US

The US had said that they were against the coup in Honduras, but they aren’t showing they care all that much. It is now less than two weeks until the election, Zelaya is still not back in power, and yet the US is hinting that they will support the election. This type of show is good enough for the US:

Roberto Micheletti, who seized power after a June military coup toppled President Manuel Zelaya, said in a televised address Thursday he might give up his duties between November 25 and December 2.

“We welcome that he is going to take a leave of absence and expect its prompt implementation. This will allow some breathing space for the process in Honduras to go forward,” State Department spokesman Robert Wood told a news briefing.

And it’s obviously just a show:

Micheletti said he will consult with “representatives of diverse sectors of Honduran society” before stepping down. The acting leader said he reserves the right to resume his post at any time during the planned absence if the Central American nation’s national security is threatened.

In other words, he will still keep all of his powers he’ll just not show himself. Also, the congress won’t vote on whether to reinstate Zelaya until December 2–after the election–which means the coup leaders will control the election during the vote. Only someone looking for political cover would think this will be a legitimate election. It looks like that’s what the Obama wants.

Enceladus’ plume and a poem

To get a better of what is in the plume that’s spews out of Saturn’s moon Enceladus (it’s known to contain water vapor, sodium, and organic molecules), they sent Cassini through it on November 2, 2009. Here’s a picture of the plume (Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute–click on it to see it better):

And since today is Friday, a poem (there might not be a poem next week):

What should I do
Run ragged to the world
Grasp a pearl in my hand
Or feign indifference?

Web sites to avoid

Well now, it seems that some web sites are very sleazy (via here via KD):

In general, the customers of these companies have no idea that they’re customers until they discover mysterious charges on their credit-card bills. When they investigate further, they find that during the checkout process at reputable websites like priceline.com or 1800flowers.com, they inadvertently clicked on a link which automatically gave their credit card details to these rip-off merchants.

I’ve seen these types of things before: when you want to download something or see a document, the site has multiple places that tell you to ‘click here’ and the one that you actually want to click is small and in an out of the way place (and even if you click the right one, you’ll get pop-ups). I didn’t expect this from mainstream sites.

KD and Felix Salmon don’t name names (well they do give the names of the sleazy companies: Affinion, Webloyalty, and Vertrue). Why would mainstream businesses like US Airways or FTD possibly alienate customers by allowing this crap? Well, look at the money involved below: there are 19 companies that have more than $10 million with this racket and Classmates made $70 million (and they have to do nothing to get it).

As a public service, since ‘free credit reports’ is one of the biggest scams, here’s the real place to get your free credit reports (you can get one every 12 months).

Here are the companies that allow the links to be put on their sites (you can see it here in pdf–go to figure 4)–show your appreciation by avoiding their business:

Partners Paid Over $10 Million

1-800-Flowers.com; Buy.com; Classmates.com; ColumbiaHouse

Confi-Check; Expedia/Hotels.com; Fandango; FTD

Hotwire; InQ; Intelius; MovieTickets.com

Orbitz; Priceline; RedcatsUSA; Shutterfly

Travelocity; USAirways; VistaPrint

 

Partners Paid Between $1 -$10 Million

1-800-PetMeds; Adteractiv; AirtranAirways; Allegiant Air; AllPosters.com;

American Greetings; Auto Parts; Avon; Barnes & Noble; Bizrate.com;

Bookspan; Boston Apparel Group; BuySeasons/Celebrate; Express;

Campusfood.com; Cendant Intercompany Agreeements;

Channel Advisor; Cheap Tickets; Choice Hotels; CollectionsEtc.com;
 
Continental Airlines; Current USA (123 Prints); Custom Direct; Digital River

Dr. Leonard’s Drugstore; eHarmony; eTix; eToys; Fareportal; FragranceNet

From You Flowers; FTD FloristsOnline; Gamestop/EBgames; Gevalia;

Haband; Half.com; Hanover Direct; Hertz; HiSpeedMedia;

