house at a time"

Posted on July 1, 2009, 5:03pm | Nick Gillespie

The Houston Chronicle chronicles attempts by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (the group that brought you the Branch Davidian standoff) to track down illegal gun purchases that end up down Mexico way. From Agent Tim Sloan comes this pearl of wisdom:

"An angry ex-girlfriend or wife is the best person in the world, the greatest source of information."

The Chron titles its story "Federal agents hunt for guns, one house at a time," and is clearly sympathetic to the feds (it's 102 degrees out! there's pit bulls at every corner!), but gives details that makes law enforcement look less than knightly:

On this day, agents weren't wearing raid jackets or combat boots and weren't armed with warrants.

Guns were hidden under civilian shirts.

Another tip took agents on a 30-minute drive from the shack to a sprawling home with a pool in the back and an American flag out front.

It turned out two handguns, of a type drug gangsters prefer, were bought by a pastor for target practice.

Some stories, they say, are hard to believe.

The lamest so far came from a police officer: He said he bought a few military-style rifles, left them in his car and—on the same night—forgot to lock a door. He couldn't explain why he didn't file a police report or why he visited Mexico the day after the alleged theft.

Those warrants can really ruin the cut of a sports jacket, that's for sure.

Whole story here.

Here's something to throw in the mix: Why not reduce the amount of violence and gun play, both here and in Mexico, but, I don't know, ending the war on drugs? Seriously, to the extent that Mexico (and by extension, the U.S.) has a drug-violence problem, it is clearly related to the illegal status of intoxicants, not the bang-bang potential of guns. Read this on that.

Hat tip: Dan Gifford, who blogs at Big Hollywood and was nominated for an Academy Award for his production of Waco: Rules of Engagment, one of the most disturbing documentaries of the past quarter-century.

SCOTUS: The Year in Review

Posted on July 1, 2009, 4:00pm | Amanda Carey

The Associated Press  released a report today detailing some of the most significant Supreme Court decisions during the past year on topics ranging from maternity leave, to voting rights, to religious monuments. Decisions welcomed by those who are libertarian-minded include the recent rulings on strip searches of 13-year olds and reverse discrimination of firefighters.  Unfortunately, the list doesn't extend much beyond that.

One of the most unusual cases involves a ten-year legal battle between a smoker's widow and $79.5 million payout from tobacco company, Philip Morris USA:

The Supreme Court left in place a $79.5 million award to a smoker's widow, ending a 10-year legal fight over the large payout. The court let stand a ruling by the Oregon Supreme Court in favor of Mayola Williams and against Altria Group Inc.'s Philip Morris USA. Williams persuaded a jury in 1999 that the company should be held accountable for misleading people into thinking cigarettes were not dangerous or addictive.

Read here for the full list.

Also, check out Jacob Sullum's take on the  $79.5 million lawsuit here.

Take Three; They're Smaller Now

Posted on July 1, 2009, 3:54pm | Jacob Sullum

Yesterday an FDA advisory panel recommended that Vicodin, Percocet, and other painkillers combining opioids with acetaminophen be taken off the market. Most of the 400 deaths and 42,000 hospitalizations related to acetaminophen overdoses each year involve such combination products. The risk is of special concern to people who take prescription medications like Vicodin (hydrocodone plus acetaminophen) and Percocet (oxycodone plus acetaminophen) for chronic pain. Contrary to popular perceptions, it's the over-the-counter ingredient in such prescription painkillers, as opposed to the narcotics, that poses the main health danger for people taking them over extended periods of time. Such patients develop tolerance to the opiods and have to raise their doses, which can be done safely and indefinitely, except that it also increases the danger of liver damage from the acetaminophen. Doctors who reflexively prescribe opioid-and-acetominophen combinations probably should be more cautious and consider alternative formulations, especially when their patients may be taking these drugs for a long time, and patients should be more aware of the acetaminophen risk. But that does not mean such drugs are never appropriate for anyone in any situation, so a ban seems hard to justify even on paternalistic grounds.

A second recommendation from the advisory panel is based on even shakier reasoning. It said the maximum dose for over-the-counter acetaminophen products such as Tylenol should be reduced from 500 milligrams to 325 milligrams per pill. This proposal does not seem to be based on new data indicating that the current recommended dose is unsafe:

Linda A. Suydam, president of the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, said the committee had ignored studies showing that doses sold by her members—two pills of 500 milligrams, up to four times a day—were safe. "I think this is a very effective dose and one needed for individuals who experience chronic pain," she said.

Instead of adjusting what's considered safe and effective based on new evidence, the dose reduction seems to be aimed at lowering the risk to people who exceed the current guidelines. The change therefore would sacrifice the interests of consumers who follow instructions for the sake of consumers who don't. And if people find that two tablets don't do the trick anymore, won't they be more inclined to take a third or even a fourth, thereby equaling or exceeding the current recommended maximum dose? Alternatively, they may switch to other over-the-counter pain relievers, such as aspirin and ibuprofen, which have their own overdose risks.  As one panel member told The New York Times, "If you keep track of what you're taking, none of this is an issue for you."

Reason coverage of the conflict between drug control and pain control here.

A Brief Reminder that Models Aren't Always Right

Posted on July 1, 2009, 3:53pm | Ronald Bailey

Physicist and occasional Reason contributor Russell Seitz has an interesting letter to the editor on climate models in the current issue of Foreign Affairs. Seitz' letter reminds Foreign Affairs readers and editors that in recent decades they...

