I wonder if Joe Biden knows many black people outside of public life.
From yesterday's Ron Hart column:
The good thing about a campaign is that if the media do their jobs, we should find out more about candidates (if they want us to). They protect the candidates that they like. It was revealed by Gore only recently that Bill Clinton does not drink. This is troubling to me as it means he was stone sober when he hit on Paula Jones.So in summary, here are the leaders who do not drink: Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, all al-Qaida leaders, Hitler, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter.
By contrast, here are leaders known to drink: Winston Churchill, Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, Ronald Reagan, Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Jeb Bush and Jesus.
Maybe not entirely accurate, but cute. More commentary at Hit & Run.
John Hawkins writes In Defense of the Drug War at Human Events. To be fair to him, he's facing an uphill battle as not many serious thinkers will try to defend our current drug policy.
Radley Balko: "Hawkins has never been the brightest bulb in the conservative blogosphere. But wow. I think I'll keep the three hours of my life it'd take me to give it the thorough debunking it begs for."
It won't take me nearly three hours. Let's look at some of Hawkins' article -
Libertarians often attack the war on drugs as a waste of tax dollars and an infringement on personal liberties. That is misguided thinking that comes from trying to apply unworkable theoretical concepts in the real world.
Implying that the drug war is not a waste of money nor an infringement on liberties in the real world? What alternate universe does Hawkins inhabit? His little essay is off to a rough start...
[...Y]ou often hear advocates of drug legalization say that we're never going to win the war on drugs and that it would free up space in our prisons if we simply legalized drugs. While it's true that we may not ever win the war against drugs -- i.e. never entirely eradicate the use of illegal drugs -- we're not ever going to win the war against murder, robbery and rape either. But our moral code rejects each of them, so none -- including drugs -- can be legalized if we still adhere to that code.
His moral code [he calls it 'our'!] apparently doesn't recognize the difference between acts which directly violate the rights of others, and those which don't. His moral code looks to be terribly deficient.
If we legalized drugs, we'd be able to tax them and bring in more revenue for the state. But, how is that working out with alcohol and cigarettes? In 2004 and 2005, 39% of all traffic-related deaths was related to alcohol consumption and 36% of convicted offenders "had been drinking alcohol when they committed their conviction offense." When it comes to cigarettes, adult smokers "die 14 years earlier than nonsmokers." But, will we ever get rid of tobacco or alcohol? No, both products are too societally accepted for that and perhaps more importantly, the government makes enormous amounts of revenue from their sale. Do we really want to be sitting around 10 or 15 years from now saying, "Gee, we'd like to get rid of heroin, but how could we replace the revenue we make from taxing it at an exorbitant rate?"
OK, I'll concede here. We shouldn't tax drugs.
[...T]he fact that drugs are illegal is certainly holding down their usage. Just look at what happened during prohibition. Per Ann Coulter in her book, "How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must)":"Prohibition resulted in startling reductions in alcohol consumption (over 50 percent), cirrhosis of the liver (63 percent), admissions to mental health clinics for alcohol psychosis (60 percent), and arrests for drunk and disorderly conduct (50 percent)." -- p.311
I'm responding to someone who quotes Ann Coulter? Oh, the shame.
Anyway, the question of prohibition is this; what produces the least negative results? The conclusion is that the problems of legalized intoxicants aren't as bad as the problems of prohibition. Perfect solutions aren't often found in the real world, or as we libertarians are fond of saying, utopia is not an option. Moving right along...
But, some people may say, "so what if drug usage does explode? They're not hurting anyone but themselves." That might be true in a purely capitalistic society, but in the sort of welfare state that we have in this country, the rest of us would end up paying a significant share of the bills of people who don't hold jobs or end up strung out in the hospital without jobs -- and that's even if you forget about the thugs who'd end up robbing our houses to get things to pawn to buy more drugs. Even setting that aside, we make laws that prevent people from harming themselves all the time in our society. In many states there are helmet laws, laws that require us to wear seatbelts, laws against prostitution, and it's even illegal to commit suicide. So banning harmful drugs is just par for the course.
One of the basic arguments in favor of legalization is the reduction of crime associated with drug use, as legal drugs are likely to be much cheaper than illegal, and the criminal organizations selling drugs will be unemployed. That's a clear lesson learned from alcohol prohibition. Hawkins argues as though he's never heard of this.
It's also very disheartening to read a self described conservative using our many dumb nannyist laws as justification for more dumb nannyist laws. Nearly any human activity can be regulated or outlawed using that line of reasoning.
Here's the conclusion to Hawkins' article:
[...W]ay back when William Bennett was the drug czar, he responded like so to a caller on the Larry King show who told him that he should "behead the damn drug dealers.""I mean what the caller suggests is morally plausible," he said. "Legally, it's difficult. But somebody selling drugs to a kid? Morally, I don't have any problem with that at all."
Bennett was right then, he's right now, and my guess is that most parents, upon finding out that someone was peddling drugs to their kid, would agree with him. Since that's the case, do we really want the federal government to take over the role of a pusher and get our kids hooked on drugs to make a profit? No, we don't.
I would be upset if someone tried to sell many sorts of legal products to my kids without my knowledge. Or how about gambling, Mr. Bennett? Do you want that offered to children? (sorry, I couldn't resist.)