Infinity Resources; J.C. Whitney; Joann.com; Lillian Vernon; Live Nation;

 Marketworks; Miles Kimball; Musicnotes; MyLife.com; MyPoints; Pizza Hut;

Potpourri; Restaurants.com; Riverdeep; Shoebuy; Simplexity;

Spirit Airlines; Suresource/Americart; Thompson Group; Tiger Direct

TimeLife; True.com; True Credit (True Link); Upsellit.com; US Search

Victoria’s Secret; Vitacost; WayPort; West; Yahoo

Terrorists to be tried in NY City

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four others are going to be tried for their crime in New York City. It seems to me that this is a simple proposition: a crime was committed in the US, so the perpetrators of the crime should be tried in the US. Given that, we need to follow the rules of law in the US Constitution where every person is guaranteed a fair trial (and everyone is equal before the law, no matter how rich or poor, no matter how bad or good, no matter anything except the amount of evidence that shows their guilt). It shows how far we’ve fallen that this is not universally agreed upon. Instead we get statements like:

“The Obama Administration’s irresponsible decision to prosecute the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks in New York City puts the interests of liberal special interest groups before the safety and security of the American people,” said House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) in a statement. “The possibility that Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his co-conspirators could be found ‘not guilty’ due to some legal technicality just blocks from Ground Zero should give every American pause.”

and (this is Palin):

Horrible decision, absolutely horrible. It is devastating for so many of us to hear that the Obama Administration decided that the 9/11 terrorist mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will be given a criminal trial in New York. This is an atrocious decision. [...]

Criminal defense attorneys will now enter into delaying tactics and other methods in the hope of securing some kind of win for their “clients.” The trial will afford Mohammed the opportunity to grandstand and make use of his time in front of the world media to rally his disgusting terrorist cohorts. It will also be an insult to the victims of 9/11, as Mohammed will no doubt use the opportunity to spew his hateful rhetoric in the same neighborhood in which he ruthlessly cut down the lives of so many Americans.

and:

“It gives an unnecessary advantage to the terrorists and why would you want to give an advantage to the terrorists, and it poses risks for New York,” Mr. Giuliani said in an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union.” He also interviewed on ABC’s “This Week” and “Fox News Sunday.”

and:

It shows a willingness to disclose how our intelligence process works and offer [the suspects] a platform in our legal system to gather intelligence for themselves,” Mukasey said before an audience of conservative lawyers at the national Federalist Society’s annual legal convention in Washington.Holder’s plan “creates a cornucopia of intelligence for those still at large and a circus for those being tried,” Mukasey said.

Unfortunately it’s not just Republicans:

Sen. Webb (D-VA) responds to Holder announcement on trials for KSM and others …

“I have never disputed the constitutional authority of the President to convene Article III courts in cases of international terrorism. However, I remain very concerned about the wisdom of doing so. Those who have committed acts of international terrorism are enemy combatants, just as certainly as the Japanese pilots who killed thousands of Americans at Pearl Harbor. It will be disruptive, costly, and potentially counterproductive to try them as criminals in our civilian courts.

And there are conservatives that have the right perspective:

Former Republican Congressman and Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr, David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union and Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, have teamed up to urge the Gitmo detainees be taken to the U.S.

“The scaremongering about these issues should stop,” Barr, Keene and Norquist wrote.

“Civilian federal courts are the proper forum for terrorism cases,” they wrote. “Civilian prisons are the safe, cost effective and appropriate venue to hold persons in federal courts.”

In his article decrying the cowardice of these people, Glenn Greenwald has links that show how that many other countries have also relied on their civil courts and tried terrorists in country. I haven’t seen any survey of relatives of 9/11 victims, but at least some think we need this kind of trial.

