2012 May

May 30, 2012

Two Views of China’s Growth

By Don Kirk in Foreign Affairs, Optimists and Pessimists

In today’s on-line The Diplomat, Dr. Minxin Pei at the Claremont McKenna College notes the most recent fall in China’s GDP growth to 8.1%. According to Professor Pei, this drop below the prior 8.3% growth “means lower demand” in China, causing worsened future performance.

There is another view, which notes that the Chinese government’s forecast was for 7.5% growth, so the actual performance beat official expectations. How is that a negative? Furthermore, there is no other major economy in the world that is performing at China’s 8.1%. Even Germany, the growth champion of Europe, is utterly stagnant at .5% growth last month, which means that China’s economy is growing sixteen times the rate of Germany’s. China’s economy is growing four times faster than the U.S. Again, how is that a negative?

Not that there are not plenty of long-term, systemic problems in China’s economy. The SOE’s are rife with corruption and inefficiency, the banks are worse, and the economic model of market-Marxism or controlled-capitalism that the Chinese practice cannot endure, because there are so many internal contradictions. Still, the present growth is stellar despite all of the systemic problems. The Chinese can gaze out at Europe’s and America’s economic problems and give thanks they have theirs, not ours.

Dr. Pei’s critique is valuable for pointing out the many problems in China, but their fall in growth rate is not a problem, except to those whose views are colored by the personal psychology of Pessimism.

[Email comments are welcome: duoism(at)sbcglobal.net]

May 28, 2012

There’s Prudence, And There’s Suicidal Prudence

By Don Kirk in Rationality vs. Irrationality, Socialism's "intellectual suicide"

In today’s Sacramento Bee newspaper, Kassie Siegel, from the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute in San Fransisco, has a Op-Ed calling for the immediate ban on fracking in California. Public testimony on fracking in California will start in late July, not soon enough for Ms. Siegel, but she is committed to the transparency such public hearings will offer.

The view that avoiding or prohibiting whatever creates harm is known as ‘prudence.’ Aristotle is famous for writing about prudence, and the concept has long been a part of Christian theological doctrine. Prudence is a life-saving judgment and whatever is life-saving is usually life-flourishing, so prudence should have a more prominent position in philosophy.

The difficulty with prudence is when it becomes non-empirical, that is, when the principle of prudence becomes ideological. For example, much political agitation accompanied the introduction of saccharine into the marketplace, arguing that the artificial sweetener had never been proven to be safe before it was marketed to the public. Since the sweetener was unknown to be carcinogenic, the agitation demanded it be banned, in accord with the principle of prudence.

But wait. In logic, such use of the prudence principle is self-defeating, because it eliminates any human action before knowing the consequences. No one knew whether or not saccharine was carcinogenic, so banning the sweetener without having such knowledge meant adopting a suicidal position based upon one’s personal psychic pessimism. Fortunately, the final regulatory decision on saccharine rejected the pessimism of ideological prudence and now anyone can safely enjoy non-caloric sweeteners.

When we caution children not to put their finger into an electrical socket, we are exercising prudence, and such prudence is based upon actual experience. Banning fracking because it might be harmful is not prudence; it’s ideological pessimism, the psychological trait whereby anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Not to make too much of this point, but the regress of penultimate pessimism is suicide. Until fracking is proven to be harmful to Ms. Siegel’s California condor, kit fox, and “blunt-nosed leopard lizard”–or especially, to humans–the oil extracting technology should not be banned in California.

Prudence is a valuable, life-saving judgment. Ideological prudence is simply psychic suicide.

[Email comments are welcome: duoism(at)sbcglobal.net]

May 26, 2012

So Corrupt Only A Computer Will Do

By Don Kirk in Political Theory, Politics, Prudent, Pragmatic Pluralism

Steve Malanga has an article in today’s City Journal on gerrymandering political district boundaries across America. The Constitution requires a census every ten years and that Congressional districts be proportional by population, so the process of re-drawing political boundaries every decade is necessary. The accepted ideological process of ‘gerrymandering’ has as many variants as there are States, with Iowa as the standout for having the least corruption while Texas, California, and Illinois vie for which is the most corrupt.

Part of the problem with corruption in gerrymandering is the view that racial minorities in the United States should have their own representatives, so district boundaries are drawn into wildly fanciful, kaleidoscopic contortions which unite far-flung communities into racially-pure hubs. The alternative view of a pluralist–not a way of thinking used in current gerrymandering–is that dividing racial concentrations actually results in giving them more influence and power by having sizable presence in multiple districts with a racial mix, instead of concentration in just one. Gerrymandering by concentrating race is, of course, an example of the monism of racism.