The for-the-children argument is a standard fallback for most any weakly reasoned regulation, and a conservative should know that. And as we've seen with cigarettes, legal sellers tend to stay legal, and avoid selling to minors. Illegal sellers have no such limits, and teenagers report it's easier for them to buy pot than tobacco.
Hawkins also posted this article on his blog, where you can read comments for a herd of like-minded folks, if you can stand it. The thread is several hundred comments long now.
For some years now James Randi's organization, JREF, has offered a $1 million prize to anyone who can prove manifestations of paranormal powers in a controlled setting. Now his organization is changing its approach:
Rather than merely waiting for applicants to present themselves, we will regularly and officially highlight well-known persons in the field and challenge them directly by name. Those challenged will then have a sixth-month period during which they may respond; during that period the JREF will heavily publicize the fact that such a challenge has been issued, we will issue press releases on the matter, and we will be frequently asking that those challenged make a response. Tentatively, we will begin by formally challenging Uri Geller, James Van Praagh, Sylvia Browne, and John Edward, on April 1st.A CHANGE IN APPROACH
For too long now, the JREF has been on the defensive rather than on the offensive. That will be changed as of April 1, when we will begin actively pursuing the possibility of legal actions being brought against prominent figures in the field to investigate whether or not any laws are being broken by false promises to clients, incorrect attributions, accepting fees for services not met, or other deceptive procedures whereby the public has been misinformed and/or taken advantage of. This will include both civil and criminal actions.
We will seek to bring civil lawsuits against offenders, we will inform the Securities Exchange Commission [SEC] of possible infractions in which they might be interested, and we will bring attention to possible violations involving 501(c)3 requirements in the case of claimed religious exemptions.
Which seems to me to be a good idea, philosophical objections to those various laws notwithstanding. I can't think of a reason as to why a fake psychic shouldn't be considered a criminal. If JREF can show those celebrity mediums-psychics-whatever to be earning money via deceptive means, well go get 'em, folks.
By now you've heard the news, Denver will host the 2008 Libertarian Party national convention! By the way, the Democrats are coming too.
Snark aside, I'm looking forward to reporting on both of them. Should be good times.
The LP convention has one decided advantage over the Dems:
"Libertarians do not accept public funding for their national convention, while the Republican and Democrat conventions generally cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars."
You were here earlier, searching. You were frustrated. That would be because it's correctly spelled petroleum.
No 'a' in there anywhere. Glad to help.
Gary Farber is asking for donations to help him through some personal difficulties. Do what you can.
Arnold Kling examines how people avoid truth in politics:
I am going to suggest that democratic politics is a very poor information-processing mechanism. The great mass of people form their political beliefs with little regard for facts or logic. However, the elites also have a strategy for avoiding truth. Elites form their political beliefs dogmatically, using their cleverness to organize facts to fit preconceived prejudices. The masses' strategy for avoiding truth is to make a low investment in understanding; the elites' strategy is to make a large investment in selectively choosing which facts and arguments to emphasize or ignore.
[...]
The general public follows what I would call a "low-investment" strategy for avoiding the truth. They do not know the names of their representatives. They do not know the difference between a Sunni and a Shia. They do not know the approximate size of the Budget deficit or its outlook. And so on.
Kling cites research finding public opinion changes randomly, reflecting no coherent ideology. However, having a coherent ideology might not lead to better outcomes:
Rush Limbaugh and Paul Krugman clearly fall within the elite, according to the standards set by Converse and other opinion researchers. They know the facts about the structure of the American political system and the identities of major office-holders. They understand the connections between various beliefs. They maintain consistent positions, and their opinions are highly predictable, unlike the unstable, random positions that show up in polling of the mass public.Limbaugh and Krugman may not necessarily be wrong (although it is hard for both of them to be right). However, both follow strategies that are designed to reinforce prior beliefs of conservatives and liberals, respectively. They highlight information and arguments that support their prior beliefs. When they encounter contrary evidence, they engage in "motivated skepticism," seeking to undermine the credibility or minimize the significance of the adverse information.
[...]
One of my strongly-held beliefs, for which I tend to attract supporting evidence and repel contrary arguments, is that markets process information more effectively than does the political process. Perhaps it as an exaggeration to refer to the market as the "world of truth," as Tim Harford does in The Undercover Economist. However, it strikes me that it is easier for market forces to drive a bad firm out of business than it is for political forces to extinguish a policy that fails to meet the objectives that purportedly drive its enactment.Those who believe in the wisdom of the political process might argue that the competition between political elites--between Democrats and Republicans or between Krugman and Limbaugh--promotes reasonable outcomes. However, I suspect that the net result of this competition is to lead to greater accretion of government power, giving the elites more to fight over. Politics ultimately becomes a competition to promise the undeliverable, whether it be better public education, inexpensive health care, or government suppression of drug abuse or sexual immorality.
How do you fight your biases? Kling's article implies you could do so by reading your political opposites' opinions more sympathetically, but not many have that capacity.
Mark In Mexico has an interesting post on the sad state of affairs of Mexico's government run national oil company. It's worth seeing for the photos, as well as the commentary on the corruption and inefficiency there.