Friday 13 and a poem

I’m incredibly lazy today, so here’s a random 13 in celebration of Friday the 13th:

She Sings Songs Without Words Harry Chapin
Does She Talk? Matthew Sweet
Fame David Bowie
Skrautvål Hedningarna
Unchain My Heart Ray Charles
Sweet Addiction Deb Pasternak
Blame It On Cain Elvis Costello
Big Mess Devo
Corner Soul The Clash
Fun World Mission Of Burma
Kansas City/Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey Little Richard
What’s Going On Hüsker Dü
Final Say Sambassadeur

Yup, not even a link to a video–you can find them on your own (I’d go for Blame it on Cain–great stuff).

And a poem to signify my relation to the predator-prey, quantum, space-time continuum desire of life to laugh at itself and then throw itself in front of a massive gas giant. Or maybe it’s about staring at cracks.

Where is life
And to what ends do we go
To find
Where is life
All around us living
And where is life?

Afghanistan and corruption

I don’t really like Afghanistan’s President Karzai. He obviously is willing to sell people out for votes and his government is corrupt enough that it might not make sense to back him. Still, I love this push back:

But Afghan officials have begun to push back, complaining the Americans are often overpaid, underqualified, and unfamiliar with the culture of the country. Even the best, most qualified advisers can sow mistrust because they answer to the US government or firms rather than to Afghan officials.

and when you see details like this:

A typical US adviser earns about $500 per day – several times what the average Afghan earns in a month. Add on the costs of security, accommodations, and support, and the cost reaches about $2,000 per day, or $500,000 a year, usually paid to a US firm, according to Paul O’Brien, a vice president at Oxfam America, a Boston-based international relief organization that monitors aid effectiveness.

you see that they have a point. They could get an advisor from India who knows the region better for much much less, but that wouldn’t help US firms. You can see the attitude here:

as evidenced in the case of Yeager, a Colorado geologist hired in 2006 to educate the Ministry of Mines staff about the process of soliciting bids for mineral exploration. Yeager, who was paid by a World Bank fund to which the United States is a major contributor, advocated the creation of investment conditions that would be attractive to Western mining companies.

But Afghan officials ignored his advice and chose a Chinese company in a process Yeager said was too secretive. The Chinese promised to build a railroad along with the mine, something that Afghans badly wanted. But Yeager said he believed that American companies should have been given more consideration.

“The United States has gone in there with our blood and treasure, but the US companies get no credit,’’ he said.

The secrecy complaint has merit (but how many non-bid contracts did the US give out in Iraq and Afghanistan?), but why exactly is an advisor to Afghanistan pushing so hard for US bids–isn’t he supposed to be working for Afghanistan’s interests?

A walk along the Charles River

Since I had the day off, I decided to take a walk along the Charles. I started off by crossing the footbridge behind the Shaw’s market on River Street (click on any of the pictures to see the full size):

Behind the footbridge is an old train bridge which is, I think, no longer used. The second picture shows one of the dams built on the Charles for the new manufacturing industry back in the early 1800’s.

I then went east and turned around here (the building in the background is one of the many old industrial buildings in Waltham and Watertown, with this one in Watertown):

I then walked back to the dam alongside Moody Street (but by then it was too dark for a good picture). It’s a nice walk and covers two pedestrian bridges, here’s the second (it looks much better from the side, but it’s hard to get a good picture with all the trees in the way):

and a view from it:

There is another pedestrian bridge just before you get to Watertown square, but I got off to a late start and didn’t go that far.

The paths are mostly wide enough for a few people (in some places they’re paved, in others they’re hard dirt, and in a few they’re elevated wood):

The river is nowhere near as wide as it is in Boston above the Museum of Science dam or above the Moody Street dam, as you can see in the following pictures:

It’s a nice walk/run/bike and you can make it as long as you want (it continues all the way to the Museum of Science dam and for a little ways past Moody Street with one break  just before Moody–it’s not too difficult to make your way all the way to 128 but there are a few places where you’re on the streets).

Saturn at equinox

Still trying out my camera, here’s a picture of Saturn at its once every 15 years equinox:

Ok, this might really be from Cassini and perhaps was taken on August 12, 2009 in a series of pictures over eight hours and then put together (Image Credit, maybe: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute). In any case, it’s a nice picture of Saturn.