The most basic problem of corruption in gerrymandering, however, is that it rewards and punishes according to ideology. Whichever member of the duopoly controls the State legislature re-draws the district boundaries to favor itself in the State, and to diminish the influence and power of its ideological competitor. The results are not just convoluted maps; the ideological gerrymander makes convoluted contortions of the body politic, where ‘communities of interest’ to create racial districts is legal language justifying ideological, legal political corruption.

The re-redistricting process should be taken out of the hands of fallible humans and put into the impartial, objective algorithms of computers. And especially, preference for, or discrimination against, race should be eliminated, to help achieve a ‘color-blind’ society. Instead, redistrict by computers with just a few standards: 1. few counties are divided unless the population size requires division, or the number of counties is smaller than the allotted delegation; 2. districts are compact and contiguous before they extend to include remote populations; 3. 2% variance is permitted in populations between districts; 4. in addition to not creating districts for race, no district boundaries are to be established by computers according to ideological affinity whatsoever. There is no mention of political parties in the Constitution, so why permit them to insulate their permanent political class?

If one goal of a democratic republic is to reduce political corruption, then turning over the ideological redistricting process to impartial computers helps.

[Email comments are welcome: duoism(at)sbcglobal.net]

May 24, 2012

Senators in Solidarity

By Don Kirk in Crony Capitalism Insidious Socialism, Foreign Affairs

The Washington Post ran an article on-line less than half an hour ago reporting that the United States Senate Appropriations Committee voted unanimously to reduce foreign aid to Pakistan next year by $33 million dollars. The reduction is designed to punish Pakistan for incarcerating Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi as a traitor for helping the U.S. kill Osama bin Laden. The aid reduction is one million dollars for each year of Dr. Afridi’s sentence.

Let’s put this Senate committee solidarity in some perspective. First of all, $33 million is only 5% of the annual aid given to the Pakistani government by the United States. And second, the remaining 95% of aid still requires that all of it be spent on purchasing U.S. manufactured armaments. Hmm. Now, that Senate solidarity of Republicans joining Democrats is starting to look suspect.

The aid is given to Pakistan to secure its help in fighting terrorism. Arguably for the American citizen, killing Osama bin Laden is the most effective achievment for their tax dollars spent on anti-terror. Why is a citizen of Pakistan guilty of treason for helping Pakistan’s ally prevent further terrorism, if our foreign aid specifically is accepted by the Pakistani government to fight terror?

And why only 5% penalty? If any of our taxpayers’ money was being used to build schools or hospitals or aqueducts in Pakistan, even a reduction of 5% would be objectionable. But since the entire aid to Pakistan is a direct method of bribing Pakistan to fight terror while it is also an indirect method of financing American defense manufacturers, the mere reduction of only 5% is not even a slap on the wrist.

What it is, is legal-corruption, in the bipartisan guise of Senate cooperation and solidarity. The duopoly Senators do not want to upset the defense manufacturers in their States.

May 22, 2012

Posturing Theofascism

By Don Kirk in Foreign Affairs, Ideo/theologies, Theofascism

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s IAEA, released yesterday its encouraging statement about the imminent signing of an agreement with Iran on IAEA inspections of nuclear facilities in the Persian nation. The Iranians were even more enthusiastic about the imminent accord. The two are falling all over themselves in back-slapping congratulations because the G5+1 nations are meeting very soon, and further economic sanctions are being considered against Iran for its obstruction of the IAEA, among other things.

Let’s ignore the posturing by the theofascist government in Iran and cut to the chase.

First, the actual history of Iran repeatedly obstructing and deceiving the IAEA in performing its UN duties is well documented.

Second, the real problem is not in having access to nuclear production facilities in Iran, so all of the IAEA self-congratulations simply feeds the theofascism’s posturing. The genuine problem is that Iran produced, and continues to produce, 20% enriched uranium, which has absolutely no civilian applications anywhere in the world. Nuclear medicine at every hospital in the world does not use 20% grade uranium, nor do any nuclear power plants of any nation (such civilian use of nuclear power requires merely 3-5% enrichment). 20% uranium has only one possible use: it can only be used as the second step to enrich uranium to the 95% purity required for making nuclear weapons.

The Iranians aver repeatedly that their nuclear program is only civilian and they would never build nuclear weapons. Their spinning centrifuges making more 20% uranium every day makes a lie out of their profession of honesty. If the theofascism in Iran had no interest in building nuclear weapons, they would not be building an inventory of 20% uranium.

This IAEA self-congratulations about Iranian inspections is worrisome. Preceeding the Iraq War in 2003, the IAEA was ordered by the Security Council to “inspect” Saddam Hussein’s known, existing stockpiles of poison gas and other WMD, and assure their destruction. Instead, the IAEA went off on a wild goose-chase, trying to find and ‘inspect’ nuclear weapons that did not exist. War resulted as much from the failed inspections as from the failed intelligence. Now, the IAEA seems to be making the same mistake again, as if the problem is the lack of inspections.