...have seen the nuclear winter melt down, the energy crisis metastasize into an oil glut, and the population bomb implode. This breathtaking string of global systems modeling fiascos leaves some analysts asking why climate models are deemed sacrosanct when variables as critical as the sensitivity of the climate to the doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have failed to converge on uncontroversial values.

Climate sensitivity refers to the equilibrium temperature increase expected to result from doubling the atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide. The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) fourth assessment report (4AR) finds that climate sensitivity is "likely to be in the range 2 to 4.5 degrees Celsius with a best estimate of 3 degrees, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5 degrees. Values substantially higher than 4.5 degrees Celsius cannot be excluded."

What does Seitz mean by "fail to converage on uncontroversial values"? One example might be a recent talk in Washington, DC. by Massachusetts Institute of Technology climatologist Richard Lindzen who argued that new data suggests that climate sensitivity is around 0.5 degrees centigrade (see slides 18 through 22) which is far below the IPCC figures. 

See Seitz' Foreign Affairs letter here. In addition, you might want to take a look at Seitz' Reason article on the implications of carbon prohibition. 

An Ounce of Government Funded Prevention May Not Be Worth the Cost

Posted on July 1, 2009, 3:48pm | Peter Suderman

In an online health-care townhall this afternoon, President Obama said that "we need to invest in prevention and wellness."  And indeed, according to CNN, Obama has already allocated about $2 billion for primary care health centers, much of which will be spent on preventive care. The reason for this, he says, is clear-cut: "We know this saves money." But the truth isn't quite so simple.

The same CNN article quotes Dartmouth professor of medicine Dr. H. Gilbert Welch as saying just the opposite: "I think it almost always costs more money." Welch goes on to argue that "the problem with early detection strategies is it identifies so many well people as having abnormalities that may be worrisome for disease. But it turns out most of them will never become a problem."

The CBO is a little more careful in its estimation of preventive care's cost savings, but doesn't come close to Obama's sweeping certainty. A post on the director's blog notes the following:

For example, many health reform proposals include expanded support for preventive care and wellness services, as well as greater emphasis on primary care. Such policies have the potential to improve health outcomes and enhance the quality of patients’ lives. To the extent that policies avert diseases or lead to more effective medical care, they also might reduce health spending on balance. However, some policies of this sort might actually raise health spending, because additional preventive or primary care generally costs money, not every aspect of preventive or primary care is effective at averting disease, and people who avoid certain diseases may fall victim to other diseases instead.

Elsewhere, the CBO has written that preventive services "would have clearer positive effects on health than on the federal budget balance." A study last year in the New England Journal of Medicine cautioned that although "some evidence does suggest that there are opportunities to save money and improve health through prevention," it's also true that "sweeping statements about the cost-saving potential of prevention... are overreaching." In other words, it depends, and we should be wary of politicians like Obama who want to sell us a bundle of expensive prevention using overly broad claims about its cost savings.

Reason.tv: Liberal and Conservative Agree on Bill of Rights...Especially That it Should Be Much Shorter!

Posted on July 1, 2009, 3:01pm

 

Liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans may disagree on all kinds of things, but based on the way they govern, they've reached a consensus that the Bill of Rights is just way too long.

Indeed, with the exception of the Third Amendment (the one about quartering of troops), is there any aspect of the Bill of Rights that they both support without reservation?

Had enough of left and right? Maybe you're ready for some Reason.

More videos and info at Reason.tv.

Subscribe to Reason.tv's YouTube channel.

"Had Enough of Left and Right?" is directed by Courtney Moorehead Balaker and written by Ted Balaker. Director of photography is Alex Manning; associate producer is Nate Chaffetz. Starring Kyle Roper as the liberal Democrat, and Paul Detrick as the conservative Republican. Voiceover by Rin Palmer.

City Councilman Learns the Folly of Breed-Specific Dog Bans

Posted on July 1, 2009, 2:46pm | Radley Balko

Aaron Rochester, a city councilman in Sioux City, Iowa, who led an effort to get pit bulls banned in the city is now appealing to prevent his own dog from being euthanized after it apparently bit a neighbor. His dog? A Labrador.

It's just an anecdote, but it's illustrative of the problems with breed-specific legislation. Bad owners create bad dogs, regardless of the dog's lineage. Bans on pit bulls don't prevent dog fighting, nor do they prevent people from raising vicious dogs. They just ensure that dogs fitting the pit bull description will be vicious, because the well-bred lines will be discontinued and good owners will stop raising them. Meanwhile, people who raise dogs for fighting will simply move on to another breed.

Moreover, the term pit bull isn't really a breed at all. It's a generic term that can and has been applied to just about any dog with bulldog and/or terrier traits (take the pit bull test here). The American Kennel Club-recognized breed that's generally associated with the term is the American Staffordshire Terrier. And the vast, vast majority of staffies are harmless (they're actually considered a child-friendly breed).

I hope Rochester's dog isn't put down, and instead sent to a trainer. But Rochester ought pay the approriate damages to his neighbor and perhaps take a couple of dog-rearing classes before he's allowed to own another dog. Maybe he'll even learn from all of this why specific breeds aren't the problem.