Views from windows and a poem

I’m still testing my camera, so here’s a picture looking out my office window towards the Prudential

and here’s a picture from the meeting room down the hall looking at part of the West Village here at NU with the Museum of Fine Arts in the background.

 Here’s a better picture of the Museum which is going through renovations:

And since it’s Friday, here’s a poem:

The person I see is such a stranger
With such a baleful stare and evil look
That I get in the mood to kill
Though I notice it’s a mirror there.

But it’s a state secret

Via KD, it seems the CIA lied about ’state secrets’ and the court found out. The judge was not happy:

The judge also criticized CIA Director Leon Panetta, saying he’s given conflicting accounts about what should be revealed in the case. The ruling led to the unsealing Monday of more than 200 unclassified versions of classified filings in the 13-year-old case.

“The court does not give the government a high degree of deference because of its prior misrepresentations regarding the state secrets privilege in this case,” Lamberth ruled.

…

Horn sued Brown and Huddle in 1994, seeking monetary damages for violations of his civil rights because of the alleged wiretapping.

Tenet filed an affidavit in 2000 asking that the case against Brown be dismissed because he was a covert agent whose identity must not be revealed in court. Lamberth granted the CIA’s request and threw out the case against Brown in 2004.

But Lamberth found out last year that Brown’s cover had been lifted in 2002, even though the CIA continued to file legal documents saying his status was covert. The judge found that the CIA intentionally misled the court and reinstated the case against Brown.

In fact the judge was so upset that he decided he could order that an individual had to be given security clearance back in August. This is important, since up to now only the executive branch has been allowed to do that.

The US settled for $3 million dollars. There’s more here.

Remember this when you look at other ’state secrets’ cases: are there really state secrets involved or do the people just not want to be prosecuted or embarrassed? Also remember that the original case that articulated the state secrets provision involved a case where there really weren’t any state secrets involved, the claim was made to cover negligence.

Gay marriage loses in Maine

The recall vote on gay marriage won yesterday in Maine (53% voted for the repeal with 83% counted). This is a little discouraging but somewhat expected: polls were showing it would be close. And there is the usual line in the article:

It is currently legal in five states, but only by virtue of politicians or judges.

The US is not a direct democracy, so most of our laws are passed by politicians. It’s the way a representative democracy works. In some ways I’d like a vote in Massachusetts just to shut up all the people calling for a vote. There hasn’t been a vote, because there weren’t enough votes in the legislature, in fact in a vote only 45 out of 196 voted to have a popular vote–if you were logical you might realize that this means people in MA are ok with gay marriage, but I guess some people aren’t logical.

In any case, time is on the side of gay marriage. Let me put up these two graphs again (from here):

The first one shows the percent of people who support civil unions or gay marriage (you’ll see that it has Maine at 49%, so it’s pretty close there) and the second compares the support in 1994-6,  2003-4, and 2008-9. Using the numbers from MA is instructive: in 1994-6 the support was about 34%, in 2003-4 it was about 46%, and in 2008-9 it’s about 56% (in Maine the percents are: about 29%, 40%, and 49%). There was an increase in support in all the states, so things look good for the future.

Also, looking at the percents, I wonder why there hasn’t been a vote in Rhode Island which has the second highest support in the country (about 53%).

Views from Prospect Hill

Since it was a pretty nice day, I decided to hike up Prospect Hill in Waltham. It’s not a real steep climb (click on the pictures to see the full size)

but it has a pretty good view of Boston

and the Blue Hills just south of Boston (Prospect Hill is the second highest point inside 128, while the Blue Hills are the highest–Prospect is all of 485 feet, while the Blue Hills is 635 feet)

The scale of some of the pictures turned out a little weird. In this picture, it looks like Boston is right next door

while in this picture centered on Waltham, it looks much further away

All of these pictures were taken from the eastern side of the hill. Normally I also go to the western side which has a nice view of the Cambridge Resevoir, but there was a large picnic going on, so I bypassed it today.