The “problem” is much more severe. There is nothing more dangerous to world peace than having an evolved form of Fascism become nuclear-armed.

May 20, 2012

Anti-Democrat Democrats

By Don Kirk in Left-Liberalism

Less than two weeks ago the State of West Virginia conducted its Democratic presidential primary. Mr. Obama won handily, taking 59% of the voter count while his only opposition earned 41% of the vote. Yes, the otherwise routine election made news because Mr. Obama’s opponent was incarcerated at the time in a Texas prison (still is), ran no campaign and yet he managed to garner 41% of the Democratic Party vote. The media is astonished by the unusual strong showing of a locked up felon nobody knew.

Does the mainstream media’s take on the WV primary election accurately describe what happened? Granted, no one in West Virginia knew the name of the President’s challenger, but the Democrats stress the positive win, not the size of the negative votes.

First of all, the voters who show up at a primary election are usually the party’s most committed ‘true believers.’ Oops. The president only earned 60% of the vote of his staunchest supporters? Put it another way: Out of the most loyal, dependable, and committed Democrats in West Virginia—people who know the President very well—forty percent turned against him.

Second, does it even matter whether the voters knew the challenger? Doesn’t the 41% of Democrats who voted for the felon actually send a message: ‘We don’t care who the challenger is or what his/her name is or what crimes they committed; we just want this incumbent off the ballot, or out of office, or gone out of our party.’ How does this vote NOT represent an insurrectionist angry shout: ‘anybody but Obama’ in the Democratic Party?

Finally, if the argument above is accurate, then Republicans have no cause to congratulate themselves. These Democratic Party mountain voters are not going to vote for Republicans in November if they have a third party alternative.

Oops again. They have no viable third party alternative in West Virginia, so the Republicans will win in West Virginia in November, likely believing center-Left voters prefer Republicans to Mr. Obama. That’s an ego-centric mistake, I believe. The two parties are only able to hang on to win elections because there is presently no viable third party alternative to the duopoly. If there is a viable third party alternative, watch Republicans lose just as badly as the Democrats in West Virginia.

May 18, 2012

Not Exactly Lying, but…

By Don Kirk in Conservatism, Left-Liberalism, Politics

CNN on-line has an article today about the presidential race in North Carolina. In the course of the article, the Democratic Party boasts of registering about 14,000 new voters so far in 2012. No comparable registration quotes from the Republican Party, even though all of the Republican Party quotes in the article are very optimistic about their chances on Election Day.

Hmm. Where is the reporter’s research on how many North Carolina voters the Democratic and Republican parties lost in 2012? Or in 2011? Or in 2010? Nationwide, the Democratic Party lost more than two million voters over the past two years as millions of Democrats bailed out of the party to re-register as ‘independent’ or in another party. Republicans, too, hemorrhaged more than a million voters during the same two years. Where’s the political reporting on the impact of those two massive trends in North Carolina?

No where in the press. Is the national media asleep, or are they merely the unthinking, unquestioning silent partner to the two parties ‘lying with statistics’? The Democrats and Republicans don’t exactly tell lies; they simply do not tell the full truth. Fine, no one expects any organization to advertise their shortcomings, but isn’t revealing such important data the reason the media exists?

When a prominent Democrat running for re-election as President boasts about “saving the auto industry,” shouldn’t the media point out that the full truth of the boast? Out of the twelve auto companies in the United States, only two received taxpayer bailouts, and those two are union-organized while nine of the other ten are not. The auto worker unions are a major influence in the Democratic Party. Not exactly telling a lie, but…using taxpayers’ monies to ‘save’ the unionized two companies in Detroit out of twelve companies nationwide is not an example of saving the entire industry.

Not that Republicans are any better. The most prominent Republican during his recent administration boasted of the four hundreds of billions of taxpayers’ dollars he was going to spend on housing (for the poor people who could not afford to make mortgage payments)–to cheers and enthusiastic applause from assembled party members–and later boasted of how he had created an “ownership society” when home ownership hit a record high. Never saw the same Republicans talk candidly about their role in the subsequent housing collapse which triggered the Great Recession of 2007-2009. Not exactly telling a lie, but…again, where’s the media?

Not every news article can quote every pertinent fact. But every time a politician boasts of the good they do, the ethic of ‘open inquiry’ requires the news reporters to start asking some especially sharper questions, so that they can tell the full story.