There’s a map of some of the trails here.

Pictures and a poem

I got a digital camera recently, so here are my attempts at some pictures.

First, here’s the Waltham Commons as I waited for the bus:

and here are pictures of my brother’s two dogs (Athena and Casper):

and it’s Friday, so here’s a poem:

The walls were crying
As I walked below them
To find my other side
And I wish they’d fall
So I might drink dying.

Honduras resolution

It seems there is now an agreement to end the coup in Honduras. A couple places have translations for the agreement. Here’s one (for a slightly different one, go here):

The accord contains the following points:

1– The creation of a government of unity and national reconciliation

2– Rejection of amnesty for political crimes, and delay of criminal prosecutions.

3–Renouncing the convening of a National Constituent Assembly or the reform of the Constitution in its irreformable constitutional articles.

4– Recognition and support for the general elections and the succession of Government.

5– The transfer of authority over the Armed Forces to the Supreme Electoral Tribunal

6– The creation of a commission of verification to ensure compliance with the points of the accord.

7– The formation of a commission of truth to investigate the events before, during, and after the 28th of June of 2009.

8– Request of the international community the normalization of international relations with our country.

9– Support a proposal that permits a vote in the National Congress with a previous opinion by the Supreme Court of Justice to return all the Executive Power back to before the 28th of June.

I guess we’ll see if Zelaya really did something illegal since the agreement does not have immunity. The agreement isn’t immediate as it has to be voted on by the legislature, who could try delaying. I wouldn’t expect them to given the pressure on them (obviously I don’t know firsthand, so I’ll see). Boz has a reaction here and has some important results from a poll here (taken October 9-13–so before the resolution, the full poll is here):

Q. 4. Is Honduras moving in the right direction or wrong direction:
Right Direction: 15%, Wrong Direction 81%

Q.13 Do you approve or disapprove of the removal on June 28 of Mel Zelaya as president?

Total approve……………………………………………………………38

Total disapprove……………………………………………………….60

Q.15 Which would have been the best way to deal with the dispute involving President Zelaya,
the Constituent Assembly, and the firing of the chief of the armed forces — to remove Mel
Zelaya as president, as was done; or to have him legally processed in Honduras?

Remove Zelaya………………………………………………………….14

Have him processed……………………………………………………70

(Other)……………………………………………………………………….9

(Don’t know/Refused)…………………………………………………..6

Thus, most of the people did not support the coup (it’s interesting to note that Zelaya is more popular now than before the coup).

And here’s a link to show that it was an unconstitutional coup.

11/6/09 Update: The deal seems to have fallen through and part of the blame lies with the US, because:

That much was clear this week when the deal’s chief U.S. negotiator, Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Thomas Shannon, confirmed that under its terms, the U.S. would recognize the election result even if congress declines to restore Zelaya.

and here:

“We urge both sides to act in the best interests of the Honduran people and return to the table immediately to reach agreement on the formation of a unity government,” State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said.

“We’re disappointed with both sides,” Kelly told reporters.

He said “we’re disappointed that both sides are not following the very clear path laid out” in the Costa Rican accords aimed at restoring President Manuel Zelaya to power following his ouster in a June 28 coup.

Zelaya has not participated because Congress has not voted on his reinstatement and doesn’t seem like it will any time soon. It seems to me that the only way Zelaya can force them to vote is to stop the process. And the fact that Micheletti formed the ‘unity’ government by himself and will continue to lead the government seems to say that he’s at fault.

Superfreakonomics and global warming

I’m a little slow getting to this, but it seems that the new book by Levitt and Dubner has a chapter on global warming (you can see an excerpt here). As usual, I leave most of the arguments to the experts (see here, here, and here for example). Instead, I’ll look at one of the responses by Levitt to the critics:

3. Economists estimate that the costs of reducing carbon emissions are likely to be upwards of $1 trillion per year.

TRUE / FALSE

He writes that this is agreed to be true. It might even be true. There are a couple  problems with this statement.

The first is that it doesn’t look at any of the benefits: alternative energy is a growing field and the US has a lot to gain if they can get in the technological lead; one of the main ways to reduce carbon output is efficiency which may cost money to implement but in the end makes money; if we use more alternative energy then there will be less pollution–so there are non-economic benefits (although since it would reduce health problems due to pollution this also has economic benefits).

The second is that it ignores the fact that the carbon economy may be on its way out. The amount of oil and gas is finite and we may now be nearing peak oil (there seems to be enough coal to last for longer, but that would worsen pollution). This means that we will have to change over at some point: thus the conversion costs will eventually happen in any case and it would be better to start now instead of waiting for it to be forced by a crash in the economy. As one commenter notes, the same type of argument would have said the US shouldn’t try to change from horse based transportation to cars since there were a lot of costs involved.

He then asks this question:

If we need to cool the Earth in a hurry, what is the best way to do it?

But there isn’t a hurry to cool the Earth–our practices are changing the conditions so that in the future there will be problems. We want to act now because excess CO2 will cause problems in the future even if we could stop emitting CO2 now.

In his answer you can see his bias:

Our question, at noted above, is what is the cheapest, fastest way to quickly cool the Earth. Like every question we tackle in Freakonomics and SuperFreakonomics, we approach the question like economists, using data and logic to conclude that the answer to that question is geo-engineering. Not coincidentally, almost every economist who has asked the same question has come to the same conclusion, including Martin Weitzman and the economists at the Copenhagen Consensus.

But that is not the question that Al Gore and the climate scientists are trying to answer. The sorts of questions they tend to ask are “What is the ‘right’ amount of carbon to emit?” or “Is it moral for this generation to put carbon into the air when future generations will pay the price?” or “What are the responsibilities of humankind to the planet?”

Notice the bolded Al Gore. That’s because he knows he better not try to argue with the real scientists who are trying to answer “What’s the best way to deal with this problem?”. They do talk about geo-engineering, but conclude that the science isn’t conclusive yet and there appear to be lots of possible problems with it (see here, for example–notice that this refers to the Copenhagen Consensus). Again, I’ll leave that to the experts. Just think about this: there is a global warming problem and Levitt says that the best way to attack it is to attack the symptoms. This means that his solution is forever: we will have to continue these geo-engineering projects until the underlying problems are solved.

As an aside (via Kevin Drum), Levitt claims that he is not a denialist and doesn’t think this is the full solution, but go look at this column by Jonah Goldberg:

If you cannot afford — politically, morally or economically — the solution to a perceived problem, then it’s not a solution. We cannot afford to end the use of carbon-based energy, so a better strategy is to develop remedies for the bad side effects of carbon use.

That’s the case Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner make in their book, “SuperFreakonomics,” which is already being torn apart by environmentalists horrified at the notion they might lose their license to Get Things Done as they see fit.

Is the atmosphere getting too hot? Cool it down by reflecting away more sunlight. The ocean’s getting too acidic? Give it some antacid.

The technology’s not ready. But pursuing it for a couple of decades will cost pennies compared with carbon rationing. Moreover, you just might get to keep your dog.

Levitt is saying this is not what he means and yet, despite several posts about environmental critics, he has no posts complaining about this or similar articles. I wonder why?

Global Warming

Hmm, it seems there is more out about global warming and the data still says the Earth is getting warmer. First, via here, a study finds the same basic ‘hockey stick’ graph using different methods. Being a math guy, I love this:

The sheer amount of computation, however, is daunting, involving heavy matrix algebra. Initial values for proxies and temperatures (where they have a known overlap) are input, and the methodology works backward to refine the relations at other times. To determine past temperatures, Tingley typically had to manipulate about one million matrices, each consisting of 1,296 columns and 1,296 rows.

Yay, matrices.