May 16, 2012

Gold Buggery

By Don Kirk in Free Markets Myth, Ideo/theologies

Forbes on-line magazine, a conservative stalwart, today has another of its interminable essays on returning to a gold standard as the cure for all economic ills. Yesterday Republican former presidential candidate Herman Cain had an Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal calling for the restoration of a gold standard. There is a plethora of options (read ‘schemes’) on how to institute a gold standard, so many in fact that if we ever did return to a gold standard and it failed to perform as promised, every gold bug would be able to claim we just did not implement the correct option. Socialists forever make that argument; socialism will work, but every failure is the result of not adopting true socialism. The conservative gold bug is as much a ‘true believer’ as is any Left-socialist.

One never reads in any call for a gold standard an analysis of how many millions–or tens of millions–of Americans would be thrown out of work within the first two years of returning to a gold backing of the dollar. The gold standard is deflationary, that is, the value of the metal-backed currency rises, making the currency harder to obtain and more expensive to use. Circulation of the more precious currency falls, and with it production, resulting in layoffs. Yet no gold bug ever tells the full story of the actual full deleterious impact of a gold standard; they only mention the admittedly many benefits from a more valuable–read ‘expensive’–currency. Again, this is just like the Left-socialists, who never ever explain that socialism always generates greater impoverity, not prosperity.

At the heart of the cherry-picking of historical data to make the gold standard argument is the belief that there is an “intrinsic” value in gold; that for thousands of years gold’s use as a medium of exchange is the result of an innate quality to the rare, shiny, malleable metal. The belief is nearly identical to the Socratic belief that every human has an innate soul, polished or soiled by our various behaviors. The gold standard is preached as ‘saving’ the economy from the ‘evil’ of fiat currency.

In the case of gold, the belief is nonsense. There is no ‘innate’ value to anything material. If there were no humans on the planet Earth, then how much would be the ‘innate’ value of gold? Zero, is the correct answer. Only humans make value, created by the interchange of opinions of something’s utility now or in the future. So, the entire argument for a gold standard is elaborate but essentially hollow, and the unknown numbers of newly unemployed from switching to a gold standard condemns the entire argument, like the argument for socialism, to being nothing better than ideo/theological belief in myth.

A final point. It is not necessary to back a currency with a hard metal to have it perform its desired function. It is certainly better for an economy to have a strong currency rather than a weak one, but no metal is required to strengthen a currency. The strength of currency, in an open market, rises or falls in value based upon whether millions of people have confidence or lack confidence in the currency they buy, hold, or sell. If we want a strong currency, and we do, it does not make pragmatic sense to throw millions of people out of work to get it. The currency’s actual value is a measure of how much wide-spread confidence there is in an economy which is growing, steadily putting more people to work. The gold bugs have it backwards. A strong economy creates a strong currency, not the gold buggers’ reverse.

May 14, 2012

Duo Economic Semi-literacy

By Don Kirk in Conservatism, Socialism's "intellectual suicide"

Greece is busted. Spain teeters, Italy totters, Portugal wobbles and Ireland stagnates. Everywhere one looks, whether in Europe, North America or Asia, the most prosperous countries are staggering economically. We would expect such financial malaise from socialist governments, but the problems these countries are experiencing largely came about during rule by conservative governments.

Iceland’s collapse was under a conservative government. So was Ireland’s. Spain’s conservatives were thrown out of government as the economy stalled, and Italy’s conservatives have left a besotted economy after years of control. France’s conservatives have choked economic growth and Germany’s vaunted conservatives are losing elections even as the German economy outperforms its broken neighbors. The conservatives in the United States are notorious for their mismanagement of the American economy and Japan’s conservatives have the record mismanagement of twenty consecutive years of stgnation.

This is not an argument for socialist economic policies. Socialism, by its nature, is an ideology that cannot build prosperity; it is an ideology about spending the prosperity that someone else built.

This is an argument that conservative economic ideology is not much better than the ideology of socialism at avoiding the adoption of self-destructive economic policies. Conservatives ideologically are expected to be prudent, but economically conservatives have demonstrated that they lack prudence just as much as socialists.

The dominant ideology in post-industrial economics is spend. The ideology of spending equates spending with growth; after all, if you are spending more you must be growing. By far, the most famous spending ideology is Keynesianism, which is Fabian socialism’s attempt to institute socialism in a market economy without incurring a violent Marxist revolution (Keynes, 1953, p. 376).

Economic growth is not built by spending. Economic growth is built by saving. A modern post-industrial economy is built upon consumer spending, and whenever such spending falters the Keynsian ideology argues for government spending to increase in order to make up the difference. So, nation-states are trying to spend their way to prosperity and borrow their way out of debt, two recipes for impoverity.

The ideology of conservatism has bought into this “death spiral” economics sold by Keynesian Fabian socialists. The result is entirely predictable: conservative governments are impoverishing their peoples just as much as socialist governments, just more slowly.

May 12, 2012

Mother’s Day

By Don Kirk in Uncategorized

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms, especially mine.

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