In another report:

The AP sent expert statisticians NOAA’s year-to-year ground temperature changes over 130 years and the 30 years of satellite-measured temperatures preferred by skeptics and gathered by scientists at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Statisticians who analyzed the data found a distinct decades-long upward trend in the numbers, but could not find a significant drop in the past 10 years in either data set. The ups and downs during the last decade repeat random variability in data as far back as 1880.

and as a check:

In a blind test, the AP gave temperature data to four independent statisticians and asked them to look for trends, without telling them what the numbers represented. The experts found no true temperature declines over time.

At this point I should put this graph in again:

I really don’t see that cooling trend, but maybe if I bang my head against some walls I will.

You can see the stupidity:

It’s what happens within the past 10 years or so, not the overall average, that counts, contends Don Easterbrook, a Western Washington University geology professor and global warming skeptic.

“I don’t argue with you that the 10-year average for the past 10 years is higher than the previous 10 years,” said Easterbrook, who has self-published some of his research. “We started the cooling trend after 1998. You’re going to get a different line depending on which year you choose.

“Should not the actual temperature be higher now than it was in 1998?” Easterbrook asked. “We can play the numbers games.”

This comment should, by itself, should eliminate Easterbrook in any respectable argument: he either has just shown he does not understand the concept of statistics or is not an honest debater.

Here’s a nice typical scatterplot (it looks at numbers gathered for counties used in the 2004 American Community Survey conducted by the Census Bureau):

It has an upward linear trend with the usual amount of spread for a correlation of .67. There are lots of questions to be asked about the data to decide if this shows some real relation, but saying there’s no relation because of the point (77678, 32.8) which lies quite a bit below the line is stupid. And it’s always the averages that matter in statistics (well, or median or …the point is it’s never a few points that matter).

State ideology and a poem

Via Kevin Drum, Boris Shor has put up a graph that:

has performed some analysis (jointly with Nolan McCarty) on the ideological positions of state legislators. The estimates are based on state legislative voting, which might make you wonder how you could possibly compare legislators in one state with those in another. The trick is that some state representatives (for example, Barack Obama) also end up in Congress. There are enough of these overlap cases that you can put legislators from all 50 states on a common scale.

Here it is:

It’s not obvious, but the states are ordered from most conservative to most liberal over all (the two lines are the US averages for Democrats and Republicans). Massachusetts is the second most liberal (California is, on average, more liberal but it’s Republicans are much more conservative). There are 12 states more liberal than the US as a whole and 7 of them are from the northeast (8 if you include Maryland–the others are: HI, CA, NM, and OR). Only NH is more conservative and, since the data only goes through 2003, I wouldn’t be surprised if NH hasn’t become much more liberal in the ratings.

And it’s Friday, so here’s a poem:

Air sweeping beneath the tides
Follow my dreams
The immortality of death
Intrudes upon the illusion.

The NRA and arms treaties

So, the UN is trying to write a law to help prevent illegal arms transfers. The main purpose is to try to stop the flow of arms to private armies in mostly lawless countries like Somalia and the DR Congo and to stop arms from getting to regimes like Zimbabwe that use them against their citizens.

Sounds nice. Let’s see what the NRA makes of this:

The National Rifle Association is in the field with a call campaign asking recipients a rather leading question — “Should third-world dictators and Hillary Clinton dictate our gun policy?” — according to several TPM readers who have reported receiving the call.

…

The call starts with a pre-recorded message from Wayne LaPierre, the NRA’s CEO, warning that Clinton is meeting with the United Nations “right now” to take away guns from Americans. Then, a live person comes on and asks the question.

Well, of course, how silly of me. It seems like this is a treaty to try to stop violence in third world countries, but that’s just a trick. Of course it’s about trying to get rid of the US constitution–everything, everywhere is about the US. And all those thousands of people killed each year in places like Somalia and the DR Congo by illegal weapons aren’t real–it’s all propaganda so people like Clinton can get rid of the 2nd amendment. I’m glad we have the NRA to figure these things out.

Sri Lanka

I haven’t talked about Sri Lanka for a while, mainly because there has been almost nothing in the news here. Looking around at the news by other countries, I catch glimpses that show the government is still not acting well. From a British newspaper, I see that Sri Lanka may be about to lose a subsidy:

The EU grants the Generalised System of Preferences Plus (GSP+), to help developing countries to boost their economies while improving human rights and labour standards. Sri Lanka is the only country in Asia to benefit from GSP+, which obliges beneficiaries to adhere to 27 international rights agreements.

The EU has investigated whether Sri Lanka violated the UN Convention against Torture, UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In August it completed a report, which described a culture of “complete or virtually complete impunity in Sri Lanka”, citing police torture, abductions of journalists and uninvestigated disappearances.

The final report is due out next Monday and both this article and one at Foreign Policy in Focus seem to be saying that it looks like they might not get an extension and that there also might be problems with an IMF loan.

From Australia, I see that there is a hunger strike by asylum seekers from Sri Lanka and:

Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Connor has agreed to send Australian police to Sri Lanka to help the government there clamp down on the exodus of asylum seekers.

But there has been hardly a peep out of Rudd or any of his ministers about the appalling camps in which an estimated 300,000 Tamils are being held following the end of the Sri Lankan civil war.

“I understand something of the plight of people around the world,” Rudd said yesterday. Of course he does.

He knows exactly what is happening in Sri Lanka. He knows how the displaced Tamils are treated by the Sri Lankan Army. He knows the Sri Lankan Government denies international aid organisations access to the camps and shuts out the international media so conditions cannot be reported.

Now I don’t really know much about these news outlets, so I don’t completely trust them, but what I see from all sources is that hundreds of thousands of Tamils are still be held in camps five months after the end of the war and Sri Lanka doesn’t allow any independent observers in (EU, UN, reporters) even with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake. That speaks very loudly to me.

Saturn, nuclear war, and a poem

To try to keep things calm, let’s start with a very nice image of Saturn (taken by Cassini–it’s a mosaic of many pictures taken over 8 hours; Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute):

Ok, now that you’re calm, here’s John Bolton intimating that Israel should attack Iran with nuclear bombs:

“Negotiations have failed, and so too have sanctions,” Bolton said, echoing his previously-stated belief that sanctions will prove ineffectual in changing Tehran’s behavior. “So we’re at a very unhappy point — a very unhappy point — where unless Israel is prepared to use nuclear weapons against Iran’s program, Iran will have nuclear weapons in the very near future.”

Which seems to be saying that Israel should use nuclear weapons against Iran, because Iran can’t be trusted not to use nuclear weapons if they get them. Or something. And this was once our UN ambassador. He continues:

“There are some people in the administration who think that it’s not really a problem, we can contain and deter Iran, as we did the Soviet Union during the Cold War. I think this is a great, great mistake and a dangerously weak approach…Whatever else you want to say about them, at least the Soviets believed that they only went around once in this world, and they weren’t real eager to give that up — as compared to a theological regime in Tehran which yearns for life in the hereafter more than life on earth…I don’t think [deterrence] works that way with a country like Iran.”

This is typical warmongering. The first step is to demonstrate that your enemy is different–they don’t respect human life, they aren’t logical, … When the US was in the cold war with the USSR, the Soviets didn’t respect life, were lazy, ugly, and whatever else the person could think sounded bad. Of course, now that there’s a new enemy, the same people have to try to show that this new group is worse (because after the cold war ended, we found that Soviets were very much like us; after WW II it was shown that the Soviets were worse than the Japanese and Germans). Bolton dutifully does that here. You’d think they’d at least be inventive (Iran uses kitties as target practice).

Anyway, since it’s Friday, a poem:

I have no bombast
For your ears
I can’t find sparkle
On your skin
So I close my mind
Mouth closed
Reach out with fingers to
Find the sky
But reach only the base
Of my eyes.